Andrew Mallard

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Andrew Mallard is a West Australian who was convicted in 1995 and sentenced to life imprisonment for the violent murder of Pamela Lawrence on May 23, 1994. The evidence used in Mallard's trial was scarce and obscure, and it was later revealed that the police withheld vital information from his defence team. Almost twelve years later, and only after a High Court appeal, his conviction was quashed, a re-trial ordered, the charges against him dropped and Andrew Mallard released.

1 Evidence at the Trial
2 Investigation
3 High Court Appeal
4 Documentary
5 Latest Developments
6 External links

[edit] Evidence at the Trial

Mallard was convicted chiefly on two pieces of evidence. The police detectives has taken notes during interviews with Mallard in which they claimed he had confessed. These notes were not signed by the accused. Secondly, a video of the last twenty minutes of Mallard's eleven hours of interviews was submitted. The video shows Mallard theorising on how the murderer might have killed Pamela Lawrence, but police claimed it was a confession spoken made in the third person.

Mallard had no history of violence. No murder weapon was ever found. No blood was found on Mallard, despite the extreme violence of the murder and the crime scene being covered with it. No DNA evidence was produced. He was convicted solely on the confessions supposedly obtained by the police and the bizarre video. In 1996, Mallard's Supreme Court appeal was dismissed.

[edit] Investigation

In 1998, Mallard's family enlisted the help of investigative journalist Colleen Egan, who in turn managed to get John Quigley MLA and Malcolm McCusker QC involved. All were appalled at the manner in which Mallard's trial had been conducted and eventually came to be convinced that he was innocent. Based on fresh evidence uncovered by this team, including a raft of police reports that, against standard practice, had never been passed to the defence team, the case was returned to the Court of Criminal Appeal in June 2003. Despite the fresh evidence and an uncontested claim that the DPP had deliberately concealed evidence from the defence, the Court of Criminal Appeal again dismissed the appeal.

[edit] High Court Appeal

In October 2004, Mallard's legal team were granted special leave to appeal to the High Court of Australia and on September 6 and 7, 2005, Mallard's appeal was heard in the High Court and the Justices subsequently judged unanimously that his conviction be quashed and a re-trial be ordered. During the hearing, Justice Michael Kirby was reported to have said that on one of the pieces of evidence alone - a forensic report, not disclosed to the defence, showing that Mallard's theory about the weapon used in the murder could not have been true - a re-trial should have been ordered.

The DPP decided not to go to a re-trial, dropped the charges against Mallard and, after almost twelve years in prison, he was released on February 20, 2006.

[edit] Documentary

A documentary called "Saving Andrew Mallard" was produced, focussing on Mallard's family, their struggle to have him freed, the deception undertaken by the original Police investigation team and the evidence uncovered that eventually led to Mallard's freedom. It was first aired on Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) Television on May 4, 2006.

The documentary's epilogue noted that the DPP still consider Mallard a prime suspect in their investigation.

[edit] Latest Developments

On May 12, 2006, five police officers were stood down by the West Australia Police commissioner in relation to the original investigation into the murder. It was also revealed that police have "a significant new piece of evidence" and that a new person of interest had been identified.

Simon Rochford was named as a prime suspect after new technology had been used to match his palm print to a previously unidentified palm print that had been found at the site of the murder. The 38-year-old was serving a life sentence for the bashing murder of his girlfriend in 1994, just two months before Mrs Lawrence was killed.

The body of Simon Rochford was discovered in his Albany Maximum Security Prison cell by prison guards at about a 7:45am AWST on May 19 2006, just hours after he'd been named as a person of significant interest in the Pamela Lawrence investigation.

On 11 October 2006 the Western Australian Police Commissioner announced that the cold case review was complete, that Andrew Mallard was no longer a person of interest in relation to the case and that there was sufficient evidence to implicate Simon Rochford that if he had still been alive the police would have prepared a Brief of Evidence for the WA Director of Public Prosecutions.

The Police Commissioner apologised to Mallard for any part the police had played in his conviction. and the Premier indicated that the government would be considering compensation, though the Attorney General indicated that no decision could be made until the Commission on Crime and Corruption had completed its investigation.

The Commission on Crime and Corruption announced that it was studying the report of the cold case review and would be holding public hearings in 2007. In the meantime it had asked the police not to release full report either to the public or within the police force and in particular ensure that police involved in the original investigation had no access to it.