New Zealand Law Society - Courts roundup 9 July - 15 July 2026
Decisions, proceedings and news from the courts in some common law jurisdictions in the past week.
Wilson v R [2026] NZSC 88 (7 July 2026)
Successful appeal – W and H's 2021 murder and aggravated robbery convictions arising from 1987 armed robbery and shooting set aside following cold-case reinvestigation – SC unanimous that appeals be allowed but split as to remedy – Majority (Winkelmann CJ, Williams, Kós and Miller JJ) set aside convictions and entered judgments of acquittal; Glazebrook J dissented in part, would have ordered a retrial – Sole live issue for majority was whether verdicts unreasonable under s 232(2)(a) Criminal Procedure Act 2011, applying R v Owen [2008] 2 NZLR 37 test (whether, having regard to all evidence, no jury could reasonably have been satisfied of guilt beyond reasonable doubt) – Crown case wholly circumstantial, resting on 10 (later 12) strands (presence/opportunity/means, motive and interest, subsequent conduct) – Majority found no reliable evidence placed appellants at the scene and remaining strands insufficient to prove presence beyond reasonable doubt even cumulatively – Crown separately required to exclude, as a reasonable possibility, that alternative suspect LH committed the offending – Majority found case against LH at least as strong as, and in respect of planning stronger than, that against appellants – Not excluded as reasonable possibility – No jury could reasonably have been satisfied of guilt – Convictions set aside, acquittals entered –
Glazebrook J, dissenting, found four pieces of Crown evidence improperly admitted giving rise to miscarriage of justice – Considered a properly directed jury could, on remaining admissible evidence, have found both appellants guilty beyond reasonable doubt and excluded LH's involvement – Would have allowed appeals on miscarriage point alone and ordered a retrial given seriousness of charges and victims' interests, rather than entering acquittals –
SC unanimously held defence hearsay statement (Hartshorne evidence, alleged confession by LH) was wrongly excluded at trial though immaterial given outcome – SC also unanimously held a takedown order should have been made in respect of media material on W’s prior convictions, though unnecessary to decide whether its absence caused a miscarriage of justice – W's interim name suppression, sought on fair-trial grounds, ordered to expire on release of judgment given no retrial ordered.
Haines v Official Assignee & Memelink [2026] NZCA 291 (3 July 2026)
Unsuccessful interlocutory application seeking pre-hearing orders against Official Assignee (OA) – Underlying cross-appeals concern HC's quantum meruit assessment of H's proof of debt in M's bankruptcy – H (former lawyer) acted for M between October 2016 and August 2018 and claimed $525,000 plus GST in unpaid fees – H seeking increase, M seeking award overturned for improperly aggregating personal, company and trust fees – M sought orders compelling OA to identify pre-hearing which components of H's claim related to M personally, his companies, or a family trust, plus ancillary procedural directions – CA held this was in substance a late attempt to obtain further evidence via de facto interrogatories after evidence had closed and a prior fresh evidence application had been declined - No effort shown to obtain information before HC trial, and evidence not cogent given OA's own position (invoice addressed to M personally/as trustee; no company fees in HC award) – Alleged aggregation errors are matters for submissions on the existing record on a rehearing, not pre-hearing interrogation of OA – Orders declined as ancillary or irrelevant –
CA also declined M's repeated request for reader/writer assistance – M's "supplementary affidavit," filed after his fresh evidence application was declined and purporting to amend that application, found an abuse of process – Affidavit removed from Court file; Registrar directed not to accept further affidavits or applications from M to adduce further evidence – No order as to costs.
Foley v ASB Bank Ltd [2026] NZCA 292 (3 July 2026)
Unsuccessful appeal against HC decision striking out F's (self-represented) counterclaim to ASB's debt recovery claim – Appeal struck out under s 164B(2)(a) Senior Courts Act 2016 (SCA) – Restraint order made under s 164C SCA – Counterclaim founded on "sovereign citizen" pseudo-legal tropes, including "strawman"/dual persona theory, unilateral revocation of contracts, and assertion that ASB itself was a "legal fiction" incapable of enforcing a contract, on which basis F joined 16 ASB individuals to the counterclaim – HC found these arguments "wholly without merit" – Consistent with prior authority rejecting such arguments as having no legal foundation – Earlier appeal by F against underlying summary judgment had already been struck out as an abuse of process – CA (Katz J) found present appeal added nothing of substance to already rejected arguments and was likewise plainly an abuse of process, noting unfairness to respondents in defending a further incomprehensible appeal and risk to Court's control of its own processes –
As this was second strike-out within two years, automatic restraint provisions under s 164C SCA were triggered – F restrained for three years from commencing or continuing any civil proceeding without leave of High Court – F advised of right to seek leave to appeal to Supreme Court.
R v Jensen [2026] NZHC 1944, 6 July 2026
Sentencing for murder – J pleaded guilty to murdering C by stabbing him 3 times with a hunting knife in a boarding house in Levin – Significant psychiatric evidence established that J suffered from serious psychotic illness, likely schizophrenia or schizoaffective disorder, and that an insanity defence was available on balance, but J declined to advance it – Court considered whether presumption of life imprisonment for murder under s 102 Sentencing Act 2002 (SA) would be manifestly unjust in light of J’s mental impairment –
Life imprisonment not manifestly unjust, principally because ongoing parole eligibility, release conditions, monitoring and potential recall were necessary to protect the public – Minimum period of imprisonment set under s 103 SA – Starting point of 11 years adopted by reference to comparable cases – No uplift for previous violent offences – One-year allowance given for guilty plea, reducing minimum period to statutory minimum of 10 years – J sentenced to life imprisonment with minimum period of imprisonment of 10 years.
R v Hoggart [2026] NZHC 1970 (9 July 2026)
Re-sentencing following CA decision quashing sentence of preventive detention imposed in 2004 – H convicted of wounding with intent to cause grievous bodily harm, injuring with intent to injure, and threatening to kill after seriously assaulting his former partner and stabbing another man – Principal issue whether preventive detention remained justified or whether finite sentence should be imposed after more than 20 years served in prison – Crown submitted there remained significant risk of serious violent offending, while defence relied on evidence of rehabilitation, advancing age, and reduced risk –
Preventive detention declined – HC held statutory threshold no longer met, despite seriousness of offences and history of violent offending – Significant weight placed on lengthy imprisonment, rehabilitation, and expert evidence that risk of future serious violent offending had reduced – Sentence of 7 years 6 months' imprisonment imposed on lead charge, with concurrent sentences on remaining charges – Having already served substantially longer than finite sentence, no further imprisonment required.
NZEI Te Riu Roa Incorporated v Secretary for Education [2026] NZEmpC 135 (30 June 2026)
Unsuccessful application (2:1) for compliance orders and injunction – NZEI sought compliance orders requiring repayment of specified pay deductions from wages during partial strike action and injunction restraining future non-compliance – First substantive consideration by Employment Court of lawfulness of specified pay deductions for partial strike action –
NZEI members engaged in partial strike action from 23 July to 22 August 2025 – Strike action comprised bans on working more than standard hours and ban on new cases – Secretary gave notice of 10 per cent pay deduction to NZEI before strike commenced, rather than to each employee individually – NZEI argued notice under s 95B(4) Employment Relations Act 2000 (ERA) could only be given once strike had commenced and 2 or more employees were parties to it – Secretary argued ss 95B(1) and 95B(4) provided alternative methods of giving notice, available both before and after commencement –
Majority (Judges Smith and Holden) found s 95B(4) provided alternatives to individual notice under s 95B(1) – Absence of future tense "or will be" in s 95B(4) not determinative, section must be read as a whole – s 95B(5)(a), providing employer may choose method of giving notice, reinforced that ss 95B(1) and 95B(4) were alternatives – Secretary's notice valid – Deductions lawful – Information provided under s 95F adequate –
Dissenting (Judge Doyle) – s 95B(1) and s 95B(4) provide 2 temporally different arrangements – Notice under s 95B(4) limited to period after strike has commenced – Plain meaning of s 95B(4) should not be departed from – Would have found deductions unlawful.
Nord Stream AG v Lloyd’s Insurance Company SA [2026] EWHC 1685 (Comm) (6 July 2026)
Unsuccessful insurance claim – Commercial Court ruled sabotage of natural gas pipelines running from Russia to Germany was a consequence of the war in Ukraine – Damage caused by explosions at locations 6.5 km apart in September 2022 rendering pipes inoperable –
NS sought indemnity under offshore operating all-risks insurance policies for damage to NS1 pipelines caused by explosions and an associated dent – Defendant insurers denied cover, relying on Exclusion 2.i in policy wording – Exclusion 2.i excluded loss or damage “directly or indirectly occasioned by, happening through, or in consequence of war”, and also damage to property “by or under the order of any government or public or local authority” – NS’s case was that in those circumstances it had cover under a separate clause, General Condition 9, for deliberate government damage –
On policy construction issues held that Institute Clauses for Builders’ Risks and Institute War Clauses Builders’ Risks did not provide overriding war-risks cover for operating fixed pipelines – War exclusion and government-act/order exclusion were separate limbs of Exclusion 2.i – General Condition 9 was limited to pollution-related government action – On causation, applying earlier first instance authorities (Spinney’s (1948) Ltd, Coxe, American Tobacco Co v Guardian Assurance Co, and Crowden), the phrase “directly or indirectly occasioned by, happening through, or in consequence of war” imposed a broad causal test – A war need not be the dominant cause, but must be more than historical background: must be a contributing factor which is “noticeable” or “specifically accountable” as a cause of the loss – War exclusion applied despite argument that pipelines were a non-military target in international waters well outside “theatre of war” – Whoever carried out the sabotage, Russia–Ukraine war was a significant contributing cause of the attacks within the broad wording of the exclusion – Also found, on balance of probabilities, that the dent was caused by an explosive charge as part of the same coordinated sabotage operation – All pipeline damage excluded from cover under Exclusion 2.i – Claim failed.
Quebec (Attorney General) v Denis 2026 SCC 25 (10 July 2026)
SC allowed Attorney General of Quebec’s appeal – restored validity of six-month mandatory minimum sentence in Criminal Code s 286.1(2)(a) for obtaining, or communicating for the purpose of obtaining, sexual services from a person under 18, concluding it was constitutional –
Criminal Code provides for certain mandatory minimum sentences for specific sentences – Can be challenged if consequences would be excessively severe for a hypothetical but reasonably foreseeable and realistic scenario – D caught in Police sting operation and challenged constitutionality of minimum sentence of 6 months' imprisonment – CA concluded it was a fit sentence for D but would be grossly disproportionate for an 18-year-old who agrees to have sex in exchange for money with a minor friend whom he knows offers these services and for whom he has romantic feelings –
Majority held that although sentence may be severe in a reasonably foreseeable scenario involving an 18-year-old first offender, it is not grossly disproportionate and therefore does not violate s 12 Charter – SC emphasized serious gravity of sexual commodification of children, high moral blameworthiness inherent in the offence, and Parliament’s legitimate objectives of denunciation and deterrence – Karakatsanis and Moreau JJ dissented, concluding mandatory minimum would be cruel and unusual punishment where a non-custodial sentence would otherwise be fit for a youthful first offender.