The Stalk Club

by Neil Cossins

Although it had been a relatively quiet night on the streets of Parramatta and surrounding areas for a Saturday night, the puking drunks, the banging cell doors and the yelling and screaming of the drug induced ensured that Craig Thoms didn’t get a moments rest, let alone a moments sleep. He shared his five metre by five metre concrete floored cell with up to eight others depending on the comings and goings in the night and the noise was a constant and irritating companion. He sat in a corner and tried to get as comfortable as possible while he waited.

  After six hours of incarceration, at eight a.m. on Sunday morning, Detective Nelson arrived, signed for custody of one Craig Thoms and escorted him to an interview room on the first floor of the station. The interview room was minimalist to say the least and consisted of only one table, bolted to the floor, and four lightweight plastic chairs. Behind the obligatory one way mirror made of near half inch thick glass, was a viewing room that contained a video camera on a tripod which was also connected to two microphones located in the ceiling of the interview room.

  “Just wait in here please Mr Thoms. I’ll go and ask your Legal Counsel to join us. Won’t be long.”

  When Craig had initially been brought to the Parramatta police station he had been provided with a copy of the Yellow Pages to find himself legal representation. He had phoned a small firm of solicitors who had in the past successfully defended him against an assault charge. Although he wasn’t sure if the solicitor who had handled his case in the past was suitably qualified to defend him against a charge of murder he was the only person he could think of at the time. He had been relieved and grateful when the solicitor, Martin Warnock, arrived at his cell at seven a.m. and seemed confident of helping him navigate his way out of the hole he was now in, or at least that was the plan.

  Martin Warnock was around five feet six inches tall and barely nudged the scales past fifty kilograms. He had a penchant for wearing bowties and despite being forty-eight and still living with his mother, was still unsure of his sexuality. He had worked for the law firm Venter and Coward for ten years and while he only had a moderate success rate with his cases and brought very little new business into the firm, he remained upbeat about his chances of one day becoming a partner in the firm. He considered that the Fogliani murder was opportunity knocking.

  Initially, he had been lividly angry at being woken up so early on a Sunday morning to come down to the drab, brown brick, Parramatta Police Station, but when he learned the details of the case his ears pricked up at the enticing thought of being involved in the Emilio Fogliani murder case. It had already received a lot of airplay on television and radio news the previous day and had featured prominently in the newspapers. Journalists had been crawling over each other to get exclusives and eagerly pushed the angle that it might turn out to be yet another underworld gang war. Warnock was glad to get a foothold in the case before one of Sydney’s many high profile celebrity solicitors inevitably waded in to offer their services pro bono and get their face on the evening news.

  Warnock had spoken briefly to his client through the bars of the holding cell but was only able to elicit the barest of details as to why he had been arrested. He guessed correctly that he would learn a lot more about how strong the case was against his client during his first formal interview.

  Detective Nelson double checked that the recording equipment was working and entered the interview room with Robards trailing behind. A Detective Sergeant from the Parramatta station named Braxton, had been roped in to monitor the interview and the equipment from the viewing room.

  Detective Robards commenced the interview by getting Craig to confirm a number of details about who he was, his age and where he lived. He also explained what crime he was being questioned about. Robards was good at interviewing. His mind was quick and agile and if there was any confusion or mistake made by the suspect he would pick it up instantly and turn it against him. He was planning on using his favourite interviewing technique on Craig, which was to get him to repeatedly lie to questions that Robards already knew the answer to and then throw it all back in his face, backed up with irrefutable evidence. Often this resulted in the suspect panicking at being caught out and becoming easy pickings.

  “Craig can you tell me where were you at around ten p.m. last Friday night?”

  “I was at home.” During his six hours of incarceration he had given a lot of thought to his predicament and decided not to unnecessarily drag any of his friends into his problems by providing any information to the police about their Friday night activities.

  “All night?”

  “All night.” Craig responded.

  “Can anyone verify this?”

  “Unfortunately I was alone.”

  “Were you anywhere near St Peters at ten p.m. Friday night?”

  “Saint who?”

  “St Peters.”

  “No, like I said, I was at home all night. Don’t you hear too good?”

  “Have you been to St Peters in recent time, say in the last week or so?”

  “No.”

  “Look Detectives,” interrupted Warnock with all the authority he could muster, hoping his voice didn’t sound too squeaky. “With all due respect, if you have any evidence, please present it and stop wasting my client’s time.” Warnock was beginning to enjoy himself. This was a high profile investigation and he was a part of it, crossing swords with the big boys from the Homicide Squad. He had only defended in two homicide cases and although he was zero from two, he was hoping to improve on that statistic. He had already jotted down some notes on what he was going to say to the media who were hopefully encamped outside the station, waiting to hear from him. He casually looked down at his attire and mentally reprimanded himself for not having worn his blue cotton shirt with matching blue striped bowtie. Blue was definitely his best colour.

  Nelson watched on as Robards proceeded with the questioning. He knew there were many ways to get a suspect to confess to a crime they did or didn’t commit and that only the strongest minded people could resist a drawn out, exhaustive interrogation that could go on for days. In some interrogations he had been a part of with his old partner mad Mick Neale, Nelson had almost been prepared to confess to the crime himself if it meant that it would bring the interrogation to an end. Neale had seemingly limitless energy and would brow beat and intimidate a suspect over and over again, exhausting them until they just gave up and signed on the dotted line. Most members of the Homicide Squad thought the bear sized, bald headed, Neale was mad – thus the nickname - and Nelson wouldn’t have argued with them, but there was method to his madness. Although he was somewhat eccentric, he was persistent, thorough and diligent to an almost obsessive level in his approach to every case. And over the time they spent working together, his ways rubbed off a little onto Nelson. Nelson regarded Neale as the best cop he had ever worked with. He was generous with his time and made the effort to instruct Nelson at every turn. He found gaps in Nelson’s approaches and filled them with suggestions or guidance. Unfortunately Neale’s obsession with the job came at the expense of his personal life and he ended up taking the early retirement option eighteen months previously, worn out by twenty-five years in the job. He had been a powerfully built athlete in his youth but by the end, carried an enormous gut, tipped the scales at one hundred and thirty-five kilograms and had a blood pressure reading that gave his doctor heart palpitations.

  Nelson decided that as Crighton was seeking a quick result he didn’t want to drag the interrogation out for days and would play it as straight as he could with Craig and his weedy solicitor.

  “Mr Thoms, we do have a case against you. We wouldn’t have arrested you if we didn’t,” Nelson said quietly, almost apologetically. He reached into a large yellow envelope and laid photos from the crime scene neatly on the table facing Craig and his solicitor.

  “You want to know what we’ve got against you? Well here it is. We’ve got a pair of latex gloves found near the scene of the crime. These gloves had the blood of the decea
sed, Emilio Fogliani, on them.”

  “So what?” replied Craig.

  “On the inside of the gloves we extracted a set of fingerprints. These fingerprints were run through our NAFIS database and came up as a match to yours. You’ve been in a bit of trouble in the past.”

  Craig looked at him as if he was speaking another language, maybe Danish. He didn’t understand how the gloves, his gloves could exist at the crime scene.

  “And,” added a now smiling Robards as he closed the trap with a snap, “we’ve got a plaster cast of a footprint in the mud which looks like it’s a perfect match to those fancy hiking boots we found in your apartment. And, last but by no means least, we have video footage of you at the scene of the crime, at the time of the crime, taken from the security cameras at a warehouse next to where you murdered Emilio Fogliani. So much for your watching TV alibi hey?”

  Robards smiled triumphantly, starting to really enjoy himself as he slid the black and white images of Craig in the photos across the desk. Craig craned his neck down to the photos, not wanting to touch them, not wanting to believe they were real. He had to admit though, they were a pretty good likeness of him, an unmistakable likeness. Martin Warnock had gone quiet and still as if he’d been frozen in his seat. All of a sudden he wasn’t so excited at being a part of this. He was now reconsidering his media strategy and wondering if there was a rear exit from the Police station.

  “As you can see, video technology is pretty good these days, even at night-time,” Robards continued. “So good in fact that we think we’ve even been able to match the clothes you were wearing in the photo to some that we took from your apartment. We’ve sent them off to forensics to run a few tests on.”

  Craig wiped the photos off the table in disgust with a broad sweep of his arm. “This is all bullshit. I had nothing to do with this.”

  “Then how do you explain the evidence?” asked Robards mildly.

  “You’re just making this shit up.”

  “I’m afraid we’re not Mr Thoms,” said Nelson. “Look, you may not believe this, but right now I’m your best friend in the world. I see the evidence in front of me and it doesn’t look good. But I’m prepared to listen to whatever you’ve got to say. So if you didn’t do this, then you tell me exactly what went down out there and don’t leave anything out, no matter how small.”

  Craig searched Nelson’s face. He wasn’t sure who he could trust right now but he soon realised that he had no choice. He looked to his solicitor who pursed his already thin lips. From his past experience where he had lost cases, he had developed a reliable gut feel for when he was on a loser and those same feeling began to assail him now.

  “Craig, it’s up to you how much you want to say at this stage however I strongly recommend that you say nothing until we have had the opportunity to discuss these developments in private.”

  “It’s ok Martin. I didn’t do this so I’ll tell them what happened and take my chances” he said dejectedly.

  Craig Thoms began to tell his story. He told them about the stalking game. He told them about how it began innocently enough, with he and his co-worker Bryce wanting to field test the equipment they were selling at their employer Carmichael’s Security, but then grew into a regular stalking competition between a handful of friends. The Detectives and his solicitor listened in silence and let him speak. He told them that on Friday night they were playing their stalking game and he followed his mark by train to St Peters and then on foot through Sydney Park and into an industrial area. He told them that the guy he had been following simply walked up to a car parked in the laneway and shot the guy in it three times and then immediately ran away.

  Robards had been listening intently but now smiled derisively. “That’s a nice story. But if it’s true then why didn’t we pick up any video footage of this other guy? All we got was you. And why did the gloves have your fingerprints in them, instead of this mystery shooter?”

  Craig’s face was blank, “I have no idea. But you gotta believe me, everything I just told you was the absolute truth.”

  Martin Warnock was now completely convinced that he was on a one way street to being zero and three from the homicide cases he’d defended. He was sincerely wishing that Craig had taken his advice and remained silent instead of committing his story to the record. He briefly wondered if this was all a dream and that he was actually still curled up in his warm bed on a Sunday morning.

  Nelson rocked back on his chair, contemplating Craig’s story. He saw the same holes in it that Robards had picked up.

  “You’re saying that you were there, at the scene of the crime, at the time of the crime, but that you didn’t shoot Fogliani. You’re saying,” he said, pausing as he tried to clarify in his own mind, “that you were set up?”

  “I don’t know, I suppose. It’s just doesn’t make sense.” Craig replied, his palms outstretched, pleading.

  “What did this guy you followed look like?” Nelson asked.

  Craig searched his memory as if his life depended on it, because it did.

  “He was strong and fit looking. Built a little stronger than me but shorter. His skin was brown and his head was shaved. Oh yeah and he had a blue tattoo that showed above his collar on the right side of his neck, like the tail of a snake or something. He was wearing a brown jacket, jeans and a baseball cap.”

  Nelson took down notes of the description.

  Robards shook his head sadly. “Look, I must be a bit slow, because I still don’t get it. You’re saying that you were stalking this mystery killer, a stranger picked from the crowd in the city no less, and then you followed him to St Peters and somehow, he managed to avoid leaving footprints where you left yours, that he avoided the security cameras where you didn’t and that he shot Fogliani and then planted gloves with your fingerprints where he knew we’d find them?”

  “I guess,” responded Craig, with a shrug of his shoulders.

  “That’s the craziest shit I’ve ever heard.”

  The interview continued for a further two hours as Robards dissected, interrogated and rubbished every piece of Craig’s story before Nelson decided that they’d all had enough for the time being and Craig was taken back to the cell to prepare for his bail hearing at the Parramatta Magistrates Court. It had been set down for two p.m. that afternoon and through the bars of his cell, his solicitor suggested that his chances of being bailed were looking decidedly slim.

  Chapter 24

  Robards returned to the interview room to find Nelson sitting where he’d left him, studying the photographs spread out on the table. The look on Nelson’s face didn’t seem a match for his own buoyant mood.

  “It’s a slam dunk case Nelson. There isn’t a jury in the world that won’t convict him on what we’ve got,” he said, hoping his optimism would be infectious.

  “Maybe, maybe not. It can’t really be a slam dunk without a murder weapon though. If we’d found the gun with fingerprints on it, then it’d be a lot stronger case.”

  “He probably tossed it somewhere. Maybe he put it in the bin with the gloves but then one of the homeless guys in the park found it while he was searching for his dinner. We won’t need it to get a conviction. We’ve got plenty without it.”

  Nelson knew the evidence was strong and yet wasn’t convinced of Craig Thoms’ guilt. There were things about the case that troubled him. At the very least, he wasn’t prepared to let it go without further investigation. Not yet at least. He closely studied the eight by ten inch photographs in front of him, wondering if the answers to his many questions were right in front of him, waiting for him to find them.

  “Why would anyone dump their blood covered gloves near the scene of the crime? That’s not too smart.”

  “So we’ve established that he’s not too bright. He’ll feel right at home in prison with all the other idiots who we’ve nailed in the past.” Robards answered, studying Nelson’s face, looking for some indication that he was winning him over, but seeing nothing.

&n
bsp; “And what about the guy that Thoms is claiming did the shooting? Who the hell is he?”

  “Oh come on. You’re not starting to believe his bullshit story about being setup are you? If there was another guy there, he would have shown up on the video, unless he’s a ghost or something. I mean, why are we looking so hard at this one? Normally you’d jump at the chance to sign off on a case and move on to the next one.” Nelson cocked an eyebrow at Robards, his blue eyes fixing him squarely in his gaze. Robards realised that this was a warning sign that Nelson was beginning to get annoyed with him, but he pushed on regardless. “Look Nelson, I’m not trying to sandbag anyone if that’s what you think. We’ve placed him at the scene of the crime at the time of the crime and we’ve got his fingerprints on the bloody gloves. Sometimes you just get lucky with a case. Accept it.”

  Nelson was tired of arguing with Robards and decided to keep any further misgivings he had about the case to himself. He understood Robards’ view of things. It was a big case and the evidence was probably more than sufficient to convict Craig Thoms. And yet he still felt the need to fully investigate Craig’s claims and put them to bed one way or another before resigning him to lengthy prison sentence.

  “Alright. I hear what you’re saying. However, it’s only day two of the investigation. Even Crighton won’t complain too loudly if we spend a couple more days chasing up the loose ends.”

  “Sure, but I still don’t see why you…”

  “I want you to follow up with the lab,” Nelson interrupted resolutely. “Make sure both the gloves and the clothes we took from his apartment are tested for gunshot residue. According to Thoms he didn’t go near the car or the gun. Let’s find out if the tests support that claim.”

  “Alright, but even if they do come back negative for GSR it doesn’t mean he’s innocent. He could’ve easily washed the clothes and maybe he wasn’t even wearing the gloves when he shot Fogliani. Maybe he just put them on after the shooting to rifle through the body or something. Anything’s possible.”