THE PRESS, Christchurch
Thursday, July 7, 2011 NEWS A9
■ MURDER TRIAL
Long sentence delights intended victim
New
Zealander
Felicity
Drumm, the intended victim
of Malcolm Webster’s murderous plans, is delighted with
the 30-year jail sentence
handed down to her former
husband by a Scottish court.
Webster was jailed for life
with a minimum non-parole
period of 30 years in the High
Court at Edinburgh for murdering his first wife, Claire
Morris, in England in 1994
and trying to murder his second wife, Drumm, in Takapuna, Auckland, in 1999.
The judge Lord Bannatyne,
said the murder of Morris was
‘‘cold-blooded, brutal and callous’’ and premeditated.
Claire Morris died after
Webster drugged her and
staged a car crash, later
telling police he swerved off
the road as he tried to avoid a
motorcyclist. He claimed
more than $400,000 from her
life insurance policy.
He tried the same tactics
on Drumm, who was pregnant
when he drugged her and
staged a car crash. She recovered but he fled with
$140,000 from her bank
account. He also planned to
claim more than $1.5 million
in life insurance.
In a statement released by
her sister, Jane Drumm,
■ HILLARY FAMILY
yesterday, Felicity Drumm
said she was delighted with
the long jail term and nonparole period.
‘‘The jail term and long
parole period reflects not only
the seriousness of this crime
but his potential to reoffend.
‘‘After many years of
thinking Malcolm may escape
justice for taking Claire
Morris’ life together with his
offending against me, the
guilty verdict and sentence
are hugely validating and
serve to bring closure to this
chapter in my life,’’ she said.
‘‘My thoughts and best
wishes go out to the Morris
family and to Simone Banerjee.’’
Webster tried to marry
Banerjee in Oban while he
was still married to Drumm.
‘‘My family and I are most
appreciative of the commit-
ment and hard work demonstrated by both the New
Zealand and the Grampian
police who together with the
Scottish procurator fiscal’s
office helped bring this case to
trial.’’
She said she also wanted to
acknowledge the judge and
jury’s efforts throughout what
was a ‘‘very demanding court
process’’.
Banerjee, who was in court
for the sentencing, said she
was ‘‘very pleased’’ with the
sentence and felt ‘‘very lucky
to be alive’’.
Prosecutor Derek Ogg, QC,
told the jury Webster was one
of Scotland’s most notorious
murderers but Webster’s lawyer Edgar Prais, QC, insisted
he was innocent but admitted
he was a thief, ‘‘a liar, a
philanderer and a ratbag’’.
NZPA
■ CUSTOMS SERVICE
In extracts of the interview
shown, she blamed Peter
Hillary for the rift, but he hit
back saying ‘‘it takes two to
tango doesn’t it’’.
June Hillary defended her
attempts to sell the watches,
saying the money would go to
the Himalayan charity her
husband had established.
‘‘I wanted to sell them to
give money to the trust, and
he didn’t like that. Ed gave
them to me to do that and I
hadn’t been allowed to do it.’’
Peter Hillary said that was
not the case.
‘‘She’s trying to defuse the
situation and make it look
like she was giving it all to
charity that was never the
plan. She felt she was going to
make a lot of money out of
this.’’
One News said the Hillary
children are in negotiations to
have the watches returned to
them and they were likely to
❯❯ NELSON: The Conservation
Department and dog control
officers are considering
pressing charges against the
owner of a dog alleged to have
mauled a seal in Nelson on
Saturday. The young seal died
following the attack on the
city’s waterfront. Seals are
protected under the Marine
Mammals Protection Act.
Venom popular
Border guardians: Greg Ward, left, and Gerry Rodgers were honoured yesterday for four decades of service as Customs officers.
Sam Sachdeva
[email protected]
cided late last year to give
nine Skyhawks to museums
in New Zealand and Australia
and sell the rest by tender.
Six Skyhawks have already been allocated to
museums.
Yesterday, Defence Minister Wayne Mapp said the
other three would go to the
New
Zealand
Warbirds
Association, at Ardmore,
south of Auckland; Ashburton
Aviation Museum; and the
Warbirds over Wanaka, in
Central Otago.
The Aermacchis would go
to the Air Force Museum at
Wigram, in Christchurch; the
George Hood Aviation Museum, in Masterton; and the
Museum of Transport and
Technology (Motat), in AuckNZPA
land.
Forty years of catching ‘‘baddies’’ has paid off for two longserving South Island Customs
Service workers.
Greg Ward and Gerry
Rodgers were among Customs
employees who received longservice awards at a
Christchurch ceremony
yesterday.
Ward, the Queenstown
■ CHRISTCHURCH DISTRICT COURT
Jail term for man seen as ‘no Goldilocks’
Anne Clarkson
A man already in prison after
a fight with a friend was
sentenced to another six
months’ jail for wandering
into an apartment building
and going to sleep in an
upstairs bedroom.
Warren Noel Blackett, 42,
had a drink-fuelled fight with
a friend, which neither can
remember well.
On March 21, Blackett was
drunk and went into the
Bishopdale apartment, where
the owners later found him
asleep in bed. .
When admitting a charge
of being unlawfully in a
building when he appeared at
a court session at Christchurch Men’s Prison on June
3, Judge Robert Murfitt said:
‘‘You were certainly no Goldilocks.’’
Blackett was also drunk on
April 14, when he went into
the yard of a Rangiora
property and took a child’s
lunchbox. The mother confronted him in the driveway
and took it back.
He also breached a protection order by becoming aggressive and threatening to
hit his mother.
Defence counsel Bryan
Green said Blackett had a
❯❯ DUNEDIN: A Christchurch
man has been jailed for three
years for the unprovoked
killing of another man in a
Dunedin McDonald’s outlet.
Matthew Bryce Larson, 23, was
sentenced in the High Court at
Dunedin yesterday after
earlier pleading guilty to
manslaughter. Larson punched
51-year-old Stephen Francis
Radnoty once in the head in
the George St restaurant on
March 12. Radnoty hit his head
heavily on the tiled floor.
Seal attack
Photo: DEAN KOZANIC
More unsold Skyhawks find ‘Goodies’ who kept the ‘baddies’ at bay
new homes in museums
Three more aviation museums will get a Skyhawk
fighter jet to display.
The air force put its fleets
of Skyhawks and Aermacchi
jet trainers on the market
when the Labour Government
decommissioned them nearly
10 years ago.
When they did not sell after
a worldwide marketing campaign, the Government de-
Jail for killing
❯❯ OAMARU: An Oamaru man
has admitted storing thousands of objectionable images
of children on a memory stick
he kept at his home. Ben
Michael Hamilton, 25,
unemployed, pleaded guilty to
16 charges of knowingly
distributing objectionable
publications and possessing
objectionable publications
when he appeared in the
Oamaru District Court. He was
remanded in custody for
sentencing on August 31.
end up on display at the
Auckland Museum.
The Oyster Perpetual
watch was presented to the
mountaineer by Rolex after
his ascent of Mt Everest in
1953, and he wore it when he
led the New Zealand Antarctic
Expedition, which reached
the South Pole on January 4,
1958.
The family is also divided
over the running of the Sir
Edmund Hillary Foundation.
Peter Hillary said organisations from other countries
were stepping in where the
Himalayan Trust used to take
the principal role, which he
described as a lost opportunity for New Zealand.
But June Hillary said the
foundation
had
limited
means. ‘‘We only have the
money to do that, so that’s our
philosophy that we keep it
and do it properly, and I think
it’s working, too.’’
■ AIR FORCE
DIGEST
Head1
Porn admitted
Feud deepens over sale
of Sir Edmund’s watches
The rift between the children
of Sir Edmund Hillary and his
second wife, Lady June, has
grown wider, with the widow
in a rare interview blaming
her stepson for the family
feud.
Last year Lady June Hillary tried to sell some of her
late husband’s watches at
auction in Switzerland, a
move that outraged his children, Peter and Sarah Hillary.
The siblings claimed the
watches, valued at $25,000,
belonged to them and should
not have left the country, and
won a High Court injunction
last year preventing the sale.
One of the watches was one
which Edmund Hillary wore
on a trip to the South Pole.
Last night One News
reported June Hillary had
given a rare interview to an
Australian news network,
which will be screened in
New Zealand on Sunday.
SOUTH ISLAND
history of trespassing and
shoplifting offences.
He said Blackett had little
recall of any of the events.
At a Christchurch District
Court sentencing at the
Rangiora Court House yesterday, Judge Emma Smith said
Blackett had an elevated,
uncontrolled abuse of alcohol.
Community-based sentences had not had an impact on
his reoffending, she said.
port manager, started working for the government
agency in 1966, while Rodgers,
the Christchurch inspections
chief Customs officer, began
in 1970.
The pair said they had
worked in a variety of roles in
the service, helping to ‘‘target
baddies’’ who tried to bring in
illegal items.
Ward said drug smugglers
still used ‘‘oldies but goodies’’
like couches and soft toys, but
officials were always looking
out for more innovative attempts to bring contraband
into the country.
‘‘You never underestimate
anyone’s ability to come up
with some new way to smuggle something in,’’ he said.
Rodgers said technological
innovations such as mobile
X-ray machines had changed
the way the service worked.
‘‘I was in charge of the first
calculator we got – a big one
that I used to calculate exchange rates – and everyone
would crowd around and ask
me how to use it,’’ he said.
The pair said they had enjoyed their time with the service. ‘‘Gerry and I would probably agree – you think back
and wonder, ‘Where the hell
has 40 years gone?’’’ Ward
said.
Fourteen other South
Island staff received longservice awards.
❯❯ NELSON: Phones were
ringing off the hook at Nelson
Honey after a bee venom
product produced by the
company was reported to have
been used by the Duchess of
Cambridge. Managing director
Philip Cropp said four extra
staff had to take phone orders
for his Royal Nectar face
cream yesterday, after bee
venom was publicised as an
alternative to botox. Cropp
was surprised to hear about
royalty using his product.
Bible stolen
❯❯ OAMARU: An Oamaru man
clearly did not read the words
‘‘thou shalt not steal’’ in the
Bible that he stole, a court has
heard. Neil Christopher Rolton,
56, pest control worker, was
convicted and discharged in
the Oamaru District Court. The
book belonged to court
registrar Peter Bond.
Fairfax and agencies