Rioters & Double-jeopardy punishments condemned

Students condemn *rioters* & Double-jeopardy punishments

The Otago Polytechnic Students’ Association (OPSA) condemns the actions of any of its members involved in illegal anti-social activities on Saturday night. OPSA believes students arrested should face the law as any other person would in the same circumstance.

However, OPSA does not support punishing students twice for the same behaviour and disapproves of any disciplinary action taken by the University on top of court punishment.

“It would be blatantly unfair if a member of the public or Canterbury student doing exactly the same thing as an Otago student got only civil discipline while the Otago student faced both civil and University discipline.” said OPSA president, Richard Mitchell.

Otago Polytechnic does not punish its students for non-Polytechnic related behaviour and OPSA endorses this approach, and would not like to see this aspect of the University’s code-of-conduct adopted.

ENDS

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