Three men in their 20s had each pleaded not guilty to the violation of the same woman, following an incident in 2022 and were set to spend the next two or three weeks on trial at the Dunedin District Court.
However, after a stop-start two days, Judge Katie Elkin formally aborted the hearing yesterday with only 10 of the 12 jury seats filled.
"It’s the first time I’ve ever had this happen," the judge said.
She reassured those who had answered their jury-duty summons that it was not their fault that the process had collapsed.
"It was a consequence of other people not turning up," Judge Elkin said.
"Hopefully the experience has not completely disillusioned you about the system of justice."
On Monday, the trial appeared to be set to start smoothly after 12 jurors were empaneled and the judge had delivered her introductory address.
However, after a brief adjournment, one juror was unable to hear the case due to circumstances outside their control.
Judge Elkin had already dismissed the remaining members of the jury pool and so could not just simply replace the departing juror.
An option would have been to continue the trial with 11 jurors but the judge instead opted to reselect the jury yesterday.
However, a smaller number of people attended court than the previous day and after some prospective jurors were challenged by counsel and others stood aside by the judge because of their personal circumstances, there were not enough to fill the seats.
Judge Elkin acknowledged the trial’s disintegration would be a "real blow" to the defendants who had been on bail for a significant period.
"It’s not ideal for the complainant, it’s not ideal for anyone who has an interest in these proceedings," she said.
The trio were remanded on bail and a new trial date would be arranged.
While such issues are novel, there was an identical situation in Dunedin five years ago.
On that occasion, 11 jurors were selected before the supply ran dry.
Anyone summonsed for jury duty who is unavailable on the assigned date can have their attendance excused by the Ministry of Justice or have their service deferred until a later date.
Under the Juries Act, anyone outside those categories who is absent can be fined up to $1000.
Despite many people failing to answer their summons, fines have only been imposed very rarely.
