R v Ross CA381/06

The Court of Appeal of New Zealand heard an appeal and cross-appeal in the case of The Queen v Craig Wilson Ross. The accused, Ross, was charged with rape, two charges of threatening to kill, and assault with a weapon. The central issue in this case was the admissibility of text messages exchanged between Ross and the complainant, as well as a video interview with the police. The Crown appealed against the ruling that the text messages were inadmissible on grounds of unfairness, while Ross appealed against the ruling that his video interview was inadmissible from a certain point onwards.

The Court of Appeal allowed the Crown's appeal against the ruling that the text messages were inadmissible. The Court found that the text messages were not unfairly obtained, as Ross was neither arrested nor charged at the time of the exchange, and there was no significant power imbalance between the parties. The Court also found that the police conduct did not warrant exclusion of the evidence.

The Court partially allowed Ross's appeal against the ruling that his video interview was inadmissible from a certain point onwards. The Court found that the video interview should be inadmissible from the beginning of page 38, tape 1 of the transcript, rather than from page 9, tape 2 as the lower court had ruled. This was because significant portions of the interview before page 9, tape 2, were also concerned with the alleged rape, and the accused was not adequately cautioned about the seriousness of the allegations at the outset of the interview.

In summary, the Court of Appeal allowed the Crown's appeal and granted the s 344A application by the Crown with respect to the text messages. The Court also allowed Ross's appeal in part and ruled the video interview inadmissible from the beginning of page 38, tape 1 of the transcript.