by Bob O'Brien
‘When did the girls actually arrive home, then?’ Sam Bass asked.
‘About an hour after we got there; it must have been around 1.00 or 1.30 a.m.’ von Einem answered. Sam methodically typed his replies onto a foolscap piece of paper.
‘What did you do while waiting for the girls to come home?’
‘We played music and had a drink. In fact, George drank a fair bit. He was drinking beer and brandy.’
‘Who are the girls that live in the house and returned after you arrived?’
‘ “P” and “K”.’
‘What are their last names?’
‘I don’t know; they’re just friends.’
He didn’t know their last names but he could take a boy to their homes after midnight. What a lot of bullshit, I thought when I read what he said.
‘What happened after the girls arrived at the house?’
‘We were all drinking and playing music and sitting around talking.’
‘During the evening, or at anytime while George was in your company, did you give him any type of tablet?’
‘No. No.’
‘Did you take any sort of tablet?’
‘Yes.’
‘What sort of tablets do you take?’
‘Rohypnol, Serepax and Sinequan.’
‘Where do you get these drugs from?’
‘They are prescribed to me by my doctor.’
‘What are they for?’
‘Rohypnol is for sleeping. Serepax is to calm me down and Sinequan is an anti-depressant.’
‘Why do you need all these tablets?’
‘I have some personal problems and they help me. I have taken them for a long time.’
‘Did you at any time give any of these tablets to the boy?’
‘No.’
‘What happened in relation to the boy while you were in the house?’
‘He went into the bedroom with P and I think he had sex with her.’
‘Did you go into the bedroom with P and the boy?’
‘No.’
‘How long did George and P remain in the bedroom?’
‘I can’t remember.’
‘What happened after this?’
‘P came out of the bedroom and we went on drinking.’
‘The boy has admitted he had sex with P but states you were in the bedroom with them when the act started. What have you to say about this?’
‘This is not right.’
‘Did you go into the bedroom at all with George?’
‘Yes.’
‘Which bedroom did you go into?’
‘P’s bedroom at the front of the house.’
‘What were the circumstances that caused you to go into the bedroom with George?’
‘P went to sleep on the lounge where we were all talking and drinking and the others went to their rooms, so I went and slept on her bed.’
When I read the transcript of the interview, my immediate question was ‘Why would P want to sleep on the lounge and not go back to bed with George?’ She slept on the lounge because she knew that von Einem wanted a go at him.
‘Did the boy come out of the bedroom with P?’
‘No. He was pretty drunk and had gone to sleep or passed out.’
‘How do you know this?’
‘P said he had gone to sleep or something like that, when she came out of the bedroom.’
‘After P went to sleep on the lounge then you went into her bedroom. Is that correct?’
‘Yes.’
‘What time was it that you went into the bedroom?’
‘I have no idea. We were talking and drinking for a long time.’
‘When you went into the bedroom, what happened?’
‘I got on top of the bed and went to sleep.’
‘Where was the boy?’
‘In the bed, asleep.’
‘During that night, did you sexually interfere with the boy?’
‘No. I never touched him.’
‘Did you actually get into the bed with him?’
‘No, I slept on top of the bed all night and when I woke up he was still asleep and under the blankets. I was still lying on top of the bed.’
‘I have had the boy medically examined and there is a scratch on the boy’s anus. Have you any idea how it got there?’
‘No, unless it happened when P had sex with him.’
‘What time did you wake up?’
‘I have no idea. It was late in the day.’
‘Where was the boy when you woke up?’
‘On the bed, asleep.’
‘What did you do?’
‘I got up and went out into the lounge. I think I had a shower and talked to the others.’
‘When you say it was late in the day, what time roughly was it?’
‘Late afternoon; I must have slept most of the day.’
‘What happened to the boy?’
‘He must have slept all day too and some of the night, as it was dark when he got up.’
‘Why would a person sleep so long?’
‘We drank over three-quarters of a bottle of brandy and was also drinking beer, and I think he was very drunk.’
Yes, I thought, but it was more than beer and brandy. He was popped some pills — Mandrax. The same drug that was given to Mark Langley and Richard Kelvin.
‘What happened when he got up?’
‘He had a shower and got dressed.’
‘Did he do that on his own?’
‘No, he was still pretty drunk and we helped him shower and get dressed. He said that he was still sleepy and he laid on the lounge.’
‘How did the boy eventually get home?’
‘He was placed in a taxi and sent home.’
‘Who paid for the taxi?’
‘I did.’
‘How much did the taxi cost?’
‘$15.’
‘There was a piece of paper with the boy’s address written on it. Who wrote this?’
‘I don’t know. I gave it to the taxi driver.’
‘How old do you think the boy, George, is?’
‘Seventeen or eighteen years old.’
‘Did the boy go with you willingly at all times?’
‘Yes.’
‘Was the boy held forcibly at the house at Alberton at anytime?’
‘Definitely not. He got drunk and fell asleep.’
‘The boy has alleged in a statement to the police that you gave him two tablets that he believed from what you told him were No Doze tablets. Did you give him any sort of tablet?’
‘No, I did not.’
If this was correct, why was he out to it for so long? I asked myself. At least we had another clue as to how these men got others to take drugs — telling the boys they were No Doze tablets.
‘Why would the boy say this if it did not happen?’
‘Probably to explain why he had been away so long. I don’t really know. I did not give him any tablet or anything. He just drank a lot of alcohol.’
Von Einem was staying very cool-headed in the interview — just as he was with Trevor and me when we interviewed him. This was not a bad answer. This guy has an answer for everything.
‘Is there anything else you wish to say about what happened with the boy?’
‘No. I have nothing to hide.’
‘I will be making further enquiries in relation to the incident involving the boy and I may well want to speak to you again about it. Do you understand?’ said the detective.
‘Yes.’
We got a team together and visited the house that George was taken to by von Einem. Here was a boy who was picked up by von Einem and later found to have Mandrax in his system. George was still adamant that when he had sex with one of the women von Einem was in the room when it happened. We needed to speak to the people who were living there. Obviously, they knew our main suspect.
The house was at Alberton. It had a low front wall. There was a path leading from the small gate to the home. The iron roof
had been replaced with another one, which was shaped to look like roof tiles. The front door was in the centre of the house and there were two large windows on either side of it, which let light into the front bedrooms. An oil fire now filled the fireplace. The third bedroom ran down the side of the house, the kitchen sat at the rear and the toilet and the laundry filled up the rear of the house. The Hills Hoist sat in the centre of the rear lawn. The house belonged to the same era as von Einem’s home; it wasn’t as bland but it was more run down.
We didn’t kick the doors down; the visit was low key and we made a cursory search of the house and yard. Different detectives were given the job of speaking to the three occupants. The most interesting thing we learned from the visit was about the three people who lived there. Two were transsexuals: persons who had changed from being men to women and the third was a man who was a homosexual.
P, the one George had sex with, was a transsexual. People might wonder how someone can have sex with a transsexual. It might seem weird, but P wasn’t ugly and most couldn’t tell the difference.
P, the transsexual, was taken to the Port Adelaide Police Station where I interviewed her about the drugging of George. I arrested her and she was charged with raping the boy. The arrest occurred because I believed she committed a crime but the arrest also was designed to put pressure on von Einem’s friends, to encourage them to talk to us about him. P’s arrest and charge got a little bit of attention in the media. ‘Woman rapes boy’ was the headline to the story and there were a few comments from men in the community.
‘I wouldn’t mind being raped by a woman,’ was the general tone of what some said, but they didn’t know the full story.
The others were interviewed about their knowledge of von Einem and our knowledge of the man increased a bit more. Our crime scene examiners took photographs and samples of fibres around the house but Des Phillips’ first impressions didn’t raise our expectation that we would find anything interesting. Also, the case against P was dismissed in the Port Adelaide Court when no evidence was put forward. There were difficulties proving that P had knowledge of the drugging and that she actually forced herself on George.
Trevor and I did one more raid shortly after the drugs were found in the boys. We visited the house of an Adelaide businessman, an associate of von Einem, and the man who owned the car that was parked in the driveway of von Einem’s home the night of our first visit. He lived in one of Adelaide’s ‘money’ suburbs. The businessman already had been named as someone who should be spoken to about the missing boys. He had been mentioned in one of the hundreds of phone calls we received at Major Crime but we did not know he was an associate of von Einem. However, when Trevor interviewed von Einem, he said that he knew the businessman and when I saw the vehicle parked in the driveway of von Einem’s home that night, this confirmed the relationship between the two men.
Trevor led the raid of the businessman’s house and shop on 19 September 1983. The team was assembled and the group knew the routine. Trevor and I would go to the house and introduce ourselves while secondary team detectives, crime scene examiners, fingerprint experts and photographers would be parked around the corner waiting for the radio to call them to the house. If no-one was home, we would wait for the suspect to come home or we’d leave and come back another time when we thought the occupant would be there. We wouldn’t go in without the occupant being present, otherwise the courts would criticise our actions and could discount any evidence that we might find.
The businessman was home, but he told us very little. He wouldn’t give a statement but said he was a homosexual and had been a friend of von Einem for years. He denied any knowledge of the murders.
Immediately after searching the businessman’s home we went to his shop, a two-storey building on one of Adelaide’s main shopping roads. He had a young man working for him in his shop, also a homosexual. The business operated on the ground floor and administration was carried out upstairs. One of the rear second-floor rooms, however, was not used for administration. In it, a bare mattress was laid on the floor; nothing else was in the room.
That mattress would be able to tell some stories, I thought. Why would he have a mattress in a room of his business premises?
We seized the mattress but there was nothing on it to provide us with any evidence that was going to solve any of our murder investigations.
The businessman’s cars were checked and samples of fibres were taken from the seats, boots and blankets in the cars. Police surveillance was placed on the businessman and he was followed over a lengthy period of time. His behaviour was almost compulsive/obsessive in the way that he would seek out male company. He would open up his business at the same time in the morning and close it punctually for lunch at twelve o’clock for an hour. He would drive his car to Number One beat and see what was happening there before checking out the other beats. At the end of his lunch break he would return to work. Although he lived very close to his business premises, the procedure would be repeated at the end of the day after he closed. He searched daily for young men to pick up.
Whenever he went out to a function at night, the businessman would go home via the beats. I was talking to one of the surveillance officers and he described how he was following our man in the city. This time he was walking along King William Street in the middle of the business district and a young boy was selling papers on the corner of King William and Grenfell Streets. The pedestrian lights turned red and the businessman stopped on the footpath back from the lights so he could ‘perv’ on the boy. When the lights did change for pedestrians to cross the road, the businessman remained where he was. He did not cross the road but remained where he was, perving on the boy. He missed a full cycle of lights before he moved on.
A young homosexual male was another associate of von Einem. He was young and, like most young boys, he was experimenting with life. He was trying out drugs and sex but the sex involved other men. He was of medium height and reasonably good looking. His youth did not prevent him from understanding the sexual desires of men and he accommodated their needs — for money.
This young man met von Einem on the banks of the Torrens at Number One beat on a weekend and, soon after, he moved into a unit at Collinswood, less than four kilometres from North Adelaide and the River Torrens. The unit was one of a number of modern apartment blocks that were being built in the area.
A phonecaller had suggested we should pay the young man a visit. Detectives Peter Woite and David Hunt visited the unit. The flat was the largest unit in a small block of flats. They did not raid the place — we need more information than an anonymous telephone call to kick down a door. There needs to be more evidence than that, such as a person having a criminal record for child abduction.
I interviewed the young man for four hours at the Angas Street police building. He said he was a homosexual but denied being a prostitute, although he did agree that some men gave him money but he said that the money was gifts and not given for sexual favours. He, too, denied knowing anything about the murders. Unfortunately, the visit to his unit and the interview revealed nothing new.
The initial raids were finished. It was time to regroup and consider what we had and what was to be the next move. Des and Ivan, the crime scene examiners, had to sort out the physical evidence, the samples of fibres and material that had been collected from the various locations. The teams of detectives still had a lot of inquiries to make, many relating to von Einem but most dealing with other leads. We were still trying to find evidence of snuff movies, and other names were being followed as potential sources who might know about the murders. Also, there were some interesting observations being made by Des and Ivan. They were showing just how much murder investigation is a team effort.
Von Einem denied knowing or having anything to do with Richard Kelvin when he was first interviewed on 28 July 1983. However, with many police investigations, once the right suspect is found, the case gets stronger and stronger. We now had evidence that von E
inem was picking up and drugging young boys but that didn’t mean that he killed boys.
As the weeks and months passed following the visit to von Einem’s home Des Phillips had dried the clothing of Richard Kelvin and searched for trace elements. He handed over tiny fragments of paint, small pieces of coloured fibre and hair to the forensic scientists. Des, Ivan and the forensic scientists were very cautious. The Splatt Royal Commission, which recently challenged the evidence provided by police and forensic scientists, was still very fresh in their minds. However, Des did indicate that the fibres on Richard’s clothing were similar in appearance to fibres from von Einem’s home but he wasn’t the expert. Sandra Young from the Forensic Science Lab would have to check them.
There were also hairs which were found on Richard’s clothing that were starting to look interesting. The majority of the hairs on Richard’s clothing were his own but there were a few hairs that were different from Richard’s and they looked very much like those hair samples that were taken from von Einem! If we could show the fibres and hair matched, then it would prove that our main suspect, Bevan Spencer von Einem, was with Richard Kelvin. We might just have a case.
Now it was time to visit a few of von Einem’s other associates and other people who had been nominated as possible suspects. There was the lawyer, the doctor, the second person whom von Einem said was one of his best friends, another transvestite and a couple of others that needed to be visited just as we had done with von Einem. Five raids were planned to happen on the morning of 12 October 1983.
Trevor Kipling planned and organised the raids. Two detectives were given a nominated suspect to interview, and a crime scene examiner was allocated to go with the detectives. If there was more than one suspect at an address, then only one crime scene examiner went to the address. Resources were starting to be stretched thin by this time and we had to manage as best we could. Also, the raids were planned to occur at the same time to prevent different suspects ringing one another and warning each other what was happening.
On that day, Trevor and I returned to von Einem’s home. After we arrived, von Einem phoned his lawyer, Helena Jasinski. Trevor explained the reason for our new visit to the house and she advised her client not to say anything. He wasn’t talking anyway and we didn’t expect him to. Helena Jasinski followed us into the house and was present as we seized the bedspread from von Einem’s bed and pulled up the carpet from his bedroom floor. Helena and von Einem objected, claiming our actions were unusual, but we knew that it was going to be important, as fibres on Richard Kelvin’s clothing were looking more and more certain to be from von Einem’s bedroom. We didn’t have to pull up carpet from the passageway and lounge as a carpet square made of the same material was laying in the passageway near the front door.