Speaker 1: Listeners are advised that this podcast series Bromwin contains course
Speaker 1: language and adult themes. This podcast series is brought to
Speaker 1: you by me Headley Thomas and The Australian News.
Speaker 2: You can Trust Opinions that matter. Now Ben Fordham comments.
Speaker 3: And now we have the bombshell witness statement from the
Speaker 3: retired nurse Judy Seeing describing what looked like a body
Speaker 3: in the back of a car.
Speaker 1: The country's leading commercial radio broadcast to Ben Fordham has
Speaker 1: been following the Bromwyn Winfield case. We've got good history.
Speaker 1: Ben's dad, the late Great John Fordham, was a giant
Speaker 1: in the media and he took me under his wing
Speaker 1: when I was a young newspaper reporter thirty five years
Speaker 1: ago during the Teacher's pat investigation in twenty eighteen, when
Speaker 1: John and Ben saw the injustice in Lynn's case, they
Speaker 1: pulled strings at the highest levels to ensure that it
Speaker 1: got the full attention of Mick Fuller, the then commissioner
Speaker 1: of the New South Wales Police Force. Ben played snippets
Speaker 1: of Judy Singh's interview with me on his top rating program.
Speaker 1: Was it possible for you to actually identify him as
Speaker 1: John Winfield when you.
Speaker 2: Looked in, Oh yeah, was he definitely him?
Speaker 3: Judy felt suspicious, but she didn't immediately act on it.
Speaker 3: In the days that followed, she didn't know Bronwin was missing,
Speaker 3: but when rumors started spreading that on when had disappeared,
Speaker 3: Judy says she knew she had to tell someone. She
Speaker 3: says she went to Ballona police.
Speaker 4: I talked to the ballon and police first, and they
Speaker 4: took me behind the counter.
Speaker 1: Did you form an impression then of how seriously or
Speaker 1: not they were taking it?
Speaker 2: Hardly? Interested?
Speaker 1: Hardly?
Speaker 2: I can't understand why that would be.
Speaker 5: Almost had to beg them to let me say something.
Speaker 1: Did you feel better for having disclosed these things?
Speaker 2: Now?
Speaker 1: No, he died recently, so and I'm taking this to
Speaker 1: the grave.
Speaker 6: Always some relief when you can get something out, you know.
Speaker 3: What's becoming clear is that the early investigation into Bronman's
Speaker 3: disappearance was not handled properly. Police were too quick to
Speaker 3: believe the storyline that a mother of two had just
Speaker 3: packed up and left and walked down on her children.
Speaker 1: Then also told his vast audience a truth which might
Speaker 1: surprise listeners. He revealed that the Bromwin podcast investigation.
Speaker 3: Has been running for one month and in that time
Speaker 3: he's not been contacted by anyone at New South Wales Police.
Speaker 3: Nobody's reached out to him to see if he's uncovered
Speaker 3: new information. Nobody's checked to see if maybe, just maybe
Speaker 3: he's found evidence that could solve the mystery of who
Speaker 3: could have killed Bronwin or what happened to her. It's
Speaker 3: been radio silence, no calls, no emails, no inquiries, nothing
Speaker 3: and that should change today.
Speaker 1: But at seven twenty pm on Thursday June twenty, a
Speaker 1: couple of hours after the release of episode seven, Assistant
Speaker 1: Commissioner of Police Mick Fitzgerald emailed to request contact details
Speaker 1: for retired nurse Judy Singh. I immediately shared those details
Speaker 1: with Fitzgerald. Detectives are going to be spending so time
Speaker 1: with Judy Singh. Finally they should take a statement from her.
Speaker 1: Ben Fordham had the last word.
Speaker 3: Well done, Mick Fitzgerald, and I'll keep you updated on
Speaker 3: this case.
Speaker 1: On the Nine Networks Today show, host Karl Stefanovic talked
Speaker 1: to Madison Walsh, Bromwin's second cousin, who has been on
Speaker 1: this case with me since the start of the podcast. Madison,
Speaker 1: your family's been watching this.
Speaker 7: Yeah, for thirty one years. We have had no real
Speaker 7: movement within this case. Nothing's happened, and our family has
Speaker 7: felt lost.
Speaker 8: What is that? That must be torture?
Speaker 7: Oh, look, it's it's hard. I mean I didn't know
Speaker 7: brom when she disappeared ten years before I was born. However,
Speaker 7: I've grown up with it. I've witnessed what my family
Speaker 7: has gone through. I know what they're still going through.
Speaker 7: Last night, when the episode released where this new information
Speaker 7: and came out, they didn't know about it, and it
Speaker 7: was both confronting and raw to witness that and to
Speaker 7: see how much that affected them, because at this stage
Speaker 7: you don't think that anything more would come out.
Speaker 2: How are they?
Speaker 9: They're good.
Speaker 7: This is motivating for them as well, because this is
Speaker 7: something new, something that the police can hopefully use now
Speaker 7: to finally do something nice.
Speaker 8: To see Mats and all the best of the family.
Speaker 1: Just twelve hours earlier, Maddie sat with Bromman's brother Andy
Speaker 1: Reid and his wife Michelle in their home in the Shire.
Speaker 1: She drove there to answer their questions and help them
Speaker 1: listen as Jude sings account of what she saw was
Speaker 1: played through episode seven. Andy and Michelle heard it for
Speaker 1: the first time as the episode unfolded. Here's Maddie who
Speaker 1: used her iPhone to make a recording.
Speaker 7: It's all very, very hard to listen to, that's for sure.
Speaker 9: That unbelievable that this poor lady's had to live with that. Yeah,
Speaker 9: it's breast keys up. Then she's going to take it
Speaker 9: to a grave.
Speaker 10: If you were going to bed, why would you have
Speaker 10: your surfboard in the car?
Speaker 7: Well, that's what I was thinking, And then there was
Speaker 7: like maybe he paddled out or something.
Speaker 11: Murray used to say to me all the time, every
Speaker 11: time there's massive floods in the hinterland. Murray used to
Speaker 11: fedigm religiously, religiously. He used to tell me about how
Speaker 11: he used to he watched for the news reports, always
Speaker 11: watching the news. I think her body's going to turn up. Yeah,
Speaker 11: it flushed out in one of the estuaries.
Speaker 9: I remember. Glenn used to say to me, mate, do
Speaker 9: you never know what will turn up?
Speaker 1: Michelle read aloud a message that she had just received
Speaker 1: from the retired detective sergeant Glenn Taylor, who began a
Speaker 1: thorough police investigation in nineteen ninety eight.
Speaker 10: He's just said it quite stunning news coming out of
Speaker 10: what a witness saw apparently on the night of Broman's disappearance,
Speaker 10: and I said, yeah, we're listening to it as we speak.
Speaker 9: We are shattered, but hopeful.
Speaker 11: It doesn't even feel like belief because we've just knowned
Speaker 11: for so long that the vastard did something that night.
Speaker 9: The systems just filed for so long.
Speaker 1: Shortly before the release of the very first episode in
Speaker 1: this podcast series, and he met with detectives led by
Speaker 1: Nigel Warren of the Unsolved Homicide Unit, and here to
Speaker 1: remind you is a bit from episode one.
Speaker 9: Basically said, well, their hands are tied.
Speaker 1: We can't do any more than what we've done.
Speaker 12: And we don't have any new evidence as it steds.
Speaker 11: Yeah, okay, he said, going Look, I cannot apologize enough
Speaker 11: for how badly the original investigation was handled.
Speaker 2: They've got no intention of puting any more work into it.
Speaker 1: When you walked away with Michelle from that meeting six
Speaker 1: weeks ago, what was your view of what they were
Speaker 1: doing on the Roman police investigation.
Speaker 9: Nothing? Nothing unless someone came forward.
Speaker 10: Unless there was something more to add.
Speaker 11: He mentioned to me that they had twenty six open cases,
Speaker 11: so there's twenty five poor people out there that.
Speaker 9: Are worse off than we are because we've quit.
Speaker 1: You given what you know, Now, what do you want
Speaker 1: them to do?
Speaker 11: They need to go and speak to Juty get correct
Speaker 11: statements like they should have done the first two times
Speaker 11: she went there. The poor woman in ninety three, the
Speaker 11: only night that he had access to that vehicle. Wow, wow,
Speaker 11: like to meet her.
Speaker 2: Thank you.
Speaker 1: Have you seen the video?
Speaker 9: Yes?
Speaker 10: Yeah, that's pretty hard to look at.
Speaker 2: I'm sorry.
Speaker 11: Michelle always knew something went wrong that night, but we
Speaker 11: never really had the proof as hard as we did.
Speaker 9: Push diskin.
Speaker 1: Maddie and I were in the Tuong Public Library and
Speaker 1: Brisbane and interviewing Mel Taylor, Devin Murray's daughter.
Speaker 2: She worked nearby.
Speaker 1: She came and saw us after she finished work and
Speaker 1: Mel was just describing what she saw as a twelve
Speaker 1: year old going through that house mate. She's the only
Speaker 1: person that remembers this bedstrip The beds were stripped of
Speaker 1: their sheets.
Speaker 9: Yeah, I've never heard of that until Mel said it.
Speaker 1: What I think it shows is that even twelve year
Speaker 1: old kids should be interviewed by cops. Would Bromwin have
Speaker 1: let the children sleep in a stripped bed?
Speaker 2: That is a bed without sheets.
Speaker 9: Never.
Speaker 10: Crystal says in her statement that Lauren woke up and
Speaker 10: went in and found a mum crying in the bedroom
Speaker 10: and then her mum said, come on, darling, go back
Speaker 10: to bed or whatever, and she went and tucked her.
Speaker 9: In and said, I'll see you in the morning.
Speaker 10: Yeah, So you don't tuck someone in if there's no bedding.
Speaker 2: How did Judy present to you?
Speaker 1: From what she said?
Speaker 10: And Kerry, Oh, totally one hundred percent telling the truth.
Speaker 5: Why would anyone make that up.
Speaker 10: She's seeing something on the night that nobody.
Speaker 9: Else knew about.
Speaker 11: There's no reason for them to fabricate anything that we've
Speaker 11: heard tonight.
Speaker 9: I just feel for Judy. The poor woman has gone.
Speaker 11: At the police station twice and she's just been dis
Speaker 11: garden and they haven't even taken us seriously on a
Speaker 11: missing person's case.
Speaker 9: What's wrong with these people?
Speaker 10: I thought she was really authentic because she could be
Speaker 10: the key to solve.
Speaker 9: Him what happened.
Speaker 10: We're very grateful, really, and we believe her wholeheartedly.
Speaker 9: You can't make that sort of stuff up.
Speaker 1: If this drive that she had witnessed was around midnight,
Speaker 1: how does that fit with what Murray saw at ten
Speaker 1: forty pm. What was he doing on the ten forty
Speaker 1: pm trip?
Speaker 7: What I'm thinking is he filled the boot with heavy things.
Speaker 9: He started wiring the boot down.
Speaker 11: Then he's got in the car and then going shit,
Speaker 11: the cars nearly empty.
Speaker 9: The last thing I had to do.
Speaker 11: Is put a body in his car and it's going
Speaker 11: to run out of fuel.
Speaker 7: And on that trip, that first trip he made, was
Speaker 7: trying to scope out he might put her. Got close
Speaker 7: to petrol station, was like, I need to fill up,
Speaker 7: fills up.
Speaker 11: And then he's come back with petrol cars full of petrol.
Speaker 7: Then goes back home and then that's when.
Speaker 8: He goes down grown up with her.
Speaker 11: Then he would have had to have come back, and
Speaker 11: then he's come back got the kids at some stage.
Speaker 1: Why do you think the surfboard would have been in
Speaker 1: the car? It is an obvious question and it raises
Speaker 1: mccarbre thoughts and ideas. Judy Singh is adamant that a
Speaker 1: surfboard was lying in the car from the back seat
Speaker 1: across to the front seat, and that something resembling a
Speaker 1: body wrapped in a sheet was on the other side
Speaker 1: of the back seat behind the front passenger seat.
Speaker 2: When John flew to Ballona in the.
Speaker 1: Late afternoon of Sunday, May sixteenth, nineteen ninety three. His
Speaker 1: friend John Watson picked John Winfield up at the airport.
Speaker 1: They went first to the local police station in Balin.
Speaker 1: John went to the station to check whether there were
Speaker 1: any orders preventing him from approaching Bromwin and the house
Speaker 1: that they had lived in together until their separation. John
Speaker 1: Winfield went in John Watson's car. John Watson and John
Speaker 1: Winfield then went from the police station in Ballina to
Speaker 1: pick up Jody's friend Becky McGuire, and Becky says she
Speaker 1: witnessed John entering the house when Bromwin opened the front door.
Speaker 1: A short time later, John drove Becky back to her
Speaker 1: place in the Winfield family's Ford Falcon.
Speaker 2: Then John returned to the house alone.
Speaker 1: You'll hear more about John's visit to the police station
Speaker 1: in a later episode when we look at John's record
Speaker 1: of interview with the former police detective Sergeant Glenn Taylor.
Speaker 1: That interview was done in nineteen ninety eight, five years
Speaker 1: after Bromwin's disappearance. If Judy sings witness account is accurate,
Speaker 1: John's surfboard has gone into the car that night there
Speaker 1: are creeks and water holes.
Speaker 2: In the Lenox Head area.
Speaker 1: John wouldn't have had a lot of time because he
Speaker 1: had to get on the road to Sydney. He drove
Speaker 1: through the night and arrived in the mid morning.
Speaker 2: In the Shire.
Speaker 1: Back then, it was a good nine to eleven hour
Speaker 1: drive depending on conditions. Lake Ainsworth, a popular swimming and
Speaker 1: picnicking place for Lenox families and visitors, is only a
Speaker 1: ten minute or so drive from Sandstone Crescent. Andy has
Speaker 1: speculated that the surfboard was in the car because John
Speaker 1: needed to float Bromwin's body out into the water.
Speaker 11: He wouldn't use the surfboard to float a body out
Speaker 11: into the middle of a creek or something and then
Speaker 11: be able to dump it off the board and then
Speaker 11: come back to the house.
Speaker 1: At a place such as Lake Ainsworth. In Andy's mind,
Speaker 1: his sister her body has been put into a large surfboard.
Speaker 2: Bag with weights or blocks.
Speaker 1: Inside it, then towed by a leg rope late at
Speaker 1: night into the still water and rolled over the side.
Speaker 1: The weights would take the bag down to the murky depths.
Speaker 1: But it's only a theory, a speculation based on circumstantial evidence.
Speaker 1: Something John vehemently denies the theory would explain the presence
Speaker 1: of the surfboard. You've been through so much over the
Speaker 1: last thirty one years. I know this podcast has been
Speaker 1: at times pretty grueling for you because it's explored for you, Andy,
Speaker 1: parts of your own personal life with your mom Barbara
Speaker 1: and your stepmother Jennifer, and tensions within the family and
Speaker 1: so on. How do you feel about the toll it
Speaker 1: takes on you and Michelle.
Speaker 2: When this is unfolding.
Speaker 9: That's been pretty harrowing.
Speaker 1: We're strong, We're strong, and he said he understood why
Speaker 1: Maddie and I did not tell him about Judy Singh's
Speaker 1: revelations before they were published.
Speaker 12: You've got to do your job.
Speaker 11: Let's the podcast doesn't work if it's just a bunch
Speaker 11: of leaked information.
Speaker 2: I fully understand it.
Speaker 11: Since we first sat down with you in that cafe Clovelly,
Speaker 11: I've lived in here.
Speaker 1: We are five years later, we've all got a bit
Speaker 1: older made. You're going to have a tough night. I
Speaker 1: hope you've nursed a beer through all this.
Speaker 10: So what do you think the police's obligation is.
Speaker 1: Next, they'll make a bee line for Jude. They will
Speaker 1: want to get a statement from her. They will want
Speaker 1: to reconstruct what she describes. They'll go to the Sandstone
Speaker 1: Crescent and Granite Street. They'll run cars past that house
Speaker 1: at night with the light on in the car at
Speaker 1: a slow speed that she described. They'll put something in
Speaker 1: the back of the car so that that can be filmed,
Speaker 1: and they'll film what they can see.
Speaker 2: They'll do all of those sorts of tests.
Speaker 1: But if they're satisfied that what she described is plausible,
Speaker 1: they'll then have to make a further submission to the
Speaker 1: Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions. Andy and I
Speaker 1: spoke about why people like Judy Singh came forward and
Speaker 1: how podcasts were like a vacuum cleaner that is drawing
Speaker 1: up so many potential new leads, tips from people, sources
Speaker 1: coming out of the woodwork, and the reluctance of police
Speaker 1: to engage with the same podcasts. They're territorial, they believe
Speaker 1: that Bromin's all It's murder is their murder.
Speaker 2: And they don't like intruders.
Speaker 1: Police are not going to be the go to for
Speaker 1: people who are dissatisfied, who have been let down by
Speaker 1: cops in the past, or who are just not going
Speaker 1: to necessarily trust cops, But who are possibly going to
Speaker 1: trust me? They just need to catch up with the
Speaker 1: modern era. How many other missing murdered women have just
Speaker 1: fallen through the cracks. The next day we heard from
Speaker 1: other important people in this case. Hello, Glenn Taylor, Glenn,
Speaker 1: Matt Condon, how are you?
Speaker 2: Oh?
Speaker 9: Yeah, good Matt.
Speaker 2: He was shocked by what he heard.
Speaker 13: Well, you can't get much more serious to crime than
Speaker 13: a murder, And to allegedly murder a young mother and
Speaker 13: leave two children behind.
Speaker 14: It's just a horrendous thought. I'm sure that this information
Speaker 14: that's now come to light would be very much a
Speaker 14: priority in any murder investigation.
Speaker 13: I was actually quite stunned. We may better finally move
Speaker 13: this investigation forward. I was appalled that so little had
Speaker 13: been going back in ninety ninety three, and then to
Speaker 13: hear this latest revelation that this witness duty had actually
Speaker 13: come to bow on a police station and reported to
Speaker 13: someone back in nineteen ninety three, that was just astounding.
Speaker 2: And then it got worse.
Speaker 13: Usually something of that absolute significant importance would have been
Speaker 13: acted upon. It would have been an absolute priority to
Speaker 13: have the lady attend the police station and with her
Speaker 13: consent to take a statement from her, and we would
Speaker 13: have some forensics come up and take some photographs about
Speaker 13: where she was standing and how she would observe this vehicle.
Speaker 15: From your perspective, is an experienced homicide detective, what sort
Speaker 15: of weight is carried by this observation by Judy singher well?
Speaker 14: Checking to make sure that the information is plausible and
Speaker 14: could be corroborated by other people homicide investigations, it doesn't
Speaker 14: matter if they're forty years old or even longer. Any
Speaker 14: information further that comes out is absolutely crucial from what
Speaker 14: Hidley has found from this lady. I mean, every single
Speaker 14: thing that she said certainly seems plausible, and she's told
Speaker 14: other people. It's not something that just come up as
Speaker 14: a result of the podcast, but certainly when the initial
Speaker 14: investigation was just so poor, We're not one person was
Speaker 14: interviewed and there.
Speaker 13: Was no formal interview of the husband, and then the
Speaker 13: whole matter was just completely shelved.
Speaker 5: There's red flags flying everywhere.
Speaker 12: I've always had.
Speaker 8: This investigation on the mind.
Speaker 16: I mean, every time anything would come up, like any
Speaker 16: human bones, fan or something, I'm always thinking, I'm hopeful
Speaker 16: to the family that it might be Bromling and the
Speaker 16: media plays a very vital role in investigations, especially investigations
Speaker 16: that have been around for a long time, and show
Speaker 16: there's potential there for people that know things about unsolved
Speaker 16: longicides to come forward.
Speaker 15: Back in your day, mate, there was no such thing
Speaker 15: as a podcast, and suddenly you have this platform to
Speaker 15: reach millions of people.
Speaker 14: It's wonderful that it's an opportunity for people further to
Speaker 14: come forward.
Speaker 13: These are most serious crimes. There's never been any closure.
Speaker 13: They can't go to a century and lace and failers
Speaker 13: or grieve what did actually happen to bromwin Where is she?
Speaker 13: The deputy state coroner, he was clearly of the view
Speaker 13: that in.
Speaker 14: A diutable offense, namely murder had been committed and there
Speaker 14: was a known person responsible.
Speaker 13: This is after hearing all the evidence out of a
Speaker 13: week and numerous numerous documents.
Speaker 14: Statements be intended, but obviously we didn't have a statement
Speaker 14: from this new witness duty at the time. It's important
Speaker 14: that senior Coroner believe that there was sufficient evidence to
Speaker 14: warrant the DPP considering a charge of murder being laid
Speaker 14: against mister Winfield. Mister Winfield's obviously got the presumption of innocence.
Speaker 14: That's there's further developments.
Speaker 1: Here's Bromlin's half sister, Kim Marshall, who is in Hobart, Tasmania.
Speaker 1: Kim has been doing it tough. Maddie's recording this call.
Speaker 17: Just say though, okay, probably nearly midnight, I decided said
Speaker 17: I'd listened to it, felt very saddened and heartbroken. I
Speaker 17: was beside myself, and then I did try to ring
Speaker 17: one or two people, but when I did try to
Speaker 17: talk to them, that made me burst into tears because
Speaker 17: I don't like being needy. So I had a big
Speaker 17: cry with Andrea and then pulled herself together and listened
Speaker 17: to the rest of it.
Speaker 1: Do you form a view of Julie's credibility veracity of
Speaker 1: what she was saying?
Speaker 17: Yes, most definitely she was aware of her environ so
Speaker 17: she had a physical thing going on watching a car,
Speaker 17: But she also had an awareness about the time of
Speaker 17: the year, the time of the evening, the type of
Speaker 17: fauna in her view, and also her miscarriage that she
Speaker 17: was worrying about. So I believe that there's so many
Speaker 17: factors there that make her recount or her witness account
Speaker 17: quite valid. But you know what, I'm actually not that
Speaker 17: surprised because I always knew that there was.
Speaker 5: Going to be information out there. I knew from day one.
Speaker 17: That the police were not doing their job. I couldn't
Speaker 17: even get a seat with Detective Discns. I always knew
Speaker 17: there was going to be a number of key witnesses
Speaker 17: that were out there.
Speaker 5: It's a small town, but my biggest thing was to
Speaker 5: actually make sure.
Speaker 8: That Crystal was all right.
Speaker 5: But we don't talk about the podcast.
Speaker 17: Crystal has this way that she wishes to compartmentalize it.
Speaker 17: She's actually an incredible person because she somehow seems to
Speaker 17: have put lots of boundaries in place, and she's staying
Speaker 17: the line. Crystal maintains that she will continue to keep
Speaker 17: reaching out to her sisters. I know that Lauren is
Speaker 17: not willing to engage in any conversation.
Speaker 5: She is not ready to talk.
Speaker 17: She does not want to entertain the idea that's something
Speaker 17: of a foul play nature that involves her father.
Speaker 5: She doesn't want to talk about.
Speaker 17: That at all, and she's not willing to discuss it
Speaker 17: with Crystal at all. And then Jody, it's just no reply,
Speaker 17: no communication.
Speaker 1: Kim said that while Crystal still referred to her stepfather,
Speaker 1: John Winfield as Dad.
Speaker 17: She doesn't feel the wars or the connection, and it's
Speaker 17: always Crystal that's actually wanting to be reassured or seek
Speaker 17: reassurance that she's still part of the family. I'm more
Speaker 17: than happy to disguise that no matter what the outcome is.
Speaker 5: In regards to.
Speaker 17: Broman's disappearance, I believe that he was a very cold
Speaker 17: and calous parent.
Speaker 1: All of this, the podcast, the curiosity of the public,
Speaker 1: and the ongoing disclosures are taking a toll.
Speaker 2: Where Andy contact to before you have listened?
Speaker 1: What did he say?
Speaker 18: So?
Speaker 5: I really don't want to tell the country there?
Speaker 17: Okay, I don't even know if I want to do
Speaker 17: the podcast any wolf.
Speaker 2: Andy and Meghan are not going well either.
Speaker 17: Because Meg is still very upset with Andrew and Michel.
Speaker 5: He wants nothing to do with Megan ever. Again. I've
Speaker 5: recommended that they both go to counseling.
Speaker 2: Megan, I'm with Maddy.
Speaker 5: Oh Man Sale, I'm good.
Speaker 1: How are you Maddie's auntie. Meghan was unsurprised by Judy
Speaker 1: Singh's account of having got nowhere when she went to
Speaker 1: local police in nineteen ninety three, Megan played the episode
Speaker 1: that featured Judy twice and she listened carefully to her story.
Speaker 19: Never in a million years I think this is going
Speaker 19: to happen. I mean, whoa episode seven Nelly blew my
Speaker 19: head off.
Speaker 5: I really do believe her.
Speaker 19: I don't really feel one hundred cent sure did she
Speaker 19: saw from one in that car? What the hell was
Speaker 19: wrong with the police not thinking on this information?
Speaker 2: As confronting?
Speaker 19: She comes across as one hundred percent credible to me.
Speaker 5: I mean, you can tell me just the emotion in
Speaker 5: her voice. You should the keet that to.
Speaker 7: I did, I did, didn't tell a soul. You were
Speaker 7: going to find out eventually, find out eventually when the
Speaker 7: time was right, when everyone else found out. I was
Speaker 7: on strips instructions. This is not the end, but it's
Speaker 7: definitely the start of something else.
Speaker 5: What were it goes from here?
Speaker 8: Yeah, she tried to make people listen.
Speaker 5: Her friend she kept at it too.
Speaker 1: Kerry McLean told me that she became emotional when she
Speaker 1: listened to the episode. She followed up reading the stories
Speaker 1: in The Australian and on the website Roman podcast dot com.
Speaker 5: It's emotional.
Speaker 18: Someone's life has been lost and the poor kids. Just
Speaker 18: one little bit of information can uncover all that.
Speaker 5: It came from me and then it came from her.
Speaker 1: Yes, when do you reckon? You and her would have
Speaker 1: last had contact probably twenty years ago.
Speaker 2: Did she sound how you remembered her?
Speaker 1: Absolutely?
Speaker 20: Yes.
Speaker 1: For the police to not act on it once in
Speaker 1: nineteen ninety three, it was bad enough. But then she
Speaker 1: goes again with a doctor from New Zealand to the
Speaker 1: Byron Bay police.
Speaker 18: Did It's unbelievable. I spoke to them, I don't know
Speaker 18: whether it was once or twice, and gave her name
Speaker 18: and the names that I knew that she went by,
Speaker 18: and her maiden name so they could find her.
Speaker 8: So we've tried.
Speaker 18: I don't speak negatively of the police, but in this case,
Speaker 18: someone dropped the ball.
Speaker 1: It's probable that the police will want to talk to
Speaker 1: you too.
Speaker 5: Yeah, I know, yes, I'm aware of that.
Speaker 1: If the police asked me for your contact detail, are
Speaker 1: you okay for me to share?
Speaker 11: Yeah?
Speaker 18: Sure, But that should have happened a long long time ago.
Speaker 1: When lots of information is coming in during a podcast
Speaker 1: series and then you get an email, a random email
Speaker 1: from someone called Jude singing, you don't know the backstory,
Speaker 1: and all she says is I saw him leaving on
Speaker 1: the night you had the light on the car, But
Speaker 1: she doesn't say what she saw in the car in
Speaker 1: her email, she didn't say that. It's very easy when
Speaker 1: you're so busy and there's so much of the material
Speaker 1: coming in, you're doing interviews, you're editing and arranging your
Speaker 1: writing to not actually reply. But because I knew about
Speaker 1: her from you, and I it was I think Judy
Speaker 1: undoubtedly was always going to contact me, because she contacted
Speaker 1: me without knowing that you had already contacted me. But
Speaker 1: the difference is that when she did contact me, I
Speaker 1: knew of her and I already had had an understanding
Speaker 1: of the backstory, and it meant that immediately she was
Speaker 1: more credible to me.
Speaker 2: And that's thanks to you.
Speaker 18: I'm really pleased that I'm involved in it and something's happened.
Speaker 18: It's amazing how everything sort of come together.
Speaker 1: Murray Nolan is a perceptive and friendly bloke. He is
Speaker 1: immediately likable and I reckon he's zen like about some things,
Speaker 1: you know. The star of The Mentalist, Simon Baker.
Speaker 6: We used to go surfing together all the time. The
Speaker 6: Legs Surfing Crew we'd all surfed together. Wow, you just
Speaker 6: lived down the bottom on the street, and now I
Speaker 6: see in Saint Crescent.
Speaker 21: In reality, Simon is one of our most successful and
Speaker 21: in demand international actors. He has his own star on
Speaker 21: the Hollywood Walk of Fame and was even once voted
Speaker 21: the sexiest man on television. I mean, look around, there's
Speaker 21: barely a soul on the beach. It's a busy day
Speaker 21: growing up. This was Simon Baker's playground.
Speaker 8: This was your house right here, This was here. He's
Speaker 8: still serves slangs point occasionally.
Speaker 1: Why did you call him smiley?
Speaker 8: Because when is the young bloke?
Speaker 6: He used to walk around small all the time. He's
Speaker 6: always this happy, a little smile on his face. The
Speaker 6: house has been pulled down now.
Speaker 1: Murray Nolan is keen to help this investigation. But what
Speaker 1: you are about to hear him say in his own
Speaker 1: words and voice is probably going to produce.
Speaker 2: Strong reactions in some listeners.
Speaker 1: And Murray knows he's inviting judgment over the things that
Speaker 1: he withheld from police in nineteen ninety three. He's got regrets.
Speaker 1: He's describing a day he was at home. It was
Speaker 1: very late May or early June nineteen ninety three. His
Speaker 1: neighbor John Winfield had been to the police to report
Speaker 1: Bromwin missing days earlier. As a result, Detective Graham diskin
Speaker 1: with the less experienced officer Wayne Tenby, went to Sandstone
Speaker 1: Crescent from the.
Speaker 2: Police running sheets.
Speaker 1: It doesn't appear that they questioned any other neighbors who
Speaker 1: knew things. The detectives only went to the door of
Speaker 1: the property next to Bromwin and John Murray and Deb's
Speaker 1: house and it's where they still live happily thirty one
Speaker 1: years later.
Speaker 12: And Murray, I've also read your statement.
Speaker 1: Yes, However, it seems you didn't at the time raise
Speaker 1: any suspicion about that noise the scrape of the vehicle.
Speaker 1: In nineteen ninety eight, Murray signed off on a written
Speaker 1: statement to the detective Sergeant Glenn Taylor. Glenn Taylor's investigation
Speaker 1: led to a brief of evidence, which went to the
Speaker 1: then Deputy State Coroner Karl Milavanovitch for.
Speaker 2: A week long inquest.
Speaker 1: Murray's statement in that brief of evidence includes key details
Speaker 1: which Murray did not disclose to police back in nineteen
Speaker 1: ninety three when they pulled up in Sandstone Crescent at
Speaker 1: a time when everything was still relatively fresh and just
Speaker 1: a fortnight or so after whatever happened on the night
Speaker 1: of Sunday, May sixteenth. The first time I met Karl Milavanovitch,
Speaker 1: it had been fifteen years since his inquest into Broman's
Speaker 1: disappearance and presumed death, but Karl still remembered one of
Speaker 1: Murray's disclosures. Karl clearly believed that this disclosure had weight
Speaker 1: and potential relevance.
Speaker 2: Here it is again from Karl.
Speaker 22: And there was some suggestion from a neighbor that they
Speaker 22: heard the car reversing down the driveway and scraping on
Speaker 22: the ground, though some suggestion there might have been something
Speaker 22: in the boot.
Speaker 2: She was never found.
Speaker 1: Now that I am back in Sandstone Crescent, dead breaks
Speaker 1: the eyes.
Speaker 23: Murray is a very tolerant person and he never sees
Speaker 23: wrong in anybody. Really, he knows John's done what he's done.
Speaker 23: But Murray is the type of person whereas on the opposite,
Speaker 23: like Headley.
Speaker 9: You wrong me and I'll wrong you.
Speaker 1: You know what I mean.
Speaker 23: He's always been that way, and I guess it's either
Speaker 23: a good or a bad nature to have.
Speaker 4: When she went missing, I never gave told the police
Speaker 4: anything because he's my friend.
Speaker 8: I never told the police laughing all staying out of it.
Speaker 8: Are you listening to yourself? It was that obvious to me.
Speaker 8: It was that obvious to me that he'd killed her.
Speaker 4: Becauys arrived, not one she's got to miss in twenty eleven,
Speaker 4: and I thought, well, almost stay out of this because
Speaker 4: resting three or four days like it was that obvious.
Speaker 24: What about when Discin started investigating soon after she disappeared?
Speaker 8: And now I told him nothing. You can't speak to you.
Speaker 4: I don't have a memory of the day, but I
Speaker 4: was cooking a lamb in the cockpot. Him and Timmy
Speaker 4: dropp up here probably about eleven o'clock one morning.
Speaker 8: He just come inside and asking me a new questions?
Speaker 12: What do you remember about that conversation?
Speaker 8: How sure it was? I could be mistaken. I'm pretty sure.
Speaker 6: There's write it down on a spy on notepad they did.
Speaker 8: There were no formal statement, you know. I thought that
Speaker 8: was a bit unprofessional with but Discoln They were very friendly.
Speaker 8: John and discon were very friendly.
Speaker 4: How do you know that it's seeing at the back
Speaker 4: of here they'd be having coffees or cups of tea
Speaker 4: and sitting on their back from the andre What type
Speaker 4: pray were you talking about?
Speaker 8: And this is like the.
Speaker 4: Initial inquiry after his border miss and the detectives have
Speaker 4: got involved.
Speaker 8: They just seemed to be a bit chumming.
Speaker 1: From his house, Murray could see the detective and his
Speaker 1: neighbor on the verandah of the house that John built.
Speaker 1: He said they would, in his words, yarna way for ages. Now,
Speaker 1: good detectives would argue that this might well be tactical.
Speaker 1: It doesn't mean that they are naive or being conned
Speaker 1: by a possible murderer. Couldn't have been the really clever
Speaker 1: detective building rapport with the murder suspect.
Speaker 8: That could have been.
Speaker 12: You say you were immediately of the view that he'd kill.
Speaker 2: We'll got rid of that.
Speaker 12: Yes, what had you decided for yourself?
Speaker 8: Well, I just what I'm staying out of this. He's
Speaker 8: my friend.
Speaker 4: I've got to live next door to him, and I'm
Speaker 4: going to surf with him, and just what I'm staying
Speaker 4: out of this.
Speaker 8: But it was just too obvious and I was follow
Speaker 8: you mistaken at the time.
Speaker 1: Deb's conversation with detectives Graham Diskin and Wayne Temby occurred
Speaker 1: separately in nineteen ninety three.
Speaker 2: She recalled it like this.
Speaker 23: It was an afternoon and him and Wayne Timby were
Speaker 23: at the front door. They didn't come in, and they
Speaker 23: asked me a couple of questions, very little like what
Speaker 23: I knew.
Speaker 1: I remember so.
Speaker 23: Them, can't you forensic the car? Can't you go in
Speaker 23: and forensic the house? And they go, no, no, no,
Speaker 23: it doesn't work like that. We can't just go in
Speaker 23: guns a blazing and accuse him of anything.
Speaker 8: Just gonna actually said, this is a missing person inquiry
Speaker 8: and not a murdering.
Speaker 23: That's right, a missing person inquiry. Yeah, And I'm like, nah, no,
Speaker 23: he's done something to her, And this is what I'm
Speaker 23: saying to them. He was very blase about the whole lot.
Speaker 23: That's why I kept saying to him, but there's something
Speaker 23: wrong here. You need to investigate, you need to go
Speaker 23: and see the house. It was just like, oh, you know,
Speaker 23: I just got to fill out these forms. And he
Speaker 23: was literally here probably five or ten minutes. He wasn't
Speaker 23: here long. I invited a minute said no, no, no, it's
Speaker 23: all right. You didn't even come inside. I was angry
Speaker 23: with him.
Speaker 8: Actually, they're going to do nothing.
Speaker 23: You know, she's missing they're not even going to open
Speaker 23: the can of worms and say, right, let's dig into
Speaker 23: this further. And if it wasn't for Glenn Taylor, that's
Speaker 23: where it still remained today. And I remember Waying Tenby
Speaker 23: at the time. He was just probably only a fresh
Speaker 23: constant book back then, and he's just sort of standing
Speaker 23: behind Disco said, and I remember he told me this.
Speaker 23: He said, Oh, well, women do this all the time.
Speaker 23: They take off, they get a bit frustrated.
Speaker 8: And they just go. And I said, no, she wouldn't
Speaker 8: do that. Brahma would never leave her kids.
Speaker 23: I said to him, Oh, well, we're treating it like yeah,
Speaker 23: miss in person until we have any other events. They
Speaker 23: believed everything John had told them, and the story he
Speaker 23: told them was that she got picked up that night
Speaker 23: by a car. Apparently she'd gone into the bedroom, made.
Speaker 9: A phone call.
Speaker 8: Ten minutes later a car picture up.
Speaker 23: Because he told me this, and I said to him
Speaker 23: at the time, well, did you see who it was? No,
Speaker 23: did you go and check who she got in the
Speaker 23: car with. Where were you when she left the house?
Speaker 23: And he said, I was watching TV at the other
Speaker 23: end of the house. I said, but John, she could
Speaker 23: have got in the car with anybody. I can't believe
Speaker 23: he wouldn't have even looked to see. This is the
Speaker 23: story he was spinning to the police and to myself.
Speaker 8: You went home, when you come home.
Speaker 25: While den was talking to Discount, you didn't mind that
Speaker 25: she was talking to Discoon.
Speaker 8: Not at all.
Speaker 4: Now, I sure would have probably told Disco at the time,
Speaker 4: But then Discins was pretty short of me the question anyway,
Speaker 4: like it was just like he was walked in and
Speaker 4: said the lay next door's gone missing. There was any
Speaker 4: signs of violence or anything. No, I never saw any violence,
Speaker 4: and I didn't So.
Speaker 24: When was the first time that a detective heard about
Speaker 24: the car rolling down the hill.
Speaker 2: And the lightspeaking? Offered?
Speaker 1: We established that it was indeed five years later, when
Speaker 1: Detective Sergeant Glenn Taylor took the case over in nineteen
Speaker 1: ninety eight. Murray Nolan's police statement is dated September of
Speaker 1: that year.
Speaker 24: Do you think that if Discot had come in, sat
Speaker 24: you down, or asked you to come down the police
Speaker 24: station and I really wanted to understand what had happened
Speaker 24: and questioned you in ninety three, would you have still
Speaker 24: been silent?
Speaker 8: Let me phrase your question, Sorry, what you said.
Speaker 24: Before, was that discin was pretty short, didn't seem terribly
Speaker 24: interested its chuggling with John.
Speaker 12: But hypothetical if in fact he had asked you to
Speaker 12: come down the station. He wanted to get a statement
Speaker 12: from you.
Speaker 25: It's ninety three, it's may You've got your suspicions, but
Speaker 25: you're also feeling some loyalty to John.
Speaker 12: What do you reckon you would have done then in those.
Speaker 25: Circumstances, if you were being pressed by the detective to
Speaker 25: cough up some information.
Speaker 8: I would have told them nothing. But I just didn't
Speaker 8: want to get involved. I thought it was just too obvious.
Speaker 4: Well, I just want this guy's going to get arrested
Speaker 4: quite soon for so much evidence here against him.
Speaker 12: Was he intimidating you?
Speaker 2: Not at all?
Speaker 8: Not at all.
Speaker 12: No, did you ever tell him, Hey, I hadn't talked
Speaker 12: to a police.
Speaker 4: At all when memory even mentioned Bromwin between me and John,
Speaker 4: when they've mentioned it.
Speaker 24: And have you had experiences with the police that has
Speaker 24: helped sort of shape your view that you don't tell
Speaker 24: them information about your friend.
Speaker 4: My dad is a detective and a lot a lot
Speaker 4: of respect for the police. My only issue was I
Speaker 4: just didn't want to get involved on stepping back. He's mistaken. Yes,
Speaker 4: I realized it's a mistake now that it's I'm offul
Speaker 4: this is so then when nothing got done, yes.
Speaker 25: Because it sounds like he was an acquaintance, not really
Speaker 25: a close mate.
Speaker 8: Look, I wasn't.
Speaker 4: I wasn't staying silent to protect him. I was just
Speaker 4: staying silent because I didn't want to get involved.
Speaker 8: Marry doesn't like a lot of confrontation. Allow my little world.
Speaker 25: Indeed, do you recall whether you told this getting in
Speaker 25: ninety three what Murray had told you?
Speaker 8: And I think I did tell him that, whether I
Speaker 8: was told dead.
Speaker 1: Murray shared with deb that he had seen the car leave,
Speaker 1: but he didn't share with her for some time the
Speaker 1: most suspicious features that the car left with its lights off,
Speaker 1: injured off, and that it scraped the ground while reversing
Speaker 1: down the driveway.
Speaker 8: I wouldn't have mentioned any of that to Discan. No,
Speaker 8: I definitely wouldn't have.
Speaker 25: What changed for you five years later when Glenn Taylor
Speaker 25: became involved, Why did you talk to him?
Speaker 4: I could see that was going nowhere and there's injustice
Speaker 4: been done here. When I would give a formal statement
Speaker 4: on the truth.
Speaker 1: Earlier, Murray disclosed that his father was a police detective,
Speaker 1: and this made it harder for me to understand Murray's
Speaker 1: silence when detectives Graham Diskin and Wayne Temby turned up
Speaker 1: at Sandstone Crescent.
Speaker 12: Did you talk to your father about it?
Speaker 2: Yes?
Speaker 4: What did you tell him? That's home the situation in
Speaker 4: what had happened, probably a couple of days later. Yes,
Speaker 4: And he said it looks all he strangler. I said,
Speaker 4: I don't think so too, because there was no blood,
Speaker 4: There was no nothing.
Speaker 8: I said that. I said, what's JAILO? Is jerns a
Speaker 8: turn or is joil a punishment? Yeah? In answer me,
Speaker 8: But that's why I was wiring.
Speaker 2: Up as well. What is jail?
Speaker 4: To put that block of that fellow up for ten
Speaker 4: years in jail? It's probably not. It wasn't a pleasant
Speaker 4: thing to do. And I thought, but I'm not going
Speaker 4: to be the one who's going to do that. I'm
Speaker 4: going to sit out of this because it was to
Speaker 4: me it was obvious.
Speaker 12: Did your dad know that you were sitting out of it?
Speaker 2: Yeah?
Speaker 8: Yes, he was okay, he was okay that yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 8: In my mind it was just it was cut and right.
Speaker 12: But your idea is about the right thing to do.
Speaker 2: Change.
Speaker 8: Since then, my ideas probably haven't changed. My idea is
Speaker 8: just tell the truth, but.
Speaker 12: It is a deliberate o mission telling the truth.
Speaker 8: There's no deliberate omissions in that.
Speaker 3: No.
Speaker 12: I mean from ninety three, not telling anyone.
Speaker 8: No, I wasn't asked.
Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, I wasn't ask and I was staying out
Speaker 4: of it.
Speaker 1: John's reputation in the community has ebbed like the tide
Speaker 1: at Boulders Beach.
Speaker 23: Well, they are calling the murder around he murder from
Speaker 23: the time Brown went missing.
Speaker 8: It was ten years later to the inquest. I think
Speaker 8: he thought you'd got away with it.
Speaker 1: Madison Walsh and I talked about Murray's decision in nineteen
Speaker 1: ninety three to keep his head down and his mouth shut.
Speaker 1: Maddie has also met Murray at his home in Lennox Head,
Speaker 1: next to Bromwin and John's house. She stared at that
Speaker 1: house and wondered what happened inside on that night, And
Speaker 1: like me, Madison finds Murray thoughtful and keen to help
Speaker 1: this investigation, which makes his omission of what was vital
Speaker 1: information really hard to fathom. Detective disc And came to
Speaker 1: see him in that early stage. Mary believed that they
Speaker 1: looked a bit interested. They weren't taking it that seriously.
Speaker 1: But by the same taken Murray didn't give them information
Speaker 1: that he had that they could have used to take
Speaker 1: it seriously.
Speaker 7: It's not a big place, a lot of secrets would
Speaker 7: be kept.
Speaker 1: John's car leaving with the lights off and the engine
Speaker 1: off and was scraping on the road. That was one
Speaker 1: of the reasons why Murray was suspicious of a murder
Speaker 1: right back on day one. Murray didn't tell the police
Speaker 1: that until he was interviewed five years later.
Speaker 7: That could have been just enough for it to be
Speaker 7: taken seriously. Saying that he witnessed that.
Speaker 1: He says he knew that she'd been killed. He said,
Speaker 1: but I just knew that she was dead.
Speaker 7: He's probably not the only one that thought that way
Speaker 7: or had an inkling of a thought that early on either.
Speaker 1: We speculated over whether it would have made a difference that.
Speaker 7: Could have been enough for formal interviews to be completed.
Speaker 7: At that time.
Speaker 1: You could have called sumb and said, I think we
Speaker 1: need the homicide squad here. Those detectives are very experienced
Speaker 1: in hardcore.
Speaker 7: The fact that there was no forensic investigation done on
Speaker 7: the car, because that could have changed everything as well.
Speaker 1: Although Murray had told me he was not intimidated by John,
Speaker 1: I have wondered about this. Murray was incapacitated as a
Speaker 1: result of a very accident in the surf when a
Speaker 1: large swell was producing heavy waves at trestles off black
Speaker 1: Head near Ballina.
Speaker 4: I'd crossed my vertebrae in my back as the worst
Speaker 4: pain of ever thought in my life.
Speaker 8: Pushed my spine right up into the back of your head. Oh,
Speaker 8: it was horrible. And what did you do?
Speaker 12: Did you hit a sand that.
Speaker 8: Went over the falls and bang lan on me?
Speaker 4: Bun but hit a roof land on a reof crushed
Speaker 4: it like a can possible for a couple of weeks,
Speaker 4: and then came home and Miss Preston regrigerated.
Speaker 1: He was in his house in Sandstone Crescent recovering his
Speaker 1: physical movements severely restricted, after being released from the medical
Speaker 1: ward a day before Bronwin's disappearance. Murray was a young
Speaker 1: dad of small children at home. Back then, John was
Speaker 1: in excellent physical condition. He was strong and fit from surfing,
Speaker 1: from his manual labor on building sites and working out
Speaker 1: with weights in his garage, John could have seemed physical
Speaker 1: intimidating without even trying to be.
Speaker 7: Debbie and Murray like, are they still in relative contact
Speaker 7: with him or have they completely ceased communication.
Speaker 1: They're not enemies and they're not boosom buddies. Debbie says
Speaker 1: she can't stand him and he won't look at her
Speaker 1: in the eye when she sees.
Speaker 2: Him around town.
Speaker 1: Wow, whereas Murray says he bumps into him a lot,
Speaker 1: mostly at the beach when they're getting ready to go.
Speaker 2: For a surf.
Speaker 7: I mean, maybe that's what works for him.
Speaker 1: John Winfield still lives relatively close to deb and Murray,
Speaker 1: although John sold the house in Sandstone Crescent a quarter
Speaker 1: of a century ago. In fact, just about everything in
Speaker 1: Lennox's head is close, relatively.
Speaker 8: Literally around the corner. At five ten minutes, I can
Speaker 8: take you there, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, I'll take you
Speaker 8: for a drive.
Speaker 1: As we drove out of Sandstone Crescent, deb raised Murray's
Speaker 1: disclosures about him not wanting to tell police what he
Speaker 1: saw and heard on the night of May sixteenth, nineteen
Speaker 1: ninety three.
Speaker 2: So where are we going now?
Speaker 23: We call this the Headlands. As you can see Headlands Drive.
Speaker 23: That's where I see John walking around here millionaires roll
Speaker 23: I call it that. He bought a dual block, one
Speaker 23: for himself and one for Jody. Are they good views
Speaker 23: up here over this side there are.
Speaker 2: And these properties look at the ocean. Yeah they do.
Speaker 1: I asked deb whether she or Murray had wondered whether
Speaker 1: his decision to hold back some information for five years
Speaker 1: was one of the reasons the first investigation went nowhere.
Speaker 5: Yes and no.
Speaker 23: When disc and as I said, was investigating it, if
Speaker 23: you'd like to call it.
Speaker 1: That, it was just like a general chit chat.
Speaker 23: He was giving them the benefit of the doubt really
Speaker 23: to say that, oh, they'll do their job. Their police
Speaker 23: officers know what they should be doing. And it all
Speaker 23: kind of died nowhere else we could go. He was
Speaker 23: waiting for them to really be the ones that will
Speaker 23: or less bring it to a head or swept under
Speaker 23: the carpet. I always get him confused, Sorry, Ledley, here
Speaker 23: we are here.
Speaker 1: Yeah, he brought that block on that block.
Speaker 8: The house next saw that jobs it's a fortress.
Speaker 2: It is very odd looking.
Speaker 1: It had been need as of him inside.
Speaker 8: That's his car in the driveway.
Speaker 2: That's him there.
Speaker 1: Right, very exclusive.
Speaker 12: As you can.
Speaker 23: See sitting up there in your smug castle.
Speaker 1: It seemed like a terrible person.
Speaker 13: Don't I.
Speaker 1: This has weighed on you for a long time.
Speaker 23: Because I have a sister, and if it hadn't in
Speaker 23: my family, I just don't know how I would be
Speaker 23: able to handle that.
Speaker 1: She was a friend and a good friend at the time.
Speaker 23: We'd still be friends today, I know we would.
Speaker 1: Did you ever have any disagreements?
Speaker 8: No, we didn't, not at all.
Speaker 23: I did feel so sorry for her though, she was
Speaker 23: gone through so much heartache with him, which is why
Speaker 23: I kipt didn't trying to encourage her to go.
Speaker 1: I didn't really expect it.
Speaker 23: All to turn out like it has.
Speaker 1: In the very first episode of Bromwin, you heard that
Speaker 1: Murray still saw John most days when they would go
Speaker 1: to Boulders Beach to check out the surf. But they
Speaker 1: haven't talked to each other about Bromwin since way back
Speaker 1: in the beginning thirty one years ago, and they have
Speaker 1: not had any contact with each other over the past
Speaker 1: month and a half. Since this podcast series, Bromwin started
Speaker 1: in May twenty twenty four, John has been surfing different beaches.
Speaker 1: While the episodes have been unfolding. He has not been
Speaker 1: back to his favorite break Boulders for some time, and
Speaker 1: I haven't heard again from John since he emailed me
Speaker 1: back in May to say that Bromwin's family was afflicted
Speaker 1: by mental illness. We know that he emphatically denies wrongdoing.
Speaker 1: We need to stress this. There is a standing offer
Speaker 1: to John to tell his side of the story in
Speaker 1: an interview with me for this podcast. We hope that
Speaker 1: John will choose to talk.
Speaker 26: There's been a development in a suspected murder of New
Speaker 26: South Wales mother Bronwyn Winfield more than three decades ago.
Speaker 1: As this episode eight was being produced, detectives from Sydney's
Speaker 1: Unsolved Homicide Unit flew north and met Judy Singh for
Speaker 1: a lengthy sit down interview in the Tweedheads police station.
Speaker 1: The detectives took her statement for the first time in
Speaker 1: thirty one years. Afterwards, Judy went with police to the
Speaker 1: home in Granite Street, Lennox Head where she and her
Speaker 1: children lived. Jude saw the balcony and the deck where
Speaker 1: she was sitting when she says she saw John Winfield
Speaker 1: drive past in the ford falcon very late at night
Speaker 1: with what appeared to be a body wrapped in sheets
Speaker 1: in the back seat of the car. Jude must be
Speaker 1: glad that she's finally been properly heard.
Speaker 26: A witness account, which was previously dismissed, is now being
Speaker 26: considered by detectives.
Speaker 1: The idea that Bromwin took off to start a secret
Speaker 1: new life with no money and somehow evaded every proof
Speaker 1: of life check over the past thirty one years is
Speaker 1: too far fetched to be taken seriously. It's also offensive
Speaker 1: to all those who knew Bromwinn's remarkable dedication to her children,
Speaker 1: Crystal and Lauren. Bromwin Joy Winfield, who was thirty one
Speaker 1: when she disappeared on the night of May sixteenth, nineteen
Speaker 1: ninety three, must be dead, but where Bromlin's remains. A
Speaker 1: new theory has emerged and developed strength during this podcast investigation.
Speaker 1: But there's a cautionary note now, it's only speculation, and
Speaker 1: I've been down this road before with no result. In
Speaker 1: the case of murderer Chris Dawson's concealment of his wife
Speaker 1: Lynn's body in nineteen eighty two, the former family babysitter
Speaker 1: who became Chris's second wife, suspected Lynn's body was close
Speaker 1: to the house in Bayview on Sydney's Northern Beaches. He
Speaker 1: is how Rebecca Hazel, who became very good friends with
Speaker 1: Chris's second wife, described it to me when I was
Speaker 1: investigating the case for the Teacher's Pet. This is from
Speaker 1: one of the early episodes in that series.
Speaker 20: Here, she's adamant, absolutely adamant. Yep, no doubt for her.
Speaker 20: She just seems like she's gone that block. I know
Speaker 20: that's where she is. She looked up, she said she's
Speaker 20: up there.
Speaker 2: She's somewhere up there on that block.
Speaker 20: For a while she could kept saying she's on the block,
Speaker 20: and then at some point she started telling me, you know,
Speaker 20: I do haven't checked the loose soil.
Speaker 1: Now, in twenty twenty four, we still don't know where
Speaker 1: Lynn's remains are. A search of the property by police
Speaker 1: in twenty eighteen did not shed any light on her whereabouts.
Speaker 27: Police have started digging for the remains of missing mum
Speaker 27: Lynette Dawson, who disappeared thirty six years ago and has
Speaker 27: thought to be buried in the garden of her family
Speaker 27: home at Bayview on the Northern Beaches.
Speaker 1: In Bromwin's case, there were searches of the house and
Speaker 1: backyard at Sandstone Crescent by forensics officers in two thousand
Speaker 1: and nine when a review by Unsolved Homicide Unit detectives
Speaker 1: was unfolding, but nothing came out of these efforts. Sixteen
Speaker 1: years after Bromwin's disappearance. Kadava dogs have also been put
Speaker 1: onto the property. Lennox Head locals have their theories in Gluis,
Speaker 1: also known as Scruffy the Concrete, has given evidence of
Speaker 1: what he believed was an unusually thick concrete slab in
Speaker 1: a house John was working on around the time of
Speaker 1: Bromwan's disappearance. Scruffy spoke to me about it when we
Speaker 1: first met.
Speaker 8: We went to do a sort of laundry bathroom area.
Speaker 28: I actually said, why do you fuck the levels up here?
Speaker 2: Because it was thick.
Speaker 1: Laundry and bathroom areas don't have to be that thick
Speaker 1: and concrete to Deer he was working there as the brickplayer.
Speaker 1: You are going to hear more about this when we
Speaker 1: get to the episode dealing with the evidence. At the inquest,
Speaker 1: Scruffy got back in touch.
Speaker 2: What has been on your mind?
Speaker 28: What everyone wants to know is where's Bromwin? Yes, one
Speaker 28: day she's there, and the next to the sign of
Speaker 28: her and the kids went at the skill. They had
Speaker 28: taken them down to Sydney, and then it wasn't until
Speaker 28: they came back that all of a sudden what happened
Speaker 28: to Bromwin and the backstory started going, well, her mother
Speaker 28: was n absent and left him family home, and she's
Speaker 28: following in her footsteps.
Speaker 2: John had been pushing to everyone.
Speaker 8: Brown was supposedly unstable.
Speaker 1: You've previously heard Deb Hall saying she's one hundred percent
Speaker 1: sure that John killed Bromin. She suggests that John, who
Speaker 1: emphatically denies wrongdoing, continues to live in the community because
Speaker 1: he takes the view they can't get.
Speaker 8: Me because they can't find the body.
Speaker 12: That's why I think he lives his life like he does.
Speaker 1: Deb and Murray are also convinced that when John left
Speaker 1: the house in the car on the night of May sixteenth,
Speaker 1: nineteen ninety three, he was in a panic. Whatever happened
Speaker 1: was not planned. Something had happened.
Speaker 23: He had his served body, had his bag, so he
Speaker 23: wasn't planning on going back to Sydney that night.
Speaker 9: Why would you do that?
Speaker 1: Here's the former experienced detective Glenn Taylor, who did dozens
Speaker 1: of interviews and worked very hard on the case for
Speaker 1: several years from nineteen ninety eight. Glenn's investigations had a
Speaker 1: significant impact and Bromwin would thereafter be seen as a
Speaker 1: probable victim of murder.
Speaker 29: Circumstantially, I believe it's extremely likely that foul play occurred
Speaker 29: in the house that night. John was obviously in a
Speaker 29: bit of a panic that his wife, Wrongan, had moved
Speaker 29: back into the home.
Speaker 1: Glenn described the events of the Sunday night from when
Speaker 1: John left the house in the family car, having woken
Speaker 1: the two girls for the drive to Sydney. You've heard
Speaker 1: some of this before, but course of its significance and
Speaker 1: what's to follow, it's best if it's really well understood.
Speaker 29: And upon arrival at the house in Sandstone Crescent, Lannox said,
Speaker 29: Roman answered the door and from there within in what
Speaker 29: we call only one sided conversation as to what then
Speaker 29: took place. According to John, they discussed their marriage, and
Speaker 29: according to him, she said that she wanted to have
Speaker 29: a break from the children, and she made some mysterious
Speaker 29: telephone call and shortly thereafter, about nine point thirty pm,
Speaker 29: that's what he's saying, she walked out the front door,
Speaker 29: and he heard a car pull up, but he didn't
Speaker 29: check to see who was in the car. That was
Speaker 29: the last time ro was ever seen. And then he
Speaker 29: made a sudden decision then to get in his car,
Speaker 29: get in the car that Romwin had possession of, and
Speaker 29: then bundle the in the car. And when I'm in
Speaker 29: bundle and then they would taken out of their beds
Speaker 29: in the pajamas they would put in the family car
Speaker 29: on the back seat with the family dog. I'm not
Speaker 29: concluding anything sinister, but the neighbor shortly before eleven pm
Speaker 29: that night observed the white Ford.
Speaker 12: Rolling down the driveway.
Speaker 29: We don't know, but it could be an influence that
Speaker 29: was waiting the boot. And then the vehicle then rolled
Speaker 29: down the hill still.
Speaker 12: With its lights off.
Speaker 29: And for some reason he believed that he needed to
Speaker 29: get a receipt, which he got. Eleven oh six pm
Speaker 29: that night, John Winfield obtained a receipt from the Airpole
Speaker 29: service station in Ballina. He still had that receipt years later,
Speaker 29: still in his wallet. He felt the need he had
Speaker 29: to retain that receipt, saying he filled up with fuel
Speaker 29: on possibly gas because it was also a gas operated
Speaker 29: vehicle and he drove all the way down to Sydney,
Speaker 29: arrived at his ex wife's home in Sydney with the
Speaker 29: two children, and he said, look, rom Win's gone on
Speaker 29: a holiday, or whereas to that effect, can you look
Speaker 29: after the children today.
Speaker 1: One of the odd things from the night Bromwin disappeared
Speaker 1: is John's attachment to the receipt from the Ampole service station.
Speaker 1: He showed it to Michelle, he showed it to Andy,
Speaker 1: he showed it to Megan when she saw him in Sydney.
Speaker 1: He showed it to the detective Graham Diskin. In nineteen
Speaker 1: ninety three and five years after Broman's disappearance, John produced
Speaker 1: the receipt from his wallet and showed it to Glenn Taylor,
Speaker 1: the then detective sergeant.
Speaker 9: It just hits me in the bat head like a
Speaker 9: sledge Emma.
Speaker 1: In the next episode, we are going to unpack John's
Speaker 1: highly unusual attachment too his receipt, and he believes he
Speaker 1: has finally solved this puzzle.
Speaker 9: Bugged us for so long.
Speaker 11: Why he had to put so much emphasis on that
Speaker 11: petrol receipt.
Speaker 9: It's a ship. What time you bought petrol? Who even
Speaker 9: needs to know that you bought.
Speaker 11: Petrol to drive a car to Sydney.
Speaker 9: No shit, Sherlock.
Speaker 1: Really, it's always bugged me, and you and I talked
Speaker 1: about It.
Speaker 9: Makes sense to us now.
Speaker 1: And it might just be a powerful clue to Bromwin's whereabouts.
Speaker 1: Bronwyn has written and investigated by me Headley Thomas as
Speaker 1: a podcast production for The Australian. If anyone has information
Speaker 1: which may help solve this cold case, please contact me
Speaker 1: confidentially by emailing Bronwyn at the Australian dot com dot au.
Speaker 1: You can read more about this case and see a
Speaker 1: range of photographs and other artwork at the website Bromwyn
Speaker 1: podcast dot com. Our subscribers and registered users here episodes first.
Speaker 1: The production and editorial team for Bromwin includes Claire Harvey,
Speaker 1: Kristin Amiert, Joshua Burton, Bridget, Bryan Bianca, far Marcus, Katie Burns,
Speaker 1: Liam Mendez, Sean Callen, Matthew Condon and David Murray. Audio
Speaker 1: production for this podcast series is by Wasabi Audio and
Speaker 1: original theme.
Speaker 2: Music by Slade Gibson.
Speaker 1: We have been assisted by Madison Walsh, a relation.
Speaker 2: Of Bromwin Winfield.
Speaker 1: We can only do this kind of journalism with the
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