Crown prosecutor Gareth Kayes gave graphic detail of Elizabeth Zhong's murder as the prosecution gave it's closing statements in the trial. Video / Pool
As the murder trial of Fang Sun began wrapping up today while entering its sixth week, Crown prosecutors took a uniquely defensive approach to their closing argument.
Roughly half of the two-hour presentation focused on Elizabeth Zhong's ex-boyfriend, Kai Gui "David" Zheng, and why they believe he couldn't have been her killer.
"He had absolutely no reason to kill Elizabeth Zhong," prosecutor Gareth Kayes told jurors in the High Court at Auckland before switching focus to the evidence against Zhong's estranged business partner, the defendant.
Zhong, 55, was found stabbed to death in the boot of her Land Rover on the evening of November 28, 2020. For over a year prior to that, she had been engaged in a heated civil court battle with Sun over control of their rapidly failing businesses, which had resulted in an estimated financial loss the to the defendant and his family of over $26 million.
Fang Sun has been on trial for murder in the High Court at Auckland since April. Photo / Michael Craig
"The Crown does not have to prove a motive to you, but I suggest the bitter dispute over money is what prompted this violent retribution," Kayes said.
Jurors tomorrow will hear closing arguments from Sun's defence team, who suggested earlier in the trial that Zheng makes a more likely suspect. His fingerprints were found inside the house and Zhong's daughter had been pleading with him at the time of her mum's death to hand over a $20,000 inheritance that didn't belong to him.
Kayes, however, spent much of today anticipating the defence argument and outlining reasons why he didn't see Zheng as a suspect.
Even though they had already broken up, Zheng had moved into Zhong's Sunnyhills home to support her during the first Covid-19 lockdown in April 2020. While Zhong's death would be over half a year later, it's not unheard of for fingerprints to survive that long, Kayes argued, pointing out that all of the prints found by police and identified as Zheng's appeared to be the result of sweat - not blood.
Auckland businesswoman Elizabeth Zhong, 55, was found dead in November 2020. Photo / Supplied
Meanwhile, he said, there were plenty of bloody smudge marks that appeared to have been the result of fabric - suggesting the killer wore gloves. It would make no sense, he said, that the killer would then take the gloves off and leave non-bloody fingerprints like those that matched Zheng.
He also argued that the inheritance dispute, in which Zheng testified he couldn't return the money because it was in a bank account frozen by the Chinese government, did not provide a very strong motive for violence.
"There's no way in the world Kai Gui Zheng is going to kill Elizabeth Zhong to avoid the payment of $20,000," Kayes said. "This is a man who owns three houses."
But an argument over more than $20 million is something altogether different, he said. In what he labelled "part two" of his closing argument, Kayes pointed out that numerous witnesses and even police reports pointed to the defendant threatening to kill Zhong in the months prior to her death.
"Fang Sun was angry enough to threaten to kill her, and angry enough to follow through with those threats," he said.
In addition, blood marks found on the undercarriage of Zhong's Land Rover, DNA found under her fingernails and tracking data all suggest Sun was involved, Kayes said.
Fang Sun appears at Manukau District Court in February 2021, charged with Elizabeth Zhong's murder. Photo / Alex Burton
Only Sun and a private investigator he had hired to follow Zhong knew that a tracking device had been illegally placed underneath Zhong's vehicle months prior to her death, prosecutors said. And blood marks that looked to be in the shape of fingers found underneath the Land Rover suggest the killer knew about the device and was feeling around for it, Kayes argued.
That same tracking device showed the Land Rover stopping on the street outside Sun's home for 15 minutes on the morning of Zhong's death. If Sun was being framed, as defence counsel Sam Wimsett suggested during his opening address, the killer would have needed to know where Sun lived, Kayes pointed out. But not even police - and certainly not Zheng - knew Sun had recently moved to that house, he said.
A DNA analysis of Zhong's fingernails, meanwhile, found it to be 670 times more likely that the male DNA detected on them originated from Sun than from another male selected at random from the New Zealand population. The analysis excluded Zheng as a contributor.
"You can be sure Kai Gui Zheng did not kill Elizabeth Zhong," Kayes told jurors as he finished the argument. "Instead, you can be sure it's Fang Sun who killed Ms Zhong.
