Boaties tell of night screams

By Eugene Bingham

Three boaties have told of hearing loud screams in the night off Furneaux Lodge.

The men, from separate boats, told the Scott Watson double-murder trial of noises that stirred them from their sleep between 4 am and 4.30 am on New Year's Day 1998.

In the High Court at Wellington yesterday, Christopher Ronald Wilson said he was awakened by a "screaming sound or a fight or something" about 4 am.

Later, Anthony William Clark and David Stephen Broadway said they heard noises from the shore.

The three witnesses were among boaties sleeping on the more than 100 vessels moored or anchored in Endeavour Inlet during the New Year celebrations.

It is alleged that Blenheim friends Olivia Hope and Ben Smart were murdered after disappearing some time after 4 am.

The Crown says the pair were last seen boarding Watson's yacht.

Mr Wilson, a Christchurch home handyman, said he and his wife went to bed early but woke up about 11.30 pm to celebrate the New Year.

They went back to bed about 12.30 am.

Under cross-examination by defence lawyer Nicolette Levy, Mr Wilson said his sleep was disturbed about 4 am.

Asked what woke him, he replied: "A screaming noise or a fight or something."

However, he did not get up and look out of the yacht.

Nicolette Levy asked him whether he had seen people returning to a nearby boat and if he had heard a "ssshhhing" noise. When Mr Wilson said he could not remember those things, she asked him if he remembered making a statement to the police that he had.

Mr Wilson said he was confused about what he remembered and what he remembered from his statement.

Justice Heron told him to ignore what he said in his statement and to just tell the court what he remembered now.

Mr Wilson then said he could not remember.

Mr Clark, another Christchurch holidaymaker, said he and his wife were moored at the bottom end of the inlet. They partied at Furneaux Lodge with friends before returning to their boat and going to bed about 1.30 am.

Questioned by crown prosecutor Nicola Crutchley, Mr Clark said he stirred from sleep about 4.30 am.

"I heard noises that I thought were coming from shore. Screams and yahooing," he told the jury.

"I thought it was people on the shore, just drunk people, yelling and carrying on."

Mr Broadway, also of Christchurch, said he and his crew of three went ashore at the lodge, but became sick of it because of the young crowd and returned to his launch.

He was awakened around 4 am.

"I heard what sounded like a fight," Mr Broadway said.

Picton housewife Lee Stewart McPhail said she and her husband sailed from Endeavour Inlet and out of Queen Charlotte Sound on January 1.

Near Cape Jackson at the top of the sound, a ketch with a lone sailor at the helm crossed the bow of their yacht.

Mrs McPhail said she did not believe it matched the description of a ketch first thought to be the boat upon which Olivia Hope and Ben Smart disappeared.

The court has heard the police initially sought a distinctive ketch in connection with the pair's disappearance, but then turned their attention to Watson's sloop. Nicola Crutchley has told the jury there was no compelling evidence a ketch was involved in the murder.

In her evidence, Mrs McPhail said the ketch she saw did not look like a ketch depicted in a police drawing distributed early in the inquiry because it did not have a band of dark colour on the hull.

She said she noticed one person at the helm, but did not know the sex.

Defence lawyer Mike Antunovic, in his cross-examination, asked Mrs McPhail about a statement she made to the police in January last year in which she said the sailor was a man.

She admitted it might be difficult for her to recall certain things and that she had not known she was going to be a witness in the case until about a week ago.