Brian Bell was found guilty of attempting to murder his wife by driving their car off a cliff. Photos / Google, Facebook
Brian Bell was found guilty of attempting to murder his wife by driving their car off a cliff. Photos / Google, Facebook
A jury has found a man guilty of attempting to kill his wife by driving them both off a cliff.
Just moments before the car crash Brian Bell’s wife told him their marriage was over and that she had feelings for another man.
The jury of seven women and five men took 12 hours to reach their unanimous verdict after a five-day trial at the High Court in Palmerston North ended on Friday.
Bell, whose name suppression has lapsed, was charged with attempting to murder his wife, Megan Peterson, just a day after they both survived the clifftop plunge.
During the trial, Peterson gave evidence that Bell deliberately drove them both over the cliff on the final bend before their home in rural Manawatū in June last year.
She told the court shortly after she informed Bell their marriage was over he said, “If there’s no you, there’s no me,” before pressing his foot on the accelerator and driving them both through a fence and down a steep bank into a tree-lined gully.
Peterson climbed out the smashed front windshield and clawed her way back to the roadside. She was so scared she wet herself and hid her white T-shirt in the dark in fear her husband would find her and “finish her off”.
She ran home where she told her teenage daughter, “He tried to kill me.” The pair fled to a neighbouring property where the owner called police.
Bell, who also climbed out of the wreckage and up the gully, went to the neighbour’s pleading for help to find his wife.
When police arrived they arrested Bell for dangerous driving, but the next day, after interviewing him, the charges were upgraded to attempted murder.
The trial
A key focus of the trial had been on whether the couple stopped between Palmerston North and their home, with Bell saying he asked his wife to drive and she refused.
His lawyer, Steve Winter, told the court his client wouldn’t have asked that if he had any intention of murdering her.
Peterson says no such stop occurred, despite Bell’s friend and mother both claiming Peterson told them it had.
Data extracted from the wrecked car shows the brake pedal wasn’t used at all in the five seconds before the crash and the accelerator pedal was fully depressed.
The pair ended up roughly 40m down the bank from the roadside. Photo / Google
It also showed the wheels were pointed 54 degrees to the left. Winter argued that this proved Bell had attempted to take the corner on the night of June 9, 2022.
Much of the trial was focused on Bell’s past, with family members describing him as having a quick temper as well as being controlling of his wife in particular.
Peterson travelled to Australia for two weeks before the crash to have a break and think about whether she wanted to continue the marriage.
She expressed in Facebook messages to family members that she wanted a divorce, and the Crown alleged that Bell read those messages on an iPad his wife had left at their home.
Friends and family said this made Bell upset, angry and “not himself” while his wife was away.
After collecting his wife from Wellington Airport on her return from Australia, Bell interrogated her on the two-hour drive home about the state of their marriage saying he wanted a second chance, which Peterson wouldn’t give him.
Eventually, she snapped and told him she had feelings for another man, moments before the crash.
In an interview with police the next day Bell told them he must have fallen asleep because he couldn’t remember the crash or the immediate events before it.
The closing submissions
In her closing submissions on Friday Crown prosecutor Deborah Davies told the court Bell had simply “snapped” and decided to kill his wife.
“He said he couldn’t live without her and then he put those words into effect.”
Davies said that Bell’s defence of falling asleep prior to the crash simply didn’t add up as the pair had been arguing incessantly about their marriage for almost the entire car ride.
“You can’t be in the middle of a conversation about one of the most important things in your life - your marriage - and just fall asleep.”
Bell’s lawyer, Steve Winter, narrowed in on Peterson’s assertion that her husband said, “If there’s no you, there’s no me” before accelerating toward the cliff.
Winter pointed out that her recollection of that phrase didn’t appear in her interviews with police immediately after the incident, nor in her official statement and questioned whether it had really occurred.
“It’s a dangerous phrase, it’s what the case is all about. And you can’t rely on it, it’s that simple.”
Winter also mentioned that the chronology of the conversation didn’t match the crash data which placed them as passing a woodshed roughly 100m from the edge of the bank at about five seconds before impact.
Winter said it was too short a distance for an entire conversation about Bell moving out, Megan telling him he had too much to live for and then him allegedly saying the crucial line that the Crown’s case hinged on.
Bell, who was on bail during the trial, was remanded in custody to be sentenced at a date to be determined.
