Speaker 1: A used grave, not a new grave. We are talking
Speaker 1: an occupied grave, complete with headstone. I look over the top,
Speaker 1: here's this guy up to his neck in the grave
Speaker 1: shoveling it out right, and I'm thinking, there's something you
Speaker 1: don't see every day.
Speaker 2: No, when we watched Western's as youngsters, one thing we
Speaker 2: would always say would be the formation of a possey.
Speaker 2: You claim to have formed a possey. I'm Andrew Rule.
Speaker 2: This is Life and Crimes Today. We're going to embark
Speaker 2: on a series of podcasts.
Speaker 1: With a guest to the studio, Mark Tregallis.
Speaker 2: Now. I met Mark Tregallis at distant parts of East
Speaker 2: Gippsland some years ago when there was a terrible bushfire
Speaker 2: at Malicutera, Malanicuta and Mark, you were a copperate Malicuda
Speaker 2: or the copperate Malicuda the policeman for many years. Well,
Speaker 2: you're not so.
Speaker 1: I was stationed in Malancouta for sixteen years and it
Speaker 1: varied between at some stages during those sixteen years of
Speaker 1: us having four or five policemen staying there. To the
Speaker 1: first day that I arrived, the sergeant handed me his keys,
Speaker 1: said these are the keys to the police station. Make
Speaker 1: yourself at home, I'm off to his team or for
Speaker 1: six months, right, and that was it.
Speaker 2: That was it, you marked you and your family had
Speaker 2: the wife and kids with you.
Speaker 1: Correct. So at that stage I was married and the
Speaker 1: first kid was on the way. Yep. And I've since
Speaker 1: then had three daughters and they now all have done
Speaker 1: the reverse trip back to Melbourne for university.
Speaker 2: And now you're following them down to keep an eye
Speaker 2: on things. Oh pretty much, Yes, visit, but along the
Speaker 2: way I know this for a fact. Along the way
Speaker 2: you gathered quite a lot of interesting country copper stories.
Speaker 2: And you're a pretty good teller of stories, and in
Speaker 2: fact you have published them in a book.
Speaker 1: My three daughters got me to write down all the
Speaker 1: crazy police stories. They wanted it for their kids and
Speaker 1: their grandkids when when they got older. I never thought
Speaker 1: it would get published, and when it did, I thought
Speaker 1: I would have to buy every copy and give it
Speaker 1: to extended family as a Christmas present for the next
Speaker 1: ten years. So I was a bit amazed when it
Speaker 1: sold out in three weeks.
Speaker 2: It's mark that reflects not only the content, which is good,
Speaker 2: but the title, and the title is remarkably good.
Speaker 1: What is it? Well? I know, but I'm asking you no.
Speaker 1: So the title is back up is three hours away.
Speaker 2: That sort of nails it, doesn't it.
Speaker 1: And there have been many, many times in my career
Speaker 1: where backup has been three hours away. To give you
Speaker 1: an idea of the far East s Gippsland in particular,
Speaker 1: is a huge area. There's a very low population and
Speaker 1: very few police. So at times during those sixteen years
Speaker 1: I was patrolling four thousand square miles by myself and
Speaker 1: I would get given jobs that would take me two
Speaker 1: and a half hours to drive to. That's just one way.
Speaker 2: And that's the border basically from the border right through
Speaker 2: to somewhere like ben River close to Orbost.
Speaker 1: I guess. So what happens is when you become a
Speaker 1: police officer on the border, you become a police officer
Speaker 1: in the adjoining state, so as a police officer in
Speaker 1: Victoria and a special constable in New South Wales.
Speaker 2: So you have got jurisdiction if you need.
Speaker 1: It, so you can continue it pursued across the border.
Speaker 1: You can arrest people with the same powers that New
Speaker 1: South Wales police have. However, you have no idea what
Speaker 1: the paperwork is, so you have to take them to
Speaker 1: a new South Wales police station and then just sign
Speaker 1: on the bottom line after the other guys with them,
Speaker 1: Where do they go to court if they're naughty? So
Speaker 1: if in Malicuta it would be Eaten magistrates court they
Speaker 1: would go to unless it was somewhat more serious, in
Speaker 1: which case they would probably.
Speaker 2: So they go to court in the other state. If
Speaker 2: you're pursue the border, it becomes their jurisdiction for court.
Speaker 1: If I pursue a car over the border and arrest
Speaker 1: them over the border, I can't bring them back. It's
Speaker 1: an extradition, gotcha right, So I have to take them.
Speaker 2: Okay, now along the way. Your daughters are on the
Speaker 2: money because they know the stories. They've heard many of them.
Speaker 2: They were there when they happened in some.
Speaker 1: Respects when I was a first moved to the country.
Speaker 1: I moved to Portland. Back in those days, during the
Speaker 1: Kennedy era, police, police, nurses, teachers used to have homes
Speaker 1: that you could rent at six percent before mister Kenneth
Speaker 1: sold them all. And what happened was I was meant
Speaker 1: to get one, but I couldn't. The guy was six
Speaker 1: So they said, could you find somewhere else? And then
Speaker 1: someone came up to me and said, look, there's this
Speaker 1: one hundred year old farmhouse out at whites Beach, which
Speaker 1: was about twenty five kilometers from Portland. At seventy five
Speaker 1: dollars a week, and I've gone for seventy five dollars,
Speaker 1: I am there. So I moved this. Now I got
Speaker 1: to admit I as a city boy, grew up in
Speaker 1: Syndall Mount Waverley my whole life, had never lived in
Speaker 1: the country. So I moved into this one hundred year
Speaker 1: old farmhouse. It was so old that when the wind blew,
Speaker 1: the wall paper used to come out about two feet.
Speaker 1: It was in winter, and I remember lighting the fire
Speaker 1: and watching TV with a family of mice on the hearth.
Speaker 1: It had character, Oh, it had characters. It also had
Speaker 1: an outdoor toilet and a semi detached shower. It was
Speaker 1: part of a ward in section of the verandah. Excellent.
Speaker 1: So on my first morning, I walked naked out the
Speaker 1: front door because I could, and into the ward in
Speaker 1: section of the veranda and into the bathroom. Now, the
Speaker 1: bath slash shower was one of those enameled cast iron
Speaker 1: tubs on four legs with a wrap around curtain. No
Speaker 1: extractor fan pushed against a far wall where there was
Speaker 1: this four foot wide lap sash window that you could
Speaker 1: drop down and that would let the steam out. Yep,
Speaker 1: and I work that out. I'm in the shower shampooing.
Speaker 1: What I didn't know was that there was a horse
Speaker 1: in the paddock next to the shower that heard the
Speaker 1: water and walked over. And it looked through the window
Speaker 1: and went water, think I'll have a drink. So it
Speaker 1: sticks its head through the window and proceeds to drink
Speaker 1: out of the shower. This is twelve inches in front
Speaker 1: of my fate. I'm completely oblivious to it because my
Speaker 1: eyes are closed because I'm shampooing. Then the horse turns around,
Speaker 1: looks at me, and says to itself, gee, I wonder
Speaker 1: what that white stuff tastes like. Let me tell you,
Speaker 1: getting licked in the face by a horse when you're
Speaker 1: naked in the shower is exciting. That would be. In fact,
Speaker 1: it's so exciting it bears detail. The lick goes in
Speaker 1: and with the tongue pretty much still attached, your eyes
Speaker 1: open and in the split second before the sud sit
Speaker 1: them and they close. The only thing you focus on
Speaker 1: is this massive set of teeth six inches in front
Speaker 1: of your face, and a horse not the first thing
Speaker 1: to come to mind as you're naked in the shower,
Speaker 1: But the first thing that does, for some unknown reason,
Speaker 1: is the monster from the Aliens movie. So you exit
Speaker 1: the shower, taken the rod and the curtain with you.
Speaker 1: I exited so fast, I hit the far wall, horse,
Speaker 1: ride up, heard its head for occasionally. I got used
Speaker 1: to the horse, and I shampooed the horse's face as well.
Speaker 1: And now the only problem with you got you.
Speaker 2: Got mates with the horse.
Speaker 1: Living out yeah, yeah, it would turn up. It would
Speaker 1: turn up every shower. Good God. Now the only problem
Speaker 1: with living out at White Speech was did he have
Speaker 1: a drink the horse? Did he ever? Did you ever? Trop? Yeah?
Speaker 1: It wasn't there. So the only problem with living out
Speaker 1: there was the exorbitant rent. So I got young Johnny
Speaker 1: to move in with me, another unconstable. So on John's
Speaker 1: first morning, he's sitting in the kitchen having a cup
Speaker 1: of coffee. You didn't tell him about the horse, did you? No? Here?
Speaker 1: When he looks up and sees me walk naked past
Speaker 1: him out the front door. So so John's head comes
Speaker 1: around the corner and he goes drink. I've got, yeah, mate,
Speaker 1: we're going and I look in and I go shower.
Speaker 1: And then he looks at me and he says, why
Speaker 1: do you have a large carrot in your hand? And
Speaker 1: you held the pause, fair question, you held, and I said,
Speaker 1: I often shower with a carrot. And he goes, you
Speaker 1: eat the carrot in the shower. I go, no, so
Speaker 1: what do you do in the shower with the carrot?
Speaker 1: And I've gone you'll find out soon enough. So a
Speaker 1: couple of minutes later, he has his shower, meets the horse.
Speaker 1: In a couple of weeks, we're both sharing with carrots. Share.
Speaker 1: I see. So that was my first introduction to country policing.
Speaker 2: That is a very funny story. And you couldn't make
Speaker 2: it up.
Speaker 1: Oh no, you cannot make this stuff up.
Speaker 2: Funny about running water and horses. I love running water.
Speaker 2: Tell us about and I'm racking my brain's here from
Speaker 2: when we've chatted in the past. Just casually gun to
Speaker 2: the German.
Speaker 1: Okay, so this isn't exactly a high crime story, but
Speaker 1: it is somewhat hilarious. I was stationed in Apollo Bay
Speaker 1: at the time, and we're working an afternoon shift so
Speaker 1: knocking off at midnight, and at about six o'clock that
Speaker 1: afternoon we got a phone call asking for an assistance
Speaker 1: with a German tourist whose car had broken down on
Speaker 1: the Grad Ocean Road. This happened a lot. We often
Speaker 1: would have problems with visiting, especially European drivers, because they
Speaker 1: would drive along the Grad Ocean Road, see an amazing site,
Speaker 1: pull over, take some photos, get back in the car,
Speaker 1: and then immediately drive on the wrong side of the
Speaker 1: road and a car coming the other way could cause problems,
Speaker 1: but Gunda didn't have this. We just got one there
Speaker 1: and I could just smell when I got to the
Speaker 1: car that his clutch had basically burnt out. So we
Speaker 1: secured the car. We got him back into the police
Speaker 1: station and sat him down, and there was a car
Speaker 1: quite close just in lawn his company, so they drove
Speaker 1: up and only took an hour for him to get there,
Speaker 1: so good to just sat in the police station and
Speaker 1: when the next car came up, the guy handed him
Speaker 1: the keys, so then we waved goodbye and Gunta headed off.
Speaker 1: Not ten minutes later, we get another call from Gunta
Speaker 1: saying that this car is broken down, so we go
Speaker 1: up to it, and sure enough he has burnt out
Speaker 1: a second clutch. And both cars were manual. So my
Speaker 1: first question to Gooda was have you ever driven a
Speaker 1: manual car? And he looked at me and said no,
Speaker 1: So he had no idea what he was doing to dry.
Speaker 1: So he's just burnt out two clutches. So I've secured
Speaker 1: the second car, got him in the back, taking him
Speaker 1: back to the police station for a second time. And
Speaker 1: this time there wasn't another car. They had to bring
Speaker 1: up one up from Melbourne. It was going to take
Speaker 1: another four hours and the company wasn't very happy with Gunta.
Speaker 1: Let me tell you, that's quite bizarre. So Gunta says, okay,
Speaker 1: then I'm going to go and get to read. So
Speaker 1: he disappears into town. Me and Andy are on deck
Speaker 1: at the time, and we're just doing paperwork in the station.
Speaker 1: Gunda comes back and he's sitting out the front of
Speaker 1: the of the watchhouse, which is the area where the
Speaker 1: public can come in, and is reading. And I walk
Speaker 1: past him and I look down and Gunta's reading a
Speaker 1: porno right and well he is German. I do a
Speaker 1: double take and I go, Gunda, what are you doing?
Speaker 1: And he goes I am reading, and I go, you
Speaker 1: can't read a porno at a police station, freaking give
Speaker 1: it to me, pull it off and wrap it up
Speaker 1: so you can have it when you go. Women and
Speaker 1: kids coming to the police station. Bait. You can't do that,
Speaker 1: So he was quite indignant. Anyway, it's almost knockoff time
Speaker 1: when the third car arrives. This one is an automatic,
Speaker 1: so about time, Gunda is feeling a lot happier with this.
Speaker 1: And the guy pulls up into the police station driveway
Speaker 1: hands over his car. He wasn't too happy, let me
Speaker 1: tell you. So we go out there. Gunna gets in
Speaker 1: the car, starts at UF, waves to us and reverses
Speaker 1: into the telephone pole at the front of the police station.
Speaker 1: Oh magnificent. Me and Andy are just dumb struck. We
Speaker 1: were speechless. We could not believe it. So Gonda stops
Speaker 1: the car, gets out, goes to the back. Sea's this
Speaker 1: massive dent in it, looks up to us and says,
Speaker 1: what do I do? And I've looked at Gunter and
Speaker 1: gone get back in and keep driving. Just keep driving
Speaker 1: frontwardswards a wave far away from Apollo Bay as you
Speaker 1: possibly can.
Speaker 2: Absolute roll goal twenty four Carrot Gunta.
Speaker 1: So I've never before or had ever had anyone have
Speaker 1: three car accidents in an eight hour shift.
Speaker 2: What were they doing giving somebody who's who clearly good
Speaker 2: and driver manual a manual. Secondly, in my experience in Europe,
Speaker 2: everybody drives smallish manuals and they regard automatics as something
Speaker 2: for little old ladies.
Speaker 1: I didn't ask him at the time. It's bizarre, yeah,
Speaker 1: the whole thing. But the whole thing was just But
Speaker 1: the weirdest thing was when I passed him and looked
Speaker 1: up and just see him reaching this pornocrafty. I just
Speaker 1: couldn't believe it. Now, what's there a story?
Speaker 2: Tell me if this is you, the story about the graveyard.
Speaker 1: And oh no, that is me, that is you. I
Speaker 1: think you've got to tell that one. Okay, then well
Speaker 1: that is most definitely one. So that was down that
Speaker 1: way too. It was at Apollo Bay. Anyone who has
Speaker 1: traveled the Gradation road out of Apollo Bay, heading towards
Speaker 1: the Twelve Apostles, you go through a small satellite suburb
Speaker 1: a couple of k out of Apollo Bay called Maringo,
Speaker 1: and then you go up the Maringo Hill, and that's
Speaker 1: heading towards trove apostles and warnable and places. So one
Speaker 1: night I was working with Mick and we're driving back
Speaker 1: and we're ten minutes from knockoff, ten minutes from midnight,
Speaker 1: right And we come down the hill and I'm driving
Speaker 1: and I look across where the old Apollo Bay Cemetery
Speaker 1: is on the right hand side, and as I look up,
Speaker 1: I see a light and so I turned to Mick
Speaker 1: and I go, Mick, there's a light on in the cemetery.
Speaker 1: And he turns to me and says what. And I go,
Speaker 1: there's a light on in the cemetery. And he goes,
Speaker 1: it's a boat because it slopes down overlooks the water.
Speaker 1: And I go, no, no, no, no, So I slow down,
Speaker 1: I do a U tune. Mick goes, don't worry about it,
Speaker 1: it's just someone reading late. We pull up front entrance
Speaker 1: of the cemetery, headlights off. We both see a flicker
Speaker 1: of a hand, torch out. We get torches off. Walking
Speaker 1: through the cemetery, it is black, no moon, no stars.
Speaker 1: Can't see a hand in front of your face. We
Speaker 1: get to the middle of the cemetery and Mick goes, listen, stop,
Speaker 1: no word of a lie. We can hear this is
Speaker 1: a shovel noise, is it? It's the sound of someone digging.
Speaker 1: Oh my god. I look at Mich looks at me,
Speaker 1: and I've gone is that what I think it is?
Speaker 1: And he goes, yeah, I've gone, what do you want
Speaker 1: to do? He goes forget we ever heard it? Drive back,
Speaker 1: knock off. I've gone that's a good plan. And then
Speaker 1: he says, all we could investigate, and I've gone planned
Speaker 1: one still sounds better. And Mick says, come on, there's
Speaker 1: two of us. We're grown men. We've both got guns.
Speaker 1: And I've gone, oh right, then, would you hold my hand?
Speaker 1: So we're walking along, digging's getting louder. I have got
Speaker 1: no idea what we're going to find. All of a
Speaker 1: sudden that stops freeze. Thirty seconds later, digging starts up again.
Speaker 1: I get to the far end of the cemetery and
Speaker 1: over a used grave, not a new grave. We are
Speaker 1: talking an occupied grave, complete with headstone. I look over
Speaker 1: the top. Here's this guy up to his neck in
Speaker 1: the grave, shoveling it out right. And I'm thinking, there's
Speaker 1: something you don't see every day. No, And I'm crouched
Speaker 1: down behind the back of the tombstone, and my eyes
Speaker 1: are poking out over the top. I'm looking at this guy,
Speaker 1: and I'm thinking, you know, this guy's acting sus. Not
Speaker 1: that digging a grave out at midnight isn't slightly sus
Speaker 1: to start with, but he's got a black beanie pulled
Speaker 1: down over his head, and every couple of shovelfuls he's
Speaker 1: taking a nervous lookout towards the front entrance of the cemetery.
Speaker 1: Definitely something going on. So I stand up from behind
Speaker 1: the tombstone. As I do that, both knees go crack.
Speaker 1: This guy rockets around just in time to see my
Speaker 1: hands curl over the edge of the tombstone. I lean
Speaker 1: over the top of him and just say gooday.
Speaker 2: And we must point out to our listeners that you
Speaker 2: are in the old money. About what's six ' seven
Speaker 2: six ' eight, Sorry, I'm six eight. I've cheated you
Speaker 2: of an inch and that metric is too two two
Speaker 2: two two. So when you stand up over a gravestone
Speaker 2: at full height with the knees cracking, it's quite a
Speaker 2: sight at midnight. He screamed, He screamed.
Speaker 1: The shovels come flying out scrambling up the side of
Speaker 1: the grave with vid him with the torches. Police don't move.
Speaker 1: He's frozen. He's looked up. He's gone. Police. Oh thank god.
Speaker 1: We get him out, pull him up out of the hole.
Speaker 1: This guy is shaking like a leaf. And I have
Speaker 1: gone mate. I can't wait to hear your story, because
Speaker 1: if you do not have the world's greatest you are
Speaker 1: in so much trouble. I don't even know where to start.
Speaker 1: And he looks at us and goes, I'm the grave
Speaker 1: digger and I go the town grave digger, and he goes, aha,
Speaker 1: I go working at midnight by hisself, and he used
Speaker 1: grave no Carna LUTs and he says, oh, well, old
Speaker 1: Bill Clogs has got to be buried with his wife tomorrow.
Speaker 1: And I finished his grave off at half past six.
Speaker 1: But theyn now, I've got a phone call from his
Speaker 1: relatives at eight o'clock. They went out and had to
Speaker 1: look and phone me back to say that I dug
Speaker 1: the hole in the wrong spot and I had to
Speaker 1: come back and finish it before the funeral tomorrow. Then
Speaker 1: there's car pools in and it's his mate in a
Speaker 1: ute full of tools and lights who's been helping him
Speaker 1: all night, but they'd almost finished, so he'd gone home
Speaker 1: to get a six pack of beer and left him
Speaker 1: with a little torch with the batteries working. It was
Speaker 1: all above board. We were stunned.
Speaker 2: Oh that is magnificent, And you thought you had the
Speaker 2: best pinch of all time.
Speaker 1: I was all you got was the best story. I
Speaker 1: would have thought. I would have been looking up law
Speaker 1: from the sixteen hundreds from England grave my grave robbing
Speaker 1: and seeing if I could translate that into modern Victorian law. Magnificent.
Speaker 1: So yeah, look, i'd have bet a thousand bucks he
Speaker 1: couldn't have come up with a story.
Speaker 2: And there you are, in a sense. As soon as
Speaker 2: you heard it, you go, yeah, a little be right.
Speaker 2: Obviously he's just dung the wrong hole, and he's and
Speaker 2: he's made.
Speaker 1: They're going to dig the right hole. So he said
Speaker 1: carry on, And the guy looked at you, and carry on.
Speaker 1: He said, no, my mate's not gone. Ten minutes. I
Speaker 1: swear I can hear footsteps coming towards me. So I
Speaker 1: stop and I listen. Can't hear anything. Minute I started digging,
Speaker 1: footsteps getting closer than You've jumped up behind doom stuff.
Speaker 1: I've shot my pasts. He jumped in the car and
Speaker 1: barreled off with the guy.
Speaker 2: Oh that's wonderful. That is a great story. I had
Speaker 2: some early warning of that one. It's just bears repeating.
Speaker 1: It's a very good story. Now.
Speaker 2: You know, when we watched Westerns as youngsters, there was
Speaker 2: always you know, the villains wore black hats, the good
Speaker 2: guys wore white hats. The Indians as we used to
Speaker 2: call the Native Americans, were often I think Mexicans or
Speaker 2: Spanish or Italian or Greek actors often and it was
Speaker 2: pretty rough and ready. But one thing we would always
Speaker 2: see would be the formation of a possey. The bad
Speaker 2: guys would gallop off with handkerchiefs around their faces, and
Speaker 2: and then the possey would chase them and had them off.
Speaker 1: At the pass.
Speaker 2: You claim to have formed the in these Skipps Land.
Speaker 1: It is no also was in Apollo Bay. We had
Speaker 1: a fair bit happened in Apollo Bay. So I should
Speaker 1: first often say that that forming a posse is nothing
Speaker 1: that is ever taught in the academy, right, okay, but
Speaker 1: they've never studied this, You do not.
Speaker 2: You've had a bit toner with possums, but not posses.
Speaker 1: Correct, right. So what happens is a police officer can
Speaker 1: ask a member of the public for assistance in arresting someone,
Speaker 1: and a member of the public can voluntarily assist a
Speaker 1: police officer. The interesting part of this though, is that
Speaker 1: if that person whilst assisting the police officer is assaulted,
Speaker 1: then the offender is charged with assaulting police, even though
Speaker 1: they are not an employee of the police, they are
Speaker 1: acting at that time as a police officer. Yeah, fair enough,
Speaker 1: and that's fair. So as everyone would know who's driven
Speaker 1: down the Great Ocean Road a Pollar Bay lawn Port
Speaker 1: campbell during the summer period, it just becomes mad and
Speaker 1: there are hundreds of campers in there. So in the
Speaker 1: Apollo Ba caravan Ground, we got a phone call late
Speaker 1: one night that there were a group of young guys
Speaker 1: going around stealing things from caravans. And this was after midnight.
Speaker 1: So again I was working with Andy, and we drove
Speaker 1: down and parked the car and then decided we'd just
Speaker 1: sort of sit back with the binoculars. It was fairly
Speaker 1: well lit and we would have a look and we
Speaker 1: spotted five guys that were going around helping themselves opening
Speaker 1: Eski's taking out any drinks that were in there. A
Speaker 1: bike got stole, and other people were just putting stuff up.
Speaker 1: But here's the thing. There's five of them and there's
Speaker 1: two of us, right, So we watched until they went
Speaker 1: back to their camp site, and then we did a
Speaker 1: check on the registration numbers of the cars and found
Speaker 1: out that they belonged to crooks that had quite a
Speaker 1: lengthy set of pride convictions, some of which were violence.
Speaker 1: They're not just cheaping easy kids, these are books. So
Speaker 1: we got onto the radio explained what had happened, and
Speaker 1: our nearest up to that point was Collak, which was
Speaker 1: well over an hour north of us, and they said, well, listen,
Speaker 1: it's going to take over an hour for us to
Speaker 1: come in and see you and get any help to you.
Speaker 1: So we had to think outside the square as to
Speaker 1: how we were going to arrest these five guys safely.
Speaker 1: So as we were walking around earlier on that night,
Speaker 1: we spotted a large group that was drinking down the
Speaker 1: far end of the caravan park. So we wandered down
Speaker 1: and it turned out to be a new South Wales
Speaker 1: rugby team on their end of year.
Speaker 2: Were they big strong blocks. They were freaking huge were
Speaker 2: they game?
Speaker 1: And anyway, so and they're half cut and so anyway,
Speaker 1: they walked up to them and we said, listen, guys,
Speaker 1: we need a bit of a bit of a hand
Speaker 1: and they said what do you need. Well, we've got
Speaker 1: to go and arrest these five guys, but we don't
Speaker 1: want to do it alone. We'd like you guys to
Speaker 1: come with us. Now. If any of them takes a
Speaker 1: swing at us, feel free to jump in. And like,
Speaker 1: these guys were like, you know, eighteen years of old,
Speaker 1: and you could just see their eyes light up at
Speaker 1: the thought of having a staush.
Speaker 2: And the gay.
Speaker 1: And I said, on top of that, if any of
Speaker 1: them take a swing at you, we charge them with
Speaker 1: assaulting police because you are acting at that point in
Speaker 1: time as police officers. How did they receive that? And
Speaker 1: they thought that was even better, of course, And one
Speaker 1: of the guys raises his hand and he said what happened?
Speaker 1: And he goes, he goes, do you have to swear
Speaker 1: us in? Oh? I was so close to saying, everyone
Speaker 1: raise your right hand and repeat after me, but I
Speaker 1: decided against it, and I said, no, no, no, that's
Speaker 1: just in America, guys. It's enough that you say you're
Speaker 1: going to help us, and that you come along. That's
Speaker 1: all we needed. So anyway, the coach was there, and
Speaker 1: the coach was sort of four sheets, So anyway, he
Speaker 1: sculls the rest of his beer and goes, right, let's
Speaker 1: get this done and we'll march over to this camp.
Speaker 1: So a bash on this tent and the voice goes,
Speaker 1: what is it? He goes police. Anyway, these five guys
Speaker 1: come rushing out and there's eighteen people surrounding them, and
Speaker 1: I go, hey, guys, listen, just want to say we've
Speaker 1: been watching you for the last half hour. We know
Speaker 1: all this stuff has been stolen. You're all under arrest.
Speaker 1: And the five guys go. They look at us, and
Speaker 1: they go, I don't think so. And you know, by
Speaker 1: this stage you've got a couple of the sixteen years
Speaker 1: old sort of champion at the bit to get in
Speaker 1: there and the sisters and clean them up. But the
Speaker 1: coach steps in and he goes, listen up, you five idiots,
Speaker 1: we're here, and if you think you're going to be
Speaker 1: able to beat all of us, you got it wrong.
Speaker 1: So how's about you do what the two nice police
Speaker 1: officers weren't turn around get handcuffed and we can all
Speaker 1: go back up, and they did so, they came around
Speaker 1: and we cuffed them. Because we work remote country, we
Speaker 1: carry spare handcuffs in the police car, so we're able
Speaker 1: to cuff them, ll stick them in the back of
Speaker 1: the van and take them back. And it was without incident.
Speaker 1: But as they were walking off, I do have to
Speaker 1: say there were a few looks of disappointment among the
Speaker 1: young amongst the young fellas, because I think they were
Speaker 1: really keen to have what had been able to have
Speaker 1: acted as a police officer for a few for a
Speaker 1: few hours. Yeah, it's a.
Speaker 2: Beautiful story of and a rare story.
Speaker 3: Oh.
Speaker 1: I mean, only time I have ever done that. Something
Speaker 1: that I chose to ask at a lecture we had
Speaker 1: one year, and that was that if that was to
Speaker 1: happen and the person assisting us is injured, are they
Speaker 1: entitled to work cover? And the answer is no, because
Speaker 1: they're not an employee a police force.
Speaker 2: All right, that's tricky stuff, occupational health and safe all
Speaker 2: that stuff. It's complicated. Mark Tregalis, thanks very much for
Speaker 2: talking to us about your new book. Well it's not
Speaker 2: that new, but it's fairly new. Back Up is three
Speaker 2: hours away from all good bookshops and many bad bookshops.
Speaker 2: We are so delighted with it that we might like
Speaker 2: to talk to you next week and we'll see you then.
Speaker 1: Well, thank you very much Andrew for inviting me to
Speaker 1: come on and have a chat, and I would definitely
Speaker 1: be up for another one next week. Excellent.
Speaker 2: Thanks for listening.
Speaker 3: Life and Crimes is a Sunday Herald Sun production for
Speaker 3: True crime Australia. Our producer is Johnty Burton. For my columns,
Speaker 3: features and more, go to Haroldson dot com dot au,
Speaker 3: forward slash Andrew rule one word. For advertising inquiries, go
Speaker 3: to news Podcasts sold at news dot com dot au.
Speaker 3: That is all one word news podcast's sold. And if
Speaker 3: you want further information about this episode, links are in
Speaker 3: the description.