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Marie Davis - Source: ONE News -
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A man who helped in the search for Christchurch teenager Marie
Davis has been found guilty of her rape and murder.
After a month-long trial the jury took just five hours to convict
Dean Cameron.
Cameron, a 39-year-old roadworker was accused of raping and
killing the 15-year-old and dumping her body in the Waimakariri
river.
Davis disappeared when she was alone in her home early on April 6
last year, 12 days before her naked body was found in the
river.
Cameron, related to one of Marie's friends, even helped with the search for her. He denied all the charges.
The jury had two questions to ask the judge on Thursday morning, asking to hear a conversation police recorded between Cameron and a friend and to watch again the video of blankets being retrieved by divers from the river where her body was eventually found.
Following the verdict, it was revealed Cameron was convicted of rape in 2004 and sentenced to four years jail.
Cameron showed no emotion whatsoever as the verdicts were read out, but tears flowed for Marie outside the high court.
"It will never bring back Marie, but at least...he got what he deserved," says Marie's mother Janet Davis.
"It's a shame we didn't get to see her grow up to be the beautiful woman she could've been," says Nick Donald, Marie's cousin.
In his closing address, Crown prosecutor Chris Lange reminded the jury that there had been no sign of forced entry to Marie's house in Morrison Avenue on the night she disappeared. He said it seemed she must have let someone she knew into the house.
Spots of Cameron's blood were found on the floor of the study where she had been using the computer that night, and his DNA was found in semen on swabs taken from her body, Lange said.
He reiterated that there was no evidence to link anyone else to the crime. He also said there was no evidence that Marie was at any risk of suicide.
"She was not a troubled girl as the defence portrayed her. She was a relatively normal 15-year-old girl," he said.
The pathologists had agreed that the cause of death was "anatomically unascertainable" but Sage had suggested that one possible mechanism was the so-called "sleeper hold" with an elbow crooked about the neck which caused unconsciousness by cutting off the flow of blood through the carotid artery.
Lange pointed out that there had been evidence by a witness, a former police officer, that Cameron had once demonstrated the use of this carotid hold.
He said if the jury found that Marie had died while Cameron was facilitating the crime of sexual violation or trying to avoid detection after the offence, they should convict him of murder.
Cameron's defence lawyer has said that the case against his client is only circumstantial, and says Cameron must have been mistaken when he said he'd never been to Davis's house, as spots of his blood were found there.
"This is plainly a tragedy, but tragedy is not relieved by an unjust verdict....the harm the net result to the community is worse than before," says Defence Counsel, Frank Hogan.
The Crown has asked the judge to consider a non-parole and preventive detention sentence.
Cameron will be sentenced in August.
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