Posts by Kyle Matthews

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  • Cracker: LOL,

    I remember those Ruby gigs as well - I only went a few times, but they seemed to be built on what was a really good capping show cast in 1996 (Y Files, I've been to every capping show since, please come back Jeremy, it hasn't been as good since).

    Since Nov 2006 • 6243 posts Report

  • Hard News: Claims,

    I think you've nailed it there, NI. It's funny how some people are saying that Robin was deranged. Right, so he was so deranged that he thought that David was the only one who "deserved to stay" (why not deserved to live?) and logged on to a computer when he could've written a note the night before. That's not including washing his clothes while David was on his paper run. As others have said, why did Robin - apparently wanting David to stay/live - leave behind evidence implicating David but not himself? One handwritten note and David would've been in the clear.

    I read Karam's book David and Goliath a number of years ago. To me it cast a reasonable amount of doubt on the police case, but it didn't put the case strongly enough that Robin was the killer. It was a stronger case for saying David shouldn't have been convicted than it was for proving Robin was the killer.

    I still could go either way on which of them did it. But the question of 'why Robin left David alive' isn't particularly relevant to me. For a person to kill his wife and three children, there's clearly something very fucked up going on there. The answer to leaving David alive could just be as simple as, once he'd killed four people, realisation struck him and he decided to kill himself, and left a message for David (it certainly wouldn't have been for the cops or the wider public) simply because David wasn't there, so didn't get shot. Or it could have been David who committed the crime, and the message on the computer was from the voices in his head. The same with the washing. If a person kills numerous members of their family, they're clearly fucked up enough in the head that the next thing they choose to do could be put some washing on. I'm not sure if we should apply 'sane logic' to the actions of people who slaughter their own family.

    I really don't think we'll ever know.

    Since Nov 2006 • 6243 posts Report

  • Hard News: What's on David Bain's iPod?,

    Russell, your link to the tv3 web site is broken. It's mangled the public address url in there as well. As is Dave's above to the Stuff website, but people can just copy and paste that in.

    John Campbell had the biggest grin on his face last night, and earlier in the day when he was part of the media scrum. Karam used the words cheshire cat a few times, but it applied to the interviewer almost as much. I was torn between feeling he should be more unbiased, and thinking 'good on you, media that actually doesn't pretend shit like that'.

    Since Nov 2006 • 6243 posts Report

  • Hard News: Claims,

    so how about, next time you see one in such a situation, how about you take it away and put it in the recycling bin? i'll promise to do the same... unless this can be proven as theft? is it theft if you throw a way a free copy?

    Otago Student magazine Critic got a very informal legal opinion on this in the mid-90s (informal as in, they phoned up a law lecturer and got an answer) when a whack job who had submitted a letter to the editor, and then went up to the Critic office after it had gone away to print demanding that they withdraw the letter (to which they said "too late"), grabbed a trolley and collected almost every copy of the newspaper on campus and ran away with them.

    The opinion they got was that it was theft. Just because something doesn't cost anything, doesn't mean that it doesn't have value, both to the people who it would be given to, and to the people who produce it. It was also affecting the business of the publishers and the advertisers who have paid to be in the paper.

    He was eventually convinced of this and handed over the bundles of precious newspapers.

    Since Nov 2006 • 6243 posts Report

  • Hard News: Claims,

    And yet he is presumably the source of the very specific detail about Broad watching and enjoying the film. Amazing.

    Exactly Russell. If he wants to sell his cake to Investigate, then he should be capable of fronting up and eating it when it comes back to bite him. Excuse me while I mangle my metaphors.

    How does this PI even attract clients any more? Can his reputation get any more shattered?

    Since Nov 2006 • 6243 posts Report

  • Hard News: Claims,

    If there was corruption going on then Investigate has 25 years of dirt (less however many years National was in power) to trawl through. This has legs, should not be let to run. Stopping it by complying with Wisharts wish is as likely the most effective solution and makes it a Labour Party initiative.

    I suspect the idea would have Labour Party political strategists reaching for the hard liquor.

    Any commission of enquiry of this sort is going to throw up some dirt and put a big spotlight on it. Might be a small amount of dirt, might be a fair amount. Especially when it has labels like 'sex' and 'corruption' and 'beastiality' in it, and its talking about police, it's going to be a really big exciting spotlight.

    Which is fine if you've just become the government and you want to look like you're cleaning out the other side's mess.

    However if you've been the government for eight years, then it's just going to look like your mess, and every story that it brings up the opposition gets to wave in front of you with '8 years they've been in charge, look who they've promoted to Assistant manager of whatnots in the police when 20 years ago they did this bad thing brought up by the commission'. It'd be dragged out in the media and lead in really nice to basically committing hari kari in the next election.

    But other than that, I'm sure Labour are keen on the idea!

    some mags have their masthead torn off, that's intentional and has something to do with something, you'd have to get a Media Buyer to elaborate on that.

    I believe these are magazines/newspapers that aren't sold. The seller gets money back if they return them to the publisher, but obviously it costs a lot of money to post back whole magazines, so they return a bit (when I've seen it, the bar tab) and keep the magazine. I presume the mag is supposed to be destroyed, and therefore shouldn't end up in doctors' waiting rooms, but who knows, maybe they can donate them elsewhere.

    Since Nov 2006 • 6243 posts Report

  • Hard News: The People's Choice,

    Hey...that's not the cute guy with the gap in his teeth that won Sale of the Century, is it?

    Well, up to you on the cute, but yes that's the same Hamish. And he won Mastermind as well.

    Since Nov 2006 • 6243 posts Report

  • Hard News: The People's Choice,

    . . . but if it were that simple, if they "knew" Watson had done it, why couldn't they just use that -- i.e. how they knew -- as evidence?

    My understanding (and I could be getting this wrong) was that he had been around and cleaned the entire boat. And not given it a tidy up and a wee wipe, cleaned it like someone does when they're trying to remove every scrap of forensic evidence. Bleach and several hose downs, and a repaint. The story of why he'd done these things didn't match common boat-ownership sense from memory.

    So by 'knew' I think the police knew because he'd done everything you do if you're trying to remove all the evidence of a double murder. You can't take 'there was no evidence so he must be guilty' to a court room however, hence the need to eliminate other potential suspects, and leave him as the only one who could have taken the two of them away. Then link that to the 'evidence of disposing of evidence' and hope the jury leaps between the two, and gets past the lack of bodies.

    He didn't get everything however - particularly the fingernail scratches on the inside of the hatch, which I assume would have required a new hatch to cover up. I think the things he missed, plus the elimination of any other potential suspects was enough to convince the jury.

    The police officer used to work in prosecutions, and he talked about a study that was done with juries that convicted criminals in serious crimes. He said it was amazing, no matter how much work you put into leading a jury through a trial by the nose, and how much work you put into painting the picture that you knew as a police officer - even when the jury agreed and convicted, if you interviewed them afterwards about what they thought had happened, lots of them came up with a scenario of events which not only didn't match the one that the police were trying to paint, but one that which was not supported by evidence and was often indeed impossible.

    Since Nov 2006 • 6243 posts Report

  • Cracker: LOL,

    Apparently the comedy fest isn't the only place he did it. Critic, in its review of M2 magazine, commented on his orientation show being the same as last year (and said some other things about him as well):

    http://www.critic.co.nz/online/view_article.php?issue=Critic2007_10&article=article57

    Since Nov 2006 • 6243 posts Report

  • Hard News: The People's Choice,

    Hey, my weird-o-meter started glowing when the Bain house was torched. I'm no legal eagle, but you do have to wonder whether any appeal is ever so slightly hampered when the crime scene is reduced to a pile of ash.

    Yeah, seeing it on the news last night reminded me that this happened only a couple of weeks after the murders. Obviously the police had finished with it then, but it's surprising that they would allow a crime scene of 5 murders to be destroyed before at least the main trial was done with.

    I'm astounded that the defence allowed it to happen, given the subsequent debates about footprints and glass lenses etc. Does anyone know/remember if David Bain chose for it to happen? I presume it was his house so he must have consented.

    A la Scott Watson -- no alibi? Tough luck. Mind you, when the media and the public are baying for a suspect and the police are under pressure for a result then it can be anyone within arm's reach without an alibi who gets his collar felt. I'm sure there are others inside who are victims of the same flawed system.

    I spoke to a police officer who was somewhat involved with this case while it was in process. He basically said "The guy is guilty, we know he's done this, he's just done a bunch of things to remove evidence (cleaning and painting the boat etc) so it's going to be hard to convict him."

    The way they had to get him was by eliminating everyone else that could have done it and then stacking up indirect evidence against Watson. The lengths they had to go to were fairly impressive - they built a database of every boat that was in that harbour over a 24 hour period using (among other things) photos collected from people on boats and walking around the tracks (this was how they proved that the water taxi driver was wrong about the type of boat that he took them out to). They contacted all the owners and eliminated all the other people that were there. Unlike CSI etc, sometimes convictions come from manpower and gruntwork.

    Did they get it right? Who can ever say that definitively? Sometimes they're wrong, but I suspect in murder cases, 90soemthing% of the time they get the right person.

    Since Nov 2006 • 6243 posts Report

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