Sir Alexander Kingcome Turner (18 November 1901 – 7 July 1993) was an

Auckland Auckland (pronounced ) ( mi, Tāmaki Makaurau) is a large metropolitan city in the North Island of New Zealand. The List of New Zealand urban areas by population, most populous urban area in the country and the List of cities in Oceania by po ...

-born New Zealand lawyer and judge.

Early life and family

He was one of four children, all sons, born to Joseph Hurst Turner, a teacher, and his wife, Gertrude Kingcome Reid, daughter of a Methodist minister, and attended Mount Eden School and

Auckland Grammar School Auckland (pronounced ) ( mi, Tāmaki Makaurau) is a large metropolitan city in the North Island of New Zealand. The most populous urban area in the country and the fifth largest city in Oceania, Auckland has an urban population of about I ...

. When he was 11, his father died, leaving the family in genteel poverty. Turner graduated from

Auckland University College , mottoeng = By natural ability and hard work , established = 1883; years ago , endowment = NZD $293 million (31 December 2021) , budget = NZD $1.281 billion (31 December 2021) , chancellor = Cecilia Tarrant , vice_chancellor = Dawn F ...

(BA, 1921; MA with first-class honours in economics, 1922; LLB, 1923). He married Dorothea Frances Mulgan (the sister of writer

John Mulgan John Alan Edward Mulgan (31 December 1911 – 26 April 1945) was a New Zealand writer, journalist and editor, and the elder son of journalist and writer Alan Mulgan. His influence on New Zealand literature and identity grew in the years afte ...

), a writer, critic, Greek scholar, and weaver, in Wellington on 21 March 1934. The couple had three children.

Legal career

As a barrister, notable successes came in two criminal trials, R v Gardner (1932) 51 NZLR 1648 and R v Phillips

949 Year 949 ( CMXLIX) was a common year starting on Monday (link will display the full calendar) of the Julian calendar. Events By place Byzantine Empire * Arab-Byzantine War: Hamdanid forces under Sayf al-Dawla raid into the theme of Ly ...

NZLR 316, cases where he was able to have confessions procured by the police by threat or inducement excluded from the evidence. These cases are still cited in textbooks on the law of evidence today. In 1952, he was made

Queen's Counsel In the United Kingdom and in some Commonwealth of Nations, Commonwealth countries, a King's Counsel (Post-nominal letters, post-nominal initials KC) during the reign of a king, or Queen's Counsel (post-nominal initials QC) during the reign of ...

. On 29 June 1953, he was appointed judge of the

Supreme Court of New Zealand The Supreme Court of New Zealand ( mi, Te Kōti Mana Nui, lit=Court of Great Mana) is the highest court and the court of last resort of New Zealand. It formally came into being on 1 January 2004 and sat for the first time on 1 July 2004. It re ...

. After serving on provincial courts he was named senior Auckland judge. On 30 August 1962 he was elevated to the Court of Appeal in Wellington, alongsid
Sir Alfred North
and Sir

Thaddeus McCarthy Thaddeus (Latin ''Thaddaeus'', Ancient Greek Θαδδαῖος ''Thaddaĩos'', from Aramaic תדי ''Ṯaday'') is a male given name. As of the 1990 Census, ''Thaddeus'' was the 611th most popular male name in the United States, while ''Thad'', ...

. Turner served as the court's President from 1 February 1972 until his retirement 17 months later. On retiring from the Court of Appeal, Turner joined the legal publisher Butterworths of New Zealand as a director and editor-in-chief,Obituary; Sir Alexander Turner, The Independent, London, 22 July 1993 a post he was active in until shortly before his death. In his 70s and 80s, he updated a series of textbooks originally written by George Spencer Bower in the early years of the 20th century: ''Actionable Misrepresentation'' was published in 1974 and '' by Representation'' in 1977. The last of these, ''The Law of Actionable Non-Disclosure'' (which Turner co-authored with Professor R.J. Sutton) was published in 1990 when Turner was 88.

Honours

He was awarded an honorary LLD by the

University of Auckland , mottoeng = By natural ability and hard work , established = 1883; years ago , endowment = NZD $293 million (31 December 2021) , budget = NZD $1.281 billion (31 December 2021) , chancellor = Cecilia Tarrant , vice_chancellor = Dawn F ...

in 1963. He was appointed a

Knight Bachelor The title of Knight Bachelor is the basic rank granted to a man who has been knighted by the monarch but not inducted as a member of one of the organised orders of chivalry; it is a part of the British honours system. Knights Bachelor are the ...

in the

1963 New Year Honours The New Year Honours 1963 were appointments in many of the Commonwealth realms of Queen Elizabeth II to Orders and decorations of the Commonwealth realms, various orders and honours to reward and highlight good works by citizens of those countries ...

, a

Privy Councillor A privy council is a body that advises the head of state of a state, typically, but not always, in the context of a monarchic government. The word "privy" means "private" or "secret"; thus, a privy council was originally a committee of the mon ...

in 1968, and a

Knight Commander of the Order of the British Empire The Most Excellent Order of the British Empire is a British order of chivalry, rewarding contributions to the arts and sciences, work with charitable and welfare organisations, and public service outside the civil service. It was established ...

in the

1973 New Year Honours The New Year Honours 1973 were appointments in many of the Commonwealth realms of Queen Elizabeth II to various orders and honours to reward and highlight good works by citizens of those countries. They were announced on 1 January 1973 to celebra ...

Death

Turner died in Auckland on 7 July 1993, aged 91, survived by his wife and three children.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Turner, Alexander Kingcome 1901 births 1993 deaths People from Auckland People educated at Auckland Grammar School University of Auckland alumni High Court of New Zealand judges New Zealand King's Counsel Knights Bachelor New Zealand Knights Commander of the Order of the British Empire 20th-century New Zealand lawyers New Zealand members of the Privy Council of the United Kingdom