Woman ‘lured away, killed’ — Inwood
A King Country farmer’s wife was lured from her remote farmhouse to see an injured animal and then murdered, a friend of the couple says.
Waikawau woman Lesley Calvert’s death 40 years ago has never been properly explained and another coroner’s inquest should be held, friend Mary Inwood said.
The inquest in 1977 determined Calvert died of ‘‘unknown causes’’ after her body was found seven and half months after she disappeared from the family home in February 1977.
But Inwood said there were flaws in both the police investigation and the inquest and she supported another inquiry by the Chief Coroner. She believed Calvert was lured from her home by a person who knew Calvert well.
The mystery man had used a bogus claim a farm animal was in distress to get Calvert away from the house, she said.
Inwood said her friend was probably killed by this person.
‘‘I don’t think he intended to kill her but when he didn’t get his way after leading her away from the house, he lost it.’’
Lesley and husband Lindsay Calvert became British immigrant Inwood’s guardians and confidants after she arrived to live in New Zealand in the late 1960s.
Inwood stayed with the King Country farming couple at their Waikawau property briefly before she went to live at a New Plymouth hostel.
However she often returned to the farm staying weekends and enjoying the Calverts’ hospitality before she married and went to live in the Waikato.
The friendship continued for many years as Inwood’s children visited the farm and became friends with the Calverts’ children.
When Lesley Calvert disappeared in 1977, Inwood and her husband, Peter, were among the searchers who combed the area for the next seven and half months until the body was found 40 years ago last week, September 12, 1977.
Since then Inwood, now living near Taupo¯ , has kept up daily contact with Lindsay Calvert.
A statement she gave to police at the time Calvert disappeared was ignored, she said.
She said Calvert would not have committed suicide because she was committed to her children.
‘‘Her children were very important to her, she helped them with pony club and other activities,’’ she said.
Inwood said Calvert didn’t take her own life, or desert her family, as police had put forward at the inquest as a possible explanation.
Inwood said the police investigation of the prime suspect, named X, who was a regular visitor to the farm, was incomplete.
She said police should reopen the investigation by going back to this person who still lived in the area, who knew more than he initially told police.
The case should be treated as an unsolved murder, not as a missing person inquiry, and a new inquest by the Chief Coroner was essential to solve the cause of death, she said.
‘‘We want the police to admit their mistakes and take another look at the case,’’ she said.
The unsolved mystery had taken a huge toll on Lindsay Calvert’s life, she said.
‘‘He knows he may not get a conviction but he also knew he was right that his wife did not commit suicide.’’
In a recent statement Calvert’s three adult children also called for a new inquest.
They claimed New Plymouth police accepted their mother was either murdered, and her body placed on the farm at a later date, or that she killed herself in the location sometime after the official search ended.
The location where the body was found, on a steep fencing line less than 700 metres from the family home, had been extensively searched without success in the months leading up to the body’s discovery.
They said they did not accept suicide as a likely cause of death as there was nothing in their mother’s ‘‘demeanour that morning that indicated that she was not intending coming back to collect us from school that afternoon,’’ the statement said.
A new coronial inquiry was the only right and proper action to be taken in an effort to resolve what we regard as an unresolved homicide, they said.