Ex-prison officer David Benbow (54) denies murdering Christchurch builder Michael McGrath, who disappeared on May 22, 2017.
Mr McGrath’s body has never been found - and nor has a murder weapon - despite widespread searches of rivers, waterways and the city dump.
Benbow’s defence team on Tuesday warned the jury at the High Court in Christchurch of ‘‘investigative bias’’ and ‘‘tunnel vision’’ from police early in their investigations who they claim were trying to find evidence to support their case.
The Crown alleged Benbow murdered his friend Mr McGrath just weeks after learning he was seeing his ex-partner Joanna Green and telling a counsellor he wanted to ‘‘annihilate’’ him.
It alleged Benbow lured Mr McGrath to his semi-rural lifestyle property in Halswell, south of Christchurch, on Monday, May 22, 2017 and used his .22 semiautomatic rifle, with suppressor and sub-sonic ammunition, to shoot him dead and then disposed of his body.
Younger brother Simon McGrath started giving evidence on Tuesday afternoon and continued yesterday, describing Mr McGrath as a gifted, hard-working builder, all-around good guy, and dependable ‘‘creature of habit’’.
Yesterday, Simon was cross-examined by defence lawyer Kathy Basire.
Given that Michael McGrath had lived amidst a protracted home renovation, stashed cash inside his walls, had $205,000 in his bank account and yet lived on a sickness benefit, not used a cellphone or home internet, hand-washed clothes and drove a car that was not registered or warranted, Ms Basire asked if it was ‘‘fair to say he operated outside of social norms’’.
He said his bachelor brother was ‘‘very frugal’’ and usually paid for things in cash.
Ms Basire also asked if he knew his brother had been diagnosed with social phobia or social anxiety around the time of the Canterbury earthquakes, when he had undergone an operation for varicose veins.
He replied that he had not known, but said that he might have opened up to other people.
Mr McGrath was ‘‘his own man’’, Simon told the court, but he never saw him as an anxious person.
The last time he saw him, Mr McGrath had seemed in high spirits, he said.
‘‘There wasn’t one part of me that thought he wasn’t his usual self . . . He seemed very, very happy.’’
He also admitted not knowing that Mr McGrath had been in a relationship with Ms Green, although he had ‘‘suspected something was up’’.
Mr McGrath had often joined his brother on Saturdays to watch rugby and socialise at a local pub but he had not been going much in the months leading up to his disappearance.
The court earlier heard how Benbow had allegedly been devastated after learning that Ms Green, his partner of 17 years, had taken their two children and left earlier in 2017.
On Tuesday, May 23, 2017, when Mr McGrath did not show up for the usual dinner at their mother’s house in Halswell, Simon thought it was unusual.
Within minutes, Ms Green had phoned his mother, saying she thought something had happened to Mr McGrath and that ‘‘Dave had done something’’.
After going to Mr McGrath’s house and not finding him home, Simon became increasingly concerned about his whereabouts.
Around 1am, he parked outside Benbow’s house and phoned him. It went straight to voicemail and he left, the court heard.
But the next morning, Benbow phoned him back, the court heard. Simon asked him about Mr McGrath’s whereabouts but claimed he did not make any accusations, but rather asked him some direct questions.
Later he questioned how Ben-bow had reacted after the disappearance.
‘‘I would assume if you’ve got nothing to hide you would come around with some concern,’’ Simon said.
Lead defence counsel Marc Corlett KC said on Tuesday that ‘‘within hours’’ of Mr McGrath’s disappearance, Ms Green had put the blame on Benbow ‘‘and the police duly obliged’’.
But despite teams of police spending thousands of hours investigating ‘‘trying to find any evidence they could to fit their theory’’, they could not find any, Mr Corlett said.
The trial, before Justice Jonathan Eaton, continues.
