The Eastman case: an unstable defendant, a lawyers' picnic, and a huge waste of public money

Eastman was freed on bail late on the evening of 22 August 2014 after serving 19 years in prison. He left prison lying beneath a blanket in the back seat of a station wagon (to escape photographers). Between mid-2014 and the end of his second trial, his period on (strict) bail conditions seems to have passed without incident.

The re-trial commenced in Canberra on 18 June 2018. Five months later, on 22 November 2018, Eastman was found not guilty. The jury spent seven days deliberating and at one point seemed deadlocked. A shell-shocked ACT public is now digesting the result of its most high-profile criminal case in living memory.

One big issue following the acquittal is who actually did the crime. On this there are several schools of thought.

The family of Colin Winchester reportedly is "extremely disappointed" following David Eastman's acquittal of the ACT police chief's murder. There is little doubt that the victim's family, the police, and the DPP were all convinced of Eastman's guilt.

A second and more common reaction follows the reasoning of inquiry judge Martin. He concluded that he was "fairly certain the applicant is guilty of the murder of the deceased"but "a nagging doubt remains". In other words the case did not pass the "reasonable doubt" test and Eastman had to be acquitted.

The third response was that some other person or persons did the crime. Eastman has always proclaimed his total innocence, and some of his former legal representatives as well as some journalists suggest that the Italian Mafia are credible suspects, despite very limited direct evidence.

We can conclude that the legal system overall found that Eastman's original conviction was unsafe. He retains the presumption of innocence and the crime remains officially unsolved.

A bigger issue is whether the legal system worked well in this case.

It came to a conclusion of sorts, - but it took 30 years, and a now presumed-innocent man spent nearly 20 years in prison, and nearly another 10 years under investigation. The legal system clearly did not work particularly well nor in a timely manner.

It is now clear from the second official inquiry that the first trial was badly conducted. Terry O'Donnell, a public defender who had represented Eastman remarked"the first trial was an absolute disgrace, it was a shambles, it was a miscarriage - the forensic evidence was almost certainly fabricated in some respects". Eastman himself must take some of the blame for this "shambles", which to a substantial degree stemmed from his own erratic behaviour. Questions do arise concerning how the presiding judge handled the case, particularly for allowing the defendant to torpedo his own defence. (The judge at the second trial had the advantage of knowing the destructive effect the defendant had on the outcome of the original trial.) The DPP has also been accused of not disclosing all relevant material to the defence in the original trial.

A huge question relates to why there was a second trial at all, and (given the acquittal) whether the investigation should be reopened.

Acting Justice Martin recommended that ("in view of the nature of the miscarriage of justice that has occurred and the period the applicant has spent in custody") Eastman should be pardoned. To again quote Terry O'Donnell, he sees no point in re-opening the investigation because "it's so long ago, the witnesses I know are alive are subject to suppression and protection orders, and a lot of the people are dead," he said. "There's too much water under the bridge to get to grips to it."