Hunter who killed best mate wasn't negligent, court told

Bernard Lee

A Taupo man who shot dead his best friend when he mistook him for a stag was not negligent, his defence lawyer insisted in the Rotorua District Court yesterday.

Kevin Ryan, QC, was addressing the jury on the second day of the trial of Bernard Lee, 50, charged with careless use of a firearm causing the death of William Gillies, 55, in the central North Island on April 2 last year.

Lee was "an ordinary, humble, kindly New Zealander", Mr Ryan said. For more than a year he had had the "searing agony" of what happened waiting to be decided in court.

"He isn't the sort of person who doesn't care."

Lee was an experienced hunter and had been friends with Mr Gillies since they both completed electrical apprenticeships more than 30 years ago, his lawyer said.

"They weren't just mates, they were best mates." Their families had shared social occasions but, said Mr Ryan, "all that has gone because of this tragic matter".

He said the two hunters were following a predetermined safety plan they had used for years, where one stayed on high ground and roared while the other went down, flushed the deer out and generally took the shot.

If the animal ran off, the stalker came back to rejoin his mate using the same route by which he had descended. That way they each knew where the other man was.

Unfortunately, on April 2, 2005, in the Pureora Forest Park, Mr Gillies didn't follow the plan, Mr Ryan claimed.

"He forgot the golden rule of coming back the same way. Mr Lee had no reason to believe his mate was still there.

"There is no carelessness. It is a tragedy."

Mr Ryan's remarks, and his later direction to the jury to "ignore" giving consideration to the Gillies family, brought gasps of disbelief and tears from Mr Gillies' widow and her supporters in the public gallery.

The defence lawyer urged the jury of seven women and five men to disregard any emotion and consider the facts presented to them.

"The onus of proof in this trial doesn't rely on Mr Lee but on the prosecution. He is entitled to reasonable doubt. It doesn't matter what Mrs Gillies or the family think.

"It's all very well saying he should have identified his target. Nice words. But it's not carelessness."

Earlier, Lee broke down while giving evidence of scoping with his rifle what he was convinced was the stag the two men were hunting.

When he fired at what he thought was the deer's head he ran down and came across Mr Gillies shoes sticking out of the bush.

"I thought 'what the hell ... ' It was my mate," he said in tears.

Under cross-examination by Crown prosecutor Fraser Wood, Lee said he normally followed the safety plan, knowing how important it was.

He denied it was him, not Mr Gillies, who had broken the procedure by moving from his spot before his hunting companion rejoined him.

Lee said his mate would have known where he [Lee] was because Mr Gillies would have heard him roar.

Mr Wood: "Why did you take a shot when the plan was that Willie [Gillies] would take it?"

Lee: "Because the deer moved. Willie had missed the shot at that stage. A stag doesn't just stand there and say 'shoot me'. The plan changed when the stag moved."

Mr Wood: "You are essentially saying it was Willie's fault because he broke the plan."

Lee: "No."

He was adamant he had sighted antlers and a deer head before pulling the trigger, despite the rain and thick bush.

Having later rationalised what happened, he thought his hunting mate must have got between him and the stag in the split second before he pulled the trigger.

In his closing address to the jury, the prosecutor said it was difficult to see how shooting a hunting companion, mistaking him for a deer, was not careless.

Mr Wood said Lee broke "golden rules" of safety by failing to identify his target and failing to check his firing zone.

Judge Phillip Cooper will sum up this morning before the jury retires to consider its verdict.

- NZPA