KEY POINTS:
Joe Karam on why he couldn't turn his back on David Bain and about being depicted as a man obsessed.
Did your profile help or hinder Bain's cause?
The other people who are fighting various cases have not got anywhere near the traction I got and, to
some extent, that might be due to the fact that I was an All Black and, therefore, there has been more talk about the case. On the other hand, one of the reasons the media have found me such an enigma or puzzle is they can't understand how somebody who appears to have it "all", that is an All Black and money, would appear to be giving that up for some unfortunate convicted murderer. That's been a twist that has been a headline-maker but, unfortunately, although it has created publicity, from David's point of view it has been the wrong publicity.
Is it not sad that people find it odd for someone to help a person in a spot?
You'd have to say the greed factor is pretty strong in society. People are worried about the fat on their table and not too worried about whether there's any on the neighbour's.
You have indicated your marriage was coming to an end around the time of the Bain case. Were you looking for something to throw yourself into?
Absolutely not. [One article] described me as "an accident waiting for the Bain case to happen". I wasn't looking for anything. I read a small article in the Herald in 1996 with a photo of David's singing teacher and eight or nine of David's university and opera friends who were selling jam to raise funds for an appeal. I rang with a view to giving them a couple of hundred dollars and that's how I got involved. It's more than 11 years for me and 13 in June for David.
What emotions do you feel now?
It's bitter-sweet. I feel relief, I feel vindication. They [the Privy Council] haven't minced words, they said there was "a substantial miscarriage of justice" ... but there's nearly a generation gone by. My daughter, the youngest, who is 24, now has a baby. When this started she was 12. My three children are raw. They carry scars because they've had to bear the brunt of the Karam name: "Who the hell does that old man of yours think he is? Can't he leave it to the police? All those judges can't be wrong."
Journalist Bruce Ansley wrote in the Listener that after three weeks and 100 witnesses everyone was left wondering why David Bain would have done this. I then met his lawyer, Michael Guest, who was adamant there had been a miscarriage of justice. I met David and expected to find a pretty wobbly sort of guy who had a psychological disorder because that was effectively the picture painted of him and I met this straight-forward guy. It was a contradiction. I went to the police and said, "There might have been a bit of a blue here", and, basically, they put their fingers up at me and were planning to take the evidence to the dump. That's when the battle began.
