Screening of murder confession banned

The public will never see a police video of the man acquitted of Katherine Sheffield's murder reconstructing how he believed he killed her.

Television New Zealand has been banned by the High Court from showing the video of Noel Rogers apparently confessing to killing Ms Sheffield, a tape never shown to the jury who acquitted him.

Rogers was acquitted of the 1994 murder of Ms Sheffield, 23, following a High Court trial this month.

In July last year, while he was in custody awaiting trial, police took him to Mangonui, where he took part in a video-taped reconstruction of her death.

The jury who acquitted Mr Rogers never saw the video because the Court of Appeal ruled police had breached Mr Rogers' rights to silence and to a lawyer in filming it.

The tape was given to TVNZ's Sunday programme by the officer in charge of the case, Inspector Jim Taare.

Following his acquittal Mr Rogers applied for an injunction against TVNZ showing the tape, which was granted by the High Court yesterday.

Justices Geoffrey Venning and Helen Winkelmann also ruled TVNZ must give the tape back to the court.

They said showing the tape would breach Mr Rogers' privacy and it was a "weighty matter" the tape had been obtained in breach of his rights.

They said it was reasonable to expect the video to be used at the trial but not by the media. "It would not be within the contemplation of any reasonable New Zealander that police would shortly after obtaining an evidential video tape and before trial, release that tape to the media."

They said police may have breached several regulations in handing the tape over to TVNZ.

"The piecemeal release of evidence before trial is highly undesirable."

Mr Rogers' defence at trial was his confession to Ms Sheffield's killing had come to him in a dream and he had confused the dream with reality.

Justices Winkelmann and Venning said it was a natural inference to be drawn that, by showing the video, TVNZ were either expressly or implicitly trying to question whether the jury might have reached a different verdict if they had seen the tape.

They said damages would not remedy any wrong done to Mr Rogers if the tape were shown.

In his affidavit Mr Rogers said he felt uncomfortable about returning to the Far North and showing the video would make matters worse for him.

"This will prevent me from starting life again and rejoining the community now that I am out of custody."

Mr Rogers is the second man to be charged with Ms Sheffield's killing.

His uncle Lawrence Lloyd was convicted of her manslaughter and spent seven years in prison before his conviction was quashed by the Court of Appeal last year on the grounds police believed that Mr Rogers had killed her.