Judge Chosen to Investigate Compensation Claim
A judge has been chosen to investigate David Bain's application for compensation for the 12 years he spent in jail as a result of his 1995 conviction for murder. The person chosen is retired judge Ian Binnie from Canada. He will begin this year and has indicated will come to New Zealand next year to interview selected parties.
The judge has a number of tasks:
- Determine if the case meets criteria for extraordinary circumstances given that the claim falls outside the normal compensation guidelines.
- Determine if David Bain is innocent on the balance of probabilities
- Determine if a compensation payout is in the interests of justice
Judge Binne wrote a letter to the editor of the Dominion Post outlining the reasons why he needs to read Karam's book David & Goliath, as follows:
""The documents provided to me by the Justice Ministry included the joint report of the Police Complaints Authority and the Police Commission. That document was explicitly written in response to Karam's book, David and Goliath. It seemed to me obvious that to understand properly the response by the authorities, I ought to have the original book containing the allegations being responded to."
"It is important to emphasise that Bain is not represented in the enquiry by a lawyer. His official spokesman is Karam. His books are, as background, the clearest indication presently available to me of the position likely to be put forward on Bain's behalf. ...The process to be followed is that Bain, through Karam, will make submissions outlining the arguments and information on which his claim relies. The arguments will then be addressed by the Crown. Both sides will be put and considered. Accordingly, the "volumes written by anti-Bain campaigners" will be relevant to my inquiry only if the Crown adopts them in its submissions."
Newswire:
A Dunedin legal expert reports that the threshold is very big
David Bain's former counsel calls for David Bain to be allowed Legal Aid