The main problem for the defence was that Victoria had the Gaols Act of 1958 in which it stated:   The defence spent a lot of time arguing about when the time of the felony ended. Did it end after the prisoners had cleared the prison walls or did it once the prisoners were caught and returned to custody?. The defence pointed to various substantial discrepancies in The Crown's case. While some eyewitnesses testified they saw Ryan to the east of Hodson when a single shot was heard, other eyewitnesses testified Ryan was to the west of Hodson. The discrepancies in evidence were substantial and wide-ranging. Opas contended that each of the fourteen eyewitnesses evidence were so contradictory that little store could be placed on them. Philip Opas produced a human skeleton as a visual aid to explain the trajectory of the fatal bullet, Opas argued that the ballistics evidence indicated that the fatal bullet entered Hodson's (chest) body in a downward trajectory. He also got a Monash University mathematics professor Terry Speed, to explain that Ryan 5 feet 8 inches (1.73 m) tall would have had to have been 8 feet 3 inches (2.55 m) tall to have fired the shot. These calculations were based on Ryan being twenty feet from Hodson and Hodson was standing perfectly upright. The bullet would enter Hodson's body 62 inches from the ground and exit 61 inches from the ground. If the shot was in a downward angle the bullet would have hit the road forty feet from where Hodson was hit, it also suggested that Hodson could have been shot from another elevated point and possibly by another prison officer. It would cast doubt that Ryan had fired the fatal shot. But the prosecution argued that Hodson 6 feet 1 inch (1.85 m) tall could have been running in a stooped position, thus accounting for the bullet's fatal angle of entry. No witnesses saw or testified seeing Hodson running in a stooped position. The trajectory theory put forward by Opas, the trial judge dismissed the theory as did the judges at the Appeal two months later. They said there was enough evidence to say Hodson was not standing fully erected but was running in a forward leaning position when he was shot. Opas in defending Ryan put a lot of pressure on a warder who made conflicting statements, Paterson had made several mutually contradictory statements to police about what he saw, heard and did on that day. In his first statement given to Detective Sergeant Carton on 19 December 1965 Paterson said; "I did not hear a shot fired other than the one I fired."