I know there are many here who believe a flight of this nature should never have taken place in a piston single at night.
That said, the aircraft type was designed for this type of mission when flown IFR by a suitably qualified and licenced pilot.
If this flight had been planned using this aircraft, but IFR using the airways at a sensible flight level, it would almost certainly have ended uneventfully.
How difficult would it have been in practice to have found a suitably qualified CPL/IR to captain this flight?