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Three News
The family of Christchurch businessman Peter Maxwell Stewart remains convinced of his innocence despite the Court of Appeal yesterday upholding sex convictions against him. Stewart was jailed for three-and-half-years in the High Court in Christchurch last December after being found guilty of five charges of indecency with a child under 12 years, one count of sodomy, and one count of rape. The sex offending by the 62-year-old son of Christchurch plastics magnate the late Sir Robertson Stewart and husband of New Zealand Fashion Week owner Pieter Stewart dated back 40 years. His brother, Mark Stewart said the family remained convinced of his innocence and would explore all options to fight the convictions. Stewart appealed on the grounds that the trial was unfair, but the appeal was yesterday Stewart appealed on the grounds that the trial judge, Justice Graham Panckhurst, erred, in admitting, and then in directing the jury about how it could use evidence from friends of the victim about lesser sexual offending against them. He also said the judge should not have permitted the prosecution to present in re-examination prior out-of-court statements made by witnesses, and erred in the directions given as to how they might be used, especially the lack of any warning as to reliability. Stewart's defence counsel also said the judge should have given the jury a stronger warning of the danger of convicting after so long a period. The judgment cited evidence from other young witnesses that Stewart had also touched them. Dismissed the appeal Justices Baragwanath, Wild and Heath in a 38-page Appeal Court judgment said they had examined the summing-up with care. Subject to challenges discussed in the judgment, they said it covered "all topics required to inform the jury as to their task and makes plain the nature of the defence case as it does that of the Crown". "We consider that given the total context of the summing up, with its directions as to onus and standard of proof, the error would not have misled the jury. "Nor do we consider that, taken as a whole, there is any imbalance in the directions, which made clear to the jury both their legal obligations and, as we have noted, the nature of the defence." |
