WEBVTT - Margaret |14 0:00:00.040 --> 0:00:05.000 M all right, Okay, we've just pulled up. 0:00:05.760 --> 0:00:10.200 We have Okay, Nina and I have spent too long together. 0:00:10.280 --> 0:00:11.639 Well, I was going to say, what's on the sign? 0:00:11.840 --> 0:00:12.640 Certainly helps you? 0:00:13.039 --> 0:00:16.520 Yeah, we are for the recording audience. 0:00:17.880 --> 0:00:22.560 We've started to bicker at each other. I'm waiting for 0:00:22.600 --> 0:00:24.240 you to say, so, Dan, where are we? 0:00:24.400 --> 0:00:26.360 I was gonna, you know, for once, I was going 0:00:26.400 --> 0:00:27.000 to say. 0:00:26.760 --> 0:00:28.800 Where we were, but we hadn't pulled up with Should 0:00:28.800 --> 0:00:29.680 we not bicker anymore? 0:00:30.640 --> 0:00:31.000 All right? 0:00:32.640 --> 0:00:36.040 But in fairness, we're two years in to working on 0:00:36.080 --> 0:00:40.960 this podcast, months past where we expected to finish, and 0:00:41.040 --> 0:00:44.560 we're both tired. Can we do a piece of microphone? 0:00:45.440 --> 0:00:51.240 Just talk? I'll talk, you record what talk. We're also 0:00:51.600 --> 0:00:55.640 still driving right now. We're near the small town of 0:00:55.720 --> 0:00:58.680 Old Bar on the mid north coast of New South Wales, 0:00:59.200 --> 0:01:02.080 which is a out three quarters of an hour south 0:01:02.200 --> 0:01:05.679 of Kendall, the town where William Tirell was reported missing. 0:01:07.120 --> 0:01:11.000 Driving this dirt road, we passed between two walls of forest, 0:01:11.640 --> 0:01:16.560 the trees seeming to crowd closer in upon us. Then 0:01:16.720 --> 0:01:22.520 suddenly the country opens to our right. There are long 0:01:23.080 --> 0:01:28.279 empty beaches, the blue sky, the sun's sparkling in the water. 0:01:29.040 --> 0:01:35.880 Oh fuck, it's gorgeous, or it would be gorgeous if 0:01:35.920 --> 0:01:41.880 this wasn't the likely sight of another unsolved murder and 0:01:42.760 --> 0:01:46.080 getting out of the car the wind wasn't whipping in 0:01:46.160 --> 0:01:51.400 as sharp as knives across the ocean. This is a 0:01:51.560 --> 0:01:55.800 place called mud Bishop's Point Reserve. You can hear the 0:01:55.840 --> 0:02:00.440 trees and just over there's the water coming down from 0:02:00.480 --> 0:02:03.880 the Manning River, and it's a beautiful place. Out to 0:02:03.960 --> 0:02:09.320 our right there's just these golden beaches. But back in 0:02:09.400 --> 0:02:13.160 December nineteen ninety six, a thirty eight year old mum 0:02:13.400 --> 0:02:17.320 called Margaret Cox. She had three kids. She was last 0:02:17.400 --> 0:02:20.320 in on a Thursday night in Taree, which is about 0:02:20.720 --> 0:02:24.840 twenty kilometers away from here, and a couple of days 0:02:24.919 --> 0:02:28.000 later her body was found in the water near here. 0:02:31.560 --> 0:02:35.800 Margaret's underwear, carrying the DNA of four other people, was 0:02:35.840 --> 0:02:39.000 found at the picnic reserve near where Nina and I 0:02:39.120 --> 0:02:43.280 are standing. Like Helen Harrison whose death we looked at 0:02:43.320 --> 0:02:48.720 in the last episode, Margaret's killing is still unsolved, meaning 0:02:48.720 --> 0:02:53.000 her family don't have any answers, except that a coroner 0:02:53.120 --> 0:02:57.760 found she had been raped, was killed by blunt force 0:02:57.840 --> 0:03:01.880 injuries to her head, and that it wasn't possible to 0:03:01.960 --> 0:03:05.120 say if Margaret was still alive when her body was 0:03:05.160 --> 0:03:08.560 put in the water. And the other thing the coroner 0:03:08.720 --> 0:03:12.760 found was that it was most likely a local who 0:03:12.800 --> 0:03:17.359 was involved in whatever happened to Margaret, because this area's 0:03:17.600 --> 0:03:19.240 a long way out of town, at the end of 0:03:19.240 --> 0:03:22.680 a long dirt road. There's no street lights, so you 0:03:22.760 --> 0:03:25.200 come here at nights and it would be pitch dark. 0:03:25.440 --> 0:03:30.480 The only light would be your car headlights, and you'd 0:03:30.520 --> 0:03:33.920 have to be a local to even know this place existed. 0:03:42.280 --> 0:03:46.160 I'm Dan Box and from news dot com dot Au. 0:03:46.840 --> 0:04:06.440 This is Witness William Tyrrell, Episode fourteen, Margaret. 0:04:14.880 --> 0:04:17.159 Thank you, gentlemen. Stop recording. 0:04:19.720 --> 0:04:23.400 To get a sense of why Margaret's case is still unsolved. 0:04:23.760 --> 0:04:27.920 Almost thirty years later, Nina and I sit down again 0:04:28.000 --> 0:04:31.560 with Gary Jubilin, the former detective who once led the 0:04:31.600 --> 0:04:36.240 investigation into William Tyrrel's disappearance. All right, hey, listen, what 0:04:36.279 --> 0:04:41.200 we're going to do is talk you through these two 0:04:42.240 --> 0:04:45.560 unrelated cases. So we talked to you through Helen Harrison before, 0:04:45.640 --> 0:04:47.880 and we're just trying to get your sense on anything 0:04:47.920 --> 0:04:50.240 that comes to mind, particularly about the investigation. 0:04:50.920 --> 0:04:54.800 So It's December of nineteen ninety six. It's the nineteenth 0:04:54.800 --> 0:04:59.159 of December. It's a Thursday before Christmas. Margaret Cox was 0:04:59.160 --> 0:05:02.000 a thirty eight year old single mom. She had three children, 0:05:02.279 --> 0:05:05.279 and on that Thursday, Margaret had spent the day with 0:05:05.360 --> 0:05:09.240 family and friends that had been consuming some alcohol from marijuana. 0:05:09.360 --> 0:05:12.680 Then the group went out in the evening and they 0:05:13.279 --> 0:05:16.320 decided to walk from Kendletown to Tarre in order to 0:05:16.360 --> 0:05:17.280 go to a nightclub. 0:05:17.520 --> 0:05:22.000 It's about five kilometers straight down the road. Tarree itself 0:05:22.080 --> 0:05:24.159 is the big city on this stretch of the mid 0:05:24.160 --> 0:05:28.520 North Coast, but it's not that big. With just over 0:05:28.600 --> 0:05:33.200 twenty thousand people living there, it shouldn't be that easy 0:05:33.480 --> 0:05:35.240 for someone to get lost. 0:05:35.760 --> 0:05:38.520 Around midnight, they stopped at a service station, which was 0:05:38.560 --> 0:05:40.359 where the Big Oyster was at the time. 0:05:40.800 --> 0:05:46.760 Yep, the Big Oyster is just that, a big sculpture 0:05:47.080 --> 0:05:51.320 of an oyster. It's meant, I think, to celebrate the 0:05:51.360 --> 0:05:55.040 local oyster farming industry, and it's kind of why. It's 0:05:55.200 --> 0:05:59.400 enormous and kind of goofy and kind of impressive and 0:05:59.520 --> 0:06:01.719 also so kind of ugly. 0:06:02.400 --> 0:06:05.400 Big ways to steal. Their service station has moved and 0:06:05.960 --> 0:06:09.480 somehow during this point, Margaret gets separated from the group, 0:06:10.040 --> 0:06:12.440 and no one's really sure what happened at that point. 0:06:12.600 --> 0:06:15.440 The theory is that she either gets into someone's car 0:06:15.640 --> 0:06:18.400 or a lift, or is taken in someone's car. 0:06:18.800 --> 0:06:22.279 Essentially, she's not seen after this point at that service station. 0:06:23.400 --> 0:06:27.560 And that's twelve midnight service station. Yeah, okay, how many 0:06:27.560 --> 0:06:28.360 people wash you with? 0:06:28.760 --> 0:06:32.800 We don't know the number. Two people who worked at 0:06:32.800 --> 0:06:38.120 the service station told police they saw Margaret with either 0:06:38.240 --> 0:06:42.400 another man or two men who bought a cigarette lighter 0:06:42.520 --> 0:06:46.200 and then left. But someone else told the police that 0:06:46.240 --> 0:06:49.960 he saw Margaret at the service station surrounded by a 0:06:50.000 --> 0:06:54.800 group of men and screaming. So it's all confusing. 0:06:56.120 --> 0:06:59.640 I mean, I'll say up front that we did apply 0:06:59.720 --> 0:07:04.000 for the coronial inquest files for this case, and even 0:07:04.040 --> 0:07:07.279 though I applied in October, I haven't received them. Dan, 0:07:07.360 --> 0:07:08.680 you've also applied. 0:07:08.520 --> 0:07:11.080 Yep, my got sent the findings, which is a single page. 0:07:11.560 --> 0:07:12.680 Yeah, not much help. 0:07:13.920 --> 0:07:16.800 The inquest into Margaret's death was held in twenty ten, 0:07:16.960 --> 0:07:21.640 fourteen years after she was murdered, and the coroner's findings 0:07:21.680 --> 0:07:25.400 say the cause of her death was blunt force injuries 0:07:25.440 --> 0:07:29.400 to her head inflicted on her by person or persons 0:07:29.560 --> 0:07:33.600 unknown and the evidence available does not enable me to 0:07:33.640 --> 0:07:36.320 make a finding as to the place of death. 0:07:37.640 --> 0:07:40.920 So it's that was a Thursday night. The following Saturday morning, 0:07:41.520 --> 0:07:44.080 Margaret's body was found floating in the Manning River. 0:07:45.240 --> 0:07:48.400 So, if you don't know Tarre, Tarre's on the Manning 0:07:48.480 --> 0:07:51.040 River and then that flows down to the coast, and 0:07:51.080 --> 0:07:54.480 it kind of it splits in two and goes around 0:07:54.480 --> 0:07:56.040 this big island and then hits the. 0:07:56.000 --> 0:07:59.400 Coast yep, and some of her clothing was found in 0:07:59.440 --> 0:08:03.360 a picnic area called mud Bishop's Reserve, where the police 0:08:03.400 --> 0:08:06.840 and later the coroner theorized that she was sexually assaulted 0:08:06.920 --> 0:08:10.560 multiple times. The police pretty quickly formed the opinion that 0:08:10.600 --> 0:08:13.480 they thought the killer was local, mainly because it's not 0:08:13.520 --> 0:08:16.560 an area that you'd likely find and access late at 0:08:16.600 --> 0:08:19.240 night if you weren't already aware of that area. Dan 0:08:19.320 --> 0:08:22.000 and I actually went to this area. Yeah, I would agree. 0:08:22.000 --> 0:08:22.600 It's pretty hard. 0:08:22.640 --> 0:08:24.720 There's no way you'd know about it unless you knew 0:08:24.720 --> 0:08:25.520 the area. 0:08:25.880 --> 0:08:29.960 And that assumption is a reasonable assumption if we're looking 0:08:29.960 --> 0:08:32.920 at an area that if you're from out of the town, 0:08:33.360 --> 0:08:35.559 you don't even know about it. So I think that's 0:08:35.600 --> 0:08:36.560 a reasonable assumption. 0:08:36.720 --> 0:08:39.920 And the other point is it's not in Tire, so 0:08:39.960 --> 0:08:43.000 she's last seen in Tire and then mud Bishop's Reserve 0:08:43.040 --> 0:08:45.360 where her clothes are found and the coroner and the 0:08:45.400 --> 0:08:49.880 police think that she was assaulted. That's a decent drive, 0:08:50.240 --> 0:08:53.760 maybe ten to fifteen minutes, but it's out a tarre 0:08:54.000 --> 0:08:56.520 down following the river, you hit another little town called 0:08:56.559 --> 0:08:59.440 Old Bar and then from there it's not easy to 0:08:59.480 --> 0:09:03.120 find your way up to this reserve. People fish there, 0:09:03.559 --> 0:09:07.320 people might go there for I don't know, teenagers might 0:09:07.400 --> 0:09:09.560 drink there. It's not an obvious place to go at all. 0:09:11.320 --> 0:09:13.160 So the police first they looked at the ex boyfriend. 0:09:13.200 --> 0:09:18.360 He was a truck driver and he'd actually driven from 0:09:18.600 --> 0:09:22.000 Grafton I think to Taree and he'd signed in at 0:09:22.000 --> 0:09:24.680 a nearby sailing club on the Thursday night that Margaret 0:09:24.760 --> 0:09:27.360 went missing, so he's an obvious person to talk to. 0:09:27.960 --> 0:09:30.400 They spoke to him. He said the relationship ended weeks 0:09:30.400 --> 0:09:33.040 before and he had an alibi, so they kind of 0:09:33.080 --> 0:09:37.160 scratched him. Police interviewed everyone they could find who'd been 0:09:37.200 --> 0:09:41.000 on the highway that day, so thousands of inquiries. They 0:09:41.040 --> 0:09:44.280 spoke to fishermen who'd been near where the clothing was recovered, 0:09:44.720 --> 0:09:47.600 and they treated some of those as potential suspects. At first, 0:09:48.800 --> 0:09:53.000 police learned that upstream at a bridge, some people had 0:09:53.000 --> 0:09:56.680 heard screaming on the night that Margaret went missing, But 0:09:57.520 --> 0:10:00.000 the investigation started to feel like it was getting bogged down. 0:10:00.920 --> 0:10:04.640 Three homicide detectives from Newcastle came up, spent several months 0:10:04.720 --> 0:10:07.960 in Tare. Another couple of detectives came up and took 0:10:07.960 --> 0:10:11.480 the lead from the local cops. So at this point, 0:10:12.200 --> 0:10:14.560 does that sound like a comprehensive police response. 0:10:14.720 --> 0:10:18.040 Well, they're treating seriously if they know the fight homicide, 0:10:18.120 --> 0:10:20.800 So you'd send a team of three. That seems normal 0:10:21.280 --> 0:10:25.480 with the family who was with her? Was anyone from 0:10:25.480 --> 0:10:27.800 the family with her at the time of her disappearance? 0:10:27.920 --> 0:10:30.440 Yeah, so that day and that night she was with 0:10:30.600 --> 0:10:31.560 family and friends. 0:10:31.679 --> 0:10:35.720 Yeah, Okay, my instinct from a homicide detective, the answer 0:10:36.040 --> 0:10:39.040 lies in at the service station, which pretty much stayed 0:10:39.080 --> 0:10:41.360 in the obvious, saying it was the last place she 0:10:41.440 --> 0:10:45.000 was seen alive. But yeah, how she wandered off from 0:10:45.000 --> 0:10:46.640 a group with no one in the group knowing. 0:10:49.120 --> 0:10:52.320 The answer to how Margaret got separated from the group 0:10:52.920 --> 0:10:57.000 might be in old newspaper reports, which Nina found in 0:10:57.040 --> 0:11:00.240 the State library. These say that Margaret was one of 0:11:00.320 --> 0:11:04.280 four people drinking together that night. They say the group 0:11:04.400 --> 0:11:07.520 drank two bottles of Jim Beam and a four liter 0:11:07.679 --> 0:11:12.319 cask of wine. One other group later described Margaret saying 0:11:12.440 --> 0:11:14.960 she could stand up, but if you asked her to 0:11:15.040 --> 0:11:17.920 walk in a straight line, it would have never happened. 0:11:18.720 --> 0:11:24.080 So pretty drunk. About eleven or eleven thirty that night, 0:11:24.559 --> 0:11:29.080 the group somehow drove from Tai to nearby Condletown to 0:11:29.160 --> 0:11:33.559 keep drinking. Only they ran out of drink in Condletown, 0:11:33.880 --> 0:11:39.679 so three of them, including Margaret, walked back. Then that 0:11:39.760 --> 0:11:43.240 group split. Margaret wanted to get a cigarette lighter, so 0:11:43.280 --> 0:11:46.040 she went to the service station and the other two 0:11:46.480 --> 0:11:49.280 walked onto a caravan park to call on a friend. 0:11:50.600 --> 0:11:54.360 My focus, if I was looking at an investigation being 0:11:54.400 --> 0:11:56.920 called out the bet would be focusing very much on 0:11:57.160 --> 0:12:00.920 everyone's movements. Was anyone showing the particular interest in that night? 0:12:01.240 --> 0:12:03.520 A group going for a drink, kicking on a nightclub. 0:12:03.640 --> 0:12:06.679 Invariably people are starting the pair up or someone that's 0:12:06.679 --> 0:12:09.560 shown an interest in her that night, thinking that he 0:12:09.640 --> 0:12:10.920 might be their man. 0:12:11.120 --> 0:12:13.959 Up until at least we get to, like the ten 0:12:14.040 --> 0:12:17.320 year anniversary of the crime. The police are still saying 0:12:17.360 --> 0:12:20.200 in the media, you know, this can be solved. They 0:12:20.200 --> 0:12:21.439 don't seem like they've given up. 0:12:22.400 --> 0:12:26.280 They also don't seem to have had much success for 0:12:26.400 --> 0:12:30.080 different reasons. Different police officers were put in charge of 0:12:30.080 --> 0:12:33.480 the case over the years, and none of them was 0:12:33.520 --> 0:12:37.720 able to be certain where exactly Margaret died. There was 0:12:37.760 --> 0:12:41.400 no blood or sign of a struggle, meaning they didn't 0:12:41.480 --> 0:12:43.319 have a lot of evidence. 0:12:44.400 --> 0:12:46.480 There's at least three or four persons of interests that 0:12:46.600 --> 0:12:50.640 were named the inquest. So early on the police released 0:12:50.640 --> 0:12:52.440 a photo fit of a man that they believed had 0:12:52.440 --> 0:12:56.000 been camping in the mud Bishop's Reserve area, and they 0:12:56.240 --> 0:12:59.280 released an image of him and the description of his car, 0:12:59.280 --> 0:13:02.360 which was a white four wheel drive Land Rover, and 0:13:02.400 --> 0:13:05.199 as a result of that, a number of people identified 0:13:05.240 --> 0:13:08.160 the same man as being the man from that photo. 0:13:09.120 --> 0:13:11.160 That man was not Frank Cabot. 0:13:12.520 --> 0:13:15.680 Mud Bishop Reserve was where her clothing was found. There 0:13:16.800 --> 0:13:21.080 I see the primary crime scene, I would suggest as 0:13:21.120 --> 0:13:24.000 a service station. I didn't get overly excited about the 0:13:24.040 --> 0:13:27.200 secondary crime scene. Someone in the area and again, this 0:13:27.360 --> 0:13:30.840 is just what's going through her mind in that why 0:13:30.840 --> 0:13:34.000 did she get to that location? She didn't have a car. 0:13:34.200 --> 0:13:37.120 How did she get to the picnic area where a clothing. 0:13:36.840 --> 0:13:38.560 Was found, because she's got to get there. 0:13:38.720 --> 0:13:42.720 Yeah, so it's who meets the service station and takes 0:13:42.720 --> 0:13:43.000 her there. 0:13:43.160 --> 0:13:45.680 That's where I'd be looking. I wouldn't be overly concerned 0:13:45.679 --> 0:13:47.840 who was around where her clothes were dumped. 0:13:47.960 --> 0:13:50.840 But the coroner ultimately ruled there was not enough evidence 0:13:50.880 --> 0:13:53.280 to point to a likely killer or to charge anyone. 0:13:54.120 --> 0:13:58.240 They also mentioned DNA, so the coroner mentioned that there 0:13:58.280 --> 0:14:02.600 was a DNA of four people on Margaret's underwear. Ye, 0:14:02.800 --> 0:14:06.040 three of those people have been identified and one hasn't. 0:14:06.400 --> 0:14:10.920 Right, Okay, Certainly, if her clothes have been dumped, her 0:14:10.960 --> 0:14:13.959 body has been dumped in the river, and it looks 0:14:13.960 --> 0:14:17.240 like she's being sexually assaulted, the DNA on the underwear 0:14:17.280 --> 0:14:19.200 would be of vital interest. 0:14:20.120 --> 0:14:20.360 Yeah. 0:14:20.400 --> 0:14:24.680 But presumably if they've identified three of those people, they 0:14:24.720 --> 0:14:28.280 aren't suspects. They must have been ruled out. 0:14:28.960 --> 0:14:32.920 Again, the media reports are confusing, but it looks like 0:14:33.160 --> 0:14:37.600 three of those DNA profiles were identified and two of 0:14:37.640 --> 0:14:41.840 them ruled out as suspects at the inquest, leaving one 0:14:42.000 --> 0:14:47.480 other identified person and a fourth DNA profile that's never 0:14:47.640 --> 0:14:52.280 been identified. But one thing does stand out from the 0:14:52.320 --> 0:14:57.320 media reports, and that is that Margaret had a bandage 0:14:57.400 --> 0:15:02.160 on her left arm. The newspaper report says she suffered 0:15:02.320 --> 0:15:06.520 a very extensive laceration on her left arm shortly before 0:15:06.560 --> 0:15:10.480 her death. Another report is different, that one says that 0:15:10.520 --> 0:15:15.000 she'd had what it called certain surgery earlier that December. 0:15:16.520 --> 0:15:19.400 So I keep coming back to if you're looking at 0:15:19.480 --> 0:15:21.920 the person of interest, you're looking at someone that was 0:15:21.960 --> 0:15:22.280 in the. 0:15:22.200 --> 0:15:25.400 Group or who met the group at that service. 0:15:25.080 --> 0:15:28.360 Station, potentially met the group at the service station. But 0:15:28.440 --> 0:15:31.720 the game then you've got that random meeting of a 0:15:31.800 --> 0:15:35.320 predator and the victim at a location where you wouldn't 0:15:35.320 --> 0:15:36.600 expect to find the victim. 0:15:36.680 --> 0:15:39.080 Yeah. OK, So that's all that was known at the 0:15:39.080 --> 0:15:47.440 time and since then essentially nothing until the William Tyrrell 0:15:47.520 --> 0:16:04.600 inquest as we go, hang you, This is Iris Northam. 0:16:04.680 --> 0:16:09.240 She's a kind face and slightly plump and smiling, older woman. 0:16:09.720 --> 0:16:19.080 She looks like a grandma out of Central Casting. And 0:16:19.280 --> 0:16:25.320 this is Nina. Iris and her husband Dooley live in 0:16:25.360 --> 0:16:30.000 a little single story brick house surrounded by bright flowers 0:16:30.760 --> 0:16:33.960 in old bar, the tiny town just down the dirt 0:16:34.040 --> 0:16:39.120 road from where Margaret's clothing was discovered. Nina and I 0:16:39.160 --> 0:16:42.000 have come to visit them because of a witness statement 0:16:42.640 --> 0:16:46.360 which we found among dozens of other exhibits released to 0:16:46.520 --> 0:16:50.760 us by the coroner from the inquest into William Tyrrel's disappearance. 0:16:52.000 --> 0:16:56.240 That witness statement is from Iris, and it sets out 0:16:56.280 --> 0:16:59.480 the evidence that she'd be prepared to give as a 0:16:59.480 --> 0:17:04.879 witness in court. That statement is also the first time 0:17:05.560 --> 0:17:11.200 the story of Margaret Cox's disappearance and her murder intersects 0:17:11.320 --> 0:17:16.959 with our story about Frank Abbot, and its full contents 0:17:17.440 --> 0:17:20.440 have never been made public before. 0:17:20.320 --> 0:17:29.680 Now, so you're doing a follow up on this. 0:17:33.880 --> 0:17:37.360 In her witness statement to the William Tyrrell Inquest, Iris 0:17:37.440 --> 0:17:40.240 explains how she first met Frank Abbott. 0:17:40.960 --> 0:17:41.880 His father. 0:17:43.400 --> 0:17:45.439 Was a customer of it US. We hit the script 0:17:45.440 --> 0:17:50.959 medically out and his father used to bring a bit 0:17:51.000 --> 0:17:56.560 of script medal in Andy and one day just come 0:17:56.600 --> 0:17:57.440 in he stole. 0:17:58.960 --> 0:17:59.920 My son. 0:18:00.119 --> 0:18:04.639 Frank's looking for a job. He can do anything that 0:18:04.720 --> 0:18:06.800 he's been in jail done. 0:18:06.840 --> 0:18:07.960 He just got out of something. 0:18:09.600 --> 0:18:11.760 That noise you can hear in the background is me 0:18:12.040 --> 0:18:16.800 talking to Iris's husband, Dooley. Dooley's getting on these days. 0:18:17.040 --> 0:18:20.200 He stooped over. He struggles to walk and it's hard 0:18:20.240 --> 0:18:22.159 to break away from the conversation. 0:18:23.200 --> 0:18:26.040 And my husband said, bring him in if you can 0:18:26.080 --> 0:18:27.840 do the work whatever I want done. 0:18:28.359 --> 0:18:32.119 And then when he came in, he just talk like 0:18:32.160 --> 0:18:36.440 a normal person. He didn't put yeah yeah. 0:18:36.480 --> 0:18:42.080 And then when he started work, you know, you just 0:18:42.160 --> 0:18:44.720 ask him to do something, you go, I'll do no 0:18:45.800 --> 0:18:53.280 back chattle anything. He didn't talk that much, but if 0:18:53.280 --> 0:18:55.760 you talk to him, it's sort of pretty insurance whatever. 0:18:55.960 --> 0:19:00.400 But well, he only worked for us fur Book months. 0:19:00.440 --> 0:19:01.960 I suppose it might have been that. 0:19:02.119 --> 0:19:07.919 One the reason Frank stopped working for them was that 0:19:08.000 --> 0:19:11.400 he got arrested in nineteen ninety one over the murder 0:19:11.480 --> 0:19:15.280 of Helen Harrison, which we talked about in the last episode. 0:19:16.400 --> 0:19:18.240 One day, one of the policemen come to wear a 0:19:18.280 --> 0:19:21.399 place and he said, oh, Frank Abbott's not going to 0:19:21.480 --> 0:19:23.800 be working for you anymore. He said, we just arrested 0:19:23.880 --> 0:19:24.720 him for murder. 0:19:25.160 --> 0:19:28.840 And I said, what, Frank was found not guilty. 0:19:29.560 --> 0:19:33.879 He just said that everything was cleared. I said that 0:19:34.280 --> 0:19:36.400 he was not guildy by now. 0:19:36.520 --> 0:19:39.080 Dooley and I are both sitting at the kitchen table 0:19:39.240 --> 0:19:43.800 listening to Iris. I asked her, did it ever worry 0:19:43.840 --> 0:19:47.320 you that Frank was put on trial for murder? 0:19:48.640 --> 0:19:52.680 It's sort of sort of did, but yeah, he sort 0:19:52.720 --> 0:19:53.520 of didn't. 0:19:55.080 --> 0:19:57.119 Didn't sport the press on it too much. 0:19:58.280 --> 0:20:02.880 Instead, they stayed friend. Iris says, Frank and Dooley used 0:20:02.920 --> 0:20:04.600 to gamble together on the horses. 0:20:05.760 --> 0:20:09.119 They are planters, of course, they bring up the sounds 0:20:09.160 --> 0:20:14.560 has writing today And anyway, Frank moved to John's River 0:20:16.000 --> 0:20:19.600 and hittering happens. What do you fancy for race number 0:20:19.600 --> 0:20:24.119 six or something? And they'd be talking away there for 0:20:24.680 --> 0:20:26.360 half an hour, think oh, yeah. 0:20:26.160 --> 0:20:28.720 This one's a good one. That wrong, And you know 0:20:28.840 --> 0:20:33.920 they just chatter on, just mates, just. 0:20:34.240 --> 0:20:39.200 Mates for years. An Iris doesn't seem to bear Frank 0:20:39.400 --> 0:20:44.400 any malice today. Did you ever hear any other stories 0:20:44.440 --> 0:20:46.359 about him? People saying things about that? 0:20:46.440 --> 0:20:48.920 Since? Yes, since quite a lot. 0:20:50.920 --> 0:20:55.480 Then we start talking about Margaret and what Iris says 0:20:55.640 --> 0:20:58.760 in her statement to the William Tyrell inquest. 0:20:58.840 --> 0:21:01.119 When Margaret Cox went miss she went missing on a 0:21:01.200 --> 0:21:05.080 Thursday night. On the Saturday morning they found a body 0:21:05.119 --> 0:21:11.840 in the river, and on the Sunday we went to 0:21:12.400 --> 0:21:12.919 an auction. 0:21:13.480 --> 0:21:14.720 It was a film I had yet to have an 0:21:14.760 --> 0:21:20.760 auction every month, and the yaid, there's Frank, we've got 0:21:20.800 --> 0:21:23.240 a few minutes before you know, we've got to be there. 0:21:23.640 --> 0:21:30.000 So when out and we're talking Frank and anyway, Burley 0:21:30.080 --> 0:21:32.359 said to him, Frank, what did you do to you arm? 0:21:32.600 --> 0:21:35.080 Because he had all these gaut marks on his arm, 0:21:36.520 --> 0:21:40.680 and Frank just said, oysters. That was it. 0:21:42.040 --> 0:21:46.359 Oysters from the local oyster beds around Tyree, the ones 0:21:46.359 --> 0:21:50.760 that inspired the big Oyster in the wild. Oysters have 0:21:51.000 --> 0:21:56.399 really sharp shells. They scratch. In her statement, Iris says 0:21:56.480 --> 0:22:00.119 Frank had about seven or eight gouge marks between in 0:22:00.160 --> 0:22:02.080 his left wrist and his elbow. 0:22:03.320 --> 0:22:07.400 Always just don't do that. I fell on the oysters 0:22:07.440 --> 0:22:10.000 once and they don't do that. They just slash. 0:22:10.040 --> 0:22:11.919 So what was the difference with these? 0:22:13.080 --> 0:22:19.119 They were gouge marks, like someone had gouged skin it 0:22:19.720 --> 0:22:21.360 with the actual flesh out with. 0:22:21.359 --> 0:22:28.400 Their fingernails, and so these weren't Did you think anything of. 0:22:28.400 --> 0:22:32.119 That at the time, Well, I did and I didn't. 0:22:33.720 --> 0:22:37.480 Speaking to Gary Jubilin, Nina reads out this section from 0:22:37.520 --> 0:22:39.960 Iris's statement to the Inquest. 0:22:41.600 --> 0:22:44.480 The gouge marks were long and straight, and they looked 0:22:44.480 --> 0:22:46.200 to be a couple of days old, as they had 0:22:46.200 --> 0:22:48.800 that kind of festy look that wounds get before they 0:22:48.840 --> 0:22:49.520 start to heal. 0:22:49.840 --> 0:22:50.040 Yep. 0:22:50.240 --> 0:22:52.639 I remember thinking that the marks on his arm really 0:22:52.640 --> 0:22:54.200 didn't match what he was telling us. 0:22:55.640 --> 0:22:59.480 As a former homicide detective, I asked, Gary, do you 0:22:59.520 --> 0:23:01.560 read into that it. 0:23:01.600 --> 0:23:04.200 Is concerning There's been a lot of murders solved by 0:23:04.200 --> 0:23:08.159 someone carrying injuries that obviously what appear to be wounds 0:23:08.200 --> 0:23:13.200 with someone struggling if they're being attacked, oyster marks as 0:23:13.240 --> 0:23:18.320 distinct from straight scratches. Yeah, I offer a concern there. 0:23:18.760 --> 0:23:22.320 I worry with contamination of Frank Abbott because his reputation 0:23:22.480 --> 0:23:26.879 is so well known that people what we know about 0:23:26.960 --> 0:23:29.879 Frank Abbott is a grub. You're testing memories from what 0:23:30.080 --> 0:23:32.280 ninety six, if it was at the inquest, We're looking 0:23:32.320 --> 0:23:37.320 at thirty years down the track. I don't know. I'm 0:23:37.320 --> 0:23:39.960 trying to think thirty years back. Can I recall specific 0:23:40.000 --> 0:23:44.439 injury or how it looks? Memory can do some funny things, 0:23:44.480 --> 0:23:47.479 so I wouldn't get overly excited, but I'd be curious 0:23:47.480 --> 0:23:52.399 where Frank is. Certainly opportunity motive capability, as I always 0:23:52.480 --> 0:23:55.520 talk about he would have the motivation, because he seems 0:23:55.520 --> 0:24:00.920 to be, in my understanding, the sexual predator capability, the opportunity. 0:24:01.080 --> 0:24:02.919 Let's set missing ingredient. 0:24:04.520 --> 0:24:08.600 Meaning can you prove Frank had the opportunity to do 0:24:08.720 --> 0:24:13.320 anything to Margaret? So far, the answer is no. We 0:24:13.400 --> 0:24:18.639 can't even say Frank ever met her. Although there is 0:24:18.680 --> 0:24:22.080 a line in Iris's witness statement about. 0:24:21.960 --> 0:24:22.760 Ken Ben bowling. 0:24:23.680 --> 0:24:26.479 She says Frank used to bowl in Tarree on a 0:24:26.520 --> 0:24:31.240 Thursday night. It was a Thursday night that Margaret was 0:24:31.359 --> 0:24:33.440 last seen in Tiree. 0:24:33.960 --> 0:24:36.520 And so the bowling alley and I've confirmed it is 0:24:36.560 --> 0:24:40.240 the same bowlier alien hasn't moved, is five minutes away 0:24:40.600 --> 0:24:43.639 from that service station. We went to the bowling alley 0:24:43.880 --> 0:24:47.040 and I said, can you tell me who was bowling 0:24:47.080 --> 0:24:51.080 here thirty years ago? No, they can't, but they gave 0:24:51.119 --> 0:24:54.200 me the name of someone who did bowl there thirty 0:24:54.280 --> 0:24:57.560 years ago, and I tracked that guy down. Unfortunately, he 0:24:57.640 --> 0:25:00.480 is a Tuesday Wednesday bowler, not a Thursday. 0:25:00.400 --> 0:25:03.760 Which at least corroborates that there was bowling on a Thursday. 0:25:03.920 --> 0:25:05.919 And the other thing we heard is that bowling was 0:25:06.000 --> 0:25:08.880 big then and people would bowl late into the night, 0:25:10.040 --> 0:25:15.280 which proves nothing. We don't know if Frank was bowling 0:25:15.359 --> 0:25:20.679 on that Thursday, or what time the bowling finished, or 0:25:21.280 --> 0:25:23.880 if that was the same time Margaret was last seen 0:25:23.960 --> 0:25:24.920