Lundy told cop he was ‘naughty’

Mark Lundy told police he had been ‘‘a bit of a naughty boy’’ for using a prostitute the night his family were murdered – but he didn’t want his words recorded that way.

Detective Jennifer Curran told the High Court at Wellington yesterday that she spoke to Lundy on August 30, 2000, the day the bodies of his wife and daughter were found at their Palmerston North home.

Lundy, then 41, said at one stage: ‘‘I have been a bit of a naughty boy.’’ But he did not want it recorded like that in writing, Curran said.

In the written statement, he said he had booked into a Petone motel while he was in the Wellington area to see clients of his business, which sold kitchen sinks and taps.

He watched movies, drank rum and coke, and about 11.30pm he phoned an ‘‘escort’’. She gave him a massage and sex in return for $140.

He has pleaded not guilty to murdering his wife Christine, 38, and daughter Amber, 7.

He first stood trial in 2002 but a retrial, now in its sixth week, was ordered after a successful appeal in 2013.

Curran, who is among the last Crown witnesses, will continue her evidence later.

On Friday the court will resume hearing from a German scientist the defence has called.

Many witnesses have spoken about two small smears on a polo shirt found in Lundy’s car.

The Crown says the combined evidence proves brain tissue from Christine Lundy is on the shirt.

Marielle Vennemann, from Germany, said tests conducted at the Netherlands Forensic Institute were not fit for the purpose of identifying the species of origin of tissue on the shirt.

There were flaws in the Dutch institute’s method and results, she said.

She also went to an American clinical pathology laboratory where some of the Lundy samples were processed. She said the laboratory was ‘‘dirty’’ and the procedures to avoid contamination were not what she would have expected.