Petition for inquiry into Sounds murders case

1.00pm

A key prosecution witness in the trial of Scott Watson for the New Year's Day, 1998, murders of Ben Smart and Olivia Hope is today part of a group presenting a petition calling for a commission of inquiry into the case.

Watson was jailed in September 1999 and later sentenced to a minimum 17 years' jail for the murders.

Witness, water taxi driver Guy Wallace, said both he and Watson had been wronged in the trial.

He had to do something to put the matter right, he told National Radio today.

Mr Wallace said he believed the evidence he gave at the trial had been misconstrued. Most of his evidence had been presented in a false light to the jury.

"I don't really think it's Scott Watson, there's another murderer out there somewhere," he said.

"They've bashed the hell out of me, saying 'no one else saw a ketch'. They've tried to twist me, twist me, twist me, and I just won't relent on that."

Much of the evidence during Watson's three-month murder trial in 1999 in the High Court at Wellington centred on the yacht Mr Smart and Miss Hope were last seen boarding. The Crown argued it was Watson's one-masted yacht Blade, but Mr Wallace gave evidence of a two-masted ketch.

The petition, being presented at 1pm today, was signed by more than 2000 people.

Watson is also being supported by the Toronto-based Association in Defence of the Wrongly Convicted.

Association board member Lon Rose, who is visiting this country, said Watson's conviction was dangerous.

"The hallmarks of a wrongful conviction scream out in this case," he told the station.

Watson was in the news last week after it was revealed he and 35-year-old Rotorua solo mother of four, Coral Phylis Branch, were married by a prison padre in a private ceremony on May 28 at Auckland's Paremoremo Prison.

- NZPA

Herald Feature: Sounds murders