The following was forwarded to the blog on here titled 'More stuff the hate-siters don't want to know' as comment in reply to one from Lee Hinkleman. I think it is an excellent contribution to the architecture of how a Miscarriage of Justice was imposed upon David Cullen Bain.
The writer firmly touches upon the 'grey' area, the point where the Courts rather than intervene in a dangerous conviction look to strengthen it in a white wash fashion. Bill Wright implored the Jury to overlook inconsistencies, things which didn't make sense in context but which he insisted they still view in the fuller picture. Those words asked the Jury to convict even if the evidence was implausible, frayed or planted. The narrative lacked substance and credibility but the Crown continued on rather than withdraw. We can see it today, but why didn't Appeal Courts in New Zealand see it a dozen years ago. The MOJ is demonstrated and the task is upon the state to remedy not only this case but others as well, to be alert for blankets of guilt cast over an accused which in the cold morning light are thread bare and as empty as a fisherman's drying net. Our Courts need to have the backbone to not only recognize a failed case but to let the accused go rather than search for reasons not to do so. The onus is always on the Crown to prove guilt and for the Courts to be ever vigilant to that and not to conduct a prosecution itself to put the grounds for conviction 'back in order.'
Yes, Lee, that's easy. They accepted it because the Crown prosecutor told them it was so. According to the transcript in McNeish's book, Bill Wright in his melodramatic and imaginative closing said:
"During the struggle [with Stephen] the accused's glasses were dislodged, so was the plastic cover belonging to the telescopic sight. A lens belonging to the glasses was found in the room three days later."
He also said
"Don't fall into the trap of taking the evidence piece by piece and examining each little bit individually, it's not that. Sometimes pieces of evidence by themselves carry no great weight but put them all together side by side and the result can be overwhelming. It's the totality of the evidence - the overall picture - that counts."
The people who argue for David's guilt, and cite unreliable evidence like the lens (and wasn't that one a convenient beauty for Weir?), are doing as Bill Wright told the jury. They are ignoring anomalies, inconsistencies and lies that undermine or negate individual pieces of evidence, but they are still including that evidence in their 'big picture'
Painting that 'big picture' uses the evidence as paint. It's like a paint by numbers kit, where each piece of evidence is a numbered colour. In painting that picture, unreliable or negated evidence should be left out, and the 'picture' that should be looked at is what is left. Bill Wright's 'big picture' was virtually blank. Of Wright's 10 points of what he described as 'hard, factual evidence', when the unsustainable evidence is set to one side, we are left with:
1) David owned the gun.
8) David said that he was the only person who knew where the trigger lock was.
While on the other hand, of the evidence available to the jury at the retrial, but not at the first trial, we have
1) Robin had blood on his hands - residual blood, photographed.
2) Robin's feet were a perfect match for the luminol footprints
3) Robin's death was of a contact shot - independently verifiable as substantially more likely to be suicide than homicide (95% suicide, 5% homicide)
4) taking the blood spatter evidence into account, there was NO position in which someone other than Robin could have fired that fatal shot
4) David was conclusively identified entering his house at 6.45 (time confirmed)
5) David could not have turned on the computer.
This produces a rather different 'big picture'.
To borrow from Van Beynen: for someone who sat through the retrial and heard all the evidence, it really wasn't that hard.
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