R v Mason CA340/05

The Court of Appeal of New Zealand heard the appeal of Adrian Nicholas Mason, who was convicted of importing into New Zealand a controlled substance, pseudoephedrine, and sentenced to three years imprisonment. The appellant appealed against both the conviction and the sentence on the basis of a claimed miscarriage of justice. The appeal grounds included the failure of trial counsel to present evidence that the appellant was expecting an EFTPOS machine and, therefore, accepted the parcel from a customs officer posing as a courier driver. The appellant also challenged the directions given by the trial judge regarding the standard of proof. However, the appeal was ultimately allowed on a different ground that was raised by the Court itself, namely the prosecutor’s misstatement of the law on importation in their final address to the jury.

The legal issues before the Court of Appeal were whether the trial counsel's failure to present certain evidence and the judge's directions on the standard of proof resulted in a miscarriage of justice. However, the Court did not need to address these issues as the Crown conceded that the appeal had to be allowed on a different ground. The Crown accepted that the prosecutor had misstated the law and that the trial judge had not sufficiently corrected this error in their summing up. The Court focused on the need to clarify when the importation of the substance had ended, as this was a critical factor in determining the appellant’s involvement.

The Court of Appeal allowed the appeal, quashed the conviction, and directed a new trial. The Court emphasized that the importation of the substance had ended once the decision was made to retain it in Customs' custody. The jury needed to determine the exact time of this decision to fix the end point of the importation process. The prosecutor's final address had misstated the issues for the jury’s determination, focusing on the appellant's knowledge at the time of delivery instead of his involvement prior to the decision to retain the substance. The trial judge's summing up did not sufficiently correct this error, leading to a potential conflict and misleading the jury. This misdirection constituted a miscarriage of justice, necessitating the quashing of the conviction and the ordering of a new trial. The appellant was remanded on bail pending the new trial with specific bail conditions.