Retired Det Sergeant Doyle's interview with Binnie

This interview has been in the public domain for a few months now and reveals some extraordinary information about the Bain case from new perspectives. Page 53.


Police don't tend to look at the motive if it's not clearly there as an issue. I n
this particu lar case , n o . I don't think at any stage we looked for a motive for
David killing his fam i ly. I think that to be very fair, I think the approach that we
p robably had taken at that point in time was that this was a you n g man who,
for whatever reason, had snapped and I know that myself and p robably a lot
20 of other police officers would have dearly hoped that there had been some
med ical condition become evident that wou ld have explained it but, aside from
that, no there was no q uestion of tryi ng to p u rsue a motive and I , I think in this
sort of a situation you'd never, ever be able to ascerta in what a motive wou ld
be.
25


Doyle is clearly saying that he 'dearly hoped' there was a 'medical condition' that made David 'snap.' On the surface that, I gather, would explain what happened and put everything in order in Doyle's mind - David had a medical condition but the fact he didn't wasn't necessary. But taking into account that David wasn't initially claimed to be a suspect that left only one person and I wonder why Doyle wasn't therefore hoping Robin had a 'medical condition' and why that was never investigated at the outset. Particularly so after police were told about the incest allegations. 'Hoping' for a medical condition seems incomparable to not investigating the prime suspect, as Robin was, at least according to Doyle, in the early days of the inquiry. Of course when looking for firm ground from the man ostensibly leading the investigation it might have been expected he would have reasons to subjecting the surviving victim to an intrusive strip search within hours of being sensitive to such an extent that he didn't test David for GSR. There are sharp conflicts in what Doyle says, and what is known to have happened.

David was being held under guard from the time police arrived. He was rightfully being treated as a suspect, it was clear that if it wasn't 'suicide murder' as it appeared to be then it was murder and David was the suspect. Taking into account that even 2 decades later nothing has changed from the morning the police arrived at the Bain household, it still holds true that it was one man or the other. Trying to pretend David was not a suspect but yet that he was under guard and strip searched is a frustrating observation. I'm surprised that Doyle continues with that theme all these years later. The invasive search was for clear reasons, that there might have been a sexual content to the murder of 3 women. The specific strip search was looking for injuries and the body chart was filled out in the prescribed manner. The police in their letter to the Minister para 535 - 539 regarding the Binnie report confirms that the examination (strip search) was thorough. A deflation for the hate-siters that have said firstly that the search never happened then later that it was limited, the police themselves say it was thorough and clearly imply they thought Binnie was offended by the fact a strip search took place and yet they were merely doing their job properly.

So accepting that the search was thorough and invasive why does Doyle feel the need to continue the theme that David was not a suspect. I can only think of one obvious reason, by Doyle claiming that David wasn't a suspect (when in fact he had to be as a survivor in a house of the dead) that it places an emphasis on David's 'guilt.' Or, 'at first we thought it was Robin (even though he was investigated) but then we discovered it was David.' About as persuasive as the 'paper run' alibi. I wonder if it ever occurred to Doyle that because there'd been a fight that the 'suspect' was likely to have blood on his hands or at least damage to his hands. Pryde reported that there was none to David on day 1 and Robin's body showed both damage and blood. I wonder how that could have been ignored by Doyle if Robin was the suspect and David 'wasn't.'


B I N N I E J :
And what I 'm talking about i s not the container that went back to the
(ina u d i b le 1 3 : 3 5 : 1 7) but I'm speaking of the samp les that were refrigerated?
MR DOYLE:
I appreciate that.
B I N N I E J :
25 And I don't believe that the destruction of those sam p les was the subject of a
letter to defence counse l .
30
MR DOYLE :
No i t wasn't.
B I N N I E J :
And therefore you wouldn't - h e had n't been i n touch with you about it, by the
same toke n , you had n't been i n touch with him to say, look, we have -

and earlier:


B I N N I E J :
You see what concerned m e i s that the rules for appeal to the P rivy Council
seem to be q u ite flexible that you can't look at a calendar and say, right the
d ate for seeking leave from the Privy Council h as passed therefore the case is
DOYLE J O Le I NTERV I EW (1 9 J uly 201 2)
6 1
done, because they like to retain flexibility a s to whether they take appeals.
So that the o n ly way of determ i n i ng whether the matter would go to the
Privy Council wou l d be by contacting d efence cou nsel .
5 M R DOYLE:
At that stage , Sir, no ind ication had been g iven to us that the matter was going
past the New Zealand Court of Appeal. To that end , I had put it in writing to
the defence counsel of our i ntentions of dealing with the exh ibits notwith -
1 0 B I N N I E J :
Well , you put it - I th ink you put i n writing that you were dealing with a
container of stuff -
MR DOYLE:
1 5 Absolutely.
20


M R DOYLE:
1 5 It never happened , probably because it's not the normal process of the way
tria ls or post-trial i n my, my experience post-trial p rocesses. I 've neve r been
i nvolved in a trial that, in a case that had gone to P rivy Council from reca l l and
so once it had gone to the New Zealand Court of Appeal that seemed to be
the end of the matter for us.
20
BINNIE J :
But you were aware there was a potential for a n appeal -
M R DOYLE:
25 N o .
B I N N I E J :
- to the P rivy Council?
30 M R DOYLE:
No I was not. N ot at that point in time and the moment I found o ut that there
was a potential and in fact it may have been M r Karam that b rought this to the
pol ice notice or M r Guest. It was not until J u n e of that year that counsel came
- that's J u ne that we' re d ealing with '96?





Looking back it's difficult to accept that Doyle might not have considered that a further appeal might have gone to the Privy Council, but regardless surely the only option was to write to counsel regarding intention to destruct evidence. He did it in the case of the items inside the container but not the smaller, and no doubt more important specimens held in a fridge. I suspected that because Doyle was  quite frank about some of the aspects of the investigation being a shambles that he would have conceded on not only the 'destroyed' evidence material, but also that David was a suspect and even when Robin was a 'suspect' that he wasn't investigated, it's so plain to see.

After all, this was the man who after saying he was 'hoping' for a 'medical condition' and who went onto explain that 'motives' were not required and who refused to investigate Robin's alleged motive (exposure as a participant in incest or worse) sent his charges to discover what David might have been 'reading.


And lastly, j ust on this q uestion of motive. There was a d i rective, I believe you
sent o ut early o n in J u ne , about checking bookshops for what David Bain had
been read ing or viewing in an effort to perhaps identify his interests and
whether there was anything pecu liar or bizarre or d isturb i n g . Do you recall
1 0 that?

In either Doyle's evidence or that of Weir's to Binnie it is mentioned that police considered that there wasn't 'enough' blood on Robin for him to have been the murderer. On the basis that there wasn't enough blood on David therefore to be murderer unless he had 'washed up,' I can't see how if one man is 'clean' of blood and the other isn't it means that the first man 'cleaned up,' but of course that the second didn't. This was one of the fundamentals in deciding that David was guilty - ignoring the wounds and blood on Robin but prefer the no wounds and no blood on David. Going further that one man might wash up but that the other wouldn't. It's very easy to see that the fundamentals in this case were amiss, and that there was no vigorous debate going on. Somebody would reach a decision and others would simply follow, no body for example, appears to have said Robin has bruised hands and we need to eliminate those from the inquiry. Or that he has a red substance under his nails and that must be tested, or that we must find out whose blood is on the towel and so on. Instead we see it said 'David must have done it and then washed up' despite there being no proof.

If such short shortsightedness and lack of robust reason could be called remarkable then so too could Doyle's reliance on the timing of the washing machine. He was able to do this without reservations for the age of the machine (which when later tested showed to jump entire cycles) or that somebody having just killed members of their family would have the presence of mind to set a known unreliable machine exactly and expect an exact result. The subtext of Doyle's interview is clear they were looking for admissions from David throughout, they thought he was a 'spinner' and would fess up or display his 'medical condition.' That's why Doyle, or who ever gave the order, wanted him fully examined, and on the first morning from 'physical' proof of David's guilt then a confession would follow, or a consent for psychiatric examination and then that blood on Robin's palms would 'seemingly' no longer matter, and so  too the bruises to his hands that Doyle never oversaw being investigated - even if just to remove them as 'relevant' to Robin's obvious guilt.

Confused hate-siters?

Well yes, that goes without saying. But somebody actually able to confuse them even more? Try this.

Donaldob has yet again dug deeper in his latest comment on Counterspin where he draws attention to a blog by Chris Patterson, a civil lawyer, at http://www.patterson.co.nz/site/#blog&1259

Although Patterson is arguing that David is guilty and shouldn’t get compensation, Patterson says:

“A finding that David Bain did not, on the balance of probabilities, kill his family is not a finding that he is innocent, but is a finding that the prosecution against him should probably never have been brought, and that the jury should not (if they had all the currently available evidence before them) have ever delivered guilty verdicts.”

The poster Donaldbob from Otago University whose main impetus seems to be attacking the Jury in a variety of facetious ways tracked down the above blog by Chris Patterson.

I won't try to explain Chris Patterson's blog overall because I can't make head nor tail of it in many places. He was apparently in Dunedin at the time of the Bain familicide, presumably at Law School. Yet in a few short sentences he's said everything the hate-siters want to hear and everything they don't, maybe he should be congratulated for that.

Interestingly, he doesn't state any facts, but suggests a reader tears a strip of paper in two and on one half list the evidence against David and on the other the evidence against Robin. Though, most conveniently,  he makes no lists himself yet is somehow assured that the list for David will require extra paper. What a quaint and awkward fellow, and it is quite a fine distinction to be able to confuse the already deeply confused hate-siters. Or indeed to write an opinion piece making serious assertions but not offering any support for that other than having woken up one morning in Dunedin when it was cold.

This has left poor old donbob unsure whether he's Arthur or Martha which has set back years of productive counselling that left him with the strongest presumption that he was Martha after all. What a conundrum for him added to by the fact that the bewildered Chris Patterson suggests Binnie's finding is that David should never have been charged and prosecuted. He's exactly right on that. However this part which the hang-bainers will be wishing to concentrate on “A finding that David Bain did not, on the balance of probabilities, kill his family is not a finding that he is innocent” is wrong. A finding that David is innocent on BOP is exactly that – a finding that he is innocent.

Overall Chris does nail it, despite his fascination with making lists and tearing paper to shreds, Binnie will have found David innocent on the BOP. I believe Ian Binnie will be critical that the prosecution ever proceeded thus fitting with Chris's interpretation. When the police and Crown went ahead hiding evidence, planting evidence, an incomplete inquiry and overcome with an impression of guilt those were extraordinary circumstances for which Bain must be compensated. This case wasn't about a lack of evidence, it was about hidden, planted and misinterpreted evidence, mantra's and impressions of guilt fed through the media by police. It was the police's fault that Robin wasn't investigated, that such facts as blood on Robin's palms and damaged hands were overlooked, along with red material under his fingernails. The police never paused to test not only whose blood it was on the towel in the bathroom, instead presuming wrongly that it was Davids, but when they found out they then ignored the fact that before he killed himself Robin Bain wiped a heap of blood off himself from a freshly bleeding wound. That should have assisted them to finally understand that final death scene was in fact a suicide scene, and Robin's damaged hands, recent bleeding, his blood inside the barrel indicated the obvious fact that Dempster arrived at before Detective Sergeant Doyle decided, lo and behold that they 'had a murder to solve.'

The relatively small world of scientists and physic graduates in NZ.

I recently blogged about marzuka and his defamatory photos. Well we now know who marzuka is, as we know who many of the remaining hate-siters are. They've enjoyed persecuting David Bain, never thinking that they would be called to task. Apart from the charges against Parker and Purkiss the rest may have thought things might stop there.

The following in italics is from somebody who has brought another dimension to the bruises on Robin Bain's hands. You know the bruises and cuts - the ones that 'don't' exist according to the hate-siters. The extensive bruising through Robin's fingers is most likely the result of the impact being 'dulled' or 'swamped' over a greater surface because of the gloves Robin wore.

Plenty more to come on Robin's hands, something which goes right to the core of the investigation and the 'cover up.' That'll be for another time. I've deleted marzuka's real name from below, if he or any of his friends read here I'd suggest he withdraw and destroy all his defamatory material from where ever it may be stored. Whether somebody pursues marzuka into the Courts is not my decision, but unlike the idiot Parker, one would assume a physics graduate understand that in the first instance on being 'discovered' is to remove all defamatory material.

The correspondent below touches on the fact Robin might have had a broken right hand from the fight with his youngest son. I must try and find out if Robin's hands were ever x rayed - if they weren't it makes the quality of the 'investigation' all the more sinister. Interspersed below are my comments by return to the letter writer.

Footnote; I've just had a very hostile email from one of the sisters, saying they believe I 'too scared' to name marzuka. Very funny. It reminds me that marzuka was actually outed sometime back by 2 of the more twisted hate-siters. It also reminds me that a hate-site administrator published some 'drawings' he commissioned from a certain couple in Dunedin which also sought to defame David and present him as the killer instead of his father. Interesting how things begin to stack up against the sisters now, more and more each day.

Thought I’d just touch base about a couple of your latest blogs.


In those hand photos I’m quite convinced that I can see extensive bruise like dis-coloration on his index & middle fingers- in front of the knuckles & also on the back of his hand, behind those same knuckles, extending down towards his wrist.The other photo that you have posted on your blog, taken from Joes latest book ,shows the bruising better.All this is in addition to the skin lesion with its 2cm circular bruise behind the knuckles of his ring & little fingers.
I actually believe Robin busted his fist during his struggle with Stephen.The bruises are similar to what I have seen in fights-& on myself sometimes after a session in the dojo.The gloves would have protected against having more cuts than he already had.


These could explain why Robin favoured his left side for shooting himself & was dis-inclined to hand write a suicide note- his right hand was too damn sore.


Just wondering what your opinion is on this? I ran it past Rob as well, but unfortunately it is probably too late to ask Dempster to have another look at it.


Also Marzurka- he’s a fellow called ---------------- a relatively recent graduate in physics.I consider his doctored photos & videos highly defamatory.

Pleased to hear from you.


Two answers. Handling the rifle with the stronger (right) hand is consistent with the way a right handed person carries and shoots a rifle. Robin bore the weight and control of the rifle with his right hand I think is shown, operated the trigger with his left not having the advantage of a normal shot where the weight of the rifle is pushed into the right shoulder and steadied by the left.

I think your observation about the gloves is why the damage to Robin's hands was 'muted.' Bloody obvious but I didn't see that before. He might have gone 'left' handed because of that, but I know myself from having had broken hands or fingers, unless it were a wrist fracture, the pain or disability is lost in the fight.


I should just add – the bruising on his fingers appears to cover the whole joint from the knuckles on the fist, to the 1st joints on the fingers.


Yes, that must be how the impact flattens out because of the gloves.