Taxi fire accused appeals

Driver just using the toilet, court told

IT was a coincidence a taxi caught fire just seconds after a Launceston man was seen walking away from it on CCTV footage, a Hobart court has heard.

In August, David Brian Langford, 48, was sentenced to 10 months in prison, wholly suspended for two years, after a jury found him guilty of unlawfully setting fire to a taxi.

At the time of the crime, Langford was a taxi driver.

About 1.45am on February 23, 2016, he drove his taxi to Summerhill and parked at a service station and mechanics workshop, which was also used as a base for taxis owned or operated by the proprietor of the mechanics business.

It was found Langford set fire to a Toyota Prius taxi, which had been parked there overnight.

The evidence did not plain how the fire was lit.

Langford was identified as being present at the time from CCTV footage, but gave evidence he went there to urinate.

In the Court of Criminal Appeal before Chief Justice Alan Blow and justices Helen Wood and Michael Brett yesterday, Langford appealed his conviction. ex-

Langford’s lawyer, Mark Doyle, said his client, who has a mild intellectual disability, was appealing the conviction because a fire investigator who gave evidence during the trial was not an expert on electrical fires that start in a car internally, which he said could have been the source of the fire.

The fire officer had consulted a third party about electrical fires before giving evidence in court.

Mr Doyle said it was a coincidence that as Langford had stopped to use the toilet, there had been some kind of electrical fault in the taxi, which led to it catching fire.

Appearing for the state, Director of Public Prosecutions Daryl Coates said the fire officer had made it clear he was not an expert on electrical car fires and that he would have formed the opinion the fire started externally even without consulting a third party about the issue.

The court reserved its decision.