Speaker 1: I think, mister Carrell, is your name, Kevin Stephen Carrell. Yes,
Speaker 1: it is, and you have been giving evidence in the inquest. Yes,
Speaker 1: did you meet with Rochelle Childs on seven June two
Speaker 1: thousand and one at Bargo? Absolutely not know?
Speaker 2: Just days before Christmas in two thousand and six, Kevin
Speaker 2: Corell is giving evidence of the inquest into the death
Speaker 2: of Rochelle Child's. It's five years since Rochelle's murder. Unbeknownst
Speaker 2: to Kevin, while he's on the stand at Glebe Coroner's Court,
Speaker 2: Rochelle's body is beneath him in the same building, being
Speaker 2: re examined by a forensic anthropologist.
Speaker 3: Sitting in the start, Kevin Correll was told Rochelle's body
Speaker 3: has recently been expered.
Speaker 4: I didn't know that, replied mister Correll.
Speaker 5: He hasn't been charged or other persons of interest have
Speaker 5: now been cleared.
Speaker 3: Counsel assisting the coroner, Peter Singleton, told him further post
Speaker 3: Morgan examination has found at least one digit is not present,
Speaker 3: its information police never made public.
Speaker 4: Kevin Corell, a grandfather of three, strenuously denies any involvement,
Speaker 4: and in court today tried to avoid taking the stand
Speaker 4: his lawyer, claiming mister Correll might be tricked into giving
Speaker 4: answers that suggest he's guilty.
Speaker 2: I'm Ashley Hanson and you're listening to episode eight of
Speaker 2: Dear Rochelle, a podcast by True Crime Australia. This is
Speaker 2: the untold story of Rochelle Charles. In this episode, excerpts
Speaker 2: from the coronial transcripts have all been voiced by actors,
Speaker 2: including those of Kevin Correll. It's important to mention non
Speaker 2: publication orders prevent us from revealing some witnesses and their evidence,
Speaker 2: and even evidence from certain has been suppressed. Those court
Speaker 2: orders still stand. Mister Carrel, who was Rochelle's boss at
Speaker 2: Camden Holden, has always denied any involvement in the murder
Speaker 2: of his young protogepe Rochelle Charles, and he's never been charged.
Speaker 6: My name is Peter Singleton. I'm a barrister and I
Speaker 6: was the counsel assisting the coroner in the inquest into
Speaker 6: the death of Rochelle Chiles.
Speaker 2: Here's Peter Singleton reading his own opening address.
Speaker 6: This matter has involved many victims. Rochelle Childs, of course,
Speaker 6: is the primary victim. She has tragically lost her life,
Speaker 6: her family have suffered greatly, and her friends have also suffered.
Speaker 6: So too of other persons and their families when those
Speaker 6: persons have come under police scrutiny for crime they did
Speaker 6: not commit. And indeed, in this inquest, there will be
Speaker 6: further pain as painful issues are necessarily canvassed. Even the
Speaker 6: family of the killer is likely to suffer discomfort in
Speaker 6: a number of ways in this inquest. I anticipate, given
Speaker 6: the large number of witnesses that have to be called,
Speaker 6: that family members of the killer will have to give evidence,
Speaker 6: which is never a pleasant experience. I anticipate that they
Speaker 6: will learn things about their family member that they did
Speaker 6: not previously know, not just about this matter, but about
Speaker 6: their personal background. Such suffering is regretted, but it is
Speaker 6: necessary in pursuit of the important functions of this inquest.
Speaker 2: The inquest ran over two years, with multiple adjournments. Almost
Speaker 2: one hundred witnesses were called to give evidence. A Gleeb
Speaker 2: coroners called in Sydney's in a West. The building was
Speaker 2: on one of Sydney's busiest roads, Paramatta Road.
Speaker 6: I would recall it as a as a brutalist type
Speaker 6: of building seemed to be basically made of concrete with
Speaker 6: a perhaps some pebble crete or some other weak attempt
Speaker 6: at beauty, but essentially it was relatively dark inside, unattractive, unadorned, unappealing,
Speaker 6: and unsympathetic to the people who had to be in it.
Speaker 2: It had been five years without answers for Chelle's loved ones,
Speaker 2: her sister Christie and her mum Anne can remember sitting
Speaker 2: in the courtroom.
Speaker 7: We were there every day, all day and it was
Speaker 7: it was hard. It was hard listening to people talk
Speaker 7: about it. It was hard listening to people refuse to
Speaker 7: answer questions too. That was infuriating. If you've got nothing
Speaker 7: to hide, why you're not answering questions. That was Kevin
Speaker 7: who eventually refused to answer any more questions, which was
Speaker 7: his right. But why wouldn't you just answer the questions?
Speaker 7: Don't be an asshole? Alrighty O.
Speaker 8: Little notes and listening and feeling sorry for those who
Speaker 8: had to go through it. Listen, just look the same
Speaker 8: way going through a sort of you know, because I
Speaker 8: all cared about her, all the people and on the stand.
Speaker 2: Can you give us some context around what led to
Speaker 2: Rochelle's inquest being held In two thousand and six.
Speaker 6: The police had conducted an investigation. They had a brief
Speaker 6: of evidence, but it wasn't sufficient to lay any charges.
Speaker 6: In this case, the state current had decided there should
Speaker 6: be a hearing.
Speaker 9: Or an inquest.
Speaker 2: There were nine persons of interest. Is that unusual to
Speaker 2: have so many persons of interest for homicide?
Speaker 6: I think it probably is unusual. My experience may differ
Speaker 6: from others, but it seems to me more than average.
Speaker 6: Bear in mind that these investigations and in quests offer
Speaker 6: need to be thorough and need to canvass all the possibilities.
Speaker 6: We don't go into them with a closed mind. In
Speaker 6: this case, there were nine people who had had some
Speaker 6: connection to Rochelle in the periods leading up to her death.
Speaker 6: All of that needed to be explored. Mister Carrell was
Speaker 6: one of the nine people who were in proximity to
Speaker 6: Rochelle at relevant times. There was evidence suggesting that he
Speaker 6: would perhaps have wanted to have a personal relationship with
Speaker 6: her beyond the workplace, and that he might have been
Speaker 6: a person who was going to meet her at a
Speaker 6: relevant time, and that needed to be explored. My recollection
Speaker 6: is he was a fairly calm witness.
Speaker 2: Let's return to some of Kevin's testimony. Kevin Carrell was
Speaker 2: legally represented by Matthew Johnston, a criminal lawyer. You're about
Speaker 2: to hear in exchange between Peter Singleton and Kevin car
Speaker 2: Real voiced by actors.
Speaker 1: The proposition is that, in the course of this inquiry,
Speaker 1: by order of the coroner, Rochelle Child's body was exhumed
Speaker 1: for a further post mortem examination. Do you understand that
Speaker 1: I didn't know that, But I understand what you're saying
Speaker 1: when you say you didn't know it. Today's the first
Speaker 1: time you've heard it. Yes, I want you to understand that,
Speaker 1: as a result of the examinations that have so far
Speaker 1: been conducted of her person or her remains in this inquest,
Speaker 1: there has been, for some reason discovered that at least
Speaker 1: one digit, if not more than one digit, is not present.
Speaker 9: Do you understand that? Do you understand what that means?
Speaker 7: Yes.
Speaker 6: During the course of the inquest, we received information that
Speaker 6: one of the people of interest had brin spreading the
Speaker 6: story that Rochelle had been killed by by Kisho would
Speaker 6: cut off her fingers. The initial autopsy had not looked
Speaker 6: at that or at least resolved that possibility. To the
Speaker 6: coroner ordered that the body be exsumed and the second
Speaker 6: autopsy be performed to see whether or not that could
Speaker 6: be confirmed one way or the other. It was plainly
Speaker 6: significant if it could be shown that the fingers had
Speaker 6: been cut off, because that would be known only to
Speaker 6: the murderers or someone the murderers had told, meaning that
Speaker 6: the person sparing the story was either a murderer, had
Speaker 6: been told by somebody, leading to a chain of inquiry,
Speaker 6: or had just made something up that, by amazing coincidence,
Speaker 6: matched the crime.
Speaker 2: How extraordinary is that for a coroner to order the
Speaker 2: exhumation of a body.
Speaker 6: In my experience, it's very rare. I don't think that's
Speaker 6: an uncommon experience. I think it is very rare, and
Speaker 6: it is only done pursuant to a legal order.
Speaker 7: And when they went back to the autops it wasn't
Speaker 7: conclusive what had actually happened to her fingers, so they thought,
Speaker 7: oh gosh, is their merit in this.
Speaker 2: It's believed the initial autopsy conducted on Rochelle's badly burned
Speaker 2: body acknowledged at least one finger was detached, but what
Speaker 2: cause that detachment wasn't clear. Was it from the fire
Speaker 2: or was it cut off by her killer. This was
Speaker 2: a pivotal moment in the inquest. Could this be the
Speaker 2: breakthrough police were waiting for? Rochelle's family was consulted in
Speaker 2: a secret meeting about the prospect of exhuming her body.
Speaker 2: They could legally fight the order, but they supported the
Speaker 2: drastic measure in the hope the truth would be revealed.
Speaker 7: When we went to Leppington to exume her. I wasn't
Speaker 7: allowed to tell anyone. So the only people that knew
Speaker 7: aside from New South I was police in the coroner,
Speaker 7: was Mum and Dad. And I can't cope with their
Speaker 7: emotions and they can't cope with mine. Like when we
Speaker 7: go to break down, we go away from the others
Speaker 7: because we're so close. We know what it does to
Speaker 7: each other. So I couldn't sit with them.
Speaker 8: It was just such an evasion, but they needed to
Speaker 8: look for something.
Speaker 7: Yeah, I remember sitting in the car with Detective Haywood,
Speaker 7: who was like a my adopted big sister at the time.
Speaker 7: Mum and Dad were in a different car because I
Speaker 7: just again couldn't be with them when it happened out
Speaker 7: at the cemetery, which you know, I go out there
Speaker 7: a lot it's terrific, And we've followed the van into Glebe.
Speaker 7: The whole way was really surreal. Following her on the
Speaker 7: road and she was actually with the medical examiner at
Speaker 7: the time that Heaven was on the stand giving evidence
Speaker 7: or refusing to give evidence at the coroner's court.
Speaker 10: I just got goose bombs.
Speaker 8: But no, that was like a a knife in your back.
Speaker 6: I did tell the person who had been spreading the
Speaker 6: story that the body had now been exhumed and was
Speaker 6: now being autopsyed or was about to be. I asked
Speaker 6: him to give evidence knowing that fact.
Speaker 2: Did you try and use that situation to your advantage,
Speaker 2: not to my advantage.
Speaker 6: But what one is trying to do is get truthful evidence,
Speaker 6: and there's a balance to be struck between pursuing that
Speaker 6: and always ensuring that it's a fair procedure. So in
Speaker 6: this case, mister Krell was the witness. Our purpose is
Speaker 6: not to trap him unfairly, but to persuade him to
Speaker 6: tell the truth. In this case, telling him that the
Speaker 6: autopsy was underway or about to occur, informed him of
Speaker 6: an important piece of information that in fairness he should know,
Speaker 6: and also conveyed to him that the investigation was continuing,
Speaker 6: further evidence may become available, and that it would be
Speaker 6: best for him to tell the truth. And that's the
Speaker 6: thinking behind that line of questioning.
Speaker 1: I also want you to understand that some of her
Speaker 1: digits from her hand were apparently not connected to the
Speaker 1: rest of her body at the time, or as sorry,
Speaker 1: are not connected seem not to have been connected to
Speaker 1: the rest of her body.
Speaker 9: Do you did you just understand that proposition? Yes?
Speaker 1: And I want you to understand this important point. The
Speaker 1: examination has not finished and we are yet to be
Speaker 1: told the result the final result of all of the
Speaker 1: investigations as to whether or not her hand or fingers
Speaker 1: have in fact been cut off. That's a matter for
Speaker 1: further forensic examination. It may be that they were not
Speaker 1: cut off. We don't know the result. Do you understand
Speaker 1: that mm hm. Is there anything you wish to say
Speaker 1: to this court about the correlation between the fact that
Speaker 1: you have been speaking, allegedly speaking to people about the
Speaker 1: cutting off of her hand or fingers and the possibility
Speaker 1: that indeed there has.
Speaker 9: Been some severance of those parts of her body.
Speaker 2: Nai Peter Singleton was pressing Kevin on information about Rochelle's
Speaker 2: body that he allegedly circulated to other people, including his
Speaker 2: former partners Alice and Evelyn. Last episode, Evelyn told it
Speaker 2: she held some information back on the stand for fear
Speaker 2: of hurting Rochelle's family, but she did call police the
Speaker 2: following morning with crucial information.
Speaker 5: Kevin, on a few different occasions too that I can recall,
Speaker 5: said to me that Rachelle's fingers were severed by bikeys.
Speaker 5: That's what you do when you steal from bikeys. Now,
Speaker 5: I said, I'm sorry, but I just didn't want to
Speaker 5: say that in front of her parents. I just didn't
Speaker 5: want to. So with that, she said, okay, I don't
Speaker 5: want you to talk about this to anybody, and I
Speaker 5: will contact you tomorrow morning.
Speaker 11: So twenty four hours had passed and she contacted.
Speaker 5: Me and said that there's been a decision to exhume
Speaker 5: Shell's body.
Speaker 2: Like the rest of Rochelle's loved ones, the exhumation hit
Speaker 2: her best friend Lisa heart.
Speaker 12: The imagery that comes up, you know, when they tell
Speaker 12: you that's what they're doing, You just you think of
Speaker 12: her and you see her, but you see what she
Speaker 12: probably could look like now, and a cold table in
Speaker 12: a room and no one's hugging her and.
Speaker 13: It was that was tough, just kind of brought her
Speaker 13: back in many ways. Ah, and then you have hope
Speaker 13: again this is going to lead to something. You know that, Yes,
Speaker 13: this is a horror, but it's going to lead to something.
Speaker 13: You couldn't think it up.
Speaker 7: It's just yeah, the.
Speaker 13: Blow after blow after blow, you just can't. Yeah, breaks
Speaker 13: you down.
Speaker 10: Let's see some more of Kevin's evidence.
Speaker 1: Do you agree that in the days after Rochelle Childs
Speaker 1: had been killed you undertook the task of cleaning out
Speaker 1: her office, cleaning out her desk On the advice of
Speaker 1: mister Johnston, I refuse to answer that question on the
Speaker 1: grounds that it may incriminate me. In your view? Was
Speaker 1: Rochelle Child's a fairly easy going, happy, go lucky type
Speaker 1: of person? On the advice of mister Johnston, I refuse
Speaker 1: to answer that question on the grounds that it may
Speaker 1: incriminate me. Mister Correll, you indicated to beliefs that mss
Speaker 1: Child's had recently broken up from a relationship with Shane Loats.
Speaker 9: Didn't you.
Speaker 1: On the advice of mister Johnston, I refuse to answer
Speaker 1: that question on the grounds that it may incriminate me.
Speaker 1: You also told police that you had overheard a conversation
Speaker 1: about miss child going to a rebels party. Didn't you,
Speaker 1: on the advice of mister Johnston, I refuse to answer
Speaker 1: that question on the grounds that it may incriminate me.
Speaker 1: You also told police about a married man called Bruce
Speaker 1: that lived nearby her at Bargo, from whom Miss Childs
Speaker 1: had received flowers at work. Didn't you, on the advice
Speaker 1: of mister Johnston, I refuse to answer that question on
Speaker 1: the grounds that it may incriminate me. You also told
Speaker 1: police that she was seeing a male called Lee who
Speaker 1: worked at Camden Bau Repairs. Didn't you, on the advice
Speaker 1: of mister Johnston, I refuse to answer that question on
Speaker 1: the grounds that it may incriminate me, and in so
Speaker 1: giving information to police. As I've canvassed in the last,
Speaker 1: approximately five questions you raised for the consideration of police investigation, Shaneloads,
Speaker 1: the former boyfriend, the person whoever it may be, who
Speaker 1: had swapped the car with her sash, and anyone else
Speaker 1: to do with the rebels, Bruce, the neighbor, and Lee
Speaker 1: of Bou Repairs. Five people who became persons of interest.
Speaker 1: Didn't you on the advice of mister Johnston, I refuse
Speaker 1: to answer that question on the grounds that it may
Speaker 1: incriminate me.
Speaker 9: But you did not raise with the police.
Speaker 1: That Rochelle had met someone over the internet and gone
Speaker 1: to see that person, did you, On the advice of
Speaker 1: mister Johnston, I refuse to answer that question on the
Speaker 1: grounds that it may incriminate me. Mister Carrell, did you
Speaker 1: hear various rumors and other bits of informal information about
Speaker 1: what had happened to Rochelle Child's On the advice of
Speaker 1: mister Johnston, I refuse to answer that question on the
Speaker 1: grounds that it may incriminate me.
Speaker 2: Kevin was legally entitled to exercise his right to silence.
Speaker 2: The objections he took to answering questions are not to
Speaker 2: be taken as any admission as to his guilt or innocence.
Speaker 2: This case was dogged by red herrings. Remember in the beginning,
Speaker 2: there was a vicious rumor that Rochelle had been killed
Speaker 2: by barkies over a drug debt. It's now becoming clearer
Speaker 2: who was involved in peddling that rumor.
Speaker 7: He said that her fingers had been cut off because
Speaker 7: she'd ripped off the rebels or something like that.
Speaker 8: But because she was set a light that could have
Speaker 8: just burnt and they need to look at that to
Speaker 8: see if Singers was severed.
Speaker 7: And it wasn't. Did the rebels do that? It was
Speaker 7: it was definitely looking at Kevin, you know, did he
Speaker 7: have information about what happened to her fingers? And if
Speaker 7: he did, how did he know?
Speaker 14: That?
Speaker 10: It's horrible?
Speaker 7: And then we buried her again.
Speaker 6: MSS Childs had been led by someone to believe that
Speaker 6: a Walk and Shaw commodore would be acquired by her
Speaker 6: dealership at Camden Holden and would arrive on the eighth
Speaker 6: of June two thousand and one. MS Childs generally made
Speaker 6: no secret of her plans and movements. It seems that
Speaker 6: it would be possible to account for nearly every day
Speaker 6: of her life because she readily confided her activities to
Speaker 6: various friends and relatives, and importantly happily discussed a work,
Speaker 6: especially in social telephone calls which were able to be overheard.
Speaker 15: We'd organized for these drinks on the Thursday to go
Speaker 15: and have a drink, and I said, I'm not going
Speaker 15: to go. I've been on the phone all night. I'm
Speaker 15: just going to go home. And we had that conversation
Speaker 15: down in the train carriage where anybody could have heard
Speaker 15: that conversation, that the plans had changed, that she was
Speaker 15: just going straight home.
Speaker 6: As of the morning of seven June two thousand and one,
Speaker 6: and indeed probably as of lunchtime on that day, MSS
Speaker 6: Childs had no special plans for Thursday evening. Yet by
Speaker 6: that afternoon she had made a plan to meet someone
Speaker 6: that evening. That plan was not communicated to any of
Speaker 6: the friends and family members to whom Miss Childs usually
Speaker 6: communicated her plans, probably simply because of the lateness of
Speaker 6: the plan. MSS Child's had planned to attend work on
Speaker 6: the Friday, not because she was rostered on that day,
Speaker 6: but because she was expecting a walking share commodore to
Speaker 6: be there and available for her use on that long weekend.
Speaker 6: Because she had been killed, Mss Charles did not attend
Speaker 6: work that Friday. The last matter I would mention in
Speaker 6: this list your honor, is that no walking share commodore
Speaker 6: in fact arrived at the dealership.
Speaker 2: Peter Singleton wasn't the only one determined to get to
Speaker 2: the bottom of this flashy ice blue car.
Speaker 7: Heavin, her boss told her that a walking Shaw was
Speaker 7: coming into the car yard and that she could have
Speaker 7: it for the long weekend. So that was really exciting,
Speaker 7: but we had to keep it quiet.
Speaker 10: Yeah, I couldn't believe it.
Speaker 15: I was like, oh my god, that's so exciting. I
Speaker 15: was just like, that's so awesome because I knew how
Speaker 15: much she loved Commodore's and at the time, I'm no
Speaker 15: car person, but I know a Walking Shaw is like
Speaker 15: one of the big cars, you know, like that adds
Speaker 15: a special car, So I was excited for her.
Speaker 7: Why the secrecy behind the Walking Shaw, I don't know
Speaker 7: for sure, but I think because it was such a
Speaker 7: classic and worth so much money, and back then it
Speaker 7: was something that someone would want to steal. So it's
Speaker 7: not something that you would publicize that you had one
Speaker 7: of these and that you were going to be driving
Speaker 7: it around because you didn't want it flogged.
Speaker 2: Basically, let's go back to Jim Morrison. He was the
Speaker 2: manager of Camden Holden where Rochelle and Kevin worked there.
Speaker 16: I had no knowledge of one being negotiated on, traded
Speaker 16: or anything. Never been discussed with me, and I'm pretty
Speaker 16: sure through the business owner he checked that with the
Speaker 16: other brands, just to see if any of the value
Speaker 16: or managed so they're had any knowledge of it, and
Speaker 16: by memory no, they didn't. So where this walking Shaws
Speaker 16: suddenly materialized from and I never did materialize, there is
Speaker 16: a bit of a mystery. It wouldn't be done secretly.
Speaker 16: It's just too big a deal. And for Rochelle to
Speaker 16: assume that it's coming in, we'll be told that it's
Speaker 16: coming in. I'm not sure whether she's just naively believed
Speaker 16: that or there was.
Speaker 9: A bit of don't let you know. I don't think
Speaker 9: that would.
Speaker 16: Be necessarily a conversation. I'm more inclined to think it
Speaker 16: might have been just some sort of furfey. There's never
Speaker 16: a walk in Shaw, but it was put up for
Speaker 16: whatever reason, and I don't just yeh can't understand why.
Speaker 2: With hindsight looking back and the secrecy that was around it.
Speaker 2: Do you think there was another motivation behind keeping it
Speaker 2: hush hush?
Speaker 7: Looking back on it, I think that the walking share
Speaker 7: is the key to this. I don't know whether it
Speaker 7: existed or not, but the fact that she was so
Speaker 7: excited about it and she had to keep it so
Speaker 7: quiet and then no one ever spoke about it again.
Speaker 7: To me, that's suspicious, and I think it needs to
Speaker 7: be investigated. I think it's the key to this. I
Speaker 7: just keep circling back to that. That's what she was
Speaker 7: excited about. That's what she was focused on. That's all
Speaker 7: she could talk about, even though she wasn't supposed to. Yeah,
Speaker 7: I think it's incredibly important that we get to the
Speaker 7: bottom of this. It was promised to her. Why was
Speaker 7: it promise to her? Was there actually a walking Shaw?
Speaker 2: On the last episode, we revealed explosive new evidence from
Speaker 2: Kevin's ex partner, who you know is Evlent. She told
Speaker 2: us Kevin showed off a walking Shaw in his carport
Speaker 2: just a year after her murder at his unit on
Speaker 2: the South Coast at Marilla, which is just thirty meters
Speaker 2: north of where Rochelle's body was found.
Speaker 7: Evelyn approached me on Facebook because my friend Mindy and
Speaker 7: I have built a Facebook page, and she approached me
Speaker 7: and I called her and I spoke to her for
Speaker 7: probably about an hour and a half on the phone,
Speaker 7: asking lots of questions.
Speaker 5: Around eight o'clock in the evening, I had had a
Speaker 5: few phone calls with Christy and.
Speaker 7: We sorry, sorry, sweetie.
Speaker 5: Talking to her, I realized that you know, it's it's
Speaker 5: not just a story in a paper.
Speaker 11: It is somebody's child, and it's and sister and whatnot.
Speaker 10: And she was obviously very careful with what she said.
Speaker 5: To me, but the information that I obviously knew, nobody
Speaker 5: knew and I didn't know that when we were talking
Speaker 5: at the time. She did say to me, had you
Speaker 5: ever gone to his home? And I said yes, I had.
Speaker 7: So I asked her just to think about when she
Speaker 7: was at Kevin's unit at Waulah, and I just asked
Speaker 7: her what did she notice? What could she see?
Speaker 5: And I told her the story about me being unwell
Speaker 5: and what the house looked like, and.
Speaker 7: We're on the walls, what was on the floor, what
Speaker 7: was she stepping on? What did she said that?
Speaker 5: He had a big knife that was on his bed
Speaker 5: head hanging.
Speaker 7: Was there anything unusual?
Speaker 10: So where did you go?
Speaker 5: And I said, well, we walked out the front door
Speaker 5: to go across to the beach.
Speaker 11: And he said, oh, come and have a look at
Speaker 11: my car.
Speaker 7: And it's incredible that that's when this piece of information
Speaker 7: came out, because I just said, what do you know?
Speaker 5: I want to show you my pride and joy and
Speaker 5: we were just talking about that.
Speaker 11: She went, oh, okay, so nothing else. I said, yeah,
Speaker 11: he had.
Speaker 5: Like a like a silvery blue colored car. I said
Speaker 5: it was a walking Shaw. I said, I remember the
Speaker 5: name because I always thought it was a pretty ass.
Speaker 7: She said, oh yeah, he had one of those walking
Speaker 7: Shaw cars in his car port. And I nearly fainted.
Speaker 5: She said to me, it was what And she stopped
Speaker 5: for a moment, and I thought, oh, my god, if
Speaker 5: I said something I shouldn't say.
Speaker 7: And then I asked her, are you sure, and she.
Speaker 11: Said, please tell me what you said again.
Speaker 2: So I did.
Speaker 7: Described to me what a walking Shaw looks like, and
Speaker 7: she described it, and she remembered having a conversation with
Speaker 7: her son at the time, who was a car fan,
Speaker 7: and he said to her, oh, yeah, no, that's a
Speaker 7: really that's a classic. That's a very expensive car. She
Speaker 7: was only ever asked by the police what he drove,
Speaker 7: so she didn't think it was important.
Speaker 5: She said, Evelyn, you didn't say that in your police statement,
Speaker 5: the name of the car, And I said no, I
Speaker 5: told them that he had a really fancy, expensive looking
Speaker 5: silverish car.
Speaker 7: She was only ever asked by the police what he drove,
Speaker 7: so she didn't think it was important.
Speaker 5: I said, you never said the name of it, and
Speaker 5: I said, well, I didn't really think that was important
Speaker 5: what kind of brand it was. They just asked me
Speaker 5: what kind of car he had.
Speaker 7: So the fact that she saw a walking short in
Speaker 7: the caryard at his unit block he's significant.
Speaker 2: Was this an oversight by police? Here's Evelyn reading from
Speaker 2: a subsequent statement to police in two thousand and seven.
Speaker 5: I then thought of my relationship with Kevin Carrell between
Speaker 5: November two thousand and two until February two thousand and three.
Speaker 11: I recalled that whilst I was with.
Speaker 5: Kevin, he had four different new cars during that time.
Speaker 5: They'd be secondhand, but quite new and expensive cars. I
Speaker 5: recall the very first time that I met Kep and
Speaker 5: he had a black Sleka sports car. The car looked
Speaker 5: to be brand new. It was very impressive. He had
Speaker 5: this car for a couple of weeks and I never
Speaker 5: saw this car again. The next car I saw Kevin
Speaker 5: with was a silver Fancy Commodore. He only had this
Speaker 5: car for about four weeks.
Speaker 11: I said that and she went, oh my god. And
Speaker 11: that's how she told me the story.
Speaker 7: And that's a piece of information that wasn't gathered by
Speaker 7: police because their line of questioning wasn't open enough. In
Speaker 7: my opinion, that's very important.
Speaker 2: Do you think that needs to be investigated now by police?
Speaker 7: Definitely, and they know because everyone has communicated that to police.
Speaker 2: While the inquest was still under weigh In April two
Speaker 2: thousand and seven, police assigned detect is to track down
Speaker 2: every single hold and walk and Shaw ever manufactured, all
Speaker 2: seven hundred and fifty of the limited models. Detective Seney
Speaker 2: Constable Eric and Nuttle, assisted by Detective Sendy Constable Sally Clark,
Speaker 2: would tasked with interviewing every owner and asking them the
Speaker 2: same eight questions.
Speaker 10: One were you.
Speaker 2: The registered owner of a Holden Commodore Group a Walkinshaw
Speaker 2: motor vehicle on the seventh of June two thousand and one.
Speaker 10: Two Do you know Kevin Correll? Three?
Speaker 2: Have you ever been approached by Kevin Correll to borrow
Speaker 2: your Walkinshaw motor vehicle on or around June two thousand
Speaker 2: and one. Four Do you know Rochelle Charles?
Speaker 10: Five?
Speaker 2: Have you ever been approached by Rochelle Child to borrow
Speaker 2: your Walkinshaw on or around June two thousand and one.
Speaker 2: Six Have you ever had any dealings with Camden Holden
Speaker 2: on or around June to thousand and one seven. Has
Speaker 2: any employee from Camden Holden ever approached you to borrow
Speaker 2: your walking Shaw on or around June two thousand and
Speaker 2: one eight? Is there any further information you have that
Speaker 2: may assist this investigation? It took them months to complete
Speaker 2: that mammoth task, but they found no connection between any
Speaker 2: registered walking Shaws and Kevin Carrell, Rochelle Childs, or Camden Holden.
Speaker 2: But as was acknowledged in the last line of Detective
Speaker 2: Nuttles statement, the information does not capture vehicles that have
Speaker 2: been fitted with body kits or accessories.
Speaker 10: To look like genuine Walkinshaw vehicles.
Speaker 2: Basically, there are fakes out there, other commodols kitted out
Speaker 2: to look like walking shorts, and because they're not registered
Speaker 2: as walking shaws, it's impossible to account for them all.
Speaker 2: Let's hear from Ben Hill, a family friend of the
Speaker 2: child's and a car mechanic who specializes in high performance vehicles.
Speaker 2: You'll remember his voice from earlier episodes when he assessed
Speaker 2: Rochelle's beloved Holden. How difficult is it to distinguish between
Speaker 2: an authentic walking share and a fake.
Speaker 17: It's very difficult unless you're a trained expert or an
Speaker 17: obsessive collector. If if one drove past or were pulled
Speaker 17: up in a car park, you wouldn't be able to
Speaker 17: spot the difference with the amount of reproduction stuff that
Speaker 17: you can buy and could even buy then to make
Speaker 17: a mock up.
Speaker 10: So how to talk me through that?
Speaker 2: How does that process play out if someone's trying to
Speaker 2: fake a walkie?
Speaker 17: Basically, if somebody knew somebody and they could buy something
Speaker 17: in the black market, then they were buying body kits
Speaker 17: and they were buying twin throts and rebirthing a six
Speaker 17: cylinder vel commodol and it was actually re using all
Speaker 17: the original components off a walking shore.
Speaker 2: Knowing Rochelle, if she was promised a walking shaw for
Speaker 2: that June Long weekend, she would have jumped off.
Speaker 17: The Harbor bridge for that. Yeah, if there's an opportunity
Speaker 17: to drive a b in it, she would have. Yeah,
Speaker 17: would have given up a left leg to to have
Speaker 17: that opportunity to drive that car.
Speaker 1: I believe.
Speaker 2: And would she have known if it was a fake?
Speaker 14: Oh?
Speaker 9: I don't believe.
Speaker 17: So Again, if it was parked there with a bonnet
Speaker 17: shut and it had replica everything on it, it would
Speaker 17: look like a walkie if it was in the garage, said,
Speaker 17: unless you're a train collector and you know what to
Speaker 17: look for. If you just opened the rollers and the
Speaker 17: light was turned on and it looked like a walkie,
Speaker 17: you'd think it was a walkie. If it had the
Speaker 17: right interior, the right paint, the right wheels, the right stickers,
Speaker 17: you'd definitely believe it.
Speaker 2: So it's possible Rochelle's boss, Kevin Carrell, had access to
Speaker 2: or rowned a fake walking shaw at the time of
Speaker 2: Rochelle's murder and police would have been none the wiser.
Speaker 2: Let's break this down with Damien.
Speaker 18: The walking shaw comes into it the fact that she
Speaker 18: just promised to have one for the weekend that weekend
Speaker 18: and to find that Kevin Carrell's got one in and
Speaker 18: seen the year later in a garage of the premises
Speaker 18: on not far from Girauah on the in the Ilawarra.
Speaker 18: Was that ever discovered at the time, because it sort
Speaker 18: of concerns me.
Speaker 7: Would police at the time had known if he had
Speaker 7: a walking Shaw they would have.
Speaker 18: But as long as the vehicle was registered in his name.
Speaker 18: If it wasn't in his name, then no, they wouldn't
Speaker 18: have known.
Speaker 10: What about if it was a fake walking show.
Speaker 18: No, because the model doesn't come up on the RTA
Speaker 18: records as being a particular. It only comes up the
Speaker 18: standard model of the vehicle. So it say it was
Speaker 18: a v VB model made to look like a walking show.
Speaker 18: It only say it's a VB. It wouldn't say it's
Speaker 18: a walking shore. It's only a kit goes on it
Speaker 18: makes you look like a carb.
Speaker 2: I'm keen to tell Peter Singleton about this possible breakthrough.
Speaker 2: Someone has come forward saying that they saw Kevin in
Speaker 2: possession of an alleged walking shaw a year after Rochelle's murder.
Speaker 2: Do you think that's of interest and should that be
Speaker 2: something that police should be looking at today?
Speaker 6: Yes, I would say it would be of interest. I
Speaker 6: can't comment on police resorts and they've got a lot
Speaker 6: of other work to do, but it would strike me
Speaker 6: that the information should be followed up. Most likely explanation
Speaker 6: would be that he's acquired an interesting walking shaws himself,
Speaker 6: but of course the police will want to know when
Speaker 6: he got it and did he have it back in
Speaker 6: two thousand and one?
Speaker 2: Did it have to be his could it had just
Speaker 2: been a walking shaw that he had access to.
Speaker 6: Potentially potentially, I mean a possibility is that he or
Speaker 6: whoever it was, borrowed a Walkinshaw and took her for
Speaker 6: a drive. And maybe it was just to impress Rachelle
Speaker 6: in the hope of a return favor that was never forthcoming,
Speaker 6: leading to violence. So there are possibilities. Undoubtedly, the Walkenshaw
Speaker 6: featured heavily in this inquest for various reasons, and it
Speaker 6: is a matter that should be followed up. Someone's got
Speaker 6: this information, they should be interviewed.
Speaker 2: Given the war sure was a major focus in the inquest,
Speaker 2: it is possible people's memories could be contaminated unintentionally. Here's
Speaker 2: Damien Well.
Speaker 18: You really have to be careful in relation to the
Speaker 18: witness's contamination, in particular when the evidence is laid bare
Speaker 18: at any inquest or perhaps trial, you really have to
Speaker 18: be careful of.
Speaker 13: How they are.
Speaker 18: Forming their thoughts and their what they think they saw
Speaker 18: or heard. And they weren't compromised by any other witnesses
Speaker 18: who may have said something else and they're just following
Speaker 18: the line that they saw or heard.
Speaker 2: It was clear the inquest was very interested in Kevin
Speaker 2: Corell's behavior before and after Rachelle's murder. Several witnesses were
Speaker 2: called to give evidence about their interactions with Kevin. Here's
Speaker 2: Peter Singleton recapping a witness who testified that Kevin had
Speaker 2: made a trouble and comment. Just three days before Rochelle
Speaker 2: was murdered and her body set on fire.
Speaker 6: A friend of Rochelle, who was a firefighter or a
Speaker 6: volunteer firefighter, happened to be visiting Rochelle at work and
Speaker 6: was talking to Rochelle outside sales the used car sales
Speaker 6: manager's office, which is actually an old train carriage. From memory,
Speaker 6: Rochelle asked the friend whether she had ever seen a
Speaker 6: dead body or something to that effect. The answer was no,
Speaker 6: and somehow that the conversation got into this murky territory.
Speaker 6: But mister Carrell came out of the carriage and was
Speaker 6: physically higher than them, looking down upon them, and did
Speaker 6: make the comment that burning a body would be a
Speaker 6: good way to get rid of a murder victim.
Speaker 2: I asked Peter Singleton to explain how much weight he
Speaker 2: placed on that particular comment.
Speaker 6: Well, of course, it's interesting because Rochelle's body was burned
Speaker 6: by whoever did it. By itself, that means nothing. Anybody
Speaker 6: could have said that. Many people have said such things
Speaker 6: that they haven't committed murders. But it's an example of
Speaker 6: a tiny circumstance that can be added with a lot
Speaker 6: of other circumstances to build a fuller picture. I'm not
Speaker 6: suggesting that mister Carrell was planning to murder Roselle when
Speaker 6: he said that and burn her body, but in theory,
Speaker 6: if you had other evidence, you could use that to
Speaker 6: be evidence of premeditation as distinct from an accident, if
Speaker 6: it ever came to having to resolve that conundrum. It
Speaker 6: is strangely not uncommon for murderers to make comments to
Speaker 6: other people about how they would dispose of the body
Speaker 6: or how they would kill someone if they were ever
Speaker 6: minded to do so, but of course deny that they
Speaker 6: ever would. I don't understand the mind of a murderer
Speaker 6: well enough to know why they would say such things,
Speaker 6: but they do. Again, mister Corell may just have been
Speaker 6: victim of an unfortunate coincidence when he said that it's
Speaker 6: only a tiny piece of evidence.
Speaker 2: The topic of fire was a common line of questioning
Speaker 2: by Peter Singleton. Now for the first time you're going
Speaker 2: to hear about evidence from a key witness, Kevin's ex partner,
Speaker 2: who you know as Alice. She lived with Kevin for
Speaker 2: almost a year before she told him to move out.
Speaker 2: It was subsequently discovered he'd moved out in the months
Speaker 2: prior to Rochelle's death. This is not her voice, but
Speaker 2: here is part of her evidence at the inquest.
Speaker 9: Did Kevin have a preferred method of getting rid of rubbish?
Speaker 2: Yes?
Speaker 9: Was it to go to the tech with it?
Speaker 14: No?
Speaker 9: No, What did he like to do?
Speaker 19: Kevin liked to burn rubbish? And yes, he liked to
Speaker 19: burn rubbish. Burn things. I'd cleaned out a whole lot
Speaker 19: of paperwork and you know things that I put I've
Speaker 19: got a little shit up the very back of my
Speaker 19: property and I put a whole lot of stuff there
Speaker 19: to be taken to the tip or disposed of in
Speaker 19: some way.
Speaker 10: And he said he'd get rid of that for me.
Speaker 19: And on one particular day, I think I was having
Speaker 19: my car washed, so I had some items in my
Speaker 19: car that I took out of my car and put there,
Speaker 19: thinking they'd be safe. They were in bags, white garbage bags.
Speaker 19: They didn't look like rubbish to me.
Speaker 9: But anyway, even though they were in garbage bags.
Speaker 19: Well, but they were in white garbage bags. The rest
Speaker 19: of the rubbish was rubbish like, it was all like
Speaker 19: strewn there to be disposed of. But these bags, and
Speaker 19: I don't even think they were all white garbage bags,
Speaker 19: but I'd put things in. There was a beach bag
Speaker 19: which had my swimming stuff in it. There's a swimming
Speaker 19: costume in there that he didn't like me wearing. That
Speaker 19: was in that bag. There was my I had a diploma,
Speaker 19: an original one, one of those beautiful diplomas that I
Speaker 19: had gained. And when I came home that day, the
Speaker 19: whole lot had been burnt, all the rubbish and all
Speaker 19: my things. And I just couldn't believe that he had
Speaker 19: just gone ahead and burnt things indiscriminately, including my belongings
Speaker 19: which didn't look like rubbish, which were put apart from
Speaker 19: the rubbish.
Speaker 2: After she broke up with Kevin, Alice began a relationship
Speaker 2: with Colin. You've heard him on Deer Rochelle before because
Speaker 2: Alice told him quite a lot about Kevin. Did Kevin
Speaker 2: ever use this fire pit, because Alice has given evidence
Speaker 2: that he used to have fires in the backyard.
Speaker 20: The shed that was up the back was more like
Speaker 20: a bit of an open sort of shed that was
Speaker 20: very old. There had been a fire had been built
Speaker 20: in the middle of it in the floor in there.
Speaker 20: At the time when he said that he had got
Speaker 20: something out of there, I had noticed that the wheelbarrow
Speaker 20: had been moved, because I had a the lawn and
Speaker 20: lee recently, I knew where I put the wheelbarrow, and
Speaker 20: the wheelbarrow had been moved. I had then sort of
Speaker 20: taken note of this little fire pit that was in
Speaker 20: the middle of this sort of garage or carport type
Speaker 20: of thing, and I did ask about it. Then she said, yes,
Speaker 20: he used to burn stuff there, but I thought was
Speaker 20: a bit odd. But then I'd come to realization he
Speaker 20: was none person, so I thought.
Speaker 2: Okay, as you've just heard. Rochelle's inquest was explosive. Her
Speaker 2: body exhumed, nine persons of interest scrutinized. So many questions
Speaker 2: needed to be answered. Who started the rumor about bikes
Speaker 2: cutting Rochelle's fingers off, Was there ever a walk in shore?
Speaker 2: What happened to her in those missing nine hours after
Speaker 2: she left work. The inquest ran for two years but
Speaker 2: concluded with an open finding. As Peter Singleton said in
Speaker 2: his opening address, what began as a blue had become
Speaker 2: much clearer.
Speaker 1: Mister Carrell, what happened to Rochelle Child's that brought about
Speaker 1: the end of her life? On the advice of mister Johnston.
Speaker 1: I refuse to answer that question on the grounds that
Speaker 1: it may incriminate me. You killed Rochelle Childs, didn't you?
Speaker 1: On the advice of mister Johnston, on the advice of
Speaker 1: mister Johnston. On the advice of mister Johnston. On the
Speaker 1: advice of mister Johnston. I refuse to answer that question.
Speaker 1: Refuse to answer that question. I refuse to answer that question.
Speaker 1: I refuse to answer that question on the ground that.
Speaker 2: On the next episode of Dear Rochelle, what was it
Speaker 2: like being married to Kevin?
Speaker 10: Carrell just like to.
Speaker 14: Talk about There was many sides to Kevin. You know,
Speaker 14: I spent thirteen years with him. He threatened to if
Speaker 14: I ever left him, he.
Speaker 6: Would help me down and find me.
Speaker 14: He would cut me up in little pieces.
Speaker 10: What makes him so dangerous? The fact that he can
Speaker 10: just snap is not to be trusted.
Speaker 7: You do want to do this, I do.
Speaker 14: It's just really hard that it happened to someone I loved,
Speaker 14: I would want someone like me to come forward, keep
Speaker 14: a stake.
Speaker 2: Let's have a break yet, just I'll just move that
Speaker 2: microphone away.
Speaker 13: I feel.
Speaker 14: I feel sometimes like it's my fault.
Speaker 10: Dear Rochelle is a multi media production from True Crime Australia.
Speaker 2: If you want to be one of the first to
Speaker 2: find out what happens next, go Dear Roshelle dot com
Speaker 2: dot a you. That's where eligible Digital News Corp Austrelia
Speaker 2: subscribers get early access to podcast episodes and breaking news
Speaker 2: in our live investigation and you will also find exclusive videos,
Speaker 2: interactive evidence, feature articles and more. That's De Rochelle dot
Speaker 2: com dot au. If you have any tips or confidential
Speaker 2: information to share with me, Ashley Hanson, please send an
Speaker 2: email to de Roshelle at News dot com dot a you.
Speaker 2: Our supervising producer and audio editor is Rehys Gunter Rachel Fountain,
Speaker 2: his executive producer and audio director. Our executive editor is
Speaker 2: Sarah Blake. Our senior journ list is Patrick Carline. Video
Speaker 2: editors are Jillian McNally, Owen Yang and Stephen Woods. Picture
Speaker 2: editors are Jeff dr Mannin and Christy Miller.
Speaker 1: Sydney.
Speaker 2: Camera operators are Daniel Andrews and Oscar Viera. We sound
Speaker 2: designed by Martin Perolta. Thanks also to Greg Thompson and
Speaker 2: Lenny Panerz. Show Bareo fageld Sa Grabe, Hailey Goddard, Stephen Grice,
Speaker 2: Charlotte carp, Tina Coggins and Harry Hughes. Special thanks to
Speaker 2: the Daily Telegraph editor Ben English and dear Rochelle would
Speaker 2: not be possible without the help and I'm wavering support
Speaker 2: of Christy and Anne Childs, Mindy Wicks, Damien Loon.
Speaker 10: And Rochelle's friends.
Speaker 2: This podcast series is hosted and investigated by me Ashley
Speaker 2: Hanson