Auckland police won't prosecute ex-detective turned private eye over illegal surveillance

A former private investigator and cop who admitted he illegally placed a tracking device under the car of a woman who was later murdered won't be prosecuted, police say.

Jun "Jimmy" Jin, an ex-detective turned private eye, was enlisted by Fang Sun to tail his business partner Elizabeth Zhong.

Police say detectives looked at charging Jin, who removed the tracker from a car containing Zhong's body the day after the murder, but found the threshold for prosecution was not met.

Sun was convicted in June of murdering Zhong in a brutal attack at her Sunnyhills home in east Auckland.

During the trial at the Auckland High Court, Jin appeared as a witness and admitted he was knowingly breaking the law when he secretly installed the GPS tracker under Zhong's Range Rover.

Early on November 27 an embittered Sun killed Zhong by stabbing her more than 20 times, nearly severing her head.

He then stuffed her body into the boot of her Land Rover, drove it around the corner and fled.

Although Jin had spent hours parked outside Zhong's home, he was not there on the night of the murder, he told the court.

The morning after, he took a call from Sun saying the area around the Sunnyhills home was crawling with cops.

"He advised me not to go over there," Jin testified.

But Jin, a 19-year veteran of the New Zealand police who spent years as a detective in Auckland, did not want officers to find his illegal tracker.

He checked an app on his phone and saw the vehicle was parked around the corner from Zhong's home.

When he arrived at the scene he saw police - then unaware Zhong's body lay wrapped in a blanket in the boot - dusting the car for prints.

Jin waited until the police left then walked to the car, knelt down and removed the tracker.

Regulations governing private investigators say a tracking device can only be installed on property where the rightful owner of the property has consented to its installation.

Jin told the Herald on Friday he acknowledged his act broke the law and he was no longer working as a private investigator.

"It wasn't legal," he said.

"You need consent."

Detective Inspector Shaun Vickers, of Counties Manukau CIB, said police staff on the Zhong case, dubbed Operation Attina, reviewed the Jin matter but did not lay charges.

"Police apply the Solicitor-General's prosecution guidelines when considering possible charges as part of any investigation," he said.

Former private investigator Jun Jin will not be prosecuted by police. Photo / Supplied

"In this particular case, police took all the available information into account and concluded that the test for prosecution was not met."

Sources working in private investigations in Auckland said the Zhong case ruined Jin's private investigation career.

The unlawful use of surveillance trackers used to happen now and then at some firms but the admission from Jin at the trial had made private investigators wary of the practice.

"After that, everyone's scared to do it," a source said.

Trackers are understood to be frequently used in matrimonial private investigation cases.

If a car is jointly owned, one party can consent to its installation.

The Solicitor-General's guidelines say two tests need to be met before a prosecution is brought: the evidential test followed by the public interest test.

The first test requires credible evidence on which an impartial jury or Judge could be reasonably expected to convict.

If that test is satisfied, the public interest test must then be met.

The main requirement for the public interest test is the seriousness of the offence, while prosecutors must also take into account whether there are grounds to believe the offence is likely to be committed again.

Jin said he is no longer working as a private investigator.

The public register of private investigators and security personnel shows his PI's licence expired in February last year.

However, he remains director of JJ Global Immigration, an immigration advisory service.

Jin holds a current immigration adviser licence.

Duncan Connor, the registrar of immigration advisers, said it had received no complaints about Jin and does not have any information to suggest he would be classified as a prohibited person under the Immigration Advisers Licensing Act.

Jin started as a police officer in New Zealand in the late 1990s.

He was a member of the then Asian Crime Squad in Auckland by 2000 and later worked in the Mangere CIB as a detective.