I'm innocent, says Maney

A woman accused of ordering the killing of Deane Fuller-Sandys steadfastly denied the charge in the High Court at Auckland yesterday.

"I'm innocent," Gail Maney told the jury.

The Crown alleges that Maney incited or procured Stephen Stone to kill Mr Fuller-Sandys in the garage of her Henderson home in August 1989 because she believed he had stolen her drugs.

Maney, aged 33 last week, is also accused, along with 33-year-old Mark William Henriksen, of helping to dispose of the body to avoid Stone being caught.

In his opening address Maney's lawyer, Peter Kaye, said that at no stage had Maney ordered a hit on 21-year-old Mr Fuller-Sandys or said anything which indicated that she wanted Stone to kill him.

Maney told the jury that she had never even met Mr Fuller-Sandys and was not present when he was allegedly shot by Stone who, witnesses have said, then passed the gun to a number of other young men and forced them to fire into the body.

A number of witnesses, who all have immunity from prosecution, have said that Maney was present in the garage when the killing took place.

One said she kicked Mr Fuller-Sandys before he was shot by Stone.

Another witness said she had previously heard Maney ask Stone to do the "hit."

But Maney told the jury: "These things never happened."

Mr Kaye told the jury that the four principal crown witnesses were "demonstrably proven liars."

The only basis for the allegation that Maney had asked Stone to do the killing was the word of one witness, one of the "group of four" liars.

The Crown says that Maney concluded that Mr Fuller-Sandys was the person who burgled her house after getting a description of the burglar from a neighbour.

But Maney told the jury she was positive that the discussion with the neighbour about the burglary took place in May 1990.

Mr Fuller-Sandys disappeared on August 21 the previous year.