A new documentary series tells the story of a former Napier councillor accused of murder in Canada.

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In 2010, New Zealander Peter Beckett was on holiday in Canada’s Rocky Mountains, enjoying a relaxing afternoon fishing on Upper Arrow Lake. His Canadian schoolteacher wife Laura Letts-Beckett was with him, reading a book at one end of their small Zodiac inflatable while Beckett threw his fishing line in from the other. It was a hot day, and Letts-Beckett asked her husband to move the boat into the shade. As he drove toward the stony beach, focusing on the water behind him, Beckett heard a splash. When he turned around, his wife was gone.

This is the mysterious moment at the heart of In Cold Water: The Shelter Bay Mystery, a new three-part true crime series screening on Prime Video and Sky Open. Beckett – a former Napier city councillor – is the only witness to Letts-Beckett’s death, which initially is viewed as an accidental drowning. But Letts-Beckett couldn’t swim and wasn’t wearing a life jacket, and Beckett’s behaviour after his wife’s death arouses suspicion. One year after that fateful day on the lake, Beckett was charged with first degree murder.

There’s no doubt that the events that follow make for a gripping true crime docuseries. A New Zealander accused of murder on the other side of the world, and a troubled marriage between victim and suspect. A jailhouse informer who was paid by police, and who alleged that Beckett planned to kill five courtroom witnesses. A murder case based on circumstantial evidence and a journey through the courts that lasted a decade, involving trials and mistrials and appeals. And at its centre, an unusual, antagonistic suspect who is described as “his own worst enemy” but who protests his innocence at every turn.

“It’s not homicide or murder,” the murder-accused insists, “but was it accident or suicide?”

If you’re looking for the answer to that question, you won’t get it in In Cold Water. Rather, the series lays out the investigation, taking viewers through the events leading up to Letts-Beckett’s death and the bizarre twists and turns that occurred afterwards. We hear from Letts-Beckett’s friends and family, as well as detectives, forensic experts, lawyers and journalists (the case gained considerable media interest in both Canada and Aotearoa, and clips from RNZ and 1News feature heavily). Each interview offers a different account of Beckett, and reveals a variety of strange and shocking allegations.

Beckett’s account is the most compelling of them all. He met Letts-Beckett when she took one of his Unimog tours in Hawkes Bay in the mid 1990s, and their connection was instant and enduring. The documentary paints a picture of Beckett as a threatening figure, but there were no signs of physical violence on Letts-Beckett’s body when she died, no signs of struggle on the boat, and no tangible evidence that Beckett was involved in the death of his wife. This is why Beckett calls this case “the biggest miscarriage of justice, I think, in the world.”

While Letts-Beckett’s voice is heard in the documentary through her journals and letters, the loudest voice in In Cold Water is Beckett. The story of this vibrant, beloved woman who died either from a terrible accident or a terrible crime comes second to Beckett’s own narrative of a man tormented by the system. Rather than pay tribute to the life of Letts-Beckett, the final word goes to her husband, in what is possibly one of the most chilling moments of the entire series.

Rather than trying to convince us one way or another, In Cold Water asks: who do you believe? How would you behave in a moment of crisis? This is a case where the truth may well be stranger than fiction, and viewers are left to weigh up the evidence about Beckett’s innocence or guilt, much like the jurors did in his murder trials. Chilling, indeed.

In Cold Water: The Shelter Bay Mystery is available on Prime Video and screens free-to-air on Sky Open from 18-20 November at 8.30pm.