A man who rated himself “10 out of 10” honest at trial and claimed his fatal stabbing of a young footballer was provoked has successfully challenged his murder conviction.

Birdsall Fa’apepele died after being stabbed 42 times at a caravan park at Paget, in central Queensland, in the early hours of December 14, 2021.

Steven Dean Michael Walker-Ely pleaded guilty to manslaughter but denied the charge of murder at the start of his trial in 2024.

A Supreme Court jury found Walker-Ely guilty of murder after a four-day trial and he was jailed for life.

But in a judgment handed down on Monday, the Queensland Court of Appeal accepted Walker-Ely’s argument there had been a miscarriage of justice while he was giving testimony in his own defence.

He told the jury he had been living at the carava

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