Joseph Douglas McGirr outside Christchurch District Court at an earlier court appearance. Photo / George Heard
A Christchurch engineer convicted for hiding the clothes of a US polo star after she died at his hillside mansion has had his final appeal thrown out by the highest court in New Zealand.
Joseph Douglas McGirr was found guilty of attempting to pervert the course of justice at a district court trial in November 2020.
It related to the death of Lauren Biddle, who died suddenly, most likely of a drug overdose, at McGirr's Clifton property on October 22, 2018.
He was cleared of supplying the 22-year-old the Class-B controlled drug MDMA, also known as ecstasy, but was found guilty of burying her clothes and belongings.
Judge Tom Gilbert sentenced McGirr to 20 months' imprisonment and later cancelled the jail sentence and substituted it with eight months of home detention so McGirr could spend a month at a residential rehab programme before another five to six months in sober living support accommodation.
McGirr challenged his conviction at the Court of Appeal, arguing that the judge misdirected the jury as to the grounds for conviction and erred in ruling the proposed evidence of a medical expert inadmissible.
But the Court of Appeal rejected his claims, finding that there had been no miscarriage of justice.
McGirr then took his case to the Supreme Court, seeking leave to appeal the earlier decision.
In a new decision released today, however, the Supreme Court judges agreed that there had been no miscarriage of justice.
During the four-day trial in 2020 at Christchurch District Court, the jury heard two accounts of what happened on that tragic night – one version from North Canterbury polo player Higginson, and one from McGirr.
McGirr himself took the witness stand to explain how he was "freaking out" after witnessing someone just die "in front of my eyes" and how he buried Biddle's clothes and belongings in an act of "spiritual reconciliation".
He claimed he'd had an "innate desire to do something reverential" with her belongings, he said, and wanted to "commemorate her life".
"At no time did I ever try to hide anything from the police," McGirr told the court.
"I was very upset and shocked, affected by alcohol and drugs."
Biddle's bikini top has never been found, the court heard.
McGirr claimed he had four party pills at his house that night.
Someone had given them to him at a party, he says, and didn't know "whether it was ecstasy or some kind of herbal". To this day, he says he's not sure of the pills' "exact composition".
After crushing one up on a chopping board in the kitchen, he says he snorted the pill's powder before returning to the spa pool where he, Biddle, and Higginson had been drinking and hanging out.
Claims earlier in the trial by his friend, North Canterbury polo player Higginson, that McGirr came out of the house to the spa with three 3cm long lines of ground up "kind of blue ... bluey" powder which he took for ecstasy were "absolute rubbish", McGirr said.
Higginson says it was him who pulled Biddle out of the spa and tried to revive her with CPR, while an aggressive McGirr - wearing an ankle bracelet for a drink-driving conviction - refused to call an ambulance, alleging he said, "F*** off. The police aren't coming around here."
Higginson bundled her into his car and drove to the top of McGirr's steep driveway where he phoned 111 and says he continued with CPR.
Emergency services arrived quickly but Biddle was declared dead on the roadside at around 1.20am.
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