Dismissed

Police have dismissed their charge against Bruce Hubbard because they weren't able to make their case. He will be applying for costs, and I hope he wins them. This case has been a farce from start to finish. It was clearly politicly motivated, pushed by a US embassy which equated criticism (or maybe just bad spelling) with threats. The police's response should have been to tell them that this is a democracy, where citizens enjoy free speech (maybe the US has heard of that?), and that New Zealanders have a right to express their views, no matter how much it annoys the US. Instead they bowed to pressure, charged Hubbard, and wasted time and money trying to prosecute him. This at a time when they are so underresourced that they can't investigate burglaries properly.

It would be nice to know how much this farce has cost the New Zealand taxpayer, and how many actual crimes could have been investigated with the money.