Six people have gone missing in the small town of Piha. A true-crime documentary is asking questions – and ruffling some feathers
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On a squally winter night 21 years ago, 25-year-old Iraena Asher vanished from an isolated beach community, one hour west of New Zealand’s largest city, Auckland.
“It was a terrible night like this,” Julia Woodhouse – one of the last to see Asher – tells the Guardian one afternoon in early July, as the rain lashes the windows of her Piha home.
Asher had been partying at a house in Piha when she called police because she felt unsafe. When the police told Asher a taxi was on its way, she pleaded for them to send officers instead, telling them: “I can’t do this by myself”. That was the last time the police spoke with her. The taxi, meanwhile, went to the wrong address.
