This year the Herald’s award-winning newsroom produced a range of first-class journalism, including investigating the state of our mental health in the Great Minds series, how NZ can rebuild stronger post-Covid with The New New Zealand and how to minimise the impact of living in an Inflation Nation.
We also tackled our literacy crisis in our Reading Block series, while dogged investigative reporting by Kate McNamara resulted in an investigation into the awarding of contracts to businesses associated with family members of Cabinet minister Nanaia Mahuta.
The following article was one of the best-read Premium articles in 2022. The story originally ran in August.
Many could not understand what an up-and-coming Auckland criminal lawyer saw in a convicted murderer and rapist. In an exclusive interview with the Herald on Sunday, Davina Reid (nee Murray) tells Anna Leask why she loves Liam Reid, why she fights for him and why she doesn’t care what anyone else thinks. It started with a chance phone conversation in 2009 and became New Zealand’s most outrageous love story.
A convicted rapist and murderer, and his lawyer.
Smuggling. Illicit messages. A prison wedding.
A woman who risked it all for a man who has been jailed for one of the country's most heinous killings.
It has been 5388 days since Liam James Reid was arrested for the rape and murder of Emma Louise Agnew in Christchurch.
He's maintained his innocence despite police saying there's no doubt he's their man, a jury agreeing he was guilty and multiple appeal courts shutting down his attempts to overturn his conviction.
Agnew, who was profoundly deaf, was reported missing by her family on November 15, 2007.
Her body was found 12 days later, hidden beneath vegetation and pine needles near a holiday park in the north of the city.
Police alleged Reid raped and murdered the 20-year-old after meeting her to look at the car she was selling.
When his trial began in the High Court at Christchurch, it emerged he'd been charged with raping and beating a woman in Dunedin days after the murder.
In December 2008, Reid was sentenced to an indefinite term of preventive detention.
He must serve a minimum of 23 years behind bars until he can seek a release on parole.
In September 2009, Reid picked up a phone at Auckland Prison and dialled the number of then-prominent defence lawyer Barry Hart.
He was in the market for someone to launch a new appeal bid.
In Hart's Ponsonby office sat Davina Murray.
"I remember the day," she says, smiling.
"The phone rang and both of the secretaries were busy, so it got rerouted to my office, which was strange because I didn't take inbound calls.
"And it was Liam, and that phone call changed my life."
Initially, the relationship was professional, platonic.
But somewhere along the way a passion ignited - a love that would break all of the rules, spark outrage and upset and end Davina's legal career.
"We didn't really have a legal team in those days, I just said I'd help him out. And so I started looking for senior counsel to do the appeal.
"Then I started printing off all the disclosure and reading it, and I did it on my own time. And when the light bulbs went - everything kind of started showing up, that nothing, not a lot of the Crown case, made any sense.
"That was when I got serious about getting him proper counsel." As Davina set about finding Reid a lawyer that would take on his case - more on that soon - other lights started flashing between the pair and their relationship moved from professional to romantic. In the past, she has spoken only briefly about the relationship. The couple agreed Davina would speak to the Herald on Sunday on three conditions: that their lawyers were present, that they could record the interview - "to ensure that if we are misrepresented we have a true and actual record of it" - and that "the appeal is also discussed and not just our relationship". "He's agreed because we're recording this and if you misrepresent it, we'll just post it on Twitter and YouTube," Davina said. "We've been so misrepresented by the press that you lose a lot of trust ... and as a result, you become voiceless.
"It gets to a point where you realise that it's time to speak ... he's been ready to have his side of the story told for 15 years. He's been incarcerated for 15 years and he's been ready to talk for a while."
The interview went ahead at the Greenlane home and legal chambers of Charl Hirschfeld, over coffee served in delicate, patterned china teacups and club sandwiches to start.
The couple's relationship became public knowledge when Davina faced criminal charges for smuggling an iPhone, cigarettes and a lighter to Reid in Mt Eden prison in 2011.
During her court case, messages she sent about Reid and her plan to marry him were revealed.
"My heart says: 'I should just do it' but my head says: 'wait'," Davina wrote.
She said she had kissed Reid in a way she had never kissed anyone before.
But she denied further intimacy.
"No, we haven't but we have come close - damn prison guards," she messaged.
"I hate that I'm in love with him ... I'm scared to lose him ... He makes me laugh, he makes me think, he makes me cry, he makes me feel beautiful, he makes me sing."
Davina says there is much more to the relationship than what was in the news at the time. And while she knows people will judge, question and even mock her choices, she wants the world to know that she adores her husband.
It was Reid who eventually proposed to Davina.
She didn't hesitate in accepting and the couple started to plan their wedding.
"He asked and I said yes," she said, reluctant to give further details.
They married in the chapel at Auckland Prison at Paremoremo, where Reid is serving his time, on June 27, 2017.
"It was the best day of my life," Davina recalled.
"I didn't feel like we were in prison - I suppose when you're in that sort of presence of love, it doesn't matter where you are.
"We had maybe 15 - we would call them screws - but Corrections officers there, and they had a really good time.
Reid's groomsmen were fellow inmates "Richie and Graham" and lawyer Jeremy Bioletti was Davina's "bridesmaid".
Bioletti is now Reid's appeal lawyer.
"It was a really special day," said Davina.
At the time, the Herald reported that the ceremony took place in the morning and afterwards the happy couple enjoyed a specially catered morning tea, had photos taken and completed the legal paperwork to seal their marriage.
The photographs were taken by a Department of Corrections staffer. Requests for the images have been declined to date.
The wedding caused widespread outrage and anger, from the public to MPs and victim advocates - and Reid's ex-partner, who is the mother of his daughter.
She revealed to the Herald the wedding took place on their daughter's birthday and she said it was "sick".
"Not only did she have to come to terms with what he had done at a very young age and eventually grew up knowing that he was a rapist and murderer - every birthday she has from now on, they will be celebrating their wedding anniversary," she said at the time.
"She struggled emotionally and now for them to do this to her is cruel and heartless."
Davina knows how people feel but it does nothing to dissipate her commitment to Reid.
"The thing that's hard is they're giving opinions without any information - they have no knowledge, they don't know," she said. "For me, marriage is a lifelong commitment. And no, we don't discuss the likelihood that he won't be released. I just don't have any space in my brain to accept that he won't be because the law is robust, and the evidence is strong that he was framed ... and until people accept that's what happened, they'll always think there's something wrong with me.
"But guess what, if I cared I wouldn't be here.
"I was cancelled before cancelling was even a word; I've had friends stop being my friend because of the associates that I might have - and you get quite a hard heart.
"So in relation to people's views of me, they'll think what they want and I accept that. You've kind of just got to keep going."
The couple have just marked their fifth wedding anniversary and Davina almost visibly lights up when she speaks about her husband.
"It's not a conventional marriage at all ... I know he's never going to be a conventional husband and probably I'm not going to be a conventional wife.
"We have quite a unique relationship. It's a difficult situation we're in - but we are absolutely loyal to each other and fighting for him to have justice in his case.
"You know, he's my best friend, and being married to him is the best thing I've ever done."
Asked why she loves Reid she pauses, briefly, and then says:
"I don't know - why do you love anybody really? At the end of the day, love is a choice," she said.
"We haven't had the cruisiest [relationship] ... like, no child dreams of marrying somebody who's in prison. But, you know, it's good."
In terms of Reid's legal case, his team say things are complex. So far, the courts have dismissed all of Reid's appeal attempts. A year after his trial Reid took his case to the Court of Appeal in an attempt to overturn his conviction and sentence. That appeal was dismissed. In 2012, Reid, then represented by high-profile defence lawyer Ron Mansfield, filed an application for leave to appeal his conviction in the Supreme Court. Chief Justice Sian Elias and Justices Peter Blanchard and Andrew Tipping dismissed the application. The proposed grounds of appeal at the time were that because of late disclosure by the prosecution of certain DNA and cellphone tracking evidence, the defence was unable to review that evidence before the trial and a miscarriage of justice thereby occurred. Further, the evidence in question was also not able to be reviewed before the hearing in the Court of Appeal. The court also heard that due to Legal Aid funding not being made available, Mansfield had not been able to file any written submissions on the appeal. The court ruled that nothing put before it could provide any basis that the evidence Reid wanted to challenge was unreliable. "The suggestion that upon a review either of those pieces of evidence may prove to be suspect in some respect is therefore entirely speculative," the Supreme Court decision stated. "In these circumstances, and in the absence of any indication that the position concerning funding is likely to change, no grounds have been established for the proposed appeal. The application for leave must therefore be dismissed. "If, in the future, the position alters and doubt can be cast upon the reliability of the evidence in question, it will remain possible for the applicant to ask the Governor-General to exercise his powers under s 406 of the Crimes Act 1961."
Davina - who now goes by the last name Reid - hopes that future is not far away and is confident she will free her man and start a new life with him beyond the prison perimeter.
It's important to note there is nothing before the courts and no timeline for action.
But Davina and Bioletti are working their way towards trying to get Reid's case back before the Supreme Court.
The pair have pored over the files for probably thousands of hours each and are now well versed in the workings of forensic evidence.
To explain each of their issues with Reid's case would take hours and is intricate in detail in many parts.
But by and large they maintain the case against Reid is "fraudulent" and "flawed".
The first major issue Davina and Bioletti have is that the complete ESR file was not disclosed to Reid's lawyer before his trial.
That means the forensic evidence relied on to convict Reid was never reviewed by his defence team before his trial - or appeals.
Davina said it "took a gigantic effort" to get the information they do have, which they want to get reviewed by an independent expert. "We're now 15 years into it and still can't get evidence that was relied on at trial to convict Liam," she said. "That's a huge issue." Finding an expert willing to take on that review has also been "a battle". The pandemic stymied them further but they now have someone willing to work with them - an Aussie expert who worked on the Peter Falconio murder. Falconio was a British tourist who disappeared in a remote part of the Northern Territory in 2001 while travelling with his girlfriend, Joanne Lees. His body has never been found but in December 2005 Bradley John Murdoch was convicted of Falconio's murder and sentenced to life imprisonment. The second major thread of the appeal is that they believe Reid should have had two separate trials for the Agnew and Dunedin offending.
They say the Crown sought to join the matters based on evidence of "similar facts".
Davina said analysis of an evidence file not disclosed before Reid's trial suggested the Crown application for the joining of the cases was "misleading".
A plethora of other problems and issues around DNA including hair and fingerprint samples and laboratory contamination; Legal Aid issues, and their claims of botched police investigations, misleading and "dodgy" evidence and other complex points they have picked out as Davina and Bioletti have moved through thousands of pages relating to the case.
They say there's even a possibility Agnew's time of death was miscalculated which, if they can prove, puts Reid well out of the picture because he has firm alibis outside the police timeline of events. They say all things lead them - every time - to the same conclusion. "Liam is not their man," Davina said. She said her husband's efforts to get a fair trial had been "frustrated" at many points along the way and there were "major systemic issues" relating to his "appellant rights".
She and Bioletti both vowed to keep fighting for Reid. They were confident that if they could get the case back before a panel of Supreme Court judges Reid's convictions would be quashed. Further, if that happened they doubted a retrial would be ordered as there would be "no chance" of empanelling a fair jury given the publicity around Reid over the years. "Our law is robust," Davina said. "The Supreme Court bench are reliable, fair ... that's one of the things that gives me hope. "I think it should be quashed to be honest. I don't think Liam will ever receive a fair trial in this nation after the press have destroyed him and misrepresented him ... there's absolutely no way you could get an impartial jury so that would obviously have to be taken into account when the bench make the decisions." Bioletti said Reid's case was also one that showed how blindly people believed in science. He said it was generally "taken as gospel" in court and "eclipsed everything else in the minds of jurors". That, he said, was problematic. "DNA evidence is crucial," he said. "DNA convicts people - it doesn't matter what else is happening." Bioletti said cases like Reid's were "extremely complex" and often "took a long time to surface". "It takes time - a lot of time," he said. "And unfortunately, Liam has to spend that time in prison while we're trying to work this situation out. It's not ideal."
He said his main reason for supporting Reid's bid for freedom was simple.
"I was initially very interested in the DNA evidence and the deeper you look into the DNA evidence, the more flawed it becomes ... that's overwhelmingly prejudicial, and I don't think it was properly examined in court."
Bioletti said the more he dug into the case the more confident he was there had been a ghastly miscarriage of justice.
"I'm pretty confident that someone will be quite shocked when they see the underlying science, and how the science was not really looked at," he said.
"Liam is not the person that has been portrayed … and I find that quite upsetting that someone is portrayed to be a certain person when they're not.
"So I have a lot of time for him."
Davina said the biggest challenge in her life - aside from the "mountain" of legal work before her - is "him being in prison".
"That's annoying," she said.
"I have a lot of respect for all the other partners that support their loved ones in prisons and the different families - you become a part of society where you're ... sort of less than less, people judge you and they look down on you.
"I really admire all of the women and men who are supporting their partners in prison, who surrender a lot to support the one that's inside."
Davina says she also thinks about the Agnew family, acknowledging their unfathomable loss and hardship and the impact on them when Reid's case is in the headlines again.
"Jeremy and I were speaking about the Agnews this morning," she said.
"You always are aware that there's a family and they have been through intense grief and pain and they're never forgotten.
"But, there are times when you need to block them out, so you can focus on the facts, the evidence and what's before you.
"I believe they are as [much] victims of this fraudulent prosecution as Liam was - and for the Dunedin complainant as well. "So, even though you obviously have a priority to get the truth out, I do feel for the Agnew family, and I hope that they understand ... you know, sometimes I dream of talking to them, and explaining to them why we battle, what we do."
Another battle Davina has in her future is trying to practise law again.
After the infamous smuggling, she was struck off as a lawyer, with the New Zealand Law Society saying her actions were "a flagrant disregard of the mutual trust and respect between a lawyer and prison authorities".
It said the "access rights lawyers enjoy are privileges which must be strongly respected and honoured".
Davina had "abused" that and "brought the legal profession into disrepute".
Any lawyer struck off can reapply to practise again after five years.
After seven years, Davina recently applied to be restored to the Roll of Barristers and Solicitors, saying justice was her "passion" and she wanted to "make a difference", particularly for those "marginalised" within the justice system.
"I think you've got 2020 vision, when you look back on anything, there're different tactics I could have used," she said in relation to the smuggling that led to her fall from grace.
"Regardless of what happened back then, I know that I'll make a difference in the justice system - it would be a mistake for the tribunal to not give me my practising certificate because the truth is that I'm a good lawyer, I was always a good lawyer. "I made a mistake. I've done my time ... I'm legally entitled to practise law. And I want to do that."
Davina explained her only interest going forward was "exposing" what she sees as "clear issues" with how forensic evidence - in particular DNA analysis - is used in criminal prosecutions.
She says she has such cases "lined up" and she suspects there will be many more uncovered.
The officer in charge of the police investigation was Tom Fitzgerald, then a senior detective in Christchurch. Fitzgerald is now a Detective Superintendent based at police headquarters in Wellington and charged with running the national crime group. Earlier this week he declined to comment on the case. Later, Assistant Commissioner Sue Schwalger gave a brief statement. "The investigation into the killing of Emma Agnew was conducted in a thorough and professional manner resulting in the conviction of Liam Reid," she said. "These matters have previously been raised and dismissed by the courts." Christchurch Crown Solicitor Mark Zarifeh also declined to comment. The Agnew family did not wish to be part of this story.
Timeline: The story so far
• Nov 15, 2007: Emma Agnew is reported missing. Her burned-out car is found in an east Christchurch park that night.
• November 26: Agnew's body is found hidden in scrub near the Spencer Park Motor Camp.
• November 27: Liam James Reid is arrested after an armed offenders squad raid on a Christchurch boarding house.
• Nov 28: Reid makes his first appearance in the Christchurch District Court.
• October 6, 2008: Reid's trial begins at the High Court in Christchurch. It is revealed he has also been charged with a sex attack on a Dunedin woman.
• October 31: Reid is found guilty on all charges.
• December 12: Reid is given the indefinite sentence of preventive detention.
• July 2009: An appeal against his conviction was dismissed in the Court of Appeal.
• September 2009: Reid connects with Auckland lawyer Davina Murray.
• 2011: Murray charged with smuggling an iPhone, cigarettes and lighter to Reid inside Mt Eden prison.
• February 2012: A further application to appeal is dismissed by the Supreme Court.
• February 2015: Murray struck off as a lawyer.
• June 2017: Reid and Davina marry at Auckland prison, she takes his name.
• June 2022: Davina applies to be reinstated as a lawyer.
