KEY POINTS:
Peter Ratima heard the talk afterwards. While the country focused on the actions of senior constable Jono Erwood in driving his police car drunk to a double fatality in north Taranaki, few people ever questioned why the accident happened in the first place.
Ratima's son Clint, 32, the drunk driver who the Serious Crash Unit found had caused the crash, had been drinking beer and rum with Erwood at his police house immediately before taking to the road out of Mokau, killing oncoming motorist Jenny Trentham, 48, and seriously injuring her husband Richard.
"There were a lot of people who blamed Jono," says Peter Ratima.
It's two years since Erwood escaped conviction for his actions that afternoon.
After he admitted driving over the limit, the judge told him he was a "physically strong man" who would be "quite capable of holding your liquor".
Erwood had been off-duty but, as the only police officer in Mokau, compelled by his own medical knowledge and the emergency equipment in the patrol car, he felt he had to help.
Four-and-a-half hours after arriving at the accident scene, a fellow officer smelled alcohol on his breath. Erwood was breath-tested and found to be over the legal alcohol limit for driving.
Details of the day were investigated by police as part of an internal disciplinary inquiry. That report, released to the Herald on Sunday after intervention by the Ombudsman, reveals behaviour quite at odds with the anti-drink-driving campaigns supported by police.
The Erwood case polarised the country, and divided the town of Mokau. In the days after the crash, as news of Erwood's arrest became known, there were those who condemned the hypocrisy of a police officer driving drunk.
Others asked what Erwood was meant to have done, knowing he could - and did - save a life if he drove.
The report, written by now-retired District Commander Mark Lammas, says Erwood should have been aware that Ratima had a vehicle, and should not drive.
Surely, like the adverts say, mates don't let mates drive drunk?
Erwood arrived in Mokau in 2001, as the town's sole-charge police officer. The hour's drive to New Plymouth would have seemed a small distance after 2 years policing on the remote Chatham Islands.
"It was isolated compared with here," he said in an interview a week after taking the job.
He quickly became a popular member of the community, heavily involved in many of the activities that make the village a vibrant and colourful place to live.
His wife of 13 years, Julie, worked part-time at Mokau School, attended by their two sons.
By 2006, the year of the accident, the volunteer fire service knew they could rely on his expert first aid knowledge, and the oxygen and defibrillator carried in the police car. But more than that, he embraced Mokau life.
He became president of Mokau's riverside golf club, playing on the oft-parched nine-hole course beside the main highway. He was also president of the local fishing club, and coached junior soccer with training two nights a week and games on Saturday.
Lammas wrote that the community involvement raised no concerns, except Erwood's "relatively frequent and high use of alcohol" in social settings, including at home.
This, apparently, was a feature of Mokau life. The golf club had a mobile bar that would be towed around the course. At the Awakino Hotel, the venue for golf and fishing club meetings, Erwood was a regular. Nights sometimes featured drinking games and plate races, where patrons would run the length of the bar with plates between clenched buttocks.
On July 9, 2006, Erwood was picked up from his home by Awakino farmer David Black and Black's brother Peter, visiting from the United States. The three had decided on a round of golf, and rang local trucking contractor Chris Wise to make up the foursome.
Starting about 1.30pm, the men drank beer as they played. Erwood later told the police inquiry he drank between two and four cans of beer along the nine holes, a figure that tallies with Wise's memories.
With two holes to go, they met Ratima, a shearing hand from Piopio in the King Country. Ratima was well known in Mokau; he worked for local farmers and his father Peter spent much of the whitebaiting season at a bach at Awakino. That week, Ratima was staying at the family bach with partner Joanne Crawford.
Ratima, like the others, had a can of beer as he finished the round. About 3.30pm, Wise returned home, while David Black drove to Erwood's home with his brother and the officer. Ratima joined them there, driving his own car.
The police report records that on returning to Erwood's home, the four drank further stubbies of beer and Erwood and Ratima drank at least two rums. They ate nothing while drinking, and the men talked about continuing their session further at the Awakino Hotel. According to the police report, they intended calling for the pub's courtesy vehicle to collect them.
Just before 5.30pm, David Black and Ratima stepped outside for a cigarette. Black returned alone - Ratima had driven off, alone, heading for Awakino.
Richard and Jenny Trentham were returning from Auckland, where they had met their daughters Trish and Cathy off the plane from a Bible study trip to Fiji. The couple had spent the weekend with their girls, before heading home to New Plymouth.
They drove south along the Taranaki coastline, the white cliffs stark in the distance. An hour from home, the Trenthams were descending the hill above an outlying holiday park;
Ratima had just passed the beachside resort, and failed to take a corner before crossing the centre line. He met the Trenthams head-on.
The volunteer fire service, led by local butcher Graham Putt, was there inside eight minutes.
The siren sounded twice, signalling to all of Mokau that their volunteers had been called to an accident that had every chance of ending in death.
It was the second siren that spurred Erwood to action. He had oxygen that would be needed - as did the local ambulance crew - and specialist training that could be the difference between life and death.
According to the report, he considered having his wife drive the patrol car, but discounted this. Civilians are not allowed to drive police vehicles - although in hindsight, this would have seemed the most minor of regulation breaches. Also, according to the report and court case, Erwood believed he was within the legal limit for driving.
He was seen stopping outside the St John Ambulance station, before driving - drunk - the 2.5km to the accident scene.
Graham Putt says he had no idea Erwood had been drinking.
Erwood's medical skills were brought to use on Richard Trentham, who suffered terrible injuries in the accident that killed his wife Jenny.
The judge at the later drink-drive trial later told Erwood: "Your assistance at the scene may well have saved one occupant's life".
The pair turned to the other car, tipped on its roof.
They called into the vehicle and received no response. Some minutes later it dawned on Erwood that Ratima - with whom he had been drinking only a short time before - was the second fatality.
Other emergency service workers arrived: the ambulance, other police officers, then the tow trucks as the work of a fatal accident took its course. The dead were removed, the road marked for later investigation.
Four-and-a-half hours after arriving, a highway patrol officer confronted Erwood, telling him he could smell alcohol on his breath.
He asked Erwood to take a breath test, which the senior constable failed. Erwood was allowed to console Joanne Crawford over Ratima's death before being taken away.
Erwood reportedly told Putt: "I'm buggered, Putty, I'm buggered. They have breathalysed me. I had a few drinks before I came here."
The police inquiry asked exactly how much Erwood did have to drink. He told the investigating detective senior sergeant he had five stubbies of beer and "at least" two drinks of rum, according to the report.
When breath-tested four-and-a-half hours after driving from his house, Erwood returned a reading of 106mg of alcohol per 100ml of blood. Ratima, by contrast, was killed almost immediately after leaving Erwood's home. His blood alcohol reading was 257mg per 100ml - three times the 80mg legal limit for driving.
Erwood's blood was tested by ESR scientist Dr Allan Stowell, who estimated Erwood as having stopped drinking between 4.30pm and 5.20pm.
By that measure, Erwood's blood alcohol level at 5.30pm - when he left his home to attend the accident - would have been between 157 and 202mg per 100ml.
The Lammas report challenges the evidence given by Erwood and others present over the level of drinking that afternoon. Erwood and Ratima "both consumed more alcohol [than] stated in the accounts of various witnesses", he found.
According to the ESR scientist, driving at this level could cause "increased reaction time, a degree of tunnel vision and a reduction of the ability to make quick and correct decisions in the event of an emergency". Erwood received an official reprimand for his "serious misconduct" in deciding to drive while "well over" the limit.
Lammas found that having staff go back on duty after drinking "when they pose a risk to themselves and other road users" was not tenable.
Lammas also considered the matter of Ratima leaving Erwood's home - a fact of which Erwood and David Black said they were unaware.
Lammas said the fact that Ratima arrived at Erwood's home drunk, or became so while there, should have figured in Erwood's mind.
"The apparent failure by senior constable Erwood to be proactive in respect of Mr Ratima should be a matter that ... Erwood reflects on and takes some responsibility for," he wrote.
"Although the failure does not amount to misconduct or neglect of duty, in a wider sense, [it] did amount to a lack of duty of care."
Like the ads say, mates don't let mates drive drunk.
Peter Ratima says: "You lose mum and dad, brothers, well, that's bad. But to lose your own kid ... man ... you never get over it."
There was plenty of blame attributed after the crash, says Peter Ratima. "A lot of fellas blamed Jono. But I said, 'I know Clint - I don't blame Jono'. He would have stopped him if he knew he was going to drive home. He would have stopped him. I knew Clint. Clint would have just jumped in the car and taken off."
For Richard Trentham, the emotional wounds are taking longer to heal. He says of his wife Jenny: "I would have swapped places if I could". But he was able to meet Erwood and say, on behalf of his family, "that we forgave him".
Erwood retained his police rank and is now a rural liaison officer, based in Stratford in central Taranaki.
Mokau remains a divided town. Chris Wise, who played that round of golf with Erwood and Ratima that day, says there are those who believed Erwood should not have driven.
"In hindsight, he shouldn't have gone. But him going down there, he may well have saved Richard Trentham." If he had not, says Wise, "imagine his conscience" if three people had died.
Of course, there are those in Mokau who say that much would have been different if Erwood had been able to stop Clint Ratima from driving at all.
