R v Antonievic

The case of R v Antonievic involved multiple defendants facing various criminal charges, which were subject to applications under section 347 of the Crimes Act 1961. The High Court of New Zealand, Nelson Registry, presided over the case. The primary legal issue that the court had to address was whether there was sufficient evidence to proceed with the prosecution of certain charges against the defendants. The Crown had filed motions to dismiss specific charges due to a lack of evidence, which the defendants did not oppose.

The court's reasoning centered on the earlier judgments made by the judge, which concluded that there was insufficient evidence to support certain charges. Consequently, the Crown decided not to oppose the s 347 applications. The judge, Collins J, affirmed that a properly directed jury could not convict the defendants on the charges in question. This led the court to grant the applications to dismiss the charges. An exception was made for Mr Thompson concerning count 90, where the court granted his application to vacate his guilty plea and discharged him under s 347 of the Crimes Act 1961.

The court granted 116 applications to dismiss charges against the defendants as follows: Bashford, Chinnock, Daly, Friend, Griffiths, Kirkwood, Lee, Lloyd, Pahl, Patrick, Stacey, and Thompson had specific counts dismissed from the first indictment, while Antonievic, Daly, Friend, Griffiths, Kirkwood, Page, and Smith had specific counts dismissed from the second indictment. The Crown did not oppose these dismissals. The final outcome was that the charges specified in the schedule of the judgment were dismissed due to insufficient evidence.