Guangdong Introduces Legal Fee Rules

China — Guangdong Lawyers’ Association has produced detailed rules regarding lawyers’ fees. The regulations came out on 9 November 2004 and will be brought into effect after examination and approval by Guangdong’s Judicial Department and Price Administration. The rules are said to be the first of its kind to be introduced in China.

Hourly fees, according to the rules, will range between 200 to 3,000 yuan (US$24-US$362) and fluctuate by 20%. The fees will be calculated using six-minute units and any remainder of less than three minutes will be disregarded.

The fees are to cover the actual working time, regardless of the number of lawyers that work on the case. However, the time of secretaries or assistants are not covered under the calculations.

Time spent handling the lawsuit, including arbitration, reconsideration, research, investigation, consulting, preparing documents and appearing in court are to be included in calculating the time spent. (Source: www.china.org.cn)

Pirated Films Website Operator Ordered to Pay US$23.8M

US — A Malaysian who ran a website that charged users to watch pirated films was ordered by a California court to pay US$23.8m to movie studios. The studios had sued Tan Soo Leong and company MasterSurf for operating the website Film88.com according to Motion Picture Association (‘MPA’).

MPA’s director of worldwide anti-piracy operations, John Malcolm, said MasterSurf set up an international web of servers designed to shelter the venture for liability. Tan had previously set up another such website called Movie88.com. During that time Tan operated out of Taiwan using servers that were hosted out of Netherlands and Iran. A Netherlands anti-piracy organisation and the Dutch courts had the servers there shut-down.

Tan and MasterSurf are also barred from infringing on any of the studios’ movies and ordered to destroy any and all copies of the copyright films that reside on the servers or in any other formats. (Source: www.cnn.com)

First Sex Tourism Law Trial Conviction

US — An 86-year-old man was recently found guilty by a California court for attempting to travel to the Philippines to sexually molest girls, in violation of a new federal law aimed at fighting sex tourism.

A judge found John W Seljian guilty of six counts, including attempting to travel for the purpose of having sex with minors and possession of child pornography. Seljian faces a minimum term of 10 years in prison and a maximum of 270 years when he is sentenced in March.

Seljian is the first to be convicted after having claimed trial under the Protect Act that was enacted last year.

Seljian, who sat in a wheelchair during the non-jury trial, was arrested in Los Angeles International Airport, where he allegedly attempted to board a flight with child pornography, sexual aids and nearly 50kgs of chocolate. Seljian told investigators that he had ‘sexually educated’ young girls in the Philippines with their parents’ consent since 1983 and that he believed it was legal and culturally accepted in that country. (Source: www.cnn.com)

DNA Data Bank to Help Track Down Criminals

China — A DNA data bank is being prepared to help police track down serious criminals such as rapists and murderers. News of the plans emerged at an international seminar on the use of DNA as legal evidence, the Beijing Morning Post reported. ‘In about 60% of violent crime cases, the perpetrators leave behind genetic evidence,’ an unnamed expert told the paper. ‘In rapes, the figure is 95%.’

Currently, DNA is only used as evidence in about 10% of criminal cases in China, the expert said. DNA is gradually being more widely used by Asian countries as they seek to fight crime. Earlier this year, Thailand said it would begin gathering DNA samples from convicts before their release in a bid to deter them from re-offending. (Source: www.isinolaw.com)

Move to Change Migration Law

Australia — A group of high-profile lawyers, appalled by a recent High Court decision to uphold the Federal Government’s right to detain asylum seekers indefinitely, has banded together to seek an overhaul of migration law.

In an unexpected move,  the Law Council of Australia has set up a working group to examine possible legal reform of mandatory detention, saying lawyers have a responsibility to fight for the ‘fundamental human right’ to liberty. A working group, chaired by the Law Council President, Stephen Southwood, QC, will examine whether any further legal challenges are possible to the Act.

The group will consider whether legal reform was necessary to give the courts a greater role in overseeing the long-term detention of asylum seekers, in terms of reviewing how long people had been detained, why they were still there and what steps have been taken to finalise their refugee claims or deport them. The working group will also look at whether detention is necessary at all or whether there should be a specified detention period after which the asylum seekers should be released into the community under monitoring arrangements.

Mr Southwood conceded that the working group faced an up-hill task as mandatory detention had bipartisan political support.However, he was quoted saying the difficulty in the task did not mean ‘the argument should not be put, or an appropriate attempt made’. He said the working group’s starting point was that the ‘liberty of the subject and the liberty of aliens, is really the most fundamental of the human rights’, and that lawyers had ‘a major role in ensuring the liberty of individuals’. (Source: www.smh.com.au)