The man accused of the macabre "wheelie bin" murder of his wife in Auckland in 1998 has lost an appeal against his conviction.
John Federici was alleged to have strangled his wife Jennifer, partly dismembered her body, put it in a wheelie bin and driven with it for about 2300 kilometres around the North Island disposing of it and other evidence in remote locations.
He was caught at Auckland Airport, trying to leave New Zealand. In 1999 he received a life sentence.
In a judgment issued yesterday, the Court of Appeal dismissed his appeal against his conviction.
It rejected grounds that the jury should have been told about the defence of provocation even though Federici's defence had been lack of murderous intent, that the prosecutor had not been fair, and that the trial judge had not properly summed up to the jury at the end of the case.
The court said some of the photographs shown to the jury were horrific and unnecessary, or emotive, but that no miscarriage of justice resulted.
It also thought some evidence of Federici's previous bad conduct was "marginal", including that he stole a textbook and police thought he was hostile, but for the most part it was relevant.
Federici's first appeal was dismissed in 2000 without a proper hearing.
Later court decisions found that the process followed in his appeal, and many others, was wrong and as a result he had a second appeal.
- nzpa
Appeal by convicted ‘wheelie bin’ killer dismissed
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