I thought the Aaron Smith story was done. I thought we'd heard the last of his so-called 'toilet tryst' in Christchurch. But no, now he's been punished.

New Zealand Rugby has issued a statement saying his behaviour amounted to serious misconduct. Serious misconduct? Really?

Smith has also been issued with a formal warning. He's voluntarily stood down from the All Blacks' Bledisloe Cup test this weekend. That means he'll have missed the last three tests for the All Blacks.

This story I watched unfold while I was overseas. I have been very critical of how New Zealand Rugby and the Chiefs handled - or didn't handle - the mad Monday stripper scandal and in particular the treatment of the woman in question, Scarlett.

I was also very critical of the Losi Filipo case. A young player who'd committed a violent crime in Wellington, but New Zealand Rugby had effectively shrugged it off and believed he could carry on playing.

But this case is different. A young, fit All Black had sex with a woman in a disabled toilet in Christchurch. Not ideal, to be fair. Not particularly dignified. But not illegal either.

And as I watched this story develop over the course of a week, it felt like it was being fuelled by a sort of morbid curiosity. There were grainy images published of the woman after she'd left the loo.

Yes, she'd had sex in a public place - albeit behind the closed door of a disabled toilet - but that doesn't mean the public has any right to know who she is.

Then photos of Smith's girlfriend appeared too. Were they ripped off facebook? Again, her identity shouldn't have been plastered across every news website either.

There was no crime here. News just in - you can have consensual sex in a loo and you won't end up in jail in this country - thankfully.

This was, purely and simply, a moral issue, and it was an issue for New Zealand Rugby to resolve in terms of the conduct of its professional sportsman in public.

Watching this story from afar, and how we responded to it, well, New Zealand suddenly looked like a very small village.

Smith, without question, acted foolishly, but he's accountable to New Zealand Rugby and his partner. That hopefully, is where this story will finally lie.