Liam Ashley's death, 11 years later.

Liam Ashley was 17 years old in 2006 when he took his parents car without permission. Apparently at the stage he was playing up a bit, nothing too serious according to his parents at the time who considered that laying a complaint with the police could be just the good shake up the young teen needed. Liam was arrested and his parents declined to support his bail so he was remanded in custody. I recall reading later that his parents considered a small stint on remand in Auckland's old Mount Eden prison would straighten him out. Shortly after he was strangled and stomped in the prison escort van by 29 year old George Baker who would say he thought the young boy was a 'nark.' The day after, Liam's life support was turned off in Auckland Hospital.

George Baker was classified as a dangerous prisoner with mental health issues who more than likely in a less rigid of the appraisal between mad and bad would have been in a mental health institution and no where near the youngster said to be 'gentle and kind.' How the young boy could apparently be a nark, the term for an informer, at the age of 17 and without any criminal background is another indication of the mental health of George Baker who was sentenced to life with a minimum parole period of 18 years after pleading guilty. Understandably the public concern was high and the Minister of Corrections Damien O Conner was under attack by the opposition shadow Minister Simon Power.

The escort vehicle was not a Corrections van but a contractor's secure van operated by Chubb Security. In 2007 Chubb expressed the desire to give up the contract no doubt because they broke the rules and put a large dangerous adult offender with a small teenager first offender. It was with that situation in mind that I read a letter from the Howard League of Penal Reform (Wellington) dated 16th October 2017 regarding Chubb operating transport for woman offenders between Auckland and Wellington. The letter sets out that the minimum trip time is 12 hours during which there is only one toilet break and no food or water short of a packed breakfast. The prisoners cannot stand (lack of headroom) and are given no chance to alight and walk around to stretch their legs, most are low security and from the description given the conditions are deliberately cramped for financial reasons. 60 cm of bench space per prisoner, inadequate leg space, steel interior, with only small grills for ventilation, they are generally handcuffed. The accommodation has been described as steel cages, without windows. These for women with minimum security ratings that allow them freedom to work outside in prison grounds. Women also prepared to undertake a rehabilitation course to be better mothers and better citizens.

These trips indeed follow rehabilitation programmes the women have completed at Arohata Prison, Wellington before being returned to the Auckland Women's Prison. The Howard League letter discloses a 2006 Ombudsman report which includes a quote from Corrections as saying;

'There is no formal national policy on the provision of food, water and rest breaks or for providing opportunities for prisoners to stretch their legs. Most prisoner transport will consist of relatively short journeys and would not necessitate the need for rest breaks for food and water.'

In 2007 the Chief Ombudsman, John Belgrave, described Corrections 'prisoner transport polices as inhumane.'

I think it is fairly clear that New Zealand Justice changes are generally reactive and most often follow some exposure or 'whipping up' of public outrage. A good example for that is any debate on sentencing where the 'outraged' always have a specific case that they can quote to show the prisons are soft, sentences too short and so on despite their being no correlation for that which is objective rather than subjective. New Zealand is not good at standing back and being objective about such things and anything to do with imprisonment is soon politicized from both sides of the spectrum, generally favouring the outraged who are not in anyway personally involved.

One reaction following Liam's death was against the mentally disturbed George Baker, such are the complexities of the man that I recall him writing (or it may have been by video) to the Court to support his appeal by saying that he had spoken to his mum and they agreed that 18 years was too long. Another was Chubb saying they would walk away from their contract, probably a less than subtle threat to Corrections. Possibly the most recent has been the escape of the prisoner to Brazil from a home leave visit, this resulted in all prisoners having home leaves stopped (some apparently recently beginning again after some 2 years) all work outside prisons was also stopped in some South Island prisons for minimum security prisoners which is apparently still in place. Think of the maths for that. Around 10,000 prisoners is the current prison population. 1 escapes 9,999 suffer for that. Consider the message as being similar to men and boys taken away from their villages in Europe or the Middle East because of a single event against the powers that be, or because of their ethnicity, never to be seen alive again.

A person sent to prison is encouraged to take part in reform programmes in the belief that they can improve themselves, gain assistance for psychological or behavioral problems they may help gain an early release and lead to an improved life for themselves, children or future children. All sounds good. This is the system extolling the benefits of prisoners taking a good look at themselves, looking to take responsibility for themselves and ultimately benefit society by not breaking the law, instead working and being productive in some way. Then 1 escapes, and 9,999 get clonked with the hammer one way or another, reduced chances to visit family toward the end of their sentences, to work outside the prison or eventually work on parole but not because they did something wrong but rather because a person they don't even know did something wrong, got caught and was re-imprisoned. So what actually is the lesson?

It appears to go like this, you've broken the law and at anytime in the future you can be held responsible for something that you didn't do or did not know about. There is something missing here obviously. I'd called it fortitude. When Simon Power put pressure on Damien O'Connor there was a fair chance neither man knew that Chubb would put Liam at the mercy of the madman Charlie Baker, in fact would have been horrified at the thought, presumably think that it could possibly never happen as did the public. However, a battle waged - perfectly understandable in the political spectrum of the time. However is it understandable now? With a prison population of over 10,000 and a solid effort being made to 'command' the re-offending problem by the current and past Government will the politicians continue to wave the big stick as to who is tough on crime and who is not? More than likely, assuming that it will let's go back to the van and being 'reactive.'

What happens if that van catches on fire, does the door open automatically? Is there even an emergency exit as is required on a bus or a plane.

What happens if the vehicle crashes, goes off the road into deep water?

What happens if the vehicle breaks down in an isolated area, say the desert road?

What happens if the steel cage is kicked to touch and the women are moved in Transit van or similar, even a people mover? So that stops can be made, a chance to walk around for both the staff and those in their custody - will the sky fall in? Will the women fail to appreciate that if just 1 of them does something wrong 9,999 others will be punished in some way.

Liam was described as 'gentle and kind'. I wonder what he would have said about this had he not be locked in a cage with a man twice his size who imagined he was something that he was not,  who didn't see just a  frightened young man being given what was hoped to have been a lesson not to drive the family car without permission and instead felt sorry and protective of him.

There's something about Witness C

There was a lot missing at the sentencing of Witness C at the Auckland High Court on 8 counts of perjury. I am not sure what I really expected. The police and Crown have done a lot to protect their informers over many years. The argument has always been that secret witnesses are a last resort, but vital to prosecutions. For the first time the New Zealand public may generally be disturbed that such witnesses may lie, but also lie extravagant detail, and consider the result as the absolute failure of the system to take any interest in the truth. When did the truth first appear to emerge in this case after David Tamihere had been convicted of the murders of the Swedish hitchhikers Urban Hoglin and Heidi Paakkonen?

When Urban's body was found buried in bush the 'stolen' watch was still on his wrist, his mortal injuries far different than what witness C had said of his being bashed to death and dumped at sea. Somehow the New Zealand Court of Appeal, despite this fresh evidence that went to the heart of the case, said that the Tamihere convictions built around the Hoglin watch being found in the Tamihere home where it was said to have been gifted to David's son, were 'safe,' At some point during the perjury sentencing Richard Francois, appearing for the 'prosecution,' dismissed the Court of Appeal of that era disdainfully. I was surprised that in the Auckland High Court I would hear the words I often repeat myself about the Court that failed to recognize the Miscarriages of Justices embodied in many cases through that 'era' starting with Tamihere, David Bain, Teina Pora, Scott Watson and Mark Lundy - a Court which filled the gaps for ailing prosecutions, painted over the cracks and administered, heartless, injustice. They were assassins disguised in black gowns forming a medieval Court who could look into the minds of Jurors, defendants and the lawyers themselves always to protect the prosecution. The Court that was never disturbed that Pora, not yet 16, had been held incommunicado, cultivated by the promise of money, lied to, then ignored the big gaps in his story and the inducements he was offered and kept in prison for 2 decades without a single recrimination for Rutherford, the 'tough' nosed South Auckland cop who ignored the real culprit and 'lone wolf' rapist and long time informer Malcolm Rewa, choosing a youth instead that couldn't describe the victim in his 'confession' and didn't know where she lived.

Informers have always been looked after, the authorities are seldom concerned about the truth when in comes to informers, they cover for them as they did in Tamihere and Watson where they said the informers evidence wasn't pivotal and that the prosecution would have still won without the tainted evidence. No explanation ever given, why if the evidence wasn't needed, the hazardous and highly prejudicial was given to the jury. A few days after 'C's' hearing I appreciated that it was right to tell the High Court of the shortcomings of the Court of Appeals in many different Miscarriages of Justice. The Court is after all meant to be a place of truth, a place where the 'truth' as offered by secret witnesses should be viewed as unnecessary and dangerous as case after New Zealand case has shown. So it was an appropriate truth at the sentencing of C in the Auckland High Court that the Court was reminded how the Justice system had been abused by police using secret witness for decades, confident that the Court would back them up. 98 years of false imprisonment on just the names mentioned above when added to Arthur Thomas's 9 years.

I am not sure of what had drawn me to the Court though it would appear to be for the chance to look at C. The once barrel chested Ngapuhi with the velvet tongue was reduced by age, pulling an audience, apparently comfortable and aloof. Hard to read, nothing indicating any sort of remorse for his relationship with the late policeman John Hughes who had helped C get early parole for a double murder only only for him to re-offend and spend longer in prison on his recall than he did for his original sentence. It was spoken about in the Court of C having continued to be 'active' in offering perjured evidence to apparently willing police, there are hints that he had been an informer for over 4 decades. He obviously treated it as a full time job.

Behind him and to his left was David Tamihere a man with an easy smile and also weathered by many years in prison thanks to C's evidence that the Appeal Court would later say wasn't needed. How blind could a Court be to think that 'confessions' that when heard by the Jury causing some to cry - could not have mattered to them. At one stage Tamihere said to a woman sitting close to me that he didn't care what sentence C got but that it was the convictions for perjury that mattered as surely they do. On that Wednesday morning on the grounds where NZ's first Parliament had stood the country moved a little closer to coming of age where the institutions of Justice themselves saw their own covered lack of skepticism exposed to the light by 8 convictions against the heart of Justice.

Around 10 kilometers away in Maximum security Arthur Taylor waited for the outcome of his successful prosecution, a minimum security prisoner held in maximum security, the same prison where both Tamihere and C had spent years and years, the bleak place from where the 'story' 'Henry went last night' was penned, the fresh faced young south islander who took his life there during one short period where  8 or 9 men hanged themselves and a protest began that Arthur would eventually join and become locked in a battle for prisoner's and their families rights. Arthur has won many battles in the Courts, to this point in time none have been more significant than the exposure of the Court of Appeal of 2 decades or so ago and the police confident of 'getting away' with bringing perjurers to Court to gain convictions. Not a single police officer has ever been prosecuted, not in Thomas, Tamihere, Bain, Watson or Lundy. The Courts don't bother to comment and police just keep going paying the mealy mouthed with money, goods or a quicker chance of freedom. Freedom is an interesting word to use in a blog about C who stole an innocent man's freedom abetted by police.

Miscarriages of Justice have many of the same characteristics case by case, sure signs that are ignored, never raised by the Courts or the police. They appear to never looked for and memory of this is shut out when faced with another case that has the same characteristics. Now it is up to all of us to remember the perjury of C. Forget the man himself as the problem, and remember the police and Judges who were his enablers.

Double Murder convictions rarely safe in New Zealand?

There is enough evidence to say that double murder convictions in New Zealand high profile cases are unsafe, not just because of yesterday's convictions of witness 'C' for eight counts of perjury he committed in the David Tamihere double murder convictions. The bad run started in Arthur Thomas's case from 1970. Arthur was twice convicted before being pardoned. At the Royal Commission which followed, police tried to bring in 2 secret witnesses who claimed Arthur had confessed, such was their obviously manufactured evidence that the Royal Commission showed them the door and commented adversely against their kind.

A relatively at the time, young detective, John Hughes featured in the Thomas case where the primary evidence was a planted cartridge case, said to been fired in the Thomas rifle, but later discovered as not having been manufactured at the time of the deaths of Jeanette and Harvey Crewe. The country was told after Arthur's pardon that the Thomas case was a one off and couldn't happen again. But from that garden where the planted shell case was found something else grew, a police propensity by some officers to plant evidence. There were other cases, one being Ngamu where Hughes made a false confession attributed to Ngamu confirming his part in an armed robbery. When Hughes left the room Ngamu took the false confession out of the rubbish bin and managed to pass to his lawyer Barry Hart. Nothing happened by way of police discipline against Hughes, as nothing had happened with the planted Thomas shell case. Already, for those so inclined in the police, administrators would turn a blind eye to planted evidence and the Courts would be equally ambivalent.

Hughes was in charge of the disappearance of a young Swedish couple Urban Hoglin and Heidi Paakkonen, soon attention was drawn to David Tamihere, who would admit having stolen the couple's car. Quite quickly it would later emerge, 3 prison snitches would be helping out Hughes, one of them, 'C', would eventually say that his testimony was fabricated by yes, John Hughes. For this observer that was the signature of the 1970s corruption that began in the Thomas case. There may have been prison snitches before that time, but after the Thomas Royal Commission they became more prevalent like a disease inflicted on Justice in this country which the Courts were willing to ignore, and for which police would never be held responsible. By this time time snitches had 'handlers' who went into prison to gain help to fabricate false evidence. Snitches had become an extension of 'policing' in NZ.

One of the familiar characteristics of 'snitches' testimony was the lack of imagination, there appeared only one tactic, outlandish and sick 'confessions' by accused in cases where there was little other evidence, in which the 'snitches' would hold the weak case together with their reported confessions, often given by seasoned criminals who happened to be 'sickened' by the confessions to the point they contacted police. Most often the snitches would be particularly brutal criminals themselves, in at least 1 case, a snitch blaming a life long friend for the murder of a young Auckland housewife would go onto being convicted of a similar crime after the man he falsely accused of murder suicided in prison before he went to trial, that case has never been resolved - and the false accuser now serves life imprisonment for an identical crime to that he blamed long term friend for.

It was no surprise for this observer that when Scott Watson was eventually arrested for the 'Sounds murders' that secret witness were involved, 2 prison inmates and an anonymous couple who after changing their stories several times would accuse Scott of revealing that he was a violent women hater prepared to kill. The 2 prison witnesses for their part would reveal yes, of course, sordid details they alleged Watson revealed to them and for which they were overcome by outrage and reported it to 'police snitch handlers'. That their confessions were dissimilar never caused a batted eye lid in the Court system, as it had not in Tamihere. The only proceedings where such witnesses were tossed out was from the fiercely independent Thomas Royal Commission who had no truck with such bottom dwelling liars.

A few more years and we advance to the Mark Lundy retrial and find, with the case somewhat in trouble, a good old 'snitch' who claimed Mark Lundy confessed to him in a prison yard where Mark had never been held. So the idea that planted evidence and stoolies was moved on from in the 1970s was proved to be false once again. The Teina Pora case also had snitches as prime witnesses, showing that it doesn't require double homicides but rather high profile cases which police struggle to solve.

The reality is that 'snitches' don't solve cases, they become an obvious part of miscarriages of Justice that Courts and Governments continue to ignore. Justice does not benefit from lying prisoners or secret witnesses, a high majority of controversial cases show that plainly no more that the reminder given by the eight guilty counts in the private prosecution brought by Arthur Taylor which police refused to do themselves.

As a matter of interest, the Lundy appeal is next month and the highly suspect 'novel science' is going to be scrutinised as it has never before been. The key evidence against Mark Lundy is highly suspect and has no authenticated forensic basis, there is no other evidence against him that would result in a conviction and the story to be revealed, I am told, is a shocking revelation that brings no credit to the New Zealand Courts and prosecuting authorities.

I am also told that the Watson case is to be re-visited, not just because 1 of the secreted witnesses there 'recanted', 'reaffirmed' and then disappeared, well at least Kirsty McDonald QC couldn't find him after 4 years of searching around her office, and never asking police for help finding their 'contact.' But also because highly suspect forensic evidence in the case, upon which the Watson convictions barely hang is no longer strong enough in the modern forensic context to solely uphold the Watson convictions as Ms McDonald claimed in 2013 after mulling over the papers for 4 years and being paid over $400,000.

Justice as we know it in controversial cases in NZ, corrupt and sinking by the minute.

Will the Lundy case finally crack this time?

I am aware that the final submissions are to be filed in the long running saga which is the Lundy case today. This case generally remains the most poorly understood convictions in New Zealand history. Most people have formed an opinion on the case despite all the concrete facts being unknown.

Rather than starting with the 'Lundy shirt' and all its controversy I'll start with the hidden and neglected parts of the case. As I've written before there is evidence of at least 2 strangers being in the home contemporaneously with the deaths of Christine and her 7 year old daughter Amber. This is known because the DNA of 2 unknown males was found under their nails. DNA in this location can more probably than not be attributed to scratching or grabbing at the clothing of an attacker. DNA of this type lasts a relatively short time if innocently picked up by contact with another person or DNA source, 6 hours is the maximum time until around only 5% of the DNA will remain as a person goes about normal tasks including, eating, dressing and washing the hands.

There were signs of a break in of the Lundy home while Mark Lundy was in Wellington and his wife and daughter home in bed when they were attacked. The police blamed that break in on Lundy, saying it was staged to cover his tracks. It's quite normal unfortunately that someone being framed is blamed for anything unexplained. In the eyes of the Jury it can easily make sense that a guilty person would hide their trail. The problem in Lundy however, as it has emerged years later, is that unknown fingerprints and footprints were also found in the house. Now Mark Lundy, in fact nobody, can leave unknown footprints and particularly fingerprints at a crime scene unless they are the perpetrators. Moreover, nobody can put unknown male DNA and fabric fibres under the nails of a deceased person. So while Lundy was blamed for a mock break in, evidence was hidden that points to it have been a real break in by 2 offenders who left DNA, finger and footprints at the scene along with fibres from their clothing. Of course the paint found on the victims in the area of their wounds, that was said to have come from Mark Lundy's tools, has since also been disproved

This unexplained evidence is actually the key to Mark Lundy's innocence and as I write above it was hidden, eventually emerging piece by piece over time. Not everyone knows it was hidden and obscured in an argument over novel science that remains highly controversial and more than a little suspect. The 'science' took over, was reported on at length, conveniently helping obscure evidence that over time would emerge as far less obscure in understanding the Lundy case. It's time for that evidence to be dealt with. Police have never explained the fingernail DNA and fibres, the finger and footprints, the paint, they got away from doing so by hiding or masking the evidence and shouts of a prosecutor that 'no man has the right to have his wife's brain on his shirt.' That phrase appears to become destined as the most inappropriate part of a prosecutor's closing ever in a New Zealand case. The reason for that being that the validity of the novel science is under siege and no longer can have any support from a crime scene that indicates that Mark Lundy did not kill his wife and daughter.

I also suspect that the appeal submissions will question the validity of the Crown being given 2 bites at the cherry and effectively changing their own case dramatically when it was in deep trouble, given the chance to say 'forget that story, we have a new one.' However, the real story is not the 'new one' they dreamed up to try and salvage their case, but rather the one they hid from the public and Jury that relates to two men, their DNA, foot and fingerprints, paint from a weapon, that were never found. At the same time as our Courts were duped into accepting 'novel science' while the prosecution secreted away critical evidence alarm grew in the established forensic science community that IHC testing was being used in manner where it was not only unaccredited to be employed, but that it was being used far outside the clinical standards where its use was established to test for disease on known samples, not on random poorly degraded gunk that would be blasted with high doses of dilution until it displayed a 'colour' that the testers wanted. Yes, negative tests were ignored, dilution rates increased until the required colour showed, mix the cake with any colours until the right colour was found - not in the least forensic science, but going after a result to fit a theory.

I think now the Court will demand answers, that the public needs, forget about the cake mix and explain how the finger, footprints, fibres and stranger DNA found its way into the Lundy household after a break in and how it could possibly not be connected to the murders of Christine and Amber.

Mark Lundy and the hidden secret evidence.

I had the chance to read Mark Lundy letters published in ‘stuff’ news earlier in the week.

It brought home to me something extremely important in this case which I hope I can clearly distil.

The Lundy case has been taken over by an argument in science, ‘novel unproven science v accredited and regulated for forensic use science.’ Of course, there is no doubt over which science should be allowed by a conservative court for one reason - the crime scene into which strangers had entered. Something, I think Mark Lundy has described to perfection.

It is lost to the conservative mind that the science argument is down the list against the crime scene evidence, which conservatively, perhaps, not even being no 2 on the list, more forthrightly inadmissible.

Mark Lundy like any man, knew his own home. He knew the signs of a break in but it was hidden from him and the Courts that there were also fingerprints and footprints left in the scene that were never traced, and which were highly unlikely to have been there after the home was cleaned by a very thorough contractor just before the tragedy.

When Dr Teoh’s letter was belatedly released by the Crown it was rightly seized upon as showing a miscarriage of Justice. However, the potential proof that unknown males had been the house, their DNA found under the nails of Christine and Amber has never been properly appreciated for its true meaning supported by the reasons it was hidden. If it were not hidden, Mark may not have been charged and was unlikely to have been convicted if he had been charged, due to the Jury having tangible evidence of other offenders to consider – the very reason the critical evidence was hidden. I think this must be taken to the COA along with all the new data showing how DNA gets under the fingernails and how long it may last.

I am 100% behind Mark on this. He was the man that lived in the home and knew it inside out, he was the grieving father who became the suspect as a matter of course. A course that when off target, away from actual evidence and into the darkness of deciphering highly ‘weak for purposes’ evidence in a case where fingerprints, footprints, a break in, and stranger DNA found under the deceased nails was secreted away.

Give him his chance for the truth to be heard in the right order, crime scene first.

Post from the Mark Lundy Support Group

NEWS RELEASE FROM ‘FACTUAL’, MARK LUNDY SUPPORT GROUP www.lundytruth.com

August 7^th 2017

We have noted the release of a new book written by Dr Temple-Camp, some of the excerpts from it, and the rather lame and tame interview of the author on TV3. Lundy has an appeal set down to be heard in mid October and we are therefore limited as to what we can say, however some of what Temple-Camp has written and said cannot be left without comment.

T-C entitles his book “Cause of Death”.  His job is a medical diagnostic pathologist who assists in determining what sort of disease a person may have, particularly cancer. We are not aware of him being an expert in cause of death in a murder, and even in the Lundy case he was not the pathologist used, rather his underling Dr Pang. There is a vast difference between medicine and forensics (more later), and neither T-C nor Pang has forensics accreditation, as far as we are aware. T-C was not introduced to the court as having expertise in immunohistochemistry (the key science in the case), or forensics.

Astoundingly, T-C has made only little mention of the fact that the time of death was greatly changed between the first trial and the retrial. Christine and Amber had bought a McDonalds’ meal at about a quarter to six in the evening of August 29^th 2000 and thus the last meal is accepted as having been eaten around 6pm. The police wanted to pin the murders and Lundy as the culprit on a time of death of 7pm, when he had no alibi. Pang duly obliged with a t.o.d. of an hour to an hour and a quarter of eating, i.e. 7-7:15pm and the first trial went ahead on that basis. The police even found an eye witness who saw “Lundy” running down the road in Palmerston North at just after 7pm. Det. Grantham said this witness was ‘positive”. The arrest interview with Lundy is crystal clear that Lundy was being arrested and charged for killing his wife and daughter at about 7pm. The foundational basis for the case, as it were. This evidence from Pang was strongly contradicted by several experts at the Privy Council and was one of the reasons why the conviction was quashed.

At the retrial, the Crown completely changed the t.o.d. from 7pm on August 29^th to about 3am on August 30^th. Pang, under oath both times, did not seem to have any problem changing his estimation from (a) with 60-75 minutes of eating, to (b) any time in the 15 hours between 6pm on the 29^th and 9am on the 30^th (when the bodies were found). The “positive” eye witness disappeared off the witness screen and was not called at the retrial. Neither was T-C.

T-C writes that “James (Pang) concluded that death had occurred about one hour after eating” and largely ignores the new Crown case, and the retrial. He follows the Crown line that Christine had herself a big meal in the early hours of the morning which explains her full stomach. We have heard of and even experienced teenagers doing that, but women in their 40’s? The fact that Amber also had a full stomach – identical to Christine, said Pang – means that she also got up out of bed at about 2am and ate a big meal. We don’t think so. The word ludicrous comes to mind.

One of the errors which we can address. T-C writes that “Lundy maintained that he didn’t own an axe – an assertion contradicted by several of his acquaintances’. Completely wrong, reversed in fact. Lundy never ever told anybody that he didn’t own an axe (tomahawk). He actually volunteered to the police that he owned a tomahawk and if he had previously “maintained” that he didn’t have one, surely the police would have commented on that? They didn’t. Lundy borrowed one from his mate over the road to cut some kindling because his own was part of his very old scouting stuff and was buried in his garage. Mark’s garage was described by witnesses as “totally full and messy” and contained “a conglomeration” of stuff. The police has Lundy’s tomahawk in their possession on December 14^th, a couple of months before the arrest. They simply asked him why it was not painted like his carpentry tools, and he replied because it is not a builder’s tool.

We mentioned above that medical diagnosis and forensics are very, very different and would like to point out that not one of the “experts” who claimed Lundy had “brain tissue” on his shirt has any disclosed qualifications, certifications or accreditation to the world’s forensic science programmes, the most respected of which is ISO17025. The Privy Council was bothered by, and drew attention to this, - their full judgment can be accessed at 

http://media.nzherald.co.nz/webcontent/document/pdf/201341/Lundy%20judgment.pdf    

Note particularly para. 81  “ It is important not to assume that well established techniques which are traditionally deployed for the purpose of diagnosis can be transported, without modification or further verification, to the forensic arena where the use to which scientific evidence is put is quite different from that involved in making a clinical judgment. Put simply, evidence that can properly used to reach a confident medical verdict may not measure up to the more stringent requirements that arise in the setting of a criminal trial”.

A simple example. The science used by the medical pathologists in this case was immunohistochemistry (ihc) as they use it for cancer diagnosis. The cut-off point between negative/positive ihc on most cancer cells is 5%. (Some breast cancers are at 1%). If 5% of cells or more stain positive to a cancer, the answer given is that you are positive for cancer. The 95%  do not matter. Now imagine a forensic science, say fingerprints, and there are 100 features which need to be matched in order to nail the suspect. How do you think the expert would get on in court if he said 5 of the features were the same and 95 were not, therefore it is a “match”? Laughed out of court, right? Simply put, that’s the difference.

There are two papers available which set out in detail what has to be done with forensic sciences. The first is the 2016 report to (then) President Obama about ensuring Validity of forensic science methods, and the second is from the UK Forensic Science Regulator also concerning Validation. The links are below –

https://obamawhitehouse.archives.gov/sites/default/files/microsites/ostp/PCAST/pcast_forensic_science_report_final.pdf

https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/375285/FSR-G-201_Validation_guidance_November_2014.pdf

From these documents you can see the very, very detailed process which has to be gone through to validate every step of the process for a forensic science to be used in court. You will note from the Obama report that immunohistochemistry is not listed as a forensic science. The National Academy of Sciences report from 2009 doesn’t list ihc as one either. We haven’t found anybody who mentions it.

So, what does T-C have to say? He writes in his book that he says to the police he uses the “Aunt Minnie” process of identification of the “brain” on Lundy’s shirt and says “You don’t have to go through the whole scientific rigmarole”. The links above, the plethora of top scientific and legal minds who have put it all together in the interests of ensuring justice and no miscarriages, and we have T-C saying the required specified care and detail is nothing but  “scientific rigmarole”.

If that is not enough, he goes on to say that this “Aunt Minnie” process uses “the lizard part of your brain, the ancient dinosaur bit that runs on automatic without any intelligent thought”.

The slide T-C examined (Exh. C3003/2) and told the police it was brain using the “Aunt Minnie” method, was also viewed by 5 neuropathologists, one PhD in physiology and one PhD in neuroanatomy – none could identify any brain cells, presumably using intelligent thought.  It seems from T-C’s book that he was very keen to give evidence and is proud of the Privy Council saying he “trenchantly asserted” stuff, as though that was a positive. We therefore do not understand why he gave evidence “under subpoena”. This is a legal/Latin term meaning under penalty, and basically means the witness is forced to turn up, or face punishment. The overall connotation is reluctance to testify, but there may be reasons we are not aware of.

As stated earlier, we are in the process of an appeal and are limited as to what we can say. We can comment on the following –

T-C writes (a) I heard the experts even managed to find evidence of brain tissue on the original dab slide using electron microscopy (b) DuPlessis confirmed that the whole argument about the lack of preservation was rubbish and a red herring.

He writes “So we were right there too. Doubly vindicated!”

This seems to be completely incorrect. DuPlessis (filed doc. 22/8/14) reports on electron microscopy “Material retrieved from the dab preparation (C3003/2 ) could not be recognised as any specific type of tissue. It consisted of non-descript amorphous debris……….” By standard microscopy, he said “ The overall appearances are consistent with degenerate/autolytic tissue……….certainly not confirmatory of cns tissue. I strongly disagree with the notion that some cells recognised within this material can be recognised as glial cells, the latter an opinion originally expressed by some of the pathologists previously examining this specimen” i.e. T-C.

Even the actual shirt stain, not the dab slide, under electron microscope – no glial cells, no axons and, as found by ihc, no neurons either. Funny “brain” this. There should be hundreds of thousands of neurons all with axons attached, and millions of glial cells.

We don’t necessarily see or understand “Aunt Minnie” but we have sure seen Mickey Mouse in more than a few places in this case. 

Temple-Camp on MARK LUNDY, fact or fiction?

Temple Camp on Mark Lundy Fact or Fiction.
To this observer, the Temple Camp book that in part features the Lundy case is increasingly looking like fiction from a man who is uncertain about Lundy’s guilt as he well should be. Starting at the beginning TC is effectively claiming credit for convicting Mark Lundy. That is, one would assume, after the first trial which has been ruled a Miscarriage of Justice, none of which is explained or apologised for by TC, and credit also for the second trial in which TC, in his own mind a ‘leading NZ Pathologist’, was not required. Forgive me for thinking that he was considered by the Crown to be a liability perhaps even the person that led the way, at least at the beginning, in what remains internationally a very controversial case. In my opinion, Mark Lundy’s 2^nd conviction resulted from a further Miscarriage of Justice that started off in a Palmerston North laboratory where Temple Camp was a big noting celebrity in his own mind.
He was asked what he could see on a slide taken from the Lundy shirt. In his own words responding to Grantham from police that it was brain matter and was told that it didn’t sound like something that could be used in court.

"It doesn't sound like something we could use in court." 

"Well, no, but you asked me what it was. I've done both things. I've done an Aunt Minnie on it, but I've also crosschecked." We moved to sit at the multi-headed microscope in the lab. There were three pathologists present, as well as two registrars, and they all had a look at the slide. We all reached the same conclusion. 

The file tells a different story from Grantham himself:

Grantham didn't mention T-C in his evidence about the identification of brain on the slide.  He said that Thompson and Beathwaite thought they could 'possibly' see one or two what appeared to be glial cells, and Pang said he 'thought' they might be glial cells, and this was after visiting Medlab and meeting Pang and T-C.

So 2 pathologists, Thompson and Beathwaite saying they thought they could possibly see 1 or 2 what possibly might be glial cells, and the third pathologists Pang, saying the might be glial cells after Grantham had visited Miller (the IHC specialist in Texas) and met with Pang and T-C. That’s a lot of might’s, possibly, vague, might, but not the same conclusion as T-C wants his readers to believe.

In fact Miller (the American IHC practitioner) would later explain the total absence of glial cells, yes the absence, so much for those possible confirmatory sighting of glial cells, and less so for the confirmation T-C claimed he got from the 3 men – as being for the reason that the sample came from deep within the brain. All parts of the brain have glial cells, they are less frequent deeper into the brain, but with 5 million or so of them they are spread out. So why write a book and make false claims? Or as we’ll see mislead the Court.

So, whose story is not correct. The man belatedly taking credit for solving the Lundy case but who wasn’t required for the retrial or the other witnesses who didn’t back up T-C Palmerston North laboratory slide observation results which he freely admitted he couldn’t prove his opinion was correct. “I’m right, but I can’t prove it.” Pathologist or idiot? Perhaps something worse a person willing to take part to gain a false conviction. I have no idea if T-C told the Jury that he couldn’t prove his opinion but one wonders why the Crown would use such a witness, unless they were desperate. Some of that desperation is later shown here in papers hidden from the first Jury.

In his new book, T-C talks about the psychology of pathology. Reading some details of his account I wonder about the psychology of self- importance or manufactured credit. More on that later.

Important issues in the Lundy conviction are whether or not diagnostic science using known samples, liver, brain, lung etc can be transferred to forensic science where the sample is not known. Internationally this is of interest in a situation described by one seasoned scientist that it is always the establishment that accept change and new methods very slowly and cautiously, no doubt because of their years of experience, teaching and immersion into improving standards. A second leg of this is that IHC relies upon known samples, so indeed is therefore a fundamentally differing starting point beginning with all the details of sample to be examined known. Forensic science has no such advantage although of course in most cases there is visual physical proof taken from a body, indeed whole body examination.

So that is one difference between the 2 disciplines, the 2^nd is the condition of the known or unknown samples as to whether they are necrotic or not. Forensics scientists have to no choice while IHC examiners have a label identifying the specimen, the full history of the patient and fresh samples. IHC relies on freshly gathered samples. In research often such samples are immediately preserved particularly in the case of brain or central nervous system material which deteriorates at high speed, a whisper of death and it’s shape and condition begins to change, so much so that medical staff will pump preservative through the body of a person who passes so that the brain might be fixed, that is preserved for observation in it true form before it has surrendered to its death, frozen for the duration of time. This later procedure is used in the case of samples taken for consented research, not live minute samples taken from a patient in theatre to immediately determine disease or other medical conditions.

The police case in Lundy asks for acceptance that long dead cells to be a reliable transmitter of type of cell, but they ask for it to be accepted without a skull or bones, even mummified remains obvious to the eye, they ask for it with samples that can only be seen under magnification after being washed with particular antibodies in order for their change of colour to reveal the source. Even then things can be tricky, contamination is fatal to true results. Everything must be handled to avoid contamination, from a crime scene human material may already be contaminated or become contaminated upon discovery, handling, storage or testing. The IHC specialist does everything from within a cocoon of contamination safety in ideal conditions, knows the sample, how it has been handled and handles it themselves in a forensically and contamination secure environment recording every step as a Doctor or Surgeon does with a live patient. This is the difference and why T- C and Rodney Miller are pissing in the wind. They don’t have apples to compare with apples let alone being able to know how to safely compare them. As we will see T-C actually altered his notes when transcribing them to evidence, left out critical points, deliberately.

To show TC’s inability to understand the argument even now, of like meeting like, is this from his book where he’s talking about samples taken from an operating theatre and comparing them with a 59-day old speck that was first of all kept in the boot of a car, then in a safe rather than the freezer in the police station exhibit’s area or far more appropriately surrendered immediately to the forensic specialists.

Speaking about criticism of himself and Dr Miller at the Privy Council, T-C reveals some of the argument forward by Professor Sheard of Otago University in the following way:

A critical part of Professor Sheard’s argument was that the shirt tissue had to be compared with identically prepared brain and thus he thought Rod Miller’s controls were invalid. As I explained to the Crown Counsel, this was perplexing. We used an identical control system to diagnose dozens of cancer patients every month. On the basis of these diagnoses, they were started on life-altering chemotherapy or radiotherapy.

Even after almost 2 decades T-C can’t understand the basic science of comparing like to like, rather than like to what might or might not be the same. He’s stuck in a lab doing routine sampling, unable to comprehend that forensic science is a completely different discipline with samples the could come from anywhere and which may have no label of identity unlike those given to an IHC specialist.

The anti-body manufacturers specifically instruct IHC practitioners that their products are not to be used on necrotic material. This brings us to the second core issue. Was the shirt sample necrotic or not. The starting point with this is Dr Teoh who said It was rotten before the first trial and whose opinion was hidden by police for over a decade. As a reader, will see by this point (the determination of the ‘health of the sample) T-C had divorced himself from his own notes and the rules of the anti-body manufacturers, and would never go back to the truth, remaining instead in his manufactured for evidence truth. Later herein, we will read about the savaging his evidence was given at the Privy Council something Temple-Camp seems unable to absorb as being the result of changing his observations to suit his opinion.

Despite the anti-body manufacturer’s instructions about necrotic material, which T-C has observed in his own notes he says the shirt material was fine for analysis using IHC even though he is not a specialist in IHC but rather a pathologists who blows his own trumpet. Was he being truthful? Let’s look at the case notes sent by a correspondent.

Here we have two copies of Temple-Camp’s Briefs, one is labelled DRAFT and is undated, the other labelled FINAL and dated February 15th. From the evidence available, we can only assume that the differences between the two are the “one typographical error” Temple-Camp referred to in Court.

DRAFT : “I examined the slide under a microscope and found components of tissue including blood vessels and cellular material which was poorly preserved but appeared to be brain tissue”

FINAL : “I examined the slide under a microscope and found components of tissue including blood vessels and cellular material which was adequately preserved and appeared to me to be brain tissue”.

DRAFT : “The preservation of the cells on the slide was suboptimal and I was concerned that it would not be suitable to carry out the antigen studies which would unequivocally identify the cells”

FINAL: Whole sentence deleted.

Compare what Temple Camps notes say or didn’t say to what he claims in his book where suddenly the shirt material is well preserved, rather than being poorly preserved or the substance suboptimal:

Where writing about the Privy Council case which was won by Mark Lundy:

These new experts seemed to believe that any brain would have decayed beyond recognition in that time. I thought that was just nonsense. The dried brain-matter was preserved within minutes of the murder and was still preserved 59 days later and will still be so 59 years from now.

His excuse now for altering his evidence shows the arrogance of the man. He cannot accept that lab notes and all other such material are the duty of the specialist witness to the Court. In fact, he says a ‘wise’ pathologists keeps his thoughts (and therefore his observations) to himself. T-C has no concept of the truth or an expert’s duty to the Court.

I had never given written evidence when I had first examined the dab slide, nearly 14 months beforehand. I realised that the defence were comparing a first draft of the affidavit I had prepared at Ben’s request with the final draft written a day later, after I had fully investigated the issue. It is an occupational hazard in homicide investigations that any preliminary comments, rough notes or drafts will be sifted through and minutely compared by astute defence lawyers. They will search for any changes in wording and these will be used to raise the spectre of reasonable doubt. A wise pathologist keeps his thought to himself until the evidence is ready in its final form.

Later he offers advice about the truth that apparently, he feels does not apply to him, though he may not have realised, his admission about pathologists not always being right applies to him.

But evidence is evidence too, and the truth never changes, no matter how much people wish it might. Pathologists are certainly not always right and not even always unbiased

The conclusions arising from this.

In 2 instances relating to evidence TC prepared on the slide material he said firstly that it was poorly preserved. In one of those instances he later said 1 was adequately preserved – he’s gone from poor to adequate about the same material. On the other he said the cells on the slide were suboptimal (poor), later he dropped that description entirely. How can poorly preserved, sub optimal cells, be properly ‘air dried,’ as he claimed in both his book and in Court. They are either preserved or not preserved. His case notes say not preserved, his book and testimony in the first trial say preserved. Someone is cheating and perpetuating a continuing Miscarriage of Justice and according to Temple-Camp it is not him. Note that ‘air drying’ is not used in IHC analysis, however it is claimed by Temple-Camp that particles flying through the air are somehow air dried in the same manner using an air dryer in a control laboratory situation. Temple-Camp imposes chance of science, he scoffs out the basic science of recording all findings and keeping them to be provided to all personnel that may be involved in a trial including the Judge and the Defence. Temple Camp broke the rules, hid evidence and then claimed it was something that it was not according to his own notes. No surgeon, doctor, pilot, or scientist would do that because they have accepted the duty of faithful recording and telling the truth.

This point about air drying was made by T-C’s idol Dr Miller himself where in a talk he said the following:

Miller gave a talk about the handling of thin smears and he said “they have to be fixed immediately to prevent air drying. T-C said at trial one that tissue has to be fixed or else it is not possible to examine it and make a diagnosis.”  

At the PC and we finally get a picture of why TC had not been called at the retrial and perhaps the real reason he wrote a self-congratulatory book:

It was hard enough listening to the lawyer for Lundy pounding and shredding my credibility and my evidence, without feeling I was under scrutiny as it happened. I could only grind my teeth in frustration and wait on events.

I was really pleased the Law Lords had said my evidence was ‘trenchantly asserted’. It sure was, and I did so because I knew it was right. For all that meagre personal satisfaction, I was depressed by the outcome. I had genuinely expected the reason and logic of what we had put forward would prevail. ‘What will happen now?’ asked Victoria. ‘Does this mean that Mark Lundy will be acquitted?’ ‘No, there’ll be a retrial. We’ll have to go through everything all over again and a new jury will decide.’ ‘That’s terrible!’ Victoria said. ‘After all these years in jail and now to have another trial about the same stuff, all over again. Why not just let him go?’ ‘Well, it would be a much cheaper and easier option for us all,’ I agreed. ‘But I’m looking forward to a proper retrial for purely selfish reasons. I would like to know one way or another whether I was right or wrong."
"I'm looking forward to a proper retrial for purely selfish reasons. I would like to know one way or another whether I was right or wrong."
Finally T-C breaks free of the thin veneer he previously tried to cover his intentions with. The whole case is about him being right, not about the truth, or about Justice, about experts honestly and faithfully recording their observations rather than as he said above: A wise pathologist keeps his thought to himself until the evidence is ready in its final form.
I take that observation as meaning be careful what you record until you have thought about it. Does a scientist, examiner, or honest person not need to choose their words where doing a job for Justice, but just simply record what they see? Apparently not in T-C’s world.

On multiple occasions T-C echoed Miller's 100% certainty. Yet on the other hand he has described the Aunt Minnie method where you just know it is Aunt Minnie without hard science to support your sighting, to tell us it is brain (or Aunt Minnie). The ramblings of a dangerous idiot, that wants his ‘truth’ to emerge by keeping his thoughts to himself in it’s final, albeit manipulated, form.

So, which is it? Let a jury determine and settle for Dr Temple-Camp, or encourage Dr Temple-Camp to show truthfully his workings. Speaking about this above he says “keeps his thought to himself until the evidence is ready in its final form.” The shirt had no final form, it was as observed in the first instance, not something manufactured until it was “ready in its final form.”

For example at location 3974 he says

"Even medical students can recognise brain tissue at a glance".

So, let us put this together from his own words.

1. Even medical students can recognise brain tissue at a glance.
2. I'm looking forward to a proper retrial for purely selfish reasons. I would like to know one way or another whether I was right or wrong
Remembering that according to him it was brain but he couldn’t prove it, it was also poorly preserved and suboptimal at the same time as being ‘air dried.’  No wonder the man doesn’t recognize the opposing elements in his own logic and writing. He’s off his rocker on this.
Above where Temple-Camp is talking to his daughter (Victoria) who expresses concern for what Lundy has been through he still unable to grasp anything other than the importance of him being right. His whole book is about his being right despite not being called as a witness after his fall from grace for altering his observations from working notes to the form of evidence. For most people, honest people that is, notes form the basis of the truth, particularly where they are written observations of what was seen. Most people don’t need such observations to distil in silence and off the written page, but then again Temple-Camp is not most people. Earlier is mentioned his delight in phrasing the term psychological pathology. He might well have considered a more seasoned term pathological liar.
On a final note, I return to Doctor Pang and the remarkable changing times of death. Remember 7 to 7.15pm not a minute later for 13 years only to become from 6pm to 9am the following morning. Reminding readers again that T-C was Doctor Pang’s boss. Many people will have thought that Doctor Pang was pressured somehow to change his time of death, a reasonable conclusion taking into account how insistent he was about it prior to the retrial. I find it interesting that Temple-Camp found it necessary to agree with Pang’s new TOD (see previous blog below for full details as to stomach contents etc. per T-C.)
Temple Camp has said he accepted the evidence of Dr Sage at the retrial who gave the opinion that Christine and Amber were not prisoners in their own home, and could have snacked into the night and following morning as an explanation as to why digestion had not started according to Pang’s autopsy report. Temple-Camp was quite happy with that change, it was perfectly reasonable and a sharp thought or similar, according to him. But what he didn’t explain, as a father and parent himself, was if his own children as 7 going on 8 year olds were allowed, or indeed could get up at 1 am in the morning and feed themselves on McDonald’s already 7 hours old. Or if he knew any children who had done such a thing or parents that would allow that. Here I recall from evidence Amber’s grandmother talking about Amber as always in bed by 8 and like all 7 year olds a sound sleeper. That’s not from changed notes by the way.