Crewe Case to be reviewed but not re-opened
Rochelle Crewe got a partly positive answer to her prayers. Her parents’ murder case will be reviewed but not re-opened.
New Zealand Deputy Commissioner Rob Pope said today that police have appointed a senior investigator, Northern Region Senior Investigator Detective Superintendent Andy Lovelock, to conduct a thorough analysis and assessment of the homicide file in an endeavour to answer questions raised by Rochelle Crewe.
“We talked to Rochelle some weeks ago and understandably she has questions that she wants answers to. We will do our very best, taking into account the limitation of time and the availability and recollection of witnesses,” said Pope. But police have not re-opened the case and they are not re-investigating it.
Despite the fact that this is not what I would like to see done in this case, I welcome a review. I would also like to extend my best wishes to DSI Lovelock who will face the daunting task of reviewing his colleagues’ work. It would have been the better decision to have a completely independent investigator take over the reviewing of the Crewe case. Whenever police reviews its own work there will always remain doubt that maybe it was not done as thorough as could have been, as critical as should have been, and of course, the fear that the public was never told all the results of the review.
For now, I wish to give DSI Lovelock a clean slate to work with and look forward to reading about his findings. The new review has no set time frame.
Yesterday, a group of prominent and respected New Zealanders backed calls to reopen the case. A survey by the New Zealand Herald of 16 members of the Order of New Zealand found eight wanted to see the 1970 murders solved and the other half did not oppose Rochelle Crewe’s bid to have the case reopened.
Those supporting Ms Crewe’s bid included former All Black captain Sir Brian Lochore, two former governors-general Sir Paul Reeves and Dame Cath Tizard, award-winning writer and literary critic Professor C K Stead, children’s author Margaret Mahy, and founding president of the NZ Council of Trade Unions, Ken Douglas.
To be continued…
Categories: Cold Case News, Forensics, Miscarriages of Justice, Unsolved
Tags: arthur allen thomas, Autopsy, Ballistics, Crime Scene, Cruelty, Evidence, Expert Testimony, Faulty Evidence, Forensics, Gun Fire, Identification, Investigations Division, Jeanette and Harvey Crewe, Miscarriage of Justice, New Zealand, Police, Prisons, Unsolved Homicide, Victim, Witnesses, Wrongful Convictions