Into the Darkness

by Robin Bowles

  Then the security swipe record showed ‘Spare master swipe 1, enter in through the front door’ at 4.06 p.m. Beth said she wasn’t sure if it was her.

  I was interested in this information. Ruth Foster had said she saw a strange man in the lift around 4 p.m. Could there be a link?

  Ms Siemensma changed the subject and asked Beth about the layout of the building on the ground floor. Beth explained that the manager’s office was quite some way down the corridor, and when you were in it, you couldn’t see the front desk. There were two possible entries to the compactor room, one from the entry hall past the lifts and one from the mailroom, which all residents had access to, but neither of those were visible from the office either, though they could be seen on the CCTV screens on the office wall.

  Beth said that the compactor made a beeping noise if it got jammed or if all the bins were full, but you couldn’t hear it from the office during the day. Likewise, you couldn’t hear when a bin fell unless it happened late at night when things were really quiet. To get into the compactor room, you needed a separate key.

  I wondered if this was a swipe card or a traditional key, so later on I rang Eric Giammario to ask him. He said it was a labelled physical key.

  He said the keys were in an unlocked box in his office, but the room itself was normally locked. The only other person with a full set of keys was the chairman of the owners’ corporation, who lived on the top floor of the building. That’s a coincidence, I thought. His floor was the source of the two false alarms that day.

  And if you were inside the manager’s office, it occurred to me, the key would be easy to find.

  Ms Siemensma took Beth to the logbook for 2 December 2010. There were several entries in her writing for the day, including the second fire alarm. She told the Coroner that people didn’t automatically evacuate if the fire alarm went off. They didn’t after the second alarm because the tradesman who’d set it off accidentally dealt with it quickly.

  During a fire alarm, people would usually have to run down the stairs, as the lifts wouldn’t have been in use. Access to the fire stairs from any level didn’t require a swipe card.

  Something niggled me here. I’d been told there was CCTV from the first fire scare showing Phoebe and Yoshi coming down in the lift to leave the building. But why were the lifts working during the evacuation phase? And could someone have followed Phoebe back in, gone up with her in the lift, and followed her to her apartment? A stranger, or someone she knew — or who knew her?

  Beth was certain the compactor room was never left unlocked or the door propped open in the absence of Balencea staff. She said that she’d never let visitors in unless she had prior notice from the resident that they were expected, and then they had to contact the person they were visiting to buzz them up. If residents told her they weren’t going to be at home when they were expecting some tradesmen, she’d check the tradesmen’s ID and make a note of their arrival, then show them into the apartment.

  When she returned to work after three and a half weeks, Beth said she looked in the logbook to read what she’d written that night, but the page had been torn out. She was certain about this, because little bits of paper had remained in the spine of the book.

  She also confirmed what Lorne had said about the alleged visits from Christo Van Egmond. She hadn’t known his name at the time but recognised him from a photo Lorne showed her. He kept repeating the same things about how Phoebe had committed suicide. After about two weeks, she said, ‘I sort of like got a little bit upset. And I said that I don’t want to talk regarding this matter anymore.’

  *

  Mr Moglia asked a lot of questions to clarify the layout of the ground floor and the details of access to the compactor room, and also asked about spare keys to apartments. He wanted to know if there were individual keys to the apartments in the key box in the manager’s office. Beth said yes, but each would only admit someone to a single apartment. It was an individual resident’s decision to provide the manager with a key to admit tradesmen or visitors who might arrive while the resident was at work. She said that Eric would usually write information about any expected visitors on the office whiteboard and people wouldn’t be let in unless they provided proper ID.

  Mr Moglia asked, ‘Do you know if there was a spare key for 1201?’

  She replied that she couldn’t remember if a key was available for 1201 that day, but there had certainly been one on her return to work. ‘After I came back, they kept getting lots of deliveries, and manager Eric would tell me to take those deliveries up to the 1201 apartment, and I would refuse. I would say, “I will not go in there”, so he would himself take it up there then.’

  She described how she kept an eye on the building during each shift by getting the lift to the top level, walking down the fire stairs, then using her master key to open the fire door on each level and looking along the corridor. That would be her first patrol. Next, she’d check the car park, then she’d walk around the outside of the building. But on the day when she found Phoebe, she hadn’t yet done any of these checks, having been caught up in other incidents.

  Mr Galbally had no questions, and Mr O’Neill just clarified a couple of details. Beth gratefully made her escape and so did we. Court was adjourned to the next afternoon, to allow the relevant parties, including the Coroner, to go to Balencea and get a better understanding of the site.

  CHAPTER 10

  THE SECURITY EVIDENCE

  Before the next witness was led, the Coroner read into evidence a summary of what occurred during the view at Balencea. All in attendance, including Lorne and Natalie, had looked at the compactor room, the Level 12 refuse room, the car park, and the mailroom. It was probably just as well they’d familiarised themselves with the environment before encountering the next witness, Eric Giammario.

  A dapper man with clipped hair and clipped speech, Eric settled uncomfortably into the seat he’d occupy for the next two days. His evidence was factual and supported by endless documents: security swipe printouts, plans of Balencea, the Level 12 layout, car park, basements, and the compactor room. Camera locations were also identified. I noted there were none in the lifts. Eric told me later that at the time Phoebe died there were only 16 cameras covering the common areas of Balencea; now there are 40.

  Ms Siemensma asked him about the security of the manager’s office. He said the door was only left open when there was somebody there. It had to be locked at all times when the office was empty.

  ‘If you went to the mailroom, would you close the manager’s door?’

  ‘There could be occasions when I probably don’t close it.’

  He was asked who else had a copy of the key to the office.

  He replied that the concierge staff had their own keys, and there was also a spare in the office. The only other person with keys was the chairman of the owners’ corporation committee, whose tradies had set off the two fire alarms on the day Phoebe died. All the keys relating to the building’s operations were kept together — fire security keys, special cupboard keys, keys to enter certain rooms in the building — and then they had some of the residents’ spare keys.

  He was asked if the key cabinet was locked.

  ‘Yes, there is a lock, but it’s generally not locked, given that the office is usually locked.’

  Ms Siemensma asked if the office held a spare key to 1201 at the time of Phoebe’s death.

  ‘I can’t be sure of that. I know they have one now and they have had one for a long time, but on that particular day, I’m not sure.’

  ‘Is there a spare key to the ground floor refuse room in the key cabinet?’

  Eric was careful with his evidence, trying hard to be as accurate as he could be after so much time had elapsed. He said he didn’t think there was a spare key to the refuse room in the cabinet, because he’d gone through an audit and had all the keys labelled. But he couldn’t be ab
solutely sure because it was so long ago.

  Eric himself didn’t have a key to the refuse room at that stage. The cleaner had one, and there was one on the concierge’s key ring.

  He was asked about the temporary cleaner who was there on 2 December. He said the regular cleaner was on annual leave and had organised for someone he knew to stand in for him for that week.

  Eric wasn’t impressed with the stand-in. ‘I just found him very hopeless. I asked the company that he shouldn’t return to the building. He would turn up for work without safety equipment and wasn’t really up to the standard to work in the building so I think that week was his last — it was his only week there.’

  Ms Siemensma asked, ‘Was this gentleman issued with a key to the refuse room?’

  ‘Yes, he was handed over the keys that were normally with the regular cleaner.’ These would give access to all of the floors in the apartment complex.

  It emerged that when Phoebe died, Eric himself had only been at Balencea for eight weeks. What a start to a new job! He’d got to know quite a few of the residents in that time, as many of them were semi-retired and spent a lot of time at home during the day, but he didn’t feel he’d necessarily pick out a stranger or visitor back then.

  He went on to itemise the entries and exits to the building and the car park. It was hardly riveting stuff, but the information was essential.

  The means of entry were discussed next. Eric said residents used swipe-card readers at the main entrance or in the basement car parks. There was also a keypad at the front door to gain access or call the apartments. ‘Each apartment would have its own allocated swipe code. So, for example, we’re talking about 1201, somebody would press 1201, the bell would ring in the apartment, the person would have to pick up the intercom handset and recognise the caller, or decide if they want to let that person in.’ The resident would then press a button to open up the outside gate to the visitor’s car park or the glass doors on the ground-floor entrance to the building.

  Exactly the same as the building I live in, I thought. I hope they don’t spend too much time on this. They did.

  Eric explained at some length how a visitor would get access to the building via the visitors’ car park. Before entering the car park, the visitor would dial the manager’s number, and the manager would view the CCTV. If the visitor was someone the manager recognised who he knew had business in the building, he’d press a release button to open the external gate to the visitors’ car park. If the manager didn’t recognise the visitor, they’d need to identify themselves before admission. Then they could only access the building by taking the lift to the ground floor unless someone buzzed them up to another level.

  ‘They’d have to go through a security process again before they can access the residential floors?’ said the Coroner.

  ‘Yes.’

  Ms Siemensma asked if people entering via the car park needed swipes for interior access.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Were there any visitors’ swipes that were programmed to access the whole building back in December 2010?’

  Eric said there were quite a few contractors’ swipes, which were handed out by the developer. He explained that the building was commissioned in 2008 and was still in what’s called a defects period, so there were contractors on site doing work.

  ‘On this particular day,’ Ms Siemensma said, ‘there were some gentlemen doing lift maintenance. Were they allocated a swipe for all floors?’

  ‘Not necessarily. But if they were issued a master, yes, that master would allow them to go everywhere.’

  To clarify, the question came again. ‘Do the tradesmen’s swipes give them access to every level?’

  Eric confirmed that they did.

  Ms Siemensma asked Eric what happened when a resident leased out a car space, as Ant had apparently been doing. Could a person with car park access also access the relevant apartment? Eric explained that it was possible they could in 2010, but since then he’d introduced a separate class of swipe card that only gave the holder access to the car park.

  Eric also said that even residents couldn’t use their cards to gain access to other levels. That was different from my apartment building, where a single fob got me everywhere. Security had been an issue in our building, and I listened carefully to what Eric said.

  Was it possible to get up to Level 12 at Balencea without having a swipe card at all? It certainly was possible in our building, where people had been following others through the front door and into the lifts, waiting for them to activate the keypad and quickly pushing the button they wanted. This gave strangers access to any part of the building they chose. Since I found that out, I’d been keeping my apartment door locked during the day when I was home. But was Phoebe’s door locked?

  In any case, security at Balencea was much more elaborate. An owner’s swipe card was programmed to the floor of their apartment, the car park, the gym, and the first-floor restaurant. The cards were numbered, and each time they were used, it registered on a reader in Eric’s office. So on a given day, Eric could see that a hypothetical Mr Brown, who lived on Level 5, went down to the gym at 7 a.m., back to Level 5 at 7.45 a.m., down to the mailroom to get his paper at 8.15 a.m., down to the car park Level 2 at 9 a.m., returned to the car park at 6.30 p.m., came home to Level 5, and stayed in.

  Exits from the building, however, weren’t recorded; the only trace was when someone went down in the lift to the basement car park. The police had scrutinised all Ant’s comings and goings, which was why his return to check on Phoebe the morning before her death had raised questions. They’d also looked for any other entries to Level 12 that day, but Phoebe’s return from the fire drill appeared to be the last entry before Ant returned at 6.05 p.m. If Phoebe had buzzed someone up, though, that wouldn’t necessarily show up on Eric’s printouts under the system used at Balencea then.

  In my building, the fire escapes were another security problem, as they could be accessed from any floor, into and out of the stairwell. So you could go into the stairs on, say, Level 3, walk up to Level 6, and exit. But at Balencea, you couldn’t enter other levels from the fire escape. Eric said, ‘Once you enter the fire escape, the idea is that you’re exiting the building.’ On the other hand, the doors wouldn’t trigger an alarm if they were left open.

  Ms Siemensma asked, ‘If you walk down the fire escape stairs, must you leave through the lobby, or can you get out of the building some other way?’

  Eric replied, ‘Yes, you can leave through other ways, because you’re going to find yourself near several exits.’ In 2010, none of those possible exits were covered by CCTV.

  He was then taken to yet another printout where the time 8.03.38 p.m. appeared on 2 December.

  ‘It looks like “intercom Level 12” and what does that indicate?’ asked Ms Siemensma.

  ‘That indicates to me that somebody was given access to Lift No.1 from Level 12. Somebody’s buzzed Level 12, and that person’s pressed the key symbol in their apartment keypad — that admits people to the building. And then when they press the diamond symbol, that gives them access to the lift.’

  This could have been Ant’s mother being buzzed in to look after Ant. Whoever it was didn’t have a fob, so the access wasn’t recorded as belonging to a particular apartment.

  This was the same in our building and used to cause problems when our guests followed a resident through the front door without buzzing our apartment first, and then couldn’t make the lift work. We’d often get plaintive little mobile calls — ‘We’re stuck in the foyer, the lift’s not working’ — until we educated our friends not to follow people in, but buzz us at the front door. Buzzing them in through the front door activated the lift as well for a short time afterwards. In Balencea, if you don’t get to the lift within about four and a half minutes, the system automatically turns off, so the lift button doesn’t work. You’ve got to go
back, call the person you’re visiting again, and get them to redo the whole process. No idle sauntering through the lobby allowed!

  The security evidence ground on and on. After a short break, we moved on to the CCTVs. Poor Eric. I don’t suppose he was as bored as I was, but all it really showed was that the cameras that were there weren’t very efficient and that whatever might have been of use, such as entry and exit points, the corridor outside the compactor room, and so on had been recorded over and was lost forever.

  The questions turned to Eric running into Phoebe and her bike in the foyer on the Monday before she died. Was her response ‘uncharacteristic’, as Lorne had alleged? Eric said it was. She shrugged when he said he’d found a spot for her bike, and didn’t really say anything. She was usually more smiley and chatty. Finding her a spot was partly self-defence on Eric’s part. He’d had to ask her to move her bike a few times, as she tended to leave it all over the place. He was worried that someone would trip over it or that it might be stolen, as she often left it unlocked.

  When asked about the accuracy of his recollection, he said wryly that ‘it might have been fresher’ if he’d made a statement at the time. I don’t think he was too happy that everyone else at Balencea was asked for a statement on the night, but police waited a year before asking him for his recollections.

  He went through the daily routine. The cleaners were responsible for locking the refuse room, he said. ‘The refuse room has to be locked at all times other than when you’re in there, so I would expect but I can’t be sure that the cleaner did it on this particular day.’ So, I wondered, if the temporary cleaner filling in for the guy on holidays had such a disregard for safety procedures, did he lock the door?

  Next came the compactor room information. Sometimes you have to sit through a lot of rubbish to get to the nub of things, and all this talk about rubbish was no exception. Even the Coroner seemed confused by the explanation about beeps and bins and blockages.