Acquittal deepens murder mystery

So who did murder 23-year-old Katherine Sheffield?

Eleven years after she was killed in Mangonui, Northland, a second man, Noel Clement Rogers, has walked free after being acquitted of her murder.

After the verdict was read in the High Court at Auckland, Ms Sheffield's sister shouted, "Who killed Kathy then?" while other family members burst into tears, some yelling "murderer" and "rapist" as they left the court. A line of police kept the Sheffield and Rogers families apart as they filed out.

Two men have now gone to court over her murder and neither has been legally identified as her killer.

In 1995, Rogers' uncle, Lawrence Lloyd, was convicted of her manslaughter and served seven years of an 11-year sentence.

He admitted cutting Ms Sheffield's throat because she had stolen his cannabis. But after his release, his conviction was overturned by the Court of Appeal last year.

The appeal was sought on the basis that police believed Rogers was responsible.

Now Rogers has walked free after the jury found him not guilty at 7.10 last night, after retiring at lunchtime on Thursday. His lawyers argued Lloyd was indeed the killer and that any admission Rogers had made about the killing had been because he was confused by a vivid dream.

The trio had been drinking and smoking cannabis at Lloyd's house on the night of the killing.

Ms Sheffield, a country girl, had lived briefly with Lloyd and when they broke up, she moved into a caravan in a remote part of Northland.

When she went missing, family feared the worst, as it was unlike her to disappear. A month later, on September 21, her body was found in a shallow grave close to Lloyd's home.

In a depositions hearing in February this year, police said Rogers believed he stabbed Ms Sheffield in the stomach then cut her throat.

- Additional reporting: Derek Cheng