WARNING: DISTRESSING CONTENT
A family friend of Philip Polkinghorne and Pauline Hanna has told the court of strange and erratic behaviour from the eye surgeon in the year or two before his wife’s death.
Stephen MacIntyre, a friend of the couple who owned a bach in the same Coromandel beach town as Polkinghorne and Hanna, said Polkinghorne became jumpy, erratic and he thought he was using drugs.
Auckland Crown solicitor Alysha McClintock and her predecessor Bran Dickey have been slowly but steadily making their way through their witness list as a jury considers whether Polkinghorne murdered his wife.
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A disturbing, previously unseen piece of evidence briefly became an intense focus of attention yesterday as the defence revealed a new theory.
Jurors were shown photos of the seemingly urine-soaked robe that Polkinghorne’s 63-year-old wife, Pauline Hanna, was found dead in at their Remuera home on the morning of April 5, 2021.
Polkinghorne, now 71, told authorities he found his wife dead and seated on a chair in the entryway of their home. She had hanged herself by leaning forward in the chair into a belt tied to an orange rope, the defence has contended throughout the trial – referring to the death repeatedly as a “partial suspension” or “incomplete” hanging.
The urine stain patterns on the robe support that assertion, defence lawyer Ron Mansfield, KC, suggested today as he wrapped up the lengthy cross-examination of forensic scientist Fiona Matheson.
But Matheson, as well as the Crown, were not so certain.
Prosecutors allege Polkinghorne strangled his wife – perhaps while high on methamphetamine and during an argument over his spending on prostitutes – then staged the scene to look like a suicide by hanging. His behaviour has been described as strange, having told police their marriage was “quite good” or “perfect” even though it would later be revealed he was living a “double life” in Australia with a sex worker, the Crown said at the outset of the trial. Prosecutor Alysha McClintock also told jurors that witnesses will testify later in the trial that Hanna revealed a violent strangling attempt by her husband about a year before her death.
But the defence has said the death was simply the result of a suicide by a person who had a history of depression.
Referring to the robe today, Mansfield pointed out that people often soil themselves at the time of death or soon after as their muscles relax. He noted the yellow staining was mostly below the belt of Hanna’s terry-cloth robe but, for the most part, not present in the buttocks area of the robe.
The defence lawyer theorised that the yellow staining must have been urine, although it was not tested for that. The lesser staining in the buttocks area suggests Hanna was in a seated position when she died, with the pressure between her backside and the seat stopping the spread of the urine in that area, Mansfield put to the forensic scientist.
Matheson agreed it “appeared” to be urine and that it was on the robe but said that because she didn’t know for sure she felt uncomfortable entertaining such a scenario. Even if it was urine, the scientist said, “there are a number of variables that I’d want to consider” before making an assumption about Hanna’s position at the time of death based on the patterns.
She later expanded on her reasons for reluctance when the Crown was given another opportunity to question her later in the afternoon. Variables that could affect the yellow pattern could be the amount of urine that was released and the orientation of the robe on the deceased person, she said.
Mansfield also noted during his cross-examination of Matheson that no testing was done on the white vinyl kitchen chair his client said he found his wife in that morning to see if there were traces of urine on it. Had urine been found on the seat, that would be another piece of evidence supporting Polkinghorne’s claim.
But Matheson said there is no test in New Zealand for detecting urine. There are some international tests on the market, but they are not used in New Zealand because they have been found to create false positives, she explained.
She noted that no liquid was noticed on the seat of the chair or on the ground underneath where Polkinghorne said the chair was found. But she also acknowledged that there’s no way to know if something had been there but dried before her arrival or if it would have been visible to the naked eye.
“There’s nothing immediately obvious that suggests stains,” she said.
Matheson’s testimony, which spanned two days, was followed late in the afternoon by that of fellow forensic scientist Nicholas Curnow, who specialises in DNA analysis.
He tested probable blood samples from Hanna’s index and middle fingers on her left hand, along with samples from either side of her neck. The sample from the left of her neck was found to feature DNA from her and from Polkinghorne, plus a much smaller amount that “could have” originated from a third person. But there was no indication that there was any more than one male’s DNA present, Curnow said.
On the other side of Hanna’s neck was a mix of DNA from her and Polkinghorne, the expert said.
Blood stains from her fingernail clippings were low level and partial and could have originated from Hanna, he added.
Curnow was also asked about DNA testing of two items that have been repeatedly referred to through the first week of evidence: the orange rope found next to Hanna’s body and the belt Polkinghorne told police his wife had hung herself with. The belt was later found rolled up in the couple’s kitchen, with Polkinghorne explaining that he removed it after discovering his wife.
“Were there any results that were able to be linked to anyone?” McClintock asked about the seven samples taken from the rope.
”In short, no,” Curnow replied.
The belt test yielded more, however.
Probable blood from the inner tip of the belt was deemed to have low-level DNA from both Hanna and Polkinghorne.
Craig Kapitan is an Auckland-based journalist covering courts and justice. He joined the Herald in 2021 and has reported on courts since 2002 in three newsrooms in the US and New Zealand.
The Herald will be covering the case in a daily podcast, Accused: The Polkinghorne Trial. You can follow the podcast at iHeartRadio, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, through The Front Page feed, or wherever you get your podcasts.
