Long Story Short

The disappearance of Olivia Hope and Ben Smart from a party on New Year's Eve, 1997, sparked one of New Zealand's biggest and most controversial police investigations.Their bodies were never found, but detectives believe they found the killer: Scott Watson.In part one of this two-part series, Eugene Bingham and Adam Dudding examine the critical evidence – hairs from a tiger-print blanket, hotly disputed eyewitness accounts, and the hunt for a mysterious missing ketch.

In 1967, a film was released that was so shocking, so arousing, and so full of rude words that the NZ censor banned men and women from sitting together when watching it.Adam Dudding and Eugene Bingham get out the popcorn and investigate what happened when the movie of James Joyce’s high-art novel Ulysses arrived downunder. It's tale of pearl-clutching, patriarchy and a punch-up in a projector-room.(Content warning: there are, unavoidably, quite a few rude words)

In June 2018, a man dressed in black was shot in the neck and left bleeding on a manicured lawn in the quiet town of Goochland, Virginia. His passport revealed he had travelled almost 18,000km from Auckland, New Zealand.Why did gamer Troy Skinner fly across the globe armed with a hunting knife, pepper spray, and duct tape? And what was he planning once he got there?Adam Dudding and Eugene Bingham unravel a bizarre tale of online obsession and legal loopholes.

Michael October, aka Mikaere Oketopa, has been in jail for years for a crime that he swears he didn't commit. Then one night, in a whirlwind of bomb threats, pizza deliveries and rioting skinheads, a group of inmates make demands that will change the trajectory of Oketopa's life.In part two of this two-part series, Adam Dudding and Eugene Bingham trace the long and frustrating campaign of Mikaere Oketopa and his supporters to prove his innocence.

After a 22-year-old woman is found murdered in the grounds of a school, police swiftly ID three key suspects.There’s just one problem: one of them says he was fast asleep on the other side of town at the time of the killing. And his co-accused swear they never met him. So why was Michael October (also known as Mikaere Oketopa) jailed all the same?In part one of this two-part series, Adam Dudding and Eugene Bingham kick the tyres of a baffling and disturbing murder investigation.

In 1986, the Russian cruise liner Mikhail Lermontov sank in the Marlborough Sounds.Decades later, questions still float around. Why was the ship sailing through dangerous waters? Why did the captain resist help to save it? And did Vladimir Putin really attend the inquiry?Adam Dudding and Eugene Bingham dive into a strange maritime mystery – a tale of tragedy, intrigue and Cold War paranoia.