Philip Polkinghorne trial: ‘Absolutely nothing to support a homicide’, defence says

Tuesday, 17 September 2024

Warning: The evidence in the Polkinghorne trial details suicide. Some readers may find the content distressing.

Dr Philip Polkinghorne’s “final insult” to his wife was blaming her for her own death after killing her, the Crown said in closing arguments on Tuesday.

But the defence said it was the eye surgeon who had been repeatedly insulted in his treatment by the detectives, and compared the Crown’s case to a fantastical murder mystery with “a script written by the police”.

“Dr Polkinghorne has had to prosecute this case to show his wife died by hanging,” defence lawyer Ron Mansfield KC told the jury on Tuesday.

The Crown’s case is that Polkinghorne’s life became more and more shambolic in the lead up to his wife’s death. He was seeing multiple sex workers, had an increasing meth habit and was infatuated with Sydney-based escort Madison Ashton.

The life he was living couldn’t continue in parallel to the life he had with his wife Pauline Hanna and collided the night of April 4 or early hours of Easter Monday when the Crown says he killed his wife.

Polkinghorne’s defence is that Hanna was exhausted by work-related stress, had a history of mental health issues, was on medication, and tragically took her own life.

Eye surgeon repeatedly insulted

Mansfield said from the moment the police arrived at the scene and a detective conducted a rope tension check they treated the scene as suspicious.

Polkinghorne was “lured” to the police station under false pretences, Mansfield said. “A master manipulator would have been aware of their rights, remedies, might have lawyered up at that point.”

Mansfield said the police had never informed him the death was being treated as suspicious.

Mansfield said the police quickly switched their open mind to thinking this was a potential homicide due to a tension check on the ropes.

'Despite any objective evidence that might allow assessment to be made,' Mansfield said.

This was an insult in such circumstances, Mansfield said. The police could have advised him he was a suspect.

'Is it too much to ask for our police to be honest and upfront in such a situation?'

He was being open and honest during the police interview. An interview he expected to be viewed by the Coroner, not played in court as a man charged with his wife’s murder.

'He was cooperative, answered all questions and there were clear occasions where he just didn’t have the answers and couldn’t recall what he had done, not done or how the scene was as presented to him and the way in which he manoeuvred the scene to allow entry.'

During long gaps in the interview, a lawyer - who was a friend of the couple, contacted him and asked why he was still at the police station and not home with his family.

'Can I suggest when you watch the interview he clearly became upset - he clearly became concerned and annoyed the officers with whom he trusted had misled him and not told him the truth,“ Mansfield said.

'What greater insult might that be for anyone, let alone Dr Polkinghorne in those circumstances - lured in false pretences… just to learn that his address is now being violated and treated as a property where there’s been a suspicious death and he's been treated as the suspect.'

Mansfield referenced the WhatsApp messages he deleted during one of these breaks in the interview.

'Given the level of suspicion he is now facing… why would he want the police to learn of something that was private and always had been between him and his wife - what he got up to regarding sexual relations outside of their union - entirely understandable at that point he might seek to delete or remove WhatsApp messages that are intimate and potentially embarrassing and certainly something that would damage both of their reputations.'

'Police found absolutely nothing to support a homicide' - defence

While police were scouring the Remuera home for 11 days after Pauline Hanna's death, Mansfield said they found nothing to support a homicide, but his client remained under suspicion and had to endure that for many months.

'But the insult didn’t end up there…he was charged with killing his wife.'

That might have been the final insult, but then the Crown suggesting Polkinghorne has tried to blame his wife's death on her was the last one.

'Add insult to injury there you have it…that’s with the Crown, knowing full well the forensic material does answer this case for you and provides complete answers and it always has provided the complete answer from 6 April. The day the autopsy conduct and report was given.'

Mansfield said the answer to Hanna’s death has always been in the pathology.

'A murder that has not been committed - that is why and only reason why the absence of pathology helps him, the absence of forensic evidence, absence of any other evidence you would ordinarily find associated with homicide.'

Mansfield said the jury have sat through weeks of evidence, trawling through potential motives for a crime that was not committed.

He reiterated the pathology in this case provided a clear cause of death - neck compression by a partial hanging.

But that didn't fit with the Crown's narrative, Mansfield said.

The highly experienced pathologists said it was rare to see a homicidal strangulation with the lack of injuries like in this case.

'This case is not the phantom, the unachievable,' Mansfield said.

'This case is exactly what you have heard from Professor Cordner and Dr Milroy - an incomplete or partial hanging, and that is how it should have been reported.'

Mansfield said by the Crown case, Dr Polkinghorne was not only a master manipulator, but a highly efficient and well-trained killer to kill Hanna by a fatal strangulation and leave no tell tale sign of injury.

'No one is telling you in theory this could not occur - but it tells you a great deal, folks, whether the Crown theory has been able to conduct the perfect murder.'

Mansfield said there were no other external or internal injuries to Hanna's neck reflective of a homicidal strangulation.

Usually in cases of homicidal strangulation, the death can take longer and more pressure is applied than longer.

'The reality of an injury is far greater…'

The injuries don’t support a homicidal strangulation, Mansfield said.

'The pathology when you approach it with logic - supports entirely what Dr Polkinghorne told the police and fits what he told them that afternoon - all of the questions they put to him for answers it by way of incomplete or partial hanging.'

Dr Polkinghorne painted as the villain by Crown - defence

After the lunch adjournment Tuesday, Mansfield KC said it was 'murder 101' that for there to be a murder there had to be a culpable homicide and on the forensic evidence in this case a culpable homicide hadn't been established.

Mansfield suggested the Crown in closing the case had created a villain that every murder mystery requires.

McClintock labelled Polkinghorne as an arrogant man, man of wealth, not to be under estimated and a master manipulator. But no others had described him like that, Mansfield said.

He said both Polkinghorne and Hanna were highly intelligent and very accomplished.

As a couple they had attained a number of assets and if they split they would split their shares 50/50.

Mansfield said the couple's personal and private lives had been laid bare in this trial.

'His entire lifestyle has been laid bare unnecessarily, to create the villain.'

Mansfield said this was not a court of morals.

Polkinghorne's use of sex workers and his sexual appetite in the years and months leading up to Hanna's death may not be liked by the jury, Mansfield said.

'Many of you will not like that, some of you will naturally feel a sense of disdain towards him - but the important thing to remember - don’t impose your morals and values on other people,' Mansfield said.

Mansfield said it was abundantly clear Hanna knew about her husband's use of sex workers.

'There is nothing secret about the relationship with Madison - in fact Pauline was involved at the very outset of the relationship in 2015 - seen from conversations with other people and the Longlands recording.'

'How other people live their lives is very much a matter for them.'

Mansfield said he wasn't saying their relationship was 'all rosy' at the end of 2019 and start of 2020.

Mansfield said Hanna was an intelligent, independent woman who made her own decisions.

'It is perfectly clear she’s aware of his association and use of sex workers for sex.'

She doesn't appear threatened by Madison Ashton.

Mansfield said the Crown had said it didn't depict a grieving husband to see Ashton three weeks after Hanna's death.

Mansfield said Polkinghorne may have been infatuated by the fantasy of what could be with Ashton, lonely and desperate or continuation of the lifestyle they had while Pauline was alive.

'You don’t have the same relationship she [Hanna] had with her husband, they chose to have a complicated relationship when it came to their sexual experiences, a complex relationship involved the use of sex workers either together or by him. If it wasn’t a problem for her what right do we have to make it a problem for us.'

But Mansfield said, in April 2021, Polkinghorne’s use of sex workers could have been a concern for Hanna and amount to a reason why she might take her own life, together with the other risk factors.

Dr Polkinghorne blaming Pauline Hanna for her own death was 'final insult' - Crown

In finishing her closing address on Tuesday, prosecutor Alysha McClintock said the evidence to find Polkinghorne guilty of murder was there.

'His conduct after his wife’s death is telling against him not being the devastated husband, telling against him as the master manipulator too.'

McClintock accepted Pauline Hanna lived with her challenges but suggested she was not suicidal on April 4.

'And even if she were, it is incredibly hard to fathom she did what is said she did - committing suicide by hanging with that rope, in that doorway, undressed in a robe and nothing else.'

McClintock said if Hanna had committed suicide it should be clear she had.

'He had changed, his two worlds were fast colliding - he either decided to end his wife’s life or they argued and he ended it in the course of that.

'Fake the rope so he could say she hung herself with it, fake some toast so he could say he was taking it to her and fake some blood before you to cover for that mark on his head that had been left by his wife and secretly try to check via duck duck duck go if he’d left a sign of what he’d done - strangulation - of his wife’s body and then he went and met with Madison Ashton where he saw his future.

'He had the intelligence to do it, the arrogance, the drivers, the meth-fuelled courage - his relationship with Pauline was done - he had detached from that life.

'He blamed Pauline in life for a lot… it is the final insult to her to blame her for her own death.'

McClintock said the Crown suggests the evidence the jury have heard proves the lie Polkinghonre told when he run 111 and said his wife had hung herself.

The Crown said the jury can safely find him guilty of murder.

The trial, before Justice Graham Lang and a jury, continues.