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David Harcourt
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| Joined: | 31 Dec 1969 |
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| Posts: | 1127 |
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Posted: 16 Aug 2006 06:50 pm |
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I see that John Barlow's lawyer has been trying to secure a pardon for his client.
How very strange, and yet how oddly appropriate.
Not a fourth trial, for that would inevitably reach the same conclusion as the third, but a pardon, thereby evading the judicial process.
What a grisly comedy this has been!
For those who came in late, on 16 February 1994 Wellington businessman John Barlow entered an office in a commercial building here in Wellington and confronted Gene and Eugene Thomas, two businessmen who had lent him money whose repayment was overdue. At the end of a short interview, Barlow shot both men, disabling them, and then carefully shot each in the head at close range. He then removed a page from the Thomases' appointment diary which recorded the fact of his appointment with them, and drove to a local rubbish dump, where he discarded the pistol after switching the barrel for another of a different calibre. He was convicted because of three things:
* He left a receipt for the price of entry to the rubbish dump in his car. (This eventually led to discovery of the pistol.)
* He was not aware that the time of his appointment with the Thomases was recorded in a second diary. Because of this record, Barlow's denial of the fact that there was such an appointment, or that he had kept it, merely served to incriminate him.
* And he was seen leaving the scene of the crime by, not one, but two witnesses.Attached Image (viewed 3204 times):
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David Harcourt
Administrator
| Joined: | 31 Dec 1969 |
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| Posts: | 1127 |
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Posted: 15 Mar 2008 04:23 am |
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I had intended to go on to tell the Barlow story but other events intervened. This morning, however, that ghastly face loomed out of the pages of the Dominion Post once again...
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David Harcourt
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| Joined: | 31 Dec 1969 |
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| Posts: | 1127 |
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Posted: 15 Mar 2008 04:24 am |
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"Cold-blooded, double murderer" is right.
This is one person who should never be paroled.
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David Harcourt
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| Joined: | 31 Dec 1969 |
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| Posts: | 1127 |
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Posted: 2 Aug 2008 01:38 am |
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The fact that Barlow has been granted leave to appeal to the Privy Council in April or May next year changes very little.
The most Barlow can hope for is a retrial, which will have the same outcome as its predecessors.
Barlow is a very, very strange man. I begin to suspect that his difficulty with a confession - which will, I hope, be a prerequisite for parole - is that, having constructed such an elaborate cover story, he has never been able to persuade himself to let it go. Once Barlow admits that the whole story is a pack of lies from beginning to end, where will he be? Instead of a mere run-of-the-mill, common-or-garden, everyday cold-blooded double-murderer he will be revealed to the world as a cold blooded double-murder, liar and fantasist whose behaviour towards his unswervingly loyal wife has been every bit as wicked as his murder of Eugene and Gene Thomas. The Thomases are dead, yes, but Angela Barlow has spent more than 12 years in Hell, believing that her husband has been wrongly imprisoned for their murders.
This is a very evil man, who should stay in prison until he confesses or until he dies.
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Guest
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Posted: 10 Jan 2011 08:56 pm |
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What of the NZ justice system ?
John Barlow has been released, and has retired to life with his dedicated wife Angela - pruning the bushes and tending to the garden.
He enjoys the company of his family and friends, the occasional nice meal and glass of fine wine.
He has never confessed to any crime, and while in prison declined to take any courses that addressed his offending, such as the "violence prevention" course.
15 years for the lives of two men.
Is that a fair assessment of the value of life ?
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