A Napier man expressed relief after a murder charge against him was thrown out by a High Court judge yesterday, and his lawyer indicated he is likely to claim compensation for 18 months spent behind bars.
Zion Hiona King, 48, a former food processing worker, had been accused of fatally stabbing neighbour Chattrice Maihi-Carroll, 46, in her home during January 2008.
The mother of four's body was found naked and two months later police arrested Mr King.
Yesterday, on the first day of a trial scheduled to last four weeks in the High Court in Napier, Justice Denis Clifford granted a defence application led by co-counsel Peter Williams QC to dismiss the charge.
Mr King, speaking outside the courtroom, said: "I am relieved alright, very much relieved."
Mr Williams told the court there was no forensic evidence offered against King, he had no relationship with the victim, and had always "vehemently denied" the charge.
The basis for the crown case was evidence of Mr King's former workmates at Hatuma Foods that he had told them about the death of his neighbour before her body was discovered.
Crown prosecutor Russell Collins said it was "unsafe" for the Crown to offer its evidence as a reliable basis for a jury to reach a verdict.
The first trial was aborted last June, with no evidence being heard and Justice Clifford declaring a mistrial.
Speaking to NZPA after the hearing, Mr Williams said the work of private investigators had helped undo the case against Mr King.
"I believe it was not a strong case to begin with. And over a period of time our investigators discovered further evidence which tended to confirm the account that the accused had given to police when he was interviewed.
"We had a group of witnesses who confirmed what the accused had said. Namely that he learnt from police about the murder when he went back home around the middle of the day, and when he went back to work he told people at work about it. That sequence was confirmed by a group of witnesses."
Mr Williams said conflicts between various witnesses' statements were not always black and white, but there had been a number of points on which accounts differed.
"Matters such as what he was wearing at the time. In the morning some of the witnesses said he was wearing the (work) overalls that were supplied clean every day. Whereas we were able to establish that the overalls had arrived late that day and he was actually wearing an apron. All that sort of stuff, what you might call circumstantial evidence, and eventually I think the Crown conceded that there were flaws in the evidence of the witnesses that they had formerly relied upon.
"For instance one witness said he had a bandage on his hand. Well he was actually photographed on one of those (security) videos on the way to work (when) he called into a garage on the way to work to buy a pie. And it was clear there was no bandage."
Mr Williams had also recruited a scientist to pursue DNA evidence and consulted with Bond University on the Gold Coast.
After his arrest, Mr King spent 18 months in Hawke's Bay Prison and Auckland's Paremoremo Prison before being granted bail in July last year.
Mr Williams said compensation was going to be investigated and would be discussed with his client "as soon as things settle down a bit".
"But I think a claim will be made."
He said the case being dismissed had brought great relief to Mr King "as one would expect having this hanging over his head all this time," but he was still upset.
"It's been a very stressful period and the stress won't go away immediately. It's been very disruptive of his life.
"At the time he was just settling down nicely. He had a good unit he was living at there and he was working hard and well respected in his job, earning good money. And then suddenly this whole thing erupted and obviously he's been put through the mill."
But the decision has left the victim's family dismayed and distraught.
"We've waited a long time to see justice done for our sister and what have we got," the victim's sister Papara Carroll told One News.
"Someone did do that to my daughter and we'd like it left open to try and find some clues to try and solve this," Ms Maihi-Carroll's mother Ripeka Carroll said.
The family wished someone would eventually be brought to justice for the murder.