Speaker 1: Hi, This is Dan and first up, I just wanted
Speaker 1: to say thank you, seriously thank you to those people
Speaker 1: who have come forward since we released those last few
Speaker 1: episodes of this series. Just on the back of those
Speaker 1: people who've contacted us with their tips, we have broken
Speaker 1: new news stories about this case. One of those is
Speaker 1: someone who's come forward and said that a second person
Speaker 1: told them that Frank Abbot's brother, Bluie, claimed that Frank
Speaker 1: was involved in what happened to William. I also spoke
Speaker 1: to a former prisoner who got in touch to say
Speaker 1: that he had met Frank Abbot inside prison and Frank
Speaker 1: had given him a detailed account of what happened to William,
Speaker 1: and that this former prisoner tried to tell detectives that
Speaker 1: he spoke to David Laidlaw, who's running the investigation, only
Speaker 1: to be told that they still think William's foster mother
Speaker 1: is allegedly responsible, and that the police didn't follow up
Speaker 1: with this prisoner about what he said he'd heard. Now,
Speaker 1: of course, both William's foster mum and Frank Abbott have
Speaker 1: denied any involvement in what took place on that day,
Speaker 1: twelfth of September twenty fourteen, and I'm not saying that
Speaker 1: these new allegations are true, just saying that they have
Speaker 1: been made and they have not been followed up by
Speaker 1: the police. We've also written another story saying the coroner
Speaker 1: who's running the inquest into William's disappearance has now said
Speaker 1: they will consider new evidence if it's provided to them
Speaker 1: by the police, and you can read all that reporting
Speaker 1: at news dot com dot au. But we also know
Speaker 1: that this story isn't over. And more importantly, we know
Speaker 1: that this story is not about us, but it's about William,
Speaker 1: and it's also now about Helen and Margaret and Sherry
Speaker 1: Lee and those people closest to them. But some people
Speaker 1: have also got in touch with us recently asking how
Speaker 1: Nina and I are doing, especially after the last episode,
Speaker 1: where I think you can hear that all this work
Speaker 1: has had an effect on us. So what we're going
Speaker 1: to do now is we're going to play the audio
Speaker 1: of an interview that Nina and I took part in
Speaker 1: just before the release of those last four episodes in
Speaker 1: this series. It's from another podcast called Something to Talk About,
Speaker 1: hosted by Sarah Lemarquand, and we're including it here because
Speaker 1: it lifts the curtains a bit on making this series
Speaker 1: and it does give you a sense of what it
Speaker 1: takes to do that and what it takes out of
Speaker 1: you when you end up doing an investigation like this.
Speaker 2: Dan Box and Nina Young, Welcome to the Stellar podcast.
Speaker 1: Thank you.
Speaker 2: I know you're very familiar with how podcasts work, are
Speaker 2: pretty much more so than anyone else in Australia. But
Speaker 2: first time here, and of course just full disclosure to
Speaker 2: our listeners right up front. We all work together, yep.
Speaker 2: But before anyone thinks that they're about to watch or
Speaker 2: listen or read to an editorial meeting, Okay, that might
Speaker 2: be true, but an editorial meeting with two of the
Speaker 2: top investigative journalists in the country, the brilliant duo behind
Speaker 2: Witness William Tyrrel, which launched last year last October, went
Speaker 2: straight to number one on the Australian podcast charts, millions
Speaker 2: and millions of downloads since, and is about to return
Speaker 2: with four new episodes that will reveal new information that
Speaker 2: could take the investigation in a whole new direction. So
Speaker 2: if that's an editorial meeting, let's get on with it.
Speaker 2: Let's call Ahara and invite Australia to come and join this.
Speaker 2: William Terrell, of course, being the three year old boy
Speaker 2: who disappeared from his grandmother's garden in twenty fourteen. He's
Speaker 2: never been found. The disappearance has been one of the
Speaker 2: most talked about cases in the country. For months now.
Speaker 2: You have been working on these new episodes that will
Speaker 2: be dropping from tomorrow. You've spoken to everyone who's been
Speaker 2: involved in the case, including William's biological family, his cares,
Speaker 2: and former homicide detective Gary Jubilan Dan. I'll start with you.
Speaker 2: You are a Walkley Award winning journalist who's broken hundreds
Speaker 2: of stories across the court of your career, both in
Speaker 2: the UK and here in Australia. Can you tell me
Speaker 2: what first drew your attention to the William Tyrell disappearance
Speaker 2: and your first involvement in investigating this case.
Speaker 1: I was one of the few reporters who covered the
Speaker 1: immediate after Martha William's disappearance, so that's going back ten
Speaker 1: years now. I wasn't there the day after, but I
Speaker 1: think I was there within days working on the story.
Speaker 1: And I remember I've covered a lot of murders and
Speaker 1: you get kind of hardened to it. They don't bother
Speaker 1: you anymore, but this one. I remember one occasion I
Speaker 1: was up on Bellerom Drive, which is the road that
Speaker 1: William was last seen on, and the detective who was
Speaker 1: leading the investigation at the time was talking me through
Speaker 1: their theory then that William may have run down this
Speaker 1: grass bank from the house to the road, and that
Speaker 1: maybe someone had been on that road and that person
Speaker 1: had taken William. And I had a three year old
Speaker 1: at home, so the same age as William to within
Speaker 1: a couple of months, I think, And because of that,
Speaker 1: I could picture a three year old and how they move,
Speaker 1: you know, that slightly wonky, slightly funky way of moving.
Speaker 1: I could picture my three year old running down that
Speaker 1: slope to the person on the road, and it troubled
Speaker 1: me in a way I don't think any other case
Speaker 1: has troubled me. And I've stayed with it in different
Speaker 1: ways and in different forms, reporting on it in the
Speaker 1: ten years since. And I think part of the reason
Speaker 1: to come back to it and look at it in
Speaker 1: the way we have done now, and Nina and I
Speaker 1: have been working on this for two and a bit
Speaker 1: years now. This is part of the reason I was
Speaker 1: grateful for the invitation to come and talk to you,
Speaker 1: because I know normally this podcast is about talking to
Speaker 1: celebrities and about with that world of celebrity. But of
Speaker 1: all the murders that I've covered, I think maybe there
Speaker 1: are a few other murders in Australia that have that
Speaker 1: element of almost celebrity to it. Not the good things
Speaker 1: about celebrity, but the vast amount of media attention. I've
Speaker 1: literally seen paparazzi car chases pursuing witnesses. I've actually been
Speaker 1: involved in one of them. The people trawling through the
Speaker 1: untold details of other people's lives, lives that are just
Speaker 1: kind of held up to the examination of the media
Speaker 1: gaze and kind of ripped apart all that element of celebrity.
Speaker 1: The William Tiole case has and has been kind of
Speaker 1: distorted by it, and now I don't think, like maybe
Speaker 1: with a lot of celebrities, what people think is the
Speaker 1: truth and what actually is the truth of completely different things.
Speaker 1: So that that's why we came back to it.
Speaker 2: Nina, What about for you, because you have, over the
Speaker 2: course of your journalism career, tell our audience a little
Speaker 2: bit about that idea, and as Dan has explained, this
Speaker 2: story that has genuinely captivated an entire nation, and then
Speaker 2: from that moment bringing something like witness to fruition.
Speaker 3: Yeah. So Dan, I think started at a company about
Speaker 3: two years ago. We met a Yeah. Yeah, the day
Speaker 3: he came in, we had a meeting and I was like, Hi,
Speaker 3: I'm Nina. I've heard you're doing a William terryl podcast
Speaker 3: and I would like to work on it because I
Speaker 3: don't do small talk. Sarah Noely, Hello, I'm going to
Speaker 3: work with you. I don't think I anticipated at that
Speaker 3: point or could have the amount of work that we
Speaker 3: were actually going to be pouring into this thing, or
Speaker 3: that would be working on it two years later, but
Speaker 3: we did get straight to work. A lot of that
Speaker 3: work is sort of quiet background filing, the amount of
Speaker 3: filing this guy does.
Speaker 1: We've got a timeline, so a list of events like
Speaker 1: bullet points, this happened, then that happened, then that happened,
Speaker 1: then that happened. I think it's actually about a quarter
Speaker 1: of a million words now, so it's the length of
Speaker 1: two and a bit books, and that's just our kind
Speaker 1: of main reference document. But you know the amount of
Speaker 1: work that Nina's done, We wouldn't be here now talking
Speaker 1: about these new episodes because I thought we'd finished this
Speaker 1: series last year, and if I used to tell Nina
Speaker 1: that I was taking the whole of this year off.
Speaker 1: But at the end of the last year, Nina went
Speaker 1: off on this kind of side investigation, which I kind
Speaker 1: of just.
Speaker 3: Kept going, like, I'll talk to you about it.
Speaker 1: And we finished the series last year. I thought that
Speaker 1: was the end of the Nina said, right now, you
Speaker 1: have to sit down and I'll tell you what I've got.
Speaker 1: And I remember, the feeling is almost this sinking feeling
Speaker 1: of Okay, there's so much more to do.
Speaker 2: So that whole year off, which, by the ways, first I've.
Speaker 3: Heard about this as a manager.
Speaker 2: But we'll talk about we'll talk about that offline that
Speaker 2: you knew then that you had to go back coming
Speaker 2: into the first series. What were the biggest questions for
Speaker 2: each of you that you initially wanted to explore. What
Speaker 2: of all of the questions that people were asking, do
Speaker 2: you think that appetite for answers was the strongest for Nina.
Speaker 3: I think there was so much mystery surrounding this case,
Speaker 3: and despite what had been fed to the media, there
Speaker 3: weren't really any details to it. So we knew that
Speaker 3: the police were looking at Williams foster mother as a
Speaker 3: potential person of interest or a suspect, but they didn't
Speaker 3: really say why, and they didn't say why they were
Speaker 3: looking at her rather than looking at other persons of
Speaker 3: interests that had been raised previously in the investigation. I
Speaker 3: think that's the biggest focus that people had when we
Speaker 3: first started this investigation.
Speaker 1: Yeah, for me, it was that that kind of gulf
Speaker 1: between mean, what people thought they knew because of what
Speaker 1: had been in the media, and what actually the truth was.
Speaker 1: But there was another element to it for me, which
Speaker 1: was because I'd been reporting on this in different ways
Speaker 1: for newspapers. I did a couple of books that touched
Speaker 1: on this. I knew a lot of the people involved
Speaker 1: in the case and the investigation, and I had a
Speaker 1: sense of how many lives had been caught up and
Speaker 1: damaged not just by William going missing, but by the
Speaker 1: police investigation that followed. So, you know, obviously you had
Speaker 1: the families, the biological and the Foster family, but you
Speaker 1: had different witnesses who'd been held up by the police
Speaker 1: to media and court scrutiny, and their lives had just crumbled,
Speaker 1: and then the police and the media had moved on
Speaker 1: to the next person, and then each time there was
Speaker 1: this kind of human wreckage left behind, and I I
Speaker 1: wanted to put the focus back a little bit on
Speaker 1: those lives as well, the lives that have been damaged
Speaker 1: because of this attempt to find this child, which still
Speaker 1: hasn't been successful.
Speaker 2: Let me ask you both a little bit about that,
Speaker 2: the motivation for doing the work that you do, because
Speaker 2: it's obviously this particular case, and then of course the
Speaker 2: other stories that you've investigated over the course of your
Speaker 2: respective careers. The material is it's extremely dark, it's confronting.
Speaker 2: You are working through details that obviously there are other
Speaker 2: people in other professions that we as a society think.
Speaker 2: I don't know how I could be exposed to all
Speaker 2: of that and then go home and live a quote
Speaker 2: unquote normal life. Is that what has motivated each of you?
Speaker 2: Nina is As Dan spoke, he had that human connection
Speaker 2: as a parent, which I think resonated with a lot
Speaker 2: of people. I know. For me, my son was the
Speaker 2: same age as William, and I remember one day there
Speaker 2: was a copy of the Daily Telegraph on the living
Speaker 2: room table and Logan was in his Spider Man suit
Speaker 2: and he said to me, Mummy, is that me? And
Speaker 2: I'm just sorry, I just wanted to share that money
Speaker 2: down when you spoke about it. Obviously, we know as
Speaker 2: journalists we don't need those personal connections to stories, but
Speaker 2: when they do happen, you know that's also tapping into
Speaker 2: something that other people are feeling. Nina, sorry, I've aston
Speaker 2: answered that question. How obnoxious off me? I really want
Speaker 2: to hear your answer.
Speaker 3: Yeah, obviously any parent in Australia can look at William's
Speaker 3: face and see that connection and sort of no, instinctively,
Speaker 3: how horrible that feeling would be a lot to lose
Speaker 3: your child. But I also kind of connected with the
Speaker 3: idea of there's all these potentially innocent people that have
Speaker 3: been held up a suspects, that who have had their
Speaker 3: lives ruined. I mean that could happen to literally anyone.
Speaker 3: You could just be going about your day, you could
Speaker 3: be in the wrong place at the wrong time. And
Speaker 3: I kind of went really naively into this investigation, going
Speaker 3: if the police are pursuing this woman so strongly, this.
Speaker 1: Is William's foster mom.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yep, of course they have something.
Speaker 1: I thought that too when it was on the front page.
Speaker 3: And the fact that we've come through the inquest with
Speaker 3: no eyewitness evidence, no forensic evidence, no evidence that has
Speaker 3: really been presented, I'm not happy with that. And so
Speaker 3: I do feel like I'm driven by wanting to hold
Speaker 3: people accountable for.
Speaker 1: The damage done to those lives by the police decision
Speaker 1: to focus on those people. And it's not just the people.
Speaker 1: It goes back to children again, and so it's not
Speaker 1: just the people you see on the front pages or
Speaker 1: the TVs. It's their families and those ripples just spread out.
Speaker 2: It's so true, isn't At every headline there's thousands of people,
Speaker 2: entire communities, entire families that are behind that, and then
Speaker 2: the story moves on, but their lives remained. And that's
Speaker 2: before we even get into the whole social media I
Speaker 2: think where everyone Obviously there's a lot of self appointed
Speaker 2: detectives out there of course with true crime as well,
Speaker 2: so people then becoming vigilantes and feeling that they can.
Speaker 1: Keep the case just on that. And sorry to interrupt,
Speaker 1: when we started this reporting, because we were reporting that
Speaker 1: maybe the police hadn't got it right, or we at
Speaker 1: least investigate in the possibility the police might not have
Speaker 1: it right about William's foster mum. I knew there were
Speaker 1: whole communities out there online who very much thought the
Speaker 1: police were in the right, and I knew they weren't
Speaker 1: going to like this, and so talk to Nina about it,
Speaker 1: about the possibility for online abuse, social media abuse, and
Speaker 1: it came in, and it came in much quicker than
Speaker 1: I expect.
Speaker 3: Yeah, he had the chat with me one day and
Speaker 3: just said, look, I'm only going to bring it. Don't
Speaker 3: look at this stuff, and I'm not going to look
Speaker 3: at the stuff, but I've told someone to flag if
Speaker 3: your name comes into it, and also if there are
Speaker 3: credible threats to come up. It was the next day
Speaker 3: that's already it happened.
Speaker 1: We had to talk to the company about it, just
Speaker 1: to let them know it's not just me, it's everyone
Speaker 1: who's worked on this project, their names on it. So
Speaker 1: there's a potential for all of those people to be
Speaker 1: chased out. And I didn't mind if they were just
Speaker 1: having a pop at me. I kind of expected it,
Speaker 1: but it wasn't okay for them to go after other people.
Speaker 1: And I have seen some of the stuff that's been
Speaker 1: said since and that element to it, that kind of
Speaker 1: modern element of media celebrity that's really ugly.
Speaker 3: Yeah, people have tried to message me on Instagram. There
Speaker 3: was at one stage somebody rang the company here and
Speaker 3: said that I'd tried to call them and they had
Speaker 3: forgotten my phone number and asked the reception to give
Speaker 3: them my phone number. And I know it was the
Speaker 3: same person because they'd come through your email and Instagram
Speaker 3: as well. So yeah, it's it's a whole new world
Speaker 3: now that we have social media involved as well.
Speaker 1: And what people seem to be happy to do on
Speaker 1: social media is be worse towards women. I think the
Speaker 1: kind of things people have said about me, some of
Speaker 1: which is laughable, it's actually quite funny, some of which
Speaker 1: is really nasty.
Speaker 2: There definitely is a toxicity I think that is reserved,
Speaker 2: particularly for women.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I was not surprised by.
Speaker 2: This, definitely not surprising. But even when you are prepared,
Speaker 2: and even when you have, as you say, somebody like
Speaker 2: down warning you, and then the next day it's happening, Yeah,
Speaker 2: you can be prepared, and then of course there's the
Speaker 2: reality and you're talking, Nina about people trying to get
Speaker 2: hold of your phone number. Anyone that's been in that
Speaker 2: situation would understand that feeling that, well, what else are
Speaker 2: they trying to fight? And are they trying to get
Speaker 2: my address? Are they going to be waiting for me
Speaker 2: in the office in the car park when I leave?
Speaker 2: In those moments? Nina? For you, how do you balance
Speaker 2: that up? Yeah?
Speaker 3: And I think for a story like this, when you
Speaker 3: know what you're doing is important and that it has
Speaker 3: you know it's worth telling, then yeah, it's worth it.
Speaker 1: Let me qualify that. I think it is worth it,
Speaker 1: and I think on this one it has been worth it.
Speaker 1: That said, it does take a toll. I don't know
Speaker 1: if I'll do crime reporting again after this, and I've
Speaker 1: done in almost twenty years on and off of doing it,
Speaker 1: but this case, this investigation, this has taken more out
Speaker 1: of me and we have found things and darknesses that
Speaker 1: I never expected to and a lot of that is
Speaker 1: in the episodes that are coming out from Monday. The
Speaker 1: things we have seen and found have been utterly shocking.
Speaker 1: I actually don't know if I want to do this anymore.
Speaker 1: So I think it's worth doing, but I don't know
Speaker 1: if I can.
Speaker 2: If that makes sense, it does make sense and you
Speaker 2: just said I think it's worth doing. And when I
Speaker 2: heard you say that, you don't think you will do?
Speaker 1: I don't know. I've got I've got.
Speaker 2: That would beg the question. Obviously, WILL want to talk
Speaker 2: to you both about what you can tell us about
Speaker 2: what's coming up and some of what you have uncovered.
Speaker 2: But without getting into that right now, is it worth it?
Speaker 2: Has it been worth it?
Speaker 1: Oh?
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's it's definitely worth it. Well, I don't think
Speaker 3: either of us are sleeping. Well at the moment, we're
Speaker 3: not sleeping. Dan's had to deal with wild mood swings
Speaker 3: from me.
Speaker 1: That's not true.
Speaker 3: Which is I think we could have anticipated. Yeah, I
Speaker 3: think we could have anticipated where this was going to
Speaker 3: take us, and I think we both thought it was
Speaker 3: going to be quite a lot more simple than it was.
Speaker 3: I think the day I was calling up bowlers from
Speaker 3: a bowling alley thirty years ago, and maybe the day
Speaker 3: I was running around trying to find a microcassette tape,
Speaker 3: and there's just been so many weird wrong turns and
Speaker 3: right turns through us. I just don't that we could
Speaker 3: have anticipated how long, in depth, unusual and dark it
Speaker 3: was all going to be. But I think it's worth it.
Speaker 2: Well, we know there was no small talk in your
Speaker 2: working relationship, as you're saying, I mean, it got straight
Speaker 2: straight to the point on your first meeting. This is
Speaker 2: obviously an extremely intense experience, and it has been the
Speaker 2: two of you working on it, and you have been
Speaker 2: doing a lot of traveling as well. You've been on
Speaker 2: the road a lot to small country towns. You're in
Speaker 2: the car together for hours every day. I mean, everyone
Speaker 2: who's ever done a road trip knows it's not all
Speaker 2: it's cracked up to be with the little Hollywood movies
Speaker 2: with their music montage. In fact, talking about montage, I've
Speaker 2: got a little bit of audio because I was going
Speaker 2: to ask if you argue, But don't answer that, because
Speaker 2: just a little bit of audio has made its way
Speaker 2: into my courtesy of our producer Emma Lee.
Speaker 3: We've just pulled up. We have okay. Well, I was
Speaker 3: going to say, what's on the sign? Certainly helps you
Speaker 3: yea for the recording audience.
Speaker 1: No, I know that I'm not just telling you what's
Speaker 1: on the sign. I'm waiting for you to say so, Dan.
Speaker 3: Well, I was gonna, you know what for once, I
Speaker 3: was going to say where we were.
Speaker 1: But we hadn't pulled up with should we anymore? All right?
Speaker 2: See, this is a danger when you're working audio that
Speaker 2: there's always audio to play back. What that's actually pretty mild.
Speaker 2: I won't editorialize.
Speaker 3: I think we also had a fight where because I
Speaker 3: was saying that Dan doesn't say yes and enough as
Speaker 3: a scene partner.
Speaker 2: Yes and enough.
Speaker 3: Yeah, she didn't know what I.
Speaker 1: Was talking about. The role of the reporter is really
Speaker 1: to do what your producer tells you. And it's possible
Speaker 1: that that maybe he got blurred after Like I mean,
Speaker 1: one point, we were doing like six hours in the
Speaker 1: car next day, six hours in the car next day,
Speaker 1: and then when you stop it is to do these
Speaker 1: emotionally charged interviews, and then you're back in the car
Speaker 1: driving on. You're staying in these motel rooms. And at
Speaker 1: one point Nina was up in the middle of the
Speaker 1: night and the next morning, you know, she's kind of
Speaker 1: feverishly looking at this thing that seemed really important. And
Speaker 1: then I get a text the next morning saying I
Speaker 1: need to talk to you. And the first thing we
Speaker 1: say is she's back in the car, the microphone's back on.
Speaker 1: But I wouldn't have wanted to do it with anyone else.
Speaker 1: And that's the thing that is true. Everything in these
Speaker 1: next four episodes is from Nina. Like I, she drove this.
Speaker 1: The stuff we found, I would never have expected she
Speaker 1: found it. I'm very much just walking around asking the
Speaker 1: questions on tape. This is where Nina took charge of
Speaker 1: the investigation without being asked, because it was mine she
Speaker 1: to without asking permission, without asking, she took charge of
Speaker 1: the investigation and just dragged it into being something. It
Speaker 1: was never going to be that good, but Nina made it.
Speaker 3: Dan is exaggerating there, Dan, There's worth a huge amount
Speaker 3: on this as well.
Speaker 2: Coming from that sort of confronting, emotionally draining, physically taxing
Speaker 2: our duous investigative work. To move in between those different things,
Speaker 2: presumably is going back to that skill that.
Speaker 1: You my wife will talk about this though. I really
Speaker 1: struggle with the transition from work out of work into family,
Speaker 1: and I'm not very good at it, partly because our
Speaker 1: work is intense in terms of the subject because most
Speaker 1: of my work seems to be murder at the moment,
Speaker 1: but also the intensity which we bring to it because
Speaker 1: we're writing scripts, we're writing articles, and then particularly if
Speaker 1: you're working from home. To flip from that into dinner time.
Speaker 1: I've got three kids, one of them is three. It's
Speaker 1: up to my wife hates I want to say this.
Speaker 1: It's rolling chaos. And to flip from basically intense murder
Speaker 1: to oh, it's dinner time with a three year old.
Speaker 1: I cannot do it. I try so hard. I'm getting better,
Speaker 1: but I'm working on that. So yeah, it looks we're
Speaker 1: not perfect at it, but we're doing our best. Is
Speaker 1: it does affect your sleep? Yeah, he has had dreams
Speaker 1: about William Tyrrel. I've got to the point where before
Speaker 1: I go to sleep, I tell myself, don't think about
Speaker 1: William tool because I won't go to sleep otherwise.
Speaker 2: Will we ever find out what happened to William Tyrell?
Speaker 2: The answer to that when we come back. Let's talk
Speaker 2: a little bit then about the next four episodes of Witness, which,
Speaker 2: as you say, being released from tomorrow Monday, mayn nineteen.
Speaker 2: As I said at the start, you have uncovered an
Speaker 2: awful lot of information and that will obviously there'll be
Speaker 2: new information in each of the four episodes. What can
Speaker 2: you tell us our audience about what you have uncovered? First,
Speaker 2: of all.
Speaker 3: Yeah, so we came to the end of the Inquest.
Speaker 3: That's where we left our last episodes.
Speaker 1: That's the inquest into William's disappearance.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and that inquest it ended very abruptly. In fact,
Speaker 3: they canceled the.
Speaker 1: Last week with a few days warning. They just said,
Speaker 1: we're not going to have the next hearings.
Speaker 3: And I think, again, naively, I was sort of hoping, well,
Speaker 3: we'll go through the inquest and we'll get all the
Speaker 3: answers that we need, we won't have any questions left.
Speaker 3: We got to the end of the inquest, I had
Speaker 3: more questions than ever and that's when we started looking
Speaker 3: at some of those questions for this next part of
Speaker 3: the series. What we decided to focus on was a
Speaker 3: particular person of interest in the case who we felt
Speaker 3: there we're remaining questions about at the inquest, and so
Speaker 3: we've really gone deep on some of the evidence that
Speaker 3: was presented at the inquest about him. We've gone on
Speaker 3: and done our own investigation from there. We've found new witnesses,
Speaker 3: we've found some potential connections between this person of interest
Speaker 3: and some other unsolved cases on the Mid North Coast
Speaker 3: that are not.
Speaker 1: William tyrrel we found new allegations about an area the
Speaker 1: police haven't searched, but that maybe we certainly would have
Speaker 1: liked to see the police search. And what has struck
Speaker 1: me throughout is that the evidence we've uncovered, a lot
Speaker 1: of it was known to the police, or could have
Speaker 1: been known to the police if they weren't asking questions,
Speaker 1: and time and again it seems that they haven't.
Speaker 3: Again, that's the other thing. I feel like I've been
Speaker 3: naived the whole time. Every time I go into the
Speaker 3: next chapter, I'm like, I was really thinking, we're not
Speaker 3: going to get too far with what we're looking at here,
Speaker 3: because we're going to realize that the place are in
Speaker 3: the middle of an active investigation here, and they're going
Speaker 3: to pop up and they're going to tell us to stop.
Speaker 3: Then it became really clear that was not going to
Speaker 3: happen because the police hadn't spoken to any of these
Speaker 3: people that they would have had to speak to if
Speaker 3: they were doing a full investigation.
Speaker 1: And people who've told us that they gave this evidence
Speaker 1: and asked that it be passed on to particular detectives
Speaker 1: and they've never had a call back. And we've spoken
Speaker 1: to families of victims who say they call up the
Speaker 1: police and ask them what's the latest, who's in charge
Speaker 1: of the investigation now? And they never get phoned back,
Speaker 1: They never get called back, And you think about the
Speaker 1: enormity of what's happened to the families involved for the
Speaker 1: police not to be responding. It just it just appaused me.
Speaker 1: And that's not every case. Like I've been a crime
Speaker 1: reporter and some of the most impressive people I've ever
Speaker 1: met are in the New South Wales Police Force. I
Speaker 1: mean that absolutely genuinely. But I used to have such
Speaker 1: a high opinion of the New South Wales Police Force,
Speaker 1: and over the course of these two years working on
Speaker 1: this investigation, that incredibly high opinion of the force, it's
Speaker 1: just been taken knock after knock after knock after knock,
Speaker 1: and there's still some incredibly impressive people there. But I
Speaker 1: can't say like I used to say that, I just
Speaker 1: think that force is just a force for good.
Speaker 3: Nina, What about for you?
Speaker 2: You keep saying that you feel a bit naive sometimes
Speaker 2: because you assume a certain outcome. Has your trust in
Speaker 2: the police, investigation and authorities? Has that also been somewhat
Speaker 2: undermined with your experience in this story.
Speaker 3: It definitely has. But I think it's really important to
Speaker 3: say that these police aren't operating in a vacuum when
Speaker 3: they're doing these investigations. Everything's being okayed from the top,
Speaker 3: so they're aware of how these things are operating. So
Speaker 3: I think that some of that accountability has to go
Speaker 3: to the top as well. We can't just be saying, like,
Speaker 3: the police on the ground have done these investigations wrong.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and so Nina's right, and some of the accountability
Speaker 1: has to be kind of reflected back on us as
Speaker 1: the media, because a lot of what you've seen with
Speaker 1: the William Toole investigation is newspapers TV taking information from
Speaker 1: the police uncritically and publishing it. And I've had conversations
Speaker 1: with journalists who have said that almost word for word
Speaker 1: on the back of the most recent inquest, which showed
Speaker 1: no evidence against the foster mother, who have said to me,
Speaker 1: we took this information from the police in good faith,
Speaker 1: and it turns out it wasn't fair, and maybe the
Speaker 1: mistake is we took it in good faith and just
Speaker 1: repeated what we were told. And you can say that
Speaker 1: about Bill Spedding, and you can say that about me
Speaker 1: because I reported on Bill Spedding when he was arrested.
Speaker 1: He was charged unrelated offenses, but he was charged and
Speaker 1: ultimately that case was thrown out and it was described
Speaker 1: as the worst case of malicious prosecution in the history
Speaker 1: of New South Wales. But I reported it all in
Speaker 1: good faith, so I'm not innocent here. But I do
Speaker 1: think when Nina talks about accountability, you've got to look
Speaker 1: at the cops in charge, and you do have to
Speaker 1: look at the media.
Speaker 2: Once all the information that's going to be revealed in
Speaker 2: these new four episodes is out there in the public
Speaker 2: domain later in the week, what would you be anticipating
Speaker 2: or hoping? Maybe both of those you can answer. In
Speaker 2: terms of the police investigation.
Speaker 3: I would like to see the police investigate some of
Speaker 3: this new information that we've found, and if they don't,
Speaker 3: I would like to know.
Speaker 1: Why Ninna's more hopeful than I am.
Speaker 3: Again, if you I'm going in a bit nicely, I'll
Speaker 3: come back to you.
Speaker 1: I would like to see I would like to see
Speaker 1: a lot if I'm honest. At this point, we know
Speaker 1: because the lead lawyer at the inquest just before Christmas
Speaker 1: of last year said that there is no evidence no
Speaker 1: forensic evidence, no eyewitness evidence about what happened to William
Speaker 1: in terms of how William was taken from that house
Speaker 1: where he was last known to be to wherever he
Speaker 1: is now. So we know there is no evidence. I
Speaker 1: would like to see the police and the coroner stop
Speaker 1: and say, well, that's not good enough. We're not just
Speaker 1: going to wrap up the investigation, which they're due to
Speaker 1: do later this year when the coroner will hand down
Speaker 1: a report. I would like them to say, we're not
Speaker 1: accepting that. We are going to throw everything at it
Speaker 1: again until we find William. I would also, and this
Speaker 1: is where it gets impossible, I would like to see
Speaker 1: them do that for do you know how many unsolved
Speaker 1: homicides there are in New South Wales. There are hundreds,
Speaker 1: hundreds and hundreds of families whose loved ones were murdered
Speaker 1: or went missing and have no answers. I would love
Speaker 1: to see them do that for all of those. And
Speaker 1: I would love for there to be a proper investigation,
Speaker 1: and I mean it's going to have to be special
Speaker 1: commission or Royal Commission powers into firstly, what went wrong
Speaker 1: with the William Tirell investigation, because ten years later we
Speaker 1: haven't found it. But also I'd love to see that
Speaker 1: investigation into what went wrong with all these other unsolved homicides,
Speaker 1: because the closer you look at them, you realize that
Speaker 1: things were done wrong in a lot of them. I
Speaker 1: would love to see all of that. I don't expect
Speaker 1: to see any of it, and that that really bothers me.
Speaker 2: Do you think we will ever find out what happened
Speaker 2: to William Tyrrel.
Speaker 3: I hope that we get answers. Am I hopeful that
Speaker 3: we will. It's looking less and less likely ten years on.
Speaker 3: Witnesses are getting older, dying and losing their memories. And
Speaker 3: you know, there are witnesses that we've spoken to in
Speaker 3: these new episodes that are coming out this week that
Speaker 3: the police haven't spoken to yet, but by this point
Speaker 3: their memories are already going. So we know that it's
Speaker 3: too late for the police really to speak to these people.
Speaker 3: It may be too late, But I really really hope
Speaker 3: we get answers.
Speaker 1: I think we might. I think we might, And it
Speaker 1: might well be something that comes up seemingly out of
Speaker 1: the blue. A new witness comes forward, a new piece
Speaker 1: of evidence, A detective picks up the file and goes well,
Speaker 1: what about that that happens in other cases. But I'm
Speaker 1: pretty sure that if it does happen, and we know
Speaker 1: this from talking to other detectives, that if that does happen,
Speaker 1: if we do get an answer, that answer will already
Speaker 1: be there in the files somewhere. The police have got
Speaker 1: so many tens of thousands of different documents and exhibits
Speaker 1: and reports and statements. The little detail that is the
Speaker 1: key to this will be in that file somewhere. They
Speaker 1: just haven't found it yet or realized what it is.
Speaker 1: And if we do answer this case, I bet you
Speaker 1: are able to go back and say there, that's the
Speaker 1: point it went wrong.
Speaker 2: What role also does public scrutiny play in this in
Speaker 2: terms of going back to accountability when it comes to police?
Speaker 2: We know that this new information will be picked up
Speaker 2: by all other media across Australia. What you have uncovered
Speaker 2: will there'll be huge public interest in it for the
Speaker 2: reasons that we've talked about. Because William's disappearance has been
Speaker 2: a source of fascination for eleven years now, we know
Speaker 2: that that sort of public appetite, scrutiny, renewed interest and
Speaker 2: demand for answers. Is this new information being investigated. Dan,
Speaker 2: you talked about investigators not returning phone calls from witnesses,
Speaker 2: not having their opportunity to speak being taken up. Are
Speaker 2: you optimistic, either of you, that that sort of interest
Speaker 2: that these new four episodes it's going to put it
Speaker 2: back on the front burner in a way that the
Speaker 2: Sweetel would and didn't.
Speaker 3: Well, we know, I mean we've spoken to homicide detectives
Speaker 3: about this, about the role that the media plays in
Speaker 3: the kind of resourcing that they get and the pressure
Speaker 3: that they get. Politically, Yeah, it can definitely push push
Speaker 3: resources onto a case and give them more of a focus.
Speaker 3: I don't know whether we will see that in this case.
Speaker 1: It can happen, though, Yeah, it does happen, and that's
Speaker 1: when the job's really good. Yeah, when you do see
Speaker 1: a case that has been forgotten or put to one
Speaker 1: side or left and opened, and you do see it
Speaker 1: picked up where you pick it up, and then you
Speaker 1: see because what happens is it's on the front pages
Speaker 1: or on the websites or on the TV. The politicians
Speaker 1: pick up the phone and they ask the police commissioner
Speaker 1: what's going on. The police commissioner picks up the phone
Speaker 1: and asks they had a homicide, what's going on? And
Speaker 1: that filters down and suddenly you've got people looking for answers.
Speaker 1: So it can happen.
Speaker 2: It can happen, and when it does happen, it will
Speaker 2: happen because of the two of you.
Speaker 1: It happens.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I wouldn't say it's because of the two of
Speaker 3: us that a lot of really brave people have come
Speaker 3: forward and spoken, and they're the ones who are really
Speaker 3: putting themselves on the line to do that. We're just
Speaker 3: standing there with a microphone, So it's definitely won't come
Speaker 3: down to us.
Speaker 2: But it is that pressure though, isn't it. And it
Speaker 2: is giving a platform for those people to be heard
Speaker 2: and then force some pressure to be brought to bear
Speaker 2: on authorities to act. My final question for you both
Speaker 2: and is about the people that are at the heart
Speaker 2: of this case. William's love to answer his families. Do
Speaker 2: you believe that this what might transpire this week in
Speaker 2: the public domain? Do you think that will bring them
Speaker 2: some sort of relief. Obviously you've spoken to them, you
Speaker 2: know them. Are you able to talk a little bit
Speaker 2: about what you think this new information might mean for them,
Speaker 2: how they're feeling and again with the case back in
Speaker 2: the headlines this week, what it might mean for them
Speaker 2: in terms of that elusive goal of closure.
Speaker 1: We've spoken to some of them. Some of them have
Speaker 1: chosen not to speak to us, and we have to
Speaker 1: respect that because what they're going through. We can't imagine
Speaker 1: to lose a child in those circumstances and never have
Speaker 1: an answer. So we have spoken to some of them,
Speaker 1: both biological family and foster family. I met with some
Speaker 1: of them just a few days ago. I'll be honest,
Speaker 1: I think the effect will be turbulence for them, emotional
Speaker 1: to urbulence. But the sense that I get at the
Speaker 1: moment from talking to them is of anger. Anger everything
Speaker 1: that has played out since that moment that William was
Speaker 1: reported missing, Anger at the lack of a resolution, Anger
Speaker 1: that were still here ten years ago, basically asking why
Speaker 1: hasn't this been fixed? And I think that anger is
Speaker 1: going to flare again as a result of what we're
Speaker 1: about to report.
Speaker 2: Well, congratulations on everything that you have achieved so far
Speaker 2: and in these upcoming new four episodes of Witness, William
Speaker 2: tyrrel Nina Young, Dan Box, it's been an absolute pleasure
Speaker 2: to talk to you. Thank you everyone, for joining our
Speaker 2: editorial meeting. I think you would agree.
Speaker 3: That's a way more glamorous, not your usual.
Speaker 2: Of course, there was audio, because, as we've just discovered
Speaker 2: thanks to Emily, we always have audio of all of
Speaker 2: our conversations. Not really HR, that's not legal. Thank you
Speaker 2: for joining me today. If you've enjoyed this episode, let
Speaker 2: us know by leaving a review or sending it to
Speaker 2: a friend, and make sure you're following something to talk about,
Speaker 2: because we'll be back with another exclusive guest next week