PUBLISHERS VIEW: "The Dominion Post says Mark Lundy had a fair trial - had his day in court. I beg to disagree. It was the prosecutor who was given another day in court. At this trial the prosecution substantially changed the approach it had taken at the first trial and adapted the expert evidence it had called accordingly. I suppose that if Lundy appeals and wins a new trial, the Crown might come up with yet another entirely new approach, and keep bashing away at Lundy - keep him reeling and weaving defensively- until it finally has a conviction and he falls; This is most unfair - not a fair trial at all. It's not enough to give someone a day in court. You also have to give them a fair prosecution. HL);
EDITORIAL: "Mark Lundy has had a fair trial." published by the Dominion Post on April 1, 2015.
GIST: "This has been a difficult and troubling case. There were very clear problems with Mark Lundy's first trial, especially on forensic matters, and the second trial was justified. And yet even after another trial which revolved around the same crucial and contested issues, Lundy has again been found guilty.
Nobody can plausibly claim that Lundy has not received justice. Both trials were textbook cases of the difficulties juries face in dealing with expert evidence. Experts disagreed about what kind of matter was on his polo shirt, and who or even what it belonged to. This lay at the heart of the case. The shirt was the one piece of evidence that supposedly linked Lundy with the crime. The prosecution painted it as the silent witness that showed his guilt. The defence said the matter might not be human brain tissue but perhaps from an animal. The contamination might have been accidental. So the jury was faced with warring experts and no obvious "smoking gun" The issue over timing and the much-discussed road trip were similarly disputed. On the issue of the time of death, the prosecution had significantly changed its ground. It no longer relied on a night-time trip from Petone to Palmerston North and back in a time that seemed at the limits of plausibility. Most people in court had driven the route and so most people had an opinion. The arguments continued in the second trial, this time revolving around the allegedly missing kilometres travelled by Lundy's car. Here again, the disagreements were fierce and they were as far from academic as could be. This was about life and death and Lundy's liberty and reputation.........The jurors clearly decided they could make a finding despite the complexity of the evidence and despite vehement disagreements among experts........that although there were weaknesses in the original case against him, and a retrial was necessary to test the evidence again.........Some will say the Lundy case exposed holes in the system. Certainly there were weaknesses in the original case against him, and a retrial was necessary to test the evidence again. Changes in the prosecution case are not necessarily a cause for concern. Even expert witnesses can change their mind – they are human and fallible – and that is a further reason why experts should not have the last word. Now the evidence has been tested again and the second jury came to the same conclusion. This won't be the end of the informal argument about Lundy. But the system has given Lundy his day in court, and when the case was found to be flawed he was given another day as well. And still he was found guilty.
The entire editorial can be found at:
http://www.stuff.co.nz/dominion-post/comment/editorials/67585810/Editorial-Mark-Lundy-has-had-a-fair-trial
