New Zealand’s solicitor general has asked for an investigation into what part the Crown played in one of the country’s most significant miscarriages of justice – making it the first time in the country’s history that Crown law has turned investigators on itself.
On Wednesday the supreme court quashed Alan Hall’s murder conviction, for which he spent 19 years in prison, after it found there had been a substantial miscarriage of justice when key evidence was not disclosed in the original trial – something the Crown itself acknowledged was wrong.
The nearly four-decade fight to clear Hall’s name over the killing of Arthur Easton has come at a substantial cost to Hall and his family. Hall’s mother sold the family home in Papakura to pay for investigators to clear her son’s name, but died in 2012, before she could see justice carried out.
Hall’s legal team will now pursue compensation, which if successful, could become the biggest of its kind in New Zealand.
On Thursday, the solicitor general, Una Jagose QC, announced she had commenced an investigation, saying she takes the “significant miscarriage of justice very seriously”.
“I am determined to find out why and how Mr Hall, Mr Easton, and both their families have been so severely let down by the justice system.”
Hall, who has autism, and is pākehā – or European descent - was convicted at age 23 of the murder of Easton in his Papakura home in 1985. But witness testimonies were tampered with, and a description of a man leaving the crime scene as “definitely dark-skinned” was removed from the testimonies. The Crown also acknowledged that police interviews with Hall were “unfair and oppressive”.
Chief Justice Helen Winkelmann told the court it was a trial gone wrong, that there had been a substantial miscarriage of justice and Hall should be acquitted, according to reports from national broadcaster RNZ. She said it was clear that justice had seriously miscarried – either from extreme incompetence, or a deliberate strategy to achieve a conviction.
Jagose has called in Wellington barrister Nicolette Levy QC to investigate how the miscarriage occurred and “why the criminal justice system failed to remedy it earlier”.
Hall’s lawyer, Nicholas Chisnall, commended the solicitor general for acting quickly and said he was “heartened” that they have appointed Levy due to her “reputation for fearlessness” and that she “won’t pull her punches if she finds something that leaves the Crown open for criticism”.
The previous highest compensation payout in New Zealand’s legal history was awarded to Teina Pora, after the Privy Council quashed his rape and murder conviction in 2015. Pora, who spent 21 years in prison for crimes he did not commit, was paid NZ$3.5m (£1.8m).
Chisnall was reluctant to put an exact figure on how much compensation Hall would seek, but said if successful the sum would exceed that of other cases “by a very wide margin”.
“When Mr Pora’s case was decided, it was $100,000 a year, now it is $150,000. The other thing is it’s based not only on years incarcerated but years convicted, including on parole, and just simply by virtue of the fact it has been over 30 years demonstrates that [sum would be higher].”
