And Then the Darkness

by Sue Williams

  AS JUDGE MICHAEL DAVID ENTERED the room, the next set of legal problems arose. Murdoch’s defence team argued that if the prosecution were allowed to mention that their man was also facing charges in the Falconio matter, the jury would naturally be prejudiced against him, and he would never receive a fair trial. Grant Algie said he could find no precedent where one person faced serious charges in two jurisdictions at once. After long legal argument, the judge ruled that the Falconio matter could be mentioned — after all, it was the prosecution’s case that the reason Murdoch had attacked the women was because of his paranoia that the police wanted to talk to him about Falconio — but that mentions be kept to an absolute minimum.

  The second issue related to the press. Algie argued that if the Adelaide case were fully reported, that would prejudice the jury at the Darwin trial later. The difficulty there, however, was that a judge in SA only had the power to suppress the mention of certain matters in SA alone. Algie, at one point, argued that Murdoch’s name not be permitted to be used. Then he objected to his image being reproduced in newspapers. In any case, one of his alleged victims, the twelve-year-old girl, couldn’t be identified which also prohibited naming her mother, her stepfather and the place where they lived.

  The case started and stopped, started and stopped, until it finally stuttered into life at a point where many had despaired that Murdoch would ever be allowed to face his accusers. Overshadowing everything was the front page news that a torso, possibly Peter Falconio’s, had been discovered in a remote dam near Marla, between Coober Pedy and the border with the Northern Territory. Five divers, a plane carrying a number of detectives and a host of volunteers scurried to the scene to look for clues. Eventually, a pathologist in Adelaide examined the remains and declared they were of a large animal; they were definitely not human.

  THE PROSECUTION CASE DELIVERED by crown lawyer Liesl Chapman was simple: she alleged Bradley Murdoch had learned police had obtained DNA from his brother Gary, had panicked over the prospect of his arrest in connection with the murder of Peter Falconio and, fired by drugs, had taken the two women hostage as ‘insurance’ for when the police arrived.

  In reply, the defence, however, was just as straightforward: there was a reward of $250,000 on offer for information that would lead to the arrest of Peter Falconio’s killer, and the mother and her de facto, together with her daughter and possibly Murdoch’s old friend Darryl ‘Dags’ Cragan, had contrived a plan to frame Murdoch in the hope of making a great deal of money. Algie neither admitted nor denied allegations of drug-dealing against his client.

  The styles of the two barristers were a study in contrasts: Chapman, small, pretty and blonde, was softly spoken, sweet and likeable — seemingly the perfect choice of prosecutor in a rape case. Algie was much more strident, verbose and passionate, frequently growing red in the face when he stormed in with an outraged point — ‘It’s an absolute furphy!’ — and was ticked off by the judge for not getting to the nub of an argument more quickly. But he was obviously a very smart operator.

  Appearances, too, in middle-class, prim and improper Adelaide, that old city of churches and corpses, can be particularly important. The mother, known to be a former escort, was on medication for anxiety which slowed and slightly slurred her speech; her daughter, dressed up for court looked much older than her thirteen years; and her wizened, sick and much older stepfather, later revealed to be a former brothel owner who’d employed his de facto, had already admitted to having been involved in the drug trade. They weren’t exactly the fine, upstanding members of the community a prosecution case would like on its side. Of course, they might have stacked up to Murdoch, but he was exercising his right to silence and didn’t say a word. They became, instead, a marked contrast to the cultured, confident and highly intelligent Algie.

  WHILE THE MOTHER AND DAUGHTER had both provided graphic accounts of their alleged ordeal, the stepfather — to whom Murdoch gave out $100 payments every now and again — claimed Murdoch always had plenty of cable ties around and lots of rolls of tape. In addition, GP Dr Susan Taylor examined the girl and found a split of hymenal tissue consistent with penetration by a finger or penis eight-and-a-half days before, and an injury to her right wrist consistent with being bound by cable ties. The girl, however, refused a full internal vaginal examination. Dr Taylor said that nervousness wasn’t unusual among young female victims.

  Amphetamines had been found in Murdoch’s bloodstream and Adelaide University pharmacologist Professor Jason White said taking high doses of speed over a long time could lead to psychotic symptoms, hallucinations, delusions, aggression and paranoia. At their extreme, the symptoms could be the same as those of a paranoid schizophrenic.

  Algie, however, alleged that the girl’s stepfather had asked Murdoch to come to stay in the annex to look after the two women while he was in hospital, and suggested he put up black plastic at the windows in case Hepi came over. With that action, Murdoch looked paranoid — and had thus been set up as part of their conspiracy.

  Algie then pointed out inconsistencies in the pair’s accusation. He said that mother and daughter each described the position they’d been handcuffed in the Landcruiser differently, and had varied from each other in the way they’d said the cable ties were tied. He also drew attention to the six-day gap between the two women being released at the Port Augusta service station on Thursday August 22, and phoning the police on Wednesday August 28. The mother had said on their release the pair had caught a cab to the hospital, where her de facto had phoned Cragan. He’d taken them to the Bolivar Caravan Park on the outskirts of Adelaide while they worked out what to do. The reason they hadn’t called the police earlier was that they were frightened of Murdoch and thought he might act on his alleged threat to shoot them if they went to the authorities. ‘We were terrified of Brad,’ the woman said. ‘Everything was just getting on top of us, like, we didn’t know how to handle it and [my daughter] needed attention, the doctor and everything.’ Algie argued they’d in fact stayed at the Bolivar working on their ruse to frame Murdoch. He claimed that her partner had advised her to delay going to the police, thereby giving Murdoch time to ‘get’ Hepi — whom her de facto hated following his death threats — before the police arrested him.

  In addition, there had been no DNA or sperm present on the quilt on which they alleged the girl had been raped, and they’d thrown out the girl’s clothes, which could have proved, or disproved, the rape allegation. Algie said her partner had not kept them because he knew they could not offer any evidence. The girl’s mother protested, ‘We weren’t thinking straight, we were in shock.’ But Algie insisted that her partner had told her to get rid of them to help his plan to make money out of the allegations. As well as the reward on offer, Algie said, the man also planned to sell their story to the media. His partner admitted making a statement to police saying that he was looking at Murdoch as ‘a moneymaking type proposition’.

  She’d previously told the police, ‘[My de facto] is looking at the Bradley Murdoch thing for the money, like he always does. He thinks he can make some money from what happened and keeps talking about going to the media, saying I knew Brad. But talking to the media does not interest me. I want [my daughter] and I to be able to talk and feel safe in our home.’

  She’d also said that she’d consider leaving him, if she were financially secure. ‘If I had not signed the mortgage on our house I bought with [my de facto], I would have left him years ago,’ she said in her police statement. ‘It was sort of the case that I was happy with what I had with my house, daughter and animals, whereas [my de facto] always wanted more and couldn’t be content with what he had… [He] was out for whatever he could get and he has been like that in all the time that I’ve known him …’

  As for Cragan, when the woman’s de facto phoned him, Algie says he drove to Port Broughton and took exactly half the cash stashed in the shed — $12,000 — and half the cannabis, weighing 1.8 kilograms (4 pounds). He then used $3000 to trade in
his Ford Falcon for a Fairmont Ghia to drive back to Katherine in. It could have been part of a pre-arranged plan to rob Murdoch but, equally, by leaving half the money and drugs there, it could have been a scheme to make sure the police found evidence against his old hometown friend. Then again, it could have been honour between drug mates that Cragan took what he believed was his fair share, no more, no less. Perhaps, with the police alerted by the woman, Cragan believed that it was all going to be over for Murdoch very soon, and the cash and dope would at least pay for him to get well away.

  Chapman, summing up the prosecution case, protested at Algie’s allegations. The women hadn’t reported Murdoch earlier because they were scared, she said. The woman’s partner was dying of cancer, and Cragan was certainly no master planner — he’d simply got out of there, as any drug dealer would, taking what remained of the business. ‘[The de facto] isn’t the driving force, the mastermind behind any complicated conspiracy, set-up, whatever you like to call it against the accused,’ said Chapman. ‘Back in August 2002, he was so sick he had to go to hospital.’ She said the women lived in a very isolated property that Murdoch knew well. It was all very frightening.

  On a trip to view that property, it became evident how rundown it was. The annex was a mess of upended furniture, with broken blinds and scattered rubbish. Outside, a group of dogs barked in a cage whenever anyone walked past. One of the pack was a thickset Dalmatian cross, answering to the name of Jack. It would turn out to be Bradley Murdoch’s dog.

  Later, an old girlfriend of Murdoch’s came on to the property to try to take Jack. The outraged mother and her de facto had her charged by police, and ended up getting the dog back.

  THE MAIN FACTORS IN THE case against Murdoch were the cable ties, the drugs, the two women and the girl’s urine on the quilt from the back of his ute. Ranged against that was the conspiracy theory, discrepancies between the two women’s recollections, the disposal of her clothes, and the eight-day delay in calling the police.

  On Monday 10 November 2003, the jury took two hours and ten minutes to deliver a not guilty verdict on all counts.

  THE JUDGE TOLD MURDOCH HE was free to go, but the scent of freedom was tantalisingly fleeting. As soon as he’d received his acquittal, he was led down to the basement cells of the court building before being re-arrested for the charges awaiting him in the Northern Territory. He was then taken by police outside, as officers forcibly restrained him, and eased into a waiting car. For those sitting every day in court, gazing at the silent defendant and wondering idly what his voice might sound like, there was at last some satisfaction. A journalist shouted after him, ‘Did you kill Mr Falconio?’ and he finally broke his silence to utter just two words: ‘Fuck off!’ It may have been a show for the photographer and reporters, as the defence team darkly muttered, but it at last gave everyone a glimpse of the new-look Murdoch, with clipped short grey hair, cleanly shaven and without the droopy moustache many friends talked of him having. He was then driven to police headquarters where he was served with a provisional warrant for the murder of Peter Falconio.

  The next day he appeared in the Adelaide Magistrates Court for an extradition hearing, and two days later he was flown to Darwin. A gaggle of journalists were waiting all day at the airport for him to arrive. Growing bored, they amused themselves by competing to find the silliest questions they could ask. But he then appeared so suddenly, that some ended up asking the questions that were freshest in their minds — the dumb ones. ‘What have you got to say for yourself now, Mr Murdoch?’ asked one. ‘Where’s the body?’ asked another. And, ‘Did you kill Peter Falconio?’ Murdoch grimaced at all the questions, glowered at his accusers, and returned to his state of sullen silence.

  The press having been given, and missed, their moment, he was promptly whisked to Darwin police headquarters in a police van. There, on 14 November 2003, he was formally charged with murder, deprivation of liberty and unlawful assault.

  THE NEWS TRAVELLED INSTANTLY TO the other side of the world. In Huddersfield, Vincent James said Joanne was relieved and pleased to hear the end might be in sight. But Joanne suspected, quite rightly, that she was just starting on a different phase of the same ordeal.

  CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE

  THE COMMITTAL OF SIN

  THERE HAD BEEN TIMES OVER the past two years and ten months when Joanne Lees felt she was drowning in her own tears. But as the date for the court hearing to commit Bradley Murdoch to a full jury trial steadily approached, Joanne had never known such anguish. She was fearful, sure enough, of the proceedings themselves, when she’d be forced to face the man she believed had attempted to abduct her and had shot her boyfriend Peter Falconio in cold blood. She was also increasingly anxious about the spotlight from the world’s press falling on her once again, with all those accusing faces trying to ask her questions and shoving cameras in her face. But, most of all, she was afraid of the Falconio family. It wasn’t so much them, she was scared of. It was their reaction to what she was about to tell them.

  Bad enough that they’d lost their son to a brutal outback killer, and even worse that his body had not been found. But perhaps the fact that his girlfriend had lived to tell the tale was some small comfort. How would they feel now when they learned that, while in Sydney with their son, she’d also been sleeping with someone else? Yet she knew there was absolutely no alternative: she had to tell them.

  When the police discovered her guilty secret over her email account in Alice Springs, they’d had to question her about it. They didn’t know; it could have proved important to the case. In the event, they also spoke to Nick Reilly, and quickly discounted the affair as irrelevant to their investigation. But the betrayal lay, quietly burning away among the police documents — which all would have to be revealed, in due course, to Murdoch’s defence team. The prosecution had discovered the defence planned to bring it up at the committal to cast doubt on the ‘perfect’ relationship she had with her boyfriend and cast doubt on her credibility, and warned Joanne.

  She knew there was nothing for it, but to confess all to the Falconio family. The irony of it was that it wasn’t a full-blown love affair, she didn’t even term it an affair, really. It was just two young people, both far from home, who’d casually fallen into bed together a few times. Peter had never known, and would never have known. It just hadn’t been all that significant. It’s what young people on holiday far from home do. The Falconio family listened quietly to her confession. They tried to understand, but it was hard. They could imagine how much courage it must have taken Joanne to tell them about it, though. And they appreciated being told before reading it in all the newspapers.

  By the time Joanne arrived in Darwin on Sunday 16 May 2004 ready for the five-week committal to start the next morning, she was completely wrung out.

  THE NORTHERN TERRITORY IS ONE of the few legal jurisdictions that still holds a full formal hearing before committing someone to trial. The hearing is before a magistrate who must be convinced there is a strong enough case to answer for the matter to proceed to a jury. Usually, the prosecution briefly outlines its case, calls a few witnesses and the committal is a mere formality. For the defence team in Murdoch’s case, however, it would be an important testing ground for so much of the evidence for the charges against him. With some 150,000 documents tendered in evidence, and nearly 600 witnesses named, they could decide how many of those people they would like to see, and work out which ones were the most important to the police case — or the least convincing.

  Mark Twiggs and Grant Algie were again Murdoch’s legal team. After their success in Adelaide at having the charges of rape, assault and false imprisonment thrown out, they were on a high. Privately, they said they were far more confident of beating the Darwin allegations. Their case hinged on the fact that Joanne had identified her attacker’s dog as a Blue Heeler rather than a Dalmatian; that she said she’d been pushed from the front of a vehicle to the back, with no such vehicles thought to exist; that she’d described her ass
ailant’s gun as having a distinct pattern, and none of those had been traced; and that the DNA discovered at the scene could have been contaminated. Furthermore, without a body, it would be difficult to prove murder.

  The pair had enjoyed some degree of notoriety as a result of their coup in Adelaide. ‘It does raise your profile, but probably only among lawyers,’ says Twiggs. ‘It might not even do your business any good. If you have a high profile, people think you might be too expensive to hire.’

  Murdoch’s case was being paid for by Legal Aid, with a top-up. It was imperative he be seen to be getting a fair trial and normally legal representation in such a complex case would be paid more.

  Algie was enjoying himself. It felt like somewhat of a David and Goliath battle — two lawyers from Adelaide up against the might of the South Australian police force, and now against that of the Northern Territory in the most talked-about case in Australia. He was a boy from small town country Australia, born in Edithburgh, a small farming community at the bottom of the Yorke Peninsula, just 80 kilometres from the childhood home of Superintendent Colleen Gwynne. His forebears had scrambled ashore from the shipwrecked migrant ship the Marion in 1851, which had set sail from Plymouth four months before, to become peasant farmers. He grew up being told by his father, ‘Don’t worry about lawyers, boy, they aren’t for people like you and me.’ But after winning a scholarship to Immanuel College in Adelaide, the Lutheran church school also attended by Australian tennis champion Leyton Hewitt, and then doing the unthinkable for a boy from his town — going to Adelaide University — he’d become a lawyer in the steel town of Whyalla, and been called to the bar in 1991. Now forty-four, he knew, apart from anything else, that the Murdoch case could be the making of his career. ‘Every successful case is a landmark,’ he says.’ You are certainly conscious of the fact that it’s going to change your life.’