WEBVTT - The Foster Parents | William Tyrrell: 3 0:00:00.040 --> 0:00:02.960 I've got my photos kind of here, thinking one day 0:00:03.080 --> 0:00:04.080 I'll put them on the wall. 0:00:04.160 --> 0:00:07.680 But Ivette Elliott is showing me some photos in her home. 0:00:07.880 --> 0:00:09.760 It was just a moment in time where it kind 0:00:09.800 --> 0:00:10.360 of captured. 0:00:12.080 --> 0:00:14.800 I've just arrived, we haven't set up for a proper 0:00:14.920 --> 0:00:18.680 interview yet, and Yvette's dog starts bouncing around us in 0:00:18.720 --> 0:00:20.760 excitement before So this. 0:00:20.840 --> 0:00:25.960 Is brilliant after bite. 0:00:25.880 --> 0:00:26.560 The day. 0:00:27.320 --> 0:00:31.560 Vette's house is neat and nice, white walls, the afternoon 0:00:31.680 --> 0:00:35.760 sun coming through the windows, and Avette herself is lovely. 0:00:36.080 --> 0:00:41.600 She's welcoming but also worried. The photos make her think 0:00:41.720 --> 0:00:45.159 back to a different time years ago now in lan Cove. 0:00:45.240 --> 0:00:48.559 So we were all lane Cove Ladies, and we've all 0:00:48.680 --> 0:00:50.960 lived in and around lane Cove. 0:00:51.560 --> 0:00:54.520 Lane Cove is a suburb in Sydney. It's a bit posh, 0:00:55.320 --> 0:00:58.760 and the lane Cove Ladies were just that, a group 0:00:58.800 --> 0:01:01.440 of women who'd meet up once a month and talk 0:01:01.480 --> 0:01:04.640 about their lives and their careers and their children. 0:01:05.280 --> 0:01:06.959 So we used to go to a music festival. 0:01:07.480 --> 0:01:09.760 When the music festivals were they were like a wine 0:01:09.800 --> 0:01:12.080 and food festivals, and the kids had just dance at 0:01:12.080 --> 0:01:12.480 the front. 0:01:13.280 --> 0:01:16.280 One of those kids was William tyrrel that was the 0:01:16.360 --> 0:01:17.000 happy days. 0:01:17.720 --> 0:01:21.080 Yeah, looks I just wonder what would we all be 0:01:21.200 --> 0:01:23.800 doing now if it wasn't for. 0:01:23.920 --> 0:01:29.760 What happened, and suggesting that what happened to William may 0:01:30.240 --> 0:01:31.240 fractured that group. 0:01:31.840 --> 0:01:36.479 Oh, absolutely everything regarding our relationship changed. 0:01:38.920 --> 0:01:43.080 Years after William was reported missing, detectives turned up at 0:01:43.120 --> 0:01:46.600 a Vett's door without warning. She and I sit down 0:01:46.680 --> 0:01:50.480 together for the proper interview, and Ivett tells me what 0:01:50.600 --> 0:01:51.680 the police asked her. 0:01:52.240 --> 0:01:56.080 It was incredibly targeted. It was very, very targeted, and 0:01:56.160 --> 0:02:00.480 they were trying to find something. And I ask them 0:02:01.040 --> 0:02:04.520 whether they had any suspects, and they said definitively yes 0:02:04.600 --> 0:02:07.640 that they did. And there was a lot of questions, 0:02:08.400 --> 0:02:11.240 and I guess, thinking back now, they were probably cleverly 0:02:12.040 --> 0:02:16.680 put together. Majority of it seemed to be very focused 0:02:17.360 --> 0:02:18.280 on William's mum. 0:02:19.639 --> 0:02:22.480 After a couple of hours, Ivette tells me the police 0:02:22.639 --> 0:02:27.160 left finishing our interview, I turn off the microphone and 0:02:27.240 --> 0:02:30.960 then Ivette tells me how, after saying goodbye to the detectives, 0:02:31.360 --> 0:02:35.880 she phoned her old friend William's foster mother, saying, I've 0:02:36.000 --> 0:02:38.160 just been interviewed by the police. And it was the 0:02:38.320 --> 0:02:43.400 weirdest thing, and William's foster mother told her another of 0:02:43.480 --> 0:02:47.480 the Lane Cove ladies had just called, saying detectives had 0:02:47.560 --> 0:02:52.680 also been asking her questions. William's foster mother told Yvette 0:02:53.360 --> 0:02:56.280 the police were trying to throw her under the bus. 0:02:57.600 --> 0:03:00.880 I'm Dan Box and from news to dot com dot Au. 0:03:01.280 --> 0:03:07.000 This is Witness William Tyrrell. Episode three, The Foster Parents. 0:03:20.560 --> 0:03:28.040 Hello, La La Tokyo, Mike one, do your close slide on? 0:03:30.960 --> 0:03:34.800 Okay, so this is unscripted ye, So, Nina, you're the 0:03:34.880 --> 0:03:38.400 producer on this podcast. You've seen more than most people. 0:03:38.480 --> 0:03:42.240 You've been through documents, interview statements, seen or listened to 0:03:43.000 --> 0:03:46.640 hours of interviews that we've done so far. So at 0:03:46.680 --> 0:03:50.760 this stage months in, what do you think of the 0:03:50.840 --> 0:03:51.640 foster parents? 0:03:54.040 --> 0:03:56.480 I think I'd like to say up front that I 0:03:58.440 --> 0:04:05.440 currently do not have any inkling theory predisposition on what 0:04:05.600 --> 0:04:08.880 happened to William. And the reason for that is if 0:04:08.920 --> 0:04:12.880 you read through everything, I think you could make a 0:04:12.960 --> 0:04:16.960 flimsy case for almost any person of interest, and that 0:04:17.080 --> 0:04:19.039 includes to me, the foster parents. 0:04:19.240 --> 0:04:22.760 It feels like everyone has an opinion on them. We 0:04:22.880 --> 0:04:25.280 can't name them for legal reasons, but their lives have 0:04:25.400 --> 0:04:29.160 been made public on front pages and newspapers and online 0:04:29.680 --> 0:04:38.160 in excruciating detail. Have a look at this, That is 0:04:38.760 --> 0:04:42.600 incoming passenger cards dug out of the National. 0:04:42.440 --> 0:04:45.760 Archives, so that the date on this document is nineteen 0:04:45.800 --> 0:04:46.360 sixty eight. 0:04:46.560 --> 0:04:49.200 Yeah, there's passenger cards from nineteen sixty eight in nineteen 0:04:49.320 --> 0:04:52.720 seventy showing the entry of a family into Australia from 0:04:52.760 --> 0:04:53.560 Papua New Guinea. 0:04:54.240 --> 0:04:55.520 Okay, what's a passenger card. 0:04:56.080 --> 0:04:58.480 Passenger card is when you fly into Australia if you 0:04:58.560 --> 0:04:59.880 catch a ship in you have to fill in your 0:05:00.000 --> 0:05:02.680 details saying who you are, where you're going to be staying, 0:05:03.240 --> 0:05:06.880 who your parents are. If you're a child, and one 0:05:06.960 --> 0:05:10.839 of these passengers is a child born a few years earlier. 0:05:12.000 --> 0:05:16.520 It's William's foster mother, and you can see her father's 0:05:16.520 --> 0:05:20.159 an engineer, her mother's listed as a housewife. The reason 0:05:20.240 --> 0:05:22.159 for their journey is a holiday. They're going to stay 0:05:22.200 --> 0:05:24.520 a month. You've got the flight number, you've got the 0:05:24.600 --> 0:05:28.160 address in Queensland where they're going to be staying. Someone's 0:05:28.240 --> 0:05:32.640 gone into the National Archives and dug these out then 0:05:32.800 --> 0:05:36.720 shared them online. Yeah, they've been poured over and commented 0:05:36.760 --> 0:05:42.440 on probably seen by I'm guessing hundreds, maybe thousands, these 0:05:42.520 --> 0:05:45.880 have been sent to journalists, so I've been sent them. 0:05:46.320 --> 0:05:49.080 Is what's supposed to be the significance of it. 0:05:50.640 --> 0:05:52.640 I don't know. The person who sent those to me 0:05:52.760 --> 0:05:55.160 told me you could do a whole podcast episode on 0:05:55.360 --> 0:05:56.559 those passenger cars. 0:05:56.600 --> 0:05:58.520 Okay, and I can say that's not interesting. 0:05:58.240 --> 0:06:01.799 But that's the level of Attentionilliam's foster mother and her husband. 0:06:02.240 --> 0:06:05.920 I think that's terrible. And I couldn't imagine living like that. 0:06:06.800 --> 0:06:09.320 Just having every element of your life under the microscope 0:06:09.440 --> 0:06:11.720 must have been it must be horrifying for them. 0:06:12.279 --> 0:06:15.880 Okay, let's jump forward to nineteen ninety six. 0:06:17.680 --> 0:06:20.920 So in nineteen ninety six, I started working at a 0:06:21.000 --> 0:06:22.640 new company and she was already there. 0:06:23.520 --> 0:06:26.360 This is another of the foster mother's close friends. She 0:06:26.480 --> 0:06:28.960 doesn't want to be identified, so these are her words, 0:06:29.080 --> 0:06:30.159 but not her voice. 0:06:31.480 --> 0:06:33.560 So we kind of bonded and bonded at work and 0:06:33.600 --> 0:06:36.400 then bonded out of work and became a friendship outside of. 0:06:36.440 --> 0:06:39.600 Work as well. And what was your impression of her? 0:06:40.320 --> 0:06:44.240 Smart? She was smart. She was fun though, like it 0:06:44.400 --> 0:06:46.919 was just you know, we'd go out shopping at lunchtime 0:06:47.160 --> 0:06:50.800 sometimes just try on dresses. It was just fun. We 0:06:50.920 --> 0:06:53.400 were both sort of thirty thirty ish. Yeah, I think 0:06:53.440 --> 0:06:55.839 I just turned thirty after I started there. 0:06:56.880 --> 0:07:00.480 A few years later, this friend was a bridesmaid at 0:07:00.520 --> 0:07:01.600 the foster mother's wedding. 0:07:02.279 --> 0:07:04.919 We went up the night before because we had They 0:07:05.000 --> 0:07:07.920 put on like welcome drinks for everybody on the Friday night, 0:07:08.040 --> 0:07:11.240 and then on the day we had hair and makeup done. 0:07:11.520 --> 0:07:14.200 It was just a happy day, you know. We went 0:07:14.320 --> 0:07:16.440 in an old car, and the groom and his groomsmen 0:07:16.560 --> 0:07:19.200 showed up in a helicopter, which I'm not sure if 0:07:19.200 --> 0:07:22.040 the bride even knew about. She probably did, but I 0:07:22.120 --> 0:07:26.000 didn't know. It was hilarious. The red helicopter came in. 0:07:26.160 --> 0:07:29.080 It was just fun. It was really, really nice. 0:07:30.480 --> 0:07:33.040 She says. The couple wanted to have a family, but 0:07:33.200 --> 0:07:36.800 they couldn't, and the reasons for that are personal and 0:07:36.920 --> 0:07:42.640 they're deeply painful. They did have IVF for years. William's 0:07:42.680 --> 0:07:46.160 Fosterman would later tell detectives she wanted to have five 0:07:46.400 --> 0:07:51.560 or six children. She'd tell police that she also always 0:07:51.680 --> 0:07:56.160 wanted to foster and adopt. She'd say she'd always grown 0:07:56.240 --> 0:08:00.960 up wanting to help others and it's weird, you'd tell police. 0:08:01.040 --> 0:08:04.640 That's a direct quote. But I always knew I would 0:08:04.760 --> 0:08:06.920 end up having children that weren't mine. 0:08:08.440 --> 0:08:11.040 When they first started fostering, I was taken by how 0:08:11.200 --> 0:08:12.720 naturally they took to parenting. 0:08:13.560 --> 0:08:16.840 This is from a written reference her friend would later 0:08:16.960 --> 0:08:18.840 provide for William's foster parents. 0:08:19.400 --> 0:08:22.880 They were not foster parents, they were parents. None of 0:08:22.920 --> 0:08:26.440 our friendship group considered the children to be foster children. 0:08:26.600 --> 0:08:29.680 They were simply their children. They did what lots of 0:08:29.760 --> 0:08:32.720 other families with young children do. They had a toy room, 0:08:33.120 --> 0:08:36.439 they ate dinner together as a family, went on holidays 0:08:36.480 --> 0:08:39.960 to the park, bike riding adventures, and as the children 0:08:40.000 --> 0:08:42.559 grew up, they were a normal, close family. 0:08:43.960 --> 0:08:47.680 I also spoke to another of the foster mother's close friends, Sarah. 0:08:48.520 --> 0:08:50.000 I thought she was a wonderful parent. I mean, I 0:08:50.080 --> 0:08:54.079 thought she was very thoughtful and considered, very loving, and 0:08:55.559 --> 0:08:56.720 the children loved her. 0:08:57.800 --> 0:09:01.360 Did you get any sense that there were difficulties within 0:09:02.200 --> 0:09:03.520 that household at that time? 0:09:04.120 --> 0:09:05.760 Oh no, none at all. 0:09:06.120 --> 0:09:08.599 I mean I would say nothing other than what a 0:09:08.679 --> 0:09:13.680 normal parenting children family life is. You know, like nothing's perfect, 0:09:13.760 --> 0:09:16.959 nothing's all roses and unicorns and rainbows. 0:09:17.200 --> 0:09:17.880 But no. 0:09:18.080 --> 0:09:21.640 I think her and her husband both unbelievably good parents. 0:09:21.720 --> 0:09:26.000 And you know, I'm William in particular if the foster 0:09:26.080 --> 0:09:30.800 father was away and then would come home and he'd 0:09:30.840 --> 0:09:34.880 be running towards him to greet him. But the just 0:09:35.000 --> 0:09:39.520 the absolute love was was amazing. And I think even 0:09:39.640 --> 0:09:42.640 you know, in the videos that they've had in the media, 0:09:43.800 --> 0:09:48.320 the home videos, like, I think it's very evident. 0:09:53.440 --> 0:09:56.040 William, you're doing really well. 0:10:07.120 --> 0:10:10.319 A third friend, Avet Elliott, showed me that photograph of 0:10:10.360 --> 0:10:13.439 their families together and talked about the Lane Cove Ladies. 0:10:14.080 --> 0:10:18.679 I remember just coming up to Christmas and you know, 0:10:18.760 --> 0:10:21.760 it was the gathering again of Lane Cove Ladies, and 0:10:22.320 --> 0:10:24.800 our kids were all of the same age. William being 0:10:24.840 --> 0:10:28.440 a couple of years younger, you know, was my son's shadow. 0:10:29.160 --> 0:10:30.440 Because he was the bigger boy. 0:10:30.920 --> 0:10:33.360 They were fun times, you know, we were just living life. 0:10:33.760 --> 0:10:34.960 I guess there was. 0:10:36.440 --> 0:10:39.880 Without thinking it was just a it was just you know, 0:10:40.559 --> 0:10:44.200 a magical time. There was no evil, you know, there 0:10:44.280 --> 0:10:46.400 was no evilness that was to come. 0:10:49.280 --> 0:10:51.679 William was nine months old when he came to live 0:10:51.800 --> 0:10:56.040 with his foster parents. That was March twenty twelve. So Nina, 0:10:56.840 --> 0:10:59.640 this is the point when you start to have questions. 0:11:00.000 --> 0:11:03.280 We don't necessarily have questions about the relationship between them 0:11:03.320 --> 0:11:06.839 and William, because I think it's fairly documented, and the 0:11:06.920 --> 0:11:11.280 picture that's painted, I think it paints the picture of 0:11:11.360 --> 0:11:16.120 a mother who is really struggling. She says at one 0:11:16.240 --> 0:11:19.480 stage that by eight am in the morning, she's already 0:11:19.640 --> 0:11:23.040 incredibly frustrated and can't believe that she could be feeling 0:11:23.120 --> 0:11:25.480 that way by eight am in the morning, and it 0:11:25.600 --> 0:11:28.920 isn't going to be sunshine and rainbows all the time. 0:11:29.160 --> 0:11:33.160 Totally understandable. Where I start to have questions is how 0:11:33.880 --> 0:11:37.160 the foster mother described the relationship with William to the police. 0:11:38.240 --> 0:11:41.199 It just there seems like there's a disconnect between what 0:11:41.280 --> 0:11:44.600 I'm seeing in the foster care documents and what has 0:11:44.640 --> 0:11:50.360 been painted as quite a happy relationship in police statements. 0:11:50.760 --> 0:11:54.160 Well, let's unpack that. So the foster parents are very 0:11:54.360 --> 0:11:59.880 rarely spoken. This is them describing William is the. 0:12:00.080 --> 0:12:05.480 The cheeky, vibrant little little boy, full of energy, loves 0:12:05.520 --> 0:12:09.080 interacting with his sister, he loved interacting with us. 0:12:10.000 --> 0:12:12.520 It's from an interview released by police less than a 0:12:12.679 --> 0:12:14.800 year after William was reported missing. 0:12:15.360 --> 0:12:18.040 I mean, he's my little boy, just bringing me to tears. 0:12:18.720 --> 0:12:23.200 Pretty cheeky, very chey, but also they've got that, they've 0:12:23.240 --> 0:12:28.839 got that love, you know, and the father and boy 0:12:29.000 --> 0:12:30.360 love that you know he had. 0:12:30.440 --> 0:12:30.800 It was just. 0:12:32.320 --> 0:12:35.640 He adored, he adored, he adored his dad. 0:12:36.600 --> 0:12:41.319 Just absolutely his eyes and there was a smile like 0:12:41.440 --> 0:12:42.920 I look at some of the back at some of 0:12:42.960 --> 0:12:45.679 the pictures, and I look at pictures when William was 0:12:45.720 --> 0:12:48.600 swineing smiling for me, and I look at pictures where 0:12:48.640 --> 0:12:49.600 William was smiling for. 0:12:49.679 --> 0:12:54.520 His dad, and it's different. Oh, completely. 0:12:54.920 --> 0:12:57.920 They adored each other, absolutely adored each. 0:12:57.760 --> 0:12:58.959 Other, and it's heartbreaking. 0:13:00.520 --> 0:13:03.199 And a few months later, on the first anniversary of 0:13:03.240 --> 0:13:07.559 William's disappearance, William's foster parents recorded an interview with the 0:13:07.679 --> 0:13:11.480 journalist Leah Harris from the Sunday Telegraph. The audio is 0:13:11.520 --> 0:13:14.520 not great, but you can hear them saying the same thing. 0:13:14.679 --> 0:13:18.000 One of their friends told me how William would always 0:13:18.080 --> 0:13:21.560 be waiting for his foster father to arrive home from work. 0:13:21.920 --> 0:13:25.120 Who would always wait at a frondom with his sisters 0:13:25.559 --> 0:13:29.320 driving the driveway. That would be just leaping, running and jumping. 0:13:29.840 --> 0:13:31.600 That was the highla of my day. 0:13:31.480 --> 0:13:33.760 Every day, really and I'm sure the high out of 0:13:33.840 --> 0:13:36.800 these turks, you know, I'm come him and hogs and 0:13:36.880 --> 0:13:40.599 puddles and kisses and go and start and start to 0:13:40.640 --> 0:13:44.400 do the routine of about time and dinner and all 0:13:44.440 --> 0:13:45.280 those sorts of things. 0:13:47.920 --> 0:13:50.959 Eight years later, in twenty twenty two, the foster parents 0:13:51.080 --> 0:13:54.040 recorded another interview with Leah Harris, who by now was 0:13:54.080 --> 0:13:57.680 working as a TV reporter for Network ten. She asked 0:13:57.720 --> 0:13:59.520 them to describe their family life. 0:14:00.240 --> 0:14:00.280 Just. 0:14:00.559 --> 0:14:03.480 Life was an adventure, and it was to be enjoyed, 0:14:04.440 --> 0:14:12.200 and it was all about learning, discovery and just being 0:14:12.280 --> 0:14:16.719 so innocent and just it's that join us of just 0:14:17.320 --> 0:14:21.120 being so innocent and loving life that I remember most 0:14:21.200 --> 0:14:21.920 about William. 0:14:23.400 --> 0:14:26.760 How did him coming into your lives change your lives? 0:14:28.120 --> 0:14:30.760 Changed it forever, but in a really positive way. 0:14:32.720 --> 0:14:34.680 Nina, What you were saying was that we've got more 0:14:34.720 --> 0:14:37.760 than one account of that family's life together. There's what 0:14:37.880 --> 0:14:40.520 we know from the foster care records, is what we 0:14:40.640 --> 0:14:44.560 know from court hearings. In April twenty twelve, a month 0:14:44.680 --> 0:14:47.720 after William came to stay with his foster parents, an 0:14:47.760 --> 0:14:50.800 official from the state government team that was supporting the 0:14:50.880 --> 0:14:54.480 foster care visits the home and he'd later say in court, 0:14:54.560 --> 0:14:58.120 and I was there that the foster parents disciplined William's 0:14:58.120 --> 0:15:03.120 sister using time out, but for them, time out meant 0:15:03.320 --> 0:15:07.920 time outside and the sister was two at the time. 0:15:09.680 --> 0:15:14.320 See there's that's judgment. But yeah, I would agree that's 0:15:14.360 --> 0:15:17.160 not appropriate for a two year old, which isn't w 0:15:17.200 --> 0:15:19.440 ashume what the foster care person was saying. 0:15:19.640 --> 0:15:23.440 Yeah, yeah, And the foster mum also told this official 0:15:23.560 --> 0:15:26.600 that she'd threatened to smack William's sister but had never 0:15:26.720 --> 0:15:30.120 done it. And we've got other documents. So eleventh of 0:15:30.160 --> 0:15:34.720 October twenty thirteen, William shows a strong preference for his 0:15:34.840 --> 0:15:39.240 foster dad but rejects interaction with his foster mum, and 0:15:39.320 --> 0:15:41.240 this is what you were talking about. Twenty ninth of 0:15:41.320 --> 0:15:45.880 October twenty thirteen, the foster mum emailed their caseworker about 0:15:45.960 --> 0:15:50.000 William's behavioral issues and she says it's like he's operating 0:15:50.080 --> 0:15:53.680 at warp speed. He's recorded as being defiant and sullen 0:15:53.720 --> 0:15:57.840 at daycare, but both of those are after a contact 0:15:57.960 --> 0:16:02.920 visit with his biological parents, and that's a pattern. So 0:16:03.080 --> 0:16:05.320 the worst of it that I can find is William 0:16:05.440 --> 0:16:08.560 cutting the hair with other kids at childcare and deliberately 0:16:08.760 --> 0:16:13.400 urinating on the floor, which are pretty bad behaviors, and 0:16:13.560 --> 0:16:16.960 more than once, the foster mum emailed their caseworker saying 0:16:17.040 --> 0:16:21.040 she was struggling to understand why those contact visits couldn't 0:16:21.040 --> 0:16:24.680 be less frequent, and she says she was quote very 0:16:24.840 --> 0:16:30.400 tired physically and emotionally. Do you read anything into that? 0:16:33.400 --> 0:16:37.800 Yeah, I mean, like I said, that all sounds relatively 0:16:37.960 --> 0:16:41.280 what I would expect for a child as in foster care. 0:16:41.320 --> 0:16:45.320 He's quite a young child. I can imagine that it 0:16:45.360 --> 0:16:47.960 would be really confusing for a kid to have these 0:16:48.000 --> 0:16:51.520 regular visits with one set of parents, go home to 0:16:51.560 --> 0:16:54.520 another set of parents and struggle to understand that. So 0:16:54.600 --> 0:16:58.800 that all sounds I think okay, And I can imagine 0:16:58.840 --> 0:17:02.600 that she would be feeling tired and frustrated, and look. 0:17:02.520 --> 0:17:06.480 Being a parent isn't easy. Nice you're a parent. I'm 0:17:06.520 --> 0:17:08.480 a parent. I've got three year old, ten year old 0:17:08.560 --> 0:17:11.440 and a thirteen year old, and I get tired and 0:17:13.040 --> 0:17:18.680 at times I might have thrown things just to deal 0:17:18.880 --> 0:17:22.359 with I mean, there's frustration. There's been times when the 0:17:22.440 --> 0:17:26.480 three year old and I are both shouting at each other. 0:17:28.800 --> 0:17:31.880 But the difference is my life isn't documented. 0:17:31.880 --> 0:17:32.880 It's not documented. 0:17:33.320 --> 0:17:37.280 Yeah, so there is evidence in these documents that William's 0:17:37.560 --> 0:17:41.119 foster care placement was working, and you can hear it 0:17:41.400 --> 0:17:49.200 in those home videos and in the documents. His foster 0:17:49.320 --> 0:17:53.760 care placement is described as being very stable. When William 0:17:53.840 --> 0:17:56.200 had his third birthday, his foster mum made him a 0:17:56.240 --> 0:17:58.240 cake in the shape of a fire engine. 0:17:58.560 --> 0:17:59.719 Happy birthday, William. 0:18:00.359 --> 0:18:03.760 They are good, dear, have you finished now? 0:18:03.960 --> 0:18:06.119 Our dear dear lucky fingers, look your hair. 0:18:08.680 --> 0:18:12.320 And William told his caseworker that he really loved his party, 0:18:12.560 --> 0:18:15.320 which was held in the family's backyard. There was friends 0:18:15.359 --> 0:18:19.359 from daycare and neighbors. This is mid twenty fourteen, a 0:18:19.440 --> 0:18:22.840 few months before he went missing, and at times the 0:18:23.240 --> 0:18:26.240 records of his foster care show his behavior seeming to 0:18:26.320 --> 0:18:30.040 get better. It might take only twenty or thirty minutes 0:18:30.080 --> 0:18:33.040 to settle him in bed at night, rather than hours 0:18:33.880 --> 0:18:37.199 at other times, though his behavior is harder to manage. 0:18:37.560 --> 0:18:41.520 There's hyperactivity he described as slapping and punching his care 0:18:41.560 --> 0:18:47.359 as his defiant oppositional behavior. It's not the simple, happy 0:18:47.560 --> 0:18:52.080 family that the foster care parents have described in public, 0:18:53.520 --> 0:18:56.480 and William's foster mum is quite a private person, and 0:18:56.760 --> 0:19:04.239 she's quite controlled and maybe be controlling. This is her 0:19:04.400 --> 0:19:06.160 talking to Leah Harris again. 0:19:07.040 --> 0:19:09.960 It's just so personal for us. I feel like I 0:19:10.080 --> 0:19:14.200 want to keep a lot of those really special memories 0:19:14.680 --> 0:19:18.159 for us personal. There are family memories, and I know 0:19:18.359 --> 0:19:22.320 people want to know more, but I just I've just 0:19:22.400 --> 0:19:27.560 got to keep something's private and special. It's just really 0:19:27.640 --> 0:19:30.200 hard now to keep talking about what happened on that morning. 0:19:35.880 --> 0:19:39.280 William's foster care worker went to the family's house on 0:19:39.320 --> 0:19:42.800 the fifth of September twenty fourteen, so that's nine days 0:19:42.880 --> 0:19:46.600 before William goes missing, and the records say that William 0:19:46.680 --> 0:19:50.199 ran up and hugged his caseworker around his legs. William 0:19:50.280 --> 0:19:53.400 was wearing his Spider Man costume, which was his favorite, 0:19:53.920 --> 0:19:56.680 and the foster mum said William's behavior had been a 0:19:56.800 --> 0:20:00.159 struggle since the last contact visit with his parents, and 0:20:00.280 --> 0:20:02.720 for a while there'd been this back and forth where 0:20:03.119 --> 0:20:06.840 William's foster mother wanted to have fewer contact visits and 0:20:06.960 --> 0:20:11.960 William's birth mother wanted more. The foster parents wanted to 0:20:12.080 --> 0:20:16.400 formally adopt William, but they feared his birth mother would 0:20:16.520 --> 0:20:20.920 fight that in court. One thing that does strike me 0:20:21.000 --> 0:20:23.160 about this case is a lot of it comes down 0:20:23.240 --> 0:20:26.760 to judgments on motherhood. Do you. 0:20:28.320 --> 0:20:32.200 Well, you mentioned the birthday party. Yeah, I was looking 0:20:32.240 --> 0:20:35.480 at a photo from that birthday party on social media. 0:20:36.359 --> 0:20:41.600 There's so one person says, the candles aren't even lit. 0:20:42.400 --> 0:20:44.760 How is this really a birthday party? The candles aren't 0:20:44.760 --> 0:20:47.159 even lit. Then someone else comes in and goes, this 0:20:47.240 --> 0:20:50.520 is incredibly dangerous because William is sitting at the corner 0:20:50.600 --> 0:20:52.840 of the table and it's pointed right at his neck. 0:20:53.080 --> 0:20:55.960 Any slip from any person could knock him onto the table. 0:20:56.320 --> 0:20:59.640 And it's just there's like twenty thirty comments of people 0:20:59.680 --> 0:21:02.440 picking apart this photo, literally a photo of a little 0:21:02.480 --> 0:21:04.840 boy smiling in front of a birthday cake. 0:21:05.080 --> 0:21:10.879 So making judgments on the foster mother's parenting. Yeah, you 0:21:11.000 --> 0:21:13.800 do see that. The trolls online compare the two mothers. 0:21:14.200 --> 0:21:18.440 So I've seen posts describing Krly as William's natural mother 0:21:19.080 --> 0:21:24.119 and saying that her family needs reunification, saying William belongs 0:21:24.240 --> 0:21:27.719 to his natural mother and the thoughts of foster parents 0:21:27.800 --> 0:21:32.760 are irrelevant. And I've seen another where that says William's 0:21:32.880 --> 0:21:36.680 mummy pleads don't hurt him. While the fosters still hide 0:21:36.720 --> 0:21:41.760 their faces. But you can't help but compare the two 0:21:41.840 --> 0:21:44.399 sets of parents, and you can't help but compare the 0:21:44.480 --> 0:21:47.360 life William had with his foster parents to the life 0:21:47.359 --> 0:21:50.920 he had before. So William's foster parents take him and 0:21:51.040 --> 0:21:55.080 his sister on expensive holidays months apart, to the Gold Coast, 0:21:55.480 --> 0:21:58.720 to Cairn's, to Barley. When his birth mum is told 0:21:58.760 --> 0:22:03.280 about the Barley trip, she says they went again lucky then, 0:22:04.720 --> 0:22:07.480 and there were other trips, including to Kendall on the 0:22:07.520 --> 0:22:11.159 mid North coast of New South Wales. William's foster mother's 0:22:11.320 --> 0:22:12.280 parents lived there. 0:22:13.600 --> 0:22:16.440 It was not really a long weekend like a Friday 0:22:16.480 --> 0:22:19.320 Settle a Sunday or a Saturlly Sunday Monday or something 0:22:19.440 --> 0:22:22.040 like that. Might be once every three or four months, 0:22:23.320 --> 0:22:27.600 especially Nana's birthday, or it might be the bit Debbie 0:22:27.600 --> 0:22:29.679 an occasion but also a good time. 0:22:29.560 --> 0:22:30.080 To catch up. 0:22:30.720 --> 0:22:34.679 Kendall's about a four or five hour drive north from Sydney, 0:22:35.280 --> 0:22:38.160 which is not an easy thing to do with young children. 0:22:38.600 --> 0:22:41.520 The trip included, you know, at the halfway point, stopping 0:22:41.520 --> 0:22:44.320 at their favorite little snack that they'd get, you know, 0:22:44.600 --> 0:22:47.120 which would be McDonald's I mean, that's really the only 0:22:47.200 --> 0:22:48.800 time that they would actually get it well. On the 0:22:48.840 --> 0:22:51.280 way up and on the way back. I think it 0:22:51.400 --> 0:22:55.280 was because that's the halfway point they get their happy 0:22:55.320 --> 0:22:57.840 meal type thing, and they got but they're still excited 0:22:57.840 --> 0:23:00.760 about the overall journey, which was to Banna's, so that 0:23:00.920 --> 0:23:02.600 was that was what they were looking for. 0:23:02.800 --> 0:23:09.440 To Williams foster nana lived in a big house at 0:23:09.440 --> 0:23:12.600 the top of a wide, dead end road called Benerine Drive. 0:23:13.720 --> 0:23:17.280 That location it's quiet. The only people who go up 0:23:17.320 --> 0:23:20.000 that road typically the people who live there. 0:23:20.040 --> 0:23:23.760 It's a colder cirque at Mum and Dad's place. They 0:23:23.840 --> 0:23:24.159 knew it. 0:23:25.119 --> 0:23:31.520 He knew it is incredibly comfortable there. So you have 0:23:31.680 --> 0:23:34.120 to assume that children are. 0:23:34.080 --> 0:23:37.600 Safe in their own backyards and in their own homes, 0:23:37.680 --> 0:23:39.440 and they've been up there. 0:23:39.640 --> 0:23:40.360 More than enough. 0:23:41.560 --> 0:23:45.000 But the lead up to that last visit was unsettled. 0:23:45.920 --> 0:23:50.200 William's foster grandfather had recently died, his foster nana was 0:23:50.440 --> 0:23:53.640 about to sell the house, and there are emails from 0:23:53.680 --> 0:23:57.879 the time between William's foster mother and his caseworker talking 0:23:58.040 --> 0:24:02.000 again about those contact visits the biological parents, and on 0:24:02.080 --> 0:24:06.680 the ninth of September Williams. Foster mum sends his caseworker 0:24:06.720 --> 0:24:09.639 an email saying I am close to giving up or in, 0:24:10.600 --> 0:24:13.840 and that phrase close to giving up or in would 0:24:13.840 --> 0:24:17.920 get repeated over and over in the years since, both 0:24:17.960 --> 0:24:21.800 online and in the newspapers. One newspaper said the phrase 0:24:22.640 --> 0:24:26.120 appears to explain at least some of the dramatic developments 0:24:26.400 --> 0:24:30.879 in the police investigation that followed, and it's used to 0:24:31.000 --> 0:24:34.160 almost imply that there's something darker about the foster mum, 0:24:35.520 --> 0:24:38.560 and it does contrast with what the foster mum later 0:24:38.720 --> 0:24:45.320 told police. Have a look at this. So this is 0:24:45.600 --> 0:24:50.480 a copy of the foster mum's interview with police, or 0:24:50.520 --> 0:24:52.040