Snowtown

by Jeremy Pudney

  Police received the call at 2.18 p.m. Sixteen minutes later a patrol was on scene. As the police officers approached the house, two men were carrying furniture to a truck. The men claimed they were friends of Suzanne’s and were helping her move, the shorter, rotund fellow producing a key to the front door which he said Suzanne had given him.

  While the policemen had no reason to doubt the men’s story, one of the officers asked for their details and wrote them in his notebook:

  John Justin BUNTING

  30 years, dob 4/9/66

  Robert Joe WAGNER

  25 years, dob 28/11/71

  Suzanne Allen’s brother decided it was time to report her missing on 10 December 1996. Computer checks revealed that the last known police record of her was in January of that year, when she had been charged with assault.

  Suzanne’s co-accused were listed as John Justin Bunting and Robert Joe Wagner. The charges were later dropped.

  Missing persons investigators tried unsuccessfully to contact Bunting and Wagner, to see if they knew where Suzanne was.

  In February 1997 police inquiries revealed a bank account in Suzanne’s name. Regular withdrawals were occurring in the town of Murray Bridge, east of Adelaide. The mailing address for the account was also at Murray Bridge—a house occupied by John Bunting. When contacted, Bunting told police Suzanne was involved in an ongoing family feud and wanted nothing to do with her brother or anyone else.

  Within months of the missing persons report being lodged, police lost contact with Suzanne’s brother. He had apparently moved on without leaving new contact details. Unable to get in touch with him—and with a seemingly credible account of Suzanne Allen’s movements—the case was closed.

  Just over a year later, in April 1998, police reactivated their search for Suzanne Allen. Her sister, Joan Potts, had written to the Victorian Police Commissioner asking for help, and missing persons investigators in both that state and South Australia agreed to take another look.

  Once again the suggestion of a family feud seemed credible. Regular withdrawals were still being made from Suzanne’s bank account—still from Murray Bridge—and the car she had previously owned was now in the possession of a friend who said she’d recently spoken to Suzanne. The ‘friend’ was Elizabeth Harvey—John Bunting’s partner.

  Having taken over the family’s search for Suzanne after the death of their brother, Joan Potts was assured by police that her sister was alive and well. Perhaps, they suggested, Suzanne did not want to be found.

  Joan was not so sure.

  EIGHT

  It was late at night and Mark Haydon resented being there. As he sat in the ground floor interview room at the Elizabeth police station in Adelaide’s north, Haydon reckoned he’d made a mistake in agreeing to come in. After all, he wasn’t under arrest.

  An hour before, two detectives had visited Haydon’s house in the working-class northern suburb of Smithfield Plains and asked him to come to the police station. The detectives explained they were investigating the disappearance of his wife, Elizabeth Audrey Haydon.

  Elizabeth’s sister, Gail Sinclair, also went to the station to be interviewed. She lived in a garage at the back of Mark and Elizabeth’s home. Some days the house seemed very crowded—also living there were Elizabeth’s two sons from a previous relationship, William and Christopher, and Gail’s teenage son, Fred.

  In addition, Gail’s boyfriend, John Bunting, would often stay over. He was mates with Mark Haydon and the pair would spend a lot of time with another friend, Robert Wagner.

  Detective Greg Stone handed Mark Haydon a writing pad and pen, asking him to outline the events immediately before and after his wife’s disappearance. He told him to start by writing his full name, the time and date.

  Mark Ray Haydon 11.17 p.m. 26th November 1998

  Perhaps it was because he struggled with reading and writing, but Haydon took more than an hour and a half to write just over two pages:

  Approximately one week before my wife’s disappearance, I told her I was not happy with the way our house had been let become so untidy. I then went outside to work on my car…she vented her anger on her sister Gail, then went outside in tears. The day after this she commenced cleaning the house. I did not notice any tension between my wife and her sister apart from this one incident. Our marrage [sic] was reasonably happy up until her leaving me. Sometime she would go out in the morning and not return until mid afternoon without explination [sic].

  The day of our marrage [sic] breakup [this was the day Elizabeth vanished] I got up approx 9.00 a.m. My wife was already up and sitting in the lounge room having a drink of Coke. I think my sister-in-law and John Bunting were in the lounge room also. I had a drink and took my medication in the lounge room, and watched TV for a while.

  At around 11.00 a.m. I put my car behind the gates and changed the starter motor. Then about 12.30 p.m. I moved the car back into the driveway. I then washed my hands and went and layed [sic] down as I had been ill most of the previous week. About 3.00 p.m. I got up and started to install a dead bolt in the back door. My friend Robert Wagner had arrived while I was asleep and helped me for a while. At about 4.30 p.m. my wife came into the kitchen and started the evening meal. Approx 4.45 my sister-in-law asked me to take her to Reynella [in Adelaide’s southern suburbs] to meet someone about a dog, we left about 5.00 p.m. arriving about 7.00 p.m. We waited till about 8.30 then left to go home as no one had arrived there at the Reynella McDonald’s.

  On the way home I stopped at the telephones at the Bolivar Caravan Park to let my wife know we were on our way home. I could not get through so I stopped again at the phones outside the Salisbury Library. I tried to ring again and my friend John Bunting answered telling me that my wife was ranting and locked herself in our room. Gail and myself arrived home about 10.30 p.m. My friend [Bunting] then told me she [Elizabeth] had made a pass at him and she got upset when he refused her offer. I then went into her bedroom to speak to her and she accused me of sleeping with her sister Gail. I then denied the accusation and reminded her that we had never had the opportunity, and that I would not have done anything if I had. She then continued to accuse me and also called me lazy and good for nothing, I then left the room. My friend John and Gail then went out to get something to eat leaving me and my other friend Robert in the lounge room. While they were gone my wife came out of the bedroom and again accused me of being unfaithful and called me a lazy good for nothing son of a bitch, she then said she was leaving me and would ring her boyfriend [to] pick her up down the road somewhere.

  At about 2.00 a.m. I went to bed and approximately 4.00 a.m. [Elizabeth] returned home drunk, got into bed and passed out. I got up about 10.30, left my wife in bed alone. My friend John and Gail came in from Gails [sic] room about 11.00 a.m. and I told them she had returned. They went out to leave us alone to sort it out. My wife got up about 11.30 a.m. I asked her where she had been, who she had been with, all she would tell me was with someone I did not know. I asked her why she had done this and she accused me about sleeping with Gail again. She then said she was going out again, I told her to really think properly about what she was doing. She then told me I may as well go an [sic] visit my father at the nursing home and said she would wait until I returned but was gone when I got back about 4.00 p.m. as I also took a drive along the beach to think. I have not seen her since that day.

  MR Haydon.

  Garion Sinclair had always been worried by Mark Haydon’s darker side. Garion’s sister, Elizabeth Haydon, had married Mark in 1997, changing her name from Verna Sinclair.

  While the couple’s relationship seemed a happy one, it was not so for Elizabeth’s two children who lived with the couple. Mark Haydon would often swear at William and Christopher and slap them across the face, and the boys would often be forced to squat under a table or stay in their bedrooms as punishment for even minor wrongdoings. Haydon seemed to resent the boys and Garion wondered if they would be better off elsewhere, like the rest of Eliza
beth’s children.

  The last time Garion Sinclair saw Elizabeth was on the night of Friday, 20 November 1998. She and Haydon had dropped the boys at his house to spend the weekend. The children were to be picked up on Sunday.

  Sunday morning came and Garion received a telephone call from another of his sisters. She said Mark Haydon had called to tell her Elizabeth had ‘taken off’. That evening Haydon turned up at Garion’s house to collect the boys, but told a different story about Elizabeth’s whereabouts: he said she was home sleeping.

  The next day William and Christopher arrived back at Garion’s house, having walked almost two hours to get there: they told their uncle that Elizabeth was missing. When Garion confronted Haydon, his brother-in-law told him Elizabeth had come home drunk early Sunday morning then run off with a ‘boyfriend’ a few hours later. Haydon claimed Elizabeth had cleaned out his bank account, as well as his elderly father’s, before leaving.

  Garion Sinclair didn’t believe Mark Haydon’s story. Elizabeth had spent almost all of her time with Haydon, so it was difficult to imagine she’d had the opportunity to meet another man. Garion also didn’t believe she would leave William and Christopher behind. Elizabeth had been a poor mother in the past, but appeared to be getting her life together.

  On Wednesday, 25 November, Garion attended the Elizabeth police station to report his sister missing.

  Elizabeth Audrey Haydon. Date of birth 29 August 1961.

  Detective Senior Constable Greg Stone skimmed the missing persons file he had just been handed. It was the evening of 26 November and Stone was just starting a nightshift. The detective had been told this case was a priority because of fears for the woman’s safety.

  Stone was an inexperienced detective, but an intelligent, insightful man and a good cop. He began by making a few notes:

  Elizabeth Haydon—m/p. Mark Haydon—husband.

  4 Blackham Cr Smithfield Plains…

  Garion Sinclair—brother.

  Stone then telephoned Garion Sinclair, adding more information to his case notes:

  Claims Mark told him on Monday 23/11 that Elizabeth has taken a lot of money from his and his father’s bank account. Elizabeth’s children told Gary on Monday that they did not see Elizabeth on the Sunday when they went home.

  Gary’s worst fears are that Mark has murdered Elizabeth.

  An hour later Detective Stone and another officer visited Blackham Crescent and asked Mark Haydon and Gail Sinclair to come down to the station. In his own writing, Haydon detailed the events before and after his wife’s disappearance. Gail told a similar story—her statement was recorded in a separate interview room.

  Both Haydon and Gail had mentioned John Bunting. He too had been present on the day Elizabeth vanished, and Detective Stone decided he should be spoken to. Bunting was living in the town of Murray Bridge, east of Adelaide, so Stone had a local patrol call by and arrangements were made for him to meet with police and give a statement.

  Four days later John Bunting turned up at the Elizabeth police station to give his version of the events surrounding Elizabeth Haydon’s disappearance. With him was Robert Wagner, who had also been at the Haydons’ home in the hours before Elizabeth vanished. Both gave similar stories to Mark Haydon’s: Elizabeth had made a pass at Bunting, the couple had argued and Elizabeth had run off with another man.

  Bunting wrote his statement by hand. Wagner, who could barely read and write, gave a brief statement to a policeman before rushing off. He said he had somewhere else to be.

  After dealing with Bunting and Wagner, Detective Stone received a message to call a relative of Elizabeth Haydon. The caller was concerned about Elizabeth’s welfare and suggested evidence could be found in the Haydons’ house, prompting another visit by Detective Stone, this time with an accompanying officer. When the police arrived, only Gail Sinclair was home.

  ‘Despite her objections, the house was searched in her presence. During the search I located four firearms in the walk-in robe of the master bedroom…those firearms were seized,’ Detective Stone would later tell the court.

  ‘Whilst I was in the walk-in robe I located…a black folding purse which contained documents and cards relative to Elizabeth Haydon.’

  The discovery of the purse alarmed Detective Stone—if Elizabeth had left of her own free will, why would she leave her purse behind?

  The following day the detectives again visited the Haydons’ house, this time to search a garage in the back yard. The day before it had been locked and they hadn’t been able to get in. In the centre of the garage floor was a pit cluttered with car parts and clothes. Emanating from the pit was what Stone would later describe as a ‘peculiar odour’. He also noticed what he thought were insect casings on the floor.

  As the investigation intensified, there would be more searches of Mark Haydon’s home. Some involved specialist crime scene officers. Haydon, by now, was well aware that he was under suspicion. He didn’t like the attention—nor did Bunting and Wagner. They resented this pushy detective named Stone and they knew it was a risk to have him snooping around.

  NINE

  It was nothing more than a routine check. Missing Persons investigator Janet Forrest tapped into the police computer as she had done countless times before. This day, 27 November 1998, she was checking on the progress of a case being handled by detectives at Elizabeth CIB, in Adelaide’s north. They were tracking a missing woman named Elizabeth Haydon.

  As she scrolled through the notes in the detectives’ computerised journal, Constable Forrest could see the investigation was well under way:

  Missing Person Elizabeth Haydon. Address 4 Blackham Cres, Smithfield Plains.

  Husband Mark Haydon.

  Sister Gail Sinclair. Address also 4 Blackham Cres, Smithfield Plains.

  Sinclair’s boyfriend, John Bunting…

  The name caught Constable Forrest’s eye. John Bunting had come to the attention of Major Crime Branch detectives investigating the disappearance of Clinton Trezise and Barry Lane. It was a secret investigation, but one which she was privy to.

  John Bunting…

  The name also featured prominently in another missing persons file. The Suzanne Allen case had been reinvestigated only recently—Bunting had provided the seemingly credible explanation of Allen’s whereabouts.

  All of a sudden, it didn’t seem so credible.

  There was a flurry of activity in the Major Crime office from the moment the missing persons cases were linked. Priorities changed.

  Suspicion of foul play had surrounded the Clinton Trezise and Barry Lane disappearances, but there was no evidence of murder. A man named Robert Wagner had been filmed taking cash from Lane’s bank account, but that was evidence only of theft—fraud at best. Wagner and his friend, John Bunting, had been the targets of limited police surveillance operations which had yielded little more.

  Detective Craig Patterson, with the help of his partner, Brian Swan, had been working the case whenever time permitted. Whenever resources permitted.

  The discovery made by the observant missing persons investigator changed everything. Bunting and Wagner were now tied to three different cases. Three missing people.

  The most recent disappearance was Elizabeth Haydon’s. The prime suspect—her husband, Mark—was best of mates with John Bunting and Robert Wagner.

  Detective Patterson met with the suburban detectives assigned to the Elizabeth Haydon case, but didn’t reveal all. He warned his colleagues to take the matter seriously, to consider murder the most likely scenario. Patterson told them he was investigating other matters in which Bunting and Wagner were persons of interest.

  The suburban detectives were told to continue the Elizabeth Haydon investigation without alerting the suspects to the parallel inquiries. Regular reports were to be sent to Major Crime.

  For Detective Craig Patterson, it had all begun fifteen months ago with a seemingly straightforward case review. Then, on 6 February 1999, the disappearances of Clinton Dougla
s Trezise, Barry Wayne Lane, Suzanne Phyllis Allen and Elizabeth Audrey Haydon were officially declared Major Crimes.

  The declaration meant that Patterson would finally be given the resources he needed. Applications were made for telephone intercepts; Wagner and Bunting’s home and mobile telephones were tapped, designated operators listening ‘live’ to each call. Relevant call recordings were then passed to Major Crime, where detectives would review them. Most often it was Patterson who would listen.

  Specialised police surveillance teams began ‘working’ the suspects more frequently.

  Police revisited the service station where Robert Wagner had been withdrawing cash from Barry Lane’s account. A new camera had been installed and Wagner was filmed making withdrawals on seven separate occasions. Each time he emptied the Lane account of the welfare payment, which had just been paid in.

  Major Crime detectives had also been looking more closely at the disappearance of Suzanne Allen. Like Barry Lane, a government pension was being paid directly into her bank account. Centrelink, the government agency that pays pensions and unemployment benefits, told police that Suzanne Allen’s correspondence was mailed to a post office box. Her residential address was recorded as 75 Barker Crescent, Smithfield Plains.

  Police quickly discovered that the address didn’t exist.

  Checks with the Australian Central Credit Union revealed regular withdrawals from Suzanne Allen’s bank account, the most recent from an ATM in Murray Bridge—the town where John Bunting lived.

  In February 1999 Bunting moved from Murray Bridge to the northern Adelaide suburb of Craigmore. The very next withdrawal from Suzanne Allen’s account was made in the nearby suburb of Munno Para.