Perspective with Heather du Plessis-Allan: I'm surprised the police allowed the Tom Phillips documentary to happen

My overriding reaction to news that a Tom Phillips documentary is being made for Netflix is surprise.

I’m surprised that the police are still allowing this to happen - especially now that it’s confirmed the documentary will appear on a platform as globally dominant as Netflix.

Just think about how many people around the world will watch this. Imagine if the series takes off and becomes popular in the same way some true crime stories on Netflix do - think The Tinder Swindler. What happened after you watched that? Or after The Menendez Brothers documentary, or docudramas like Apple Cider Vinegar?

You started Googling, didn’t you? I know I did.

What do we think people around the world are going to find when they start googling the Marokopa kids? There is a real chance they could come across suppressed information.

And given how difficult it is to enforce suppression laws overseas, what do we think some of those global websites are going to do? There has to be a risk that some publishers abroad will release that suppressed material.

To me, this feels like rolling the dice - big time - on information surfacing in a way New Zealand law simply can’t control. If that happens, it could permanently limit these children’s ability to live lives that aren’t haunted by stories about what happened in the bush.

That’s why I’m so surprised the police aren’t just going along with this documentary but are reportedly actively supporting it. Let’s be clear - without police cooperation, this documentary would almost certainly struggle to be produced at the standard Netflix requires.

That makes this a very big risk for the police - and I don’t understand why they’re taking it. Why are the police so keen to help make a documentary about one of the saddest events in New Zealand’s history?

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