Taunts led to bar scuffle

By Eugene Bingham

Scott Watson taunted a youth whose sister had cancer by saying she would die, it was alleged in the High Court at Wellington yesterday.

Oliver Cory Perkins told the Marlborough Sounds murder trial he and Watson scuffled after the comments in the Furneaux Lodge bar.

Mr Perkins used a police montage of photographs to identify Watson, who stands accused of murdering Olivia Hope and Ben Smart.

The Canterbury University student said he struck up a conversation with Watson in the lodge after midnight on New Year's Day, 1998.

Watson had introduced himself as Mr Prozac and said he was sailing a double-masted ketch about the sounds.

The conversation became "pretty weird" when Watson grabbed a bead necklace around Mr Perkins' neck and asked if he was wearing it because he was a girl.

Relations soured further when the topic of his sister came up, said Mr Perkins.

A friend of Mr Perkins, Chris Bisman, quietly told Watson that his sister had cancer.

"He came up to me and said she would be dead in two years," said Mr Perkins, who turned and walked out of the lodge in a state of shock.

Upon his return, Mr Bisman was demanding that Watson apologise.

"He went to shake my hand, but he was pretty insincere about it and started smiling. It got pretty mildly aggressive between myself, Chris and this man," said Mr Perkins.

Bouncers eventually told the pair to leave Watson alone.

Under cross-examination, Mr Perkins said he had been shown a photograph of Watson alone in January last year, months before he was shown the montage.

He agreed that the man might have eventually made a sincere apology.

Before the trial adjourned for the day, Justice Heron spoke to the jury about Mr Perkins' evidence, particularly Watson's alleged comments about his sister.

"That evidence is not given simply with a view to blacken the character of the accused," said Justice Heron.

"That sort of evidence is not admissible, but there comes a time when events of this kind are required to be the subject of evidence because they impact on a witness' recollection of the identity of the person."