Alan Hall case: Evidence police removed was ‘crucial … absolutely fundamental’

Friday, 10 July 2026

Alan Hall, who was wrongfully convicted of murdering Arthur Easton in 1985.

A key witness who saw someone fleeing from the direction of a bloody murder scene has stuck to his description of the possible offender, despite strong questioning from lawyers.

Two former police officers are on trial in Auckland’s High Court for wilfully perverting the course of justice in the wrongful conviction of Alan Hall, by removing a vital description from the witness’s statement before it was presented to court.

Both men have pleaded not guilty, and have name suppression.

In October 1985, Ronald Turner and his wife were driving in Papakura when they saw a man acting suspiciously run across the street, coming from the direction of Arthur Easton’s house, where the 52-year-old father of five lay dying in his hallway after being stabbed by an intruder.

Turner and his wife told police the man was Māori, and Turner repeated this in three statements, including that he was “100% sure” of the man’s ethnicity. Turner is Māori himself.

However, in his statement that was read to the court at Hall’s 1986 trial, Turner’s description of the man being Māori had been removed.

Hall, who is Pākehā, was convicted of Easton’s murder, and served 19 years in prison before his conviction was quashed by the Supreme Court in 2022. Hall was later awarded nearly $5 million in compensation for his wrongful conviction.

Arthur Easton, who was murdered in his home in Papakura in October 1985. Alan Hall was convicted of his murder in 1986. In June 2022 the Supreme Court quashed Hall's conviction and said there had been a substantial miscarriage of justice.

Turner also described the person he saw as being between 5’7” and 6’. Hall is 5’7”.

During the second week of the two former officers’ trials, the court has heard from lawyers, former police officers, and former judges, about whether Turner’s description of the possible offender as Māori was important.

It also heard from Turner, whose altered evidence is at the heart of the case. It wasn’t until two years after Hall’s trial, that Turner became aware his evidence had been changed some time between making his statements, and what the jury heard.

More than 40 years after his initial identification, Turner told the court this week he didn’t resile from what he repeatedly told police at the time.

“I still believe that it was a Māori guy.”

When pressed by one of the defendants’ lawyers, David Jones, KC, Turner said he based his description largely on the man’s mannerisms and movements.

Former High Court judge Kit Toogood has been giving evidence for the Crown in the trial of two former police officers charged with wilfully perverting the course of justice during Alan Hall’s wrongful conviction.

Turner’s former wife, Linda Burrows, also told the court she believed the person they saw that night was Māori, despite him wearing a balaclava and hoodie, given how he walked and acted, and a fleeting view of his face.

Former High Court judge Kit Toogood, KC, said police had an ongoing duty to disclose the information, and didn’t believe concerns about whether Turner’s description was reliable, were relevant. Reliability of evidence was a matter for a jury to decide, he said.

Turner’s identification of the man as Māori was underscored by other witnesses’ evidence of the assailant, was “clearly a live issue”, and the description was “obviously highly material”, Toogood said.

To suggestions Turner’s statement was just opinion, Toogood noted “every eyewitness is expressing an opinion … and that doesn’t make it inadmissible”.

Lawyer Charles Cato, who represented Hall at an initial hearing in 1986, said the relevance of Turner’s description was “central, crucial” to Hall’s legal team, but they never knew about it.

And he said if Hall’s trial lawyer, Peter Williams, had known about it, “he could have made a great deal of it in front of a jury”.

Another of Hall’s former lawyers, Bruce Stainton, said discovering what Turner really said in his statements was difficult to uncover, despite repeated attempts to ensure they had all relevant information from the police and the Crown.

“You don’t know what you don’t know.”

If he had been aware of the full Turner evidence at Hall’s 1987 appeal, “it would have made a huge difference to the approach the Court of Appeal would have taken”.

Prominent defence lawyer James Rapley, KC, said the undisclosed Turner evidence would have dramatically changed Hall’s trial. The failure to provide it to the defence was “so grave” and “so significant”, it would also have been the first point of any appeal.

Rapley said it was “absolutely fundamentally important information”, and this was “crystal clearly obvious - no doubt about that”.

Alan Hall has been in court to hear evidence nearly every day of the trial.

The Crown case against the two former police officers is due to conclude on Monday, with the defence case likely to take two days, before each side sums up.

The trial is being heard in front of a judge alone, Justice Ian Gault.