The Good Cop

by Justine Ford

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  Twenty-five-year-old Mersina Halvagis was stabbed to death by serial killer Peter Dupas as she tended her grandmother’s grave one spring day in 1997. Her father, George Halvagis, says Ron didn’t even work on Mersina’s case, yet always lent him a sympathetic ear. ‘He personally ensured that my daughter Mersina’s case remained open and all evidence was re-investigated,’ George says. ‘This resulted in a conviction and a measure of closure for the family now that justice has prevailed.’

  Halvagis says Ron dedicated his life to making society ‘safer and better’, and has helped many families of victims in his personal time. ‘He’s a humane and compassionate person who deserves public recognition. He’s mixed with so many broken-hearted victims.’

  ‘He’s the greatest, Ron. He’s a man of great character and victims just love him,’ says Noel McNamara, who runs the Crime Victims Support Association with his wife, Bev McNamara. Noel and Bev’s eldest daughter, Tracey, was murdered in 1992 and the couple have since devoted their lives to helping other families in similar circumstances.

  ‘People never forget Ron once he’s helped them,’ Bev says. ‘[As the family member of a murder victim] you know he’s very interested in you. He gives you everything. You’ve got his whole attention and he’s so gentle to people and follows through. He answers every phone call. He tells you things as they are, and that’s what I like about him. And you know you can trust him with your life.’

  Jo-Ann Adams, whose seventeen-year-old son Gary was murdered in 2003, is grateful to Ron for cracking her son’s case when it might otherwise have gone unsolved. In 2011, the desperate mum approached Ron at a fundraiser and persuaded him to look into the case. At the time Gary was listed as a missing person, but Ron discovered that the teenager had been killed, and later that year arrested Gary’s stepfather, John Xypolitos, for the murder. In 2013 a jury found Xypolitos guilty of bashing Gary to death with a hammer, and he was sentenced to a non-parole period of twenty-four years. ‘If it hadn’t been for Ron, Gary’s case might still be sitting in a box somewhere,’ Jo-Ann says.

  A result like that might not have been possible had it not been for Ron setting such high standards for himself and his crew. ‘He did keep a very high bar, which was fantastic when you achieved it,’ Birch says.

  It earned Ron the nickname ‘The Great Man’. He didn’t care for the moniker because he maintained he was just doing his job, but as the guilty verdicts stacked up, he lived up to the title.

  Former Homicide detective Tim Peck met Ron in 2005. One of the cases they worked on together was the cold case disappearance of twenty-two-year-old Elisabeth Membrey, a casual bartender who was hoping to embark on a career as a journalist. ‘For me the most outstanding feature that Ron displayed was “accurate empathy”,’ he says. ‘I came across this phrase while studying a psychotherapy course and each time the phrase was used in context it reminded me of Ron. It is about the ability to show humility, to accept another human being for what they are, and to provide a space for that person to feel safe regardless of the circumstances. There are many counsellors, therapists and other mental health professionals who spend their whole career trying to develop this skill – Ron has it in spades.’

  As time went on, Ron became far more than a mentor and boss to Peck. ‘There is a bond that is created when dealing with such sensitive and emotional issues that arise in homicide investigations that goes further, in my view, than “normal” police camaraderie. This was particularly the case when dealing with Ron. He became the sounding board for all sorts of work-related issues and was available to provide advice or support, regardless of his own busy commitments. He was available at times to his own detriment, tremendously giving, but always open, transparent and dependable.’

  When Peck went through a dark period in his personal life and left the force in 2014, his former senior sergeant did not let him down. ‘It was Ron I went to in crisis and he has since helped me through the rehabilitation process and continues to provide unconditional support and guidance,’ Peck says. ‘The accurate empathy was evident but this time I was the recipient, and I took great comfort from that. The outcome may have been tragically different but for his influence, support and presence.’

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  The media also noticed there was something exceptional about Ron, and it wasn’t just because of the high number of cases he took to trial but about the way he behaved. The results naturally followed.

  Leading Australian crime writers, John Silvester from the Age and Keith Moor from the Herald Sun, both agree that one of the things that made Ron so special was the way he treated everyone with respect. ‘He goes beyond the call of duty,’ Moor says, revealing that Ron has been known to stay in contact with victims’ relatives for thirty or forty years.

  Silvester remembers driving to a fundraiser with Ron, who spent most of the trip on the phone to an informer who had given evidence in a case some ten years earlier. ‘He was having trouble with his neighbours over a fence,’ Silvester says. Ron was trying to help him. ‘It was an old case and this bloke was no longer of any use to him,’ Silvester explains. Yet there he was, ‘trying to negotiate some little thing’.

  Silvester is also aware of an occasion in which Ron may have prevented bloodshed. After a man was killed during a feud between rival crime families, Ron approached the victim’s mother. ‘He said words to the effect of, “I’m not promising I’ll solve it but I’m not interested in your [criminal] background. I will give it all I can”,’ Silvester reveals. ‘And she spoke to the sons and said, “You let this man do his job”. So he might have stopped a war.’

  Moor says Ron recognised early on that the media is not the enemy and that it can be used as an investigative tool. ‘He’s old-school in that he believes in telling people as much as he can about the crime,’ Moor explains. ‘Ron is a great believer that it only takes one call to Crime Stoppers to solve a case.’

  The way Ron sees it, a good police officer makes a connection with the person they’re talking to, whether colleagues, victims’ loved ones, suspects, witnesses, or members of the community who may be able to help crack a case.

  How an investigator talks and the kinds of questions they ask can be critical. It is the very basis of how they gather information.

  And, of course, crimes can only be solved, Ron insists, through information. While information may come from forensics, it also comes from people. Keep people onside, be straightforward and do not backflip on promises: that is the key to a police officer’s success. It was certainly the key to Ron’s. In his twenty-five years at Homicide, Ron estimates around seventy-five per cent of all the suspects he interviewed either made admissions or full confessions, an astonishing figure and a direct result of his progressive approach to formal interviews. While some have raised an eyebrow at what they consider a ‘touchy-feely’ style, the numbers do not lie.

  For Ron, it was about giving much-needed answers to those who needed them most – the families of the victims.

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  Question, answer. Question, answer. When Ron first started in the job in 1974, that was how interviews were conducted. Officers would ask a question, wait for the interviewee’s answer, type it on a clunky Facit typewriter, then move on to the next question. There was no connection between the police officers and suspects, and the rudimentary three-page records of interview, containing questions and answers, reflected that.

  By the late 1970s, police were permitted to take slightly longer statements, and suspects were required to read them back before signing off on their statement. If a suspect was illiterate, another police officer would read back the interview before getting their assent.

  Ron noticed that his Homicide boss, Detective Senior Sergeant Brian McCarthy, had a different approach. ‘Brian had a good manner in the way he spoke to suspects,’ Ron says. ‘As I’ve said before, it was like someone coming to a priest for a conversation. He’d
have a fairly relaxed manner. He showed me that if you were authentic and straightforward, you had a better connection with them.’

  Once Ron was granted permission to conduct interviews at the Homicide Squad, he followed his boss’s example. ‘Prior to sitting down and doing a typed interview we’d often have a conversation where the suspect was cautioned and we’d take copious written notes of what they were saying,’ Ron says. ‘The person might actually admit to the crime before you got to the more formal stage.’

  The pre-interview, if it could be called that, was controversial. ‘There were allegations that the conversation before the formal interview didn’t take place,’ Ron says. ‘It was often put to you that it was a fabrication of what was said.’

  Around the mid-1980s, Victoria Police began tape-recording every interview. ‘People were cautioned, the tape recorder was put on and everything that was said in the room was recorded,’ Ron says. The new process led to longer interviews, yet Ron noticed that officers still overlooked key aspects of cases. ‘By the late 1980s I’d realised there was no formal training in interviewing other than the question–answer, question–answer approach. You either picked up good traits from good operators or picked your own style and put it together.’

  Ron believed the force could do better. ‘By 1994, when I returned to the Homicide Squad after leaving the job, the Homicide Squad alone had moved to video-recording interviews with audio.’

  It was around this time that Ron started to develop and reinforce his own style, predominantly based on what he’d seen McCarthy do. ‘It was about treating people you’re interviewing – especially suspects – fairly, and having some sort of connection with them.’ In practice it meant that Ron often started an interview by offering a suspect a coffee, or asking if they wanted to smoke. ‘Most would say no, but then when I said I would have a coffee and ask, “Are you sure you don’t want one?” they would nearly always have one with me,’ Ron says.

  When Allan Birch joined Ron’s crew in 2005, he’d never seen a detective take such an informal approach. Initially, the former Armed Robbery Squad detective found it ‘distasteful’ when he saw Ron put his arm around a suspect. But he quickly realised that humanity was the secret to the experienced homicide investigator’s success. Plus, not all suspects are guilty. ‘Ron would always say, “Do not bring your prejudice. Don’t bring your hypothesis and try to make the evidence fit it”,’ Birch recalls. It didn’t take long for Birch to realise that by following Ron’s example, investigators could get more information out of suspects than by standing over them.

  From 2007, conscious that Australia did not have an interview model, Ron began studying interview techniques, which took him overseas and started conversations with police in other countries.

  Meeting police from around the world was enlightening. ‘I found out that London had had an interviewing model for several years, Brazil had had one for around eight years, and New Zealand had adopted a model similar to London’s,’ Ron says.

  It’s about time Australia got up to speed, he thought. Upon their return to Australia, Ron and Detective Senior Sergeant Chris O’Connor arranged for an expert from London to share their method with a small group of Victorian police. ‘One thing about Ron, he would never sit back on his laurels. He’s always developing himself,’ Birch says, adding that everything Ron learnt led to better outcomes.

  Ron was highly impressed by the overseas models and believed techniques from both England and Canada should be implemented in Victoria. ‘So Chris O’Connor and I got together again and we developed an interview training package,’ Ron says, adding that he had already started using aspects of both models in his own interviews.

  In customising the training package, Ron and O’Connor meshed the first three elements of the English PEACE model – Preparation and Planning, Engage and Explain, and Account – with the second part of the Canadian model, which was Interrogation. It wasn’t about yelling and screaming at a suspect. ‘The interrogation, or monologue, is about having a one-on-one conversation with the suspect,’ Ron says.

  ‘During this process, you might have a break, then come back into the room. The first part of what you might say is an accusation. For example, “There is no doubt in my mind that you’re involved in this death”.’ The investigator might then go from standing to sitting and is most likely looking the suspect in the eye. ‘I might then say something like, “I’ve spent some time with you. I don’t think you’re a bad person but you’ve made a bad choice. Your emotions have outrun your intelligence”.’ At that point, the investigator might find a way to connect with the suspect. ‘So you might say something like, “I know you’ve been having financial trouble, and I know you’ve been fighting with your partner”.’

  During the accusatory phase, Ron says an innocent man will react strongly – Peter Smith was a good example. ‘But the person who’s involved won’t protest,’ Ron says, ‘because they’re only confirming what they know.’

  Ron started to teach his crew the method he and O’Connor had adapted and fine-tuned. Then Ron did something that rattled a few old-school investigators: he removed the table from the interview room. ‘What I’d learnt from the study I did was that a table is a barrier to communication,’ he explains. ‘And I also went to a method of conducting interviews on your own.’ In the past, two detectives had always been present during interviews but it was no longer necessary as a video camera captured everything. Ron’s new approach gave interviewers an opportunity to have a one-on-one conversation with their suspects.

  The key, Ron told his troops, was authenticity. Suspects could smell insincerity a mile off. Ron didn’t want his crew mimicking him either: they had to be themselves. ‘You’ve got to be present in the room. Sometimes you’ve got to show a bit of yourself and be genuine, because if you don’t, you’ll never be successful.’

  Ron had two other pertinent sayings: ‘There are two things that cost you nothing – the ability to listen, and the ability to understand.’ He encouraged those he taught not to interrupt the suspect, and to put themselves in their shoes.

  Around 2010, Victoria Police started to formalise the training method, and Ron led a three-day course teaching practical interviewing skills to officers from the Crime Department. It was very popular and, over four years, he trained 386 detectives.

  The new interviewing method was not without opposition. It came as a great surprise to some of the state’s more conservative lawyers when they saw Ron wearing jeans and a t-shirt during a videotaped interview. ‘Again, it was about having a connection, about coming to the suspects’ level, but still being professional,’ he says. ‘I explained it had been done in London for sixteen years and we had a similar legal system. I was totally complying with the Crimes Act, which included telling the suspects their rights and cautioning them.’

  In one instance, Ron purchased two armchairs and placed fishing magazines and a packet of cigarettes on a coffee table. It was unorthodox, but Ron knew his suspect liked fishing and smoked, and figured he might open up if he was in a familiar environment. Ron thinks he flicked through the magazines during a break; it seemed to relax him.

  Ron was no Mr Plod when it came to cautioning suspects either. ‘I’ve gotta tell you what your rights are,’ he’d say. ‘You might’ve watched a lot of television. You might’ve watched a lot of American shows. I’ve gotta tell you, you’re a suspect in this person’s death. You’ve got a driver’s licence – that’s a privilege, and it’s something you could lose. But I want to tell you that your rights are something no one can take from you.’ Ron would then tell the suspect they had a right to total silence. ‘You don’t have to tell me anything,’ he’d continue, ‘but what you do tell me could be used in evidence against you.’

  As Birch had witnessed early in his career at Homicide, Ron would sometimes put an arm around the suspect. ‘The [teaching] material says it’s high risk but it’s also high gain,
’ Ron says. ‘If the suspect feels it’s not genuine, that’s it. They’ll pick it up.’ But, as Ron learnt from experience, if suspects recognise it as a sincere gesture, they sometimes spill the whole story. ‘You’ve got to be empathetic but not sympathetic,’ Ron used to tell his students.

  Birch is full of praise for Ron’s interview technique. ‘It served me exceptionally well in my career at Homicide,’ he says. ‘We managed to get people who were last known to have seen a missing person alive admit to the killing, and take us to the body.’

  Ron also taught Birch how to read when a suspect wanted to get their crimes off their chest. ‘Many killers are not happy that they’ve killed someone. They’re terrified of the public outcry,’ he says. ‘But you can see in their demeanour and body language they want to admit to it.’

  The way Birch sees it, The Good Cop has no equal. ‘He would have to be the gun of homicide investigation and the most forward-thinking about possible interview techniques. He wasn’t scared to try something new if it was going to better the outcomes. It’s extremely unique in coppers.’ Ron’s methods were a means through which he could help others through his work. ‘In his career, those who really mattered in priority were the deceased and those who loved the deceased,’ Birch says.

  ‘He was so successful,’ Birch continues. ‘How can you not be won by that?’

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