Witnesses describe sightings of ketch

By Alison Horwood and Eugene Bingham

WELLINGTON - Nine people who told police they saw a vessel with similarities to the one described by water taxi driver Guy Wallace were called as defence witnesses at the Scott Watson double-murder trial yesterday.

The sightings, between the Marlborough Sounds and the Taranaki coast in the week after December 31, 1997, were mostly of a distinctive two-masted ketch.

Mr Wallace has given evidence that he dropped Olivia Hope and Ben Smart on a well-kept ketch with a man in the early hours of New Year's Day. The Crown maintains there is no compelling evidence the ketch exists and the pair boarded Watson's sloop, Blade.

Watson denies murdering the couple and his trial has lasted 51 days in the High Court at Wellington. His defence case opened on Monday, and the trial is expected to finish next week.

Peter James Bloomfield, of Nelson, told the court yesterday that he and some friends were motoring around Cape Jackson about midday on January 1 last year when he saw a 40ft ketch with rope dangling from the back heading north towards Cook Strait.

It had a white hull and a wooden mast and looked quite scruffy.

He described the distinctive "cut-away" stern of the ketch. Asked to compare the stern of the ketch he saw with that of a boat drawn by police under direction from Mr Wallace, he said: "It was almost identical."

Mr Bloomfield did not see anyone on board, but another man on his boat, Stephen John Knight, said he noticed a lone man crouched at its stern. "I recall waving to him and he turned his back and did not wave and I made the comment that perhaps he was hung over and did not want to be friendly," said Mr Knight.

He said the man looked fairly rough and might have been at sea for a while.

His brother Donald Lewis Knight said the ketch was blue and white.

"It had quite a lot of port holes and I was gazing at it for quite a while."

When asked to compare the sketch of the ketch produced by Mr Wallace with the boat he saw, Mr Knight said: "I would say that was one and the same boat, from memory."

Richard Gregory Low said he was fishing about 12 miles off the Taranaki coast on January 2 or January 3 when he saw a two-masted sailing vessel. It had a blue strip above the water line and round port holes.

He waved at the two people on board but they did not wave back. When he changed direction to follow deeper water, the ketch veered away to keep a distance between them.

Mr Low said he rang the police and told them about the sighting but he never heard back. At the start of the trial, he contacted the court and left contact details for defence counsel.

A policeman who was with Mr Low at the time said he did not believe the fishing trip took place that early in January. The officer, who was granted name suppression, told the court he could pinpoint the trip to January 7 because his rosters showed that was his first day off since New Year's Day.

The defence is expected to wrap up its case today. Closing submissions to the jury will be heard next week.