A lawyer for the Human Rights Commission has told a court the Sensible Sentencing Trust not only broke name suppression for a convicted paedophile, but breached his privacy by getting his private police record.
The commission is prosecuting the trust at the Auckland District Court on Wednesday for breaching the rights of the man who was jailed in 1995 for 12 months for five offences that took place in 1975 and 1978 against two girls.
The commission's lawyer, Simon Judd, said the man, now 58, is not a serial paedophile as has been reported.
Mr Judd told the court that, at the time of the 1995 conviction, the media did not report the man's name - which he said was proof that he had name suppression.
However, Mr Judd said court record that would prove this have been lost. He said people have been searching for the sentencing notes at the Christchurch court for two years but they can't be found.
Mr Judd said the commission was also concerned that information the trust circulated about the man's convictions had been taken unlawfully from the police database.
But a lawyer for the Sensible Sentencing Trust says if name suppression documents for the man can't be found, it is likely that the orders were never made.
David Garrett argued that no name suppression is in place and the trust has every right to publish his name.
