RedHanded - Episode 207 - Searching the Sounds: The Disappearance of Ben Smart & Olivia Hope

Episode Date: August 5, 2021

Award winning champions of the people RedHanded bring you a boat themed mystery for the ages. In the early hours of New Years Day 1998 Ben Smart and Olivia Hope boarded a mystery yacht and vanished without a trace. Their bodies have never been found, yet one man has been imprisoned for the double murder. He has always maintained his innocence, but the question is can we believe Scott Watson? Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/redhanded  Follow us on social media: Instagram Twitter Visit our website: Website See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Wondery Plus subscribers can listen to Red Handed early and ad-free. Join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or on Apple Podcasts. They say Hollywood is where dreams are made. A seductive city where many flock to get rich, be adored, and capture America's heart. But when the spotlight turns off, fame, fortune, and lives can disappear in an instant. Follow Hollywood and Crime, The Cotton Club Murder on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Hannah.

I'm Saruti. And welcome to a very boat-themed Red Handed. I have learned so much about boats. There is a lot of boat chat. I don't know anything about boats. Well, you're about to learn. And I was talking to my Australian friend about it last night and he was like, Hannah, I know.

Like, we have boats in Australia. Like, I know. And I was like, and did you know that two masts are called differently? He was like, yes, yes. Yes, I did. Well, I'm sorry he was so disinterested in all your new boat-y fact knowledge because you won't have that same problem here today, Hannah, because I'm ready to learn.

Ready to learn. Okay, great. I'm ready to impart my boat knowledge. And we're talking about boats because we are going to be covering the most notorious disappearance on modern record in New Zealand. Lots of you have been asking for this. And I actually think we need to recruit a New Zealand correspondent

because things are unfolding as we speak. And I think we need a mole. Someone on the ground. So send in your applications to saruti.l. No, I'm joking. I'm kidding, I'm kidding. So we're actually going to kick off on a New Year's Eve. New Year's Eve, always a disappointment.

But the New Year's Eve party at Fernow Lodge on New Zealand's South Island in 1997 slash 1998, obviously the night starts in 1997, it finishes in 1998. That's generally how New Year's works. And this one would have deadly repercussions. This is a story of three people, two of whom knew each other, and the third person was a total stranger. But connected to each other or not, New Year's Eve 1997-1998 would change all three of their lives forever, and maybe it would even end them. And that maybe might sound confusing,

but it will become a lot more clear as we go on, because, friends, this week we have a mystery for you. This mystery-spawning New Year's Eve party started out innocently enough. 17-year-old Olivia Hope set off from her parents' home in Marlborough on 30 December 1997. She made her way to a place called Watamonga Bay, and I know I will have said that wrong,

but, um, we move. Olivia Hope was headed to a chartered yacht called the Tamarack and there were nine people aboard already waiting for her including her sister Amelia. With Olivia aboard the vessel the Tamarack headed to Picton seven miles away to pick up three more people and then headed to their final destination Ferno Lodge. Ferno Lodge took me quite a while to get my head around and actually the entire area that we're dealing with today could do with some explaining. So I'm going to hand over to Antipodean expert, Sruti Bhai.

Because yes, just in case you didn't already know, New Zealand is made up of two islands. The North Island has Auckland and the South Island has Christchurch. Both of those are cities that you've probably heard of. We are at the very top of the South Island today, in an area known as the Marlborough Sounds. What is a sounds, you ask? Well, it's a network of sea-drenched valleys and it's absolutely beautiful. I have for a very long time, because I've never been to New Zealand, but I have for a very long time just sat behind my laptop and Googled pictures of various sounds in New Zealand and sighed a wistful sigh.

It is bang on your vibe, actually actually i've also been looking at pictures i'd never heard the word sound used in that um oh thing before there's a couple of other sounds um that i've is there i mean it's because i didn't do geography gcse oh i didn't did you know we didn't do geography gcse you could only do it when you got to as and a level up until then all of us just did humanities your school is from the olden days no they just didn't they just couldn't they just couldn't it was a terrible school and they were like no geography we don't have enough teachers um and it's very hard to control all of you children so it's going to be called Humanities and it will be History, Geography and RE all smashed into one.

Wow. Do you know who got 100% in their religious studies GCSE? Well, I know it wasn't me, so it must have been you. It was me. And then I got 100% in Philosophy as well at A-level. Well, there you go. A-2. Killing it.

Yeah, suck my giant philosophical dick. Well, guess who got an a star in humanities gcse this bitch but also no school has enough teachers for geography teachers which is why they're all pe teachers yes that's yes yes i mean they honestly just had nothing and i've told you this before when i got to a level and i think about this particular moment in my life sorry guys very slight tangent into the teenage traumas of saruti bala coming up when i got into like asa levels that's year 12 year 13 i was like such a massive giant nerd i was like i want to do chemistry biology maths and art those are the four a levels that i want to do school

and school was like can't do chemistry here because you're literally the only person that wants to do a chemistry AS and A level and I was like so what's the solution here and they were like we're going to organize a bus every Monday and Wednesday and it's going to take you to the other high school and you're just going to do it there with a bunch of teenagers you don't know that sounds like a very appropriate moment to have just said no thanks then i pick literally any other subject i was like okay fine and every monday and wednesday i used to get on a little bus with a giant fucking chemistry textbook and go to the other high school and i used to sit

in their six form lounge like it wasn't the most weird intense thing in the world and then I'd go do chemistry with a bunch of teenagers I didn't know what the fuck man it sounds like a um it sounds like at the beginning of a Mallory Blackman book there are many other stories I could tell you from my life that I think would also sound like a Mallory Blackman book but let's not dwell people uh that's what happened and I'm all the stronger for it today you know so there you go look at you now look at me now with your incredibly important chemistry hate level with my chemistry podcast where it is every now and then called upon me to pronounce a chemical name that's been used to murder somebody yeah yeah miss bexley would be proud anyway let's get back to this cool so sounds the sounds of new zealand yes sorry yeah i really um i put you in there with my

tangent lasso and i you know i went with it so the sounds I would love to go see the various sounds of New Zealand they look absolutely stunning and yeah like we were saying they're kind of like a sea drenched valleys there are loads of coves there are little caves and little inlets and all this kind of thing it's just absolutely stunning absolutely beautiful and ferno lodge is in one of these cove slash bay situations obviously on the land part and not in the the sea drenched sea part no it's very much it's not like it's not bikini bottom no it's on the land everybody relax and uh it was on a particular inlet called Endeavour Inlet. And whenever I hear names like that, my colonialism bell starts a-ringing. Endeavour Inlet. Oh, Jesus.

And Ferno Lodge has legendary, apparently, New Year's Eve parties. And this particular year, so 1997-1998, Olivia and her sister Amelia, and a bunch of others, were headed there aboard the Tamarack. 2,000 people would make their way to the Furneaux Lodge for the celebrations that evening. That's a lot of people for one party. Yeah, I have seen that printed multiple places. And I wonder whether it's like 2,000 people in the inlet itself at multiple different parties. I just don't believe it can be 2,000 people at Verno Lodge. Like that just seems, I mean, maybe I'm wrong.

And I have seen it published multiple different like reputable sources that 2,000 people were there. But like, it seems a lot for one rod. It really does. Wow. Okay. Well, we'll go with that. There is either 2,000 people there or 2,000 people on that inlet. Pick your favorite. So Olivia Hope has been described as having quote unquote sensitive features.

Like what, what does that that what are insensitive features when they're at home like I feel like and I have um obviously googled Olivia to um have a look at what she looked like I think my best guess is what they mean is that she has very like soft feminine features she's very she's very like uh I know she's a New Zealander, but she's quite like English Rose looking, very like soft featured, small featured. Yes, yeah. That's the vibe.

And it's a weird way to put it, but yeah, that's what I assume. And she also had strawberry blonde hair. She sometimes wore thin rimmed glasses. And like every fantastic person out there, Olivia was also head girl at her school. And she was headed to study law. I found my head girl badge the other day at the bottom of a drawer.

I thought I'd been lost forever. I don't know what to do with it now. My favourite thing about you is that you have head girl on your LinkedIn. I find that so funny. Oh my God, that's so true. I hadn't thought about that in so long. But yeah, man, it was a moment my life peaked

was when they were like, this is a terrible school, but you get to be head girl. Here's a badge. Oh, man. So, yeah, Olivia was, you know, she's kind of like your typical overachieving kind of student. She's head girl. She was off to uni to study law. She was also a talented pianist, and she dedicated a lot of her spare time to the instrument. But, we thought, it seems like she was quite like a practical girl and she was off to study law rather than trying to pursue piano as a career. The impression I got from interviews with her parents was them being like, because her dad's a local politician, blah, blah, blah. I got the impression that it was very like, you're just going to be a frustrated piano teacher,ivia going to law like you know that's very much the

the vibe the vibe olivia had heaps of friends and one of them was ben smart he was older than her at 21 but they moved in the same circles and they'd known each other for a long time and in some of the reporting on this case there seems to be some sort of feeling that they were romantically involved but we don't know for sure and also it doesn't fucking matter like there's all this speculation like especially in the documentary yes they have these like reenacting actors playing Ben and Olivia and they're like snogging and I'm like that there is no that is nowhere like nobody ever said that and it's also because they do it so in the documentary like there's no commentary on it like it just happens so then as the the watcher you assume that they're together but

actually yeah no it's interesting because not having known this case before we decided to do a deep dive onto it I just assumed they were a couple from like the vague media clippings I'd ever had a look at you wonder why but then it is just that added salaciousness isn't it it's like a young couple and they're both quite attractive and young and like yeah I think they're just like oh look this tasty couple go missing and they were murdered but spoilers but you know what I mean that's definitely the vibe everywhere you read this is like friends like Ben Smart and Olivia Hope there was no boyfriend-girlfriend stipulation. But even if they were shagging, even if they did get off that night, who amongst us hasn't got off with a friend on New Year's Eve for the sake of it?

Literally everybody's done it at least once. And Ben, key musician also, and a bit of a looker in a 90s kind of way. And he was spending New Year's on the Endeavour Inlet too. At the beginning of the night, he was with his mates in somewhere called Punga Cove, which is a little while away. And during the night's festivities, he took a boat across the inlet to Ferno Lodge to catch up with Olivia. And I think if you go and find someone New Year's Eve after midnight, it's because you're going to fuck them.

Oh, yeah. And you haven't just, like like got an Uber across the city. No, no. You've got on a boat to cross an inlet to catch up with. And my Australian correspondent told me yesterday, water taxis are fucking expensive. Yeah, I fucking bet. Because in my mind, it was just like normal,

just like everyone was doing. He's like, no, no, they're super expensive. Like people don't just get them on like a whim. So. He's like, no, no, they're super expensive. Like people don't just get them on like a whim. So if I'm wrong about that, take it up with Eddie Crow. So Ben catches up with Olivia. They party and then they decided they'd had enough. Both Ben and Olivia caught the Ferno Lodge water taxi helmed by Guy Wallace.

Remember him because he becomes pivotal to this whole tale later on. So Guy Wallace drives the young pair to the Tamarack which was moored in the bay and they quickly found that there was no room for them to sleep. Others had beaten them to it. This seems to be one of the few times in life where if you snooze you win. I asked my Antipodean correspondent this yesterday I was like is it like a normal thing because in my head I was like oh maybe it's just a normal thing for like new year renting an airbnb with all of your friends maybe just chartering a yacht is a normal thing in in new zealand uh no apparently not apparently it's like it's a super rich person thing to do so it's not so if you had paid to sleep on this yacht and someone was in your sleeping space you would be extremely annoyed i see and uh olivia was rightfully annoyed she had after all paid to sleep on this tamarack and some freeloader had taken her spot ben on the other

hand had not paid as was pointed out by one of the surrounding snoozers. So Olivia picked up her stuff and decided that there was no point even trying. Her and Ben Smart were going to have to find somewhere else to sleep. So Ben and Olivia got back to the water taxi and asked Guy Wallace, the guy driving it, if there was anywhere they could sleep on the shore. Quick reminder that by this point it is about 4 or 5am on New Year's Day. Of course there was just going to be like actually nowhere that Guy Wallace could recommend. Even if he wanted to help them, he couldn't. Guy Wallace is probably the most Kiwi guy ever. Ever. Like he's so no nonsense. And he was just like, well, like I had somewhere I would have told them, but there literally was nowhere. Like,

what did you want me to do? But Ben and Olivia were not the only water taxi passengers that night slash that morning. A third passenger, a man who was later described by guy wallace to have shoulder length wavy hair was in the niad too and in case like me uh just moments before didn't know what a niad was apparently it's a little boat so there you go like a little water taxi and it also it's a greek mythology word it means fresh water fairy like an imp adorable so this guy who the third passenger who was in this taxi with the wavy shoulder length hair was the opposite of the young clean attractive ben and olivia because this guy was scruffy and he was drunk he told ben and olivia that they were more than welcome to come and sleep on his yacht

for the night. The identity of this man, for some, is a certainty. And for a great many others, it remains a total mystery to this day. But back in 1998, the very, very early hours of 1998, Guy Wallace was not particularly invested in where the lot of them spent the night. He was a barman at Fernow Lodge, so he'd probably had quite enough of drunk people for the evening. Wallace took Ben, Olivia and the yacht-owning man to his vessel, which Guy Wallace later described as a 12-metre, so just under 40 foot, blue and white ketch with round portholes.

Ketch? What's a ketch? Ketch? Well, I'm going to lay down my boat knowledge for you. blue and white catch with round portholes. Catch? What's a catch? Catch? Well, I'm going to lay down my boat knowledge for you. Can't wait. My newly acquired boat knowledge. Hit me. So a catch is a two-masted sailboat.

It's the two masts is the important bit. That's what makes it a catch. Okay. Got it. And if you don't know what a mast is, as my friend Sarah did not last night, it's the sticks with the sails on. Really getting back to basics here on the boat knowledge.

I know. What is a mast? Okay, let me tell you. Just in case. Well, I, you know, sometimes people don't know. Anyway, sticks with sails on, there are two of them. And catches can be massive and they can be medium sized. And this boat knowledge will become more important as our story goes on.

Unless you are the New Zealand police who don't really seem to give a shit about this extremely pertinent fact. According to Guy Wallace, this 12-metre catch had vanished from its mooring by 8.30 on New Year's Day. So this is about 4 or 5am, so we're talking four and a half hours max,

and it's gone. And so had Ben, Smart and Olivia Hope. Guy Wallace was the last person to definitely see them. Ever. They boarded the mystery, scruffy drunk man's catch and they were never seen again. And so began one of New zealand's most infamous missing persons turned murder investigations the only other famous new zealand case i can think of

is black hands is it david bain is that his name i can remember literally nothing about it apart from the theme tune to the podcast because it's so good that podcast like we've recommended it before on this show and it's quite an old podcast by now but if you haven't listened to it just listen to the jingle if you don't want to listen to the whole thing I might just go listen to the jingle after this because it is it's like a goosebump inducing it's just terrifying oh absolutely yeah there's something about it that is so atmospheric it is I actually quite like the Bane case I know we get a lot of requests to cover it on here I think the problem is is that Black Hands is like I don't know it's like almost a 10 part series or something they do so much of a deep dive into it and I'm not saying we won't but

it's quite hard after you've heard that to feel like we could sum it up in an hour and a half exactly that's the problem and sometimes it's when people do such a good job with a long-form series you're kind of like could we do a better job kind of no watch this space but what I would also say is that I didn't realize this not being New Zealand but um I have realized since people get very heated about the Bain case, about the David Bain case in New Zealand. People are very, very like, he did it or he didn't do it. And they get, like, I can't think of a comparable case here in the UK that people get so heated and angry with each other about. And so I'm a little bit scared to do it because in case people just yell at us.

That's fair enough. Yeah, I don't want to get the wrong conclusion but let us know I don't know New Zealand New Zealanders am I right are people that like um on edge about the David Bain case and what do you think did he do it didn't he do it I actually want to know and then maybe we'll just pick the consensus and then when we do it we'll just say that that's the case pandering to the audience. Journalism. I'm a journalism. The David Bain case will crop up

on true crime podcasts now and again. But generally speaking, New Zealand cases aren't covered that much on true crime shows. And that's because of two things. Firstly, the true crime podcast medium and its inability to accept that countries outside the USA and the UK exist. And two, the crime rate in New Zealand is super low.

Between 2007 and 2017, there were only 737 murders recorded. In 10 years? Yes. It's really not very many at all. That's like 7.4 murders a year in a whole country. Quick maths. Quick maths. I mean, I do have a maths A-level, and if I couldn't divide 737 by 10, I think I have to give it back. I think I just have to give my A-level back. Well, you can have my GCSE in maths because I couldn't do that. To put that into context, between 2014 and 2019, there were 727 murders in London alone. It does make London look very bad.

But there's only about 150 murders in London every year. I thought it was going to be way more than that. But I do remember once watching a thing about, like, New York versus London, which is more dangerous. And apparently, and this might be completely outdated information but when i did watch that i think it was saying that in london you're much more likely to get like mugged on the street but in new york you're much more likely to be the victim of a home invasion i can see that i can see that i think there there there is definitely high rates of violent crime in london but like them actually ending in a death is quite rare,

it would seem. But fuck loads of knife crime. Maybe it's because we don't have guns. Maybe that's it. Maybe it's just you're less likely to die from a stabbing. Did you see that boy who got stabbed like literally this week or last week in Brixton? Yes, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Yeah, it's very, it's just awful. I was going to say tragic as if it's like an accident. It's not, it's fucking horrend. I was going to say tragic as if it's like an accident. It's not. It's fucking horrendous. But so London, stab city. But New Zealand, very safe. And the people are very friendly and very nice. So back on New Year's Day 1998, when Olivia Smart didn't show up at the Tamarack,

as everyone was assuming she would, all aboard the yacht were instantly, extremely worried. By the 2nd of January, Olivia's parents had reported her missing. As she had last been seen with Ben, and he was also missing, it was assumed that he had met the same fate. And now, it's time to meet our third character, Scott Watson, who, until New Year's Eve 1997, had literally nothing to do with Olivia Hope and Ben Smart at all. Scott Watson was a boatman. He had built his own yacht, a 26-foot, which is about eight meters, sloop, which is another boat term we're going to throw at you all today. And this sloop had a steel hull and he called it blade.

Now, what's a sloop, I hear you scream? Well, it is the word for a boat with only one mast. There will be a boat quiz at the end of the episode, so I hope you're taking notes. So Watson had built this boat and he lived on it and he absolutely bloody loved it, as you would if you had built a boat with your own hands. And he spent his time sailing around the sounds, picking up odd bits of work and tidying up his yacht home. Scott Watson caught wind of the celebrations at Furneaux Lodge through a few friends and he decided that he would go along for the festivities. He had heard that Furneaux was a good time.

Every time we say it, I can't help but think of Infernos whenever we say Furneaux Lodge. Oh, no. Oh, the stickiest floor in London. Oh, no, no, no, no. I mean, I've never been there, and I have no interest. Oh, don't bother. Absolutely not.

It's literally your seventh circle of hell. If I had to create a place that you would hate, it is Inferno's. And I have realized that myself from a distance, and I have never even glanced in that direction. Though we will be in Clapham when we do our London shows that is true so you know if you haven't got your ticket for the second London show yet that we've added go do that and I still won't come to Inferno's but maybe you could go after I don't know we'll wave at you from outside yes so yep he heard that Inferno's was a good time so he had gone along for the New Year's

Eve party and when Scott Watson got there, he anchored his boat. But then he saw his old friend David Mahoney, captain of the Mina Cornelia, which I assume, if you're captain of, is another boat. And he spotted Dave waving at him. So Dave is the captain of the Mina Cornelia, which has been chartered by other people, so he's a skipper.

Got it. And he is renting out his boat for other people. Dave is making his money on the Mina Cornelia, and he gestured to Scott Watson to come over and tie his boat to theirs, rather than just anchoring it on his own. There were loads of boats that people had chartered to go to the party, all moored together like a big tangly boat bonanza.

I don't know, maybe it's safer to tie your boat to someone else's boat. I don't know what the reasoning would be for that. But doesn't matter. Watson joined his pal that he'd known for his whole life and the party began. A photograph of the revelers was taken. Scott Watson is clearly visible, although a little worse for wear. He's clearly cleanly shaven

and his dark hair is cropped close to his head. Scott Watson is not the most popular man aboard the boat that night. He was being quite obnoxious. By 10pm he was thoroughly drunk and the group headed to shore. Like a true pirate, Watson was drinking from a bottle of rum as he approached Fernow Lodge and that bottle of rum was confiscated by a staff member and then he was allowed to head inside. By his own admission, he was drunk. But at 10pm on a year's EP, wasn't he? And he went into the party.

I'm not sure how much of this party is inside. I'm not sure how much of it is outside. It's unclear. But he heads in to the party and he very quickly starts pissing people off. He's lecherous. He makes fun of an 18-year-old boy for wearing a pearl necklace

that turns out it belongs to his dead sister. Jesus. He's being obnoxious. He's being loud, touching women's bums and stuff. He's not a great guy to be around. And according to Watson himself, he headed back to Blade on a water taxi alone, driven definitely not by Guy Wallace,

but probably another NIAID operator called John Mullen. He gives a description that matches John Mullen rather than Guy Wallace. Watson doesn't wear a watch, so he couldn't be sure of the time he left the party, but he thought it was probably around 2 or 3 a.m. Actually, he hates watches. He thinks they compartmentalize you into little segments, which is said like a true boatman, I think.

Wow. I mean, they also just help you know what time it is. I mean, it depends how important time is to you, I suppose. Very. When you're being accused of a double murder, it turns out. Yes. Well, given the game away. Damn it. Sorry. Bleep this out. So according to him, when Scott was dropped off back at Blade by the NIAID operator, he banged on over to the Mina Cornelia, hoping that there would still be people up and partying, but they weren't. So he tried another boat and the sleeping boat people aboard told him to piss off. And off

he pissed, back to Blade where he ate some food and went to sleep. Or so he said. The next morning, Scott Watson got up at about 6.30 and determined to carpe that diem, he set sail for his mate's house in Erie Bay. He got there somewhere between 10 and midday. His mate was looking after a property on Erie Bay and he was also growing weed, which in New Zealand is very much illegal and often carries jail time. So Watson hung out with his ganja growing friend for three days and then headed back to his native Picton and went on with his life. It was only once he returned from his days away that he heard Olivia Hope and Ben Smart were missing, and the police wanted to speak to anyone who had been at Furneaux Lodge. On January the 7th, Watson took himself to the

police station and pointed out his single-mastered sloop to the police. He made a statement the next day, and on the 15th of January, Watson was arrested in connection with the disappearances of Ben and Olivia. While Scott had been smoking weed at his mate's house, an enormous search for the missing kids was organised. Dogs, divers, helicopters, the navy. Authorities pulled out all the stops but it was no good. Not a trace of the pair was found. Over 300 people were interviewed, including barman-turned-water-taxi-extraordinaire Guy Wallace, who told the police that he had taken Ben and Olivia to the Tamarack,

where they discovered they had no place to sleep. So they got back in the NIAID and a scruffy drunk man offered them a place to bed down, on his nearby yacht. So that's where Guy Wallace took them next. Wallace insisted to the police that the vessel was a two-masted catch. He even underlined the word twice on his statement. Despite his description, the police didn't have any more luck finding the boat Guy had described than they did finding Ben and Olivia.

And the vessel started to be referred to as the mystery catch. It's interesting that they even refer to it as the mystery catch, which we have all learned today means double-masted. And yet Scott Watson turns up and points to his sloop, which we all now know means single-masted, and they're like, well, this must be the mystery catch. I mean mystery sloop. I mean mystery boat. It's quite a big difference, obviously. It is quite a big difference, and Guy Wallace works at Ferno Lodge. He's around boats all the time.

He's going to know what a catch looks like. And if he was working that night, he is literally one of the only people that wasn't drunk. Yes, exactly, exactly. Olivia's dad, Gerald Hope, placed himself at the centre of the media frenzy that was starting to harm around his daughter and her friend. He implored the public for any information they had and photographs of those who had been at Ferno Lodge that night streamed in, including the one of Scott Watson that had been taken aboard the Mina Cornelia, showing him to have short hair and to be clean-shaven.

Hmm. People did point out Watson to the police, though. He had been drunk, belligerent, and remember, he had been making women feel incredibly uncomfortable. There were also multiple reports of a scruffy-looking man being at the party, staring at women and sitting alone. This man had shoulder-length, fair hair, and looked like he could do with a really good scrubbing. He was European-looking, and about five foot ten inches. He was wearing blue jeans, possibly training shoes, and a Levi short-sleeved shirt that had a red tab on the left breast pocket and was possibly green. Detailed, detailed descriptions.

Very detailed and very different. Yes, very different to Scott Watson. And I think the Scott Watson, bad news in that sort of situation. I think like he was clearly misbehaving and people were going to the police saying, actually, there was this guy who was being a real asshole.

And then there's, in my opinion, this other very different looking guy who's also being an asshole. And like it gets swapped around, potentially, maybe. Reports from outside Furneaux were phoned in too numerous people claiming to have seen a catch that's a double master with round portholes and a blue and white stripe leaving the sounds on the 2nd of january in the documentary it's like these old couples being like well we watched the boats all day and it was such a lovely boat

and we even sat there on the porch and we had, gosh, isn't that a lovely boat? So, you know, have they made it up? Maybe. I don't know, but there are multiple people who say, I saw this very distinctive looking catch, leave the sounds. Mm-hmm. One charter operator even claimed to see two people aboard, a fair-haired woman and a dark-haired man,

very much matching the descriptions of Ben and Olivia. And this charter operator apparently waved at them, and they declined to wave back, which he noted was uncharacteristic for boaties. There are loads of other accounts just like this. How accurate they are is anyone's guess, because all of the information the police were looking for was widely reported on. And if the TV and the papers say the police are looking for a blue elephant called Jemima with a red hat and a sausage roll addiction, someone somewhere will say they have known Jemima their whole life. The media coverage of this case is a hot topic

and many, possibly correctly, believe that the mishandling of sensitive information by the press directly precipitated the arrest of Scott Watson. But he wasn't the only one in the police Times Press firing line. For example, an initial police report described Olivia as spoilt, emotional, a drinker and sexually active. Why do any of those things matter? No, the only word that you need to know is Olivia is missing.

Missing. I think that's what you mean. And that's like not even code. It means, especially in the 90s and also today, basically those words mean that whatever happened to Olivia, she was asking for it because women's lives are valued on their fulfillment of what being a lady is perceived to be at that particular moment in time. Absolutely. And I also just like, if there had been other adjectives

that were more sort of pertinent to this, like she was a constant runaway or something like that i'm not saying that would mean like don't look for her obviously but i'm saying like that would be pertinent to somebody who's gone missing but like being spoiled being emotional being a drinker and being sexually active have nothing to do with a reason that somebody would be missing literally everyone's everyone's drinking, it's a party. Yep. And this misogynistic description of Olivia Hope was published in the New Zealand Herald, much to the dismay and embarrassment of her family.

Gerald Hope, her dad, was a good public speaker and he'd even run for mayor, so he had no problem staying in the public eye and keeping his daughter in the headlines. Ben Smart's family took more of a backseat. He was hip-hop's biggest mogul, the man who redefined fame, fortune, and the music industry. The first male rapper to be honored on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, Sean Diddy Cone. Diddy built an empire and lived a life most people only dream about.

Everybody know ain't no party like a Diddy party, so. Yeah, that's what's up. But just as quickly as his empire rose, it came crashing down. Today I'm announcing the unsealing of a three-count indictment, charging Sean Combs with racketeering conspiracy, sex trafficking, interstate transportation for prostitution. I was f***ed up. I hit rock bottom, but I made no excuses. I'm disgusted. I'm so sorry. Until you're wearing an orange jumpsuit, it's not real. Now it's real.

From his meteoric rise to his shocking fall from grace, from law and crime, this is the rise and fall of Diddy. Listen to the rise and fall of Diddy exclusively with Wondery Plus. Hi, I'm Lindsey Graham, the host of Wondery's show American Scandal. We bring to light some of the biggest controversies in U.S. history. Presidential lies, environmental disasters, corporate fraud. In our latest series, NASA embarks on an ambitious program to reinvent space exploration with the launch of its first reusable vehicle, the Space Shuttle. And in 1985, they announced they're sending teacher Krista McAuliffe into space aboard the Space Shuttle Challenger,

along with six other astronauts. But less than two minutes after liftoff, the Challenger explodes. And in the tragedy's aftermath, investigators uncover a series of preventable failures by NASA and its contractors that led to the disaster. Follow American Scandal on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. Experience all episodes ad-free and be the first to binge the newest season only on Wondery+. You can join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app, Apple Podcasts, or Spotify. Start your free trial today. And we're back. Apple Podcasts or Spotify. Start your free trial today. from Furneaux Lodge were recorded. It turns out there were 24 altercations at Furneaux Lodge that night. One of them included a scruffy-looking man

attacking a woman on the jetty near the lodge. Now, as with much of this case, we don't know much more than that about that particular incident. Because this lady, whoever she was, never came forward. But at least one person claimed that they saw Scott Watson walking away from a woman who was asking him why he had hit her. Again, we don't know if this was the same woman or even if it was definitely

Scott Watson, because the lady never identified herself. And and also all of the people who are witnesses at Furnow Lodge that night most of them are off their fucking heads yeah and it's dark it's dark yeah that too exactly police claim that Scott Watson started to fit the description of the mystery man despite looking nothing like him investigators Investigators described Scott Watson as, quote, shaking and looking quite emotional when he's come into the police station. And they also said that it was as if he was about to confess at any minute during his interrogation. Watson totally denies this,

claiming that interviewing officer Tom Fitzgerald was a liar and was deliberately trying to unnerve Watson by banging into the arm of his chair and demanding, what have you done with these people? Where are they? And it's difficult to believe, I have to say, that a man who voluntarily took himself down to the police station and pointed out his own boat on which he lived would have been in such a state.

It's tricky. I have been burned by wrongful conviction episodes before, so I am not going to say either way. But if the information we have collected is right, it does seem difficult to believe that a man who hears that the police are looking for people who've been at fern and lodge and thinks oh i was there i'll go and tell i'll go and tell them yeah what they need to know this is my boat look at its single mast it's difficult to believe that someone who would voluntarily do that would get themselves

worked up to such a state absolutely and also i'm not saying that somebody who's involved wouldn't necessarily go and insert themselves into an investigation. But I think the descriptions are so different. And the fact that, well, a scruffy looking man with shoulder length wavy hair never turned himself in and came to point out his yacht or anything. And they're basically like, this guy came forward and then a bunch of people, it seems, at the party were like he was being very lecherous. And they're like, well, came forward and then a bunch of people it seems at the party were

like he was being very lecherous and they're like well get him get him according to chief investigator rob pope i really do not like this guy it didn't take long for scott watson to stick out quote like a dog's balls i've never heard that term no before me either me either typical new zealand term i someone tell us don't know don't know maybe it is uh obviously more more obviously here or a turn of phrase dogs dogs bollocks is like a positive thing. And if you're the dogs bollocks, you're the fucking best at something. Yeah, which makes less sense than sticking out like a dog's ball. Because they do stick out. They do stick out. You're right.

They do stick out. Blue's not got any anymore, so I can't really remember. But they do stick out. RIP Blue's balls. Absolutely. So, he says, Scott Watson sticks out like a dog's ball and also he had, quote, the right sort of agenda and pedigree.

That is a quote from a police officer. What does that even mean? It just means, like, yeah, he looks like he probably did it. He's a wrong-in, probably. God. Good investigation. He's as good at investigations as we are at journalism. Yeah, exactly.

My feeling of this whole investigation is, like, just square peg round hole. It must be him because of the reasons we're going to go into. This wrong- in diagnosis is supported by Watson's 48 previous convictions, which that's a lot of convictions to have. And if you were a police officer, that's probably where you would start looking. It's like, who's got a criminal background?

Who was at Furner Lodge last night? That's, you know, that's okay. That's good policing. And also a really unfortunate mugshot taken halfway through a blink that does make Scott Watson look uncaring and furtive. I've blinked in the show notes, like a side-by-side comparison, because I really didn't think that it would be that much of a big deal that he would look that different.

But if you look at, like, the blink mugshot and the next one, they're taken, like, seconds apart apart he looks like a totally different person that's fascinating that's so interesting because normally we talk on the show about like oh well you know this person at the press conference didn't look sad enough or this person didn't look like distraught enough and they weren't crying hysterically and therefore they're guilty get him him. It's just a literal snapshot in time. And people are like, look. Yeah. The way you look shouldn't matter.

But as we know, in the media, the way someone looks is everything. And he does look like he doesn't give a fuck. But it's just, it's an unfortunate shot. And in the next one, he looks really wide-eyed and scared. It's like Dali Rutia with the silly string. Oh my god, literally, exactly, exactly, exactly. Of course, it's the surly blink mugshot that made the papers, not the wide-eyed deer in headlights one. So the public started to think that Scott Watson was a wrong-in too. And his convictions weren't the end of his bad guy status. Apparently, Scott Watson

had tattoos on his arms and on his hands, one of which was a skull with the word skin on it, which has white supremacist connections. Connotations, I should say. I don't know how true that is. I have only seen it in one place. I haven't seen a picture of it. I haven't been able to corroborate it.

So I don't know. But, you know, it's no secret that people have opinions about tattoos, but especially hand ones and on the subject of tattoos there has been so much tattoo gatekeeping on the facebook group so many people have been like oh i just don't think hannah just does she's not heavily tattooed enough to like get this tattoo and i'm like i'm good fuck no i'm so i can do what i fucking want it wouldn't matter if i had none or if I had 50 if I want to get it I'm gonna get it it's such a weird like don't tell me what to do with my own body guys I love you but no I'm doing it guys now she's gonna get it on her fucking face thanks very much did you tell the people because I know we we

let it slip in the um patreon names segment of oh of the two episodes ago. But I think you should tell the people the name, the listener name you have chosen to be tattooed on your body somewhere. Lily Makepeace. There you go, Lily. Are you freaked out? Are you listening to this episode?

If you don't want me to do it, Lily, I won't. You've got to tell us in the next 24 hours after this episode goes out if you don't want it to be Lily Makepeace tattooed on Hannah's, possibly above her eyebrow now. I don't know what's going to happen. We'll all find out soon enough.

It's just going to be a teardrop, but like the lines are Lily Makepeace. Okay, nailed it. And in case you hadn't noticed, I hate being told what to do and it's literally the way to make me do the opposite. So you've made it worse for yourselves. So there you go.

I am very mature. Hannah is stubborn and doesn't like to be criticized, was my first school report. Okay. Followed swiftly by loud, confident and wrong. Exactly. Very quickly on the tattoo thing, someone being like, people call hand and face tattoos job stoppers. Guys, I'm a podcaster. It doesn't matter if I have tattoos on my hands. guys i'm a podcaster it doesn't matter if i have

tattoos on my hands or her face exactly it doesn't matter or the end of my nose that just says fuck you anyway so scott watson uh he's got the blinky mug shot which is unfortunate he's reasonably heavily tattooed it seems and he has 48 criminal convictions. And he also has a reputation for being lecherous and aggressive around women. One woman told a story that he threatened her with a knife after she rejected his sexual advances. No conviction was made, but that doesn't mean it didn't happen, believe women. So do I want to marry him? No. Is he guilty of the murders of olivia hope and ben smart let's take a closer look it is also almost never mentioned that all of watson's 48 convictions happened when he was a child literally a child they happened mainly between the ages of 15 and 18 and also none of

these convictions were sexual in nature. I'm not saying the accusations made against him weren't sexual, like Hannah just said, but the convictions we're talking about. And only one of the 48 convictions was violent. Now, obviously, you know, we do know that there are gateway criminal offences that are usually carried out by offenders in their teen years. But it does seem strange to me that a man would commit a bunch of convictions like this in his teenage years, then do nothing else, and then just randomly murder two people when

he's like a fully grown adult man. I don't know. It feels like there's a big gap there. And his singular violent conviction of the 48 related to someone trying to steal his boat and Scott Watson brandishing a tool that he had been using to fix his boat and scared that person off. He thought nothing more of it, but then he was nicked for assault. But what is it that the police have on him in this case? Well, it all came from Blade. That's his sloop. When the police seized Watson's sloop, they paraded it through the main street of his hometown.

They told the press that they were not revealing whose boat they had seized. But of course course everybody knew picton is a small place and if he built this boat it's not like a generic like catalog i don't know where do you buy your boats catalogs i don't know whatever but he fucking built this boat people would have known it was the boat shop the boat shop yes i think there is so much mishandling of evidence as we'll go on to see he really is demonized and just not a fucking shot at a trial no way like the population is so small in new zealand in general um which is why they're so good at handling everything pick up jacinda yeah and because the crime rate is so low like i understand why the press pounced

on it but like that it was missed it completely mishandled by the police. See, I don't think because like, and I know this is probably the wrong thing to say, but I don't think you can hold the press accountable for anything because like they will run with whatever you give them. I completely put the responsibility on the police and what they were releasing.

It's difficult because everyone's just working with their own agendas. And in a favorable viewing of the police, you could be like like they have these two kids who are missing they're getting a lot of pressure especially because olivia's dad is like a politician and he's very good at like getting the media to pay attention to their case also that the couple well the couple the pair are like prime newspaper headline grabbing missing kids. And so the police are just like, look, this guy's a bad guy. He was there. He probably did it.

I'm not saying that's how you do an investigation, but that they're under certain amounts of pressure. But it's a poor investigation. I also think because there are so few murders, they are clearly incredibly inexperienced about how to handle this. Yes, yes, yes, yes, definitely. You see that time and time again, like just look at cases like infamous cases like Madeleine McCann

and even the Soham murders, you know, when there is just like a lack of experience in that homicide team, if there even is a homicide team. The police also tracked down the caretaker buddy that Scott had visited after the party Inferno Lodge, the pot-growing mate you will remember. This buddy told investigators that Scott had not arrived until 5pm, which in the police's mind meant that Scott would have had plenty of time

to kill Ben and Olivia after their arrival on his sloop, throw their bodies into the Cook Strait. I guess a strait is like a fast-moving river, part of the sea. I don't know. You know what I mean. Something like that. A strait is like separating two land masses, so the Cook Strait is what separates the North Island and the South Island. Got it. There you go. Facts. And so, yeah, they think that he would have had enough time to do this

and still make it to his friend's house in time for a tea time spliff. So why does his friend say this? Because Scott Watson obviously says that he got there much earlier. He is convinced that his mate was pressured by police with charges for weed cultivation. This happens a lot. There is a lot of people saying one thing and then coming out later saying, the police pressured me. Square peg round hole. So now the police had Watson in custody and his boat was seized, they announced that there had never been a mystery catch.

There was no physical evidence of it ever existing. They argued that Guy Wallace must have been mistaken about the number of masts on the vessel he took Ben and Olivia to, ever existing. They argued that Guy Wallace must have been mistaken about the number of masts on the vessel he took Ben and Olivia to, because so many yachts were tied all together and it was dark. Guy Wallace very publicly said that this was bullshit, that he knew what he'd seen. And also he didn't just like look at the boat from a distance. He literally took Ben and Olivia and the man to the boat, to the yacht in his water taxi. So he would have like had to get close enough for them to be able to get on board.

I don't know how the logistics of that works, but he would have been close up to it and known which one they got on. Absolutely. And he's very detailed about how they got off and how they had to reach up and pull themselves up over the top of the side. And he's very detailed about all of that. Yeah. So I am not convinced that Guy Wallace would have been mistaken as something as so obvious as one mast or two. I just don't believe that.

I know almost nothing about boats. I am an incredibly seasick person. I don't not enjoy boats, but I have to stay as high as I possibly can on a boat. And so I'm a little bit scared of them. But even I could tell the difference between a boat with one mast or two. So let's all fucking, you know, calm down, police. Even though Guy Wallace is saying that it definitely was a catch, it didn't seem to bother the police that much. And they carried on with their investigation, building their case against Scott Watson. The forensic search of the sloop led to the following discoveries. The boat had been newly painted. Before New Year's Eve it had been white and red. Afterward it was blue. Also a

weather vane had been removed. The police argued that this was an attempt to disguise the boat. The interior of the boat had also been extensively cleaned, including cassette tapes that had been wiped. I don't know whether that's wiping the case or wiping, like, the tape of the case. I don't know, but it seems they point it out. There were rub marks on the hull, and the theory put forward by some was that these marks occurred as Watson threw Ben and Olivia overboard, perhaps wrapped in a sail.

There were scratches on the hatchet blade. The police contended that these were made by the fingernails of a person, Ben or Olivia, terrified for their life and desperate to escape. There are also holes in the squabs, which is boat talk for cushion, and investigators argued that Watson had cut out bloodstains from the cushions. So no actual blood? No, just saying that because it's been cleaned and because there are holes, that must be where the blood was. And, you know, I wouldn't just like discount all of this evidence if there was something else to back it up.

Yes, yeah. Because as you can see, this is all circumstantial to the highest degree and i know we say circumstantial evidence is evidence because it is but it's not even very good circumstantial evidence this is the thing according to scott watson all of these points can be very easily explained away he said that the holes in the squabs were from a cigarette and a painting accident and one would argue like if he's throwing these two people that he's murdered overboard like wrapped in a sail why would he be like oh a blood-stained cushion let me just cut the blood out why would you just throw the fucking

cushions away what a bizarre thing to suggest that somebody would do um he also said that the scratches on the hatch were from a wooden stick that he used to keep it open. I can absolutely visualize that little scenario in my mind and that makes sense. And he said that the marks on the hull were from weeds. I assume that means like seaweeds that are dragging across your boat. The weather vane he said had been removed because it didn't work. The boat was also clean he said because he lived in it it wasn't just like his holiday boat or his weekend boat it's literally his house and he said that salt ruins cassette tapes and basically everything else and this is

why he wipes it down constantly and keeps it clean yeah he'd done like a big a big boating a big sailing and there was a big storm and he was like so everything was covered in fucking salt and it breaks everything so obviously i was just gonna clean it and it's also like and maybe this is just me randomly proposing this in the middle of this episode it's got nothing to do with anything it's also new year's eve i feel like it's a time where people like change stuff and get things you know maybe you'll be like i'm gonna paint my boat and i'm going to clean my boat and I'm going to have a fresh start this year or whatever. So I don't know. I just.

My stepdad's Scottish and on New Year's Eve, you clean your house. It's like you like it's a tradition, like everyone cleans their house and then you get changed and then you can like proceed with Hogmanay. It's a big deal. Scott Watson said that he painted the boat because he wanted to. The disguising the vessel argument also doesn't make heaps of sense when you remember that Watson himself pointed out his sloop blade to the police when he voluntarily made a statement on the 8th of January. Though one could argue that he would have maybe assumed

that other people would have seen a blue and white boat and now he's here pointing at a red boat. That's true. That is true. I don't know. There were also rumours kicking around that all of the anchors were missing from Blade and the police never actually commented on this. But it of course implies that they were missing

because Scott Watson used them to weigh down the bodies of Olivia and Ben as he threw them overboard. But the missing anchor theory is another falsehood because all three anchors were actually on the boat. And absolutely, if you were going to throw two dead bodies overboard, if Scott Watson is a man who lives on the sea, he would know that you would have to weigh them down. Everything you don't weigh down finds its way back to the surface. The police don't comment on it

because it's in their interest that everyone thinks that he did it. Of course. I mean, this is the thing we see time and time again with police investigations, is that they will investigate. Of course they will. But once they decide that, this is not generically for all police forces, this is a typical formula we see.

Once they decide who they want it to be, they will ignore all of the evidence that maybe points at it not being that person and build a narrative around what does point to that person. And that's what we're seeing here, in my opinion. So all of these things stacking up against Scott Watson are pretty bad, but Scott Watson has bigger problems. He has two big problems in the form of two strawberry blonde hairs discovered on a tiger-printed blanket on his boat. At Watson's trial, which kicked off in June 1999, Susan Kathleen Vintiner, a forensic biologist with the Institute of Environmental Science and Research, testified that she recovered 400 hairs from this blanket, mainly short, dark ones.

But actually, on her first examination, Vintner didn't find any hairs that had even an outside chance of being Olivia's. But upon having a second look, two strawberry blonde hairs, one 15 centimetres and one 25 centimetres long, were found on the blanket. These hairs were later confirmed by DNA testing to have belonged to Olivia Hope. So that at least puts Olivia Hope on blade on the night she and Ben Smart vanished, right? Well, maybe not, because on the day of the second blanket examination, reference hairs from Olivia Hope's home were on the same laboratory table. And there was a one centimetre hole in the bag that the hairs were being kept in.

And the police hadn't counted how many of Olivia's hairs had been taken, so it was impossible to say if any were missing. It's less convincing now, isn't it? Yeah, again, it's just the fact of, like, that piece of evidence taken on its own, or that finding taken on its own, it feels like such a smoking gun but the fact that there were opportunities for contamination just weaken it as a piece of forensic evidence absolutely

absolutely and that is in my view if that is the only piece of evidence that that has legs which it is i think that's grounds for a retrial guys listening might be like oh well you know giving too much of the benefit of the doubt to Scott Watson. The thing is, you have to remember that the way that the police investigate crimes, we should require it to be, aim for it to be as seamless as it possibly can, for them to be taking all the steps they can to avoid cross-contamination, etc. And at a criminal trial, there is a reason why the standard for being found guilty is there has to be beyond a reasonable doubt. You know I think it's only right that this investigation is put under the microscope. But with the press whipping the New Zealand public into a frenzy of Scott Watson being

the worst man alive the potential evidence contamination wouldn't matter. One apparent lie that made it into the press and the courtroom was that it was reported that when Watson was arrested, he whispered to chair-barging Tom Fitzgerald, about time. Are you in a film, Tom Fitzgerald? I think he's living his Sweeney fantasy, honestly. For God's sake all this shit is only coming up because they haven't got any other evidence so they're like

well he said this to me otherwise you wouldn't literally never bring any of this crap up got watson denies this but this is the myth building we or rather the jury are dealing with watson's family weren't spared either. They were described as gangsters who were planning to take a hit out on Olivia's dad and the lead investigators on the case. This comes from their phones and their house being tapped. And it's a conversation they have as a family.

It's not serious. They're just like, oh, well, what if we just fucking killed him, then what? Like, it's not, in my opinion, I don't think there was any intention of actually hiring a hitman. It also wouldn't have solved anything. So what, you killed the lead investigators on this case, they're not just going to be like, oh, well, now we better let you go free, Scott Watson,

because the lead investigator is dead. What? Like that? I'm not saying that they didn't just think of a stupid plan to go kill these people, but it wouldn't have actually made a difference. So at trial, 500 witnesses were called, most of whom had something negative to say about Scott Watson. He was drunk, violent, obnoxious, or all three. One of the 500 was our old pal,

Guy Wallace, who, contrary to his later public statements, said that he was, quote, pretty definite that the man on the water taxi that night with Ben and Olivia was Scott Watson, although admitting that he did not fit the description of the mystery man who had been given by many others. In later years, Guy Wallace said that he felt pressured by the police to identify Watson. And he also said that Scott Watson was not the man on the NIAID that night. I think Guy Wallace is kind of the nail in the coffin. Because as you say, like, he's the only sober one. He's the last one to see them.

And then he changes his mind and he says, oh, I'm pretty definite it was him. But then obviously later on he comes out saying, I was pressured by police, just like the ganja grower. And he's a very confident speaker, Guy Wallace. So I think he probably carries that with him. According to Scott Watson, the only thing missing from his trial

was the soundtrack to Jaws. And I think that's a very good description. Like it really is, like they're painting him as this like monstrous person, which like I don't necessarily think he is. And even though it was at trial, the cross-contamination potential of the two hairs, that happens in the courtroom, like that is brought up.

But Scott Watson reckons that the trial took so long, it was 500 witnesses, that the jury forgot about any evidence that actually mattered. Everyone on the other side of the law was so convinced that the case against Scott Watson had more holes in it than the Titanic, that prison guards brought him his clothes to court, like his own clothes, because everyone was like, there's no way, you're definitely going to walk. But those clothes still haven't been worn. Scott Watson was found guilty of the murders of both Olivia Hope and Ben Smart. And just to remind everybody,

no bodies or even blood has ever been found. No. And before he was sent down, he shouted to the jury, you're wrong. He was handed a life sentence with 17 years non-parole. He's still in prison today and he has never once admitted guilt. Which is a tricky situation for a convicted murderer to be in because if you never admit guilt, you basically have no chance of getting out because you haven't shown remorse.

And again, with like, you know, comparison to like the David Bain case, I don't know what people's general feelings are in New Zealand about whether Scott Watson actually did this or not. I know that there was a whole documentary made called Doubt about, you know, picking holes in this case. It also does seem from the research we did that it was incredibly weak amounts of evidence.

But if people feel like, you know, we're giving him too much of the benefit of the doubt, I really do believe in the idea of like, better one guilty man go free because he wasn't, you know, there wasn't enough evidence, he wasn't investigated properly, we don't have police corruption, then a hundred innocent men go to jail for a crime that they didn't commit.

And the standards just don't seem to have been met in this case, for me, from what we've seen. I think it's a trial by media, I really do. Still though, Watson hasn't given up. He has never stopped fighting his conviction. In the year 2000, Watson's defence team appealed his conviction, but it was ruled that there was no new evidence to warrant a second trial. And that's the problem with the contamination argument being used at his first trial,

is it's already been heard. It doesn't count. Like you can't, you can't retrial it because it was already presented and it didn't make a difference. No second trial, even though one witness, we're not sure who, but my money is on Guy Wallace, told the New Zealand Herald that his testimony was nothing more than an act resulting from being pressured by police. I mean, I don't know what the standards are specifically in New Zealand. We know in this country, for you to be granted appeal, it is highly, highly, highly unlikely.

We just do not do appeals in this country really we're just like you were convicted and there's nothing wrong with our justice system so see ya and i think it would shock people to know obviously we're not talking about an american case we're talking about new zealand but um in a lot of people like to sort of point holes that the american justice system in particular. And actually, the appeal system there is far, far better for the defendant than it is in this country. Even the entire process of the trial and the appeals process, we are shockingly behind the rest of the world here in the UK. I think we can't really get into it now because it's not got anything to do with a New Zealand case, but I think we'll do a case in the near future where we dig into the terrible justice system that exists in the UK. So back to New Zealand and back to Scott Watson.

Another failed appeal attempt happened in 2003. They even tried for a royal pardon in 2009, which took four whole years to be declined. Four years? Yeah, what are you doing? What do you do? God damn it, Liz. Maybe just be a bit more disciplined with your workload, Liz. You get fucking enough money. Maybe just be like, I set an hour aside a week

to go through these pardons that I'm meant to be looking at. Jesus fucking Christ. Anyway, in 2015, the parole board denied him because Scott Watson failed two drugs tests and his psychological report put him at very high risk of committing violent acts outside of prison. Watson has appeared in front of a parole board twice and as yet has not been approved. In 2016, he was judged to be an undue risk and was told he would not be allowed another parole hearing for another four years. But almost as we speak, Scott Watson's case is being heard in the Court of Appeal for the fourth time since his convictions for the murders of Olivia

Hope and Ben Smart. We will have to appoint that Kiwi correspondent to send us all of the latest updates. And we'll just have to keep you guys posted. And please do, like, in the meantime, tell us what you think, because I'm fascinated to know, really, what the general feeling is, especially from New Zealanders. I believe it is happening now. I could be wrong. It was very difficult to find when it starts. So please, if you would like to apply for it to be our Kiwi correspondent, please let us know if and when the trial has started. So where are Olivia and Ben?

We genuinely don't know. We have absolutely no idea. Their bodies have never been found. Like, literally not even a whisper of them has ever turned up again. They quite literally vanished. Was Scott Watson anything to do with it? I don't know. Do I believe that the prison professionals

who are saying that he shouldn't be released know what they're talking about? Probably. But i don't i don't think he did it but do i know for sure of course not i'm a moron what do i know no we don't know and i think that's the thing is like the prison professionals are dealing with it based on the idea that he is guilty because he's been convicted if he's in prison and he's taking drugs to be able to cope with being in prison for a crime he committed or a crime he didn't commit, and then he has a lot of anger issues, obviously they're going to look at him and be like, this man isn't safe to be outside because he's a convicted murderer and he's really fucking angry and addicted to drugs. I don't know if Scott

Watson did it or not. Would this evidence have convinced me beyond a reasonable doubt? I don't think so. That's what I think. I do think we can say it was a trial by media. The press definitely got their hands on way more information than they should have. I don't think he was given a fair trial. Every member of the jury already had an opinion on him before he entered the courtroom. Equally, I'm not convinced by the evidence that was presented at trial. If that really is all the evidence there was, I don't think, like Saru, I'm not sure I would have been convinced by it.

So did Scott Watson really stick out like a dog's balls because he was the murderer, or is it because he was a transient boat dweller with almost 50 previous convictions, and that made him an easy target for a baffled police force with minimal experience in mystery disappearances. Although Scott Watson is certain that many people bore false witness at his trial, it doesn't seem that he's holding any grudges, though.

He thinks that people were pressured and bullshitted by police, like his friend who was growing the weed and like Guy Wallace, because the pressure would have been enormous on Guy Wallace imagine the whole of fucking New Zealand possibly or at least that area thinks that Scott Scott was and definitely did it the police are telling you did it and you're the only person that's like I don't think it was him that night on the boat yeah you just can't it takes like what would it take on a normal person to stand up against that level of pressure and scrutiny? I don't think I would be able to do it. So I think, you know, I don't blame Guy

Wallace at all. Scott Watson says that he didn't take the stand at his own trial because he has never been good at expressing himself and that he would have just talked himself into a corner, sworn a lot and looked worse. And I think, you know, when people, you know, criticise defendants for not taking the trial, of course, it can to some people make them look guilty. But I also think it's a calculated move on part of the defence. They are there to advise you. And I'm sure his defence took one look at Scott Watson and the way he spoke and behaved. Sometimes they were like, you cannot take the stand because you will make things worse. Exactly. And I am aware that i am coming

across very sympathetic um to scott watson but i would there's a link below to an interview with him after he's been in prison for 17 years and he is very like considered and he's like i don't blame anyone who took the stand at my trial like they you know the police bullshitted them and that's not their fault and the jury it's not their fault either because they were in like a difficult position and all of this shit was being said about me and blah blah blah and he's obviously he's had a long time to fucking think about it but he does come across in that interview as as a good person not that good people don't do bad things but uh i read it and before you fly off the handle about anything, listeners, go and read that interview with him. And because it definitely humanizes him for sure.

Absolutely. I think this is the thing. I don't know whether he did it or not. We're not here to start like a two woman, you know, free Scott Watson campaign. All we're saying is just that the quality of the police investigation that was carried out doesn't seem to have been thorough and two people have vanished like ben and olivia have gone missing there's almost like very little information about what actually happened to them who they were what what could have happened it just seems like the police fixated on this man um yes whether he did it or not i I don't know.

But there you go. That is the case of Scott Watson and the mysterious disappearance of Olivia Hope and Ben Smart. We do really want to hear what you guys think. But just again, sometimes like with cases like this, it can get a bit heated in the social medias. So if you're going to share your opinion, please just do it like grownups.

We can disagree with each other. We don't have to resort to internet shit slinging. We are too old for that. Just be nice. Yeah, we're all too old. We're all too grown up. I don't care if you're listening to this and you're 12 years old. You're too old for internet shit slinging. Exactly. And that's the standard we're going to hold all of us by. that is that case um yeah thank you guys so much for listening like we said if you want to hop on over now and come hang out with us under the duvet that would be a delight so if you would like to come sign up to be a patron you can do so patreon.com slash red handed and here are some lovely people that did so in roughly november 2020 thank you Thank you very much to Tysha Jacobs, Olivia, Alice Stewart-Cox, Emma, Katie Gallagher, Ella Tansley, Susan Bayman,

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they bite you I'm so sorry that happened to you but like we can't go kill sharks that's literally the moral of Moby Dick like you can't take your vengeance against an animal but I did think that was quite funny anyway I shall let you continue shark bait Sharkbait. Ooh-ha-ha. Jonah JL. Philly girl JL. Kyra Laird. Daria Rumbelow. Emily Beaumont. Katie. Fuck off. Not you, Katie.

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The Ontario Liberals elected Bonnie Crombie as their new leader. Bonnie who? I just sent you her profile. Check out her place in the Hamptons. Huh, fancy. She's a big carbon tax supporter, yeah? Oh yeah. Check out her record as mayor.

Oh, get out of here. She even increased taxes in this economy. Yeah, higher taxes, carbon taxes. She sounds expensive. Bonnie Crombie and the Ontario Liberals. They just don't get it. That'll cost you. A message from the Ontario PC Party. They say Hollywood is where dreams are made. A seductive city where many flock to get rich, be adored, and capture America's heart. But when the spotlight turns off, fame, fortune, and lives can disappear in an instant.

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