‘Yes.’
‘And had he come out to the kitchen or taken a glass of water to the bed when he went to bed?’
‘He took a glassful when he went to bed.’
Funny how she could remember him taking a glassful of water to bed but couldn’t remember what she cooked for dinner that night.
‘Was that a regular occurrence?’
‘Not a regular occurrence, but it was something he did occasionally.’
According to Ben and Adam, and Lance from his short stay in the house, you didn’t dare take food, drink or even water into the bedrooms.
‘So were your phones normally turned off?’
‘As I explained, my Telecom one I left on because I was often on call at work for weekends for alarm duty — we were on a roster for it, and that was my weekend to be on duty for it. My Vodafone [phone] I always switched off and plugged in at night because it did not hold its charge because it was a very old phone.’
‘OK. So by the time the police and the ambulance had arrived there, you had already gone through the bedside drawer next to Phil and found the Phenergan tablets?’
‘No.’
‘Who found them?’
‘The police officer.’
‘OK. So when you got up to take food in the middle of the night, you were not aware of anything like.’
‘No. No, he was breathing, he was asleep obviously, so I never bothered … I would never wake him because he had an early start and I would just go out and make myself a drink and some toast and sit on the couch with that.’
The coroner cut in, ‘Can I just interrupt you there for a minute. So he was breathing when you got up?’ Helen replied, ‘Yes.’
I asked, ‘And what time did you say you got up?’
‘It would have been about one o’clock.’
At this point the coroner took the morning adjournment. She warned Helen that she was under oath and was not to even speak with her solicitor.
Morning tea became a family strategy meeting, working out who needed to question Helen and what they needed to ask. After morning tea Vicki asked where the suicide note was with the handwritten ‘Phil’ that Helen had shown herself, her husband and Zak, and got the same boring answer as myself and my father: that there was only one note and it was the one the police had. Vicki also asked about when Helen went to bed, if Phil was asleep and if he was breathing at the time. Helen said that his breathing seemed to be fine. Helen confirmed that Phil was basically asleep at 10.30 when she went to bed, although that was the time that the supposed suicide text was sent from Phil’s phone. When Vicki asked about where Phil’s phone was found, the coroner cut in and asked, ‘So his phone would be switched on?’
‘His phone would be switched on and left on his bedside table because he worked in the food industry and sometimes on a Monday morning they would ring him and ask him to start half an hour earlier.’
So not only does Helen have her phone on for alarm duty in her fantasy world, but now Phil has his on for special Monday early-morning call-ins. She had a story for everything.
Dad was next batter up. He brought up the DNA test Helen claimed to have had done and the email in which she had sent him the results. Helen was handed a copy of the email and her reply was, ‘I certainly have no recollection of that email.’ Karen blurted out, ‘Well, she sent it’ and was told off by the coroner.
Coumbe interjected, ‘May I just say something about the email? I am a wee bit concerned about that email being entered into evidence. I have received an email allegedly from Philip’s father which had been doctored. It was not the email which had been sent to him that was returned to myself. Anyone with any sort of computer skill could take an email, cut and paste information into it, and print it off as an original email. So without a chain of evidence I don’t think that should be entered.’
This seemed to be Coumbe’s first experience in the coroner’s court. He got up to ask Helen some questions, but they were more an attempt at mounting a defence for Helen. The coroner even asked him, ‘Can I ask where this is leading? Is this leading to anything that is relevant to the circumstances of his death?’
Coumbe replied, ‘It is, Your Honour. There have been allegations raised that Mr Nisbet had contributed sums of money, and a great deal of the allegations from the family is in regards to money which was allegedly Phil’s that they believe has given rise to his death. Presumably from their allegations, that …’
‘I have not had that in evidence,’ the coroner said.
Coumbe retracted with, ‘OK. That is probably to do with matters which perhaps have not been raised by the police at this stage, Your Honour. If you like I would just stop that line of questioning.’
I think Coumbe had been watching too many TV programmes and was beyond his knowledge base and qualifications in the situation.
When he questioned the detective, he asked if fingerprinting and handwriting examinations were undertaken on the suicide note. When the detective pointed out the note was typed not handwritten we all had a little laugh over that; he wasn’t up with the game on such a crucial piece of evidence.
Coumbe soon realised that the family had seen the note Helen had handed to the police as well as the copy she had shown us and got a little grumpy that he didn’t have a copy. The coroner replied, ‘Anyone that asks for disclosure can have it. No one asked for it. I am not compelled to disclose it unless it’s asked for.’
I questioned the detective on several things I wanted confirmed and brought to the attention of the coroner and then Andrew also questioned him.
In many inquests, the statements of evidence are read out before the court. It would have been interesting for everyone concerned to have listened to Helen’s two statements to the police regarding the circumstances of Phil’s death. I have included these as an appendix (see page 253), as I found the information conflicting and at times comical and beyond believable. Helen seemed to be unable to tell the same story twice, whether it be to family members or the police in a signed sworn statement.
THE INQUEST WAS OVER BEFORE 12.30 p.m.
I knew in my heart that there was no way the coroner could rule Phil’s death as suicide. We had managed to push the facts we needed the coroner to consider out into the open.
I headed with the girls to a bar down the road to celebrate, then met up with most of the others for a celebratory lunch. Now we just had to wait for Sue Johnson’s confirmation of what we knew was correct: that Phil had died from excess levels of Phenergan but hadn’t taken it of his own free will.
Phil with his first car.
Twelve
The Police Step Up
We flew back to Brisbane on 23 November with no word from the inquest office. Mum and Dad were staying on in New Zealand for a few more weeks so I borrowed their car till mine was fixed. Christmas came with still no findings. Aaron, Lance and his partner Danieka came down from the Sunshine Coast and stayed a few days. We didn’t catch up with Mum and Dad on the day; it was easier that way, so the kids could have a day untainted by their uncle’s murder. It was so hard facing another year still without any answers. We had come out of the inquest feeling so positive but as time passed our high had fizzled out.
The end of January brought my yearly work pilgrimage to Sydney. Work conference was always a great escape from the day-to-day rut we all fall into. The main event was rewards night, which this year was held at Luna Park. Finding the perfect outfits for conference had been a great distraction since my return from the inquest!
Lance and Danieka’s baby, my first grandchild, was due to be born while I was away, but finally arrived on 9 February 2011. Rajon, Lacau and I went up and stayed the weekend on the Sunshine Coast and met our new family member, Dakotah Ella-May Connelly — our beautiful little redhead.
In mid-February, shortly after I became an Australian citizen, Andrea arrived from Christchurch for a holiday. On 22 February she was in the lounge on her laptop and I was vacuuming when we heard the news of the massive Christchurch
earthquake. We raced down the road to my friend Jane’s, as she had pay TV and continuous news on the quake.
The day was a haze, as we tried to contact family and friends and waited for replies. Andrea lives in North Beach, the side of Christchurch which was badly hit by the quake. Her husband Paul took in another family whose home was uninhabitable, and was also busy feeding neighbours and helping them get water and other necessities.
During the days following the quake we were glued to the TV news reports. A press conference held just 48 hours after the quake took my breath away, as Coroner Sue Johnson appeared. When she spoke it reminded me of the lady we met at the inquest office. The kind, compassionate, caring lady she is makes her the perfect coroner.
I think it’s women like Sue Johnson who our teenagers should be looking at as role models and striving to be like. If I could start all over again, education and career-wise, I would study law, work as a Crown solicitor, then work towards being a coroner. But unfortunately, being in my mid-40s and a single parent I haven’t the time, energy, or peace and quiet to study law!
That year Sue won the NEXT Woman of the Year award in the Health and Science category. I could see why she won this award, as she has the perfect mix of genuine empathy and professionalism. Sue is such a ‘real’ person, her heart and soul are in her job.
After the earthquakes I was talking to my stepson Sam, and he told me about his experiences. He explained he was looking out the floor-to-ceiling glass windows at his work when he saw a man walking along the other side of the road who he swore was Philip. He walked along the windows, staring at the man, then ran out the back to tell the lady he worked with. As he started to say, ‘Oh my God, you wouldn’t believe …’, the quake hit and all the glass broke in to where he had been standing a few minutes earlier. Sam felt Phil had been protecting him that day.
Karen and Ben’s home wasn’t structurally damaged, but the sewer age system was and their hot-water cylinder was broken. Ben attended Shirley Boys’ High School, which was severely damaged and closed, so Ben came over to the Gold Coast to live with us for a couple of months, returning to Christchurch just before Anzac Day in time for his 16th birthday. While on the Gold Coast he attended the local high school and spent time with his cousins and grandparents.
During this welcome distraction I called the inquest office, which had been relocated to the Hornby Police Station. The coroner’s assistant explained the coroner was very busy with the victims of the earthquake, and I said I totally understood — those victims were definitely a priority over our findings.
ON WEDNESDAY, 18 MAY 2011, two years and 15 days after Helen murdered Phil, I was driving from Hope Island to Runaway Bay to my next stores in the early afternoon when I had a gut feeling about the inquest results. I rang the coroner’s office and the assistant informed me that the findings had just been posted out that day, to my PO box address in Australia. I’m scared at times how accurate my instincts are!
I asked if he could email them, but he explained that they were still temporarily at Hornby Police Station and didn’t have their own scanner. He said I would be happy with the coroner’s findings: that Sue Johnson had ruled Phil’s death was not suicide.
I was relieved but I couldn’t wait for the week the mail would take to get to me, so I asked if someone could come and pick up a physical copy. He had no problem with that.
I rang Andrea, who was now back in Christchurch, and checked she had a scanner. I then asked if she could bribe her husband for me with the promise of a bottle of bourbon the next time I was over. The bribe worked, and Paul headed to Hornby on his way home from work to pick up the coroner’s findings. I called the family to let them know the good news as I completed my work for the day.
I rang Andrea as I arrived home and she let me know she had just sent the email. While I turned on my computer and opened my email, Andrea started reading the findings to me. On the last page it said:
67 I consider that on the facts, as established by the evidence before me, I am unable to reach the threshold required for a finding of suicide. As I can take this no further I leave this point open.
FINDING
68 I find that Philip James Nisbet died sometime between 3 and 4 May 2009 at his home in Christchurch, the cause of death likely being Phenergan toxicity due to ingestion of a large quantity of Phenergan tablets.
This is what we had been waiting for — not that we should have had to have an inquest. If the police had done their job, Helen would have been arrested and charged and the coroner would have made her findings without a formal inquest.
While I was still at work I had rung Giles Brown at The Press with the news and had promised to forward the email as soon as it came through, which I did. I spoke with Giles over the next two days and he said the story would appear on Monday morning’s paper. I had no idea what he was going to say.
He explained the story would go live online around 4 a.m. New Zealand time, which was 2 a.m. where I was. On the Sunday night I tried to stay up but I knew I wasn’t going to make it, so I checked online just before 1 a.m. on the off-chance it had gone live early and went to sleep.
I woke to the phone ringing just after 6 a.m. It was Chris Cooke, a producer from TVNZ’s Sunday programme. He had read Giles’s article and wanted to know more, as he was interested in telling my story, including highlighting the police’s failure to adequately investigate Phil’s death initially. As I talked to him, I Googled Giles’s story online. It had made the front page, and was titled ‘No proof of suicide – coroner’:
A man who died from a suspected suicide in Christchurch might not have taken his own life, a coroner has found.
Police say there is no evidence of foul play in the death of Philip James Nisbet, 47.
Nisbet was found dead in bed at his Halswell home on May 4, 2009.
However, his family believe the findings show police ‘messed up’ their investigation of the death.
Coroner Sue Johnson, who held an inquest in November, found there was insufficient evidence Nisbet killed himself.
‘I have no evidence of any weight that Mr Nisbet intended to commit suicide,’ she said.
There was ‘no objective proof’ he wrote suicide notes sent by text and typed on a computer.
Nisbet had sent a text message to his son arranging to meet him on the day he was found dead and had recently told a neighbour he was feeling happy because his stepson was moving out of his house and they ‘did not get on’.
The last person to see him alive was his widow, Helen Nisbet, who joined him in bed about 10.30pm, when he was ‘asleep or drowsy at least’, the coroner said.
She called the police shortly before 6am the next day.
Helen Nisbet showed the police a text sent from her husband’s phone at 10.30pm saying: ‘I’m sorry honey, i can’t keep going like this (sic). i love u so nuch (sic). Please take care.’
On July 6, 2009, Helen Nisbet showed police a typewritten suicide note she found on a piece of paper in a briefcase. Her husband’s name was typed at the bottom.
Mobile phone records showed she sent a friend a text message about the note six weeks before telling police.
At the inquest, Helen Nisbet said she left a message with police about the note when she found it, although there was no record of this.
Phil Nisbet’s family told the inquest she showed them a copy of the note that was signed in handwriting, not typed.
Helen Nisbet also said in an interview with police that the note was signed with handwriting, but said she made a mistake when shown the typewritten page.
Police never analysed the computer at the house to see when the note was typed.
The ‘suicide’ text was sent to a Vodafone cellphone that Helen Nisbet owned, but did not initially tell police about.
By the time she did, information about calls or texts made from the number were no longer being kept.
‘Other than the fact the text message was sent from Mr Nisbet’s cellphone, there
is no evidence to indicate he sent it,’ the coroner said.
‘I find Mrs Nisbet herself to be an unreliable witness. There are a lot of inconsistencies in her evidence.
‘It is possible these are explained by the stress she had been under.’
Although Phil Nisbet had a history of depressive episodes, they did not last long and there was no evidence of any in the two years before he died.
The threshold of evidence for suicide was not met, and ‘I leave this point open’, the coroner said.
Phil Nisbet’s adopted sister, Lee-Anne Cartier, 41, who lives in Australia, said she was not happy with the police investigation.
‘I think they messed up and it’s too late to find any other evidence now,’ she said.
Detective Sergeant Scott Anderson, of Christchurch South, did the initial investigation. He told The Press he had no plan to reopen it.
Helen Nisbet told The Press she was satisfied with the police investigation.
Of course Helen was satisfied with the police’s attempt at an investigation, I said to the producer. As at this point she had got away with murder!
THE FOLLOWING MORNING, AFTER THE girls had left for school, I was finishing getting ready for work. I had turned my hair straighteners on and went to shut down the computer. As I went to close my Hotmail I saw a new email. The subject line was ‘Philip Nisbet’ and the sender’s name was ‘Murton, Gregory (Greg)’. My first thought was that it must be something to do with the Sunday programme, but I opened it, and read:
Hi Lee,
I am writing to you as the O/C [Officer in Charge] of the Christchurch South CIB, in relation to the death of your brother.
I read in the newspaper earlier this week the concerns of your family in relation to the death, and I can assure you that having read that newspaper report, on the facts as they were reported, I share them.
As a result I have obtained the file and am presently reviewing it.
There are a large number of issues that I want to satisfy myself of, and enquiries that I want to be assured were completed.
Black Widow, The: How One Woman Got Justice for Her Murdered Brother Page 10