Crimes NZ

Teina Pora was wrongly imprisoned for 20 years for the rape and murder of Susan Burdett, brutally attacked in her Papatoetoe home in March 1992. Investigative journalist Eugene Bingham joins Jesse to us through the case.

On Monday 23 March, 1992, Susan Burdett was raped and beaten to death with a softball bat.

What followed would become one of this country's most prominent miscarriages of justice.

Teina Pora was convicted of Burd...

Deane Fuller-Sandys went missing on 21 August, 1989 after setting off to go fishing at the rough West Auckland beach Whatipu and for nearly a decade he was presumed drowned.

Deane Fuller-Sandys went missing on 21 August,1989 after setting off to go fishing at the rough West Auckland beach Whatipu and for nearly a decade he was presumed drowned.

In February 1997, police began investigating tips which led them to charge Auckland woman ...

David Dougherty was convicted for the rape and abduction of an 11 year old girl in 1993. But he wasn't guilty of the crime. Donna Chisholm was the journalist at the centre of the campaign to free him and have him compensated.

In 1993, David Dougherty was convicted of abducting and raping an 11-year-old girl in Auckland.

He spent more than three years in prison before being acquitted at a retrial in 1997, following fresh DNA evidence.

...

Investigative journalist and presenter David Lomas began covering the Mr Asia drug ring case when he was a crime reporter at the Dominion newspaper in Wellington in 1978. He has followed the story ever since.

The Mr Asia drug ring imported large quantities of drugs into New Zealand and Australia through the 70s.

The drug ring, one of the largest New Zealand has ever seen, was led by Marty Johnstone, the original Mr Asia, and grew fro...

In October 2016, a group of women gathered in West Auckland for a pamper party. It ended with the death of Carly Stewart. Defence lawyer, Marie Dyhrberg QC was involved in the case.

In October 2016, a group of women gathered in West Auckland for what was supposed to be a fun social event - a chance to do their nails, catch up with friends, and have a few drinks.

But the party took a bizarre and violent turn, when Anna Browne stabbed ...

In 1989, two Swedish tourists, Sven Urban Höglin and Heidi Paakkonen, went missing in the Coromandel. Mr Höglin's body was discovered by pig hunters in 1991, but Ms Paakkonen has not been seen since.

David Tamihere spent 21 years in prison for the 1989 murders of Sven Urban Höglin and Heidi Paakkonen.

The Swedish tourists and had gone tramping in bush near Thames in April. They were reported missing in May.

David Tamihere was convicte...

Canterbury plant scientist David Lloyd fell severely ill in suspicious circumstances in 1992. The ensuing investigation became known as the 'poisoned professor case'.

When Canterbury scientist David Lloyd fell ill in 1992, suspicious immediately fell on his former lover.

Dr Vicky Calder was arrested in 1994 and stood trial twice for attempted murder, or alternatively poisoning with intent.

Lady Deborah Chambers QC presented The Trial...

On a Sunday afternoon in Christchurch in 1996, scrap metal dealer John Reynolds failed to return home for lunch. Later that evening, his brother found the 55-year-old lying in a pool of blood at the scrap yard.

Fifty-five year old John Reynolds was discovered lying in a pool of blood at this scrap metal yard in 1996.

He had been hit repeatedly around the head with a blunt instrument.

More than two decades on, Mr Reynolds' killer ...

Coral-Ellen Burrows was reported missing on September 9th, 2003. She was six years old. Former detective John Gualter worked on the case, known as Operation Reef.

On September 9 2003, six-year-old Featherston girl Coral Ellen Burrows was reported missing. Police were alerted when her mother went to pick her up from school, and found out that she hadn't attended class that day.

Ten days later, Coral's stepfather Stephen Will...

In 2002, Mark Lundy was found guilty of killing his wife Christine and 7-year old daughter Amber, but investigative journalist Mike White has some questions about the prosecution's case.

Christine Lundy and her seven-year old daughter Amber were brutally killed in their own home in August, 2000.

Two years later, Mark Lundy, Christine's husband and Amber's father, was convicted of their murders.

Mark Lundy was in Wellington o...

The 1985 bombing of the Rainbow Warrior is described as the first act of terrorism against New Zealand. An assault which claimed the life of Greenpeace photographer Fernando Pereira.

On 10 July 1985 the Greenpeace ship, the Rainbow Warrior, was sunk at an Auckland wharf.

Two French agents planted two explosives on the ship while it was berthed at Marsden wharf, the second explosion killed Greenpeace photographer, Fernando Pereira.

Aut...

In 2002, an armed stranger snatched Baby Kahu from her stroller and held her for ransom for nine long days.

Wellington lawyer Donna Hall was walking her dog with two nieces and eight-month-old baby Kahu, when a stranger brandishing a gun grabbed the baby and drove off.

The next day the family was sent a ransom note demanding $3 million dollars.

For nine terrifying days the family had no idea where Baby Kahu was or if she was safe.

NZ ...

The details of the 1977 murder of Betty Benning were so bizarre, movie producer Philly De Lacey turned it into a black comedy.

In 1977 on a quiet Karori street, Alf Benning brutally murdered his wife Betty.

Her body parts were discovered buried beneath a freshly planted apple tree in the backyard. Alf had copies of books borrowed from the local library about getting away with murder.

The killing is the subject of the black comedy film...

The disappearance of Jane Furlong is a mystery that has gripped the nation for nearly thirty years.

In 1993, 17-year-old Jane Furlong disappeared from Auckland's Karangahape Road.

Nineteen years later her remains were found on a beach at Port Waikato. Her killer has never been brought to justice.

Stuff journalist Kelly Dennett wrote The Short Life and Mysterious Death of Jane Furlong, a book which won a Ngiao Marsh award for Best...

Lorraine Cohen and her son Aaron spent much of the 80's locked up in a Malaysia prison facing the death penalty.

In 1984, Lorraine Cohen and her son Aaron were arrested at a Malaysian airport and charged with drug trafficking, a charge that carried a death penalty.

Journalist Tim Donoghue spent much of his career covering the story and eventually wrote about book called The Tiger Who Smiled about the legal battle to save the Cohens.

G...

Chris and Cru Kahui were just 84 days old when they were fatally injured in their Auckland home. Their father, also Chris, was charged with murder but eventually acquitted of the crime.

It was a case that shocked the nation. The deaths of newborn twin boys, Chris and Cru Kahui in 2006.

The twins' father Chris was charged with their murder, but he was eventually acquitted.

Marie Dyhrberg, lawyer for the twins' mother, Macsyna...

On August 16, 1980, 6 year-old Alicia O'Reilly was found dead in her bed, in the room she shared with her 8-year-old sister. For years the case has gone unsolved, but police are currently following up new leads

Alicia O'Reilly was found dead in her bed in her Avondale home on August 16, 1980.

It appears she was killed while her eight-year-old sister slept just metres away.

This episode of Crimes NZ is a crime against a young c...

It's one of the most brazen robberies in New Zealand's history. In November 1956, Auckland mobsters made off with the equivalent today of $1 million after breaking into the Waterfront Industry Commission's offices.

In 1956, Auckland mobsters might have pulled off the heist of the century, after breaking into the Waterfront Industry Commission offices and making off with the equivalent of a million dollars.

In his book The Great New Z...