property. Late on the evening of 9 May 2010, Welsh smashed the rear window of Yuen’s work van. When Yuen found out, he and Elphick drove across Canberra for more than three hours trying to locate Welsh, before using Ashcroft to lure him to the location of the murder under the pretence of a drug purchase.
By August 2010, police had arrested and charged Yuen, Elphick and Ashcroft in relation to the murder. All pleaded not guilty and were remanded in custody.
Following a detailed assessment of the available evidence, the charges against Elphick and Ashcroft were downgraded to conspiring to commit grievous bodily harm and they were released on bail. However Yuen remained in custody on the murder charge. In March 2011, all three accused were committed to face trial in the ACT Supreme Court, with Elphick and Ashcroft to be jointly tried on the conspiracy charge, and Yuen to face a separate murder trial.
During the trial build-up Yuen mounted several challenges the admissibility of evidence including incriminating telephone calls intercepted prior to his arrest and hostile SMS messages exchanged between he and Welsh prior to the murder. A pre-trial hearing was listed in the Supreme Court to deal with these challenges one week before the trial was scheduled to start. On that day instead of challenging the evidence, Yuen plead guilty to the murder. The trial was vacated and the matter was listed for sentence. Yuen was also to be sentenced for the vicious bashing of another inmate whilst on remand for the murder.
During the preparation of the statement of facts Yuen claimed the gun had accidentally discharged, resulting in the matter being listed for a lengthy disputed facts hearing, involving most of the key trial witnesses, ballistic evidence and a lengthy cross-examination of Yuen. Following the disputed facts hearing the court found the fatal shot was deliberately fired and the matter was listed for a three day sentence hearing in April 2013, during which the court again heard from Yuen, as well as the family of Brendan Welsh through their victim impact statements.
On 31 May 2013, Yuen was sentenced to 28 years imprisonment with a non-parole period of 20 years, for the murder as well as the prison bashing. He will be eligible for parole in October 2030.
Elphick and Ashcroft were then jointly tried by jury for conspiring to commit grievous bodily harm on Brendan Welsh. Most of the witnesses called in the Yuen disputed facts hearing were again called to give evidence in the trial, and Yuen was again called to give evidence. After deliberating for five days, the jury could not agree on a verdict in relation to Elphick, however found Ashcroft not guilty.
Following discussions between defence and the Crown in preparation for the re-trial of Elphick, the charge of conspiracy to commit grievous bodily harm was replaced with one count of being an accessory after the fact, and Elphick pleaded guilty. He was sentenced to seven and a half months imprisonment.
Martin
Corey Martin was charged with murdering Andre Le Dinh at Le Dinh’s apartment in Belconnen in May 2010. Andre Le Dinh was a full time public servant and a part time dealer in cannabis. He dealt from his unit and often had large quantities of drugs and money in the unit.
It was the Crown case that Martin came to know about this, and formulated a plan to rob Mr Le Dinh. Martin somehow gained access to Mr Le Dinh’s apartment and a violent altercation took place. A key aspect of the Crown case was the physical disparity between Martin and Mr Le Dinh. Mr Le Dinh was of slight build weighing around 50kg and being about 165 cm’s tall. Martin was| |
||||
| 26 ¦ | DIRECTOR OF PUBLIC PROSECUTIONS ANNUAL REPORT 2012-2013 | |||
| ← Previous Page | Next Page → | |||