Counsel taxes police with distorting and fabricating evidence

Press, 20 September 1980, Page 3

Counsel taxes police with distorting and fabricating evidence

. PA Auckland The alleged bias of the police, ' the Justice Department, and the D.S.I.R. were attacked at the Royal Commission of; Inquiry into the Thomas; case yesterday. Counsel for Arthur Allen Thomas, Mr P. A. Williams, the police of. doing the minimum required ;by law to help the defence, and of distorting and fabricating evidence. He said that at both Thomas trials the Crown advanced evidence to the effect that about 10 years before the -Crewe murders Mr Thomas had displayed certain affection towards Jeanette Dernier, as Mrs Crewe was then. Mr Williams said it was only by twisting and distorting that a previous display of honest affection towards a young girl by an adolescent youth could. ( be made a motive TO years later for murdering her.

Referring to exhibit 350, a cartridge . case found at the Crewe property. Mr Williams said the police had been put in a desperate situation by fabrication of evidence concerning the exhibit. This , had le '■ to further ancillary difficulties in their case; and their desperate endeavours to explain their non-finding of exhibit 350 by Suggesting that their search

had been inadequate or incomplete was just another! example. ; .. . | Mr Williams said that a somewhat chilling 'aspect of the inquiry had been the I revelation not only Of police] bias but of bias .by the. D.S.I.R. and by the; Justice! Department. Reports prepared by Mr Pike,.a senior member of the! Justice Department, related! in particular to the. forensic .evidence in the "Thomas case, he said.

The subsequent report of .the Solicitor-General and the Secretary for Justice clearly indicated a complete reiiance on D.S.I.R. material and a hostile attitude in contradiction to the D.S.I.R. view obtained from a private source.

Mr .Williams said the ramifications of matters raised before the commission were far wider than the! issues pertaining io the] Thomas case, ' important! though those issues were. He submitted that the D.S.I.R. must make its sei-] vices more readily available and its members .should not. allow themselves to be caught up in the emotional consequences of the adversary system. Mr Williams said it was not considered necessary to deal in detail with the evidence of Mr Hutton;. How-

ever, his attitude towards the defence < again clearly demonstrated the adversary system at its. worst: . There was no' instance of any assistance giyen to the defence except, the very least which was'* barely consistent with the-gegal necessities, a-a at. times less. Witnesses who might have helped the fence were inconsistent with the police theory and were not called by the prosecution, but were invariably not handed over to the defence.

Unless- there was objects ivity and fairness by the police in matters related to criminal prosecution, miscarriages of justice would occur, the Thomas case being one example, Mr Williams said.

It was clear that without the help and time of Dr T. J. Sprott, an industrial chemist; Pat Booth, a journalist; <,nd Professor Neil Mowbray, an engineer, Mr Thomas’s pardon would never have been obtained. Mr Williams submitted ] that the commission should ! closely inquire into the conduct of Dr Nelson, the senior scientist of the D.S.I.R. A scrutiny of his conduct revealed that he had not acted objectively nor with that degree of propriety expected from a person in his position, Mr Williams said.