Editorial: The power of self control

Doug Laing is a senior journalist with Hawke's Bay Today. FILE

Debating court-case outcomes can be fraught if one hasn't observed the complete proceedings.

But on the face of it we have reached a crisis point, in the case of a man a jury found guilty of injuring with intent to injure, because the target had raped his 15-year-old stepdaughter.

It was an understandable apoplectic response even without the anguish that followed as the rapist was able to remain on the street, in apparent arrogant disregard for not only the victim but also the law before he was finally arrested, ultimately to be sentenced to seven-and-a half years in jail.

That latter aspect goes close to justifying the stepdad's action in many people's eyes, especially if one were to crystal-ball the future on how the teen and the family might cope.

The good news is that a Judge says it's unlikely the stepdad will be sent to jail when he's sentenced next month, despite five years being the available maximum penalty.

If this all adequately recounts the events, then the public has a right to ask about the defence of provocation, or circumstances where any reasonable person might be capable of losing the power of self-control.

But a fair old outcry after absurd self-defence claims in the trial of Clayton Weatherston for the murder of his ex-girlfriend in Dunedin in 2008 seems to have led to toning-down of the provocation defence to the point where it is now more a mitigating factor in sentencing, rather than a pathway to acquittal.

When such an approach also rules out leniency for a battered woman who has finally exterminated the partner, the public can perhaps take a good look at itself, and ask whether it gave the politicians a little too much scope.

The Weatherston case was never a case for changing any rules, other than how trials are conducted.

Perhaps now many more can ask themselves in what circumstances they, too, might be incapable of maintaining the power of self-control.