An inquest is probing the disappearance of Mike Zhao-Beckenridge, who vanished with his stepfather in 2015.
An inquest is probing the disappearance of Mike Zhao-Beckenridge, who vanished with his stepfather in 2015.
WARNING: This article discusses suicide and may be distressing.
A school staff member who was one of the last people to speak to missing boy Mike Zhao-Beckenridge described him as “out of breath and panicky” the day he disappeared.
“He just seemed a bit out of sorts and a bit worried and concerned,” the staff member told the Coroner’s court this afternoon.
Swedish-born helicopter pilot John Beckenridge broke a court order and picked up his 11-year-old stepson from his Invercargill school on March 13, 2015.
A week after the pair’s disappearance, Beckenridge’s dark-blue 4WD Volkswagen Touareg went off an almost 90-metre cliff near Curio Bay, but when police recovered the vehicle there were no signs of any bodies. The pair have been missing ever since.
However, Mike’s mother Fiona Lu is convinced her son is still alive and her former partner staged the pair’s death after she moved her son from Beckenridge’s Queenstown home to Invercargill with her new partner.
Now, Coroner Marcus Elliot is looking into the case at the Christchurch District Court to consider whether it is likely the pair are dead.
John Beckenridge (left) disappeared with his step-son Mike Zhao-Beckenridge (right) in March 2015. Photo / Supplied
The hearing, which began on Monday, is expected to take two weeks and will hear evidence from witnesses, including someone who believes she spotted the pair overseas four months after their disappearance.
On Tuesday afternoon, the court heard evidence from a staff member at Mike’s school, who cannot be identified.
She told the court Mike had arrived at school on March 13, but he was pulled out of his music class in the morning to take his iPad from him, as requested by his mother’s partner Peter Russell.
The staff member said Mike took an “unusually” long time to deliver the iPad to her office and was seen coming in from the front of the school, near the public road, rather than from the direction of his classroom.
She described the boy as “panicky” and breathing heavily as if he had been running.
She took the iPad from Mike and sent him back to his music class, instructing him to use a staff door, leading to an external door to go directly through the school rather than having to walk around the school grounds. She said Mike was very reluctant to go this way.
Police were alerted to a reported sighting of the Beckenridges on March 19 at a campsite off Weir Rd on the Haldane Estuary roughly 14km from the cliff Beckenridge’s vehicle went off.
CCTV footage showed Mike going through the first door, but he wasn’t seen exiting the second door.
Mike turned up at his music class but sometime between lunch and the end of the school day, he disappeared.
The woman described Mike as a good student with “excellent attendance” but noted he had told others he wasn’t going to be at the school for very long, insisting he would return to Queenstown.
“He always said he was going back to live with his dad in Queenstown.”
Later that afternoon, when there was still no sign of Mike, police were called, launching a massive search dubbed Operation Mike.
The court also heard that staff at Mike’s previous school said he was very close with Breckenridge and would “likely be traumatised” after leaving him.
Heartbreaking texts sent from Mike to his mother before his disappearance read: “You do not deserve to be my mum. You certainly do not deserve my love.”
Footprints matching a pair of boots owned by Beckenridge were found at the campsite where he and his stepson were spotted after their disappearance.
As police continued their search, they were alerted to a reported sighting of the pair on March 19 at a campsite off Weir Rd on the Haldane Estuary roughly 14km from the cliff Beckenridge’s vehicle went off.
Police detective Aaron Dempsey conducted a scene examination of the tent set up at the campsite with various items such as a generator, two empty 1-litre fuel containers, an air mattress and a cooking device, noting that the tent was “quite well kept”.
Swab testing and further examinations revealed a plaster with Mike’s fingerprints on it as well as boot prints of a shoe belonging to Beckenridge, which would later wash ashore in the Curio Bay area.
Dempsey also said it appeared to him that the tent was erected out of sight from other campers and there was a small firepit, but it was hard to tell when it had been lit.
As police continued their search members of the public joined in, something Dempsey said was very helpful.
On Monday, Lisa Preston KC outlined the case.
Police found various items such as empty petrol containers and a cooking appliance at the campsite the Beckenridges were spotted before their vehicle went off a cliff.
Beckenridge met Mike’s mother Lu, who is from China, in 2006. Lu’s parents were raising Mike at the time.
The pair later moved with Mike to Queenstown. Their relationship broke down in 2014. Shortly after that, Lu moved to Invercargill.
In February 2015, the Queenstown Family Court made an order that Lu had care of Mike.
Mike was unhappy to be taken away from his stepfather and was secretly communicating with him by email, pleading for Beckenridge to come to take him away from his mother and her partner, Russell.
Mike told Beckenridge he was misbehaving so he could be sent back to live with his stepfather. He also called the police on one occasion, saying his mother had assaulted him in the hope he would get sent back to Queenstown.
On March 20 Beckenridge’s friends began receiving “concerning” texts from him, stating the “Gestapo” was after him and Mike, and they would soon be getting on the “Midnight Express” for departure.
On March 22, items belonging to the Beckenridges, such as clothes and car parts, washed ashore in the Curio Bay area. Soon after Beckenridge’s vehicle was found at the bottom of the cliff in the water.
The Police National Dive Squad was able to dive on the wreckage of the vehicle on March 29 but it wasn’t until May 6 that the vehicle was able to be recovered. No bodies were ever found.
To date, police have had 60 suspected sightings of the Beckenridges or their vehicle, some of which have been deemed unlikely or eliminated.
Information about possible sightings continues to be reported from people in New Zealand and from New Zealanders who say they have had an encounter on holiday overseas.
