So much lying in one little article…

Weightlifter Laurel Hubbard’s dogged fight to keep her name out of the media

His. His name. He’s a man.

Olympic weightlifting hopeful Laurel Hubbard has failed in a nine-month battle to keep her name secret over a driving charge.

Hubbard, 41, a transgender athlete who is trying to qualify for the Tokyo Olympics, was charged with careless driving causing injury after her vehicle fishtailed on a sharp bend near Queenstown on October 24, 2018.

Her car hit a vehicle carrying an Australian couple in their 60s. The male driver spent nearly two weeks in Dunedin Hospital and needed major spinal surgery on returning to Australia.

His. His name, his vehicle, his car. He was driving his car too fast so he crashed into another car, causing a painful serious injury to another person.

Hubbard, who is the daughter of cereal magnate Dick Hubbard, pleaded guilty in January this year and offered to pay the couple about $13,000 including $1000 for emotional harm. 

A trifling amount.

The case could not be reported because Hubbard, represented by lawyer Fiona Guy Kidd QC, successfully applied for suppression orders at each of the five stages of the court process.

Why should he be able to do that?

The High Court in Invercargill this week overturned the suppression orders after an appeal by Stuff.

At sentencing on February 4, Judge Bernadette Farnan discharged Hubbard without conviction noting she was a first offender, the low level nature of the accident, Hubbard’s remorse and the reparation payment. She disqualified her from driving for a month (the normal disqualification is six months) and ordered her to pay about $13,000 to the Australian couple. 

What “low level nature”??? Major spinal surgery, two weeks in the hospital? How is that low level? Dangerous driving isn’t a joke.

Are some more equal than others?