Networked Knowledge - Media Report

[This version of the report has been edited by Dr Robert N Moles
Underlining where it occurs is for editorial emphasis]

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On 17 July 2006, Colin James of the Adelaide Advertiser reported on the Weightman case in NSW involving Dr Allan Cala now of the South Australian Forensic Science Centre.

James said that Cala was now under official investigation for finding that the Weightman's had, in fact, died in a car accident. He said the State Government in South Australia had sought an urgent briefing on State Forensic Centre Senior Pathologist Dr Allan Cala after the NSW Health Care Complaints Commission confirmed he was being investigated for allegedly unsatisfactory professional conduct.

Colin James pointed out that Dr Cala had appeared on Channel 7's Forensic Investigators series and had frequently conducted autopsies and prepared expert reports for prosecutions since he moved to SA from NSW in 2004. He was said to have given expert evidence in hundreds of cases in SA and interstate, including the inquest into the murder of a woman on Norfolk Island and the trial of a mother who killed her four children.

James reported that the NSW inquiry into Dr Cala was launched after the NSW Supreme Court lifted suppression orders identifying him as the pathologist who examined Sydney couple Bill and Pam Weightman after their bodies were found in a car in 2000. NSW Premier Morris Iemma has called for a full report on Dr Cala after it was revealed he found Mr and Mrs Weightman died in a motor vehicle accident, when they had actually been drugged and murdered by their adopted son and an accomplice.

James aid that it had been alleged Dr Cala missed vital evidence that the couple had been given the sedative drug Serapax in cups of tea by David Weightman, who had hatched a murder plot with a male friend. It was said that Weightman allegedly held the legs of his adopted parents while his friend suffocated them with pillows before their bodies were put in their Mitsubishi Magna sedan, which was pushed down a national park embankment.

The pair escaped police attention until two years ago, when suspicious relatives confronted Weightman. He admitted murdering the couple with his friend, who was arrested last week. Dr Cala's findings were overturned in Weightman's murder trial when another forensic pathologist found bruising and other injuries to the Weightmans were consistent with them being forcibly held down and suffocated. Toxicology tests found traces of Serapax in both bodies.

NSW Opposition Leader Peter Debham said that a broader inquiry than the investigation by the Health Care Complaints Commission was needed to determine why Dr Cala and NSW police failed to discover evidence of the murder.

"We need the inquiry, not only as to why the pathologist got it wrong, but also why police were so under-resourced at the time of the original accident when the car was found that it wasn't obvious this was a murder scene" he is reported to have said.

Colin James reported that the South Australian State Forensic Science Centre Director Dr Hilton Kobus was apparently unaware that an inquiry had been launched into Dr Cala's work. He referred inquiries to the SA Government. A Government spokeswoman was reported to have said that a report would be prepared for Acting Minister for Administrative Services and Government Enterprises Paul Holloway. James reported that Dr Cala could not be contacted for comment.

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