Speaker 1: Listeners are advised that this podcast series Bronwyn contains coarse
Speaker 1: language and adult themes. This podcast series is brought to
Speaker 1: you by me Headley Thomas and The Australian. Bronwin's good
Speaker 1: friend Anise Barnard and her husbands are making plans. They
Speaker 1: are going to sell the house Denise loves and Fareweller
Speaker 1: community in which they have lived for about thirty five years.
Speaker 1: They are moving a few hundred kilometers north to be
Speaker 1: closer to their children on Queensland and Sunshine Coast.
Speaker 2: Just go and start a new life with my family.
Speaker 2: Time to move on and be with my granddaughter.
Speaker 3: And how do you feel about leaving all these memories
Speaker 3: and after se many years?
Speaker 4: Oh, I'm fine stoke.
Speaker 1: As we chatted at her home, I showed Denise the
Speaker 1: brief snippet of video of Bromman. The bit filmed while
Speaker 1: she visited her father Philip in a Brisbane hospital. He
Speaker 1: was gravely ill after a liver transplant and would die
Speaker 1: days later.
Speaker 2: Sometimes you'll blink or wink or move his head if
Speaker 2: I think he's responding.
Speaker 4: It makes me feel a lot better. But all I
Speaker 4: ever telling me said he's going to get better. Wow.
Speaker 2: It's exactly how she looked. It's amazing to see her,
Speaker 2: see her talking.
Speaker 5: You forget how people sound.
Speaker 4: Too much time gone by.
Speaker 1: Right after hearing and seeing Bromin on the screen of
Speaker 1: my laptop at an outdoor table, Denise disclosed something unexpected
Speaker 1: and do you.
Speaker 2: Know Broman's third person of my friends that's gone missing
Speaker 2: without a trace. You would have heard of Wi Borkin
Speaker 2: and Julie Jamison. Yeah, there were two of my friends
Speaker 2: in Sydney that disappeared, never a trace of them ever.
Speaker 2: Both nurses then rumored I'd heard Ivan Latt.
Speaker 4: They're eighteen. Whatever happened to them?
Speaker 2: How do people just disappear and you never see them again?
Speaker 5: Welcome to the program.
Speaker 6: His crimes left a trail of fear and sorrow stretching
Speaker 6: all the way from Australia to Europe. Ivan Malatt remains
Speaker 6: a key suspect for a spate of unsolved murders dating
Speaker 6: back to nineteen eighty.
Speaker 1: In May two thousand and six, ABC News reported.
Speaker 7: Serial killer Ivan Malatt has been named as a person
Speaker 7: of interest at an inquest into the deaths of two
Speaker 7: Sydney nurses. Westmead Coroner's Court has heard that Gillian Jamison
Speaker 7: and Deborah Balkan were last seen in a Western Sydney
Speaker 7: hotel in nineteen eighty. The coroner has recommended the case
Speaker 7: be referred to the Unsolved Homicide Squad for further investigation
Speaker 7: outside the court. Detective Sergeant Ian McNab said the case
Speaker 7: would indeed be referred to the Cold case Unit.
Speaker 1: Detective Sergeant McNab said, it's always frustrating if you can't
Speaker 1: solve the matter.
Speaker 4: A more timely day.
Speaker 3: When Bromin disappeared, what did you believe had happened?
Speaker 2: Well, I hadn't seen her for a little while. I'd
Speaker 2: gotten right into the gym. She was working at Eden's
Speaker 2: and doing other things. And I think the first call
Speaker 2: I got was from Andrew, her brother, and he said
Speaker 2: had I seen Brown? And I said no, I hadn't,
Speaker 2: And then that was followed up by Debbie. Were you
Speaker 2: all started this wear issue? What's happened to her?
Speaker 3: Do you remember talking to police in nineteen ninety three,
Speaker 3: immediately after Bromin vanished?
Speaker 4: No, I don't think I did speak to police.
Speaker 3: Did it take until nineteen ninety eight when you gave
Speaker 3: your statement?
Speaker 4: No, I think it was nineteen ninety eight.
Speaker 5: Do you know why do you know why police didn't
Speaker 5: speak to you?
Speaker 4: I have no idea. Yeah, I don't remember.
Speaker 5: Well, you know, it's understandable.
Speaker 3: We're going back thirty one years to when Bromin disappeared.
Speaker 3: One of the things that I think people like Debbie
Speaker 3: and others have some regrets over is that the suspicions
Speaker 3: they had were not acted upon by police or even
Speaker 3: by themselves at that time.
Speaker 5: In ninety three. You've said that you formed the suspicion
Speaker 5: straight away.
Speaker 2: Well in that time period, you know, recently after she disappeared.
Speaker 5: Are we talking days, weeks, months?
Speaker 4: Probably weeks?
Speaker 2: Yeah, after talking to like back then, Andrew, Debbie, obviously
Speaker 2: we're all on board talking about what was going on
Speaker 2: and the night the car went down the driveway and
Speaker 2: all that sort of thing. That I've never gone from
Speaker 2: the assumption that I think he did something, whether it
Speaker 2: be in the heat of the moment, that's how I
Speaker 2: believe it happened. But I've never waited from that. He
Speaker 2: from memory, filed a missing person report, yes, and I
Speaker 2: believe at the time a lot of that was that
Speaker 2: they believed John that she'd just gone off and disappeared.
Speaker 4: Left him yeah, and.
Speaker 2: Why would you if you loved your girls, why would
Speaker 2: you ever want to assume a your identity and even
Speaker 2: go and set up again. Unless she had a plan
Speaker 2: to maybe set yourself up and then come back and get.
Speaker 4: Them, But no, I don't think it's pausible.
Speaker 1: In an earlier episode, you heard Denise disclosing what she
Speaker 1: told police when they came to her for a statement
Speaker 1: in nineteen ninety eight, five years after Bromwin's disappearance.
Speaker 2: I still recollect when she told me that he had
Speaker 2: had her by the throat up against the wall and
Speaker 2: that she was frightened.
Speaker 3: It's not an easy question to ask, but I have
Speaker 3: to ask. Do you think that Bromwin's friends could have
Speaker 3: should have said more, done more early on to raise
Speaker 3: the alarm.
Speaker 4: Yes, I'm sure we should have. I don't know even
Speaker 4: now why we didn't.
Speaker 3: Presuably you could have formed the group of mums you
Speaker 3: were for playgroup and all gone to the police station
Speaker 3: and said, hey, we think she's met with foul play.
Speaker 5: Yeah.
Speaker 4: I don't know why we didn't do that.
Speaker 2: Even now, I don't that would be what I would
Speaker 2: do now, But back then, I don't know why we didn't.
Speaker 2: For a while did we believe that as John had said,
Speaker 2: she'd gone away for a while to have a break.
Speaker 2: But after that, why didn't we go?
Speaker 4: I don't know.
Speaker 1: And in other cases, I've talked to people who say
Speaker 1: that the hope that someone they really loble are very
Speaker 1: close to will come back prevents them from accepting that
Speaker 1: foul play has occurred.
Speaker 5: There's this candle that they keep alive.
Speaker 2: I don't think at any time I thought she was
Speaker 2: going to come back after that?
Speaker 4: Why didn't I do anything? I don't know.
Speaker 2: Was it my husband saying, oh no, that John's a
Speaker 2: good bloke. Nothing, there wouldn't been anything like that happening.
Speaker 2: Did I tend to go that way for a while?
Speaker 4: I don't know.
Speaker 5: Was that Lester's view?
Speaker 4: My husband's always sat in the fence. He knows my feelings.
Speaker 4: He's always set in offense about it. But where is she?
Speaker 2: Then?
Speaker 4: I said to him, or where is she? If she's
Speaker 4: still around?
Speaker 5: Where is she?
Speaker 4: Yeah? Currently answer that, Penny.
Speaker 5: Have you understood why he's sat on the fence.
Speaker 4: I just think it's just a blokey thing.
Speaker 1: As I write this, another ABC News story reports on
Speaker 1: a national summit about violence perpetrated by men against.
Speaker 8: Women at its first national round table, the Federal Circuit
Speaker 8: and Family Course of Australia looks to find solutions to
Speaker 8: a growing emergency.
Speaker 4: It is a national disgrace and has tell me do
Speaker 4: more about it. There is no doubt it is getting worse.
Speaker 7: So we do have a national crisis in this country
Speaker 7: and this Court is absolutely committed to making sure that
Speaker 7: it's playing it's part.
Speaker 8: Addressing the crowd was the Attorney General Mark Dreyfus, who
Speaker 8: called on men to step up.
Speaker 4: One death of a woman at the hands of a
Speaker 4: man is one too many. One death a week is
Speaker 4: an epidemic.
Speaker 8: At least twenty four women have been killed in Australia
Speaker 8: this year, ten more than this time last year.
Speaker 4: In Victoria.
Speaker 8: They include Samantha Murphy, Sweza Madigani, Rebecca Young and Hannah Maguire,
Speaker 8: all allegedly murdered by men, and as the community grieves,
Speaker 8: outrage grows. Last week, hundreds took the streets of Balaras
Speaker 8: demanding action.
Speaker 1: The ABC's journalist at the summit, Leanne Wog, reported it's rare.
Speaker 8: For judicial leaders to speak out publicly on any topic.
Speaker 8: Today's round table is a clear sign of the crisis
Speaker 8: facing Australia amid surging levels of family violence and violence
Speaker 8: against women.
Speaker 9: A call to action for a nation in mourning.
Speaker 1: My friend and colleague Claire Harvey is regularly reporting and
Speaker 1: analyzing policy and cases concerning domestic violence.
Speaker 10: From The Australian. Here's what's on the front coming up.
Speaker 10: Why domestic violence has suddenly rocketed to national attention. The
Speaker 10: Australian spent decades leading the conversation on domestic violence, coercive
Speaker 10: control and the safety of women. Domestic violence now takes
Speaker 10: up well over half police time, but there are deep
Speaker 10: flaws in the systems of prosecution and protection. Sarah Eisen
Speaker 10: is a political reporter with The Australian.
Speaker 11: We've had twenty seven murders of women in the first
Speaker 11: four months of twenty twenty four. There's never been as
Speaker 11: many women killed in the first four months of.
Speaker 4: Any year ever.
Speaker 11: There's a real concern that the national plant and violence
Speaker 11: against women and children just isn't really working.
Speaker 7: Say it was.
Speaker 10: At one of the rallies on the lawn in front
Speaker 10: of Parliament House in Canberra. Prime Minister Anthony Alberanesi took
Speaker 10: the microphone.
Speaker 9: To the mind that governments of all levels must do better.
Speaker 10: The declaration was met with cheers, jeers and tears. Victims
Speaker 10: can obtain apprehended violence orders, but offenders can ignore them
Speaker 10: if they're determined enough. Police can arrest perpetrators, but magistrates
Speaker 10: can grant them bail, or they can serve light sentences,
Speaker 10: which leaves victims doubly vulnerable.
Speaker 1: In my conversations with Madison Walsh, who was born a
Speaker 1: decade after her blood relation Bromwin disappeared, we kick around
Speaker 1: ideas and angles.
Speaker 5: It helps to share. So, Maddie a couple of things
Speaker 5: I'd like you to do.
Speaker 1: Timelines are so important, definitely in cases like this. They
Speaker 1: help us understand what's going on, Who said, what, when,
Speaker 1: what happened. As you go through it, it'll become more
Speaker 1: and more detail.
Speaker 12: Lynn's niece did a timeline years before I got involved
Speaker 12: in the Teacher's pet She did this for the month
Speaker 12: of January because it was a crucial month leading up
Speaker 12: to when the disappeared. I remember talking to once to
Speaker 12: a great criminal lawyer, and he said timelines win cases.
Speaker 1: Maddie has driven from the northern beaches of Sydney to
Speaker 1: meet me at the home of Bromwin's brother Andy Reid
Speaker 1: and his wife Michelle in the Shire near Qunella in
Speaker 1: the south. We are looking at the time John spent
Speaker 1: in the Shire after he arrived in the family sedan
Speaker 1: on the morning of Monday May seventeen, nineteen ninety three,
Speaker 1: with the two children, Lauren and Crystal. They had driven
Speaker 1: through the night from Lennox. The children should have been
Speaker 1: in school in Lenox, but instead they were in Sydney.
Speaker 1: According to John, Bronwin had told him on the Sunday night,
Speaker 1: May sixteen that she needed a few days away, a
Speaker 1: short break.
Speaker 5: They ended up staying with you for how long?
Speaker 13: Think about ten days? Yep, Because by then he kept stalling.
Speaker 13: He kept stalling about going back, and we said, John,
Speaker 13: the kids need to be back into school.
Speaker 9: I want you to take the kids back up.
Speaker 1: By this stage, Andy knew that the authorized break in
Speaker 1: by Bromwin's neighbor Murray at the house at Sandstone Crescent
Speaker 1: had not provided clues to the whereabouts of Bromwin, and
Speaker 1: Bromwin hadn't turned up for work at Eden's takeaway on
Speaker 1: Wednesday May nineteen. Where was he staying while his children
Speaker 1: were with you?
Speaker 9: The first night he slept in our place.
Speaker 13: But on the Wednesday, when Bromin obviously didn't turn up
Speaker 13: to the takeaway shop, he wasn't comfortable enough. He was
Speaker 13: seeing the kids at our place, might have dinner with us,
Speaker 13: but then he go and sleep.
Speaker 9: At his parents.
Speaker 13: And by very early in that next week, I'd made
Speaker 13: the decision that and I'd confronted him and said, either
Speaker 13: I'm going to cradle a police station to report brom
Speaker 13: And missing now, or you pack the kids up, you
Speaker 13: take them back home, and you report a missing.
Speaker 9: So which one is it?
Speaker 13: He opted said, I'll get the kids back up there,
Speaker 13: get them back into school, and I'll go.
Speaker 5: And report a missing.
Speaker 1: He went back to Ballina and he did report brom
Speaker 1: And missing in late May.
Speaker 13: Yes, in hindsight, there's no way in the world that
Speaker 13: I would have let John report her missing if I
Speaker 13: knew the ramifications that would lead me too.
Speaker 1: As Bromwin's next of kin, John Winfield was at a
Speaker 1: distinct advantage.
Speaker 5: The police policy.
Speaker 1: At the time meant they dealt first and foremost with
Speaker 1: next of kin of a missing person. In circumstances where
Speaker 1: the next of kin, for example, the husband should have
Speaker 1: been a number one person of interest. When Lynne disappeared
Speaker 1: in nineteen eighty two from her house at Bayview on
Speaker 1: the Northern Beaches and from her two children. Her husband
Speaker 1: Chris Dawson, was next of kin. Chris had reported Lynn
Speaker 1: missing some five and a half weeks after she disappeared,
Speaker 1: and even though Lynn's brother, Greg Simms was a police
Speaker 1: officer at the time, he was effectively excluded by police
Speaker 1: in the early years they deferred to Chris. The Northern
Speaker 1: Beaches cops told Greg that as his sister's husband was
Speaker 1: the next of kin, they would deal with him try
Speaker 1: number of occasions sting out missing persons, and because I
Speaker 1: wasn't the next to king Chris Dawson was, they wouldn't.
Speaker 5: Tell me anything.
Speaker 10: Pass hands were tired, as well as Griggs, as well
Speaker 10: as everybody's because she was classed as a missing person
Speaker 10: and we were not next to kin.
Speaker 1: In this way, Lynn's killer got preferential treatment.
Speaker 13: Because at that stage I had to jump through that
Speaker 13: many hoops to be the person that was doing Bromwin's
Speaker 13: official next of kin on police records, it was just stonewalled, stonewalled,
Speaker 13: stonewalled by John Winfield.
Speaker 9: I know you can't, we can't put Bromin's.
Speaker 13: Picture on a milk carton because that'll upset the kids.
Speaker 9: Can't do this, that'll upset the kids.
Speaker 1: What do you recall about your contact with Detective discu It.
Speaker 13: I had several conversations with Detective chrome Discin, but knowing.
Speaker 9: What we know now, none of what they did earlier.
Speaker 9: The piece was very thorough.
Speaker 14: John's the husband.
Speaker 15: He was having all the stay seven hundred kilometers away.
Speaker 15: We're down here with two little kids. He's up there.
Speaker 15: He had an answer for everything.
Speaker 1: Did you say to Detective discon or any of the
Speaker 1: other officers in the weeks or even months after Browin disappeared. Look,
Speaker 1: I think that this could be foul play.
Speaker 13: Yeah, I'd said to him straight out. I don't think
Speaker 13: this is right. I do not think this is right.
Speaker 13: This is so out of character of my sister. You
Speaker 13: need to investigate that.
Speaker 1: I have been reading the original police running sheets, a
Speaker 1: contemporaneous record kept by police which shows who was contacted,
Speaker 1: with a date and a brief summary for each entry.
Speaker 1: The running sheet shows that on May twenty eighth, nineteen
Speaker 1: ninety three, the day after John Winfield reported Brodman missing,
Speaker 1: a police officer, Julie Donovan.
Speaker 16: Spoke with doctor Chris Mitchell, who stated Winfield last saw
Speaker 16: him on May fourteenth, nineteen ninety three. Was aware of
Speaker 16: marriage problems, however, did not find Winfield to be depressed.
Speaker 16: Spoke with manager Peter Jacobson at Commonwealth Bank. Stated that
Speaker 16: there was an account in the name of Bronwin Winfield
Speaker 16: in San Suzi that was receiving a family supplement. However,
Speaker 16: up to date money had gone in from supplement but
Speaker 16: none taken out.
Speaker 1: There is another entry for eleven am. On May thirty,
Speaker 1: Denise Barnard and Deborah Hall attended the police station.
Speaker 16: Both girls stated very much out of character for Winfield
Speaker 16: to leave children. Hall informs that on May fourteen, Winfield
Speaker 16: started to move back into house at Sandstone Crescent.
Speaker 1: The entry shows that deb Hall discovered those two police
Speaker 1: what John had told deb that John and Romlan had
Speaker 1: an altercation on the Sunday evening May sixteenth, when John
Speaker 1: arrived at the house. That's the word in the police
Speaker 1: document from nineteen ninety three, altercation. The Collins Dictionary defines
Speaker 1: an altercation as a noisy argument or disagreement. According to
Speaker 1: the running Sheets, police officer Julie Donovan spoke to the
Speaker 1: clairvoyant and tarot card reader who had been receiving visits
Speaker 1: from Bromlin, but he said he had not seen Bromlin
Speaker 1: since early May. On June one, Detective Graham Diskin's name
Speaker 1: features prominently in the running sheets.
Speaker 14: Two pm, visited Sandstone Crescent, spoke to husband Jonathan Winfield,
Speaker 14: inspected house and obtained letters written by missing woman. Questioned
Speaker 14: husband further and delved into past.
Speaker 1: It must have been a relatively brief inspection and conversation
Speaker 1: with the person who had a noisy disagreement with his
Speaker 1: wife and was the last person to see her alive,
Speaker 1: because at three pm Detective Discan was at the Rental
Speaker 1: Accommodation in Byron Street, where he talked to the owner,
Speaker 1: Shirley Taylor. Half an hour later, Detective Sergeant Discan went
Speaker 1: to the Ballina Taxi Service depot to see if Broman
Speaker 1: had possibly traveled out of town in a cab. The
Speaker 1: next day, June two, he contacted Australian Federal Police, who
Speaker 1: told him Broman had not held an Australian or New
Speaker 1: Zealand passport since nineteen eighty and he was advised that
Speaker 1: Broman had not applied to travel overseas. Graham Diskin then
Speaker 1: contacted Telecom, which was the name then for the telecommunications
Speaker 1: company now known as Telstra.
Speaker 14: To obtain phone usage at home. Since sixteen May nineteen ninety.
Speaker 1: Three, he reported that there were three relevant long distance
Speaker 1: or meeted telephone calls. His records do not indicate any
Speaker 1: reference to local calls. The first long distance call was
Speaker 1: made at six point fifty three pm on the Sunday
Speaker 1: and it was to John's daughter Jody Winfield in Sydney.
Speaker 1: The second was just thirteen minutes later, at seven oh
Speaker 1: six pm, and it was to John's brother Peter Winfield
Speaker 1: in Sydney. It seems that John was letting family members
Speaker 1: know that he had arrived safely after the flight from Sydney.
Speaker 1: The third number, however, is a curious one. In the
Speaker 1: official police running sheet, Detective Sergeant Graham Diskin has reported
Speaker 1: that this number was called at two thirteen in the morning,
Speaker 1: and that was the morning of May seventeen, a Monday.
Speaker 1: It is a strange time for someone to be making
Speaker 1: a telephone call. Remember, neither John nor Broman was using
Speaker 1: mobile telephones then. All these calls were made from fixed
Speaker 1: home phones or landlines. Now John Winfield must have been
Speaker 1: well on the way to Sydney in the early hours
Speaker 1: of Monday morning. But the actual number which police claimed
Speaker 1: was called from the house at Sandstone Crescent at two
Speaker 1: thirteen am was also unusual. It started with zero zero
Speaker 1: five five, and that meant it wasn't a normal long
Speaker 1: distance call, it was some kind of service. Graham Diskin
Speaker 1: compared the number with other numbers he saw on uncollected
Speaker 1: mail enclosing Roman's telephone bill for the separate Byron Street
Speaker 1: rental accommodation and here's what the detective reported in the
Speaker 1: running sheet for June two, nineteen ninety three.
Speaker 14: Account shows that missing person had called the double zero
Speaker 14: double five numbers on a number of occasions prior to
Speaker 14: moving back to the family home. Unusual that the husband
Speaker 14: stated that he left the family home at eleven pm
Speaker 14: on May sixth, nineteen ninety three, and a double zero
Speaker 14: double five number was called at two thirteen am on
Speaker 14: May seventeen, nineteen ninety three. It may well be that
Speaker 14: the missing person has returned to the family home after
Speaker 14: the husband left allegedly at eleven pm, But.
Speaker 1: Detective Sergeant Diskan had misunderstood something very fundamental. He made
Speaker 1: an error with significant ramifications. Contrary to what he wrote
Speaker 1: down in the police running sheet. The information obtained from
Speaker 1: the telephone company by the detective does not show that
Speaker 1: a call from the home phone at Sandstone Crescent was
Speaker 1: made at two thirteen am on Monday May seventeen. In fact,
Speaker 1: it shows that the call was made at two thirteen
Speaker 1: pm in the afternoon of Sunday the day before, and
Speaker 1: there was no mystery about it. Bromwin or someone else
Speaker 1: it could have been Crystal had called the number to
Speaker 1: get the results for the weekly lotto draw. Here's Michelle
Speaker 1: Reid with her husband Andy.
Speaker 15: They told us that they checked the phone records and
Speaker 15: someone had been at the house after John had left.
Speaker 15: They'd been making phone calls to some doub double five
Speaker 15: number which ended up the police couldn't check it up
Speaker 15: because those numbers were banned from.
Speaker 4: The police station.
Speaker 15: Because someone at the police station had been ringing sex
Speaker 15: lines and that was straight out of his mouth, leading
Speaker 15: us so long thinking someone had done that in the
Speaker 15: middle of the night, and the fool of a man
Speaker 15: had said what happened in the am and it was
Speaker 15: actually in the pm of the day before. He didn't
Speaker 15: even get that right, and from that mistake that led
Speaker 15: all of the original police officers up there to think
Speaker 15: that shed They all believed that Broman had gone off,
Speaker 15: so they were.
Speaker 9: At all thinking John had done anything.
Speaker 15: John ran with that, He ran with that, He ran
Speaker 15: that she had to please said please, said, she's someone.
Speaker 17: Ring the phone.
Speaker 15: I left at eleven o six and must have been
Speaker 15: Bromlin because no one else had a king.
Speaker 1: But that discovery is not made for five years, a
Speaker 1: long time.
Speaker 15: Until the next lot of policemen took over.
Speaker 5: That was a royal creup point.
Speaker 13: And it was actually Michelle found that out because Michelle
Speaker 13: was looking at phone records trying to point out numbers
Speaker 13: and that for them, and that's.
Speaker 9: When Michelle turned around and went, hey, on.
Speaker 13: This phone call was never there was no No one
Speaker 13: ever returned to the house and made a phone call
Speaker 13: at two am on the in the Monday morning after
Speaker 13: midnight Sunday.
Speaker 1: No one the detective's a mistake over the timing of
Speaker 1: this telephone call appears to have had a crucial bearing
Speaker 1: on the course of the investigation. The misunderstanding lent weight
Speaker 1: to discons theory that had slipped back into the house
Speaker 1: after John had left. This was despite other evidence which
Speaker 1: in my view, should have already been ringing loud alarm bells.
Speaker 14: Inquiries at the Commonwealth Bank indicate that her bank account
Speaker 14: has not been touched to date.
Speaker 1: The running sheets become more detailed over the following days.
Speaker 1: At nine thirty am on June three, Detective Sergeant Discan
Speaker 1: teamed with Detective Wayne Temby and they went back to
Speaker 1: talk to Deborah.
Speaker 14: Hall, unable to assist with any further information except for
Speaker 14: a conversation relayed to her by John Winfield that on
Speaker 14: the night she left, she informed him that she had
Speaker 14: the opportunity of getting away for a few days and
Speaker 14: was going to take the opportunity. Paul is very surprised
Speaker 14: that missing person has left children and not made contact.
Speaker 1: At eleven am, detectives Discan and Temby.
Speaker 14: Had a long conversation with John Winfield about missing person
Speaker 14: and reason for taking children to see Sydney on Sunday night.
Speaker 14: Stated that they travel better at night and that his
Speaker 14: wife was aware that he would have them for eight
Speaker 14: to ten days in Sydney.
Speaker 5: Whilst she had a break.
Speaker 14: Produced a document where he purchased petrol in Ballina at
Speaker 14: six minutes past eleven on May sixteenth, nineteen ninety three.
Speaker 14: This is consistent with next door neighbor hearing him leave
Speaker 14: the premises unable to assist with phone call being made
Speaker 14: from his premises at two thirteen am on the Monday morning.
Speaker 14: Indications are that the missing person has returned to the
Speaker 14: family home after he and the children had left, and
Speaker 14: made the call whilst obtaining her property. He still states
Speaker 14: that after she made the call early in the evening,
Speaker 14: she walked out the front door about nine pm, carrying
Speaker 14: no property. We still can't find her handbag or a
Speaker 14: small blue suitcase. John states that he did have a
Speaker 14: conversation with her about getting away for a couple of weeks,
Speaker 14: deny as receiving any phone call in the middle of
Speaker 14: the night after missing person had been missing a few days.
Speaker 14: Apparently has told other people he had a call, but
Speaker 14: no person spoke.
Speaker 1: It is notable in my opinion that the proposed duration
Speaker 1: of Bromwin's purported break has by early June blown out
Speaker 1: by a long way. Initially, according to John, his wife
Speaker 1: Bromwin had told him she wanted a break for a
Speaker 1: few days, but by early June, with Bromwyn still missing,
Speaker 1: John is saying to police that she had said she wanted.
Speaker 5: To get away for a couple of weeks.
Speaker 1: Detectives Discan and Temby went to Eden's Takeaway and spoke
Speaker 1: to Bromwyn's workmates, but they were unable to help. The
Speaker 1: Running sheet states that an unnamed person at the takeaway
Speaker 1: told police that Bromwyn.
Speaker 14: For about the last month has been strange and seemed
Speaker 14: to be lacking in concentration. Also, she seemed to lack confidence.
Speaker 14: Any man that smiled or spoke to the missing person
Speaker 14: caused her to believe that there was a likelihood of
Speaker 14: some Eventually, Romance confided in them that she was having
Speaker 14: an affair with Jacko, now in New Zealand. He too
Speaker 14: was friends with the owners of the shop, and they
Speaker 14: are aware that no such affair was happening. This is
Speaker 14: supported by the letter from Jackson to the missing person.
Speaker 1: Recently, Gary Jackson is still known to many as Jacko.
Speaker 1: He spoke to my friend and colleague David Murray to
Speaker 1: share some information about Bromlin.
Speaker 5: Jacko was clearly.
Speaker 1: Very fond of Bromwin, and Bromwin believed that with Jacko
Speaker 1: she had a chance of a loving and healthy relationship.
Speaker 18: See this is a trouble. I've had a stroke and
Speaker 18: this is hard. I can remember the words where I
Speaker 18: can't sound Gary.
Speaker 9: Can I share this reporting with Headley for the podcast.
Speaker 18: Absolutely?
Speaker 5: It's really sad.
Speaker 18: I didn't know that bron Wan liked me, and she
Speaker 18: said you are the perfect person for me.
Speaker 19: I really do like was Golbs tracked by that we
Speaker 19: kiss and that's all we did. I said that I
Speaker 19: loved her and Rowan was tall, lay the shoes, a
Speaker 19: beautiful woman.
Speaker 18: She just left John and watching divorced. I had a
Speaker 18: thing with her, was about two weeks. It wasn't sexual
Speaker 18: because we didn't have sex. There was more than friendship,
Speaker 18: you know. But John was always around us.
Speaker 20: We couldn't go out anywhere.
Speaker 18: John was out there sitting in his chair watching us.
Speaker 18: I knew John before, but he was terrible for her.
Speaker 18: John intimidated her.
Speaker 9: Can you tell me what you think happened?
Speaker 18: Yeah, he killed her. John killed her, but they can't
Speaker 18: find the body at the police didn't do their job.
Speaker 1: Broman had separate from her husband and was struggling to
Speaker 1: make ends meet while living in rented accommodation with her
Speaker 1: two girls. Good friends tell me she had confided she
Speaker 1: was fearful of John. She was no doubt lonely, distracted,
Speaker 1: lacking in confidence, and hopeful of meeting someone else. You
Speaker 1: heard in an earlier episode from Kelly O'Brien, one of
Speaker 1: the local heroes of lenox because of her longtime commitment
Speaker 1: to young people in the community. I asked Kelly what
Speaker 1: she remembered about the efforts by police in nineteen ninety
Speaker 1: three when they started talking to people in Lenox Head
Speaker 1: about Bromin's disappearance. Detective Graham Diskin, along with the detective
Speaker 1: Wayne Tembe, spoke to a number of people who knew
Speaker 1: Bromin in nineteen ninety three, and they spoke to them
Speaker 1: in nineteen ninety three. They didn't take any statements from
Speaker 1: any people at that time. Call from nineteen ninety three
Speaker 1: the tone or commitment of police. Why your contact with Brohman,
Speaker 1: your recollections of her as a mother and so on
Speaker 1: were not actually put down in formal statements as they
Speaker 1: were five years later.
Speaker 20: I remember thinking.
Speaker 21: That it was so scared what they were asking and
Speaker 21: how they approached the staff around what had happened. I
Speaker 21: remember thinking it was so unprofessional and poor at the time. Honestly,
Speaker 21: The first conversations were like two minute conversation, and I
Speaker 21: was like, really, is that it?
Speaker 1: I mean, it is such an unusual thing, isn't it?
Speaker 1: A mother with two small girls and everybody says she
Speaker 1: doated on them? Just vanishers, never contacts anybody again, who's
Speaker 1: never seen again, doesn't return to say hang on, I've
Speaker 1: got a legal right to half this house. I need
Speaker 1: money to support myself. Do you find all of that bizarre?
Speaker 21: I guess I had a blind trust that I wasn't
Speaker 21: that important to be speaking with, and perhaps the other
Speaker 21: people that they were speaking with they were.
Speaker 20: Getting more from.
Speaker 21: Because I'd never been involved with the system in these ways.
Speaker 21: I became more infuriated that it had not been dealt
Speaker 21: with properly and was cross.
Speaker 20: How does someone disappear?
Speaker 21: And no one seemed to care that was responsible for
Speaker 21: finding out the answer. To think that people would believe
Speaker 21: a story that she'd listened to a Taro reader and
Speaker 21: then run off with someone's quite ludicrous. I still think
Speaker 21: that if they had have dealt with that really swiftly,
Speaker 21: we wouldn't be here today talking.
Speaker 20: Yeah, it would have been solved. It's really sad.
Speaker 1: Do you have any ideas as to why it was
Speaker 1: treated just so routinely in those early days.
Speaker 21: No, I can only imagine that they had some sense
Speaker 21: or view that women weren't important, or women did these
Speaker 21: things and believed here. So I'll just find that kind
Speaker 21: of thing outrageous to entertain. Any idea that we don't
Speaker 21: count is something I wouldn't want to think. It surprised
Speaker 21: me at the time as a young person, and certainly
Speaker 21: now working in the field, I would call out pretty slack.
Speaker 21: It is baffling, and I don't know whether our society
Speaker 21: was happy to just turn a blind eye or let
Speaker 21: things be.
Speaker 1: I know from talking to other women a little bit
Speaker 1: older than us who have been in similar situations, they've said,
Speaker 1: you trusted the police, you didn't speak up.
Speaker 20: In hindsight, we were all very remiss in that we
Speaker 20: were led by police.
Speaker 1: So maybe people were fawning to the police rather than saying,
Speaker 1: do you fricking jobs properly.
Speaker 21: We're taught to believe our elders, our teachers, our administrators,
Speaker 21: the priests, the police, and the doctors. But I think
Speaker 21: we should never let the elephant be hanging around too
Speaker 21: long under the table. I think it's best that transparency
Speaker 21: comes about. We know as a society, we find things out,
Speaker 21: we make things right in the end, and you get
Speaker 21: a better sleep for it.
Speaker 1: Maybe it's a case of better late than never for Bromin.
Speaker 21: Bromwin's not here, but certainly the girls and the girl's
Speaker 21: children surely need to know their family story and the
Speaker 21: rightness of it, the wrongness of it.
Speaker 1: Let's go back to the police running sheets from June
Speaker 1: nineteen ninety three. At two pm on June three, Graham
Speaker 1: Diskin talk to Michelle Reid, Bromwyn's sister in law, and
Speaker 1: the detective reported in the running sheet.
Speaker 14: She is very concerned about the missing person and stated
Speaker 14: that the actions of the missing person are identical to
Speaker 14: what her mother did.
Speaker 1: This is a reference to Bara Reid, the mother of
Speaker 1: Bromwyn and Andy.
Speaker 14: Reid has spoken to the mother and she does not
Speaker 14: seem too concerned, although she is a schizophrenic herself.
Speaker 1: At three pm, the detective talk to Bromwyn's solicitor in Lismore,
Speaker 1: Chris McDevitt.
Speaker 14: He has been instructed by the missing person so far
Speaker 14: as property settlement and family law matters are concerned. He
Speaker 14: stated that the missing person had sought advice about moving
Speaker 14: back into the family home during a week prior to
Speaker 14: her disappearance. He advised her that because the house was
Speaker 14: jointly owned and the husband was in Sydney, her and
Speaker 14: the children were quite entitled to move back in now.
Speaker 1: The next line in the detective's running sheet, as a
Speaker 1: result of talking to the solicitor mcdebittt, is in my
Speaker 1: view important.
Speaker 14: On Sunday May sixteenth, in the late afternoon, the missing
Speaker 14: person contacted him and stated that her husband had returned
Speaker 14: from Sydney and she was concerned about him being in
Speaker 14: the house. Mcdevittt advised the missing person that she might
Speaker 14: contact the police and inform them of the situation, and
Speaker 14: if need be, have them call by as a precaution
Speaker 14: in order to prevent a breach of the peace. The
Speaker 14: missing person seemed happy with that and made an appointment
Speaker 14: to see mcdebittt at nine am on May seventeen, nineteen
Speaker 14: ninety three, an appointment she never kept.
Speaker 1: This is a striking piece of information. Firstly, let me
Speaker 1: clarify the contact. The telephone call from rom When to
Speaker 1: her solicitor was a local call. That's why it didn't
Speaker 1: show up. When the detective got information about meeted calls
Speaker 1: or long distance calls. But as of three pm on
Speaker 1: June three, Detective Sergeant Graham Discin has been told by
Speaker 1: a lawyer an officer of the Supreme Court, that his
Speaker 1: client had called him out of ours on a Sunday
Speaker 1: and they then talked about escalating it to police. This
Speaker 1: is surely a red flag, but no, it appeared to
Speaker 1: have changed nothing and no statement was taken by police
Speaker 1: from Chris mcdebittt in nineteen ninety three. The only record
Speaker 1: made at the time was the brief June three entry
Speaker 1: by Detective Sergeant Graham Discan in the police running sheet.
Speaker 1: It seems that police continued to treat Bromman as a
Speaker 1: brooding housewife who walked away from her kids. In an
Speaker 1: earlier episode, you heard that Broman's appointment time with her
Speaker 1: solicitor was a lie.
Speaker 5: Am.
Speaker 1: The arrangement had been made the previous week, not in
Speaker 1: a Sunday afternoon telephone call. I've wondered whether Bromwin and
Speaker 1: Chris mcdebittt decided to bring the meeting forward by two
Speaker 1: hours to nine am as a result of John's arrival
Speaker 1: in Lenox. Did things become more urgent and focused on
Speaker 1: June four which is getting onto three weeks.
Speaker 5: Since Bromwin's disappearance.
Speaker 1: Detective Graham Diskin telephoned Bromwin's half sister, Kim Marshall, was
Speaker 1: twenty two at the time and she lived in Tasmania
Speaker 1: with her mother, Barbara, Bromwin's mother. According to the entry,
Speaker 1: Kim believed that Bromwyn would contact Kim soon, as they
Speaker 1: had plans to catch up in Lenox on June fourteen.
Speaker 14: Kim states that Bromwin is very similar to mother. When
Speaker 14: everything builds up around her, she will walk away and
Speaker 14: eventually go and get some help. Believes that she appears
Speaker 14: to be unusual in not taking or contacting children since
Speaker 14: May sixth. Kim also believes that, like their mother, Bromwin
Speaker 14: suffered a hormonal imbalance after the birth of the children,
Speaker 14: which causes them to be irrational. Kim believes that Brombin
Speaker 14: will get help and then walk into the family home
Speaker 14: like nothing has happened.
Speaker 1: On June eighth, detectives Graham Diskin and Wayne Tenby note
Speaker 1: that they went to see a close friend of Bromin,
Speaker 1: a woman I've called Joan. In an earlier episode of
Speaker 1: this podcast series, Joan isn't her real name, but you
Speaker 1: heard her voice in episode two. She has asked that
Speaker 1: I not reveal her true name.
Speaker 14: She stated that she had spoken to the missing person
Speaker 14: on the morning of May sixteen, and all appeared well,
Speaker 14: although the missing person seemed to be rambling on about
Speaker 14: things in general and slightly confused, no mention about leaving
Speaker 14: or being in fear of anybody.
Speaker 5: I received a different version from Joan.
Speaker 3: Are you saying now that you believed in ninety ninety three,
Speaker 3: within a few days of Brown disappearing, that you suspected
Speaker 3: foul play by John.
Speaker 22: Yeah, I'd fill it. I'd like to report it to
Speaker 22: the police, but not being family, I didn't think they'd
Speaker 22: taken any notice of this. He told me that I
Speaker 22: was a planned trip. She was had an opportunity to
Speaker 22: go to Queensland for a couple of weeks, and I
Speaker 22: felt it, well, it wasn't a plan trip because I'd
Speaker 22: just spoken to her, because I said, well, she wouldn't
Speaker 22: have just gone away and leave the kids. So he
Speaker 22: had to report it. I even went to the police
Speaker 22: station after he'd said he had reported, to check if
Speaker 22: he had, because it wasn't.
Speaker 1: Sure he would have, and what did they tell you that.
Speaker 22: To start with, they were treating it as like a
Speaker 22: domestic sitch basis, the people go missing because they want
Speaker 22: to sometimes, but now they were treating it as a
Speaker 22: missing person.
Speaker 1: Did you say to the police in nineteen ninety three,
Speaker 1: I suspect that Jonathan has got rid of his wife
Speaker 1: and he's just lying now about her going on a trip.
Speaker 22: Probably not straight away, but when they started coming around
Speaker 22: asking questions, I did say it, Well, I don't believe
Speaker 22: what he was saying, that she'd planned it and she
Speaker 22: wouldn't go off and leave the kids.
Speaker 20: It would have been weeks, I'd.
Speaker 1: Say, And there was a detective discount. Yeah, do you
Speaker 1: remember him, yes? Do you believe you told him that
Speaker 1: you thought it was suspicious?
Speaker 20: I would say so, yes.
Speaker 1: But your recollection is that you told at least detective
Speaker 1: disc And in nineteen ninety three, within weeks of Bromin's disappearance,
Speaker 1: that you were suspicious of possible foul play.
Speaker 22: He'd come around a few times, so it could have
Speaker 22: been more than a couple of weeks.
Speaker 20: But yeah, I suspected.
Speaker 22: Just didn't make sense.
Speaker 1: Why then didn't it become a full blown murder investigation
Speaker 1: in nineteen ninety three.
Speaker 22: I have no idea. I think they messed up.
Speaker 1: Why hasn't there been more disquiet in this little community?
Speaker 22: It's me I can understand it. But John also said, oh,
Speaker 22: she was seen in Ninburn. No, I said, I can't
Speaker 22: imagine Bromwin walking down the street in Lidburn, little mane.
Speaker 22: If he didn't do it, I feel sorry for him
Speaker 22: because we all think that he did.
Speaker 1: Now let's go back to Detective Discan's internal police report.
Speaker 14: Since the report of the missing person, checks with the
Speaker 14: Commonwealth Bank, Kirklands Medicare, Harveyworld Travel, jet Set Travel and
Speaker 14: CountryLink rail services have all met with a negative result.
Speaker 14: On June ten, interviewed Solicitor Graham Holland of Byron Bay
Speaker 14: states that he had been consulted by the missing person
Speaker 14: on May four regarding dissolution of marriage, property settlement and
Speaker 14: custody of the two girls, which was to take priority.
Speaker 14: The missing person was in fear of returning to the
Speaker 14: family home if the husband should return from Sydney whilst
Speaker 14: she was residing there. Solicitor Holland stated that she had
Speaker 14: very little money and was only concerned about the welfare
Speaker 14: of her two little girls.
Speaker 1: Detective Sergeant Graham Diskin has reported.
Speaker 14: Spoke again to John Winfield by telephone, unable to assist
Speaker 14: with any further information, and he has had no contact
Speaker 14: from missing person. Stated that he had been ringing family
Speaker 14: over the last few days, hoping they had heard something.
Speaker 1: The running sheet shows that the detectives had a conversation
Speaker 1: with someone from a family support group in Ballina.
Speaker 14: Card indicates that there has only been emotional abuse by
Speaker 14: the husband towards the missing person. On April nineteen, seemed
Speaker 14: to be coping well with the pension, but was alarmed
Speaker 14: if husband were to return to the family home.
Speaker 1: You heard in the first episode that Romman's contact with
Speaker 1: the ballaner Byron Family Support Service had been diorized by
Speaker 1: a counselor there, Doreen Strong. Perhaps she wrote about it
Speaker 1: on a card at the support service. Is that missus,
Speaker 1: Dorian Strong? Yes, your daughter in law contacted me. She
Speaker 1: said that you remembered the case.
Speaker 23: Yeah, well I did, because I did the initial call
Speaker 23: from them when she was wanting to make an appointment.
Speaker 1: I've mentioned your connection to the case in one of
Speaker 1: the episodes.
Speaker 23: Yeah. Well, look, I was looking forward to trying to
Speaker 23: find my original statement.
Speaker 1: It's not very long. If you'd like, I can read
Speaker 1: it to you.
Speaker 22: Ah.
Speaker 23: Yes, I was in holidays and Tasmania and I had
Speaker 23: a call from our manager Trish, who said the detectives
Speaker 23: were looking back into it. Now that would have been
Speaker 23: gosh aunt about two thousand or something like that. I'm
Speaker 23: not quite sure exactly what you So you made.
Speaker 1: It in October nineteen ninety eight at Ballina Police Station
Speaker 1: and say, I'm currently employed as a support worker at
Speaker 1: the Ballana Byron Family Support Service. You received a telephone
Speaker 1: call on Friday, the second of April from a woman
Speaker 1: named Bromwin Winfield, who was living in Lennox Head. You say,
Speaker 1: I recall Bromwin stating that she had left her husband
Speaker 1: ten days earlier. Bromin indicated that there had been emotional
Speaker 1: violence and threats relating to custody of her children. Broman
Speaker 1: stated that she had been to a solicitor and had
Speaker 1: received advice in relation to custody of the children. Broman
Speaker 1: stated that she was feeling better, but felt she needed
Speaker 1: some support. I told Bromwin that the service would telephone
Speaker 1: her back and arrange an appointment to see her. Details
Speaker 1: surrounding this conversation are recorded on the original day sheet
Speaker 1: for the second of April nineteen ninety three, retained by
Speaker 1: the service.
Speaker 23: Yeah, yeah, I can remember it quite clearly. We spoke
Speaker 23: to it, and I think it was one of Broman's
Speaker 23: friends that it was ringing and talking to us about it.
Speaker 23: I was doing intake that day and it was another
Speaker 23: worker that was going to see her.
Speaker 1: On the next page, you say from records, I am
Speaker 1: able to say that on Wednesday, the seventh of April
Speaker 1: nineteen ninety three, a family support worker, Stephanie Irvin, contacted
Speaker 1: Bromwan by telephone.
Speaker 21: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Records indicate that Bromwin stated that she could not talk
Speaker 1: to Stephanie over the phone as someone was there and
Speaker 1: she could not go into any depth. The records state
Speaker 1: that Broman sounded okay, voice was strong, but the girls
Speaker 1: need some help. The records indicate that Bromin stated that
Speaker 1: she would get back to us. From records maintained, I
Speaker 1: could also say that on Thursday, fifteen April nineteen ninety three,
Speaker 1: there was a phone call from Bromwan received. Bromen apparently
Speaker 1: stated that she was coping okay, but feels that she
Speaker 1: would like someone to talk to Bromen requested that Stephanie
Speaker 1: Irvin telephoned her. The statement goes on to say that
Speaker 1: the record show a telephone call was made to Bromwin
Speaker 1: by Stephanie and an appointment was made for a house
Speaker 1: visit at ten am on April twenty eighth, nineteen ninety three,
Speaker 1: but no person.
Speaker 5: Was at home.
Speaker 1: The last paragraph of your statement, missus Strong says, from
Speaker 1: my experience as a family support counselor, I find it
Speaker 1: strange that Broman would go missing without taking the children,
Speaker 1: as she was concerned over their custody. Just prior to
Speaker 1: her disappearance, Broman was concerned over the custody of her children,
Speaker 1: and there was no indication that she intended to give
Speaker 1: custody of the children to her husband. Yeah.
Speaker 23: Well, after that conversation with her, and she was concerned
Speaker 23: that he would come and take the children.
Speaker 20: That was so.
Speaker 23: I think I have heard her to Tony Mannering he
Speaker 23: was the solicited whether she kept that or not that appointment.
Speaker 1: Yes, she did see him.
Speaker 23: I remember saying to the police at the time, and
Speaker 23: like she wouldn't leave the kids because that was her
Speaker 23: main concern when she rang.
Speaker 1: Right, do you recall the tone or anything about the
Speaker 1: conduct of the police in the original inquiry that came
Speaker 1: just weeks after Bromin disappeared. When they spoke to you.
Speaker 23: No, I just thought they would be doing their job.
Speaker 23: I didn't get any indication that they weren't serious about it.
Speaker 23: But I'd listen to your podcast and evidently there was
Speaker 23: lots of things that weren't done initially. I know it's
Speaker 23: a long time ago, but I can still remember it,
Speaker 23: and we talked about it at work between workers, and
Speaker 23: it was ever Or one of her friends who was
Speaker 23: really not going to live up on it. She was
Speaker 23: quite concerned. We still remember. And now I've just turned eighty.
Speaker 23: I'm not young anymore.
Speaker 1: When did you retire from the service, missus Strong?
Speaker 23: I worked there for eighteen years and then I retired
Speaker 23: in twenty eleven.
Speaker 1: Well, in your statement, you say that records indicate that
Speaker 1: on four June nineteen ninety three, a friend of Bromin's
Speaker 1: contacted the service stating that Broman had been missing for
Speaker 1: about three weeks and had taken no clothes and her
Speaker 1: bank accounts had not been touched. And you say that
Speaker 1: this friend was checking the service to see if Broman
Speaker 1: had been in touch. In the podcast, we're referring to
Speaker 1: this woman as Joan, not as her real name, so
Speaker 1: you will have a different name.
Speaker 22: It's the police looking into it, like they said, and
Speaker 22: I've gone missing all time because they want to, and
Speaker 22: I think that's the view they had to start with.
Speaker 22: She would not go off and leave their kids.
Speaker 1: So I think she's probably the person who put Romin
Speaker 1: in touch.
Speaker 23: I know she had several conversations about her missing and
Speaker 23: she was quite concerned.
Speaker 1: Do you have any ideas as to why this wasn't
Speaker 1: taken more seriously at the time. And it's so unusual
Speaker 1: for a woman to disappear when she's got children and
Speaker 1: clearly seems dedicated to them, and she's actually going through
Speaker 1: a separation from her husband. About whom she's concerned.
Speaker 23: Well, we were all concerned, and naturally if we were concerned,
Speaker 23: we would have thought the authorities would have been concerned
Speaker 23: as well.
Speaker 1: You spoke to detectives Discn and Tembe in June of
Speaker 1: nineteen ninety three, but no statement taken from you until
Speaker 1: October twenty eight, nineteen ninety eight, five years later.
Speaker 23: Five years here. Yeah, well, I just can't remember the
Speaker 23: conversation with those two detectives.
Speaker 1: I'm really glad we've had this chat, Missus Strong.
Speaker 23: I just hope that something can be done.
Speaker 1: It is possible that a page or more of the
Speaker 1: police file from nineteen ninety three disappeared before the detective
Speaker 1: Sergeant Glenn Taylor became involved and did a thorough investigation
Speaker 1: in nineteen ninety eight. On June ten, Detective Wayne Temby
Speaker 1: spoke to Tony Mannering, one of the three solicitors visited by
Speaker 1: Bromwan after she had separated from John. Tony Mannering had
Speaker 1: a record of their meeting in his office on April two,
Speaker 1: and this had resulted in a lengthy letter to broman
Speaker 1: You heard most of it read aloud in a previous episode.
Speaker 1: Here's what the detective Wayne Temby put down in the
Speaker 1: police running sheet in June nineteen ninety three.
Speaker 24: Stated that she appeared to be level headed and fully
Speaker 24: aware of her intentions under wanted custody of the two children.
Speaker 24: He subsequently informed her of guidelines in respect to family
Speaker 24: law matters in a letter which was sent on April six.
Speaker 1: The next major document in the police files is a
Speaker 1: three and a half page report dated July fourteen, nineteen
Speaker 1: ninety three and written by a detective Senior Constable of
Speaker 1: Ballina Police, a detective others rather than Graham Diskin or
Speaker 1: Wayne Temby. The first paragraph of the police report sets
Speaker 1: the tone.
Speaker 17: It states, about nine point thirty pm on Sunday, May sixteen,
Speaker 17: Bronwyn Joy Winfield born April twenty fourth, nineteen sixty two
Speaker 17: of Sandstone Crescent, Lennox Head went into the main bedroom
Speaker 17: of the family home and made a telephone call. Shortly after,
Speaker 17: she walked out the front door of the house, and
Speaker 17: a car was heard to drive away from the area.
Speaker 17: Missus Winfield has not been seen or heard from since
Speaker 17: that date.
Speaker 1: This report was circulated among police, but right from the
Speaker 1: start it fully adopts the version of events that has
Speaker 1: come from Romwin's husband, John Winfield. There is not a
Speaker 1: hint of a suggestion that this version from him might
Speaker 1: be self serving. John was the only purported witness and
Speaker 1: the last person known to have seen Roman. None of
Speaker 1: the neighbors or heard a car at nine point thirty
Speaker 1: pm stop outside the house. Why wasn't the report's opening
Speaker 1: expressed factually such as according to the account given by
Speaker 1: the husband of the missing person, she went into the
Speaker 1: main bedroom of the family home and made a telephone call.
Speaker 1: The next misleading point in the report states.
Speaker 17: The husband, Jonathan Winfield, has been interviewed no less than
Speaker 17: six times and he's not been able to offer any
Speaker 17: ideas as to her whereabouts.
Speaker 1: According to the records, the police spoke to John, but
Speaker 1: they didn't record an interview with him until nineteen ninety eight.
Speaker 1: No statement was taken from him or anyone else until
Speaker 1: nineteen ninety eight. The other theme of this police report
Speaker 1: revolves around Bromman's mental health.
Speaker 17: Missus Winfield, according to close friends, appeared to be suffering
Speaker 17: from a state of mental confusion in the weeks leading
Speaker 17: up to her disappate appearance, and after visiting a clairvoyant
Speaker 17: at Lennox Head, she believed that he was her father.
Speaker 1: The report discloses that the clairvoyant was put under covert surveillance.
Speaker 17: This was carried out for two days and evenings and
Speaker 17: met with a negative result.
Speaker 1: The report then discloses more of John Winfield's version of
Speaker 1: what happened. When he arrived at the house on the
Speaker 1: Sunday evening May sixteen.
Speaker 17: He stated that his wife met him at the door
Speaker 17: and they sat and talked for some time in the
Speaker 17: dining room. The children were then put to bed and
Speaker 17: both he and his wife had an evening meal.
Speaker 1: There is no reference whatsoever to any altercation, and the
Speaker 1: concerns expressed by Bromwin two solicitors whom she consulted have
Speaker 1: been minimized.
Speaker 17: Inquiries revealed that Jonathan and the two girls left Sandstone
Speaker 17: Crescent around eleven pm and traveled to Ballina, where he
Speaker 17: filled the car with petrol and traveled to Sydney. It
Speaker 17: would appear that whilst the husband was traveling to Sydney,
Speaker 17: the missing person has returned to the family home, gathered
Speaker 17: some clothes and her handbag, and made another double zero
Speaker 17: double five call.
Speaker 1: This is a reference to the error made about the
Speaker 1: telephone call, the one that was actually made at two
Speaker 1: thirteen pm on a Sunday, and how police somehow misconstrued
Speaker 1: it as having happened at two thirteen am on Monday.
Speaker 17: When listened to for that period, the recorded voice supplies
Speaker 17: lot of results.
Speaker 1: And then after disclosing that Bromman has not been in
Speaker 1: touch with anyone and apparently left with little to know
Speaker 1: money and hadn't touched her bank accounts, the report revisits
Speaker 1: Bromwin's state of mind. The report states.
Speaker 17: It is known the missing person was suffering from a
Speaker 17: mental state of confusion. Documents in the handwriting of the
Speaker 17: missing person located at the family home indicate that she
Speaker 17: may have been suffering from mild depression. It would also
Speaker 17: appear that she carries some form of grudge against certain
Speaker 17: members of her family over property dealings, and her father
Speaker 17: over minor things. On July twelveth, nineteen ninety three, Jonathan
Speaker 17: Winfield reported to police that he had been absent in
Speaker 17: Sydney with his children from June twenty sixth to July eleven.
Speaker 17: Upon his return to Sandstone Crescent, Lennox Head, he found
Speaker 17: that clothing belonging to the missing person, together with photographs,
Speaker 17: had been taken from the family home.
Speaker 1: The unlikelihood of this does not seem to have been
Speaker 1: considered by police. They know from their inquiries with her
Speaker 1: bank that she has not withdrawn one dollar of her
Speaker 1: own money for food or shelter. Why how did they
Speaker 1: imagine she was supporting herself from May sixteen until the
Speaker 1: day on which she has, according to John, gone back
Speaker 1: into the house. Briefly, the final paragraph states.
Speaker 17: It is now requested that particulars of telephone calls made
Speaker 17: by the missing person from her home and from her
Speaker 17: neighbors be canvassed in an effort to locate her.
Speaker 1: In terms of suspicion, none whatsoever is expressed in relation
Speaker 1: to the husband from whom Bronwyn had newly separated. The
Speaker 1: only person regarded with suspicion apart from Bromwyn was a
Speaker 1: local clairvoyant and tarot card reader who was put under
Speaker 1: surveillance for two days, with more police attention to come.
Speaker 5: As the report.
Speaker 17: States, arrangements are now in place to have a regional
Speaker 17: crime squad surveillance unit carry out further observations, particularly of
Speaker 17: his nighttime activities.
Speaker 1: Bronwyn's second cousin, Maddie Walsh, and I have arrived at
Speaker 1: the home of Terry Batisse and her husband Brian at
Speaker 1: Ocean Shores, about a half hour drive north of Lenox.
Speaker 1: When Terry was thirty, she and Bromwan were friends on
Speaker 1: the local Lenox school's playgroup committee.
Speaker 25: I was the treasurer, she was the president, and I
Speaker 25: think Denise was the secretary. There was this psych called
Speaker 25: Pendragon hanging around Lennox at the time. She'd been to
Speaker 25: him and the talk was did he tell her something
Speaker 25: that made her want to go and hide.
Speaker 22: For a little while.
Speaker 25: That was the talk that was going around.
Speaker 1: And what's obvious from the police files is that after
Speaker 1: Bromwin disappeared, he was the only person who was put
Speaker 1: under any kind of surveillance. In subsequent investigations by the
Speaker 1: then detective Sergeant Glenn Taylor from nineteen ninety eight, the
Speaker 1: man known as Pendragon was ruled out as a person
Speaker 1: of interest. Harry recalled Broman's love of children and maternalistic instincts.
Speaker 25: Once my daughter was born, I was in balin affair
Speaker 25: and she saw me and she came up and she
Speaker 25: was just, oh.
Speaker 4: What a beautiful baby.
Speaker 25: She was just so overwhelming. It was like, oh, you're
Speaker 25: so lucky, genuine, very heartwarming, and she was just so
Speaker 25: kind with my new little baby.
Speaker 1: But when Bromin vanished under those bizarre circumstances in May
Speaker 1: nineteen ninety three, Terry's husband Brian, a former first grade
Speaker 1: and two time Grand Final winning rugby league player for
Speaker 1: the Canterbury Bulldogs in the nineteen eighties, immediately fastened onto
Speaker 1: a grave view.
Speaker 4: Terry tom of the story and I said, she's dead.
Speaker 4: I'll guarantee you'll never see your friend again.
Speaker 25: Probably because I said she would never leave those girls,
Speaker 25: never ever would leave.
Speaker 9: Terry was a good shocked when I said that.
Speaker 1: I remember why, given that certainty that so many people
Speaker 1: had that she wouldn't have left her kids, didn't it
Speaker 1: become a more serious police matter very early?
Speaker 25: Definitely, my friend was always onto it. She kept ringing
Speaker 25: the detective every week, what are you doing?
Speaker 5: What are you doing?
Speaker 25: And I think people in town may have been dead perhaps,
Speaker 25: and no one really came to any sort of decision.
Speaker 5: Were you scared of him?
Speaker 4: No, I guess I can't fright.
Speaker 9: Nine out watch the police.
Speaker 20: Police goes over.
Speaker 1: This will be a try.
Speaker 9: Brian police goes over.
Speaker 25: He do he ripped himself around, he saw the break,
Speaker 25: He stepped over three players.
Speaker 26: It definitely sounds like when I hear all you guys
Speaker 26: talking about it, it's something that was kept so under wraps.
Speaker 4: It was more of a whisper than a talk.
Speaker 26: It was kept in No one disappears at the face
Speaker 26: of the earth for no reason, So hopefully with the
Speaker 26: media involvement.
Speaker 27: What do you think they will do when police do
Speaker 27: a good investigation as they did in the second stage
Speaker 27: of this in ninety eight, and then they get a
Speaker 27: police brief evidence to the corner, and the corner recommends
Speaker 27: a prosecution. The DPP, when it says no, never has
Speaker 27: to explain properly why. In early two thousand and three,
Speaker 27: the DPP told the police that there's nobody, no evidence
Speaker 27: that John killed Bromlin, so we're not going to prosecute.
Speaker 27: Have they misunderstood something in the evidence that's caused them
Speaker 27: to come to this negative view.
Speaker 5: We don't know, because they don't have to say.
Speaker 1: I think a lot of Roman's friends and family believe
Speaker 1: that if all of the circumstances, if they were all
Speaker 1: put before a jury, then what.
Speaker 9: Other explanations exactly.
Speaker 1: You just hope that a fresh set of eyes in
Speaker 1: the office of the DPP would come along and say,
Speaker 1: let's take another look at this. Why didn't we prosecute
Speaker 1: it back in two thousand and three after the inquest.
Speaker 4: Well, I still believe then she.
Speaker 23: Died that night.
Speaker 1: Marilyn Hannigan lives in the nearby town of Ballina these days,
Speaker 1: but in the nineteen nineties she and her partner Bruce
Speaker 1: Huxtable were near neighbors of John and Bromwin. In Sandstone Crescent.
Speaker 1: They were fond of Bromwyn and wary of John. Bruce
Speaker 1: died in two thousand and five.
Speaker 28: The last time I saw her actually standing in the
Speaker 28: driveway beside the car. Oh my god, she was so
Speaker 28: tiny and so thin. We lived at fifty seven, just
Speaker 28: cross the road on the corner, and my partner was
Speaker 28: a retired senior detective sergeant with police. The first time
Speaker 28: somebody came to the neighborhood actually and ask us about anything,
Speaker 28: it was about five months after she disappeared, and Bruce
Speaker 28: gave this copper a hell of addressing down because he said,
Speaker 28: she's been missing for five months and it's just now
Speaker 28: that you're coming to us the neighbors and whatever. And
Speaker 28: it was like, you, well, you wouldn't have been on
Speaker 28: my team mate, and that sort of stuff.
Speaker 5: He was with Victoria Police.
Speaker 20: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Do you recall whether after Bromin disappeared, In the months
Speaker 1: after she disappeared, what the thinking was about what had happened.
Speaker 28: Bruce had pretty well said straight up, oh what the
Speaker 28: hell has he done with her?
Speaker 1: Were you more of the view that Bromin might have
Speaker 1: wanted to take a.
Speaker 20: Break, No, she wouldn't have left those girls and.
Speaker 1: Bruce being retired, he didn't feel that he could do.
Speaker 5: Anything he could have.
Speaker 28: We had a spit catering business that we did go
Speaker 28: and do a few jobs for police at different times,
Speaker 28: like Ballana police.
Speaker 20: We'd do a pig on the spit. He did know
Speaker 20: local policemen.
Speaker 1: So why do you think there wasn't a whole lot
Speaker 1: more focus and concern from police but also from the community.
Speaker 20: I don't really know.
Speaker 28: It just seemed to be a botch from the word go,
Speaker 28: and I know Dare She would ring them every week
Speaker 28: and then every month or whatever and ask the police
Speaker 28: had they gotten news, have done anything new, or.
Speaker 4: All that sort of stuff.
Speaker 20: She was really dogged. Nothing much ever happened. It just
Speaker 20: all seems so unfair and awful.
Speaker 1: Close your eyes and picture Roman coming in with her daughters.
Speaker 29: Yes, yes, it was all about the little girls having
Speaker 29: their head trimmed, their little friends trimmed, and had them
Speaker 29: dressed beautifully. And she was always well dressed too, very
Speaker 29: neat and tidy. You can't help but notice somebody like that,
Speaker 29: because in Lennox it was all hippie stuff.
Speaker 1: Longtime local of Lenox head people like Bernadette Armstrong are
Speaker 1: hearing about this investigation and striving to help. They've harbored
Speaker 1: grave concerns for three decades. A retired senior police officer,
Speaker 1: Glenn Taylor disclosed in the first episode of this podcast
Speaker 1: series that the original investigation into Broman's disappearance was very poor.
Speaker 1: The more I talk to people from lenox the more
Speaker 1: misguided the nineteen ninety three investigation looks. It's difficult to
Speaker 1: disagree with the view of many in this place that
Speaker 1: police back in nineteen ninety three, when the trail was fresh,
Speaker 1: saw Bromwin as a feckless young woman who'd possibly taken
Speaker 1: off with another fella. But as Bromin's neighbor and good
Speaker 1: friend Debhaul described it to me one day recently, it
Speaker 1: is a two way street. There were undoubtedly people in
Speaker 1: Lenox Head who kept their suspicions and knowledge of some
Speaker 1: things to them, and the police are not mind readers.
Speaker 1: I have tried to talk to the former Detective Sergeant
Speaker 1: Graham Diskin, who was in charge of the investigation in
Speaker 1: nineteen ninety three. His side of things is important, but
Speaker 1: he has declined to talk about the case. He has
Speaker 1: been retired from the New South Wales Police for more
Speaker 1: than twenty years. In nineteen ninety three, there was a
Speaker 1: more junior officer, Wayne Temby, who helped Graham discin in
Speaker 1: those early days. Wayne Temby has been retired for some
Speaker 1: time too, and he also declined an interview request. Wayne
Speaker 1: Temby played an integral role in the subsequent investigation in
Speaker 1: nineteen ninety eight, led by Glenn Taylor, which made so
Speaker 1: much progress. But you can't silence women like Bernadette Armstrong.
Speaker 29: I have to tell you onto this right from the
Speaker 29: word Joe, I want to see her found.
Speaker 1: Bernie's hairdressing salon had pride of place next to a
Speaker 1: Chinese restaurant in Lennox Head in the nineteen nineties, and
Speaker 1: opposite was Eden's Takeaway, where Broman worked part time.
Speaker 29: I've been churned up the last few days about the podcast.
Speaker 29: I'll never rest until I find out what happened to
Speaker 29: that Paul girl. I did thirty six years of hairdressing.
Speaker 29: I've done thousands of people's hair, especially women, And do
Speaker 29: you know out of all the people I've done, Bromwan
Speaker 29: stood out to me and she struck me as the
Speaker 29: most wonderful, impeccable mother.
Speaker 20: I never lost that feeling.
Speaker 29: Whenever she came in, I think, oh my god, she's
Speaker 29: got the dress beautifully. So when that happened that she'd disappeared,
Speaker 29: there was a fellow called Graham.
Speaker 4: Graham disc game discan.
Speaker 20: Yeah, yeah, have you heard of him?
Speaker 1: Yes, I've heard of him, but I do know that
Speaker 1: he was involved in the original investigation in nineteen ninety
Speaker 1: three when Bromin first disappeared.
Speaker 29: That's exactly right. But he came into my salon. I
Speaker 29: didn't know him really from a bar of soap and
Speaker 29: I was at turning to a lady's here. I was
Speaker 29: doing her hair and I had another lady in the
Speaker 29: chair next to her, and he went, Bernadette, I believe
Speaker 29: you know Bromin Winfield. And I said, oh, yes, she's
Speaker 29: kind here. And he said, come on, this is where
Speaker 29: we find the gossip. This is how he spoke to me.
Speaker 29: Come on, you're in here, all you girls, and you
Speaker 29: know what she's done. I said, what are you talking about?
Speaker 29: And I got on the high horse straight away, and
Speaker 29: he said, you've got the goss here. I said, I
Speaker 29: haven't got the goths here. Just spit it out and
Speaker 29: what do you want? And he went, you know she's
Speaker 29: run off with somebody. She would have told you she's
Speaker 29: got a boyfriend. And he went, yeah, come on, he said,
Speaker 29: she's run away. And I said, listen, stop right now.
Speaker 29: I said, don't you speak to me like that. And
Speaker 29: I said, and I'm telling you now that I know
Speaker 29: nothing about that.
Speaker 20: He said it.
Speaker 29: About three times, and I thought, you say that again,
Speaker 29: I said.
Speaker 20: Graham, I said, I'm busy.
Speaker 18: Oh was wild?
Speaker 29: How dare he try to put words in my mouth? Oh,
Speaker 29: she's got a fellow. She's run up with a fellow.
Speaker 29: That's what he was saying. Get your fact right, you know,
Speaker 29: before he come into my place and start spreading gossip.
Speaker 29: I said, she was a lovely client. That's all I know.
Speaker 29: I said, I know nothing personally about the girl.
Speaker 20: I said, but I'll tell you what.
Speaker 29: That's something I would never believe that she's left those
Speaker 29: two little girls. And you know, I've stuck to that
Speaker 29: headly all the way through, all the way through, and
Speaker 29: I'm still still the same. And I complained to them
Speaker 29: in that ball at the police station. I said, listen,
Speaker 29: he came in here into my salon and I said,
Speaker 29: tell me what I thought or knew. She would never
Speaker 29: have left the Little Girls and I will never change
Speaker 29: that opinion ever.
Speaker 1: Bronwyn is written and investigated by me Headley Thomas as
Speaker 1: a podcast production for The Australian. If anyone has information
Speaker 1: which may help solve this cold case, please contact me
Speaker 1: confidentially by emailing Bronwyn at the Australian dot com dot au.
Speaker 1: You can read more about this case and see a
Speaker 1: range of photographs and other artwork at the website Bromwyn
Speaker 1: podcast dot com. Our subscribers and registered users here episodes first.
Speaker 5: The production and.
Speaker 1: Editorial team for Bromwin includes Claire Harvey, Kristin Amiot, Joshua Burton, Bridget,
Speaker 1: Ryan Bianca, far Marcus, Katie Burns, Liam Mendez, Sean Callen,
Speaker 1: Matthew Condon and David Murray. Audio production for this podcast
Speaker 1: series is by Wasabi Audio and original theme music by
Speaker 1: Slade Gibson. We have been assisted by Madison Walsh, a relation.
Speaker 5: Of Romwin Winfield.
Speaker 1: We can only do this kind of journalism with the
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Speaker 1: For all of our exclusive stories, videos, maps, timelines and
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