Convicted police killer David Harold Eastman's last chance to have his case re-opened is a renewed appeal to ACT Attorney-General Simon Corbell.
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Eastman failed this week in a court bid for a new judicial inquiry into his conviction for the 1995 murder of Assistant Commissioner Colin Winchester, gunned down in the front yard of his Deakin home in 1989.
Observers believe this week's decision by Supreme Court Judge Shane Marshall was Eastman's last chance in the courts to have the case re-examined in light of fresh evidence that has recently emerged.
But Mr Corbell, who has the executive power to order a new inquiry, declined this week to say whether he would consider such a request from the 65-year-old convicted killer who has now spent nearly 17 years behind bars for a crime he says he did not commit.
Justice Marshall found this week that amendments made to the ACT Crimes Act in 2001 limited a convicted person to one judicial inquiry into the soundness of a conviction.
A report prepared by former ACT chief justice Jeffrey Miles in 2005, in which he said Eastman had been mentally fit at his 1995 murder trial, deemed there was no miscarriage of justice and the ACT government need take no further action.
But the Miles inquiry was limited to the question of Eastman's mental state at the time of his trial and did not consider the question of new evidence.
Fresh evidence recently has emerged that Eastman says could explain the presence of gunshot residue in his car, a key issue in his controversial 1995 trial. A witness has come forward with a gun he used rabbit shooting after borrowing Eastman's car. Eastman can ask Mr Corbell for an executive order for an inquiry to examine the new evidence.
A new inquiry ordered by Mr Corbell could also look at the issue of new evidence as well as the hotly disputed testimony of ballistics expert Robert Barnes as well as other aspects of Eastman's conviction.
Mr Corbell declined to say whether he would consider revisiting the amendments to the Crimes Act limiting a convicted person to one judicial review.
''I note the decision of Justice Marshall in relation to Mr Eastman's request for a further Inquiry into his conviction,'' Mr Corbell said in a statement.
''But I have no further comment to make at this time.''
