Police quizzed murder accused over six years

King allegedly said she had received phone calls from Wayne Roycroft, when his body was at the Waihou property where she still lived. Picture/ Greg Bowker

Murder-accused Christine King was interviewed frequently by detectives between 1988 and 1994, but continued to stick to a story that her husband had left on a "tiki-tour" of New Zealand before departing to Australia for good, a court heard yesterday.

King, 51, is on trial at the High Court at Hamilton for the 1988 killing of her then-husband Wayne Roycroft, by poisoning him with up to 48 sleeping tablets.

Until last year, King had managed to evade police inquiries that might implicate her in her husband's disappearance, the court heard.

She told police from 1988 to 1994 that her former husband had made several phone calls from Australia, when in fact Roycroft's body remained at the Waihou property where King continued to live.

The body was initially buried beneath a veranda but was later burned on a bonfire, the court has been told.

By 1994 King was living at the same address with a new partner, Paul Baxendale. On Monday Crown prosecutor Ross Douch said that evidence would show that Baxendale had helped dig up and burn the body.

During one of the claimed phone calls which King said she had received from Roycroft in early 1988, he had proposed getting back together.

But King said she had rejected the idea.

On April 21, 1994, Detective Sergeant Hugh Read of Thames police took a signed statement from King. In it she wrote: "I still believe he's alive, I would have had a gut feeling if he was dead."

It was also revealed yesterday that police first "probed" the Waihou property in August 1994, but failed to find anything of interest. The probe followed increased interest in the case, brought about by a Crimewatch TV show.

Under cross-examination from King's lawyer Judith Ablett-Kerr, former detective Anthony Grieg confirmed a statement made in 1989 by the manager of The Palace in Te Aroha, where King had worked.

The manager, Bruce Thomas, had told the detective that King sometimes came into work with bruises on her face.

Evidence from another witness, June Godfrey, was also heard yesterday. Ms Godfrey told the court that King confided in her about feeding sleeping tablets to her husband.

Earlier Ms Godfrey said that King did not like her former husband following her to work and recording her car's mileage.

Ms Godfrey also said that Roycroft was a gambler and drinker, and was prone to fighting with local man Larry Hammond.

On Monday Mr Douch said that evidence would show that Hammond helped King bury Roycroft's body.