Legal remedy (2)

I'm fairly certain that among the hang-bainers is an anxiety that paying David, or remedying the situation he was put in by the Crown, would lead to a precedent that anybody tried and acquitted would be entitled to legal remedy of some sort.

Generally, that would never be the case, unless a prosecution was shown to be malicious or so poorly constructed that negligence became an issue. David's case stands alone for many reasons, also unique in that it falls into an area that would be hard to argue that part of the original trial and evidence offered (and that withheld) was if not malicious, then certainly negligent. The reason for this being that the first fully informed and instructed Jury to hear the evidence for and against David was readily able to acquit. Further, the first Jury asked questions pertinent to the issue of the glasses, and the sighting of David that morning on the street before the suicide note was written but were not given the relevant information, part of the police file, but withheld.

It's fair to say the first Jury were on the trail of what might have had the hallmarks of travesty of Justice. This, following the attacks made on the credibility of David that the fateful glasses were indeed his mothers as he had maintained but which the Crown kept silent knowing he was telling the truth.

So to the second trial. The Crown after 16 years still unable to explain the forensic evidence which beyond reasonable doubt showed that Robin suicided. The attendance of motive, the 'well-being' of Robin's mental state, and so forth all became secondary, perhaps even not required once on the balance of probabilies Robin's death was shown as suicide.

I'll try to make a list of what David has lost, although only he will fully appreciate his loss:

His family, and the cruel twist that he was falsely accused as being their killer.
His freedom and dignity.
His opportunity for privacy and grief.
The life before him had he not spent 13 years in prison.
His home.
His inheritance.
His privacy and the chance to live his life anonymously if he had so chosen.

What were/are the contributing factors to David's loss:

A poor inquiry into his family's death and David having been prematurely charged before any forensic tests were returned and before it was understood that his father had, as it has so graphically appeared, committed suicide.

The lethargy of the NZ Courts to recognise and react to a Miscarriage Of Justice.

The decision to hold a retrial when it was clear to the Crown they were (after 15 years) still unable to reconcile Robin's death, forensically, with common sense or in any other way with murder, instead of suicide.

The 'abandonment' post trial of David after his acquittal: ie,

No effort made to assist or advise him but rather the placing of an onus on him to go to those that had wrought this disaster on him for help.

Put another way, the pedestrian struck down on a crossing while the offending driver, either drives off or waits in his car for the pedestrian (if he can) to get to his feet, come forward and remonstrate about the injury he has received.

The abandonment by The Crown of liability for what has happened to David as he was held for 13 years under a MOJ, including the loss and burning of his property and the apparent mountain now before him to regain what is lawfully his.

The proliferation of hate messengers and sites, driven to attempt to mislead the public into the belief that the Justice System failed not David, but the memory of a man who killed his family and then himself.