Anyone reading the Alan Hall case would be shocked at the blatant attempt to frame him for the crime.
You honestly get the perception after reading the reports that the cops simply rounded up the most vulnerable person near the crime and bullied him into answers that were used to frame him while withholding evidence that proved he didn’t do it.
They knew Alan couldn’t have committed the crime, but the simply framed him anyway because their interrogation techniques are manipulative and have little to do with catching the actual criminal and more to do with simply finding a prosecution.
With the recent litany of miscarriage of justice cases, seeing the inside of a corrupted police interrogation process happening in real time now suggests the Police have learned NOTHING from the mistakes and failures of the past, which is what we have been promised every time one of these miscarriages of justice get exposed!
Dean Fuller-Sandys & Leah Stephens murders: Court of Appeal hearing under way for convicted killers
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- August 1989: Tyre-fitter Deane Fuller-Sandys is presumed to have drowned after failing to return from a fishing trip at Whatipu on Auckland’s west coast. Five days later sex worker Leah Stephens disappeared and her body was found three years later near Muriwai Golf Course.
- March 1999: Gail Maney and Stephen Stone were jointly convicted and sentenced to life imprisonment for Fuller-Sandys’ murder. Stone is also convicted and sentenced to life imprisonment for Leah Stephen’s rape and murder which was allegedly connected to Fuller-Sandys’ killing. Colin Maney and Mark Henriksen are found guilty of being accessories to Fuller-Sandy’s murder.
- Now the case is before the Court of Appeal. This is Maney’s third appeal following unsuccessful attempts to clear her name in 2000 and 2005.
Two of the four key witnesses who gave evidence against the people accused of murdering Deane Fuller-Sandys and Leah Stephens have recanted their evidence and a third doesn’t want anything to do with a retrial if one is ordered.
Gail Maney and Stephen Stone were jointly convicted and sentenced to life imprisonment for Fuller-Sandys’ murder following a trial in 1999. Stone was also convicted of raping and murdering Stephen. The pair have been fighting to clear their names ever since.
What the bloody hell happened here? The Police threaten prosecution of 4 people unless they sign off false confessions to frame two other people and the whole case has imploded decades later???
EVERY TIME WE CATCH COPS USING FLAWED INTERROGATION TECHNIQUES THEY PROMISE TO CHANGE BUT DON’T!
Based on what we currently have in front of us with this case and the recent miscarriages of justice cases of Peter Ellis, David Dougherty, Teina Pora, David Lyttle, Mauha Fawcett and Alan Hall you get a terrible feeling that Police are not following the evidence, but are merely rounding up the most vulnerable suspects and bullying confessions out of them or twisting the evidence to fit the crime.
What is happening here is a can of very sick and toxic worms being ripped open while the media’s attention is on the petty and the vacant.
What is being exposed here is a rotten process that reeks of corruption. I once thought that maybe as much as 5% of the prison population might be innocent, after looking at what has been starkly revealed in this police interrogation process, I think that number might be closer to 30% of the prison population being innocent.
What has been revelled here calls into question fundamental values of justice and Policing in a democracy. The total lack of wider attention this case and the questions it raises must be addressed.
Our Police worship culture needs to acknowledge that Good Cops can do bad things and if this level of manipulation to gain convictions is what is happening, then surely something has gone very wrong in the system.
A system no one seems prepared to challenge!
The New Zealand Police are at grave risk of losing their social licence. I think that many should be assigned “other duties”.
NZ Police has a deep violent/macho/racist culture which is very resistant to change–and they hold a grudge for as long as someone they fitted up lives.
It does not matter if accused people did not grow up in Sunday School or have previous offending (like say Scott Watson)–the integrity of the judicial system and establishing the facts is what matters.
The safe cushy jobs of the 91 staff at the new Ministry for Regulation, which has been set up by David Seymour the leader of Act, are paid on average $152000 anually, and whose main workplace injury risk would likely be RSI or papercuts.
And at the same time, Act are in the process of watering down firearms legislation, which will have the effect of putting more powerful guns (mssa) in the hands of the offenders, faced by Police.
While the average 2024 salary for a NZ Police officer, who may face life and death situations, even placing their own life, and mental and physical wellbeing on the line, is $70000 – less than half the pay of those in the new Ministry.
I’n sure if the whole Ministry of Regualtion went on a 2 month strike tomorrow no one would notice anything. But if the Police went on a two month strike, things would quickly go downhill.
Thank god (CoC) for the Ministry of Regulation (sarc).
Police officers have similar training / qualification requirements to soldiers, however soldiers face higher personal risk & receive less in the way of financial renumeration. Let’s compare apples with apples.
I doubt very much that our soldiers face more risk than police.
How many soldiers died in the last 5 years while on active service.
How many actually got shot at or assaulted. Find out the numbers for police and I think you will find the soldiers are safer than police hands down.
The Police walk / drive the same streets as you do. Do our streets have armed militants or IEDs hidden in the rubble? Should we arm ourselves & wear body armor too? I’m guessing the answer is no.
You don’t get the point. Our soldiers very rarely are on the front line. How many actually served in Afghanistan for example. I would be reasonably confident that over the time we had troops there more Police were killed or injured in NZ.
Can you tell me how many soldiers are actually in zones of the world where they face the same danger as Police out in our country right now tonight. I bet you would be surprised.
As Stephen points out, compensation is not related to actual risk, so your point is irrelevant anyway. When you sign up for a job, it is up to you to assess the risks & the rewards. The thing with soldiers, is of the risk increases greatly, they can’t just quit & move to Australia. If Police need guns & armor to walk my streets, visit my neighbors, to visit our communities, do I?
Once again it seems our justice hierarchy are trying to save face but at what costs. Our NZ police are complicit in this and many other cases if they can’t prove it, they set them up using dirty low-down tactics. And to make matters worse the CoC are giving our Police even more powers, here comes more stick and social upheaval.
The Alan Hall case and outcome is all about the system protecting the system.
Have you noticed that none of the cops, or rather ex cops who were involved in changing the independent person’s statement by deleting the description the witness gave – a tall dark skinned person seen running from the scene – and adding into the statement that the person seen running away was wearing a light coloured top, because Alan Hall had a similar top – have been prosecuted and probably will not be. If any of us, changed a statement that was going to be put into a court case to influence the outcome in our favour, the cops would charge us immediately, no questions asked.
In the Alan Hall case the cops who did this committed a serious crime which resulted in an innocent man being sent to prison for many years for a crime he did not commit, but the system is protecting them. Just disgusting.
And of course the cops change the narrative to suit themselves. While this is not on the level of the Alan Hall case, in the NZ Herald this morning there is an article about cops not enforcing the law against vaping in cars carrying children. The cops said their focus was on a health first approach – https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/police-u-turn-after-initially-choosing-not-to-fine-motorists-smoking-and-vaping-in-cars-with-kids/SGSQQ6VDLFGYDLQ66ZKDI5U4Z4/ If that is the case, why do they continue to prosecute people who are heavily addicted to methamphetamine and found in possession of a small usable quantity only because they are addicted to it but not supplying it?
I reckon, the Hall case and the other cases referred to by MB a just the tip of the iceberg and yes I agree MB, this is about cops involved in major cases, developing a theory, which is wrong, but twisting the so-called evidence to fit that theory. But go one step further – the system has protected them.
In the Gail Maney case, I wonder if the system is going to prosecute the cops for what they did? Oh, of course not, because the system protects the system.
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