New Zealand Case Law: Decisions & Judgments

Topic

Admissibility of electronic communications

Legal area

Court

5 Oct 2020

CUREL v R [2020] NZCA 473

Citation

[2020] NZCA 473
Court

Court of Appeal

The Court held there was no miscarriage of justice: the attempted but undelivered texts were probative of the complainant's state of mind and, although better left admitted, their partial exclusion was moot because defence achieved its evidential purpose via other texts and cross‑examination; the Crown's submissions cautioning against imposing lay expectations were proper rebuttals of defence inferences and did not require expert evidence; the judge's directions warning against speculation were appropriate and did not unfairly denigrate the defence overall; the naming convention criticism was…
21 Sept 2017

FENWICK v R [2017] NZCA 422

Citation

[2017] NZCA 422
Court

Court of Appeal

Leave to bring a second appeal was declined because the Court concluded Davison J properly conducted the s 30(2) balancing exercise and, although he found the first production order was improperly issued, exclusion of the text messages would be disproportionate to the impropriety; any error in treating police good faith did not materially affect the outcome and there is no real risk of a miscarriage of justice warranting a second appeal.
29 Mar 2017

R v FARQUHAR [2017] NZCA 95

Citation

[2017] NZCA 95
Court

Court of Appeal

The Court held the Facebook messages were admissible because they demonstrated repeated sexualised interest in the complainant specifically, making them highly probative of motive and explaining the accused's conduct and police interview; any prejudicial effect was co‑extensive with that probative relevance and therefore not illegitimate, so the Judge erred in excluding the messages and the evidence must be admitted at trial.

New Zealand Case Law

CUREL v R [2020] NZCA 473

FENWICK v R [2017] NZCA 422

R v FARQUHAR [2017] NZCA 95