R v Lenaghan: Is it Business as Usual in New Zealand despite the Reforms of the Evidence Act 2006?
| Date | 01 November 2008 |
| DOI | 10.1350/ijep.2008.12.4.305 |
| Published date | 01 November 2008 |
| Subject Matter | Case Note |
CASE NOTE
R v LENAGHAN: IS IT BUSINESS AS USUAL IN NEW ZEALAND?
CASE NOTE
R v Lenaghan:Isitbusinessasusual
in New Zealand despite the reforms
of the Evidence Act 2006?
By Dr Chris Gallavin*
Senior Lecturer in Law, University of Canterbury, New Zealand
Keywords Criminal evidence; Hearsay; Scope of the hearsay rule; Labels;
Exceptions to the hearsay rule
he staged commencement of New Zealand’s Evidence Act 2006 over July
and August 2007 capped more than 15 years of preparatory work by the
NewZealandLawCommission.
1Having been referred to as a code
throughout its development the final enactment is, unfortunately, unlikely to
be applied as such. Although it does formulise a number of basic principles
governing the admissibility of evidence2the legislation does not represent a
comprehensive codification of New Zealand’s law of evidence and preserves a
role for the common law development of evidence norms.3Therefore, strict
adherence to the Act as a code is unlikely to occur. However, the Act’s emphasis
on the admissibility of all relevant evidence provides the judiciary with a clear
doi:1350/ijep.2008.12.4.305
THE INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF EVIDENCE & PROOF (2008) 12 E&P 325–332 325
1 See in particular: New Zealand Law Commission, Hearsay Evidence: an Options Paper prepared for
the Law Commission by an advisory committee on evidence law, Preliminary Paper No. 10, June
1989, New Zealand Law Commission, Evidence Law: Principles for Reform, Preliminary Paper No.
13, 1991 and New Zealand Law Commission, Reform of the Law, Report 55 (August 1999) vol. 1, and
Evidence Code and Commentary, vol. 2.
2 The foremost principle of the Evidence Act 2006 can be found under s. 7 which provides that ‘All
relevant evidence is admissible in a proceedings except evidence that is’ inadmissible or excluded
under the 2006 Act or any other Act. Section 8 provides for a general rule of exclusion where the
probative value of evidence is outweighed by its unfairly prejudicial effect or where it will
‘needlessly prolong the proceeding’: s. 8(1)(a) and (b).
3 See Evidence Act 2006, ss. 10 and 12.
T
* Email: chris.gallavin@canterbury.ac.nz.
To continue reading
Request your trial