Man accused of trying to murder wife by driving car off cliff can’t remember crash

The gully in rural Manawatū where a man allegedly tried to kill his wife by driving their car over the steep bank. Photo / Google

A man accused of trying to murder his wife by driving their car off a cliff says he can’t remember anything immediately before the crash.

The jury in the man’s trial for attempted murder heard his hour-long police interview, recorded a day after the crash and where he can be seen with multiple cuts on his face and head, during today’s evidence.

Earlier this week his wife told the High Court at Palmerston North the couple were experiencing serious relationship issues when she took a two-week trip to Australia for a break and to clear her head.

Her husband of 23 years picked her up from Wellington Airport and she said that during the two-hour drive to their rural Manawatū home, she told her husband she wanted a divorce and that she had feelings for another man.

She said her husband, who has name suppression, then said “If there’s no you, there’s no me”, before accelerating at a sweeping bend on the gravel road, plunging their car through a fence and 40m into a tree-lined gully.

From there the woman managed to climb out of the smashed front window.

Bloodied, bruised and fearful of her husband the woman managed to claw her way back to the roadside.

The spot where the couple's car ended up halfway down a "cliff" or "steep decline." Photo / Google

She ran home where she told their teenage daughter: “Your father tried to kill me, we need to go”.

The pair ran to a neighbouring property whose owner called the police.

Meanwhile, the husband also escaped from the vehicle without any major injuries and made his way to the same property, banging on the doors and windows and begging the neighbour for help to look for his wife who he thought was still in the gully.

Today the jury heard the man’s police interview in which he said he couldn’t remember the crash, or the moments shortly before it happened.

‘It’s not in me’

The man, along with his family members, has a differing account of the return car journey than his wife, saying he did not continually interrogate her about the state of their marriage and that they’d discussed other things as well.

One of the key differences in his statement compared to his wife’s was that they stopped so he could have a drink somewhere between Palmerston North and their home near Dannevirke and asked if his wife wanted to drive, but she declined and said she had a splitting headache.

She told the court the pair did not stop on the way home from Palmerston North.

The man told the interviewing police officer, Detective Conrad Tamati, that he was “100 per cent exhausted” and would never intentionally do anything to hurt his wife.

“She is the mother of my kids and I love her to pieces.

“I can’t even shoot a deer anymore because I don’t like hurting things … so there’s no way I’d want to hurt my family. It’s not in me.”

The cliff crash trial is set to conclude in the High Court at Palmerston North tomorrow. Photo / Jeremy Wilkinson

The man went on to tell police he didn’t remember anything from shortly before the crash and said that he must have “nodded off”.

He said he didn’t remember telling his wife “life is not worth living” and “if there’s no you, there’s no me”, before accelerating straight at the bend and crashing the car through a fence and down the bank.

“I can’t remember any of that at all. I’ve got too much to live for. I’ve got two kids I love and a wife.

“Why would I turn around and say that if they mean so much to me?”

When questioned by police about how whether he thought the bank where the car went down was dangerous, the man said “You’d have to be nuts” to drive down it.

“It’s a long way down. You wouldn’t wanna drive off it. Like, think of the consequences. You’re gonna hurt yourself aren’t ya?”

Did the stop happen?

The man’s lawyer Steve Winter told the court the alleged stop between Palmerston North and the couple’s home, was a key factor in the case.

“If he was forming an intent to kill his wife, stopping and suggesting she drive is an important part of the case which we say points to him being not guilty,” he said.

The man’s employer took the stand and said the husband had plans to move out and move on with his life.

Another witness, a close friend of the defendant’s, said the same thing, though the man was upset about what appeared to be the impending end to his marriage.

“There is no way he would ever do anything to harm his wife or his children,” the witness told the court.

The friend also said he’s spoken to the woman in the aftermath of the crash and she’d told him the pair stopped for a drink of water and the man asked his wife to drive.

However, Crown prosecutor Deborah Davies accused the man of trying to put pressure on the woman on behalf of the husband.

“She said she saw you only a couple of times and you were making her feel guilty,” Davies said.

“That’s not what I was intending,” the witness replied.

“‘You know he just fell asleep?’ Did you say that?” Davies asked.

“Yes,” he said.

Davies said the witness was there as a friend of the defendant and was looking to protect him.

She also said the woman was unlikely to confide in him given that he was her husband’s friend - who she believed had just tried to kill her.

The defendant’s mother told the court the woman told her they stopped between Palmerston North and their home.

“He had asked her to drive and she said no.”

The trial is set to conclude tomorrow.