Stone v The Queen - [1989] HCATrans 177

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IN THE HIGH COURT OF AUSTRALIA

Office of the Registry

Adelaide No A6 of 1989
B e t w e e n -
ANTHONY WESLEY STONE

Applicant

and
THE QUEEN

Respondent

Application for special
leave to appeal

BRENNAN J
DEANE J
DAWSON J
GAUDRON J

Stone

McHUGH J

TRANSCRIPT OF PROCEEDINGS

AT ADELAIDE ON MONDAY, 21 AUGUST 1989, AT 2.45 PM

A1T9 /1/PLC

21/8/89

MR S.W. TILMOUTH: May it please Your Honours, I appear with

my learned friend, MR A.J. CROCKER, for the
applicant. (instructed by Ward & Partners)

MR D.H. PEEK:

If it please the Court, I appear with my

learned friend, MS R. STEEN, for the respondent.
(instructed by the Crown Solicitor for South
Australia)

MR TILMOUTH:

I hand up the written outline, Your Honours.

BRENNAN J: Yes, Mr Tilmouth?

MR TILMOUTH:

May it please Your Honours, the focus of this

appeal concerns directions that His Honour gave to
the jury in relation to a basis on which it could
approach its assessment of the Crown case and,
in particular, the basis in which it could deal with
certain alibi evidence which was given at the trial.
Now, before coming to the relevant parts of the

sunming up which I shall do shortly, the basis that
His Honour put to the jury which was different than
the Crown case arose in this way: Your Honours,
in the end result the applicant was charged only
on three counts - there was an order for severance
of the others - and that appears from the endorsements
on page 5. And those three counts related to a time
period between 21 April 1987 and 30 April 1987,
obviously nine days.
The case for the Crown was substantially based

upon a confession, a typed confession which was
signed by the applicant and which the Crown said it
could support by proving that certain things that
the applicant had said in that confession were true
and hence that the confession was a reliable basis
upon which the jury could find him guilty beyond
reasonable doubt. And in further particular the
basis of the Crown case here was, with respect to

each of the three armed robberies, that the applicant
drove a get-away vehicle which he had stolen earlier
on the day of the robberies. The evidence was that
each of the three get-away cars were stolen, probably

in the morning; each of the robberies was in the
early afternoon; and each of the vehicles in question
was a Commodore motor vehicle of a certain age - I
think it was about 1979 - which had been interfered
with and driven away in the same way. There was a
method of entering the car and interfering with the
steering mechanism which enabled the ignition to be
started.
Now, what the Crown said was that that disclosed

a similar fact basis on each of the thre~ counts
which it was put

Grounds of appeal

[14] The appellant contends that the primary judge erred in finding that the respondent had discharged the onus of establishing the matters required under the relevant provision.

[15] It was submitted that his Honour failed to give adequate weight to the evidence of the second witness, and that the findings of fact were not reasonably open on the material before the Court.

[16] The respondent, for its part, submits that no error is disclosed, and that the conclusions reached were well within the range of outcomes available to the primary judge.

Consideration

[17] It is convenient to deal first with the question of construction, as the resolution of that issue informs the remaining grounds advanced by the appellant.

[18] For the reasons that follow, we are of the view that the appeal should be allowed in part and the matter remitted for further determination.

Continue reading Stone v The Queen

Details

AGLC: Stone v The Queen [1989] HCATrans 177
Case: [1989] HCATrans 177
Decision Date

CaseChat Overview and Summary

The applicant, Stone, appealed to the High Court of Australia against a decision of a lower court. The dispute concerned the directions given by the trial judge to the jury regarding the assessment of the Crown's case, particularly in relation to alibi evidence. The Crown's case primarily relied on a signed confession made by the applicant, which it sought to corroborate by proving the truth of certain statements within the confession.

The central legal issue before the High Court was whether the trial judge's directions to the jury concerning the basis upon which they could assess the Crown's case, and specifically how they should approach the alibi evidence, were adequate and correct. The Crown's case, in relation to three counts of armed robbery, was that the applicant had stolen and then used specific Commodore motor vehicles as get-away cars. The Crown argued that the method of stealing these vehicles, all of a similar age and type, and their subsequent use in the robberies, established a similar fact basis for the charges.

The High Court considered the evidence presented, including the applicant's confession and the Crown's assertion of its reliability based on corroborating details. The applicant's legal team did not dispute that the three vehicles in question were indeed used as get-away cars and were stolen in a similar manner. The focus of the appeal, therefore, was on the judge's summation to the jury and how it guided their deliberations on the evidence, particularly in light of the alibi evidence.

Orders