Murder in the Pacific

In 1985, while the rest of the world is starting to use computers, New Zealand police didn’t even have a fax machine, nor did they have a clue how to use one. This episode tells the story of how a young group of detectives, with no prior experience of international crime, caught some of the world’s most sophisticated and highly-trained military saboteurs.

International criminals operating in New Zealand might have expected to go unnoticed but just one day after two explosions sink the Greenpeace ship Rainbow Warrior, police are overwhelmed with calls from locals who have spotted unusual goings-on. One witness leads them to Swiss couple, Alain and Sophie Turenge, who claim to be on a tourist trip. They come in voluntarily for questioning but their inability to answer simple questions leads the police to question their identities.

Meanwhile, four handsome French sailors have been spotted enjoying time with locals on the North Island. They leave a trail of clues – and women – in their wake but when the police catch up with them they have insufficient evidence to hold them and the quartet slip through their fingers.
Meanwhile the Turenge couple are found to have false passports and the New Zealand police start to suspect more powerful forces are at play.

Convinced that they have something to do with the bombing but aware that they couldn’t have placed the explosive devices themselves, the hunt intensifies for the bomber.

Murder in the Pacific, BBC Two, 9pm