Appeal launched against guilty verdicts in Kingsley Alley Jr murder trial

Australia Broadcast Center

05-05-2025

Three people found guilty of murdering a teenager after a house party near Darwin in 2022 have launched an appeal seeking to have their convictions thrown out, following what they say was a "miscarriage of justice" during their trial.
Madison Butler, 20, her mother Melissa Clancy, 39, and Dechlan Wurramarra, 22, were
Another man, who was 17 at the time and cannot be named, was jailed for 14 years for his role in the offending.
Lawyers for the then-teenager, Butler and Clancy have now filed appeal notices challenging the way prosecutors conducted the trial and the presiding judge's instructions to the jury.
The ABC understands Wurramarra is yet to file a notice but also intends to appeal.
The NT Supreme Court heard Kingsley Alley Jr was 'outrun and outnumbered' when Dechlan Wurramarra, Melissa Clancy and the teenager attacked him with a knife and metal poles.
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ABC News: Hamish Harty
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In the documents, seen by the ABC, the lawyers argue that prosecutors' cross-examination of a key witness about inconsistencies between her original witness statement and her evidence at the trial should not have been allowed.
The witness, whose identity is suppressed, was the only witness to directly implicate Clancy in Mr Alley's death, telling police Clancy called out from a nearby car for the younger trio to "kill him".
"[The witness] gave evidence [at the trial] that either there were no words said from within the car, or that she did not recall," Clancy's lawyers said.
"Rather than allowing her to refresh her memory from the written statement … the prosecutor instead put closed, leading propositions to the witness until the witness accepted that the content of the original police statement was true."
David Edwardson KC says prosecutors' cross-examination of a witness who implicated Melissa Clancy in Kingsley Alley Jr's murder should not have been allowed to go ahead during her trial last year.
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ABC News: Oliver Chaseling
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Each of the legal teams also accused prosecutors of flouting the presiding judge's instructions about the admission into evidence of "extraordinarily poor" CCTV audio of the killing.
"The learned trial judge allowed this over objection by the applicant, albeit on the express basis that [a] transcript was [not] to be provided to the jury," Butler's lawyers said.
"Without notice to the applicant or the court, the prosecution displayed a PowerPoint transcript to the jury during its closing address."
In a submission supported by Clancy and Butler, the teenager's lawyers also argued the trial judge's instructions to the jury had departed from relevant provisions in the NT's criminal code.
Kingsley Alley Jr's family remembered him as "a smart, kind, beautiful soul" after his four killers' sentencing in January.
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ABC News: Hamish Harty
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They said the territory's "joint commission" laws applied "when two or more people agree to commit an offence together and an offence is committed under that agreement".
"The trial judge's failure to direct the jury that they had to be satisfied of the relevant intention — being that an offence would be committed 'under the agreement' — was a failure to direct on an essential requirement of the charged offence," the lawyers said.
The court will now decide whether to grant the group leave to appeal before setting a hearing date.