Vic: Adelaide shooter loses High Court appeal

AAP General News (Australia)
02-13-2004
Vic: Adelaide shooter loses High Court appeal

MELBOURNE, Feb 13 AAP - A young Adelaide man must remain in jail for shooting a delivery
driver in the eye, following a High Court decision today.

Paul Habib Nemer, 21, was initially handed a three-year suspended sentence with a $100
good behaviour bond for shooting newspaper delivery man Geoffrey Williams in August 2001.

A plea bargaining arrangement with South Australia's Director of Public Prosecutions
Paul Rofe resulted in an attempted murder charge being reduced to a charge of endangering
life.

But following a public outcry, the state's attorney general ordered Mr Rofe to challenge
the sentence in the Court of Appeal and Nemer was resentenced to four years and nine months.

Nemer, who pleaded guilty, had claimed the gun discharged about eight metres from the
vehicle as he ran towards it with the intention of firing into the air.

Mr Williams lost an eye after being shot.

Outside the court, Mr Williams said he was relieved the case was over.

The High Court today, in dismissing an application for special leave to appeal against
the jail sentence, ruled there had been no miscarriage of justice.

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KEYWORD: NEMER

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