Jury finds man guilty of arson

Press, 26 July 1986, Page 4

Jury finds man guilty of arson

Nelson reporter

A jury in the High Court, Nelson, has found guilty a young man who had pleaded not guilty to two charges of arson in Nelson last year. Phillip John Stephenson, aged 21, unemployed, was charged with setting fire to a garage at 46 Shelbourne Street on November 14 last, and with setting a fire in a wood box in a garage at 55 Shelbourne Street when he ought to have known the danger to life was likely. Both fires. occurred on the same night, and about the same time. Stephenson, who was found guilty after a jury retirement of nearly four hours, was remanded by Mr Justice Jeffries to August 1 for sentence. He was allowed ball of $lOOO. Mr C. Brown appeared for the Crown, and Mr C. N. Tuohy for Stephenson. Evidence given in the three-day trial was that two fires started in suspicious circumstances in the same street about the same time on November 14 last year. Mr Bruce Hargreaves, of 46 Shelbourne Street, gave evidence that because his house was being recarpeted almost all the furnishings, including antiques, were stored in the garage. A fire was noticed about 11.30 p.m., but within minutes the garage was engulfed in flames as the fire was fuelled from the petrol of an almostnew car. The knocking of a neighbour woke Mr William Tansley to the danger of a fire in his garage at 55 Shelbourne Street. The flames were extin-

guished with a garden hose, but not before scorching the wall of the house above in which a baby aged 6 months was sleeping. Two youths not known in the neighbourhood were watching the blaze, and Constable Robert Wooster took their names. One of them was Stephenson. The other one, Wayne Allan Kirkwood, gave evidence that Stephenson joined his family to watch television that night, but left about 10.45 p.m., and returned about 11.15. At the fire Stephenson acted “weird” and was jumpy. Detective Anthony Ivan Vasta produced a statement made by Stephenson in which he admitted lighting both fires. He said he wanted to be involved in something to get attention.

As he was completing the interview with Stephenson, the defendant’s mother arrived and he had called out through the door “I didn’t do it.” This was before he signed the statement, said Mr Vasta.

Stephenson, in evidence, denied lighting the fires. He said he read and signed the statement “because everything was moving very quickly and I was getting confused.” His mother, Mrs Shirley Stephenson, said that as a result of accidents, her son had difficulty in expressing himself. She did not believe the statement alleged to have been made by her son because it contained expressions and passages she could not reconcile with the way in. which her son expressed himself. In his closing address to the jury, Mr Tuohy said the only evidence that Stephenson had committed the offences was the statement he had not yet signed, when he told his mother he had not done it.