Lawyers to file further submissions
(l-r) Defendant Tuifa’asisina Perkin Headle with defense counsel Mathew Lemisio
By Staff Reporter
Nine charges against American based Samoan woman, Tuifa’asisina Perkin Headle were withdrawn by the District Court yesterday due to the lack of evidence.
Her Honour, Judge Alalatoa Rosella Papalii dismissed the nine charges after Counsel for the Prosecution, Leinafo Taimalelagi-Strickland made the application to withdraw in her written closing submission the charges citing lack of evidence as the basis.
Judge Papalii accepted the application to withdraw and accordingly dismissed the charges.
In August of 2022, the Prosecution filed 23 charges against Mrs Headle claiming harassment by way of electronic communication against Prime Minister, Fiame Naomi Mataafa and other Members of the ruling FAST Political Party.
Mrs Headle had pleaded not guilty to all the charges against her.
This matter was recalled yesterday after it was adjourned from early April following the hearing of the Prosecution’s evidence, for both Counsels to submit their closing submissions.
For a reason not known to Newsline, the matter was called this morning.
Representing Mrs Headle is defense counsel, Mathew Lemisio.
Judge Papali’i, after dismissing the nine charges raised with Ms Taimalelagi issues that she believed required further submissions from Counsels.
Judge Papalii was particularly interested in more submissions from the Prosecution on why the Police did not obtain a search warrant during the course of their investigation to compel Facebook to release the information behind the Salote Syrah facebook page that the Prosecution is accusing Mrs Headle as its owner.
Her Honour said if the Prosecution had obtained that warrant that would have resolved all the main issues that are prevalent in this case.
The search warrant issue came to the fore when the Prosecution’s IT witness from the Ministry of Police confirmed during cross examination that a special partnership between Facebook and the Ministry allows, allows for the release of information behind fake pages such as the Salote Syrah facebook page.
Ms Taimalelagi tries to explain to the Court that from her discussions form her team of investigators, who claimed that there is no such arrangement, at this point Her Honour interjected and said that this was not entirely true as she had received on a number of occasions, applications for a search warrant of this nature.
Her Honour was also mindful of Counsel giving evidence from the lawyers practicing bar. The other issue which Her Honour raised with the Prosecution was URL or Uniform Resource Locator.
Ms Taimalelagi told the Court that they will address this issue in their supplementary submission.
But during the trial, the Prosecution’s IT witness claimed that while URL’s are unique, it can compromised in various ways through hacking.
The Prosecution also did not call the assumed victims of these offending to testify as to how were they harassed by the facebook postings that the Prosecution is accusing Mrs Headle of.
The matter is now adjourned to the 21st of July for Counsels to deliver their submissions on issues that Her Honour will include in a Court’s minute to be issued to both Counsels by Monday of next week.,
Her Honour also marked the 4th of August 2023 as the day that she will deliver her final decision on this matter, which has taken a year by the time of the decision, to adjudicate.