Exemplar Report - Caroline Byrne (Gordon Woods) PDF

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Exemplar report for the case report assignment...

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Exemplar 2 Written by 4 amazing PFS students in 2016

65242: Principles of Forensic Science Mid-Semester Assignment The Death of Caroline Byrne

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On June 8th 1995 Caroline Byrne was found at the bottom of the cliffs located at the popular lookout ‘the Gap’ in Watson's Bay Sydney. The previous day, June 7th 1995, Byrne did not show up to both work and an appointment scheduled. Several witness statements claim that Ms Byrne was seen in the area. One witness claimed seeing her arguing with two men near the Gap at approximately 10.30pm, and another stated that they heard a scream in the area at approximately 11.30pm that same night. In the early hours of the morning on the 8th of June, Byrne’s father and brother, along with Wood searched the area for Caroline. Wood claimed that he could see Caroline’s body, however, it was not until further police intervention that an official sighting of the body was made. Initially ruled as a suicide, no investigation into her death was made until May 29th 1996, when a coroner could not be certain that there was no foul play involved. In October 1998, the inquiry into Byrnes death was officially re-opened, with Byrnes boyfriend at the time of her death, Gordon Wood, being a major suspect. After being extradited from the UK in May 2006, Wood was put on trial for Byrne's Murder in July 2008. The first case that went to trial was dismissed, This was because of major discrepancies with the jury, where it was revealed that there were plans to re-visit the crime-scene at night and a jury member had disclosed this information to a local news radio station. This broke the Jury Act where; “A juror must not, except with the consent of or at the request of the judge or coroner, wilfully disclose to any person during the trial or coronial inquest information about: (a) the deliberations of the jury, or (b) how a juror, or the jury, formed any opinion or conclusion in relation to an issue arising in the trial or coronial inquest.” (Jury Act 1997 NSW s 68B) This resulted in the trial being thrown out and Wood being remanded for a trial at a later date. In August of that year, a proper trial went ahead. Here Wood was found guilty of Byrne's murder and sentenced to a non-parole period of thirteen years in prison starting on the 21st of October 2008. Landing Point and the Pool Experiments The landing point of Ms Byrne’s body was a main concern in this case, primarily how far out from the cliff her body landed and whether she landed there by jumping or being pushed. Before a coronial inquest in 1997, Physicist A/Prof Cross was questioned by police about the nature of the fall and whether homicide was a possibility. When A/Prof Cross was first contacted, it was believed that Byrne had landed 30m down and 9m out from the northern ledge of the cliff. After making brief calculations, he concluded that it would have been likely that Ms Byrne had jumped off the cliff herself, instead of being pushed (Cross 2014).

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A/Prof Cross then conducted his own experiments on the fall 6 years later, in late 2003, concluding that Byrne had jumped off the cliff, running at high speed outside the cliff’s safety fence. There was no further investigation by the police until 2004 when Sergeant Powderly, the police officer who recovered the body, was asked to point out the correct landing spot which was 11.8m away from the northern ledge, not the original 9m away from the cliff. (Cross 2014) A/Prof Cross then conducted several pool experiments to test whether Byrne could have jumped and landed in the correct landing spot using female police cadets and

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Exemplar 2 Written by 4 amazing PFS students in 2016 strong, male police officers. Conducting over 20 experiments, it was eventually concluded that Byrne could not have possibly landed so far out from the cliff, even when using a running start. Through his experimentation, A/Prof Cross concluded that in order for Byrne’s body to land so far from the ledge, she had to be ‘spear thrown’ by a relatively strong man. This conclusion accounts for the landing position of the body; head first with no significant injury other than head injuries (Cross 2014). Because of mistakes made by the police, information changed throughout the investigation and subsequently several recalculations had to be performed by A/Prof Cross. For example, information about Byrne’s landing point and also the height of cliff (25.4 not 30m) changed due to complacency on the police’s behalf. This information that was passed onto Cross regarding the landing spot was crucial in his investigations, as he relied on this to compose the bulk of his scientific findings. In A/Prof Cross’ examination of the nature of Byrne’s death, he had composed two questions that could not be concluded from the information he had received. 1. Why Byrne’s body had landed head first in the rock cavity without and substantial injury other than a head injury. 2. How the police knew the location of the body despite no photographs being taken. The A/Prof then went on to state that the police could not determine any answers to the questions he had made (Cross 2014).

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The Pool Experiments The experiments conducted by A/Professor Cross to recreate the death of Ms Byrne were one of the core pieces of evidence leading to the conviction of Mr Wood. However, these experiments were somewhat invalid, as they were performed in conditions which did not accurately represent those of the night and location of Ms Byrnes death (CCA 2012). A/Professor Cross composed a series of experiments where the running and jump speed of 13 female police cadets was measured with a run-up of 4.0-5.0 m. Additionally A/Professor Cross conducted experiments where female cadets were thrown by athletic male subjects into a swimming pool. A/Professor Cross calculated that for a woman of Ms Byrne’s weight and estimated athletic ability she would have to lodge herself or be lodged from the northern ledge at a speed of 4.5 m/s. Subsequently Cross concluded that it wouldn’t be possible for Ms Byrne to jump or dive to the alleged landing point and that the only possibility was that she had been thrown off the edge of the cliff (Cross 2014). Additional experiments of a similar nature were conducted by Professor Marcus Pandy at the University of Melbourne, although not as extensive as the experiments performed by A/Professor Cross. Professor Pandy reached the conclusion as opposed to A/Professor Cross that suicide could not be excluded. According to Professor Pandy’s results it was possible for Ms Byrne to gain a jumping speed of over 4.5 m/s and consequently land at the point 11.8 m away from the edge of the northern ledge. However, the validity of Professor Pandy’s results are arguable. Professor Pandy merely used two test subjects to determine the possible speed with which Ms Byrne could have lodged herself off the cliff. Moreover, the results produced from the experiments proved to be consistent with those of elite athletes and not with the alleged physique of Ms Byrne (Cross 2014). Notwithstanding the controversy, Professor Pandy’s results were subsequently deemed more reliable by the Appeal Judge (CCA 2012).

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Exemplar 2 Written by 4 amazing PFS students in 2016 The results presented by A/Professor Cross also contained controversy and met resistance in court due to the dissimilar conditions surrounding the recreations of the fall and the actual fall of Ms Byrne. A/Professor Cross claims that a man with the ability to bench press a least 100 kg could throw a woman of similar size to Ms Byrne the required distance to reach “hole A” (Cross 2014). These results, however, were obtained with an even run-up area in daylight and could only be applied if the victim wasn’t struggling. Conclusive evidence suggesting that Ms Byrne had been unconscious at the time of her death was never presented at the trial (CCA 2012).

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Witness Testimony Two key witness testimonies were presented by the prosecution regarding alleged positive identifications at two occasions of Byrne and Wood. On one of these occasions two witnesses also claim to have seen a second man in the company of the victim and defendant. Martin and Melbourne, upon being presented with a photo of Ms Byrne, claim to have seen her on the day of her death walking past their café in the company of two men. The first man was described as “tall and fair”, and the second man as shorter, with black hair in a ponytail and entirely dressed in black according to the notes officer Dally-Watkins composed on the day. Both men were subsequently presented with two photographs of Mr Wood and another man, Leigh, taken by Dally-Watkins at the wake of Ms Byrne. Wood was at this time dressed in a brown jacket. Dally-Watkins saw the two men and appreciated similarities between Wood and Leigh and the descriptions provided by the witnesses (CCA 2012). In November of 1997, when the inquest of Ms Byrne's death was initiated, Melbourne Positively identified Wood as one of the men he had seen on the day of Ms Byrne’s death among a gathering of people in the Coroner's Court, Wood was at that time wearing a brown jacket. In addition, Martin and Melbourne claimed to have identified the second man they witnessed in the company of Ms Byrne on the day of her death among the same group of people. However, the man they claim to have seen was not Leigh who they had previously suggested was the second man in the company of Ms Byrne (CCA 2012). Evidential Issues

There were various contributing factors and misconceptions that resulted in the issues presented in the forensic evidence. These factors included: a lack of communication, misunderstanding of the evidence and a considerable amount of time between the recovery of Byrne's body and Wood’s conviction, as well as other general discrepancies.

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The most crucial part of an investigation for forensic scientists is the events that take place at the crime scene. To build a strong case that explores all possible aspects of a crime, a substantial and detailed investigation needs to occur and traces need to be collected and analysed effectively to be classed as evidence. However, the construction of strong foundational evidence is not only contributed by the forensic scientists present, but by the various experts involved throughout the investigation. In this circumstance, the major role that police officers and investigators played in the beginnings of this investigation tainted the potential of the forensic evidence. (Vernon 2013) When recovering Byrne’s body, the officers present at the scene had already formulated opinions on the cause of death. Assuming suicide, based on the reports

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Exemplar 2 Written by 4 amazing PFS students in 2016 that Byrne had presented to a doctor with symptoms of depression, the infamous reputation of The Gap and the position of the deceased’s body. The preconceived idea of suicide is what lead to a staggered and lengthy investigation, which was aided by the accused as Wood insisted that it was indeed suicide for the first year after he death, as well as causing major discrepancies in the body and landing position - as no crime scene photography had taken place. The issue of a ‘suicide mindset’ is not unique to Byrne’s death. It is common that investigators at a crime scene will treat the scene differently if there were any prior notions to a suicide before attending. This also occurred in the investigation of the disappearance of Kellie Ann Carmichael. Carmichael disappeared on April 26th 2001, last seen leaving her baggage at a Katoomba hostel. When investigating, Police discovered that Carmichael had a history of schizophrenia and assumed her disappearance to be a suicide. “They even told us people come from all over the world to commit suicide here [Katoomba],". Mr. Carmichael has stated in an interview with the Daily Telegraph that any important evidence was lost the moment it was treated as a suicide. Carmichael’s case is still unsolved today. (The Daily Telegraph, ‘Police assumed Kellie Carmichael's death was a suicide’, 10/8/2009)

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The attitude of the police in Carmichael's case is a reflection of police investigators in Byrne’s death. It was not until 1997 that this case had enough grounding to speculate anything outside of a suicide. The resulting lack of evidence gathered by police, meant the interpretation of any forensic evidence submitted was majorly flawed, as there were no photos to document the landing spot. Sergeant Powderly, one of the main police officers involved in the case had identified the ‘wrong’ landing spot in a evidential video in 1996 and upon checking the site again in 2004, re-identified the ‘correct’ landing spot. This process had affected the way expert A/Prof Cross had conducted his forensic investigation and further undermined his presentation in the case. The long duration of this case meant that a justifiable execution relied on the strength of evidential documentation. The purpose of photographing a crime scene is to the cement evidence and provides reliable record of the scene. Because no photographs were taken of Byrne’s body. A/Prof Cross had to source out another reliable way to determine the landing site of Byrnes. The evidence presented by the prosecution to the courtroom was both disregarded and considered bias by the defence and the judge. This may be because of a lack of understanding towards proper scientific practices and the important role scientific findings play in reconstructing the events of a crime. The defence, in this case, misinterpreted the physics and main conclusions made by the forensic scientists, referencing only a book written by A/Prof Cross, which very briefly outlines the case and his findings through experimentation. “One might expect greater attention to detail to occur in a murder trial. Expert evidence in a murder trial may be subject to more intense scrutiny, although barristers are generally not well equipped to ask all the right questions or to understand all of the technical aspects of the evidence. As a result, some of the expert evidence presented at the trial that perhaps should be challenged may not be challenged at the time, although it may well be challenged several years later on appeal.” (Cross 2014)

The CCA in Wood’s later appeal did not consider any other, more thorough, reports written by A/Prof Cross on the case, meaning all findings the defence attempted to

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Exemplar 2 Written by 4 amazing PFS students in 2016 refute were understood on a relatively basic level of scientific knowledge. This is a clear example of how a lack of communication and understanding between any level of prosecution/defence can dramatically alter the court’s perception of science within forensics. The defence challenged the validity of A/Prof Cross’ findings in the appeal, stating that he “clearly saw his task as being to marshal the evidence which may assist the prosecution to eliminate the possibility of suicide and leave only the possibility of murder.” (Cross, 2014) The defence also questioned how deeply A/Prof Cross was involved in the case, suggesting he proceeded to take his own initiative in finding further evidence for the conviction of Mr Wood. It is clear that the role A/Prof Cross played as a forensic expert was misinterpreted by the courtroom. This misinterpretation is of a common occurrence in many legal cases, mostly due to a continuing failure to acknowledge the significance of forensic science and the failure of any higher body to enforce a standard that the judge/jury and legal experts have to have a certain scientific-based knowledge. For instance, R v Keir (Court of Criminal Appeal (NSW) 1996) The judge had to determine whether a prosecutor's fallacy had occurred during the previous trial and conviction of Keir. When reiterating what the forensic expert had stated about the DNA results of deceased in question, the judge misspoke the statistics.

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“...it is approximately 660,000 times more likely to obtain this particular DNA profile found in the bones if it comes from a child of... (the parents)... than from a child of a random mating in the Australian population”. The trial judge repeated to the jury the Crown’s submission, that there is a 660,000 to one chance that the bones are not those of the wife. His Honour was not asked to direct the jury against reasoning in this way.” (Case Notes on R v Keir Court of Criminal Appeal (NSW) No. 60092/00)

This is another example of the poor understanding a courtroom has on the details of forensic evidence and how easy it is for evidence to become misconstrued. The failure for the courtroom to understand or address the statistics in Keir’s case ultimately led to an appeal. “Judges’ illiteracy in science means that they are ignorant regarding certain premises that are essential to modern judicial discourse” (Faigman, 2006) Similarly, The ‘physics of Byrne’s fall” presented in Wood’s case was extremely detailed and required a level of scientific literacy in physics to understand and process the likelihood of each outcome. There were multiple aspects of A/Prof Cross’ findings that were not addressed in the case. This was largely due to the Judge, Justice Barr disregarding the nature of any scientific findings and the probabilities associated with it. “Those lacking scientific training make the critical mistake of thinking of scientific knowledge as categorical or certain. “ (Faigman 2006) Justice Barr however, commented on the impact the time frame had on the case “things moved as slowly as they did between 1996 and 2004 because the police had no firm idea of what their case was… the resulting ten-year delay was the responsibility not of the offender but of the investigating authorities” (R v Wood (2008) NSWSC 1273), noting the effect this would have had on the ability for any forensic expert to interpret the evidence and how any information from the crime would be challenging to re-adapt and address at a significantly later date.

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Exemplar 2 Written by 4 amazing PFS students in 2016 Witness testimony

The circumstances under which the witnesses’ testimony was gathered creates significant issues leading to potential prejudice against the defendant. Melbourne and Martin provided a description of the two men they saw with Ms Byrne on the day of her death, subsequently they were presented with only one set of photographs of Wood and Leigh, as opposed to an array of photographs of different men with similar descriptions incorporating the pictures of Wood and Leigh. The impact that this issue had on Martin´s and Melbourne´s testimony is shown by the increased recurrence of Mr Wood´s brown jacket. As stated above, there was no mention of the brown jacket in the initial witness statements collected by Dally-Watkins. The jacket was first introduced on the photo of Wood that Dally-Watkins presented to Martin and Melbourne after Ms Byrne´s wake. Following this event Martin identified Wood in the Coroner's Court where Wood was wearing the brown jacket. Subsequently, when Martin and Melbourne gave their testimonies in court the original descriptions of the two men had changed significantly. Both Martin and Melbourne recalled the “tall and fair” man to have worn a brown jacket similar to the defendant´s.

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Similar fallacy can be observed in the case R v Blick where the victim of a robbery, Mr Smail who had previously described the robber with a goatee, was asked to identify the robber in an array of photographs where the accused was the only man in the photographs with a goatee (R v Blick [2000] NSWCCA 61). Reform or repercussions of the case Following Wood’s conviction, he was incarcerated in Goulburn prison in 2008 and remained there for four years. In August 2011, he lodged an appeal and the Court of Criminal Appeal overturned the charge and entered a verdict of acquittal in February 2012. It was the conclusion of the Chief Justice that the verdict of the jury in the original trial could not be supported having regard to the evidence and, as ...