Father's foot would leave print about size found in Bain house, court told

ESR forensic scientist Kevan Walsh. Photo / Pool

Robin Bain's foot would leave a print about the size of bloody sockprints found in his home after the killing of his family, a court has heard.

The High Court in Christchurch is today hearing more evidence about who could have left the bloody sockprints considered important to the murder retrial of David Bain.

David Bain, 37, is on trial for the murder of his parents and three siblings in his Dunedin home on June 20, 1994. His defence team say his father Robin, 58, shot dead the family before turning the .22 rifle on himself.

The defence says if Robin left the bloody sockprints in the house, then David could not be the murderer. A senior police in investigator in the case has agreed the killer likely left the prints.

A complete bloody sockprint found in the house using luminol, a chemical that reacts with blood and glows, was measured at 280mm by a forensic scientist.

Last week, ESR forensic scientist Kevan Walsh gave the results of testing, using people with feet about the size of David, 300mm, and Robin, 270mm, and wearing socks coated in pig blood to make prints on carpet.

Today, under questioning from defence lawyer, Michael Reed QC, Mr Walsh agreed that his conclusion was that someone with a foot the size of Robin's, walking on carpet, and observed under luminol testing, would leave a bloody sockprint of approximately 280mm.

His average print for the series of tests of a foot the size of Robin's was 282mm.

For testing of a foot the size of David, Mr Walsh used his own foot which he measured at 298mm. The average sockprint size for this testing was 297mm.

Mr Reed put to him that his own expert did the same testing, but using a foot exactly matching the size of David's at 300mm, and found someone with a foot this size would leave an average bloody sockprint of 306mm.

None of these test results achieved by the defence expert were less than the size of David's foot, he said.