Mothers Who Murder

by Xanthe Mallett

  In May 1987, Justice Morling issued a 379-page document, disparaging of the techniques used during the investigation by Joy Kuhl, James Cameron and other key witnesses at the trial. Justice Morling put great weight on the credibility of the witnesses at the campground the night Azaria went missing, saying he found it extraordinary that none of them – if the prosecution’s account of the events was to be believed – noticed anything unusual about the demeanour or actions of the accused, or anything that made any of the other campers the least bit suspicious. In fact, all of the other campers had accepted Lindy’s account without question. Justice Morling went further when he concluded:

  I am far from being persuaded that Mrs Chamberlain’s account of having seen a dingo near the tent was false … [and that] if the evidence before the Commission had been given at the trial, the trial judge would have been obliged to direct the jury to acquit the Chamberlains.11

  In essence, the report provided to the Morling inquiry stepped through each and every piece of crucial evidence against the Chamberlains and debunked it all. Another nail in the prosecutor’s evidential coffin. This was a very worrying state of affairs for all forensic experts. I have to wonder – how could so many have got it so wrong?

  There is a painting that, in my view, sums up the miscarriage of justice. The imagery is incredibly powerful, as it depicts Pro Hart’s12 perception of the trial process. The judge is blindfolded in the image, as Pro Hart believed he was blind to the real facts of the case. This is an interesting interpretation of the ‘blindness of the law’, as Lady Justice, an icon of fairness, frequently seen embellishing courtrooms and courthouses, is depicted blindfolded to represent just that – that the law is blind. But she is meant to be blind to prejudice and bias, not truth. As the personification of moral force in the judicial system, Lady Justice is an ancient symbol of impartiality – holding scales (imagery that dates back to ancient Egypt) to show that the legal system balances the strength of support for both sides of a case, and her double-edged sword symbolising the power of justice and reason. Lady Justice did not help Lindy Chamberlain during her court case.

  A month after the finding of the Morling Royal Commission, the Chamberlains held a victory feast. Among the invited guests were defence witnesses and lawyers, as well as a couple whose daughter had been taken by a dingo. Journalists and politicians who had supported them throughout their ordeal were also there.

  In 1988, the Court of Criminal Appeal of the Northern Territory unanimously quashed the convictions against both Lindy and Michael Chamberlain. A third inquest took place in 1995 into Azaria’s cause of death; this was described as a ‘paper inquest’ as opposed to a full inquest, as all evidence was tabled in paper form rather than taken again in the witness box. The third coroner, John Lowndes, reviewed the evidence as well as the Morling Report and returned an open verdict, as although the coroner was satisfied that Lindy did not murder Azaria, he was unable to be reasonably satisfied that Azaria died as a result of being taken by a dingo because he claimed it was too long ago to be sure, and he left the cause of death open – thus it could be asserted that it was never completed. In 2012,13 thirty-two years after Azaria’s disappearance the final inquest was convened. Presided over by Coroner Elizabeth Morris, this was actually the reopening of the third inquest.14 This only occurred because Lindy and Michael continued to push for a full investigation into the circumstances surrounding the loss of their daughter.

  THE MEDIA’S INFLUENCE

  I am part of the media now, and would not agree when someone describes the media as purely negative. It is true that there are members of media organisations who have agendas, and the media, by and large, is self-serving. Those who work for media outlets, regardless of what format, generally need ratings or sales. It is, in the end, about money. In the melee of getting a good story, I often wonder if those members of the media who are willing to do anything for that big headline forget that the stories they’re telling are not abstract. They involve real people and, sadly, in most cases the big stories focus on people’s suffering, as that’s what sells.

  I am, as an expert with an academic and forensic background, protected from that side of things. Mostly. I have been called a reporter, but reporters are skilled journalists, which I am certainly not. I’ve learnt my investigative skills through forensic investigation rather than journalistic training, and the reason I work on a case is because something needs exposing, questions need answering. Lindy Chamberlain’s case is a prime example of that.

  As the police case for murder was being developed against Lindy, the newspapers helped fuel the fire. Various motives were suggested and religious rumours abounded – was Azaria sacrificed to atone for the sins of the Seventh-day Adventist Church? Many reporters, and everyday citizens around the country, fell into the fatal trap of watching the Chamberlains and deciding that they weren’t behaving in a way that would be expected for a couple suffering the tragic loss of a child.

  The media storm continued after the Chamberlains lost their High Court appeal. However, many people were now questioning Lindy’s guilt, as news reports began casting doubt on the reliability of the forensic evidence presented at trial. The Free Lindy campaign gained momentum, with more than 100,000 people signing petitions calling for Lindy’s release. Polls showed that where once the majority thought Lindy guilty, now the country was deeply divided – with 48 per cent of those questioned now thinking Lindy innocent.

  COMPARATIVE CASES

  New figures compiled by the Queensland Government’s Department of Environment and Resource Management were provided as evidence at the 2012 inquest into Azaria’s disappearance, and Coroner Morris15 said the new evidence in relation to dingo attacks on infants and young children helped convince her to reopen the investigation.

  In particular, beautiful Fraser Island has seen more than its share of dingo–human incidents. Located approximately 250 kilometres north of Brisbane off Australia’s east coast, Fraser Island is the world’s largest sandy island. In the early 1990s, the island was added to the list of World Heritage sites, due to its beauty as well as its unique flora and fauna – including the Fraser Island dingo. The wild dingo is the island’s apex predator, and is possibly one of the last pure strains of dingo, making it of national and international importance to anyone wishing to retain the natural diversity of not only the island but also the continent. Because of the isolation of the population, wildlife experts acknowledge that Fraser Island dingoes may at some point become the purest strain of dingo on the eastern Australian seaboard and perhaps Australia-wide. As a result, the dingo is protected under the 1992 Nature Conservation Act, as it is classed as native wildlife and protected as a ‘natural resource’ in areas such as Fraser Island. It is the Queensland Parks and Wildlife Service’s legal responsibility to safeguard these populations.

  Set this idyllic naturals’ paradise against the savage attacks by dingoes on humans. There has been a history of fatal attacks. For example, in 2001 a nine-year-old boy was killed by two of the approximately 160 resident dingoes while on Fraser Island, near the family’s Waddy Point camping ground. A seven-year-old boy was also injured in the attack. The circumstances around the incident seem to indicate the two boys were being followed by the dingoes as they walked along the beach. The boys then broke into a run, and the nine-year-old fell over, at which point the dingoes attacked. Interestingly, a spokesperson from the Fraser Island Defenders Organisation was quoted as saying that ‘people have encouraged dingoes to the point where they have entirely lost their fear of humans’.16

  The Queensland Government is responsible for the Fraser Island dingo population and reviewed its strategy in 1999 after a series of attacks on people. The Queensland Government’s dingo strategy includes heavy fines for anyone caught feeding the wild dogs, as it has been recognised that a significant amount of human food has made its way into their diet. The Fraser Island management strategy recognises that dingoes have lost their fear of humans because of benef
icial, regular and continuing contact.

  The attacks continue, however; there was an attack on a three-year-old girl in 2011,17 and there were two separate incidents in 2012, one against a fourteen-year-old girl18 and the other against a twenty-three-year-old male German tourist.19 In 2009 a four-year-old was injured while walking along the beach with his family and in 2013 a woman was bitten by a dingo that was later euthanised as it had shown aggression to humans before. Recent evidence therefore shows that tourists are still not getting the message that feeding dingoes is not only bad for the animals but is dangerous and encourages attacks on humans. The Queensland Government announced a new fence would be built on the island – because people won’t do the right thing and not feed the wild dogs.

  Azaria’s case still haunts our social consciousness, as evidenced by the fact that any stories about the case can still draw headlines in the international media. A prominent daily British newspaper article covering the attack on the two boys in 2001 even concluded with a comment that the incident revived memories of Azaria’s disappearance in 1980.20 If we had known then what we know now, I wonder if Lindy’s claim that a dingo had taken her baby would ever have been questioned.

  THE HUNT FOR MADELEINE McCANN

  The case of missing British toddler, Madeleine McCann, has a number of similarities to Azaria’s disappearance. Madeleine was last seen on the evening of Thursday 3 May 2007 by her mum, Kate. The British family – Kate, her husband Gerry, and their three children, Madeleine (aged three at the time) and her younger twin siblings – were on holiday in Portugal. The family was part of a larger group, consisting of seven family friends as well as their five children. Like Azaria, Madeleine went missing from her bed as she slept – in this case in the family’s apartment – while her parents were only metres away.

  The child was discovered missing at 10 pm and the police at first assumed she had wandered off or had been abducted. But – again as the result of a botched forensic blood analysis – attention soon turned to the McCanns, as the Portuguese police believed Madeleine had died in the apartment. This resulted in the McCanns being declared suspects in July 2008. The ensuing media storm was huge, with the parents suffering abuse at the hands of the British press and subsequently the public, many of whom thought the parents were not behaving ‘normally’ under the circumstances.

  Kate and Gerry were absolutely focused on keeping Madeleine on the front pages. Some mistook this for their seeking attention for themselves. The tabloid papers were particularly cruel, and the McCanns later won substantial damages against a number of British papers that had made false – and entirely unsubstantiated – claims against them. However, there was a plus side to all of this: it kept Madeleine’s story in the public eye.

  I talked to numerous people at the time, experts in behavioural analysis, who had been watching the case develop. The unanimous response was that Kate and Gerry were innocent and had nothing to do with Madeleine’s disappearance. They were simply using the media to best advantage – knowing full well that when Madeleine was no longer on the front page of the paper, when her story had been replaced with the next, then the likelihood of finding her would plummet. So the parents put up with the harassment and abuse, as they knew that was the only way they were likely to find their daughter. None of the professionals I spoke to were surprised when the parents were found not to have been involved.

  Sadly, as yet, and like Azaria, Madeleine has not been found. But as there was no sign of injury when she disappeared – no blood as in Azaria’s case – the McCanns have not given up hope. Because of their brave media strategy (and I absolutely believe they did fully intend and plan to use the world’s media to help find Madeleine) the case still makes headlines when new information comes forward, which it did in 2011 with the announcement that the Scotland Yard in the UK was reopening the case. The BBC’s Crimewatch (the UK’s version of Australia’s Wanted) program followed up in late 2013,21 showing a reconstruction of events on the evening Madeleine went missing, as well as providing significant information in order to seek assistance from members of the public across Europe. Perhaps most importantly, facial composites had been developed of two men the police were very keen to talk to in relation to her disappearance. The public’s response to the appeal – six years after the girl went missing – was described by British police as ‘overwhelming’.22 In January 2014, the police hunt for Madeleine’s kidnappers continued, as they searched properties and examined financial records of three suspects in Portugal. At the time of writing, the three suspects remain under investigation by Scotland Yard. It is arguable that without the help of the media, in the form of the television appeal, these advances would not have been made in the search for the little girl.

  The family’s plan seems to have worked. If Madeleine hadn’t been kept in the public’s mind, would we all have known her name? Would the Home Office have stepped in? And would Crimewatch have made a special appeal? Children go missing all the time, and I would argue it was the parents’ media strategy that has led to this case progressing this far. The media is now on the McCanns’ side, but that certainly was not the case to start with. With the level of vitriol they suffered, I also wonder if we have learnt anything from cases such as the Chamberlains’, as we are still all too willing to vilify parents, to condemn them to guilt, when they don’t respond as we presume they should.

  CASE CLOSED

  In any murder case, or other criminal case for that matter, the method (the ‘how’) and the motive (the ‘why’) often lead to the offender (the ‘who’). So an investigation can be seen as a simple equation: how + why = who. Sometimes you may have the ‘how’ and ‘who’ but not know the ‘why’, but once you have two parts of that formula complete, it’s easier to solve the crime. Easier, not easy. The equation may be simple, but filling in all parts is not – and in fact, even after the offender has been identified and the method determined, the why can still be elusive.

  So it doesn’t always work out, but this formula can be helpful when reviewing a case. As I see it, the main problem in this case is that the police decided on the ‘who’ before reasoning through the ‘how’ and ‘why’. In fact, it appears they decided a crime had occurred because they decided they had their man – or in this case, woman. There was no crime until they decided Lindy must be guilty. So the whole case was built around proving Lindy’s guilt, rather than letting the evidence lead where it would. According to the findings of the third inquest, Lindy Chamberlain was recognised as an exemplary mother. A number of facts regarding Lindy’s mothering were found to be undisputed, including that she was not suffering from any mental illness, there was no evidence she was ever violent towards any of her children, she was not angry or irritated with Azaria at the time of her disappearance, and she showed no indication of anxiety at the time of putting Azaria to bed. Therefore, there was no motive (the why) for Lindy (the who) to hurt Azaria or any indication that she was suffering any distress that may have affected her actions. As stressed by the defence at the Chamberlains’ trial, the prosecution had two years and three months to come up with a reason, any reason, why Lindy would want to hurt Azaria. They couldn’t. There was also no motive for Michael to help her cover up the murder – nothing. And the ‘how’ doesn’t stack up in this case either. The steps Lindy was hypothesised by the Crown to have gone through in under ten minutes, with lots of potential witnesses – none of whom reported hearing or seeing anything suspicious – is at best incredibly unlikely. The ‘how’ and ‘why’ just simply does not equal the ‘who’ in this case. It never did.

  It is clear from the evidence reviewed that Lindy and Michael Chamberlain should never have been charged. This case should never have gone to trial. The police investigation was biased from the start, compounded by the fact that the experts’ evidence was unreliable. But what should have happened and what did happen are often worlds apart.

  This case is a warning to all forensic scientists. However, it is much, much more than
that. It’s a warning to each of us that we can all be unfairly accused – and it outlines what the devastating results can be when the justice system lets us down.

  Finally it was case closed for the Chamberlains at the conclusion of the fourth and final coroner’s inquest into Azaria’s death, held in the Northern Territory by Coroner Elizabeth Morris. The coroner heard new evidence about dingo attacks on humans, including three fatal incidents. Only now was the cause of death on Azaria’s death certificate changed from ‘unknown’ to ‘death by dingo’. To do this, Morris had to institute a new law to enable the culprit wildlife to be a named method of death in the absence of a body, thereby reducing the problems associated with an inability to name specific injuries and cause of death in cases of this nature. This was only one of many new laws, statutes and precedents this case engendered. Coroner Morris also took the opportunity, at the final conclusion of the legalities, to personally apologise to the Chamberlains.

  Chapter 3

  KATHLEEN FOLBIGG (1989–1999)

  Like Lindy Chamberlain before her, Kathleen Folbigg is despised by huge swathes of the Australian population. And indeed, as we shall see, the Folbigg case has other disturbing parallels with Lindy’s. Kathleen stands accused – and has been found guilty – of murdering four of her children. The initial deaths did not cause concern; however, the death of her fourth child, nineteen-month-old Laura, saw a police investigation initiated and Folbigg sentenced to forty years’ imprisonment.