Speaker 1: The public has had a long held fascination with detectives.
Speaker 1: Detective sy aside of life the average person is never
Speaker 1: exposed to. I spent thirty four years as a cop.
Speaker 1: For twenty five of those years I was catching killers.
Speaker 1: That's what I did for a living. I was a
Speaker 1: homicide detective. I'm no longer just interviewing bad guys. Instead,
Speaker 1: I'm taking the public into the world in which I operated.
Speaker 1: The guests I talk to each week have amazing stories
Speaker 1: from all sides of the law. The interviews are raw
Speaker 1: and honest, just like the people I talk to. Some
Speaker 1: of the content and language might be confronting. That's because
Speaker 1: no one who comes into contact with crime is left unchanged.
Speaker 1: Join me now as I take you into this world.
Speaker 1: I've always found trying to understand the mind of a
Speaker 1: criminal a useful tool in solving crimes. Getting into the
Speaker 1: mind of a criminal can also prevent crimes before they occur.
Speaker 1: It's a fascinating part of being a detective. That's why
Speaker 1: i'd about talking to today's guest Detective Senior Sergeant Chris Blake.
Speaker 1: Chris is a serving member of the New Zealand Police
Speaker 1: Force and he is the manager of the Behavioral Science Unit,
Speaker 1: a unit that was modeled on a similar unit established
Speaker 1: by the FBI. Chris's role is to ensure his team
Speaker 1: of psychologists and analysts provide support to investigators to solve
Speaker 1: and prevent serious crimes. Today we talked about the history
Speaker 1: of the unit, Chris's own policing career, some interesting cases,
Speaker 1: and how the skills his unit provide assists investigators. This
Speaker 1: is real life mind Hunter stuff. You're going to enjoy it.
Speaker 1: Chris Blake, Welcome to I Catch Killers.
Speaker 2: Well, thanks, Garry, it's a pleasure to be here.
Speaker 1: Well, I know how hard it can be for a
Speaker 1: serving police officer to get permission and approval to do
Speaker 1: anything in the media or come on a podcast like this,
Speaker 1: so I appreciate you making the effort.
Speaker 2: No nowhere is at all. Hopefully we can do it.
Speaker 1: Justice Parameters, Well, I think it's good for people to
Speaker 1: hear from serving police officer as a public because people's
Speaker 1: perception of what police are all about and it's very
Speaker 1: sort of black and white world. Are they the cops
Speaker 1: are the cops, And it's good to put a human
Speaker 1: face to what we actually do. Yeah, absolutely, house things
Speaker 1: in New Zealand, police force because over here across the country,
Speaker 1: like I'm from New South Wales and we have the
Speaker 1: state police and the federal police, but we're really struggling
Speaker 1: to get people to join the police at the moment.
Speaker 1: Are you experiencing the same thing over in New Zealand?
Speaker 2: Not that I can gather. I think almost the opposite.
Speaker 2: They seem to be pumping the wings through the college,
Speaker 2: so I'm not sure what's behind that. I think there's
Speaker 2: a lot of people hunting for jobs, and it's a
Speaker 2: secure job for life if you want it, so it's
Speaker 2: actually quite attractive at the moment for a lot of people.
Speaker 1: I think, well, I think in today's day and age,
Speaker 1: having a secure job is a very good thing.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Absolutely, I'm not qualified to do anything else, so
Speaker 2: I can't afford to lose my job. So I think
Speaker 2: a lot of people that do leave, Yeah, I find
Speaker 2: that they do come back eventually.
Speaker 1: I found that over the years with people I knew
Speaker 1: that just hit the wall and I'm out of here.
Speaker 1: I hate this job. There's an easier life. There's a
Speaker 1: better life out there. If I put it on a
Speaker 1: percentage basis, I reckon ninety percent. Tried to get back
Speaker 1: in at some stage.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Absolutely, unless you find something fantastic that just takes
Speaker 2: off and that's you. Then year people eventually go, actually,
Speaker 2: that wasn't that bad.
Speaker 1: Well, and the beauty of being a cop, and I've
Speaker 1: had a few New Zealand cops on and so I
Speaker 1: get the understanding of the way you guys operate, and
Speaker 1: it's not this similar to how we operate. But the
Speaker 1: diversity of roles that you can get in policing is
Speaker 1: it's like a small gas board, isn't it. Oh it is.
Speaker 2: You could probably think of any job you could do
Speaker 2: outside and most of them on some way, shape or form,
Speaker 2: you can probably find inside the police. You know. If
Speaker 2: you want to be a commercial diver, well there's a
Speaker 2: dive squad. You want to fly helicopters, well you could
Speaker 2: get a job on the police helicopter, you know, and
Speaker 2: everything in between. So it's pretty incredible.
Speaker 1: No, Well, I'm always like to speak to people that
Speaker 1: like their job when they're they're police officers. You've found
Speaker 1: yourself in a I'm slightly jealous because I think it'd
Speaker 1: be fascinating the role that you've got now heading up
Speaker 1: the Behavioral Science Unit of New Zealand police. That must
Speaker 1: have been something that you were very excited about getting
Speaker 1: that role. Oh yeah, and it.
Speaker 2: Sort of stumbled into it. It was a job I
Speaker 2: didn't really want for another ten years. I wanted to
Speaker 2: enjoy what I was doing, learn a bit more, get
Speaker 2: some qualifications. It was sort of like that pinnacle goal.
Speaker 2: And then when they advertised it, I wasn't even going
Speaker 2: to apply, and my wife suggests that I should, so
Speaker 2: that I throw my name and the hat and maybe
Speaker 2: next time they'll take a look at you. And then
Speaker 2: I got it. So I found myself going, this is insane.
Speaker 2: How do I do this job? And totally reliant on
Speaker 2: the staff, the experts there to show me the.
Speaker 1: Rope because you were a detective before then that I
Speaker 1: always liked and I work very closely with a psychologist
Speaker 1: in my time in homicide, doctor Sarah Yull, and I
Speaker 1: found it fascinating getting a different perspective on the way
Speaker 1: to approach investigations.
Speaker 2: Yeah, definitely. It is looking from that behavioral angle and
Speaker 2: the steps that the offender has taken, rather than what
Speaker 2: as detectives we do, which is considering everything from a
Speaker 2: physical evidence sort of perspective. Yeah, quite different. But does
Speaker 2: incorporate a lot of the similar sorts of things. You know,
Speaker 2: they are informed by the scene examinations and the suspect
Speaker 2: interviews and all that side of it very much looking
Speaker 2: at the offender and where they've come from, why they
Speaker 2: did what they did, how they did it, where they're going.
Speaker 1: Well, it adds another tool to investigations and for people
Speaker 1: that don't fully appreciate what the role of that unit
Speaker 1: you're heading up at the moment, I just this is
Speaker 1: the description of the role that they play. Help advance
Speaker 1: police investigations by providing operational psychology advice. Psychological advice, I
Speaker 1: should say, help police to better understand criminal behavior and
Speaker 1: the personalities of the people they deal with. Consult the
Speaker 1: high profile, complex and difficult to solve investigations where circumstances
Speaker 1: are often distressing, and the material graphic help provide profiles
Speaker 1: of unidentified offenders, complete indirect personality assessments, and conduct risk
Speaker 1: assessments across multiple domains. Now, I know we've got a
Speaker 1: lot of true crime listeners that tune into this, and
Speaker 1: then people who are fascinated by crime. I think that
Speaker 1: would be really hitting the mark on the interesting aspect
Speaker 1: of criminal investigation.
Speaker 2: Yeah, absolutely, And you know, it's come a long way
Speaker 2: since the nineteen eighties and the days of mind Hunter. Yeah,
Speaker 2: and you know, no longer are we going, you know, hey,
Speaker 2: that's your guy. But there's now been so much science
Speaker 2: between now I'm in then Now they can certainly go
Speaker 2: this is your type of guy, yeah, and this is
Speaker 2: how to go about looking for him.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Well, we had were very Fortunately. I was so
Speaker 1: excited as like a little school kid. Doctor Anne Burgess
Speaker 1: who worked with John Douglas in the establishment of the
Speaker 1: FBI and the unit they had there tied in with
Speaker 1: the mind Hunter TV series that portrayed the work that
Speaker 1: they did, and it was fascinating getting her perspective on
Speaker 1: how it helped advance criminal investigations. So further on in
Speaker 1: the podcast, we're going to break it down the type
Speaker 1: of things that Ken the unit can do. But I
Speaker 1: just want to talk a little bit about yourself first
Speaker 1: up and find out Okay, but what made you join
Speaker 1: the police to start with? You grew up in whereabouts
Speaker 1: in New Zealand? Did you grow up in?
Speaker 2: I grew up in Auckland on the North Shore, So
Speaker 2: that's right. Now I've come a really long way.
Speaker 1: I think like just keep moving forward there. So what
Speaker 1: inspired you to join the police.
Speaker 2: It's a long story and a short one. So I
Speaker 2: never thought about being a cop. When I was younger,
Speaker 2: I was pilot and the Air Force ditched our a
Speaker 2: fighter squadron when I was a young teenager and then, yeah,
Speaker 2: my maths and physics scores were absolutely hopeless, so I
Speaker 2: never had an open hell of getting into the Air Force.
Speaker 1: Just kind of off there. Just say that they scrapped
Speaker 1: the fire the squadron. That's the only thing that held
Speaker 1: you back.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I was definitely destined for that. Yeah, it wasn't
Speaker 2: because I was thick, but I ended up joining. A
Speaker 2: couple of things happened while I was at high school
Speaker 2: that probably, on reflection, did impact where I end up,
Speaker 2: and one of those was Columbine in nineteen ninety nine.
Speaker 2: So I was thirteen when that happened in the States,
Speaker 2: a world away, but massive impact given the media coverage
Speaker 2: it had, right, and I just couldn't wrap my head around,
Speaker 2: you know, there's kids shooting kids, and mum a kid,
Speaker 2: so a lot of thoughts around that. And then a
Speaker 2: year two years later, September eleven, so right at the
Speaker 2: time where I'm thinking, what should I be doing with
Speaker 2: my life? All my mates want to be engineers and
Speaker 2: counts and doctors, and they've got this life plan. I'm going, actually,
Speaker 2: there's more to the world than sitting on earning money.
Speaker 2: So after my pilot dreams were shot down by my
Speaker 2: lack of brain, I ended up joining the Army Reserve
Speaker 2: into the infantry and some awesome stuff in there, you know,
Speaker 2: just the that mindset of we're just going to do this,
Speaker 2: synk it through it, no matter what brilliant brilliance training.
Speaker 2: But it definitely made me think I don't want to
Speaker 2: be wet, cold, tired and hungry twenty four to seven
Speaker 2: for the rest of my life. So I ended up
Speaker 2: going what should I be doing? Full time? And the
Speaker 2: police then kind of came up as a pretty sound
Speaker 2: secondary option. So it wasn't until Army it even considered it.
Speaker 2: There are a few cops in the Army Reserves with
Speaker 2: me and they talked fondly about it. So I thought,
Speaker 2: I'll get that a crack for a couple of years
Speaker 2: and then do something else, And almost twenty years on,
Speaker 2: I'm sure there.
Speaker 1: Well, maybe it was destinate choosing that path. What was
Speaker 1: it about the crimes that you talked of that fascinated
Speaker 1: you because you would have only been a teenager at
Speaker 1: that stage. What was it that really resonated with you
Speaker 1: when you saw the reports of Colombine and ninety eleven?
Speaker 1: What was it?
Speaker 2: Yeah? I mean I just couldn't. I couldn't really understand it, right,
Speaker 2: you know, being thirteen and not knowing anything about psychology,
Speaker 2: let alone grievance and all of that sort of stuff.
Speaker 2: It just couldn't, for the life of me gather you know,
Speaker 2: you'd heard about terrorism and these words, and that people
Speaker 2: shoot people and murderers, but they have two kids walking
Speaker 2: to a school and do that. It was so bizarre
Speaker 2: to me. And so you know, every article I could find,
Speaker 2: I'd be reading about it because I was just interested.
Speaker 2: And I think it took them a very long time
Speaker 2: to even unpack a lot of the wires behind that.
Speaker 2: And as you know, Gary, even if you get all
Speaker 2: the wires, it still doesn't really make a lot of sense.
Speaker 1: Nice.
Speaker 2: You know, when there are people around that have seen
Speaker 2: things and there's a bit of leakage, and there are
Speaker 2: people that are friends with these guys, and you just go,
Speaker 2: how does this happen? I mean, it's not happening all
Speaker 2: the time.
Speaker 1: It's quite frightening what's happening. And we had Nathan Brooks
Speaker 1: on doctor Nathan Brooks who works in your unit and
Speaker 1: talking about crime, and even Am Burgess talking about where
Speaker 1: the future of crime could be. And these lone actors
Speaker 1: are definitely a concern, and it's just it feels volatile.
Speaker 1: I think all communities are feeling a little bit vulnerable
Speaker 1: for various reasons. But the ideologies that seem to be
Speaker 1: getting more extreme and the way that way that people react.
Speaker 1: Just wind it back a little bit to the Army reserves.
Speaker 1: You said it was good in that you've got to
Speaker 1: address problems. Okay, we're going to overcome this, and that
Speaker 1: I honestly think that the military perceived as sort of
Speaker 1: concrete thinkers in just a perception of the military that
Speaker 1: they don't open their minds up to other alternatives. My
Speaker 1: experience of it, my observations of it, it's so far
Speaker 1: from the truth. It's not funny.
Speaker 2: Yeah, absolutely, i'd agree with that. I think, you know,
Speaker 2: the tactics involved, they're pretty conferent because they have to be.
Speaker 2: Everyone's got to know what they're doing. If you're shot
Speaker 2: at and you're going to react to that. Everyone needs
Speaker 2: to know what they're supposed to do. But in terms
Speaker 2: of innovating and overcoming and adapting, Yeah, that's a component
Speaker 2: to it, right, And that's probably the unseen stuff that
Speaker 2: people don't really consider. They just see the tactics or
Speaker 2: that concrete side of it, and that colors the whole
Speaker 2: idea of it.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's an interesting view. I even saw it in
Speaker 1: policing because I spent some time in tactical policing and
Speaker 1: also criminal investigations, and the criminal investigators were always paying
Speaker 1: out on the tactical dudes that they're just the knuckle
Speaker 1: draggers and all that. But I can honestly say when
Speaker 1: I've worked with them, sometimes you're sitting in the back
Speaker 1: of a vent or sometimes you do briefing or waiting
Speaker 1: or waiting for the briefing, and you'd have some quite
Speaker 1: intellectual conversations. And I think it would surprise people because
Speaker 1: they just see the blikes running around in the black
Speaker 1: overalls and helmet on their head and carrying big guns
Speaker 1: and they think, Okay, these guys are just one dimensional,
Speaker 1: but it's so far from the truth.
Speaker 2: Oh absolutely, And like over here, we're our Special Tactics Group,
Speaker 2: are our full time tactical team. But for years it's
Speaker 2: slightly changed. Now we've got this new tactical response model
Speaker 2: where you can be a full time operator but not
Speaker 2: a the STG. But for so long at the arm
Speaker 2: Offender Squad and that was of part timers, so you
Speaker 2: had your day job, so you know, they'd be working
Speaker 2: with you in the CIB one day and you could
Speaker 2: be at a job with them and they're in their
Speaker 2: black gear and yeah, you're so right, like some of
Speaker 2: the questions in serious crime briefings that coming from those
Speaker 2: aoskuys sitting there and man, I don't even consider that,
Speaker 2: And I'm supposed to be running this show. Why do
Speaker 2: you ask me that I hadn't even thought about that? So, yeah, absolutely,
Speaker 2: what a diverse group of guys and girls.
Speaker 1: Yeah, policing the academy, where were you first stationed and
Speaker 1: your academy experience. And then I think it's always interesting
Speaker 1: in guests, no matter where their careers progressed in the policing,
Speaker 1: there's always something that's embedded in their mind from the
Speaker 1: early times in their policing because it's quite confronting when
Speaker 1: you walk out of the academy and you wear a
Speaker 1: new uniform and you're actually a police officer. What were
Speaker 1: you What were your memories of coming out of the
Speaker 1: academy and hitting the streets.
Speaker 2: Just getting thrown into it. Really, my memory is I
Speaker 2: had no idea what was going on. Leis College was
Speaker 2: five months and I loved that right coming out of
Speaker 2: the army. It was like a holiday in terms of
Speaker 2: the residential accommodation and how the days went, and people
Speaker 2: that had never experienced that before. It was quite a
Speaker 2: foreign environment for sure, But for me, I just love
Speaker 2: every second of it and just the camaraderie of it.
Speaker 2: It was awesome. But I popped out the end just going, actually,
Speaker 2: so how do we do this again? Because the way
Speaker 2: that we were taught was, and no one's fault at all.
Speaker 2: You've got to be taught some really important stuff at college.
Speaker 2: You've got to be taught how to affect and arrest
Speaker 2: legally and I guess look after yourself and your mates,
Speaker 2: so how to use all those tactical options, and that's
Speaker 2: probably the core stuff. So you get pumped full of
Speaker 2: that for five months, you pop out, and then you
Speaker 2: go you're going to domestics, talking to people that have
Speaker 2: been married for forty years that have had an argument.
Speaker 2: You're going what I supposed to do here? So those
Speaker 2: earlier years coming out were it was just a constant abuse,
Speaker 2: you know, because I looked ten years old. You know
Speaker 2: what was this bring your kid to work day?
Speaker 1: Just constantly Yeah you on the yeah exactly.
Speaker 2: So just finding your feet, bridging that gap between college
Speaker 2: and all the really important stuff they have to teach
Speaker 2: you and baptism. Fire out there on the street, learning
Speaker 2: by doing, and I guess ballsing a few things up
Speaker 2: on the way, learning from the people you're dealing with
Speaker 2: in your colleagues.
Speaker 1: Yeah, you do get thrown in the deep end. And
Speaker 1: I caution people when they see police make a mistake that,
Speaker 1: you know, within six months of me being out of
Speaker 1: the academy, I would as a senior person on the car.
Speaker 1: So I'm the one making the decisions. And sometimes you're
Speaker 1: looking at people and they've got a uniform on. Then
Speaker 1: you think they've got all this experience and they're just yeah,
Speaker 1: babes in the woods.
Speaker 2: Really, Oh yeah, I've got so much respect now, you know,
Speaker 2: Like people hang around for a while and then you move.
Speaker 2: You know, you might join the CIB or a technical
Speaker 2: group career. But I look back now and I look
Speaker 2: at how it's even changed in the nineteen years since
Speaker 2: I came out of college, and man, I've got so
Speaker 2: much respect for the guys and girls on the front
Speaker 2: line now. Just decisions they have to make now I
Speaker 2: just go far out. Yeah, it's just completely changed. And
Speaker 2: they're doing it with only a couple of months on
Speaker 2: the street after college as well. It's incredible.
Speaker 1: And I think there's more accountability now with social media,
Speaker 1: Like if we made a mistake. I know, when I
Speaker 1: went through the early stages of policing, it wasn't held
Speaker 1: up to public ridicule. It was someone would pull you
Speaker 1: aside and go, no, that's not how we do this,
Speaker 1: and you learn on the job. Now if you make
Speaker 1: a mistake, you become a TikTok sensation and yeah, you're humiliated.
Speaker 1: There's a lot of pressure.
Speaker 2: Totally, and and I sort of sit on the fence
Speaker 2: there because I go, you know, we don't want to
Speaker 2: go the way of Russia. So you know, having intrusive
Speaker 2: scrutiny and criticism of enforcement as fantastic and we should.
Speaker 2: But on the other hand, you go. Yeah, like just
Speaker 2: sick and guessing themselves all the time, because if someone's filming,
Speaker 2: are they going well, if that little bit got taken
Speaker 2: out of context, that's going to look bad. Yeah, what
Speaker 2: a crazy twenty first century world.
Speaker 1: I don't mind the accountability. Like the police, we need
Speaker 1: to be accountable, but there also needs to be a
Speaker 1: level of putting in perspective and understand the context of
Speaker 1: what's happening, like when they see someone yelling at someone,
Speaker 1: they don't know what the lead up to that has been.
Speaker 1: And yeah, there's still as police, we've got to work
Speaker 1: within the parameters that were allowed to But yeah, accountability, yes,
Speaker 1: but also let's give a little bit of latitude understanding
Speaker 1: that people are learning to do their job as well.
Speaker 2: That's right and perspective, right, Like where I came out
Speaker 2: of college, you know, there are only a couple of
Speaker 2: frontline cars out on a night shift. You know, sometimes
Speaker 2: you just have to get the job done quickly because
Speaker 2: you've got ten other more important jobs waiting. So you
Speaker 2: might say something that on reflection, you know, looks bad,
Speaker 2: but you just kind of move on to the next
Speaker 2: most important thing. And that that's just stuff that people
Speaker 2: don't see you know.
Speaker 1: Yeah, what how long did you stay in uniform before
Speaker 1: you went into playing clothes?
Speaker 2: Not very long, so there's only three years for me,
Speaker 2: And it was around about that time where it was
Speaker 2: becoming more common to go quicker. But you know, there
Speaker 2: was definitely a list on the whiteboard of the d
Speaker 2: S and you know, you were ninth cab off the
Speaker 2: rank and it was going to take you a couple
Speaker 2: of years to get there. So it was just at
Speaker 2: the turning point of that. So I was quite lucky
Speaker 2: I got into that to a playing clothes volume crime
Speaker 2: drug squad that was not down to me at all.
Speaker 2: There's a couple of guys there that vouched for me,
Speaker 2: and I landed that gig. And then there that was
Speaker 2: sort of the stepping stone. Everyone that was on that
Speaker 2: team got sort of encouraged to join the CIB. So
Speaker 2: I just didn't really have any desire even then, but
Speaker 2: just sort of got swept up in that and went
Speaker 2: along for the ride.
Speaker 1: And what did you find that something must have triggered
Speaker 1: your interest in working in COB What was it that
Speaker 1: you found interesting about that aspect of pleasing Yeah, I.
Speaker 2: Guess I started to like what I initially didn't. When
Speaker 2: I was in the uniform. You know, you walk past
Speaker 2: the interview suite and you'd see the detectives and you'd go,
Speaker 2: that sounds horrible. I don't want to be sitting into
Speaker 2: your room for hours. Or you'd be standing on a
Speaker 2: corner in a crime scene and the poor detectives are
Speaker 2: in there for days, and you'd go, I love my job,
Speaker 2: just going job to job, job. And it wasn't until
Speaker 2: on that plane, closed unit, just sitting down talking to
Speaker 2: Irisi arrested and just going, well, there's so much more
Speaker 2: to this, and this isn't black and white, this is gray.
Speaker 2: And I think it was just dealing with people for
Speaker 2: longer periods of time, which, okay, this is actually what
Speaker 2: the CIB is about. We're actually spending more time doing
Speaker 2: the same things so that we get that better chance
Speaker 2: of a good outcome. And I think that's where I
Speaker 2: sort of had that light bulb moment and went, Okay,
Speaker 2: this just makes sense. Now I'm going to get better
Speaker 2: at my job if I go down this pathway, whether
Speaker 2: I circle back to uniform or not. So yeah, it
Speaker 2: was sort of a no brainer.
Speaker 1: We had had a chat a week or so ago
Speaker 1: and you were talking about one case that you got
Speaker 1: called to called out to a murder and you didn't
Speaker 1: have many details and you had to speak to the
Speaker 1: suspect then custody. Tell me what you learned about that
Speaker 1: particular matter, and that sort of change your view on
Speaker 1: what's important in that interview room. You were talking about
Speaker 1: interview rooms. What was that case? What were the circumstances there?
Speaker 1: Because I found that fascinating when you were telling me.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so there must have been about around about twenty twelve,
Speaker 2: I think or just after, but a lady called Jasmine
Speaker 2: Cooper got killed up in Tahana, which is a little
Speaker 2: town right at the north northern boundary of Auckland. I
Speaker 2: guess before you head into Northland. And I've just come
Speaker 2: off a advanced interviewing course and that had taught us
Speaker 2: a lot about sort of folks zeroing in on forgetting
Speaker 2: about the wider pressures of homicide investigations and court and
Speaker 2: who's going to be watching and all that kind of stuff,
Speaker 2: and it's focusing it and all an interviewers as a
Speaker 2: conversation with someone else, you don't have to know everything
Speaker 2: before you go into it. And that was another light
Speaker 2: bulb moment for me, and I think even to this day,
Speaker 2: you know, by and large, policing hasn't caught up with that.
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 2: It's there's so much pressure to do the tick box
Speaker 2: one to twenty steps in a robotic fashion because that's
Speaker 2: the way, that the easiest way to teach it. Yeah,
Speaker 2: and we go, I don't know anything about this. How
Speaker 2: am I gonna get his free recall and write all
Speaker 2: my questions down and make sure I asked them right
Speaker 2: that With this one, I couldn't even do a plan
Speaker 2: because I don't know anything about it. So I get this.
Speaker 2: I'm asleep and I get a call from the DC
Speaker 2: here and he just goes, you see, to go up
Speaker 2: to Tihana And I'm like, cool, where's that And he's like,
Speaker 2: it's about an hour and a bit north. The guys
Speaker 2: have locked him up, so he's in the cells. Run assault,
Speaker 2: but that's it, and he's been in the cell for
Speaker 2: about an hour. He says, just go up and interview him.
Speaker 2: And I'm like, on what, well he's he's killed his
Speaker 2: ex partner and I'm going, oh, has he Well, we
Speaker 2: don't even know. So we race up there thinking it
Speaker 2: over and get up there and there's nothing to go on,
Speaker 2: so we just stuff that, let's just go and then
Speaker 2: have a chat to him, because we're gonna have to
Speaker 2: do that anyway. That's exactly what we did, and we
Speaker 2: just talkalked about nothing for a couple of hours in
Speaker 2: the interview room because there was nothing I knew about
Speaker 2: the case to raise. He denied it all, of course,
Speaker 2: and after a couple of hours he just sits there
Speaker 2: and he just goes, well, you know, I guess I
Speaker 2: should probably tell you the truth now, and then he
Speaker 2: gives us a blow by blow of the entire incident,
Speaker 2: absolute tragic family harm argument that his anger got the
Speaker 2: better of him and and he's killed his ex partner
Speaker 2: and gave it an incredible detail. And I walked away
Speaker 2: from that just going, we really need to get better
Speaker 2: at trying, you know, rather than just sort of going, oh,
Speaker 2: you don't want to make a statement, do you, and
Speaker 2: then walking away, which I think there is a little
Speaker 2: bit these days because there's so much pressure and a
Speaker 2: million things to do, it's just actually going I can
Speaker 2: just sit with this person and just chat unless it
Speaker 2: goes and if they're going to sit in the room
Speaker 2: with me and chat hey, happy days. Who knows whether
Speaker 2: that's going to lead to getting any kind of truth
Speaker 2: out of them, but we'll give it a go, and
Speaker 2: you just never know where that's going to lead. So
Speaker 2: that taught me that as don't be too quick just
Speaker 2: to shoot yourself on the foot and say, I don't
Speaker 2: really have much to say here, let's go.
Speaker 1: I think a couple of points that you've made there,
Speaker 1: just the fact that you prepared to sit down and
Speaker 1: chat with someone and get that rapport happening. Get them
Speaker 1: to feel comfortable, because someone feels comfortable if you just
Speaker 1: especially you're in an interview room, sit down, just have
Speaker 1: a conversation. You can talk on the proof of stuff
Speaker 1: and all that, let them feel comfortable and you start
Speaker 1: to get that relationship that develops relationship. People get shocked
Speaker 1: by what do you mean relationship? I think if you're
Speaker 1: in a room with someone long enough for a relationship
Speaker 1: of what context of a relationship? Who knows who cares?
Speaker 1: But a relationship, a connection occurs. I saw a lot
Speaker 1: of cops as you identified there, so they're not going
Speaker 1: to talk, not going to try. And I would see
Speaker 1: people that I looked up to mentors of mine in
Speaker 1: the way that they operated in the interview room. And
Speaker 1: I'd like to to think I did it myself throughout
Speaker 1: my career or a latter part of my career, where
Speaker 1: I'd go into the interview room and walk out and go, yeah,
Speaker 1: they've confessed, and people think what's gone on in the
Speaker 1: interview room? They look like you've done something wrong and
Speaker 1: invariably sitting down talking And I also say to people this,
Speaker 1: So I think there's a lot of confessions come on
Speaker 1: this basis. Think of the worst thing you've ever done
Speaker 1: and holding that just on your own. You want to
Speaker 1: tell someone, you want to get it off your chest.
Speaker 1: Quite often, I found that people made confessions in the
Speaker 1: interview room because they wanted to unburden themselves with what
Speaker 1: they were trying to hide. So, yeah, it's amazing what
Speaker 1: can come out of the interview room if you're prepared
Speaker 1: to sit there.
Speaker 2: Absolutely, and you know there's so much focus on and rightly,
Speaker 2: so there's hyper focus on all the safeguards these days,
Speaker 2: right and that police have screwed it up for so
Speaker 2: many years and interviewed illegally, appressively, unfeeling. Now we have
Speaker 2: a wealth of guidance on how to do it right.
Speaker 2: And there's so much of that and that all has
Speaker 2: to be taught that they don't actually teach how to
Speaker 2: actually have the conversation like a normal person. Everyone's so
Speaker 2: focused on robotically doing the rights and the room set up,
Speaker 2: and I'm going through this list and I've got my
Speaker 2: interview plan and this is going to trial, and the
Speaker 2: holy hell people are going to watch me, and I
Speaker 2: need to make sure that I, you know, the offender
Speaker 2: is bad because cops occurred, and there's black and white
Speaker 2: and that's what the jury is going to think, and
Speaker 2: all of that stuff just colors the whole interview. And
Speaker 2: it's just like, you can do all that stuff and
Speaker 2: still just actually have a normal conversation without judgment, and
Speaker 2: then the conversation starts flowing. And that's that's what needs
Speaker 2: to change in the in the training side of things,
Speaker 2: it's just be yourself, be normal, and there's no tricks
Speaker 2: involved in it.
Speaker 1: It's human nature. It allow human nature. Some of the
Speaker 1: preambles we had to read on before the recording. It
Speaker 1: evolved over the years because when recording came in, the
Speaker 1: electronic recording of interviews, but sometimes you'd have to you'd
Speaker 1: sit there and you'd read out a page verbatim and
Speaker 1: you see the person seeing there going what's going on?
Speaker 1: And it was hard to explain even what you were
Speaker 1: reading out. There were so many do you agree with this?
Speaker 1: And this? And it was just it was crazy. But yes,
Speaker 1: I think, and I'd like to put everything in front
Speaker 1: of the jury, you know, when it's said and done.
Speaker 1: Put it all in front, not this sanitized version of Okay,
Speaker 1: this is what said, and I am now going to
Speaker 1: caution you. Yeah, we get that, you've got to put
Speaker 1: the caution in and you've got to protect people's rights,
Speaker 1: but let people see what actually goes on and then
Speaker 1: form their own views from whether it was oppressive like
Speaker 1: in New South Wales. You no threat, promise or inducement.
Speaker 1: I understand that, but sitting talking to someone can't really
Speaker 1: fit into the threat, promise or inducement. You're just having
Speaker 1: a conversation with a person. The other point that you
Speaker 1: made that the way interviewing is people are taught to interview,
Speaker 1: like the list of questions, a series of questions. Mistakes
Speaker 1: I've seen made when I'm observing someone doing and I
Speaker 1: probably did it myself. You'll have your twenty questions that
Speaker 1: you want to get out. I'm sitting here asking you
Speaker 1: and I'm just I've asked that question. I've asked that question,
Speaker 1: but you've probably given an ambiguous answer that means nothing
Speaker 1: when it comes to court anyway. You've got to actually
Speaker 1: listen to what the person is saying and then expand
Speaker 1: on it if you need to expand on it or clarify.
Speaker 2: So that's right, and being comfortable like going around in
Speaker 2: circles and coming back to things, you know, like that
Speaker 2: Peace model of interviewing is fantastic. What a great guy.
Speaker 2: And you get the free recall first, then you ask
Speaker 2: some questions you want to ask, and then it gets
Speaker 2: a bit more adversarial towards the end. But you know,
Speaker 2: you can get caught up and the questions you want
Speaker 2: to ask and you go, we got that one out,
Speaker 2: let's move on to the next. And in person you're
Speaker 2: interviewing introduces something from left field. You know, you go, well,
Speaker 2: that doesn't compete with my plan. Not shut up enough
Speaker 2: about that, I want to do my thing, and actually
Speaker 2: you're just killing the conversation. And people just need to
Speaker 2: be comfortable going, yeah, I'm going to go wherever you
Speaker 2: take me if you want to talk about that one
Speaker 2: hundred percent, let's talk about that. Mother doesn't matter. I
Speaker 2: can come back to that latter. I joined the police
Speaker 2: knowing it's going to be like this, so I shouldn't
Speaker 2: bock off, you know, five minutes ago.
Speaker 1: And I was given some good advice very early in
Speaker 1: that you come into the interview room, you control the
Speaker 1: pace of the interview room because you see some interviews
Speaker 1: go off track and it's like the cops are losing
Speaker 1: their way and oh, this is not going the plan.
Speaker 1: You see it falling apart. You can stop the interview.
Speaker 1: I'm just going to take a break now, step outside
Speaker 1: and have a rethink about what the strategies are that
Speaker 1: you get the approach. But I, from my point of view,
Speaker 1: that was one of the most interesting parts of policing.
Speaker 1: I love love the interview room. The pressure was on,
Speaker 1: but I did love the interview room because quite often
Speaker 1: you'd be on a lengthy investigation and it was all
Speaker 1: coming to the crunch in the next six or so
Speaker 1: hours that you spending the interview room speaking to the person.
Speaker 1: So fascinating area of policing.
Speaker 2: Yeah, one hundred percent something I still really enjoy. You know,
Speaker 2: it's just being able to sit in that room with
Speaker 2: someone and just go whatever reasons that we're here talking.
Speaker 2: You know, that single reason doesn't color your whole life,
Speaker 2: you know. And I'm happy to sit in that room
Speaker 2: and get to know somebody and all of the good
Speaker 2: parts of their life as well as the reason we
Speaker 2: hear and not have fear that I'm going to be
Speaker 2: judged harshly by the public for looking like I'm having
Speaker 2: a nice conversation with a murderer. Right, we should feel
Speaker 2: that pressure there. We're still doing our job, but we
Speaker 2: don't be a complete dick to the person we're sitting
Speaker 2: across the table from.
Speaker 1: Well, I've got it. Well, i'll save it. But I've
Speaker 1: got a quote that I've pulled out of some of
Speaker 1: the material I've got on of what you've said about
Speaker 1: the way that you look at policing them the way
Speaker 1: it should be approached. It'll touch on what you're talking
Speaker 1: about there, because it's it might be considered a fairly
Speaker 1: liberal view of a police officer to say, yeah, oh, well,
Speaker 1: I'm not going to judge judge the person, and but
Speaker 1: you're doing your job and I think you get better results.
Speaker 1: But we'll explore that a little bit a little bit
Speaker 1: further in the in the podcast Criminal Informants. Did you
Speaker 1: get to work with a lot of criminal informants in
Speaker 1: your COB days.
Speaker 2: Yeah, definitely, And it's part of a part of the
Speaker 2: business for the CIV right, And most of the time
Speaker 2: it just falls naturally out of doing your job, and
Speaker 2: it's that having a normal conversation, like we were just
Speaker 2: talking about. So if you go to every search warrant
Speaker 2: and every person your arrests and you're a complete deck,
Speaker 2: they're not going to want to talk to you again. Yeah,
Speaker 2: but it's just normal and you do your job, but
Speaker 2: you're you're fair and you're reasonable, and then you find
Speaker 2: when you run into those people again, which you often.
Speaker 1: Do, yeah, invariably.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's right, you feel like you know them and
Speaker 2: they feel like they know you a bit as well.
Speaker 2: So then the conversation starts and that's just kind of
Speaker 2: like part two of what you'd kept off earlier, and
Speaker 2: so naturally a lot of those interactions would develop into
Speaker 2: informant relationships. Yeah, and that's the way it's been for
Speaker 2: decades usually, that's how it works in the CIBA.
Speaker 1: Had any interesting informants if you've dealt with informants, you
Speaker 1: would have had some interesting ones that turn your life
Speaker 1: upside down, because it's sort of I describe it as
Speaker 1: almost like a marriage or relationship when you're dealing with
Speaker 1: an informant and whatever problems the informant has in their
Speaker 1: life apparently you're responsible for and you're getting these late
Speaker 1: night calls. Have you experience that without identifying the informant? Oh?
Speaker 2: Yeah, of course, right, And it's partly because you know
Speaker 2: you're rooting for these people, you know, and you feel
Speaker 2: really I always used to feel really humble taking those
Speaker 2: because I go, man, I've got a simpler existence and
Speaker 2: I don't have much to complain about, really, and you're
Speaker 2: talking to these people who their lives are so complicated,
Speaker 2: and you just I couldn't even function if I was
Speaker 2: living your life, and so yeah, and trying to do
Speaker 2: right by them. And as a result, Yeah, you're taking
Speaker 2: those calls late at night and listening to their whole life,
Speaker 2: isn't it. That's what because you're in it. You're in
Speaker 2: it with them their whole life. You're not just there
Speaker 2: to listen to what they have to say about whatever
Speaker 2: it is you might be interested in. You're invested, and
Speaker 2: so when they're sick, you're listening to it and you're
Speaker 2: trying to talk them through it. If they're fighting with
Speaker 2: their partner, you're trying to talk them through it. And yeah,
Speaker 2: it's full on.
Speaker 1: Okay, Well I get you. You understand that because quite
Speaker 1: often and a lot of my investigations involved informants. And yeah,
Speaker 1: the defense quite rightly when the matter goes to court,
Speaker 1: the tax of relationship with the informant and you know,
Speaker 1: did you offer a discount their senses? Did you offer
Speaker 1: them money, did you do this? Did you do that?
Speaker 1: What they didn't understand and what defense never got through. No,
Speaker 1: I just treated the person with respect because they were
Speaker 1: confused as to why is this person doing what they're
Speaker 1: doing most occasions, in the serious situations, putting their lives
Speaker 1: at risk. Why, Well, you haven't actually asked me. If
Speaker 1: you ask me a general question, I'd say, because they
Speaker 1: respect what I've done and I've given them respect, and
Speaker 1: quite often they haven't had respect their whole life.
Speaker 2: So it's absolutely right. And nobody is all bad and
Speaker 2: no one's all good. Everyone sits somewhere in the middle.
Speaker 2: So because you might cook myth you know, once, that's
Speaker 2: not you twenty four to seven, and there's a whole
Speaker 2: lot of crime that you don't agree with. And that's
Speaker 2: the nuance that I think has missed when people look
Speaker 2: objectively and they just go, it's black white. You're either
Speaker 2: police or you're not. If you've committed a crime, you're
Speaker 2: a criminal. And that's the box you're in. Why would
Speaker 2: you talk to anyone? And the police and they can't
Speaker 2: wrap their heads around it, but actually rued as people
Speaker 2: and some of us get along.
Speaker 1: Yeah, And I think the defense in their hard line
Speaker 1: of thinking what are you offering this person and just
Speaker 1: treating him with respect? One I had that probably and
Speaker 1: I say this jokingly, it didn't go too far. It
Speaker 1: was all documented the relationship. But I got a phone call.
Speaker 1: I think it was in the weekend. I don't know
Speaker 1: about informants, but they always managed to reach out at
Speaker 1: the most inappropriate time. So it's whenever you're just about
Speaker 1: to do this or just about to do that, and
Speaker 1: then you're going to put your life on hold. But
Speaker 1: I've got a call from a hospital and this informant
Speaker 1: had been admitted to hospital and asked, you know Gary
Speaker 1: Jubilan yep and mentioned the name of the person. He's
Speaker 1: in hospital. I said, Okay, why are you finding me?
Speaker 1: We got you down. He's got you down as next
Speaker 1: of kin. Okay, what's up with him in the hospital.
Speaker 1: He had a bag of heroin that he had ingested
Speaker 1: that it bursts or whatever. So, yeah, these are the
Speaker 1: situations you've got to deal with with informants. But I
Speaker 1: often say to police, cultivate. Now I hate the word
Speaker 1: cultivate because it makes like you're manipulating the person. But
Speaker 1: the importance of building relationships with criminal informants will help
Speaker 1: you as a.
Speaker 2: Detective, absolutely. And you see that other side of it, then, right,
Speaker 2: you actually, unlike the suspect and of you, you see
Speaker 2: the other side and their lives and some of the
Speaker 2: things that are going on in your life start to
Speaker 2: actually make sense, and you go, I actually kind of
Speaker 2: get this now. If I had to walk in your shoes,
Speaker 2: your whole childhood right through to now, I can understand
Speaker 2: why these things are going on for you. And to
Speaker 2: get that perspective as only helpful in the context of
Speaker 2: the rest of your job.
Speaker 1: Okay, let's talk about the behavioral science unit and a
Speaker 1: bit of the history of it. And it was an
Speaker 1: interesting history of the notes I've got here who was
Speaker 1: established in nineteen ninety eight, but between nineteen eighty two
Speaker 1: and nineteen ninety six there were something like seventy stranger
Speaker 1: based sexual assaults of the CURD and that was sort
Speaker 1: of the genesis of how the unit evolved. Can you
Speaker 1: talk us through that, because I found that fascinating. It'll
Speaker 1: give people a real insight into what we're talking about
Speaker 1: here and what value a unit like the one you're
Speaker 1: managing brings to an investigation.
Speaker 2: Yeah, for sure. Yeah. So it was around about nineteen
Speaker 2: ninety three, and so that our unit didn't exist, of course,
Speaker 2: and Counties Manacau dealt with two intruder rapes, nighttime ones
Speaker 2: with child victims, and you know, detectives being they're really
Speaker 2: intelligent people that they are having two of those in
Speaker 2: the space for a couple of weeks when they are
Speaker 2: not things that happen, being really intelligent that when man,
Speaker 2: this might actually be linked or could potentially be the
Speaker 2: same person. And so they kick off an investigation to
Speaker 2: try and find this unknown offender. And during the course
Speaker 2: of that investigation, which was monumental, they reached out to
Speaker 2: reached out offshore to the FBI, who were the only
Speaker 2: sort of people doing it at the time. I think
Speaker 2: the UK were doing it but had a slightly different
Speaker 2: take on it and brought back a bit of that
Speaker 2: behavioral analysis to it and came up with this suspect
Speaker 2: list of thousands of people. And so the investigation just
Speaker 2: had to go around speaking to these thousands of people
Speaker 2: and taking blood off them to see a sea food match.
Speaker 2: So it wasn't for about eighteen months that they caught
Speaker 2: up with Joseph Thompson and so they lock him up
Speaker 2: and it turns out that once they do that, he
Speaker 2: confesses to a raft of these offenses stretching right back
Speaker 2: into the early eighties. So he was operating undetected for
Speaker 2: that length of time, not undetected, and that the crimes
Speaker 2: were reported, but they were dealt with individually. You know, Okay,
Speaker 2: rapis happened, I can't find any offenders here, and it
Speaker 2: gets filed and then three months later that happens again,
Speaker 2: and nobody had linked them all together because everyone's busy.
Speaker 1: Right, So when Joseph Thompson was arrested, how many charges
Speaker 1: are we talking about here?
Speaker 2: From memory? I mean, in terms of the intruder rapes
Speaker 2: that he was carrying out. I think it was forty
Speaker 2: plus somewhere in that regard. But there was a wealth
Speaker 2: of other offending that he was responsible for, you know,
Speaker 2: unlawfully on property, burglaries where they maybe couldn't get towards
Speaker 2: that sexual evidence threshold. So it would have been in
Speaker 2: the hundreds that he was actually ended up convicted of.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and was he the first New Zealand serial rapist?
Speaker 1: Had you experienced that type of thing before on that magnitude?
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean certainly to that degree. Right, I'm sure
Speaker 2: there must have been in the distant past other serial offenders,
Speaker 2: but he was the one where you know, you're talking
Speaker 2: you know, forty plus, like that's a massive amount, and
Speaker 2: over over nearly twenty year period, it was definitely the
Speaker 2: biggest first that that New Zealand had ever encountered.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's a horrific, horrific crime spray, Isn't it absolutely tragic?
Speaker 1: Any anything come out about what may? Evyd? Do you
Speaker 1: aware of any of the backstory too?
Speaker 2: So him not so much. So he admitted he freely
Speaker 2: admitted a lot soon he was arrested, right, So he
Speaker 2: was one of those guys who said, look, this is
Speaker 2: who I am. I know I've got this problem, this
Speaker 2: is what I've done. I know that what I do
Speaker 2: is wrong, but I just can't help it. So, you know,
Speaker 2: the sexual fantasy element for him was massive, and he
Speaker 2: just couldn't overcome those thoughts and just keep them inside.
Speaker 2: He had to d Yeah, that's what drove me, have
Speaker 2: to act on them. So he knew that there was
Speaker 2: something wrong in terms of his thoughts and what he
Speaker 2: was doing, but he just couldn't couldn't stop them. But
Speaker 2: in terms of his background, you know, he had a
Speaker 2: bit of a tragic upbringing, but it was nothing. It
Speaker 2: was nothing startling. It's not the cliche where you think
Speaker 2: a sexual offender must have been sexually abused, but there's
Speaker 2: always something in their past. There's some sort of trauma
Speaker 2: or something tragic, but it's not always sexual. So we
Speaker 2: hare Joseph Thompson. And then despite saying off the back
Speaker 2: of that, well we're not going to have that again,
Speaker 2: we'll make sure that doesn't happen, then it started happening
Speaker 2: again and there was another.
Speaker 1: Serial cerial rapist here. Yeah.
Speaker 2: Yeah, And so when Joseph Thompson's in prison, suddenly there's
Speaker 2: are these other offenses happening, and they were happening in
Speaker 2: Counties manacau which is South Auckland, and in Auckland City,
Speaker 2: and both of those are different policing areas, and they
Speaker 2: started off their own separate investigations looking for this person.
Speaker 2: The original boss of the unit I named Chuck Henwood.
Speaker 2: He had worked on the Joseph Thompson case, so he
Speaker 2: got seconded to the Auckland City second thing and goes, man,
Speaker 2: your files over here in the city are really similar
Speaker 2: to this these ones we're dealing with in South Auckland. Again,
Speaker 2: realize that they're looking for the same guy again, so
Speaker 2: they merge these investigations very similar process. Eventually they pick
Speaker 2: up Malcolm Riwa and I remember these names because I
Speaker 2: was a kid at the time and they were on
Speaker 2: the news, and with Joseph Thompson, I didn't really understand
Speaker 2: what was going on, but those two cases were the
Speaker 2: genesis of the unit. So after that, the organization when
Speaker 2: we can't have this, we can't have serial rapists and
Speaker 2: their crimes not being linked together over decades because we
Speaker 2: need to be able to stop this. Districts don't talk
Speaker 2: to each other, probably similar to Ossie the different state
Speaker 2: police forces don't talk to each other. If you get
Speaker 2: a rape case, you're not just going to randomly reach
Speaker 2: out to the other end of the country to go, hey,
Speaker 2: do you have anything similar? There might be number three hundreds,
Speaker 2: two hundred things to do. So they set up the
Speaker 2: unit to track every stranger based sexual offense the country,
Speaker 2: to have a one stop shop for it, so that
Speaker 2: if a new thing cropped up and it looks similar
Speaker 2: to one that was unsolved, we could link them together.
Speaker 2: So that was the early genesis of it, and it's
Speaker 2: evolved massively since then with psychology and all the rest
Speaker 2: of it.
Speaker 1: So with that, at the time when they reached out
Speaker 1: to the FBI, was it a case of just stain
Speaker 1: in contact with the FBI and getting them to have
Speaker 1: a look at it that, Okay, we're getting all these rapes.
Speaker 1: Do we think they're linked? And the FBI would give
Speaker 1: you a way of linking the crimes the methodology of
Speaker 1: the way the offender gained entry into the place, I suppose,
Speaker 1: or different things, or the nature the way that the
Speaker 1: offender treated the victim. Is that the type of thing
Speaker 1: that brought them all together.
Speaker 2: Yeah, definitely, So the FBI would have said, or they did.
Speaker 2: You know, it's a exactly what's happened here, like how
Speaker 2: have they gotten? What have they actually done? And based
Speaker 2: on that they are able to go this is the
Speaker 2: type of guy that you're looking for based on our
Speaker 2: experience over in North America. So they're able to whittle
Speaker 2: it down, not massively, to an age range. And this
Speaker 2: is the type of crime you might expect to see
Speaker 2: in this person's background. So if he's you know, if
Speaker 2: he's breaking a home in the middle of the night
Speaker 2: and be able to do that, well, that doesn't just
Speaker 2: come out of nowhere. So that's the experience. And how
Speaker 2: does how does that person learn they must be familiar
Speaker 2: with burglary or some other similar type of offending, so
Speaker 2: that that all armed that suspect list that they then
Speaker 2: went through and took the blood the blood's from, But
Speaker 2: they then needed to sort of New Zealand a fire,
Speaker 2: I guess. So they then said, we've got this knowledge now,
Speaker 2: and they started to create their own database of offenders
Speaker 2: and there I guess their histories and things, and our
Speaker 2: computer system at the time, couldn't you search for that
Speaker 2: kind of stuff really well and still come So they
Speaker 2: just constructed it behavioral database essentially as opposed to a
Speaker 2: criminal history database, and that was the early start of
Speaker 2: that work. And then we sort of went away from
Speaker 2: the FBI a little bit. As far as I'm aware,
Speaker 2: the Canadians sort of overtook because we're far more in
Speaker 2: common legally and jurisdiction. Yeah, Canadians, so that RCMP now
Speaker 2: have really close relationship with We go over to them
Speaker 2: for training and we use their software system, which is
Speaker 2: that behavioral database for use today. So now our closest
Speaker 2: relationship overseas is definitely with the Canadians.
Speaker 1: Okay, it's interesting how it evolved that around that era
Speaker 1: that you're talking with the serial fenders, because it was
Speaker 1: something we quite often the different law enforcement agencies operated
Speaker 1: in silos, like not communicating and then even then won
Speaker 1: like New Zealand Police or New South Wales Police, which
Speaker 1: is covering the big area, you don't know what the
Speaker 1: local area. What's happening in the local area's command is
Speaker 1: how thin because you're not working on it. So making
Speaker 1: that link, but I think the beauty of what they
Speaker 1: bring and when you look at it, it's not rocket science,
Speaker 1: is it. You don't sort of stand back Oh, that's amazing.
Speaker 1: It's almost a common common sense approach to the way
Speaker 1: that you would look at the crime.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah, that's what I've found. And it's almost you know,
Speaker 2: a lot of the advice given is, you know, a
Speaker 2: good detective will already have an inkling and they kind
Speaker 2: of stamp on it from the people that have the
Speaker 2: signature block that says behavior Science Unit, registered psychologist, And
Speaker 2: that is so true. But at the same time, I've
Speaker 2: just seen that the people on the team are just incredible.
Speaker 2: They can take any case and just go, based on
Speaker 2: their own experiences, go this is kind of where you
Speaker 2: need to be going, which just saves so much time
Speaker 2: rather than going down twenty six paths all at the
Speaker 2: same time, and that can really narrow it to just
Speaker 2: one or two, which is just.
Speaker 1: What I don't think people appreciate that haven't worked in
Speaker 1: major crime or crimes of this nature. Serial defending how
Speaker 1: much information comes in too. It's almost like you've overwhelmed
Speaker 1: with information, So it's about analyzing that information, collating it all.
Speaker 1: The start with analyzing it, then pick out what's important
Speaker 1: and what's not important.
Speaker 2: Yeah, totally, and without somebody sort of guiding you you're
Speaker 2: going I you know, you're taught that you've got to
Speaker 2: keep that open mind and a tunnel vision because we've
Speaker 2: been there and had our ass is handed to us
Speaker 2: for doing that and rightly so for decades, and so
Speaker 2: you can consider it all and it's really helpful to
Speaker 2: have someone go, well, actually, if the offenders done this,
Speaker 2: this and this, they can be this type of person.
Speaker 2: That's fantastic. You can focus your resources while still looking
Speaker 2: at those other things, but you're not suddenly having to
Speaker 2: juggle a million balls all at once.
Speaker 1: And that breaking it down simply. I knowed there was
Speaker 1: a case I worked on when homicide was homicide and
Speaker 1: Serial Violent Offenders unit that wire and we're doing serial
Speaker 1: rapists as well, and there was a rapist that was
Speaker 1: operating in the area of Sydney and multiple victims, but
Speaker 1: always the offenses were occurring on a Tuesday or Thursday night.
Speaker 1: I think it's a long time ago. Looking back at it,
Speaker 1: we saw the pattern and then when the person was
Speaker 1: actually arrested, it was obvious he was living at home,
Speaker 1: but he was telling his partner at the time that
Speaker 1: he was at tech on the Tuesday and Thursday nights
Speaker 1: that were the nights that he was going to after
Speaker 1: hours study, so that's when he was out and about,
Speaker 1: and that's when the offenses were always occurring, from that
Speaker 1: six o'clock to nine o'clock time on the Tuesday or
Speaker 1: Thursday night. And I look back at that and it's
Speaker 1: all these little bits of experience that you gain the
Speaker 1: longer you stay in it. And I think it would
Speaker 1: have been a smart play when we were appealing to
Speaker 1: the public with anyone with information, we know this person
Speaker 1: is not at their home between the hours of six
Speaker 1: pm nine pm on the Tuesday and Thursday night, if
Speaker 1: anyone knows someone blah blah blah. Little things like that
Speaker 1: can be very very helpful.
Speaker 2: Yeah, definitely, And still to this day where we don't
Speaker 2: do that, do we not often enough? Anyway? Yeah, absolutely,
Speaker 2: if you know when it's happening, there's a reason for it.
Speaker 2: They're clearly not otherwise supposed to be. Otherwise they probably
Speaker 2: would have been dubbed in by somebody. Yeah, someone thinks
Speaker 2: they're somewhere and they're not. So Yeah. Definitely, like getting
Speaker 2: that stuff early and being able to put that out
Speaker 2: in the media.
Speaker 1: What's your thoughts on using the media in investigations because
Speaker 1: I know there's different schools of thought with impolicing sometimes
Speaker 1: whether the media do I thought during my career and
Speaker 1: post career they are always a good tool if they
Speaker 1: were used properly. The media the information that you could
Speaker 1: put out one hundred.
Speaker 2: Percent, Like so many cases, the majority of cases have
Speaker 2: a media element to them. There's no SPS crime that
Speaker 2: doesn't these days. And I've always yeah, I've always found
Speaker 2: to be nothing other than helpful ethical, you know. But
Speaker 2: what people kind of get caught up in is I
Speaker 2: think a lot of cops think that the journalists are
Speaker 2: trying to do their job for them, and like they
Speaker 2: have this clash like I've been doing my job because
Speaker 2: I'm the detective and you're not. But I don't quite
Speaker 2: realize that you have a completely separate job and they
Speaker 2: both come with their own legal parameters, pressures, objectives which
Speaker 2: are slightly different. But that's okay, and there's so much
Speaker 2: overlap and you can work together. So as long as
Speaker 2: there's not that like clash through nothing other than ignorance,
Speaker 2: I think then amazing, amazing the media on board for investigations.
Speaker 1: I think it needs to be used from policing point
Speaker 1: of view and now I've got the opportunity to say
Speaker 1: it from the media point of view and the police
Speaker 1: point of view. Now working in the media, but from
Speaker 1: the place point of view, and I reference Sarah Yule again,
Speaker 1: I would often consult her, what's the message I'm going
Speaker 1: to put out? Because when I'm looking down the camera
Speaker 1: and I'm talking on in the media, there's not one
Speaker 1: word that I'm not saying without a purpose to ever
Speaker 1: either get a witness to come forward or get a
Speaker 1: reaction from the offender. And I think it's sort of
Speaker 1: frowned upon in policing, but I think it's something that
Speaker 1: we could exploit more really put pressure. And I've used it.
Speaker 1: We've organized crime. I've used it in serial offenders, all
Speaker 1: sorts of high profile cases where I'm sending the message
Speaker 1: out in an organized crime one. We created that the
Speaker 1: way that we were discussing the crime. We had multiple
Speaker 1: unlimited resources coming after these people, and I know at
Speaker 1: panic them. I had solicits contacting me, how many murders
Speaker 1: are you going to be charging our client with? We
Speaker 1: didn't have any evidence, but and we didn't make an
Speaker 1: untrue representation, but we created the thought that time sticking
Speaker 1: away you better get in now, because sooner or later
Speaker 1: we're going to come and knock on your door.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and it's and that's the honest true, isn't it?
Speaker 2: Like we don't use that enough in police We don't.
Speaker 2: I think there is that rigidity around. Well, I'm only
Speaker 2: going to tell the media and therefore the public what
Speaker 2: I want out there, and nothing else is fair game.
Speaker 2: But at some point it's like we'll hang on what's
Speaker 2: the media's role and what could be helpful here? And
Speaker 2: beyond that, like what if we're actually trying to achieve
Speaker 2: we actually want to arrest the people responsible for this.
Speaker 2: They're going to probably watch this too. How else we
Speaker 2: can we use this for advantage low normal people rather
Speaker 2: than standing there like robots and just delivering a couple
Speaker 2: of things. But yeah, that message is massive, right, And
Speaker 2: then they're on the phone straight away and a lot
Speaker 2: of people are panicking. Have got nothing to do with it.
Speaker 1: I did one, and it's on the Willim Tyrill matter.
Speaker 1: You might have heard about that, the young boy that disappeared.
Speaker 1: It was let it. It was the end of my career.
Speaker 1: I got into trouble, probably aware of that. But when
Speaker 1: I took the investigation over. I made it very clear,
Speaker 1: and I came up with the strategy. I wanted to
Speaker 1: put pressure on people to come forward and had a
Speaker 1: map of where we disappeared from and said this is
Speaker 1: a one square kilometer. Anyone that lives in that one
Speaker 1: square kilometer that has not come forward and spoken to
Speaker 1: police makes me wonder why you haven't come and spoken
Speaker 1: to police. Now what that did? I had some complaints,
Speaker 1: so that was very aggressive that what you're doing. But
Speaker 1: it flushed people out. Obviously we haven't solved it. It
Speaker 1: didn't work, but it was a strategy. It's better than
Speaker 1: sitting there going I don't know what's happened. Like, we
Speaker 1: came up with a strategy and tried to flush people out.
Speaker 2: And that's great. Right, people need a why, They need
Speaker 2: a reason. Yeah, Like so many people sit there knowing
Speaker 2: things about things and they go. But I'm not going
Speaker 2: to be the one to step up and tell the police,
Speaker 2: but I think somebody should. It's not usually the case
Speaker 2: that there's one hundred people that know and they're all
Speaker 2: just digging their heels and then don't want to talk.
Speaker 2: They do want to offload, and they just need to
Speaker 2: be given the reason to do it so that they
Speaker 2: get is absolute goal. Just if you're within the zone
Speaker 2: and you haven't come and talked about here's that little
Speaker 2: drive to go, well I'm within that zone. Okay, well
Speaker 2: I guess now is the right time. That's brilliant and
Speaker 2: that should be used all the time.
Speaker 1: Another one was with the William Tyrell case, that when
Speaker 1: we're putting out the reward or talking about it, that
Speaker 1: anyone that's watching this, if the person that you're watching
Speaker 1: it with might appear disinterested, overly disinterested, or might overreact
Speaker 1: or just making I'm thinking, if someone's sitting there that's
Speaker 1: involved in it, sitting there with a friend, a family
Speaker 1: member or whatever, and the William Tyrell matter comes up
Speaker 1: on TV, they turned the TV off, or turn the
Speaker 1: radio down, or close the newspaper. They don't want to
Speaker 1: talk about it, or they're fixated on it. Something like that.
Speaker 1: Little triggers that might flush flush people out. But it's
Speaker 1: something that you're unit was formed on the basis of
Speaker 1: the FBI. Very early in my policing career, I read
Speaker 1: the book by John Douglas Mind Hunter, and it was
Speaker 1: a long time ago that I read it, But what
Speaker 1: really stuck in my mind was the way he would
Speaker 1: strategically use the media to bring information, bring witnesses, ford
Speaker 1: or flush the offender out. And I think it's a
Speaker 1: strategy that's under used in policing.
Speaker 2: Yeah, definitely, you want me reach, right, So why wouldn't
Speaker 2: you use every single evenue that you could.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, well it's a tool, it's a tool. It's
Speaker 1: just I want to break down more of the work
Speaker 1: that the unit does. But just before we finish part one,
Speaker 1: what's the makeup of your unit? Just describe the behavioral
Speaker 1: science unit. How many people are you got working on
Speaker 1: it and how do people access the unit?
Speaker 2: Yeah, we're really small, so there's only five people on
Speaker 2: the team. There's two registered psychologists and then three behavioral
Speaker 2: analysts and their work is added into that. The analysts
Speaker 2: are doing that serial sexual offender behavioral capture work and
Speaker 2: are advising major crime investigations. And we're just a support unit,
Speaker 2: so we don't hold cases. We're not investigating ourselves, so
Speaker 2: we don't work on things proactively. Investigation teams have to
Speaker 2: reach out to us. So that's just kind of a
Speaker 2: marketing exercise. You know. We go and talk on training
Speaker 2: courses and sell what we can do and put things
Speaker 2: on the intranet to say what we can do, and
Speaker 2: then you know someone somewhere and most stations know that
Speaker 2: we exist, and often we're just grateful people reach out
Speaker 2: and go, how, I don't know if you can help
Speaker 2: with this, but just thought we'd reach out to you.
Speaker 2: So a lot of that, and then you get a
Speaker 2: lot of repeat customers because if you do a good
Speaker 2: job for somebody, they'll come back for everything, which is great.
Speaker 2: So it very much gets skewed towards areas that have
Speaker 2: maybe used us before. So there's definitely parts of the
Speaker 2: country that don't use us so much.
Speaker 1: And I laugh at that because I used to The
Speaker 1: standing joke with Sarah Yule and myself was that I
Speaker 1: thought she was my own private criminal psychologist. It was
Speaker 1: on call twenty four to seven. But yeah, I'm that guy.
Speaker 1: I just and I was quite cranky and jealous when
Speaker 1: she was going to other investigations. I thought I had
Speaker 1: sole access. But we joke on that. But that's very
Speaker 1: much how it played out in New South Wales too,
Speaker 1: and where people got to see the skills that a
Speaker 1: psychologists can bring to the investigation. Okay, I want to
Speaker 1: call in that expertise and what I found from an
Speaker 1: investigator's point of view, and I know others like the
Speaker 1: others that have used as the resources. It gives you
Speaker 1: a different perspective. You can get that group think in
Speaker 1: a police environment. You're all in the incident room together,
Speaker 1: you're talking, and then a psychologist comes in and looks
Speaker 1: at it a little bit differently from the way a
Speaker 1: police perspective. Do you see that in the work that
Speaker 1: you're doing with the unit, Yeah, definitely.
Speaker 2: And a real common one is major crome investigations looking
Speaker 2: for advice on interviewing somebody you know, And that's I
Speaker 2: like those ones because coming from the operational background, I see,
Speaker 2: you know, that's something that that would be really useful.
Speaker 2: And you get so many where they're like, okay, so
Speaker 2: what we're going to do is we're going to smash
Speaker 2: in their doors at six am with the armed offenders squad,
Speaker 2: going to rip them out of their bed. We're going
Speaker 2: to throw them in the car, get them in the cell. Cool.
Speaker 2: Once we've done that, how do we make them talk
Speaker 2: to us? You got to go, yeah, okay, well just
Speaker 2: throwing this out there, but are you going to lose anything?
Speaker 2: If maybe you don't smash his door in, or are
Speaker 2: you going to lose anything if you actually go see
Speaker 2: them at three pm? Or let's be really wild, what
Speaker 2: if you ring in and give them a heads up,
Speaker 2: you know, and just throwing out these ideas and sometimes
Speaker 2: they are undoable, right. There are some cases you want
Speaker 2: the elements of surprise so you don't lose evidence. But
Speaker 2: that is such a ridge way of thinking. You know
Speaker 2: that we have to do it and take them by surprise,
Speaker 2: and you kind of go, okay, but do you have
Speaker 2: all your evidence already? Yep? Are you expecting to find
Speaker 2: any more at this place?
Speaker 1: Not? Really?
Speaker 2: Okay? Well, hey, you've got so many great options now,
Speaker 2: or knock that conversation before it even starts.
Speaker 1: I'm laughing here, Chris, because I'm probably laughing at myself
Speaker 1: because I was probably those cops that we're going to
Speaker 1: smash the door in six am and make a big impact.
Speaker 1: But yeah, that's that's exactly the type of thing I
Speaker 1: think that a unit like yours can bring to investigators,
Speaker 1: just that different perspective because we might have been working
Speaker 1: on for three months and we're so hard. We are
Speaker 1: going to catch these guys and we're going to hit
Speaker 1: them hard. And then but why won't they talk to us?
Speaker 2: Oh, we're thinking I've done it too earlier, and you
Speaker 2: go really show him. I'm going to really know what
Speaker 2: he's done is wrong because I'm going to go in
Speaker 2: at six am and then you know, man, when he
Speaker 2: sits in that cell, he's really going to be steering
Speaker 2: things over and diferent perspectives. No, he's not. He's been
Speaker 2: in itself so many times. There is nothing you can
Speaker 2: do that he hasn't seen before. In fact, the way
Speaker 2: he is is probably the result of police treating him
Speaker 2: like that for so many years. So why don't we
Speaker 2: just do this a little bit different and I don't know,
Speaker 2: treat them like an ordinary person because that's the way
Speaker 2: that we should be treating people. And so do we
Speaker 2: need to do ABC and D. Why don't we just
Speaker 2: do it this other way instead?
Speaker 1: Yeah, there's definitely And that's a fascinating part about the
Speaker 1: strategies and the direction you take it. Let's have a
Speaker 1: break now, when we come back, we'll dissect more of
Speaker 1: what the unit does and try to give people an
Speaker 1: understanding of how it actually actually works. So if we
Speaker 1: have a break and we'll come back for a part
Speaker 1: two