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A police fingerprint expert has come under heavy questioning in the David Bain retrial.
Bain is on trial in the High Court at Christchurch for the
murder five members of his family in Dunedin in 1994.
Kim Jones was responsible for taking fingerprints in the
inquiry.
Jones was questioned by the prosecution several days ago and on
Tuesday he returned to the stand for his cross-examination.
Almost immediately, he came under some heavy questioning from Bain's lawyers who questioned his practices and said that several experts disagreed with some of his evidence.
There was an especially tense moment in court where Bain's lawyer accused the witness of giving misleading evidence in Bain's original trial.
Jones sat in the witness box for several seconds without speaking before saying he had no comment to make on the subject.
Also, on Tuesday, a close friend of parents Margaret and Robin Bain described how Margaret was becoming what some people would describe as "mental" in the early 90's.
Barbara Short gave evidence via video link from Sydney and knew the couple when they all lived in Papua New Guinea in the 80's.
Short says she went to stay with the Bain's in Dunedin in 1991 when Margaret was involved in what she called "new aged things".
She says Margaret believed in previous lives, and actually told her the pair had been related in a previous life.
She also claimed to be related to the emperors in Egypt, something the witness said she was very concerned about.
Nine weeks into the trial, the last Crown witnesses are being called. A couple of police officers are expected to give evidence and some more background evidence about the Bain family is expected to be presented before the Crown wraps up its case in the next couple of days.
