Monday, October 24, 2016

David Eastman: Australia; Bulletin; ABC News reports that his lawyers have launched a new bid to prevent him facing trial over the 1989 murder of senior AFP officer Colin Winchester. ..."Lawyers for David Harold Eastman have launched a new bid to prevent him facing trial over the 1989 murder of senior AFP officer Colin Winchester. Eastman spent nearly 19 years in jail after being convicted of the murder in 1995. He was freed in 2014 after an inquiry found the forensic case against him was deeply flawed and there was a miscarriage of justice." Reporter Elizabeth Byrne; ABC News; 24 October, 2016;.

 
"Lawyers for David Harold Eastman have launched a new bid to prevent him facing trial over the 1989 murder of senior AFP officer Colin Winchester. Eastman spent nearly 19 years in jail after being convicted of the murder in 1995. He was freed in 2014 after an inquiry found the forensic case against him was deeply flawed and there was a miscarriage of justice. On Monday Eastman was in court for the first time since being freed, watching for some of the day from the public gallery. The hearings, in which Eastman's lawyers will argue for a stay on the charge, will be presided over by three Victorian judges, to avoid any local conflicts of interest in the long-running case. Earlier this year Eastman lost a bid for a stay on the murder charge, with Justice David Ashley throwing out the application. A three page statement explaining the decision was suppressed.........Because the report remains suppressed, most of the arguments in the new hearings also cannot be aired in public.
Judges Robert Osborne, Simon Whelan and Phillip Priest have also foreshadowed closing the court for extended periods during the hearings to consider suppressed material." 
https://www.google.com/url?rct=j&sa=t&url=http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-10-24/david-eastman-appears-in-court-in-bid-to-block-murder-trial/7960566&ct=ga&cd=CAEYACoSODQ2NTY2NDM3MTU2ODc2NTAwMhowODlkNzM0ODdiYjAzOWQ1OmNvbTplbjpVUw&usg=AFQjCNFW7T5S4zXidFN9zUcSv-DJS3PB4w

See Wikipedia report at the link below: "A new inquiry relating to his conviction was announced in August 2012.[12] In 2014, the inquiry, headed by Justice Brian Ross Martin, found there had been "a substantial miscarriage of justice", Eastman "did not receive a fair trial", the forensic evidence on which the conviction was based was "deeply flawed" and recommended the conviction be quashed. Because a retrial would be neither feasible nor fair, Eastman should be pardoned. However Martin said he was "fairly certain" Eastman was guilty but "a nagging doubt remains".[13][14][15] Publication of the report followed a failed attempt by the Australian Federal Police to have at least parts of it withheld.[16] On 22 August 2014 the Supreme Court of the Australian Capital Territory quashed the conviction and ordered a retrial."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Eastman