Ruling soon on taped evidence?

Press, 26 November 1981, Page 26

Ruling soon on taped evidence?

PA Auckland The Court of Appeal will be asked to rule on evidence obtained under an interception warrant. The taped evidence, obtained by the police with the use of an electronic “bugging” device, made legal history when it was played at a drugs trial at the High Court at Auckland earlier this month. Appearing before the court was Glenda Faye Menzies, aged 26, an unemployed bank teller of Avondale, who was sentenced to 12 years jail for supplying heroin and morphine. Counsel for Menzies, Mr Graeme Jenkins, said that he had lodged an appeal against her conviction and sentence. One of the grounds for the appeal is that the judge erred in ruling that evidence obtained under an interception warrant in the name of Colin James Prast was admissible against Menzies. Other grounds are that the judge erred when he

reversed an earlier ruling and made transcripts of the tape recordings available to the jury as an aid to determine what was on the recordings; when he ruled that the Crown could bring evidence relating to morphine obtained by the interception warrant when the warrant was granted in respect of heroin only; and when he ruled that there was a valid interception warrant in respect of the private communications of Prast at Coronet Place renewed from April 3. Mr Jenkins also claims that the trial judge erred in declining an application to strike out conspiracy charges against Menzies and that that resulted in the Crown being able to use evidence that would otherwise have been inadmissible. He also claims that the sentences imposed were “manifestly excessive” and that there was a gross disparity between the sentences imposed on Menzies and those of her co-offenders.