Tully found guilty on five charges
The jury has found find Russell John Tully guilty of five charges relating to the Ashburton WINZ office shootings.
Tully stood impassive and looking resigned as the jury delivered its verdicts on the 11th day of the trial, and nodded to Justice Cameron Mander as he was remanded in custody for sentence on April 15.
People in the public gallery – many of them have stayed throughout the trial – remained quiet as the verdicts were delivered.
The verdicts were delivered after almost six hours of deliberations in the High Court at Christchurch. The Crown said the 49-year-old homeless man bore a grudge about his treatment by WINZ.
That led to him donning a balaclava on the morning of September 1, 2014, and going into the WINZ offices where he let loose with a pump-action sawn-off shotgun.
In 61 seconds while he rampaged through the office, he fired the weapon at four women, hitting three of them.
The jury convicted him on charges of murdering receptionist Peggy Turuhira Noble and case worker Susan Leigh Cleveland, who was shot three times as she pleaded for her life.
Tully was also found guilty of attempting to Kim Elizabeth Adams, who was narrowly missed by a solid shot fired into a wall near head height as she made her escape through a rear door.
The jury found him not guilty of attempted murder of Lindy Louise Curtis who was shot in the leg as she hid beneath her desk.
The jury convicted him of unlawful possession of two shotguns but found him not guilty of setting a man trap – a wire stretched between two trees across a track near the Ashburton River after the shootings.
Tully has been absent for much of the trial, and has been manacled in a wheelchair and later in an ordinary chair when the jury has seen him in court. He was removed from the courtroom twice early in the trial for outbursts that interrupted the proceedings.
Nor has he had his own lawyer, but two amicus curiae have questioned witnesses and presented defence submissions. They questioned whether the Crown had proved its case against Tully.
The Crown said the circumstantial evidence pointing to Tully as being the masked, lone gunman was “overwhelming”.
The jury returned to court repeatedly today to see videos taken by businesses in the area around the WINZ offices and to watch the CCTV footage showing the shootings inside the offices.
Justice Mander thanked the jury for their diligence in deciding the case.
“It is a tough job being a juror and this has been a tough case,” he said.
The family of murder victim Peggy Noble issued this statement after the verdicts, through a police officer: “They would like to acknowledge the support which has been given. They are thankful for the strength which each witness displayed to reach this outcome. Their love goes out to all the victims affected by this tragedy.”
Category: News
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