The Assistant Director of Public Prosecutions, Lee Burney has advised the lawyer for Amenoni Nasilasila, to get his house in order.

Nasilasila’s lawyer, Mosese Naivalu, applied to resubmit his affidavits and number it correctly because it was not done in the previous documents presented to the Court of Appeal and State.

Mr Burney argued that Naivalu had raised serious allegations against the former defence lawyers and yet his own house was not in order. He wasted two months and the process will now be repeated.

Nasilasila appeared before Court of Appeal Judge Justice Chandana Prematilaka yesterday. The 28-year-old former Fiji 7s player was charged and convicted for rape of a 24-year-old woman at Olosara, Sigatoka, on December 22, 2018.

Mr Naivalul has also sought time to translate Nasilasila and the victim’s Facebook messages from iTaukei to the English language.

However, Mr Burney argued that he believed those messages were related to Nasilasila’s previous relationship with the victim and this was not an issue during the initial trial.

Justice Prematilaka gave Mr Naivalu until December 4 to file and serve six paginated fresh copies of the affidavit and also to contain the translated messages to the trial counsels.

He gave the trial counsels until December 28 to reply to the filed affidavit.

Nasilasila is serving a sentence of eight years imprisonment with a non-parole period of six years.

He is appealing against his conviction and sentence while there is a bail pending appeal application.

The matter will be called for mention on December 29.

Edited by Selita Bolanavanua

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