A judge sets aside a two-month jail sentence, wholly suspended for 18 months, given to Senior Constable Neil Punchard who plead guilty to nine counts of computer hacking in 2013 and 2014.

A judge has set aside the two-month jail sentence, wholly suspended for 18 months, given to a Queensland police officer who leaked the personal details of a domestic violence complainant to her former partner.
Key points:

• Punchard was originally sentenced in October 2019 after pleading guilty to all nine charges
• He gave a woman’s residential address to her ex-husband after accessing police databases
• Judge Craig Chowdhury re-sentenced Punchard to a total of 140 hours of community service

Senior Constable Neil Punchard was stood down from official duty in December 2018 after being charged with nine counts of computer hacking in 2013 and 2014.
Punchard accessed confidential police databases on nine occasions and gave the woman’s residential address to her ex-husband, who was his friend.
He was sentenced to the suspended jail term in October 2019 after pleading guilty to all nine counts.
Judge Craig Chowdhury today allowed the appeal and re-sentenced Punchard to a total of 140 hours of community service for two computer hacking charges.
He was convicted and not further punished for the other seven charges.
The convictions will not be recorded.
Punchard remains stood down by the Queensland Police Service on full pay.
Sentence ‘excessive’ due to ‘mitigating factors’
In his written consideration, Judge Chowdhury said, “In my view, a sentence of imprisonment for these offences, albeit wholly suspended, was excessive when having regard to the precise circumstances of the offending, the mitigating factors and sentences imposed by Magistrates for this specific offence in other cases.”
Judge Chowdhury said a police officer of Punchard’s experience should have known better than to involve himself in an “acrimonious family dispute.”
“Despite his initial reluctance to get involved, it is clear over the relevant period that [Punchard] became an active party in supporting [the man] in his bitter dispute with his former wife, and did so with gusto.
“The exchanges between the appellant [Punchard] and [the man] that were in evidence were not simply “unattractive”, but were derogatory and offensive,” he said.
Punchard pleaded guilty to leaking the personal details of a domestic violence complainant to her former partner.(ABC News)
With regard to the most serious of the offences the disclosure of the woman’s precise unit number Judge Chowdhury said it was important to note that there was a court order in place that required the woman to disclose her residential address to her former partner, that the man already knew the street and apartment complex where the woman lived, and no domestic violence order was in place with the woman as the aggrieved and the man as the respondent.
Judge Chowdhury also noted that there was no evidence to indicate that Punchard was aware of any allegation of domestic violence levelled by the woman against the man and that he “specifically checked whether any protection order had been made before releasing the address”.
Offences ‘did create a risk’ to the ex-wife
Judge Chowdhury said “there is no question that the nature of the offences are serious” and that the most serious charge “did create a risk to [the woman]”.
But he added that “it was the same risk created by the terms of the Federal Circuit Court order” and that on the evidence, the man never went to the unit where the woman was living.
He said it was a logical implication that Punchard would be dismissed from the police service if a conviction was recorded and exercised his discretion not to record convictions.
“There is no question that the appellant, now 54 years of age, will find it difficult to find work if he loses his job as a police officer, especially in the current climate.
“Of course, that may be the result of future disciplinary action by the police service, regardless of whether a conviction is recorded.
“It remains, however, a relevant consideration for me in assessing the impact that the recording of a conviction will have on the appellant’s economic and social wellbeing, and his chances of finding employment,” he said.