Stephen Stone’s son files complaint over Crown Solicitor’s statement
The son of Stephen Stone has filed a Law Society complaint against the Auckland Crown Solicitor, alleging she misled the court with her statement about the lack of evidence to retry his father, who was acquitted of double murder last week.
Daniel Stone, 32, said Alysha McClintock’s statement had caused “significant harm” to his father and family by “perpetuating a myth” the Crown case was dropped because witnesses were unavailable.
Stephen Stone spent more than 26 years wrongfully imprisoned for the 1989 murders of Deane Fuller-Sandys and Leah Stephens.
In July, the Crown admitted he and three others convicted in connection with the crime suffered a miscarriage of justice. The Court of Appeal accepted a police failure to disclose two key documents led to the miscarriage. Stone’s convictions were quashed in October and a retrial ordered.
Known as the “Larnoch Road Four”, their convictions relied heavily on four eyewitnesses who were given immunity from prosecution and name suppression.
On Wednesday, McClintock told the High Court in Auckland one of the key reasons a retrial couldn’t go ahead was because three of the four witnesses were “no longer available, through a combination of the consequences of the appeal decision, death and witnesses no longer being in New Zealand”.
I could not believe the Prosecutor when she claimed the only reason they weren’t seeking a retrial of Stephen Stone was because they couldn’t access the 4 witnesses was just jaw dropping.
Let’s be very clear here.
The Police threatened and bullied the 4 witnesses into giving false statements, that’s what the evidence shows!
The Cops purposely manipulated evidence with these 4 eyewitnesses to concoct a case against Stephen Stone.
As the very righteous Tim McKinnel who has worked on previous miscarriages of justice makes the point clear…
Private investigator Tim McKinnel, who worked on the case, said outside the court on Wednesday that the Crown’s statement was “incredibly frustrating”.
“There is no acknowledgement of their own role in these miscarriages of justice, and they gave the distinct impression that they believe Stephen has done something — and that’s outrageous in my view.”
…pretending the Crown can’t access the witnesses rather than acknowledge their cops stitched 4 innocent people up for 2 murders is appalling and really shows the Crown refuses to admit their cops were corrupt!
We collectively locked 4 people up for 2 murders using cops who framed them with false evidence and even when we get caught red handed doing that, the Crown uses technicalities to explain away the case, rather than admit what their corrupt cops did.
FFS.
The State is the biggest abuser of human rights in NZ.
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Yeah. This is why we always need to shrink the state.
Act Party policy Maninblack.
Once the Crown narrative is set, you are who they say you are.
The Justice system then uses all its collective power to ensure it stays that way, whether it be conspiring to bear false witness, coercing witnesses or cutting deals with out-of-their-depth defense lawyers.
It’s another example of the Westminster System no longer being fit for purpose.
The sooner benevolent A.I takes over the better.
It seems that AI is developing a reputation of telling people what it thinks they want to hear so I definitely would not trust it to decide truth in a court room.
We need to be prosecuting those police who convict innocent people if we actually want their culture to change.
Agreed.
However realise that our judicial system isn’t about establishing truth. It is a process for settling criminal and civil matters and for delivering decisions and judgements that our society deems appropriate. Any claim to truth seeking is incidental.
The scientific method is the greatest mechanism our species has developed for getting as close as possible to the truth and reality. Yet, it recognises its fallibility and far more faithfully implements error acknowledgment and correction than our judicial system.
NZ cop culture holds deep grudges and rarely admits wrongdoing-that is left to weasels at the IPCA-NZ blue bellies are “never wrong” on serious cases.
@Tiger Mountain – yes agree. The IPCA is an embarrassment and support the cops position that the cops can do no wrong and even when it is shown that the cops have done wrong, their position is that the cops can do no wrong.
Not wanting to distract from MB’s article above regarding the shocking and disgusting comments made by the crown prosecutor in court when the charges against Mr Stone were withdrawn, but a classic example of the corrupt system we constantly witness is when the IPCA recently upheld a police decision not to charge a police camera operator who threatened and pushed a member of the public to the ground, after the member of the public remonstrated with the camera operator, because the cops said that while there was sufficient evidence to charge the camera operator, it was not in the public interest to do so – https://www.stuff.co.nz/nz-news/360672984/do-you-want-die-speed-camera-van-operator-threatened-disgruntled-member-public, yet they charge an elderly pensioner who was driving his vehicle with fighting another younger male driver, who is meant to be a wealthy CEO, who cut the pensioner off while driving and there was a confrontation between the two of them – https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/ponsonby-ceo-charged-over-supercar-road-rage-case-unable-to-give-evidence-at-co-accuseds-trial/PVPLKHAD6FDDFMEJZU3UTRYDSA/
I accept the CEO was also charged but my point is, the camera operator assaulted and threatened a member of the public but the cops don’t charge him because “it is not in the public interest to charge him” and the IPCA uphold that decision, yet the cops charge a pensioner in his mid-70s with fighting a younger male who caused the confrontation in the first place.
No wonder the public are getting more and more cynical about the cops and the IPCA.
As usually happens in such miscarriages (Pora, Ellis, Thomas etc) the deeper failings of refusing to admit error quickly move beyond the initial ones. This is now about the judicial system. The police IPCA etc have already been exposed, now it’s the Crown and courts moving in so as to prevent themselves from being exposed.
I remember watching Tim McKinnel on TV saying when he left and set up his company the cops came down on him ‘why are you picking on us’ was their whine!
Why is the TDB and many of its followers so anti Police?
It is not anti-police, it is pro due process, pro honesty, pro ethical conduct and pro accountability.
Have you ever recognised any of those things in your own behaviour?
Now now Martyn there’s no reason to think this says anything SYSTEMATIC about policing in NZ.
Yes in 1997 they had to invent a imaginary story and stand over some random petty criminals to get them to tell it to send a Maori guy they didn’t like away. But now they can arrest and send someone like Mr. Stone away simply for wearing Kia Kaha boxing club gear! There’s no need for this sort of misconduct anymore, it’s all done in a civilized way under the law.