Local Perspective

In what ways do morals and values

shape or influence the criminal law?
 Local Perspective

My local perspective is at a state level. Laws created

at this level predominantly concern people only in the
state where the law is created because state
government makes laws about their state. In Australia
the state legal system uses a bicameral parliament
system that doesnt change from state to state apart
from Queensland Each state of Australia has a
Governor, who represents the Queen of Australia and
performs the ceremonial duties of a head of state.
 Aberdeen
Aberdeen is a small town in the upper Hunter
Region of New South Wales, Australia, in Upper
Hunter Shire. It is 12 kilometres north of
Muswellbrook on the New England Highway.
Aberdeen is named after Aberdeen, Scotland. At
the 2006 census, Aberdeen had a population of
1,791. The governor of New South Wales is His
Excellency General The Honourable David
Hurley.
 Perth
Perth is the capital and largest city of the Australian
state of Western Australia. It is the fourth-most
populous city in Australia, with an estimated
population of 2.04 million living in Greater Perth. The
Perth Metropolitan Region includes 30 local
government areas, which themselves consist of a
large number of suburbs, extending from Two Rocks
in the north to Rockingham in the south, and east
inland to The Lakes. The governor of Western
Australia is Kerry Sanderson, who is the first woman
to hold the position.
 Aberdeen and Perth Legal Systems
Both in Aberdeens New South Wales and Perths
Western Australia a bicameral system of
government exists. Essentially the legislators are
divided into two separate assemblies, chambers or
houses upper house is elected using proportional
voting (parties win seats in percentage to the votes
they received) and the lower house through
preferential voting (this is when a citizen
individually numbers and ranks all candidates for
both houses of parliament according to their
preferences.)
 Moral Crimes (Aberdeen)
On February the 29th 2000 Policemen responded to a report
of blood on the doorway of a house. Breaking down the
back door, police found his body with Knight comatose from
taking a large number of pills. She had stabbed Price with a
butcher's knife while he was sleeping. According to the
blood evidence, he awoke and tried to turn the light on
before attempting to escape while Knight chased him
through the house, he managed to open the front door and
get outside but either stumbled back inside, or was dragged
back into the hallway, where he finally died after bleeding
out.
 Moral Crimes (Aberdeen)
Price's autopsy revealed that he had been stabbed at
least 37 times, in both the front and back of his body,
with many of the wounds extending into vital organs.
Several hours after Price had died, Knight skinned him
and hung the skin from a meat hook on the architrave
of a door to the lounge room. She then decapitated
him and cooked parts of his body, serving up the meat
with baked potato, pumpkin, beetroot, zucchini,
cabbage, yellow squash and gravy in two settings at
the dinner table, along with notes beside each plate,
each having the name of one of Price's children on it;
she was preparing to serve his body parts to his
children.
 Moral Crimes (Aberdeen)
A third meal was thrown on the back lawn for unknown
reasons and it is speculated Knight had attempted to
eat it but could not and this has been put forward in
support of her claim that she has no memory of the
crime. Price's head was found in a pot with vegetables.
The pot was still warm, estimated to be at between 40
and 50 degrees Celsius, indicating that the cooking had
taken place in the early morning. Sometime later,
Knight arranged the body with the left arm draped over
an empty 1.25-litre soft drink bottle with the legs
crossed. This was claimed in court to be an act of
defilement demonstrating Knight's contempt for Price.
 Moral Crimes (Perth)
Police and forensic investigators scoured the murder scene
and collected evidence, but it was five weeks before farm
hand Bill Mitchell, a friend of Karen MacKenzie, was
arrested. He was arrested on either the 28th or the 29th of
March. Mitchell had been spending the day getting high on
a mixture of cannabis, alcohol, and amphetamines. The
trouble began with the sound of a car arriving at the
MacKenzie home. Daniel went out to see who it was and
was confronted by Mitchell. Mitchell, wielding an axe, killed
Daniel and headed for the house. There he found Karen
asleep in the lounge room. After attacking her with the axe
and killing her, he raped her. Amara and Katrina were fast
asleep in their bedrooms, when Mitchell turned his
attention to them. The funeral for the four victims was held
on March 5th 1993. Bill Mitchell did attend.