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Speaker 1: Philip Polkinghorn's defense lawyer has started wrapping up his defense

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Speaker 1: in the High Court in Auckland. Today. Ron Mansfeld called

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Speaker 1: the Crown's allegation that Polkinghorn had murdered his wife insulting.

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Speaker 2: This has been a trial prosecuted by emotion, and where

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Speaker 2: the victim is logic. Logic is evidence based, it's reliable,

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Speaker 2: it is sound. A trial run by emotion allows our

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Speaker 2: murder mystery fantasies to run wild.

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Speaker 1: He reminded the jury that this is not a court

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Speaker 1: of morals and cautioned them to judge Polkinghorn based on

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Speaker 1: the not based on his use of sex work as

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Speaker 1: a myth. Now, George Block has been at the trial

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Speaker 1: for the last two months and is with us. He George, Hi, Heather,

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Speaker 1: what was insulting about that?

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Speaker 3: Well? Mansfield there really picked up where Crown's luster Alisha

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Speaker 3: McLintock left off. She said Polkinghorn blamed his wife for

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Speaker 3: a lot in her life and we're belittlert and it

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Speaker 3: was the final insult to her for him to blame

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Speaker 3: her for her own death. Mansfield came back and said

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Speaker 3: it was actually Polkinghorn who had had a lot of

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Speaker 3: insults starting with police not having an open mind when

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Speaker 3: they visited his home and Upland Road in twenty twenty one.

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Speaker 3: Those insults continued when they interviewed him for four hours,

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Speaker 3: not telling him he was a suspect that afternoon and

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Speaker 3: not telling him they had launched a massive investigation at

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Speaker 3: his home and they continued Ron Mansfield case. He says

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Speaker 3: when it went public in the media that the death

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Speaker 3: was unexplained, he's suspicious and he sort of, in Mansfield's words,

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Speaker 3: became a pariah because of that fact. And he became

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Speaker 3: isolated over those sixteen months before he was charged, which

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Speaker 3: was another insult. That's sort of where he was going

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Speaker 3: with that.

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Speaker 1: Now he has said that that Polkehorn deleting is WhatsApp

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Speaker 1: messages was entirely understandable.

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Speaker 3: How so that was interesting. Yeah, So Polkinghorn deleted his

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Speaker 3: messages with Sidney Escort Madison Ashton right after the interview

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Speaker 3: on April five, and Mansfield said that was just because

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Speaker 3: he didn't want that to become public, you know, if

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Speaker 3: it was going to be this big investigation, didn't want

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Speaker 3: its extramarital liaisons to become public fodder. There was also

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Speaker 3: the search for leg edema after strangulation, which McClintock said

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Speaker 3: basically revealed the murderer. And Mansfield explained this by saying,

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Speaker 3: that was the day of the autopsy and he still

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Speaker 3: wasn't getting any information, and his client was simply wondering

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Speaker 3: why he was still a suspect. Whether this could have

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Speaker 3: been a reason, like how her legs look, whether that

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Speaker 3: could have meant that he was being treated as a suspect.

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Speaker 1: Now, Ron Mansfeld's made the point it seems to be

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Speaker 1: something that he's relying on that Hannah's body showed no

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Speaker 1: signs of struggle or injuries that were consistent with murder.

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Speaker 3: Right, that's really the core of his closing. He says

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Speaker 3: he's got the pathology on his side. He says she

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Speaker 3: had a few non specific injuries, but all the pathologists

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Speaker 3: just said she died by a net compression, leaving the

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Speaker 3: door open to either hanging or strangulation, but definitely the

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Speaker 3: door wide open to the hanging, he says. He says

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Speaker 3: that the bruise on her temple could have been her

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Speaker 3: sort of fumbling around trying to hang herself. The bruise

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Speaker 3: on the right arm, while it looks like four fingers,

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Speaker 3: if it's someone gripping her. Wise, they're no thumb mark,

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Speaker 3: and he says it could have been made by a

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Speaker 3: pathologists transporting her body after death, or by someone steadying

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Speaker 3: her at a personal training session for example. So he

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Speaker 3: says the injuries are not nearly enough for the amount

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Speaker 3: required if they were the sort of defensive wounds that

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Speaker 3: you'd expect in a violent strangulation like getting DNA under

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Speaker 3: the fingernails, for example. All her acrylic nails, he says,

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Speaker 3: were in place when they did the autopsy, and that

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Speaker 3: shows he says that there was no struggle consistent with

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Speaker 3: the violent assault.

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Speaker 2: For more from Heather Duplessy Allen Drive. Listen live to

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Speaker 2: news talks. It'd be from four pm weekdays, or follow

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