Slain woman's clothes excavated from long-drop toilet, court told

Katherine Sheffield

Police have recovered the clothes that slain Northland woman Katherine Sheffield was wearing the night she was killed 10 years ago, a bail hearing in the Auckland District Court heard yesterday.

The clothes were excavated from the bottom of a long-drop toilet, where they had lain since 1994, and are undergoing forensic tests.

The Crown maintains that Noel Clement Rogers murdered Ms Sheffield, 23, and let his uncle, Lawrence Lloyd - who was wrongly jailed for the September 1994 killing - take the blame.

Rogers was yesterday refused bail at the Auckland District Court by Judge Avinash Deobhakta.

Rogers, 31, of Whangarei, is also accused of raping Ms Sheffield the previous year.

Rogers' uncle, Lawrence Lloyd, was convicted of Ms Sheffield's manslaughter. He was released after serving seven years of his 11-year sentence, still claiming his innocence.

Mr Lloyd was charged after he woke up beside Ms Sheffield's body and buried her at a Northland farm.

His conviction has been quashed by the Court of Appeal which ordered a new trial.

At Rogers' bail hearing yesterday, Public Defender Michael Corry said that there was ample precedence for someone on a homicide charge to be granted bail.

Mr Corry maintained that the evidence was thin and the police had decided to bolster their case by adding the rape charge.

He said the allegations were denied.

Mr Corry said that his client would abide by any conditions set by the court.

It was a novel and unique case where two men now faced charges independently in respect of Ms Sheffield's death, he said.

Crown prosecutor Steve Haszard said it was not clear what charge Mr Lloyd might face, though there was the issue of burying the body.

Mr Haszard told Judge Deobhakta that Mr Lloyd woke up and found Ms Sheffield dead beside him, her throat cut and stab wounds to her neck.

"He was of the belief that he must have done it," Mr Haszard said.

Provocation was run as a defence and that was partly successful, as Mr Lloyd was convicted of manslaughter, not murder. Mr Haszard said it had since become clear that Rogers was present at the house that night.

"While Mr Lloyd was unconscious on the ground, it was he, Rogers, who has killed the deceased."

Mr Haszard said that Rogers then cleaned up the scene, changed the dead woman's clothes and threw them down a long-drop on the property.

He said it was simply too risky for Rogers to be released on bail.

Rogers faces a depositions hearing in February.