Philip Polkinghorne at day 1 of his trial for the murder of his wife at the High Court at Auckland. Photo: RNZ/Nick Monro
Warning: The contents of this story discuss suicide and assault.
A forensic pathologist called by the defence in the trial of Philip Polkinghorne says Pauline Hanna's death is consistent with partial hanging, not strangulation.
Polkinghorne is on trial at the High Court in Auckland for the murder of his wife, Hanna.
The defence's case rests on Hanna having committed suicide, while the Crown argues the scene was staged after a violent strangulation.
Polkinghorne told police he found Hanna dead on the morning of 5 April 2021 in their Remuera home.
Earlier in the trial, Crown pathologists told the jury that Hanna's death could have happened from a number of different mechanisms, one of which was a partial hanging.
The defence is calling expert witnesses to prove that Hanna died by partial hanging, and on Wednesday, continued with Dr Stephen Cordner, an Australian forensic pathologist.
Lividity consistent with Polkinghorne's account - expert
Dr Cordner said the lividity in Hanna's body - the settling of blood with gravity after death - was consistent with her sitting in a chair, as Polkinghorne said he found her.
"So in a body that's sitting, which I do believe the lividity pattern is present here, the lower legs from the knees down [there is] much lividity. And the dusky purple colour is, to my eye and I think it's pretty clear, is different to the pale colour of the thighs."
He said the left forearm showed a dusky purple colour, but the other did not, which could be explained by a hand sitting in a lap.
Polkinghorne was instructed by emergency services on a 111 call to cut Hanna down.
"Is it consistent with her being removed and laid back with a pillow behind her head for a period of time, and left in that position for a period of time before the emergency services arrive?" defence lawyer Ron Mansfield KC asked.
Defence lawyer Ron Mansfield KC. Photo: RNZ/Nick Monro
Cordner said: "In my view, the lividity was still mobile at the point when she's laid on the ground, and that goes to what I said before - I think that is an indicator that death probably occurred in the small number of hours before she was found."
He said a 'small number' of hours was between three and six.
An incomplete mark does not rule out hanging - expert
Cordner said while he agreed with Crown pathologists that Hanna died from compression of the neck, the absence of a mark around the neck did not rule out a partial hanging as the cause.
"An incomplete hanging by way of ligature could be successful in resulting in death without any mark," he said.
He said it was difficult to imagine someone setting up an already dead body in such a position to get such a mark that disappeared by the time of autopsy.
"People in the court would need to imagine what it is like to manipulate an unconscious - I use that word because that's how a dead body would be like - to move around and to simulate a hanging by perhaps sitting the individual, the dead individual, in a chair and setting it up to try and create this sort of thing.
"And that really is quite mind boggling to imagine that because the looseness and the floppiness."
He said he did not consider the death to be a suspicious circumstance.
Injuries not typical of strangulation - expert
Cordner said the injuries found on Hanna's body were "not even in the ballpark" of those expected in a homicide by strangulation, which the Crown argues took place.
Cordner said in the case of a strangulation, either by hand or by object, you would expect to see other injuries relating to a sustained assault and resistance from the victim.
"The generally accepted view that homicidal manual or ligature strangulation, is very often the end point of a more sustained assault. The assailant has to overcome the victim, before the victims in a position to be successfully manually strangled," he said.
"So the resistance might result in injuries to themselves as they scrape away trying to remove the hands, or to remove the ligature, they might actually cause scratches of their own on the neck."
He said 70 percent of strangulation cases had those injuries, such as bruises to the head or scratches on the neck, and the remainder mostly had obvious reason why they did not, such as being ill or young.
Mansfield questioned whether it would be expected for a victim of an assault and strangulation to lash out at the assailant or to the surrounding room, causing injuries to themselves or to the assailant.
Cordner confirmed.
"But certainly when you've looked at the photographs for Ms Hanna or Mr Polkinghorne, did you see any of those types of injuries, so injuries around her neck, injuries to her hands or her arms or any form of clear defensive injury indicating that she was part of a struggle between herself and an assailant?" Mansfield asked.
Cordner confirmed neither himself or the two Crown pathologists observed any of those injuries.
Hair clips were still in place in Hanna's hair, as were her acrylic nails.
The jury earlier heard evidence that there was no skin cells or blood DNA matching Polkinghorne's found under Hanna's fingernails.
"I really want to be clear that we're we're not in the ballpark of assaultive injuries or the number and severity and location of injuries where any forensic pathologist would say we could conclude assault," Cordner said.
The trial, and Cordner's evidence, will continue on Friday.
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