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Antonie Dixon was granted a retrial on murder and other charges because of errors by the first trial judge in summing up evidence in the case, court documents reveal.
Dixon was found guilty in the High Court at Auckland on Friday for the second time of murder and causing grievous bodily harm.
After a five-week trial, the jury threw out Dixon's defence that he was insane when he attacked two women with a samurai sword in January 2003 at Pipiroa, near Thames, and then drove to East Auckland, where he shot dead James Te Aute.
He was also found guilty of shooting at police, firearms charges and kidnapping. Dixon, 40, was found guilty of the same charges in March 2005.
The convictions were quashed last year by the Court of Appeal, which ordered a retrial. The court suppressed its reasons until after the completion of the second trial.
Court documents have now been released showing the reason for the retrial related to errors in the way Justice Judith Potter directed jurors during her summing-up at the first trial.
The appeal judges found Justice Potter did not properly instruct the jury on the law relating to insanity and failed to assist the jury on how Dixon's taking of methamphetamines could have affected any mental disorder he may have had.
She also failed to offer the jury the option of finding Dixon guilty of manslaughter. Dixon is in the Auckland Central Remand Centre awaiting sentence on Friday.
Within minutes of the latest verdicts being delivered defence lawyer Barry Hart said he would lodge an appeal to the Court of Appeal.
He refused to say on what grounds the appeal would be lodged other than to say "there are deficiencies in the summing-up and other matters".
Crown prosecutor Simon Moore said the trial involved incredibly complex evidence and the most complex summing-up he had ever heard.
He said the trial judge, Justice Hugh Williams, did an "extraordinary job" with his summing-up.
- NZPA
