Grace Millane murder trial ‘threatened’

A leading criminal barrister is concerned the trial of the man charged with murdering British backpacker Grace Millane could be threatened due to ongoing suppression breaches.

Grace Millane vanished at the start of December from central Auckland before her body was found in the Waita¯ kere Ranges on Sunday. The 26-year-old man was charged with her murder has been granted interim name suppression after an appeal by his lawyer.

Despite that, a number of international media outlets have published details of the man’s identity and his name has been searched more than 100,000 times on global search engine Google.

New Zealand Bar Association vice-president Jonathan Eaton QC told Radio NZ the publicity about the accused undermined the chance of finding an impartial jury.

On Tuesday, Google sent out an email to subscribers of its Google Trends service naming the accused in the subject line.

‘‘That’s obviously quite extraordinary and raises a couple of issues, the first is that demonstrated the justice process struggling to cope with how we rein in the social media aspect in the internet age,’’ Eaton said.

He understood Google’s explanation that the company was not aware of the suppression but said there should be an inquiry.

Eaton said that from a legal perspective it was ‘‘hugely problematic’’. ‘‘Everybody who is accessing the defendant’s name is obtaining information which has been suppressed by way of a court order which is completely undermining the current legal status of the case in New Zealand.’’

He said other jurisdictions should respect the laws but overseas media outlets would not care about the fair trial rights.

Catrin Owen