Catching a killer

It remains one of this country’s highest-profile unsolved crimes. On the afternoon of New Year’s Eve in 1998, Ashburton schoolgirl Kirsty Bentley set off for one of her frequent walks with her pet Labrador. She never returned.

Now, more than two decades after her mysterious murder, police have a fresh view on what might have happened.

Detective Inspector Greg Murton took over the investigation in 2014 and since then he’s been poring over every detail in the massive file, and pursuing his own inquiries. In a rare glimpse into how murder investigations are conducted, he has revealed the existence of evidence not previously made public, and a new profile of the likely killer.

To give new impetus to the case, police have posted a reward of up to $100,000 for anyone who can help them close it.

Both the review and the reward have come too late for Kirsty’s father, Sid, who died in 2015. But they offer both relief and hope to her brother, John, and mother, Jill, who have struggled to cope with the aftermath of what they claim was a flawed investigation from the beginning.

FAMILY UNDER SUSPICION

Kirsty was just 15 when she left the house on that sweltering afternoon. It was 34°C and she was looking forward to seeing in the New Year with her boyfriend by the family pool.

“She was in love – she was very, very happy. Kirsty had a life ahead of her,” recalls Jill from her home in Invercargill, where she has lived for more than a decade.

Both the family and the police searched into the night after the teenager failed to return. But it wasn’t until about 9.30am the next day that her dog, Abby, was found tied to a tree just off a wooded track that they often used on their daily walks. The track was next to the Ashburton River, just 500m from their home, and had been searched the night before.

Then came a chilling discovery – 30m from the dog, Kirsty’s underwear and shorts were found on top of a bush. Her body was not discovered until 17 days later in the Rakaia Gorge at the bottom of a steep bank, covered in branches. She was wearing the cotton sarong and black top she was seen in before she left for her walk.

The Rakaia Gorge is a 32-minute drive from where her underwear and dog were found, and her body might have lain there forever had it not been for two men searching for cannabis plants. Her body was too decomposed to determine whether there had been a sexual attack, but it was obvious she had been killed by a single blow to the back of her head with a blunt weapon. There was no evidence of a prolonged assault or struggle.

Hundreds of suspects were identified and interviewed. A Commer van seen in the neighbourhood came under intense scrutiny, but was never positively identified, and there was also a focus on the