Arthur Allan Thomas convicted of Crewe murders for a second time

The murder of Waikato farming couple Jeanette and Harvey Crewe at Pukekawa in the winter of 1970 is one of the great ‘whodunnits’ in New Zealand’s criminal history. It also became one of the country’s most protracted legal struggles as Arthur Allan Thomas, the neighbour convicted twice for the murders, fought to clear his name.

Thomas was first convicted of the double murder of the Crewes in 1971. His appeal was rejected by the Court of Appeal and an inquiry by retired judge Sir George McGregor found no reason to reopen the case. Thomas’s supporters maintained his innocence and began a long quest to have the convictions quashed. In the face of strong public opinion the government referred the case back to the Court of Appeal, which ordered a retrial that began in late March 1973.

The defence questioned evidence presented by the police in the first trial, especially with respect to a cartridge case that had been crucial to the original conviction. Forensic scientist Dr Jim Sprott testified that the cartridge case found in the Crewes’ garden did not match the bullets that had killed the couple. Despite this, Thomas was convicted for a second time.

The matter did not end there. A campaign led in part by Pat Booth of the Auckland Star attempted to overturn Thomas’s conviction. The publication in 1978 of Beyond reasonable doubt?, by British author David Yallop, proved decisive. Yallop was scathing in his criticism of the way the police and courts had handled the case. He included an open letter to Prime Minister Robert Muldoon asking for a pardon. Muldoon responded by ordering Auckland QC Robert Adams-Smith to investigate. The barrister’s finding that ‘an injustice may have been done’ led to Thomas’s pardon in December 1979.

A 1980 Royal Commission concluded that police had committed ‘an unspeakable outrage’ – they had planted the cartridge case that had been key to the original conviction. Thomas received $950,000 (equivalent to $4.5 million in 2016) in compensation for the nine years he had spent in prison.

Scene from Beyond reasonable doubt, 1980 (NZ On Screen). See the full feature here: