Lawson v The Queen - [2014] NZCA 463

IN THE COURT OF APPEAL OF NEW ZEALAND

CA397/2013
[2014] NZCA 463

BETWEEN	RAWIRI DAVID LAWSON Appellant
AND	THE QUEEN Respondent

Hearing:	6 May 2014 (further submissions received 18 August 2014)
Court:	O’Regan P, Courtney and Clifford JJ
Counsel:	T Ellis for Appellant K A L Bicknell for Respondent
Judgment:	22 September 2014 at 11 am

JUDGMENT OF THE COURT

The appeal against conviction is dismissed.

____________________________________________________________________

REASONS OF THE COURT

(Given by O’Regan P)

Introduction

The appellant was convicted on charges of aggravated robbery and kidnapping after a High Court trial in Wellington before Mallon J and a jury. Mallon J sentenced the appellant to a term of imprisonment of eight years, with a minimum period of imprisonment of four years, nine months.[1] He was given a first warning under s 86B of the Sentencing Act 2002. The appellant appeals against conviction, but not against sentence.

Issues on appeal

[1]R v Lawson [2013] NZHC 1150.

The issues on appeal are framed by the grounds of appeal pursued in the hearing before us, which differed in some respects from those appearing in the notice of appeal. The six grounds of appeal before us were:
(a)Breach of fair trial rights because the appellant was stopped by a Department of Corrections officer from passing a note to his trial counsel during the closing address of the prosecutor.
(b)Wrongful admission of propensity evidence, pursuant to a decision of this Court on a pre-trial appeal.[2]
(c)Unfairness resulting from the Crown’s position in its closing address differing from that in its opening.
(d)Failure by the trial Judge to direct the jury adequately about the defence case that the culprit was actually another person.
(e)Unfairness resulting from the late withdrawal of one of the counts in the indictment, which inhibited the raising of defences by the appellant at trial.
(f)Unreasonable verdict.
[2]R v Lawson [2012] NZCA 540 [pre-trial decision].
We will deal with each of these grounds in turn. Before doing so we set out a brief summary of the facts.

Factual summary

The incident leading to the charges occurred in the early hours of the morning on 16 September 2011. At around 1.40 am an intruder smashed a window on the second floor of the Countdown Supermarket at Coastlands Shopping Mall in Paraparaumu. The broken window gave access to the office of the manager. An alarm was activated and staff investigated, but the intruder was not detected at the time.
Around 5.30 am on the same day, the supermarket’s cash officer arrived at work. She deactivated the alarm and went into the cash office to audit the money in the safe. The intruder then entered building through the broken window armed with a knife and wearing a stocking over his face. As the cash officer tried to leave, the intruder grabbed her and returned her to the cash office. He demanded that she open the safe. She did as instructed and the intruder took $18,070 in cash. He then took the cash…

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 Lawson v The Queen

Details

AGLC: Lawson v The Queen [2014] NZCA 463
Case: [2014] NZCA 463
Decision Date: 22 September 2014 at 11 am

CaseChat Overview and Summary

The Court of Appeal of New Zealand heard an appeal from Rawiri David Lawson against his conviction for aggravated robbery and kidnapping. The appellant was sentenced to eight years' imprisonment by Mallon J in the High Court at Wellington. The appeal was against the conviction only, not the sentence. The appellant raised six grounds of appeal, which were considered by O’Regan P, Courtney and Clifford JJ. The grounds related to alleged breaches of fair trial rights, the admission of propensity evidence, the Crown’s position in its closing address, the trial judge’s direction to the jury about the defence case, the late withdrawal of one of the counts in the indictment, and the unreasonableness of the verdict. The court considered each ground in turn and concluded that none of them had any impact on the trial or the verdict. The appeal against conviction was dismissed.

Orders