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#372 Wrongful Conviction: False Confessions - Teina Pora · Wrongful Conviction

0:04
Speaker 1: Hey there, it's Laura and I writer. I am here
0:06
Speaker 1: with an update on a case we shared with you
0:08
Speaker 1: back in Season one of False Confessions. It's the story
0:12
Speaker 1: of Tana Porra, which is perhaps the most famous wrongful
0:15
Speaker 1: conviction in New Zealand. Shortly after our episode aired, New
0:19
Speaker 1: Zealand officially opened the Criminal Cases Review Commission or CCRC
0:24
Speaker 1: to investigate other possible wrongful convictions. Like Conviction Integrity Units
0:29
Speaker 1: here in the US, the CCRC will reinvestigate cases and
0:33
Speaker 1: present its findings to the court, which will then weigh
0:36
Speaker 1: the evidence and grant relief if they see fit. Since
0:40
Speaker 1: the CCRC began operation in New Zealand in twenty twenty,
0:44
Speaker 1: the work of its investigators has led to one exoneration
0:47
Speaker 1: already and three more seem likely in the near future.
0:51
Speaker 1: This is a hugely positive step in New Zealand, where
0:54
Speaker 1: justice can move really slowly and exonerations like these have
0:57
Speaker 1: been exceedingly rare. But with the CEA CRC, true justice
1:01
Speaker 1: seems a lot closer at hand. Welcome to wrongful conviction,
1:11
Speaker 1: False Confessions. I'm Laura and I Writer.
1:13
Speaker 2: And I'm Steve Drissen.
1:15
Speaker 1: So far we've told you false confession stories that span
1:18
Speaker 1: the United States, from urban Chicago to rural Nebraska. Today,
1:23
Speaker 1: we'll take you across the globe to New Zealand with
1:26
Speaker 1: a story that still hits way too close to home.
1:29
Speaker 1: A sixteen year old boy who confessed to a rape
1:32
Speaker 1: and murder he didn't commit. His wrongful conviction allowed the
1:35
Speaker 1: real offender, a prolific serial rapist, to assault dozens of
1:40
Speaker 1: other women, while a teenager languished behind bars after making
1:57
Speaker 1: a murder. Came out season two, Steve and I have
1:59
Speaker 1: had an opportunity to travel around the globe talking to
2:02
Speaker 1: audiences about the problem of false confessions and the need
2:04
Speaker 1: for criminal justice reform. We've spoken everywhere from the United
2:08
Speaker 1: States to the United Kingdom, to Ireland to Australia. You
2:12
Speaker 1: remember this guy, Steve, who traveled around Australia with us.
2:15
Speaker 2: Oh God, this guy, this guy was beautiful.
2:18
Speaker 1: What was his name, Jimond?
2:19
Speaker 2: His name was Simon. Simon. Simon was like a roadie
2:23
Speaker 2: from the nineteen seventies, always wearing black T shirts and
2:29
Speaker 2: deep into the heavy metal scene.
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Speaker 1: Somehow, poor Simon gets assigned to the lawyers who are
2:34
Speaker 1: traveling around talking about false confessions. One of my personal
2:37
Speaker 1: points of pride though, is that by the end of
2:38
Speaker 1: this trip around Australia, he seemed to like what we
2:41
Speaker 1: were trying to do, so we had a great time
2:43
Speaker 1: with him. But Simon kept asking us, as did everybody
2:46
Speaker 1: else we met around Australia. Have you heard about Tana Pora?
2:49
Speaker 1: Have you heard about New Zealand's Brendon Dassy? And that's
2:53
Speaker 1: exactly who Tana is.
2:55
Speaker 2: Police officers around the world are often trained in very
2:59
Speaker 2: similar ways about how to interrogate suspects, and so I
3:03
Speaker 2: expected and was beginning to discover false confessions in places
3:08
Speaker 2: like Japan and Korea and other Commonwealth countries like Australia
3:14
Speaker 2: and New Zealand and Canada.
3:16
Speaker 1: These are stories that hit home around the globe, whether
3:21
Speaker 1: it's for you know, social justice driven lawyers or heavy
3:24
Speaker 1: metal roadies. You know Tanapora, Brendan Dassy. We all know
3:28
Speaker 1: someone vulnerable like them, and we can all see the
3:32
Speaker 1: need to do justice in cases like these. Tanapora's story
3:39
Speaker 1: starts about eight thousand miles away from where Steve and
3:41
Speaker 1: I are sitting right now in the United States. It
3:44
Speaker 1: starts in South Auckland. That's an urban area on the
3:47
Speaker 1: southern edge of New Zealand's largest city, Auckland. It's home
3:51
Speaker 1: to a large minority population, including Maureed's, the indigenous Polynesian
3:56
Speaker 1: population of New Zealand. Parts of South Auckland can have
3:59
Speaker 1: no negative connotations. Too often it's associated with poverty and crime.
4:05
Speaker 1: When our story starts in nineteen ninety two, South Auckland
4:08
Speaker 1: was home to a thirty nine year old woman named
4:11
Speaker 1: Susan Burdette. Susan lived alone in a tidy house on
4:15
Speaker 1: Paw Road. She worked days as an account's clerk at
4:18
Speaker 1: a chemical manufacturing company, and on the evening of March
4:21
Speaker 1: twenty third, nineteen ninety two, Susan leaves her weekly bowling
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Speaker 1: league meet up and drives home under a night of
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Speaker 1: beautiful stars. Susan's a hard worker, so when she doesn't
4:33
Speaker 1: show up at work the next few days, her colleagues
4:36
Speaker 1: get concerned. They call her friend Steve eventually to find
4:39
Speaker 1: out if he knows where she is. Steve gets worried
4:42
Speaker 1: and he ends up going over to Susan's house that Wednesday,
4:45
Speaker 1: March twenty fifth, at about twelve forty pm. He finds
4:49
Speaker 1: the front door unlocked, goes inside and is greeted with
4:52
Speaker 1: a horrible sight. Susan is lying horizontally on her waterbed
4:57
Speaker 1: and she's clearly dead. The upper half of her body
5:01
Speaker 1: is wrapped in a duvet and there's a wooden baseball
5:04
Speaker 1: bat lying on the bed next to her. Her legs
5:07
Speaker 1: are dangling off the side of the bed and they're crossed.
5:11
Speaker 1: Someone whoever did this had positioned her that way. The
5:15
Speaker 1: police arrived, they remove the duvet and they find that
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Speaker 1: Susan had been beaten badly about the head, very likely
5:21
Speaker 1: with the baseball bat. She'd also been sexually assaulted, and
5:24
Speaker 1: there's plenty of DNA left behind seamen, as well as
5:27
Speaker 1: a bloody smudge mark on a light switch. Susan's hands
5:31
Speaker 1: were covered with defensive wounds, which indicates that she'd fought
5:34
Speaker 1: back against her attacker, and her friends later identified the
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Speaker 1: baseball bat as belonging to Susan. She had kept it
5:41
Speaker 1: next to her bed for her own protection. The police
5:45
Speaker 1: begin by investigating Susan's other friends, but DNA and alibis
5:49
Speaker 1: clear them all and the investigation quickly stalls. The pressure
5:53
Speaker 1: is building building, that is until about a week after
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Speaker 1: the murder. That's when police get a call from a
5:59
Speaker 1: woman named Garry McLaughlin, and she tells them a story
6:02
Speaker 1: about her then sixteen year old nephew, a shaggy haired,
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Speaker 1: baby faced mawory kid named Tana Pora.
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Speaker 2: Well, let's talk about Tana for a bit. Tana had
6:13
Speaker 2: it rough growing up. His mother died when he was
6:15
Speaker 2: a young boy, and his father left shortly afterwards. He
6:19
Speaker 2: then got passed around from family member to family member
6:23
Speaker 2: and ultimately ended up in his aunt Terry's house.
6:26
Speaker 1: A few days after Susan Burdett's murder made headlines, Tana
6:30
Speaker 1: and some friends found a baseball bat in the local
6:33
Speaker 1: park and they were joking about it being the murder weapon.
6:36
Speaker 1: Back at Aunt Terry's house, Tana kept talking about the bat.
6:40
Speaker 1: Tana had a history of run ins with the law,
6:42
Speaker 1: nothing really serious, but enough for Terry to want him
6:45
Speaker 1: out of her house. She called the police over and over,
6:49
Speaker 1: insisting that Tana knew something about Susan Burdett's murder. But
6:55
Speaker 1: police quickly come to the conclusion that Tana and his
6:57
Speaker 1: buddies were just over excited teens who are talking shit.
7:02
Speaker 1: They interview Tana, they take his DNA, They even execute
7:05
Speaker 1: a search warrant, but Tana and his friends are ruled
7:08
Speaker 1: out conclusively as Susan Burdett's killers. The DNA doesn't match,
7:13
Speaker 1: the search warrant turns up nothing, and while tana does
7:17
Speaker 1: have a record, there is nothing in his background that
7:19
Speaker 1: would suggests this level of violence or depravity.
7:22
Speaker 2: Now, let's fast forward almost exactly twelve months to March eighteenth,
7:27
Speaker 2: nineteen ninety three. We're almost a year out now from
7:30
Speaker 2: the discovery of Susan Burdett's body. In the course of
7:34
Speaker 2: police investigations. That's a lifetime and this is the only
7:38
Speaker 2: unsolved homicide from nineteen ninety two.
7:42
Speaker 1: Tana Pora is seventeen years old. Now he still has
7:45
Speaker 1: that babyface, but his police record has grown. During a
7:49
Speaker 1: routine interview with Tana about a car theft, police get
7:52
Speaker 1: an anonymous phone tip about Susan Burdett's murder. This caller
7:57
Speaker 1: links the murder to a local gang called the mongrel
8:00
Speaker 1: Agang Tana is rumored to have connections with, so the
8:04
Speaker 1: police decide to keep him at the station for questioning.
8:07
Speaker 1: His interrogation begins at nine am and continues for the
8:11
Speaker 1: next four days.
8:13
Speaker 2: The police have Tana Pora in the interrogation room and
8:17
Speaker 2: he's telling multiple different stories. The stories don't make any sense.
8:23
Speaker 2: It's not an interrogation with banging of the table or
8:26
Speaker 2: raised voices or threats or even promises.
8:31
Speaker 3: To unite a comment that you're gonna tell us more?
8:35
Speaker 3: Is that correct? Okay?
8:38
Speaker 2: Well, tell us this is a seventeen year old kid
8:41
Speaker 2: who is highly suggestible and eager to please the authorities.
8:46
Speaker 2: They're applying him with cigarettes and fast food and drinks.
8:51
Speaker 3: You head spring raw bodog chips and drink. Is that correct?
8:56
Speaker 1: The detectives even mentioned twenty thousand dollars as a reward
8:59
Speaker 1: for information about Susan Burdette's rape and murder. Tana's story
9:03
Speaker 1: keeps evolving, and the camera keeps getting turned on and off.
9:08
Speaker 3: You said you were going to tell us everything.
9:10
Speaker 1: First, Tana tells the police that he drove two other
9:13
Speaker 1: men to Susan's house and waited outside while they went
9:16
Speaker 1: into attacker.
9:17
Speaker 3: Are you telling us about a person called dog raping
9:21
Speaker 3: this woman? Did you hear any more or see any more?
9:25
Speaker 3: It's outside in the caravan.
9:27
Speaker 1: Eventually he changes that story.
9:29
Speaker 3: I thought what you've said so fair that you've climbed
9:32
Speaker 3: it in the bedroom window and you've gone through to
9:35
Speaker 3: open the door up for the other two.
9:37
Speaker 1: All right, now he's climbing in through one of Susan
9:40
Speaker 1: Burdette's windows and letting the other two in through the
9:43
Speaker 1: front door.
9:44
Speaker 3: And you were inlier. You could see quite clearly what
9:46
Speaker 3: was happening, Is that right? Okay?
9:50
Speaker 2: I was just watching and you.
9:51
Speaker 3: Were just watching.
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Speaker 1: And in the end, after four days, Tana confesses to
9:56
Speaker 1: being in the room, to actually holding Susan down while
10:00
Speaker 1: his two associates raped her.
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Speaker 3: And you were in the room some of this time
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Speaker 3: while this was happening. Is that right? You are holding
10:07
Speaker 3: Susan dan?
10:09
Speaker 2: And that last story, the one that ultimately seals Tana's fate.
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Speaker 2: It comes after a break in the tea room, where
10:17
Speaker 2: of course, the cameras are turned off at.
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Speaker 1: The suggestion of the police. Tana identifies this too supposed
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Speaker 1: accomplices as senior members of the Mongrel Mob, that local gang.
10:28
Speaker 1: The police bring in those two individuals that Tana had named,
10:31
Speaker 1: but their DNA doesn't match the DNA found on Susan's body.
10:35
Speaker 1: They're cleared and they're released. Things don't go as smoothly
10:39
Speaker 1: for Tana. He's arrested based on his confession. He's charged
10:43
Speaker 1: with Susan Burdett's rape and murder, and fourteen long months later,
10:48
Speaker 1: prosecutors try Tana Porra for participating in the murder of
10:52
Speaker 1: Susan Burdett along with two unknown accomplices.
10:55
Speaker 2: And let's stop right here for a minute. This is
10:58
Speaker 2: round one of the battle of these two titans of evidence,
11:03
Speaker 2: confessions versus DNA. DNA seemed to clear Tanapora of any
11:09
Speaker 2: role in this crime, but it's the confessions that ultimately
11:14
Speaker 2: lead to his conviction.
11:17
Speaker 1: On June sixteenth, nineteen ninety four, a jury took less
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Speaker 1: than ninety minutes to convictaan Apora of rape and murder.
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Speaker 1: He received a life sentence and was shipped off to prison.
11:37
Speaker 1: At the same time, the New Zealand Police are beginning
11:39
Speaker 1: a focused investigation into six rapes that had occurred between
11:44
Speaker 1: nineteen eighty eight and nineteen ninety two in the Auckland area,
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Speaker 1: including Susan Burdette's rape. Now, these attacks were all similar
11:52
Speaker 1: enough that some police officers began to worry that they
11:55
Speaker 1: had a serial rapist on their hands. All of them
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Speaker 1: involved a lone wolf attacker who broke into women's homes,
12:02
Speaker 1: wrapped their heads in blankets or duveys and repositioned them
12:06
Speaker 1: so that they lay sideways across the edge of the
12:09
Speaker 1: bed during the attack. And by April nineteen ninety six,
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Speaker 1: a few years after Tana's conviction, the investigation into these
12:17
Speaker 1: rapes linked them all, including Susan Burdett's attack, to the
12:22
Speaker 1: DNA of the same person, a man named Malcolm Raywa.
12:28
Speaker 2: Now, who is Malcolm Rewa? First of all, he's twenty
12:31
Speaker 2: years older than Tana Porra. And while I usually try
12:35
Speaker 2: to avoid characterizing my fellow humans like this, Raywa is
12:40
Speaker 2: a monster. He's a terrifying figure, a prolific serial rapist.
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Speaker 1: He's the kind of predator that women worry about. He's
12:50
Speaker 1: the worst nightmare.
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Speaker 2: Raywak committed his first rape in the nineteen seventies. His
12:55
Speaker 2: wife was in labor giving birth to their child at
12:57
Speaker 2: the time, so Raywa took the oppertains unity to sexually
13:01
Speaker 2: assault a nurse in a hospital bed.
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Speaker 1: Unbelievable four and a.
13:06
Speaker 2: Half years in prison he spent for that awful crime.
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Speaker 1: So Raywah gets out of prison and apparently rapes again
13:12
Speaker 1: from then on. Over the dozens of rapes that he
13:15
Speaker 1: went on to commit, Raywa started developing a pattern an
13:19
Speaker 1: m O. He'd carefully select his victims, who tended to
13:23
Speaker 1: be single women, professionals who were home alone. He'd stake
13:26
Speaker 1: out their homes in advance and plan his attacks meticulously,
13:30
Speaker 1: and then always the same thing, a surprise attack after
13:34
Speaker 1: the woman had fallen asleep, a physical attack first to
13:37
Speaker 1: subdue her, then the blanket or duvet around her head,
13:40
Speaker 1: and a rape at the side of the bed.
13:42
Speaker 2: And raa would hide in their homes. He would wait
13:46
Speaker 2: for them to get into bed and begin to fall asleep,
13:50
Speaker 2: and then he would attack.
13:52
Speaker 1: Raywa apparently suffered from a rectile dysfunction, which is why
13:55
Speaker 1: he positioned his victims in a way that allowed him
13:58
Speaker 1: to maintain sexual coind during his attacks. That's also why
14:02
Speaker 1: he acted alone. He didn't exactly want an audience. Ray
14:06
Speaker 1: was arrested on May thirteenth, nineteen ninety six. It's a
14:10
Speaker 1: pretty dramatic sting operation. Actually, the police had been planning
14:13
Speaker 1: this for quite some time. When he tries to run,
14:17
Speaker 1: police dogs wrestle this guy to the ground. Now, the
14:20
Speaker 1: police remember that Tanapora had already confessed to one of
14:23
Speaker 1: the rapes, to which Reywa is tied by DNA, so
14:27
Speaker 1: they immediately ask him if he knows Tana Pora. Reywa
14:31
Speaker 1: is crystal clear never met him. Based on the arrest
14:36
Speaker 1: of Malcolm Rawa, the Court of Appeals throws out Tana's
14:40
Speaker 1: conviction in nineteen ninety.
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Speaker 2: Nine, never met him. Now, at this point in time,
14:45
Speaker 2: where you have a prolific serial rapist operating in the
14:48
Speaker 2: same neighborhood as the Burdette murder and his DNA is
14:53
Speaker 2: at the crime scene and he's telling you I don't
14:56
Speaker 2: know Tanapura, most prosecutors and police officers would throw their
15:01
Speaker 2: hands up and say we can't go forward with a
15:04
Speaker 2: reprosecution of Tana Pora. We have to free him.
15:08
Speaker 1: But instead Tana is retried, and if you've listened to
15:11
Speaker 1: this podcast, you know what's coming. Prosecutors change their theory
15:16
Speaker 1: of the case and argue at Tana's second trial that
15:19
Speaker 1: he and Rewa raped and killed Susan Burdett together, even
15:24
Speaker 1: though Rewa had denied knowing Tana, even though Rewa always
15:28
Speaker 1: acted alone, and even though Rewa would never have wanted
15:32
Speaker 1: some teenager there to witness his sexual dysfunction.
15:36
Speaker 2: So now we have round two of a battle between
15:40
Speaker 2: confession evidence and DNA evidence, except this time we know
15:45
Speaker 2: whose DNA it is. It's the DNA of a serial
15:49
Speaker 2: rapist named Malcolm Rewa. Will Tana's confession bring him down?
15:53
Speaker 2: Or will the jury side with the science and recognize
15:58
Speaker 2: that Tanapora and Malcolm had never met.
16:06
Speaker 1: Sure Enough, despite all hopes that the DNA evidence would
16:09
Speaker 1: be enough to clear Tana, Tana was convicted a second
16:13
Speaker 1: time of raping and murdering Susan Burdette and sent back
16:17
Speaker 1: to his life sentence. Meanwhile, Malcolm Raywa himself stood trial
16:21
Speaker 1: for three months in nineteen ninety eight on what amounted
16:24
Speaker 1: to forty five counts of rape, involving twenty seven different women.
16:30
Speaker 1: His trial ended with convictions for sexually assaulting twenty five
16:33
Speaker 1: of them, including Susan Burdett. Just like Tana, he was
16:38
Speaker 1: shipped off to prison for decades. Now, this is justice
16:42
Speaker 1: for Rewa, but for Tana Porra it's anything but. And
16:46
Speaker 1: for years Tana served as time with little hope of freedom,
16:50
Speaker 1: and things might have stayed bleak for him had it
16:52
Speaker 1: not been for a man named Tim mckinnal.
16:55
Speaker 2: Now, who is Tim.
16:56
Speaker 4: Mckinnall At the moment, Tom is self employed, private and vistagata.
17:00
Speaker 4: But when I finished university. I joined the police as
17:03
Speaker 4: a twenty two year old.
17:05
Speaker 2: Tim McKinnell started out his career as a cup, a
17:08
Speaker 2: good cup, one of the best cups. Tim had become
17:11
Speaker 2: a member of the South Auckland Police Force in the
17:14
Speaker 2: late nineteen nineties, eventually rising to junior detective by the
17:18
Speaker 2: year two thousand. That year, the force had been divided
17:22
Speaker 2: over the case of Tanapura.
17:24
Speaker 4: A lot of chat went on in the police bar
17:27
Speaker 4: at the time, and there was a real disconnect between
17:31
Speaker 4: two different groups of people. People that thought Tana Porter
17:34
Speaker 4: was a guilty man and had been involved in the
17:36
Speaker 4: rape and murder of Susan Bidett, and there was another
17:38
Speaker 4: camp of experienced police officers who thought that he was
17:43
Speaker 4: an innocent man.
17:44
Speaker 2: In fact, Tim remembers seeing all manner of drunken arguments
17:48
Speaker 2: at police bars and he was struck by the passion
17:52
Speaker 2: of those who believed in Tana Pura.
17:55
Speaker 1: Tim never forgot those arguments or his own growing doubt
17:58
Speaker 1: about Tana's guilt, even after he eventually left the police force,
18:02
Speaker 1: and as many retired officers do, he became a private investigator.
18:06
Speaker 1: Now in two thousand and seven, Tim attended a local
18:09
Speaker 1: conference on wrongful convictions and false confessions, and that conference
18:14
Speaker 1: brought up those old, lingering questions that Tim had about
18:16
Speaker 1: Tana's case. The last straw came when Tim was diagnosed
18:21
Speaker 1: in his thirties with a rare blood disorder, not exactly
18:24
Speaker 1: a death sentence, but the kind of health scare that
18:27
Speaker 1: led him to reevaluate his priorities and seek out more
18:31
Speaker 1: meaningful work like freeing the innocent. Eventually, Tim decided to
18:35
Speaker 1: take the plunge. In two thousand and nine, he visited
18:39
Speaker 1: Tana Pora, who was then thirty four years old in prison.
18:43
Speaker 1: Tana was no longer that teenage car thief Tim had
18:46
Speaker 1: read about. He was polite, well mannered, surprisingly gentle, even warm.
18:52
Speaker 1: Tim begins to feel an urge to help this guy.
18:56
Speaker 2: But there's the matter of Tana's confession. Tim starts by
19:00
Speaker 2: digging up videotapes of Tina's interrogation, and they're not easy
19:04
Speaker 2: to find. They're on old VHS tapes in boxes in
19:08
Speaker 2: police departments. But he gets them and he sits down
19:12
Speaker 2: to watch them, and he is blown away by what
19:16
Speaker 2: he saw.
19:16
Speaker 4: When you examine what he was able to say on
19:20
Speaker 4: day one. In the first few interviews on tape, and
19:23
Speaker 4: you compare that to what he was able to say
19:26
Speaker 4: four days later, there are marked differences. There were some
19:30
Speaker 4: very particular things that happened in Susan's house that the
19:33
Speaker 4: offender would know, and it's clear from the interviews that
19:36
Speaker 4: Tana Porter had no idea about any of them.
19:39
Speaker 1: Despite four days worth of trying, Tina just was not
19:42
Speaker 1: able to tell a story that matched what actually happened.
19:46
Speaker 1: When police asked him to describe Susan Burdette, he says
19:49
Speaker 1: she was chubby, even though she was actually quite athletic.
19:53
Speaker 1: Tina is asked to draw a picture of how he
19:55
Speaker 1: left Susan's body. Remember she'd been found horizontally with her
19:59
Speaker 1: legs dangling over the side of the bed, but he
20:01
Speaker 1: draws her lying vertically on the bad.
20:04
Speaker 4: When he was.
20:05
Speaker 1: Asked whether there was anything special about Susan's bad, Tina
20:08
Speaker 1: can't come up with the fact that it was.
20:10
Speaker 4: A water bad, and so one of the questions that
20:12
Speaker 4: arises about that is how did he come to know
20:14
Speaker 4: things on day four that he didn't know on day one.
20:19
Speaker 1: The interrogators take Tina on a field trip to Susan
20:22
Speaker 1: Burdett's street so that he can point out details of
20:25
Speaker 1: the crime to them in person, and they videotaped the
20:28
Speaker 1: whole thing.
20:29
Speaker 4: He started giving them directions that were taking them away
20:32
Speaker 4: from her house, so though helpfully tried to direct him
20:36
Speaker 4: back towards her house, it was pretty clear on tape
20:39
Speaker 4: that he still had no idea where he was going
20:42
Speaker 4: and wasn't able to identify anything familiar. In the end,
20:47
Speaker 4: they took him to the outside of the house where
20:50
Speaker 4: Susan had been raped murdered and asked him if he
20:54
Speaker 4: recognized anything, and again he didn't, so the police officer
20:57
Speaker 4: and it's really chilling, really chilling to watch it. He said, Look,
21:02
Speaker 4: it's clear you don't recognize what it is you're looking for.
21:05
Speaker 4: So do you think it would help if I showed
21:06
Speaker 4: you house? And that's an extraordinary thing for a police
21:10
Speaker 4: officer to do.
21:19
Speaker 2: For Tim, that's it. This was a false confession. He
21:22
Speaker 2: was motivated, fired up, and he would not rest until
21:26
Speaker 2: Tina Poora was cleared. But he needs to present more
21:31
Speaker 2: evidence to the lawyers and other people he wants to
21:34
Speaker 2: get involved in this case.
21:36
Speaker 4: So Tana's case isn't one that was only scarred by
21:39
Speaker 4: false confession. There were the other issues that were beginning
21:41
Speaker 4: to arise with the involvement of Tana's family.
21:45
Speaker 2: Tina's cousin became a key witness for the prosecution against Tina.
21:50
Speaker 2: She claimed that she had seen Tina with Rewa on
21:55
Speaker 2: multiple occasions, including once at Tina's girlfriend's home.
22:00
Speaker 1: Tim was able to discredit Martha's testimony.
22:03
Speaker 4: There was evidence of paid witnesses, including his cousin and
22:07
Speaker 4: his auntie. Those family members gave evidence against him, and
22:11
Speaker 4: we know that at least one of them was paid
22:13
Speaker 4: five thousand dollars for her trouble.
22:15
Speaker 1: Tim tracks down Fiona, Tina's girlfriend, and Fiona says that
22:19
Speaker 1: she has no idea who Malcolm Rawell was and that
22:22
Speaker 1: he was never in her home. From his time on
22:25
Speaker 1: the police force, Tim was well acquainted with the various
22:28
Speaker 1: gangs operating around South Auckland, so for him, one piece
22:32
Speaker 1: of the prosecution's argument was clearly ridiculous.
22:35
Speaker 4: Malcolm Rawa was a senior member of the Highway sixty
22:39
Speaker 4: one motorcycle Club, Mortal Enemies of the Mongrel Mob and
22:44
Speaker 4: Sotana Porter as somebody who was supposedly involved with the
22:48
Speaker 4: Mungrel Mob. Going to Susan Burdette's house late one night
22:54
Speaker 4: with a senior member of the Highway sixty one's to
22:56
Speaker 4: commit a brutal rape and murder. Anybody that knows anything
23:00
Speaker 4: about gang culture in New Zealand will tell you that
23:02
Speaker 4: that's just nonsense.
23:06
Speaker 1: Tim doesn't stop there. He also starts assembling an all
23:09
Speaker 1: star team of experts, starting with an Icelandic professor and
23:13
Speaker 1: former detective himself, Geisley good Johnson, who was a professor
23:18
Speaker 1: by that time in London. Now. Geasley essentially created the
23:22
Speaker 1: field of false confession science. He's the father of everything
23:25
Speaker 1: we're talking about during this podcast, and after Tim sends
23:28
Speaker 1: him Tanea's interrogation videos, Geezley agrees to write a report
23:33
Speaker 1: deconstructing Tana's statements and deeming them unreliable.
23:37
Speaker 2: Next, Tim enlists the help of respected local New Zealand
23:41
Speaker 2: journalist named Phil Taylor. Phil had questioned the States case
23:45
Speaker 2: against Tana for years and is happy to help, and
23:48
Speaker 2: Phil delivers. In twenty twelve, as the case for Tana's
23:52
Speaker 2: innocence is building, Phil releases a bombshell article titled Innocent
23:59
Speaker 2: Man in Jail for twenty Years, and in it Chuck Henwood,
24:03
Speaker 2: the detective who had developed the original criminal profile of
24:07
Speaker 2: Malcolm Rewa says the cops got it horribly wrong in
24:10
Speaker 2: Susan Burdett's case. Tana had nothing to do with this.
24:14
Speaker 2: Now this is a huge deal because Chuck Henwood is
24:18
Speaker 2: the most famous criminal profiler in New Zealand, a bit
24:22
Speaker 2: like John Douglas of the mind Hunter fame.
24:25
Speaker 4: For somebody like Chuck Henwood come out and express a
24:28
Speaker 4: firmly hell conviction that Tana Porter was innocent was hugely
24:32
Speaker 4: important in terms of public perception and momentum for our
24:36
Speaker 4: appeal work on Tana's case.
24:38
Speaker 2: And in the middle of this, there's this remarkable moment
24:42
Speaker 2: when Susan Burdett's brother Jim comes forward and says, I
24:47
Speaker 2: too believe that Tana Pora is innocent, and he actually
24:52
Speaker 2: meets with Tana Pora. It's this incredible moment of reconciliation
24:57
Speaker 2: and grace.
24:58
Speaker 1: Momentum is building a across the board, but there's still
25:01
Speaker 1: one more piece. Can Tim provide a better understanding, a
25:05
Speaker 1: better explanation of why Tana confessed to a crime he
25:08
Speaker 1: didn't commit.
25:09
Speaker 4: We had a documentary maker called Michael Bennett making a
25:12
Speaker 4: documentary about Tana's case. Perhaps the most significant development in
25:17
Speaker 4: twenty years occurred because the person that had been watching
25:19
Speaker 4: it was a woman called doctor Valerie McGinn.
25:22
Speaker 1: Doctor McGinn provides Tim with the answer he needs. She
25:26
Speaker 1: writes report, saying, your clients, mister Tana Pora sounds very
25:30
Speaker 1: similar to many people with fetal alcohol spectrum disorder. She
25:35
Speaker 1: even attaches a journal article that details how individuals with
25:39
Speaker 1: FASD are at an increased risk of getting arrested. And
25:43
Speaker 1: more importantly, people.
25:44
Speaker 4: That have it can be impulsive, they suggestible, they eager
25:48
Speaker 4: to please figures of authority. And so when you look
25:51
Speaker 4: at those types of behaviors and then you consider the
25:54
Speaker 4: position Taner was in when he was in the police
25:57
Speaker 4: station in nineteen ninety three, it almost makes it inevitable
26:02
Speaker 4: that he was going to confess to something.
26:05
Speaker 1: Doctor mcginnon confirms categorically that Tena suffers from an FASD disorder,
26:10
Speaker 1: he was uniquely susceptible to falsely confessing in the interrogation room.
26:14
Speaker 4: One of the things that really bothered me about Tana's
26:16
Speaker 4: case is we could never understand why he did what
26:19
Speaker 4: he did, the things he said, and the people he implicated.
26:23
Speaker 4: It just none of it made sense to us, and
26:25
Speaker 4: we couldn't explain that to the courts, and so once
26:28
Speaker 4: we got this diagnosis of feder Welck whole spectrum disorder,
26:32
Speaker 4: it all became clear. It was the final piece of
26:34
Speaker 4: the puzzle and we finally understood what it was we
26:37
Speaker 4: were dealing with.
26:38
Speaker 1: And that does it. All the pieces are assembled for
26:41
Speaker 1: Tim and his team to appeal Tena's conviction and they
26:45
Speaker 1: bring the case in November of twenty fourteen to the
26:48
Speaker 1: Privy Council in London, the final Court of Appeal where
26:51
Speaker 1: Commonwealth countries like New Zealand can bring cases like Tena's.
26:56
Speaker 2: It's the court of last resort and it's staffed with
26:59
Speaker 2: senior judge some of the best and brightest minds in
27:03
Speaker 2: the entire Commonwealth.
27:05
Speaker 1: Now this is Tana's last shot, and his lawyers put
27:09
Speaker 1: his FASD disorder at the front of their case, arguing
27:13
Speaker 1: that judges in the nineteen ninety four and two thousand
27:16
Speaker 1: trials weren't aware of his disability and if they had been,
27:19
Speaker 1: they would have ruled differently.
27:20
Speaker 4: There was a big group of people that gathered at
27:22
Speaker 4: Michael Bennett, the documentary maker's house, waiting for that decision
27:26
Speaker 4: to be announced, and it was an extraordinary moment. We
27:28
Speaker 4: only got to tell Taneer about an hour before the
27:31
Speaker 4: whole world found out that he had his conviction quashed
27:34
Speaker 4: and he was no longer a rapist and murderer. It
27:37
Speaker 4: was incredibly emotional for him.
27:41
Speaker 1: On March third, twenty fifteen, in the case of poorra
27:45
Speaker 1: Versus the Queen, the Council of rules that Tina's confessions
27:49
Speaker 1: must be thrown out, and they quashed his conviction for
27:53
Speaker 1: the rape and murder of Susan Burdett. Two weeks later,
27:56
Speaker 1: the Crown prosecutors dropped their case and declined to reap Tina,
28:01
Speaker 1: and after more than twenty years, tana Pora was officially exonerated.
28:06
Speaker 4: You know what his first concern was for was for
28:09
Speaker 4: the police officers that had interviewed him. He didn't want
28:11
Speaker 4: their reputations to be tarnished because of what had happened.
28:15
Speaker 4: One of his first thoughts was for other people, and
28:18
Speaker 4: that was that was pretty cool.
28:20
Speaker 1: In so many of these wrongful conviction cases, you see
28:23
Speaker 1: people go through so much pain, and they have every
28:26
Speaker 1: right to be bitter, resentful, angry, all of those things,
28:31
Speaker 1: but so often you see them express, at least publicly,
28:33
Speaker 1: these incredible acts of grace. It's almost as though they've
28:36
Speaker 1: lived through so much pain they don't want to cause anymore.
28:40
Speaker 2: In twenty sixteen, Tana received a sum of money to
28:43
Speaker 2: compensate him for the time he had spent in prison
28:46
Speaker 2: for a crime he did not commit. He also received
28:49
Speaker 2: an apology from the New Zealand government.
28:51
Speaker 4: Tana grew up in prison. He was there for twenty
28:54
Speaker 4: two years and he struggles every day. We keep in contact,
28:59
Speaker 4: but life isn't great for him. The money makes some
29:02
Speaker 4: things easier, but it doesn't repair the psychological damage. It
29:06
Speaker 4: doesn't bring the years back, and it doesn't make his
29:11
Speaker 4: life easy now. It is incredibly difficult to watch him
29:16
Speaker 4: struggle through life after everything he's been through.
29:19
Speaker 1: Tana, we salute your sheer endurance, your will to keep
29:24
Speaker 1: on fighting and surviving and living through this ordeal from
29:27
Speaker 1: the other side of the planet. Know that we won't
29:29
Speaker 1: forget your name or what you've been through, and all
29:32
Speaker 1: of us together, we're fighting to make sure it doesn't
29:35
Speaker 1: happen again. Wrongful Conviction, False Confessions is the production of
29:48
Speaker 1: Lava for Good podcasts in association with Signal Company Number
29:52
Speaker 1: one Special thanks to our executive producer Jason Flamm and
29:56
Speaker 1: the team at Signal Company Number one executive producer Kevin
29:59
Speaker 1: warda Senior producer and Pope, and additional production and editing
30:03
Speaker 1: by Connor Hall. Our music was composed by Jay Ralph.
30:08
Speaker 1: You can follow me on Instagram or Twitter at Laura
30:11
Speaker 1: Nyrider and you.
30:12
Speaker 2: Can follow me on Twitter at s Drizzen.
30:15
Speaker 1: For more information on the show, visit wrongfulconvictionpodcast dot com
30:19
Speaker 1: and be sure to follow the show on Instagram at
30:22
Speaker 1: Wrongful Conviction, on Facebook at Wrongful Conviction Podcast, and on
30:26
Speaker 1: Twitter at wrong Conviction