Retired eye surgeon Philip Polkinghorne has pleaded not guilty to murdering his wife, Pauline Hanna, in 2021.
The Crown alleges Polkinghorne, 71, strangled his wife and staged her death to look like a suicide at their Remuera home but the defence says there is no evidence of a homicide.
The defence suggests the possibility that this has all been for nothing, that it was a waste of police time and public money, that it only served to shame and ruin an eminent surgeon,that it ought to have been treated as suicide and kept behind a veil of silence, that the murder trial of Dr Philip Polkinghorne at the High Court at Auckland these past six wild weeks has been a fiasco.
His defence has remained the exact same position he held since the morning of April 5, 2021, when he dialled 111 and said his wife Pauline Hanna had hanged herself.
An expert witness, a vastly experienced pathologist flown in from Melbourne, spoke all day on Wednesday and again on Friday to share his scientific finding that she died by suicide, not at the hands of her husband; not, in summary, murdered.
Professor Stephen Cordner, aided by a pair of red-rimmed glasses and a big white cochlear implant drilled into the side of his head, appeared as the 17th witness called by defence lawyer Ron Mansfield KC.
Cordner is an interesting guy. He wore the same rumpled grey suit both days and was so perfectly relaxed, so patient with his answers, that it was easy to imagine him quite happily giving evidence for another week if requested.
Mansfield was in no hurry for him to leave. “One final question,” he said on Friday morning; and then asked two more final questions.
His presence was signalled by Mansfield in the opening week of the trial; since then, the defence has been waiting for the man – here he comes, he’s all dressed in grey.
Philip Polkinghorne (right) and his lawyer Ron Mansfield KC arrive at the High Court at Auckland. Photo / Michael Craig
He gave Mansfield what the defence has been needing, wanting, very keenly desiring. He was asked what he would have reported as the cause of death if he had conducted the autopsy of Hanna.
At precisely 10.57am, Friday, September 6 – I think it’s worthwhile to mark such moments – he answered: “I think I would have said cause of death was hanging, with no findings to support the alternative view of homicide. And – yeah. So.”
The Prof said other flat and emphatic things. He was asked about the findings of two pathologists called by the Crown, who remarked on how ligature marks around Hanna’s neck had disappeared within hours.
He said: “For some reason I don’t understand, they think the disappearing marks are suspicious. But it’s a well-recorded phenomenon.”
He was asked another question in regard to the two pathologists who viewed that homicide and suicide were possible causes. He answered: “My view is that it’s reasonable to go a bit further. The findings support hanging, and there’s no findings to support homicide.”
He elaborated, flatly and emphatically: “There is no evidence of a forensic pathology kind to positively support a conclusion that the deceased has been homicidally, manually, or ligaturely killed.”
Throughout the first four weeks of the trial, which has held the nation in a kind of trance, the Crown argued that Polkinghorne killed his wife, then staged it to look like a suicide.
The jury – and all of us who have followed the trial – have essentially been asked to imagine Polkinghorne creeping around the house, a tiny fellow with nasty little feet, choreographing an awful dance of death by placing his wife’s body on a chair, and gathering a length of rope and a braided belt to garrote her in a convincing mime of suicide.
“They got little hands, and little eyes,” Randy Newman sang in his famous satire about the evils of short people. “And they walk around, tellin’ great big lies.” The Crown prosecution seems to know all the words. Polkinghorne is their lying sex elf, who tried to get away with murder.
But the defence version asks us to imagine something else, something more infinitely sad than brutal and callous – Hanna fetching a chair, a length of rope and a braided belt, and taking her own life.
The laws on reporting suicide are strict. We must not say anything, including the word itself; very often there are buried news stories, one terse paragraph in length, which name a deceased and add the euphemism, “Police say there were no suspicious circumstances.”
Pauline Hanna and Philip Polkinghorne at an event in December 2018. Photo / Norrie Montgomery
The fear of contagion is profound. And yet the Polkinghorne trial, with its live blogs, its podcasts, its many, many reports on TV and radio and print, has explicitly reported on an alleged suicide, made the prospect of it public.
An author in Dunedin put it this way, in an email she sent me on Thursday: “If Pauline’s death had been treated by the cops as a straightforward suicide we would have learned nothing about their lives due to the reporting laws and the possibility for contagion in the community.”
Correct. But now we know everything about their lives – methamphetamine, sex workers – and it may, as the defence insist, have all been for nothing, not much more than a tawdry meaningless exercise in voyeurism for a nation kept agog.
Justice Graham Lang has presided over the trial with good grace. The packed and sometimes gaily chattering public gallery might have been routinely severely chastised by another judge – the combustible, flame-haired Justice Moore comes to mind – but Justice Lang has only once or twice asked them to please STFU.
He did so on Friday morning. There was an end-of-week looseness among the onlookers, and they were up to their old tricks, blocking the doors of courtroom 11 in their impatience to be let in.
“I’ve told you about this before! Move back!” ordered a security guard. They moved back. They’re really very nice; I’ve much enjoyed my chats with Lois, Jan, Kelly and the gang.
In any case, I was also in TGIF spirits, and brought in a Tupperware container of 24 banana muffins that I baked on Thursday night.
I work from home as a journalist and have zero intention of ever calling into the Herald offices but I now regard good old courtroom 11 as my office; the muffins were an office treat, for court staff, lawyers, fellow media ghouls.
I also shared some with friends and family who are there for Hanna. Listening to Professor Cordner talk all day Wednesday and most of Friday (Thursday was a day off) was hell.
“I think I would have said cause of death was hanging”, etc. They wear the White Ribbon emblem on their collars. Their feelings are clear. Not, in summary, suicide.
They sit in the front row, close to the jury; the Polkinghorne family – his sister, son, daughter-in-law – share the same row, a few seats apart. Interesting family.
Philip Polkinghorne's trial is about to go into a seventh week at the High Court at Auckland. Photo / Jason Oxenham
On Wednesday, his sister wore a blouse patterned with socks, possibly in tribute to her brother’s wildly expressive collection, which he has modelled throughout the trial. The socks affirm the legend of Polky, as the court had heard him called with considerable affection by old friends who talked of him in the witness box as a hilarious kind of rooster, always up for a laugh, not so much a snappy dresser but a crazy dresser.
There was the texted advice read out in court from his amour, sex worker Madison Ashton: “Do not wear a f***ing bowtie to the funeral.” It was very forcefully argued, suggesting that Polky was a bowtie kind of guy. Ashton added: “Keep the hat.”
Police were taking one last walk-through at the Polkinghorne house while the funeral was being conducted. They had sealed it off, were collecting forensic evidence, holding meetings with the Crown solicitor.
Mansfield cross-examined investigation head Detective Senior Sergeant Chris Allan, who wore a wide-checked shirt, like a tablecloth, when he appeared in the witness box. He said he had kept an open mind that the cause of death was suicide in the early days of the police inquiry. Mansfield: “I wonder if we can just explore that open mind.”
He reminded the court that Polkinghorne has pleaded guilty to possession of a methamphetamine pipe, and then asked Allan: “The Crown solicitor doesn’t deal with possession of a methamphetamine pipe, correct?”
Allan: “Correct.”
“Only with an allegation of murder or manslaughter, correct?”
“Correct.”
“Police went to 79 neighbouring properties, correct?”
“That’s the routine, yes.”
“For a homicide inquiry, yes?”
DSS Allan answered: “Yes.”
Mansfield has more witnesses to call on Monday and Tuesday. One of Justice Lang’s many duties is to make sure the trains run on time, and he told the court on Friday that he expects the prosecution will give its closing address on Wednesday, the defence on Thursday, and his own summing up on Friday.
Must bring in some more muffins. The end is nighish.
“We are getting to the sharp end of the trial,” Justice Lang told the jury last week. “There’s a long way to go so keep an open mind. Don’t come to any conclusions at this stage; it’s far too early for that.”
Good advice then, and it still holds true. The trial is alive, a dynamic and unruly beast, heading in all kinds of directions at great pace.
In cross-examination to Crown prosecutor Alysha McClintock, Professor Cordner gave somewhat more equivocal answers about the forensic evidence of Hanna’s death. It was a surprisingly polite cross-exam.
“You’re trying very hard here to say it’s more possibly a suicide,” she put to him, quite sweetly. Her fellow prosecutor Brian Dickey farewelled the court on Wednesday; he had personal commitments.
It was sad to see him go. He’s such a nice guy and also he would surely have shouted at Cordner – despite his cochlea implant, the Prof is still quite hard of hearing, but I bet he would have heard Dickey’s favoured approach, which is to roar.
“They got grubby little fingers, and dirty little minds,” Randy Newman sings. “They’re gonna get you every time.” He was only joking about short people. The week after next we will find out what the jury thinks.
