Woman likely to appeal car bonnet murder conviction

A woman found guilty of murder in the High Court at New Plymouth last night is likely to appeal her conviction.

A jury took six hours to decide that Cindy Fairburn, 38, had committed murder when she drove her car with her former partner Darin (Nardy) Maxwell, 42, clinging to the bonnet head-on into an Isuzu truck.

But Fairburn's lawyer, Susan Hughes QC, told the Taranaki Daily News she was surprised at the verdict, at the conclusion of the two-week trial.

"I expected a verdict of manslaughter," she said, adding that an appeal was inevitable.

An appeal must be lodged within 30 days.

The court had been told that Fairburn had suspected Mr Maxwell of molesting their two-year-old daughter but an examination of the toddler found no sign of sex abuse.

The prosecution said that Mr Maxwell had clung to the bonnet of Fairburn's car while she drove 13km along State Highway 3 from Inglewood toward New Plymouth on August 6, 2007.

She had then deliberately driven her car into the path of a 4WD flinging Mr Maxwell from the bonnet through the windscreen of the other vehicle.

He died from his extensive injuries.

The 4WD driver also suffered life-threatening injuries but survived after weeks in hospital.

Fairburn spent 15 weeks in hospital, and then caught an infection which resulted in one of her legs being amputated.

The newspaper reported that the decision was met with tears of relief, sobbing and hugs of joy from Mr Maxwell's family and distraught weeping from a shocked Fairburn family and her friends.

Justice Rhys Harrison sentenced Fairburn to the mandatory life imprisonment with a non-parole period of 10 years.

Mr Maxwell's five sisters, all dressed in black and carrying a large framed photo of their brother taken at a family wedding just before his death, told the newspaper that it would have been a difficult decision for the jury but they had got it right.

- NZPA