In New Zealand Police v Hannah Meiling Murphy & Ors [2026] NZDC 20914, the District Court at Westport ruled on trespass charges against nine protesters at Bathurst Resources’ Stockton Mine on the Denniston Plateau, several of whom had occupied an aerial ropeway tower and coal buckets in April 2025. Fletcher Pilditch KC appeared for all nine defendants on a pro bono basis.
BT Mining Limited had purported to issue trespass notices against the protesters, even though the protesters were exercising their right to protest on the Ngakawau/Hector reserve, which was gazetted as a public recreation reserve under the Reserves Act 1977. BT Mining considered that they could trespass anyone from the public reserve.
Judge Neave accepted Mr Pilditch’s submission that the company’s rights derived from an ancillary coal mining licence under the Coal Mines Act 1979, covering only a narrow 20m corridor containing ropeway, together with a non-exclusive licence from the local Reserve Board, which could not lawfully exclude the public from the wider reserve without breaching the Reserves Act 1977. The warning, purporting to cover the whole public recreation reserve and was accordingly too broad.
The Court convicted the five defendants who had occupied the company’s ropeway tower and buckets, as this was a “place” under the Trespass Act 1980 for which BT Mining was the lawful occupier. But the remaining four defendants, found elsewhere on the reserve, were acquitted, as the company lacked authority to exclude them from the wider area that was public recreation reserve.
