Speaker 1: Hilda. I'm Chelsea Daniels and from the team behind the
Speaker 1: front page. The New Zealand Herald's daily news podcast, This
Speaker 1: Is Accused the polking Horn Trial. Over the next six weeks,
Speaker 1: in conjunction with our usual daily episodes, we'll be bringing
Speaker 1: you regular coverage as one of the most high profile
Speaker 1: trials of the year makes its way through the High
Speaker 1: Court at Auckland. A warning, this podcast contains disturbing content.
Speaker 1: The trial of Philip Polkinghorn has in theory, hit the
Speaker 1: halfway mark, with Justice Graham Lang telling the jury it's
Speaker 1: broadly on schedule. Given we're about halfway, let's run through
Speaker 1: some of what we've heard over the last few weeks.
Speaker 1: Philip Polkinghorn is accused of strangling his wife, Pauline Hannah
Speaker 1: at the couple's Remuere home in April twenty twenty one,
Speaker 1: before allegedly staging the scene to make it look like
Speaker 1: sh'd taken her own life. His defense maintains she committed suicide.
Speaker 1: We've heard from police officers, those who first attended the
Speaker 1: Upland road scene, and a Canadian rope expert who said
Speaker 1: the bright orange rope hanging from the upstairs balustrade was
Speaker 1: too loose. A beltmark on her neck seen on the
Speaker 1: Easter Monday morning, disappeared by the next day, suggesting it
Speaker 1: could have been applied after death or taken off up
Speaker 1: to two hours after the courts heard thirty seven point
Speaker 1: seven grams of meth was found dotted around the home.
Speaker 1: A pipe was found at Polkinghorn's workplace. Auckland Eye and
Speaker 1: a work friend has detailed the day he came forward
Speaker 1: and disclosed his drug use. Friends and family of Hannah
Speaker 1: have testified she confided in them about the couple's relationship,
Speaker 1: Polkinghorn's infidelity, his alleged anger issues, and an incident where
Speaker 1: she claimed he wrapped his hands around her neck. Polkinghorn
Speaker 1: has already pleaded guilty to possession of meth, which was
Speaker 1: made public on day one of the trial. We've heard
Speaker 1: from Pauline herself via a recording of a family dinner,
Speaker 1: where she divulges details of their sex life as sex
Speaker 1: worker in Sydney, threesomes and emotional abuse. He's out of
Speaker 1: control because he doesn't understand how to control himself. But
Speaker 1: he loves me more than anything in the world. I'm
Speaker 1: his brick, he is mine. She said. The court listened
Speaker 1: to a rambling epic of a recorded police interview hours long,
Speaker 1: where Polkinghorn details how he found his wife on the
Speaker 1: morning of April fifth, twenty twenty one. We've heard of
Speaker 1: Hannah's medical history, an itemized list of prescriptions spanning decades,
Speaker 1: highlighting her battle with depression, a long relationship with weight
Speaker 1: loss drugs, reports of suicide ideation in twenty nineteen, and
Speaker 1: an attempted suicide in the early nineteen nineties. Her record
Speaker 1: is peppered with mentions of alcohol use disorder and a
Speaker 1: couple of psychiatrist visits. The defense points to a powerful
Speaker 1: cocktail of medications and is indicated it'll offer evidence later
Speaker 1: in the trial that some of it, when combined or
Speaker 1: when taken with alcohol, can increase the risk of suicide.
Speaker 1: Her work on the COVID nineteen response was stressful. She
Speaker 1: worked all the time, sending emails at all hours, they say,
Speaker 1: with her details of tea and toast, a scrape or
Speaker 1: was it a graze on the forehead? How power usage works,
Speaker 1: an orange nylon rope, a sheet in the dryer, a
Speaker 1: trip to the tip, a batch at rings beach, a
Speaker 1: crisscross patterned belt, plans for Christmas twenty nineteen, weekly visits
Speaker 1: to a sex worker on the North Shore, a COVID
Speaker 1: vaccination rollout, a retirement payout. And that is just the
Speaker 1: first three weeks. Week four of the trial began on
Speaker 1: a Tuesday morning. As Philip Polkinghorn's lawyer, Ron Mansfield had
Speaker 1: an unrelated case before the Supreme Court on Monday, Polkinghorn
Speaker 1: and the jury had the day off. First to the
Speaker 1: stand on Day sixteen was former chief executive of auckland I,
Speaker 1: Deborah Boyd. She joined the clinic in twenty sixteen. She
Speaker 1: refused to be filmed or recorded, but you'll remember we
Speaker 1: can report what she said. She said she started noticing
Speaker 1: a change in Polkinghorn's behavior from twenty eighteen. She noticed
Speaker 1: weight loss. Pauline had him on a diet. She said.
Speaker 1: She started receiving emails in the early hours of the
Speaker 1: morning and noticed he'd fall asleep in board meetings. His
Speaker 1: eyes were shut and he wasn't participating in the conversation.
Speaker 1: She recalled. This was happening at most of the six
Speaker 1: weekly meetings in twenty twenty, the year before Hannah's death,
Speaker 1: Prosecutor Pip McNabb asked about the meth pipe found at
Speaker 1: Auckland I in October twenty twenty. You'll remember it was
Speaker 1: found on a Monday and CCTV footage was checked to
Speaker 1: see who was there over the weekend. Polkinghorn Boyd herself
Speaker 1: a cleaner, a finance manager. She said it was never
Speaker 1: established who left the pipe at the clinic. Drug testing
Speaker 1: was done at the clinic in July twenty twenty one,
Speaker 1: and the results found a consulting room tested positive for
Speaker 1: meth in an air conditioning vent. Defense lawyer Ron Mansfield
Speaker 1: asked Boyd if the laser room where the pipe was
Speaker 1: supposedly found was used the Thursday before. He referenced a
Speaker 1: report which states the room was last used for a
Speaker 1: teenage male patient on that day. Boyd said if the
Speaker 1: pipe was there on the Thursday, it would have been
Speaker 1: found on the Friday. The rooms are checked between each day.
Speaker 1: Mansfield said that's an assumption. The room where the myth
Speaker 1: was later detected in the air conditioning was a consult
Speaker 1: room which could be used by anyone and wasn't specific
Speaker 1: to Polkinghorn. Boyd agreed, but Polkinghorn always worked out of
Speaker 1: a certain room, she said, but concedes there was no
Speaker 1: record of who used the consult room or when Mansfield
Speaker 1: and Boyd go through meeting agendas emails about when board
Speaker 1: members has shown documents. This surprime example of the level
Speaker 1: of research required of lawyers in a trial like this.
Speaker 1: It shows the defense went as far as requesting the
Speaker 1: emails sent to board directors to calculate how far before
Speaker 1: board meetings they were sent out and thereby challenge Crown
Speaker 1: accusations about his behavior at the meetings. The defense team
Speaker 1: also has researched the temperature on a certain day several
Speaker 1: years ago to show, according to Mansfield, that it's no
Speaker 1: surprise someone would fall asleep during a meeting. Two more
Speaker 1: Auglandire staff took to the stand next. Both declined to
Speaker 1: be filmed and recorded as well. Janet Wigmore, a registered
Speaker 1: nurse and the clinical services manager, has worked there for
Speaker 1: nineteen years. She's the one that found the meth pipe
Speaker 1: just inside the door of the RETINALD laser room during
Speaker 1: a routine check of the clinic before work started. Two
Speaker 1: people were with her. There was a glass pipe and
Speaker 1: a lighter, she remembered. She told operations manager Tracy Molloy,
Speaker 1: who later testified as well about the discovery. She reiterates.
Speaker 1: Polkinghorn was one of several people to have visited the
Speaker 1: clinic that weekend before the paraphernalia was found. He went
Speaker 1: in during the day and then again about eight pm
Speaker 1: on Saturday, then back again on Sunday. CCTV captured him
Speaker 1: walking down the corridor with a man and woman at
Speaker 1: the weekend. Defense lawyer Ron Mansfield asked whether the pair
Speaker 1: were patients. She didn't know. Jeremy Hill was called to
Speaker 1: the stand. He's an operations coordinator at the Drug Detection
Speaker 1: Agency in Auckland. In twenty twenty one, he was a
Speaker 1: testing technician. They do workplace testing for drug analysis, including
Speaker 1: on site screening. We've already heard from Deborah Boyd that
Speaker 1: she arranged for meth testing at Auckland Ay in July
Speaker 1: twenty twenty one. Hill had to wait until the clinic
Speaker 1: closed because they wanted to do a confidential test. He
Speaker 1: took swabs of several rooms, taking away fourteen swabs in total, just.
Speaker 2: Looking for different areas in different rooms, so depending always
Speaker 2: in the room and how well it was used. I
Speaker 2: taggered the same.
Speaker 3: Sort of areas, what sort of areas are they usually?
Speaker 2: So usually it's some high touch point areas, so things
Speaker 2: like light switches, keyboards, phones that are used day and
Speaker 2: day out with touching their hands. Or high airflow areas,
Speaker 2: so things like ear vents, air filters, HVAC systems, so.
Speaker 3: Arranged just depending on what just arrange here.
Speaker 1: Crown Prosecutor Pep McNab walked Hill through all of the
Speaker 1: swabs taken, where they were swabbed, what object, what room.
Speaker 1: The samples were sent to a Hamilton lab for testing.
Speaker 1: Of all of the samples, there was one particular area
Speaker 1: with a level of concerning contamination. That was the heat
Speaker 1: pump grill in consult Room four, a consult room which
Speaker 1: could be used by anyone but one which Polkinghorn used often.
Speaker 1: Rod Mansfield questioned readings Hill did after another company cleaned
Speaker 1: the practice. He came back in September when several swabs
Speaker 1: came back with a positive result, including a printer tray
Speaker 1: in consult Room four. It had a reading of one hundred,
Speaker 1: much higher than the other readings in July or September.
Speaker 1: Pep McNab clarified a couple of things.
Speaker 3: Just briefly, mister Hill, you said that in September twenty
Speaker 3: twenty one when you did the second lot of testing,
Speaker 3: the printer had the result of one hundred micrograms. Was
Speaker 3: that printer tested the first time in July twenty twenty one.
Speaker 1: Not for coverage of other news events in New Zealand,
Speaker 1: listen to the front page The Herald's daily news podcast
Speaker 1: wherever you get your podcasts. Margaret Skelton is a forensic
Speaker 1: accountant for the New Zealand Police. She took to the
Speaker 1: stand as an expert witness, having been tasked with analyzing
Speaker 1: Hannah and Polkinghorn's financials. She started her testimony at the
Speaker 1: end of day sixteen, before returning on day seventeen. Skelton
Speaker 1: was given an z and ASB bank statements as well
Speaker 1: as some other information about different trust accounts and funds.
Speaker 4: Yeah, it was a bit of a two way street really.
Speaker 4: You'd find out, you know, where the investigation was going
Speaker 4: in a general sense. But when I analyzed bank statements,
Speaker 4: no matter you know what it's relating to, you tend
Speaker 4: to look for certain time transactions. So in this case,
Speaker 4: I identified transactions to accounts of payees that were frequent
Speaker 4: or common in the bank accounts.
Speaker 1: She would pass on names to police of people who
Speaker 1: came up regularly in the records, she looked at their
Speaker 1: individual accounts, joint accounts, credit and debit cards. A joint
Speaker 1: account was where Hannah's salary was paid.
Speaker 2: Were you able to distill who appeared to be the
Speaker 2: daily user of that account or the regular user of.
Speaker 4: That account primarily her? The spending that I saw and
Speaker 4: it were of the everyday type of expenses parking, coffees, lunch, groceries,
Speaker 4: things like that.
Speaker 1: Could you tell between users of the account once or not?
Speaker 4: Well, you can when it comes to internet banking transfers
Speaker 4: and bank cards because because if you are for in
Speaker 4: case of a debit card, it'll have a number, and
Speaker 4: on ASB bank statements those card numbers are displayed so
Speaker 4: you can tell from the card number.
Speaker 1: An ASB account is Brian Dicky's first focus, an account
Speaker 1: solely operated by Polkinghorn. As well as monthly pension payments
Speaker 1: and fortnightly payments from National super there was a regular
Speaker 1: weekly payment of five hundred dollars to an account named
Speaker 1: a Laria Family Trust starting in February twenty nineteen. Suffice
Speaker 1: to say, Skelton's testimony was lengthy and involved a lot
Speaker 1: of numbers different accounts, transfers and cash withdrawals. First off,
Speaker 1: details of Polkinghorn's bank transfers to a litany of payees
Speaker 1: or female became clear.
Speaker 5: All right, and the next person, I think this, did
Speaker 5: you've got here as medicine Ashton?
Speaker 4: Correct? So my investigation revealed that there was. There were
Speaker 4: transfers totaling one hundred and six, one hundred and thirty
Speaker 4: one dollars made to Missession and the last payment was
Speaker 4: on the fifth of January twenty twenty one.
Speaker 1: So he gave one hundred and six thousand, one hundred
Speaker 1: and thirty dollars to Australian sex worker Madison Ashton, with
Speaker 1: whom prosecutors say he was living a double life between
Speaker 1: February twenty nineteen and January twenty twenty one. Here are
Speaker 1: some other transactions. Nearly thirty six thousand dollars from twenty
Speaker 1: sixteen to twenty nineteen on a woman named Lee, who
Speaker 1: was identified by Polkinghorn's barber earlier in the trial as
Speaker 1: a mutual acquaintance sex worker, just over seventy two thousand
Speaker 1: dollars between twenty nineteen and twenty twenty one on a
Speaker 1: woman named Jody sixty one thousand, eight hundred dollars between
Speaker 1: twenty sixteen and twenty twenty one to a Northcote Point
Speaker 1: resident named Ilaria, who was identified by her neighbors to
Speaker 1: jurors as a sex worker who would receive frequent visits
Speaker 1: from the surgeon. We heard that earlier in the trialer's work,
Speaker 1: over thirteen thousand dollars between twenty seventeen and twenty eighteen
Speaker 1: was spent on a woman named Kimberly, and just over
Speaker 1: seven thousand dollars in twenty nineteen on a woman named Indra.
Speaker 1: The total amount spent on women alone was two hundred
Speaker 1: and ninety six thousand, six hundred and forty five dollars.
Speaker 1: Now we get onto cash with drawers in the year
Speaker 1: from February twenty eighteen, they're about one hundred and twenty
Speaker 1: with drawals from Australian ATMs, totally around one hundred and
Speaker 1: fifteen thousand New Zealand dollars.
Speaker 4: So most as a result of my investigation, appeared to
Speaker 4: be made when Miss Polkinghorn was not in Australia. I
Speaker 4: was aware at that point that Possession lived in Australia
Speaker 4: at the time, and in to eighty twenty nineteen from
Speaker 4: this anzet account, mister Polkinghorn started making international transfers to
Speaker 4: medicine Ashtionin and those cashwift drawels ceased and those payments
Speaker 4: that the payments that were made were referenced in the
Speaker 4: one hundred and six thousand that I mentioned earlier.
Speaker 1: Skelton explained they can obtain people's travel records from immigration,
Speaker 1: so she was able to compare the withdrawals to when
Speaker 1: he was in New Zealand. Skelton took the court through
Speaker 1: cash with drawals, So.
Speaker 5: For twenty sixteen, just run through.
Speaker 3: Those first plas.
Speaker 4: Yes twenty and sixteen, cashwift draws from those three accounts
Speaker 4: totaled thirty thousand, three hundred dollars twenty and seventeen. They
Speaker 4: totaled twenty two thousand, three hundred and fifty dollars twenty
Speaker 4: and eighteen. The total was thirty three thousand and fifty
Speaker 4: dollars twenty and nineteen. Forty nine thousand, three hundred twenty
Speaker 4: twenty was eighty five thousand, one hundred and In twenty
Speaker 4: and twenty one, which is just to the end of
Speaker 4: March twenty twenty one, the total was twenty one thousand dollars.
Speaker 1: I went through what happened to the money from the
Speaker 1: sale of the Pappatoy toy property that it earlier been
Speaker 1: referenced in the trial. You'll remember it sold for about
Speaker 1: a million dollars. Skilton followed that money. First off, two
Speaker 1: payments of two hundred and fifty thousand dollars went to
Speaker 1: an investment and managed fund that Polkinghorn held. There was
Speaker 1: also seventy two thousand dollars in transfers to his Australian account,
Speaker 1: transfers to Kelly and Ashton, one hundred and fifty two
Speaker 1: thousand dollars paid to Ben Polkinghorn, his son, and twenty
Speaker 1: six thousand dollars spent on a Sanyong yute.
Speaker 4: It took I think it was almost a year. Certainly,
Speaker 4: by March twenty twenty one the account balance was back
Speaker 4: at five thousand dollars. So it took a period of
Speaker 4: time for the balance of the funds to be dispersed
Speaker 4: on a variety of different smaller spending items.
Speaker 2: But as you've said before, Adoptor Polkinhorn's the sole authority
Speaker 2: on this particular account.
Speaker 4: Quick, all right.
Speaker 1: I won't go through every detail of every account because
Speaker 1: there are a lot you can read full testimony at
Speaker 1: enzherld dot co dot nz if you're interested, but I
Speaker 1: will know activity connected to an account called the Hannah
Speaker 1: Polkinghorn Trust. Funds would be transferred to it, say like
Speaker 1: two thousand dollars a fortnight from Hannah's salary, and when
Speaker 1: the account balance reached anywhere from eight to fifteen thousand dollars,
Speaker 1: it'd be transferred to a joint ASB account, then dispersed
Speaker 1: among accounts controlled by polking Horn, so.
Speaker 4: That the Internet banking transfer is made from the Hannah
Speaker 4: Polkinghorn Trust total three hundred and nine thousand, eight hundred.
Speaker 4: They were authorized or conducted by mister Polkinghorn, and did.
Speaker 5: All of that go to accounts ultimately over which he
Speaker 5: was the soul.
Speaker 4: Of foreign exactly, So if you lose all the noise
Speaker 4: in between, it was going from joint accounts into accounts
Speaker 4: that he controlled by himself.
Speaker 1: That stopped happening at about twenty twenty, and by March
Speaker 1: twenty twenty one, the balance in that account was about
Speaker 1: forty four thousand dollars. That's something Skelton noted as being interesting.
Speaker 1: She went on to explain how she knew who made
Speaker 1: what transfers when we have an account number. We also
Speaker 1: have a customer number. These customer numbers are unique to people.
Speaker 1: From twenty nineteen to March twenty twenty one, there was
Speaker 1: just over one hundred and ninety eight thousand dollars transferred
Speaker 1: from an an Z account to Polkinghorn's Australian bank account.
Speaker 1: Skelton also referenced two accounts in Hannah's name. She opened
Speaker 1: them in December twenty twenty. She said it's possible Hannah
Speaker 1: opened to this account without Polkinghorn's knowledge, as is not
Speaker 1: an authority on it. Skelton went on to establish the
Speaker 1: couple's worth looking at their two properties, the Remuera one
Speaker 1: and the one at rings Beach, their investment account, personal accounts,
Speaker 1: and trust accounts. They were worth nearly ten point five
Speaker 1: million dollars. Defense lawyer Ron Mansfield asked about when a
Speaker 1: couple chooses to separate assets, No matter whose name they're in,
Speaker 1: would be divided fifty to fifty, right, So it.
Speaker 5: Doesn't really matter, does it? What name a particular essay
Speaker 5: it is held in?
Speaker 4: From that perspective, no, doesn't.
Speaker 5: Matter what name a bank account was held in. No,
Speaker 5: wouldn't matter whether someone was a signatory or wasn't a signatory.
Speaker 4: When it comes to the attribution of money in the
Speaker 4: bank account.
Speaker 2: No.
Speaker 1: He asked Skelton about the couple's wages on polling Hannah's salary.
Speaker 1: Her net's salary was about one hundred and fifty two
Speaker 1: thousand dollars after tax deductions and key we Saver contributions.
Speaker 1: Mansfield said it would equate to a salary of around
Speaker 1: two hundred and eight two one hundred and twelve thousand
Speaker 1: dollars if.
Speaker 5: She so chose, say, for example, if she wanted to
Speaker 5: separate or wanted to prepare to separate somebody, then she
Speaker 5: could redirect that salary into another account, couldn't she Yes,
Speaker 5: because that would be something that she would be able
Speaker 5: to control immediately.
Speaker 4: Yes, Well, you just tell your employer.
Speaker 1: So even if they separated, Mansfield said, she was on
Speaker 1: a comfortable salary that's before the division of assets, where
Speaker 1: they'd both get about five point two five million dollars each.
Speaker 1: Skilton agreed. Mansfield takes her through various transactions from Hannah's
Speaker 1: personal account, the one she set up in December twenty twenty.
Speaker 1: Trillie's cooper Rodney Wayne New World Farow fresh A pharmacy,
Speaker 1: fruit and bed shop.
Speaker 5: No payments to private investigators are there. No no payments
Speaker 5: to matrimonial lawyers or solicitors.
Speaker 4: No.
Speaker 1: The trial continues tomorrow. You can listen to episodes of
Speaker 1: Accused the Polkinghorn Trial through the Front Page podcast feed
Speaker 1: or find it on iHeartRadio or wherever you get your podcasts.
Speaker 1: This series is presented and produced by me Chelsea Daniels,
Speaker 1: with producer Ethan Seles and sound engineer Patti Fox. Additional
Speaker 1: reporting from The Heralds Craig Captan and George Block, and
Speaker 1: for more coverage of the Polkinghorn Trial head to enzedhrold
Speaker 1: dot co dot nz