Speaker 1: Kiyota.
Speaker 2: I'm Chelsea Daniels and from the team behind the front
Speaker 2: page the New Zealand Herald's daily news podcast, This Is
Speaker 2: Accused the Polkinghorn Trial. Over the next six weeks, in
Speaker 2: conjunction with our usual daily episodes, we'll be bringing you
Speaker 2: regular coverage as one of the most high profile trials
Speaker 2: of the year makes its way through the High Court
Speaker 2: at Auckland. A warning, this podcast contains disturbing content. Questions
Speaker 2: swirl around a certain dinner at a Havelock North restaurant,
Speaker 2: more on what prescription drugs Pauline Hannah was taking and
Speaker 2: the unraveling of the issues at Auckland. Eye friends and
Speaker 2: colleagues have weighed in at the end of the third
Speaker 2: week of Philip Pulkinghorn's trial. He's accused of murdering his
Speaker 2: wife in a Pril twenty twenty one. He maintains she
Speaker 2: took her own life. Pheasant's husband, John reared and took
Speaker 2: to the stand on day thirteen, but continued his evidence
Speaker 2: on day fourteen. He spoke about the dinner in twenty
Speaker 2: twenty when Pauline confided in them that Philip had put
Speaker 2: his hands around her neck. She started talking about the
Speaker 2: difficulties in her relationship, the arguments, and how she had
Speaker 2: to be very very careful around her husband otherwise he
Speaker 2: would blow out.
Speaker 3: You did it just so we capture that you were
Speaker 3: gesturing with yours one hand above the other right and
Speaker 3: above your left, and you've got your fingers open around
Speaker 3: your throat.
Speaker 1: I captured that.
Speaker 4: Right, Yes, So she gestured that she did, and then
Speaker 4: she said nothing for maybe five seconds, and we just
Speaker 4: sort of looked at him and thought, what are you doing?
Speaker 4: What are you saying? And then she said, he tried
Speaker 4: to strangle me.
Speaker 3: So, as best you can recall, how accurate are those
Speaker 3: words he tried to strangle me?
Speaker 4: Oh, very acurate?
Speaker 1: And who was he?
Speaker 4: Well, because all of the conversation that we'd had to
Speaker 4: date was about Philip and Pauline and their.
Speaker 3: Marriage, So how certain are you about the words? He
Speaker 3: tried to strangle me? And when she'd done that, she'd
Speaker 3: done that gesture and she'd said that.
Speaker 1: What happened next?
Speaker 4: I just said to her, pack up your bags, you
Speaker 4: come home with us.
Speaker 1: Why were you saying that?
Speaker 4: Well, multitude was that he'd done it once, he'll do
Speaker 4: it again.
Speaker 1: Did you say that?
Speaker 4: That's why? I said to you.
Speaker 2: Yes, he remembers her telling them she didn't have any money,
Speaker 2: she'd have nowhere to live. John continued to strongly encourage
Speaker 2: her to come home, and what.
Speaker 1: Was her reaction if you need to suggestion that she
Speaker 1: should come home?
Speaker 4: I felt that she was very nervous about the idea
Speaker 4: of leaving the flood.
Speaker 3: Why did you Why do you say you felt that?
Speaker 3: What did she say or do that that made you
Speaker 3: feel that?
Speaker 5: Well?
Speaker 4: When she started telling us about the fact that he'd
Speaker 4: shown great remorse, and I'm going, yeah, he might have,
Speaker 4: but if he's do it to you once, he will
Speaker 4: do it to you again. No, see this time and
Speaker 4: time again?
Speaker 6: Was was?
Speaker 3: What was Pheasant doing when you're having this conversation about it?
Speaker 3: If it's seven once, it will happen again.
Speaker 1: What was Pheasant's reaction to this? Or do you not
Speaker 1: now recall.
Speaker 4: I don't specifically recall her reaction, but it would have
Speaker 4: been the same as mine. What were you focusing on
Speaker 4: her safety? Like get her out of where she was
Speaker 4: and get her home?
Speaker 5: Who's safety or Leans?
Speaker 4: Yep.
Speaker 2: He also remembered staying at the couple's Remuerra home and
Speaker 2: Philip coming home and the mood dropping.
Speaker 1: Philip came in that night. You thought Pauline's demeanor.
Speaker 4: Change, oh straight away?
Speaker 1: Did you?
Speaker 3: How had she been prior to that, to Philip coming
Speaker 3: home very bubly and when he came home?
Speaker 1: What was the change?
Speaker 4: It was almost like she was careful about the words
Speaker 4: that she said, profere that she made something say something wrong.
Speaker 4: It so appeared to me.
Speaker 1: Did you speak to her about that on that occasion?
Speaker 4: No? Not dead.
Speaker 2: When he continued his evidence on day fourteen, John remembered
Speaker 2: the last conversation he had with Pauline at her mother's
Speaker 2: funeral in February twenty twenty one.
Speaker 4: She was talking about the grandkids. So Philip's eldis child
Speaker 4: and Bruce's daughter had a child, both of them which
Speaker 4: she called you know she was she was their grandmother,
Speaker 4: and she was so excited about that whole process and
Speaker 4: being part of their lives growing up. And yeah, I
Speaker 4: mean she had a lot to look for.
Speaker 1: You speak often about family, Oh.
Speaker 4: Yes, yeah, and the grandchildren like they were front and
Speaker 4: center all the time.
Speaker 2: He spoke about how they found out Pauline died. They
Speaker 2: returned home and there was a voicemail message from Bruce
Speaker 2: and Rose Hannah, which was unusual. Pheasant went up to
Speaker 2: the bedroom and rang the Hannah's back. Then he heard
Speaker 2: his wife cry out. He then recalled Philip, telling them.
Speaker 3: Phone no speaker or the sign was on speaker, and
Speaker 3: just explain for us what Philip sid when he called
Speaker 3: Pheasant in those days after Pauline's death.
Speaker 4: So when we answered the phone, he was already and
Speaker 4: he said, my darling wife, she's gone. I couldn't tell
Speaker 4: you what other words he said, but that's what stuck
Speaker 4: with me. And he was crying and yeah, it's not
Speaker 4: an unusual emotion to have if your wife has died,
Speaker 4: So it's okay. And then he carries on talking for
Speaker 4: a few minutes about the loss. Yes, and it's all
Speaker 4: at the same level of emotion. And then he talks
Speaker 4: about the police. And the second that he starts talking
Speaker 4: about the police, the crime has stopped. Like there is
Speaker 4: no emotion in his voice whatsoever.
Speaker 1: What when you say he was talking about the police,
Speaker 1: can you recall what sort of things he was conveying
Speaker 1: about the police.
Speaker 4: Well, he said, the police are going to charge me
Speaker 4: for murder. I didn't kill my wife. Well those are
Speaker 4: the words I do know. Definitely, happened.
Speaker 1: Which one?
Speaker 4: Sorry, the police are going to charge me with murder.
Speaker 2: On cross examination, Ron Mansfield asked whether John knew anyone
Speaker 2: who'd committed suicide he has.
Speaker 4: Do they have a lot to live for? There were
Speaker 4: a lot of people that loved him.
Speaker 7: Yes, so we all have a lot to live for,
Speaker 7: don't we, Sue.
Speaker 4: I don't think all people have a lot to live for,
Speaker 4: but both think Paulne did have a lot to live for.
Speaker 2: Ys Mansfield suggested John wanted to put the boot in
Speaker 2: with his comments about Hannah having to be careful around Polkinghorn.
Speaker 2: They spoke about the dinner in twenty twenty.
Speaker 5: Do you think that.
Speaker 7: Both you and Fearsant just talk this claim by Pauline
Speaker 7: to be the alcohol.
Speaker 4: Talking on that night? Definitely No.
Speaker 7: Whilst she had been talking about twenty nineteen being a
Speaker 7: terrible year for her and Philip, you didn't put too
Speaker 7: much weight on what she had claimed, given that she
Speaker 7: had been drinking.
Speaker 4: I disagree.
Speaker 2: If you took Pauline seriously, then you would have had
Speaker 2: further discussions with her, and you didn't, Mansfield claimed. John
Speaker 2: said they did. It's just not reflected in the texts.
Speaker 2: Crown Prosecutor a Lesia McClintock comes back to clarify a
Speaker 2: few things.
Speaker 3: It's been suggested to both the context you've given to
Speaker 3: the conversation.
Speaker 1: At Marlow and your evidence yesterday was both. Mister Mansfield said,
Speaker 1: putting the boot in and gilding the lily. I think
Speaker 1: was the other one. You remember him suggesting, this.
Speaker 3: Is anything that you've told the court about what happened
Speaker 3: at the Marlow restaurant, Things that you've said in order
Speaker 3: to put the boot.
Speaker 1: No, that you've said in order to gild the lily.
Speaker 2: No took coverage of other news events in New Zealand,
Speaker 2: including the state of our economy post O cr Katz.
Speaker 2: Listen to the front page The Herald's daily news podcast
Speaker 2: wherever you get your podcasts. Pauline Hannah's doctor took to
Speaker 2: the stand. They have named suppressions, so we can't name them,
Speaker 2: their practice or any other identifying details. They were heard
Speaker 2: gp for many years. They brought her medical records to
Speaker 2: court and we've heard a bit about it from day
Speaker 2: nine when Ron Mansfield revealed a previous suicide attempt and
Speaker 2: her long history of taking antidepressants. You'll remember he mentioned
Speaker 2: Hannah being given medication for alcohol use disorder. In two
Speaker 2: thousand and four and thirteen. The witness said Hannah had
Speaker 2: seen a specialist she wanted to control her drinking. Her
Speaker 2: records say she was drinking a bottle of wine a
Speaker 2: night in twenty thirteen. In twenty nineteen, Hannah said her
Speaker 2: intake was two or more glasses of wine a night.
Speaker 2: She would have been at the recommended limit of fourteen
Speaker 2: units a week. She was prescribed weight loss medication in
Speaker 2: twenty ten, something she took most of the time from
Speaker 2: that point. While Zoppo clone, a sleeping pill, was found
Speaker 2: in her blood, she was never prescribed it. Earlier in
Speaker 2: the trial, we heard the Zoppa clone in her system
Speaker 2: when she died was at a high level, suggesting a tolerance.
Speaker 2: The witness recalled Hannah having suicidal thoughts in December twenty nineteen.
Speaker 2: She'd never discussed them before or discussed any previous suicide attempts.
Speaker 2: Cross examinations saw the GP asked more about psychiatrist visits.
Speaker 2: In twenty thirteen. A note in her records said the
Speaker 2: psychiatrist noted Na wanted to detox from alcohol and take
Speaker 2: ant abuse, a medication used in the treatment of alcohol
Speaker 2: use disorders. In twenty seventeen, Hannah was again prescribed now
Speaker 2: treksone by another doctor after raising concerns about her drinking.
Speaker 2: It's used to manage cravings. Defense lawyer Hannah Stewart questioned
Speaker 2: the doctor about why Pauline was taking the weight loss
Speaker 2: drug duramine, given it's meant to be short term. No,
Speaker 2: but it's not uncommon, they said, so, just because others
Speaker 2: do it, that makes it okay, asked Stuart. They're asked
Speaker 2: about why Hannah was kept on the medication for eleven
Speaker 2: years without being weighed. The witness reiterates Hannah didn't have
Speaker 2: any side effects and appeared to be maintaining her weight.
Speaker 2: Stewart is intending to call evidence suggesting a link between
Speaker 2: the use of duramine and other drugs with an elevated
Speaker 2: suicide risk. In December twenty nineteen, Hannah had reported her
Speaker 2: mother was an hospital, her husband had left her. She
Speaker 2: was crying, and the GP referred her to the crisis team.
Speaker 2: She's expressed suicidal thoughts. The GP called her the following morning,
Speaker 2: and Hannah said she was feeling better. When the trial
Speaker 2: resumed on day fifteen, Susan Ormond was called to the stand.
Speaker 2: She's an ophthalmologist at Auckland Eye and the clinical director.
Speaker 2: She met Philip Polkinghorn in two thousand and one when
Speaker 2: they both worked at Auckland DHB. They had a good
Speaker 2: relationship and friendship and socialized outside of work. She'd met
Speaker 2: Pauline many times. Crown Prosecutor Pitt McNabb asked about whether
Speaker 2: there'd been concerns about Polkinghorn at work in the one
Speaker 2: to two year period before Hannah's death as a clinical director.
Speaker 2: Ormond said there'd been people who expressed concerns about certain
Speaker 2: aspects of patient care and him being irritable with staff
Speaker 2: in the theater.
Speaker 6: There were some concerns that he was generally more irritable,
Speaker 6: just generally, not just in theater. I mean, I certainly
Speaker 6: found him more irritable than usual, but you know, there
Speaker 6: were sort of we're having problems at Auckland.
Speaker 2: I Philip gone to her and her husband's home for
Speaker 2: lunch the day before Pauline's funeral. There he made a
Speaker 2: couple of revelations. He was worried about them coming out.
Speaker 6: So he said, well, what were those things? And the
Speaker 6: first thing he actually mentioned was regarding his and Pauline's
Speaker 6: sex life. And then when we asked what the other
Speaker 6: thing was he was worried about, he said drugs, to
Speaker 6: which I said what sort of drugs, to which he replied, meth.
Speaker 3: Did he offer any further explanation of what exactly he
Speaker 3: was worried about in terms.
Speaker 6: Of myth coming out, well, the conversation at that point
Speaker 6: we were quite shocked. We weren't expecting, you know, we
Speaker 6: weren't expecting to hear him say meth. And the conversation really.
Speaker 5: Was around, you know, sort of what do you mean meth?
Speaker 6: You taking meth kind of thing, and he he wasn't
Speaker 6: specific about whether it was he or appauling, but he
Speaker 6: talked about it as if it was both of them,
Speaker 6: you know, we use meth or whatever. He asked if
Speaker 6: we'd ever tried meth, to which we said no, and
Speaker 6: he said, well you should.
Speaker 2: Almond then told the company lawyer and phone the Medical
Speaker 2: Protection Society.
Speaker 5: It was a very difficult position.
Speaker 6: On the one hand, you know, this was a close
Speaker 6: friend and colleague who was with us for support and
Speaker 6: was telling us things in confidence, and obviously we want
Speaker 6: to keep those things confidential.
Speaker 5: But at the same time, as clinical director.
Speaker 6: You know, one of my obligations is very much to
Speaker 6: make sure that all the patients we see are safe
Speaker 6: and receive the highest quality treatment. And to find out
Speaker 6: that one of the doctors had been using math was
Speaker 6: a considerable concern.
Speaker 2: On cross examination, Ron Mansfield, as he did with another witness,
Speaker 2: had Ormond show how Polkinghorn worked long hours in both
Speaker 2: the public and private systems and at Auckland Medical School,
Speaker 2: where he helped with training and research. Ormond told police
Speaker 2: Hannah and Polkinghorn were a perfectly normal couple and she
Speaker 2: never saw him put down, control, manipulate or abuse his wife.
Speaker 2: Onto his delayed retirement due to two doctors leaving unexpectedly
Speaker 2: that set up another practice and the cost of solicitors
Speaker 2: was larger than the amount due to be paid out,
Speaker 2: it caused considerable disruption to Auckland. Die could this have
Speaker 2: contributed to him being agitated?
Speaker 7: And I think you saw that frustration yourself by way
Speaker 7: of him being slightly more agitated, as you put it,
Speaker 7: than he might ordinarily be in certain circumstances.
Speaker 5: Now I said, irritable, but yes, irritable, Thank you.
Speaker 2: Ormond would last sea Hannah alive at a crowded house
Speaker 2: concert at Spark Arena on March twenty first, twenty twenty one.
Speaker 2: Mark Connolly is the chair of the board at Auckland Eye,
Speaker 2: an independent director who joined in twenty nineteen and became
Speaker 2: chair in twenty twenty. He's not a clinician or shareholder.
Speaker 2: Like other witnesses, he chose not to be recorded. While
Speaker 2: much of the tensions at auckland I over the sudden
Speaker 2: departure of two shareholders was before his time, he said
Speaker 2: the circumstances were controversial, sudden, and unexpected. On Polkinghorn's retirement issues,
Speaker 2: he was initially planning on leaving sometime in twenty twenty.
Speaker 2: A doctor was arriving from overseas and Polkinghorn was keen
Speaker 2: to have him take over some of his patients, Connolly remembers,
Speaker 2: so they settled on June thirty, twenty twenty two, as
Speaker 2: a final date. Polkinghorn was concerned about his payout, which
Speaker 2: we heard earlier in the trial was lower than what
Speaker 2: was offered to those two doctors who abruptly left. Connolly
Speaker 2: said he wasn't happy about that and wanted, at a minimum,
Speaker 2: the same amount the others got. They got six hundred
Speaker 2: and fifty thousand dollars, while he was offered about three
Speaker 2: hundred and sixty thousand. We heard the other day it'd
Speaker 2: eventually be four hundred and fifty thousand dollars. Connolly agrees
Speaker 2: Polkinghorn wanted more, and he confirmed. He replied saying he
Speaker 2: couldn't because otherwise other specialists set to retire would be
Speaker 2: knocking on my door asking for the same package. She said.
Speaker 2: The first week Connolly was made chair in twenty twenty,
Speaker 2: the chief executive rang him and said, we've discovered a
Speaker 2: meth pipe in the practice that pulled CCTV for the
Speaker 2: previous weekend. Four or five people had come into the practice, Polkinghorn,
Speaker 2: a cleaner, the CEO and CFO. The pipe was found
Speaker 2: in a preparation room, a room used by ophthalmologists. Fast
Speaker 2: forward to a meeting in May twenty twenty one after
Speaker 2: Hannah's death, and his colleague Susan Ormond would reveal Polkinghorn
Speaker 2: had told her he was a meth user. Ron Mansfield
Speaker 2: asked Connolly about the pipe discovery. It happened on a
Speaker 2: Monday morning. There was a young patient in the prep
Speaker 2: room on the Thursday or Friday before Connolly confirmed the
Speaker 2: meth pipe was handed over to police. He isn't sure
Speaker 2: if it was fingerprinted or DNA tested. The trial continues
Speaker 2: next week. You can listen to episodes of Accused the
Speaker 2: Polkinghorn Trial through the Front Page podcast feed or find
Speaker 2: it on iHeartRadio or wherever you get your podcasts. This
Speaker 2: series is presented and produced by me Chelsea Annuals, with
Speaker 2: producer Ethan Sills and sound engineer Paddy Fox. Additional reporting
Speaker 2: from the Heralds Craig Captan and George Block and for
Speaker 2: more coverage of the Polkinghorn Trial head to enzedhrold dot
Speaker 2: co dot nz