Speaker 1: The public has had a long held fascination with detectives.
Speaker 1: Detective see aside of life the average person is never
Speaker 1: exposed to. I spent thirty four years as a cop.
Speaker 1: For twenty five of those years I was catching killers.
Speaker 1: That's what I did for a living. I was a
Speaker 1: homicide detective. I'm no longer just interviewing bad guys. Instead,
Speaker 1: I'm taking the public into the world in which I operated.
Speaker 1: The guests I talk to each week have amazing stories
Speaker 1: from all sides of the law. The interviews are raw
Speaker 1: and honest, just like the people I talked to. Some
Speaker 1: of the content and language might be confronting. That's because
Speaker 1: no one who comes into contact with crime is left unchanged.
Speaker 1: Join me now as I take you into this world. Today,
Speaker 1: I had a chat with retired Queensland cop Dennis Martin
Speaker 1: as a former detective. Dennis had a diverse career with
Speaker 1: the police, where he worked on the Daniel Morkam case
Speaker 1: helped track down pedophiles. Before he got into policing, he
Speaker 1: grew up in the remote country town of Mare, where
Speaker 1: there was a tough racial divide. When he was younger,
Speaker 1: he joined the army as a soldier and then went
Speaker 1: on to join the Queensland Police, where he spent the
Speaker 1: next twenty years of his life. I never worked with Dennis,
Speaker 1: but we've had lengthy conversations over the years after we're
Speaker 1: both out of the police. Let's have a listen, Dennis Martin,
Speaker 1: welcome to catch killers.
Speaker 2: No problems, Thanks very much.
Speaker 1: It's been a few years in the making getting you on.
Speaker 1: I think we first started talking and communicating after I'd
Speaker 1: left the cops and you were out of the cops.
Speaker 2: That's great. Yeah, yeah, it has been some years.
Speaker 1: Yeah. They slipped by it, don't they very quickly. I'm
Speaker 1: going to ask you a big question up front. When
Speaker 1: you look back, what's your reflections on your time in
Speaker 1: the police.
Speaker 2: Look, I think the reflection would be that it was
Speaker 2: a good job. There was a lot of satisfaction. There
Speaker 2: was a until you started to climb the rank structure,
Speaker 2: and then you found out obviously there was some you know,
Speaker 2: issues that you had to comply with if you were
Speaker 2: to go any further, if you wanted to stay as
Speaker 2: probably a constable. Yeah, I think everything was probably kosher
Speaker 2: and if you didn't want to do anything that was
Speaker 2: going to make anybody think adverse to you or make
Speaker 2: any decisions that other people didn't want you to make,
Speaker 2: you'd be quite happy.
Speaker 1: Yeah, there's a bit of a compromise, and they have
Speaker 1: the further up you go up up the corporate ladder,
Speaker 1: there is a hierarchy.
Speaker 2: Yeah. The sooner you get to the the closer you
Speaker 2: get to the point of the pyramid, the more scrutiny
Speaker 2: you come under, and the more I guess you leave
Speaker 2: yourself open for other people to have a go at you.
Speaker 1: Yeah. I look at policing and I'm not sure, and
Speaker 1: we're going to talk about your army career. But operational
Speaker 1: police and management police there two different streams. There were
Speaker 1: people that I could respect in the police that were
Speaker 1: good managers, but I didn't think they had the skills
Speaker 1: or the experience as an operational police officer. But it
Speaker 1: seems to get convoluted. As you climb up the top.
Speaker 1: Someone rises because they might be a good operational police officer,
Speaker 1: come management and they're not. They're better offers operational police
Speaker 1: officers and managers. Then on the other side you have
Speaker 1: these people who are good managers and they climb up
Speaker 1: the corporate ladder or the hierarchy, and all of a sudden.
Speaker 1: They think they're operational, but they haven't got the experience.
Speaker 2: That's exactly right. Yes, you'll get some people that come
Speaker 2: never leave the academy. Basically, they're like full time union students.
Speaker 2: Stay there and then they may come out on the
Speaker 2: road for a couple of years, and they're back is
Speaker 2: teaching the academy. Then they'll go to a managerial position,
Speaker 2: and then they're back on the road as an inspector
Speaker 2: giving you operational advice. Yeah, they have got no idea,
Speaker 2: absolutely no idea, and the advice they give you might
Speaker 2: be legally sound, but it's not correct for that part
Speaker 2: of the area of town you're in, if that makes sense.
Speaker 2: You know, they've got no feeling of what the crims
Speaker 2: are up to. They've got no desire to put a
Speaker 2: criminal notice and maybe source him out for some information.
Speaker 2: It's just there's the evidence. Why aren't you arresting him?
Speaker 2: Why hasn't this been done? They've got no idea to
Speaker 2: play the longer. Yeah, you know, and they are only
Speaker 2: there for one short period of time anyway, to get
Speaker 2: back behind a desk so they can go up to
Speaker 2: superintendent and someone say forth.
Speaker 1: I think that's a big and I can only speak
Speaker 1: for New South Wales, but my observation of other state police,
Speaker 1: possibly even the federal police. The way that people can
Speaker 1: climb the rank so quickly, I think causes problems. I
Speaker 1: looked at New South Wales and thought you could simplify
Speaker 1: or make it a better structured police force if you
Speaker 1: had to stay for a period of time on the rank,
Speaker 1: like say you became a sergeant, maybe you had to
Speaker 1: spend five to seven years as a sergeant before you
Speaker 1: could rise to be an inspector. Yeah.
Speaker 2: Look, I don't disagree with that at all, and I
Speaker 2: think that, you know, I tried to bring in something
Speaker 2: at what they call a detective training school. You've had
Speaker 2: some detective trainers there that were a detective sergeant, but
Speaker 2: you know they've been there for five and seven and
Speaker 2: eight years. And my suggestion was that, look, why don't
Speaker 2: you know you use this as some sort of I guess,
Speaker 2: a bit of training for the operational police officer. But
Speaker 2: a rest period gave him off the road after say
Speaker 2: ten years, give him two years there and then back
Speaker 2: on the right, fresh of them up, freshing them up
Speaker 2: and gives you up to date information and on road experience.
Speaker 2: For the new detectives coming through. Yeah, you thought I'd
Speaker 2: kill the mother. You can't suggest such things, absolutely not.
Speaker 2: He's been here for ten years and you know he's
Speaker 2: getting sized thirty eight in his trousers and wants to
Speaker 2: have small doughnuts for lunch. And there leave him alone.
Speaker 1: It's a strange world, strange world policing. But yeah, there's
Speaker 1: good and bad, and there's good cops bad cops. But anyway,
Speaker 1: your career and people, Yeah, whether you like it or not,
Speaker 1: but there's a lot of your profile is extrinsically linked
Speaker 1: to the Daniel Morkham case in that there was you're
Speaker 1: and we're going to talk about it in detail later
Speaker 1: on in the podcast, so that don't want to cover
Speaker 1: off on it now. I want people to understand who
Speaker 1: you are before we get into the detail. But people
Speaker 1: remember Daniel Markham that I think it was. He was
Speaker 1: thirteen years old two thousand and three, seventh of December
Speaker 1: two thousand and three when he disappeared. It was a
Speaker 1: horrendous situation and his parents campaigned for a long time
Speaker 1: and it took I think eight years before Brett Peter
Speaker 1: Cowen was finally arrested for Daniel's murder and convicted. You
Speaker 1: actually spoke to Brett Cowen within weeks of Daniel's disappearance
Speaker 1: and you at that point in time you formed the
Speaker 1: view that he was should be the number one suspect
Speaker 1: for the murder. That's greatky time, we're going to talk
Speaker 1: about that in depth because I think it's a very
Speaker 1: interesting gives you an insight into policing and the robust
Speaker 1: nature of policing, and there's a lot of pressure when
Speaker 1: you're investigating crimes of that nature.
Speaker 2: Yeah, look there is a lot of pressure, but there's
Speaker 2: a lot of pressure brought from both ends, both from
Speaker 2: the families that want something completed and they want some
Speaker 2: I guess resolution, and then you've got from the manage
Speaker 2: and the management side of policing. You were saying, look,
Speaker 2: we're not going to pay any overtime at the moment. Either,
Speaker 2: do your own time, working your own time, So it
Speaker 2: comes down from money. And then you've got pressure from
Speaker 2: the operational management. We're saying we've got another murders just occurred.
Speaker 2: You need to wrap this up, or we need to
Speaker 2: not give you as many resources. It's just never ending
Speaker 2: and people don't understand these competing priorities. Yeah, you know,
Speaker 2: and they think, well, what hasn't something happened? Yeah, probaty
Speaker 2: only got one guy working on it.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Well so all those competing competing interest and we'll
Speaker 1: break that down a little bit. But before we move
Speaker 1: on and talk about you, we're just in. I've seen
Speaker 1: you speak about the Markham case and the empathy that
Speaker 1: you have for Daniel's parents family, about what they went
Speaker 1: through and how tirelessly they worked Denise and Bruce to
Speaker 1: get justice for their kids. So I think we need
Speaker 1: to sort of pay some homage to them and the
Speaker 1: brutality of the crime. It's one that captured the attention
Speaker 1: of the nation, really didn't.
Speaker 2: It did, And they were just the epitome of what
Speaker 2: a family would be. They were shed somebody's grandmother. He
Speaker 2: was a nice gentle fellow. They were a lovely family
Speaker 2: and that's just the way they came across and they
Speaker 2: were honest and open. There was nothing you could say
Speaker 2: bad about them apart from just lovely people.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah, it was a sad, sad case. Was your life.
Speaker 1: It's been an interesting and diverse life. You grew up
Speaker 1: in Maury, western Town in New South Wales, it's a
Speaker 1: town that had a tough reputation. There was a bit
Speaker 1: of a racial divide there between the Aboriginal community and
Speaker 1: the white community. That's the perception that seems to come
Speaker 1: from the town. There was a lot of issues there.
Speaker 1: You grew up there as a young Aboriginal boy in
Speaker 1: that world. Tell us your experiences of your childhood growing
Speaker 1: up in Maury.
Speaker 2: Well, it's a very robust little town, you know, and
Speaker 2: I don't think it's ever changed. It's always been around
Speaker 2: ten thousand people, ten thy five hundred, very much an
Speaker 2: itinerant working town, and a lot of people would come
Speaker 2: and do stick picking and cotton chipping and all of
Speaker 2: those sort of things. You know, we lived what is
Speaker 2: now well inside the town limits. But when we were there,
Speaker 2: our house was on the outskirts and all it was
Speaker 2: as soon as you walked out your door, you turned
Speaker 2: left to go into scrubland and then you just get
Speaker 2: big bribe bushes coming down the road, or if you
Speaker 2: turn right, you go up to Killick store near the school.
Speaker 2: And that's the way it was, and that was the town.
Speaker 2: You know. There was never any I didn't see a
Speaker 2: great deal of racism in my early years it was
Speaker 2: later on when I realized what racism was. But apart
Speaker 2: from that, whether you were playing black white Chinese, not
Speaker 2: that there were many Chinese, but there was the Chinese
Speaker 2: shopping down, so you might have seen them. That was
Speaker 2: the only thing other than that they're all kids, and
Speaker 2: that's what it was, you know. Yeah, it was rough tumble.
Speaker 2: There was no shoes, There was no nothing to do
Speaker 2: other than you go out and play in the fields. Really,
Speaker 2: that's that's all there was.
Speaker 1: Do you have good memories of your childhood?
Speaker 2: Yeah? I do. Growing up, my father was a grave
Speaker 2: digger and that's all pick and shovel, So I remember
Speaker 2: going with him to the cemetery on a lot of occasions,
Speaker 2: helping backfill graves. And then he was also the senatory
Speaker 2: cart so he'd run down through the back lanes early
Speaker 2: in the hours and pick up the sanitary carts from
Speaker 2: the toilets in the back. And so I jump on
Speaker 2: the truck and go and help him tar out the
Speaker 2: tin till we took in the van and washed them out.
Speaker 2: So it was all of that sort of stuff, you know,
Speaker 2: And that's just and there'd been nothing to go and
Speaker 2: get a twenty two and go over and you get
Speaker 2: some rabbits and bring them home and you know, skin
Speaker 2: them and gut them and have some dinner that evening.
Speaker 2: Or it was absolutely that's what we were allowed to do.
Speaker 1: Okay, that was the life. Well, it gives a bit
Speaker 1: of an insight and compared to life growing up in
Speaker 1: the city, no wonder you turn out tough growing up
Speaker 1: and having environment. And I supped it self sufficient too.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Well, look, it's a funny story when you say that,
Speaker 2: because years later my daughter, I can't remember how well,
Speaker 2: she might have been about six or seven. It was
Speaker 2: near Easter time and I didn't even give it a thought,
Speaker 2: and I took her over into the paddocks and we
Speaker 2: got some rabbits and he did shoot the yes, and
Speaker 2: she's still from to this day he brings it up
Speaker 2: that I killed Easter bunny. Tasted nice.
Speaker 1: Your por chop will have to get there on the
Speaker 1: on the podcast. So how long were you living in
Speaker 1: Maur Did you join the army straight from Maur.
Speaker 2: Yeah, look, I joined, I didn't join. I I did
Speaker 2: some work at the local RSL club and I was
Speaker 2: sitting there one day after cleaning the toilets and our
Speaker 2: little things that used to do at the club. And
Speaker 2: in came the recruitings ergeant from the army, so they
Speaker 2: were in town. So I went and had a chat
Speaker 2: and he goes, look, no one joins the army for
Speaker 2: three years, mate, He said, you always do it for
Speaker 2: six wink wink. I didn't know.
Speaker 1: So in I went and signature before it walked out.
Speaker 2: Absolutely yeah, So in I went and that was that
Speaker 2: was that, And I didn't come out until ninety seven
Speaker 2: and then stayed in as a reservist after that.
Speaker 1: How old were you when you joined the eighteen and
Speaker 1: where'd you do your basic training?
Speaker 2: Basic training was at one RTP kopooka Atana wagga yea.
Speaker 2: I still clearly remember. I was in Charlie Company, twenty
Speaker 2: four Patoon and it was a corporate kirk out and
Speaker 2: I still remember him. Yeah, just it looked very similar
Speaker 2: to yourself.
Speaker 1: My son went through the basic training down there, and
Speaker 1: I remember, I call it the best bit of par
Speaker 1: anything I did, because I sent him in as a
Speaker 1: kidney came out of man. But it really I saw
Speaker 1: the difference. And it was what three four months or
Speaker 1: whatever the training was, but you saw the kids get
Speaker 1: on the bus and be driven there and by the
Speaker 1: time they're passing out they were completely different human boots.
Speaker 2: Absolutely love you know. I was pretty straight up and
Speaker 2: down coming from Mari. I thought, yep, jumped on the
Speaker 2: bus here in Sydney because so sorry, I got recruited
Speaker 2: and you had to fly from. Actually, I think we've
Speaker 2: got to train over and not train from. There's only
Speaker 2: one train every couple of days from Mari to Sydney,
Speaker 2: and then had to make our way to the recruiting
Speaker 2: section and then they got us on a bus from
Speaker 2: here to Wagga. But during the bus trip they searched
Speaker 2: you took anything off of your like knives or anything
Speaker 2: that you shouldn't have had got you off for the bus.
Speaker 2: At the end of the day, lined up all your gear,
Speaker 2: took it away next top with the barbershop, no hair left.
Speaker 2: I was just that's the way it was.
Speaker 1: I remember before my son joined though, I was saying,
Speaker 1: you probably want to do some training, get some training,
Speaker 1: get some fitness up, and that I'd go for a
Speaker 1: run with him in the morning and do a little
Speaker 1: bit and he'd be laying there, laying on the lands.
Speaker 1: I think you have no idea, You have no idea
Speaker 1: what's about to happen to you. But anyway, it's an experience.
Speaker 1: So where'd you go and what was your role after
Speaker 1: basic training?
Speaker 2: Well, after that, I went to what they called, I
Speaker 2: guess initial employment training down at Pucketpanyol. I went down
Speaker 2: there for another few months and then I ended up
Speaker 2: here at Mossman at thirty Terminal Squadron. So I stayed
Speaker 2: there for a couple of years, and then I went
Speaker 2: to Uburudonga and then swapped over to Intelligence Corps and
Speaker 2: I went from there to One INC Company at in Brisbane.
Speaker 2: Whilst there at One INC Company did tours of Somalia
Speaker 2: and they came an interesting Yeah, that was interesting.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: I was caught up there with a few things that
Speaker 2: you know, yeah, I guess being investigated for war crimes
Speaker 2: and all that sort of stuff when we came back.
Speaker 2: And that continued right throught about two thousand and nine.
Speaker 2: They just kept sniping from the sidelines and found out
Speaker 2: there was nothing there. And that's the way it was
Speaker 2: obviously until people started coming back from Afghanistan and Iraq
Speaker 2: and they thought we've got some new people there we
Speaker 2: can investigate, so turned the long.
Speaker 1: Yeah, they left alone on there what's the role I
Speaker 1: think the people who have been listening to the podcasts
Speaker 1: long enough gather sense of what the role of an
Speaker 1: intel officer is in the cops. What's the role of
Speaker 1: a military intel officer?
Speaker 2: Yeah, well, look, a military intel also has a lot
Speaker 2: of hats they can wear, and you know the psychological operations,
Speaker 2: So on which turn you would go in and try
Speaker 2: to work out how you're going to I guess change
Speaker 2: the hearts and mind to the people. You might be
Speaker 2: doing air drops of that sort of stuff, And I
Speaker 2: remember quite clearly and in Somalia the French Foreign Legion
Speaker 2: tried similar But what they did was, you know, drop
Speaker 2: things from the helicopters and say, look, come in and
Speaker 2: give us your weapons. And they were waiting for them
Speaker 2: as were coming with the weapons. They took them as
Speaker 2: combatants and just shot them dead. Deal with the French
Speaker 2: Foreign Lesion.
Speaker 1: Okay, well that's yeah, we're not formed for that point.
Speaker 2: So then we have counterintelligence. Obviously you're looking at owned
Speaker 2: forces counter intelligence and then counter intelligence on the enemy.
Speaker 2: Then we have not eye ups, imagery, endless, linguist endless,
Speaker 2: and one analyss one intelligence operator can do the whole lot.
Speaker 2: So it was quite diverse. I thought, very good. I
Speaker 2: do remember clearly talking to an old general from the division,
Speaker 2: and he never spoke to obviously enlisted people like me
Speaker 2: very often. But I ended up being his intelligence sergeant
Speaker 2: and he said, look, I want ninety nine percent accuracy
Speaker 2: from here. If you're not, I'll get somebody else in tomorrow.
Speaker 2: So there was a lot of work to try and
Speaker 2: make sure that he got the accurate information.
Speaker 1: Well, this is an important role, isn't it. Like when
Speaker 1: you've just job description there of what you're covering. If
Speaker 1: you if you got it wrong, you could you could
Speaker 1: create a disaster literally.
Speaker 2: Look absolutely yeah. You know, at the end of the day,
Speaker 2: if you give them false information to act on that information,
Speaker 2: you know, you've got other people's lives in your hands.
Speaker 2: But I was actually very lucky that I went through
Speaker 2: that period of time that the intelligence operators went out
Speaker 2: beyond the field, right, and you know we're in different
Speaker 2: sort of clothes and trying to gain sources and get
Speaker 2: information like that, right, right, So that was it was
Speaker 2: very interesting.
Speaker 1: So I had more control of the information that came in,
Speaker 1: and you could make your assessments and a better way
Speaker 1: to verify based on that. What were the dramas in
Speaker 1: Somalia at the time when you were over there, What
Speaker 1: was going on?
Speaker 2: It was just all they call it clans, but that
Speaker 2: really just tribes or whatever you want to call it.
Speaker 2: They were just shooting, killing each other and the whole
Speaker 2: country was just a mess. It was run by a
Speaker 2: couple of warlords, you know. War's army was one in
Speaker 2: around the Bi Dull area. The other was a deed
Speaker 2: was the I think the main one from Mogadishu. Yeah,
Speaker 2: so I remember once I jumped on, I was told
Speaker 2: to go to mogad issue. And it was one of
Speaker 2: those things that people don't say, well, how do you
Speaker 2: get the mogod issue? Yes, you were told to get that.
Speaker 2: You got there. So I wandered out to the airfield
Speaker 2: and they I found an Irish fellow and it just
Speaker 2: happened to be Patrick's day and he was drinking a bit.
Speaker 2: Said I I'll get you to Modishu. So we went
Speaker 2: by Rwanda. What I ever was doing in Rwanda, I'll
Speaker 2: never know. And then we went from there, so I
Speaker 2: didn't go off the plane, so we'd come from there.
Speaker 2: We ended up Mogadisha and then I was they said,
Speaker 2: I'll just wander over there and tell them who you
Speaker 2: are and what you're for. And I did, and so
Speaker 2: I ended up with the Psychological Operations Group for in
Speaker 2: the seventh Marine Expeditionary Forts from America.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: So we're at the stadium in in Mogadishu, and I
Speaker 2: thought Pakistan was on our sides, but they started to
Speaker 2: shoot inwards to the stadium, not outwards.
Speaker 1: Just they were hopeless. It would have been an interesting
Speaker 1: time for you.
Speaker 2: It was interesting, you know, and it was a good experience. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1: So how long did you stay in the Army.
Speaker 2: I got out in ninety seven to join the police,
Speaker 2: but day on as reserves.
Speaker 1: Okay. What rank were you when you left?
Speaker 2: Sergeant?
Speaker 1: Sergeant Okay, so good experience. What made you leave the Army? Well,
Speaker 1: the career.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I wish I'd stayed in the Army, to be honest,
Speaker 2: But the issue with the Army was that it was
Speaker 2: a young man's game. And after it, Yeah, the physical
Speaker 2: title was incredible. You can only carry you know, seventy
Speaker 2: or sixty kilos on your back and dig holes to
Speaker 2: sleep in at nighttime for so long before you get
Speaker 2: a bit tired. And every day is training, which is
Speaker 2: nothing wrong with that, but you're training for something that
Speaker 2: may never occur, and when it does occur, it's a
Speaker 2: bit of an anti climax, and therefore you think, well,
Speaker 2: if that's it, there's not much else.
Speaker 1: I'm not putting it in.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and I'd always wanted to join the police, So
Speaker 2: because I did a join. I did apply to New
Speaker 2: South Wales as a cadet back in nineteen eighty two, right,
Speaker 2: but for one reason or another I didn't have the
Speaker 2: education or something they said, coming from Maria High School
Speaker 2: with great grades seas I thought to be fair.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: So other than that, no, So that's when I applied
Speaker 2: to join the Queensland place.
Speaker 1: Yeah, okay, policing. So New South Wales didn't accept you. No,
Speaker 1: okay Queensland may I'm not sure if you made the
Speaker 1: right choice or not, but okay with Queensland. So when
Speaker 1: did you join the Queensland Police?
Speaker 2: At ninety seven yea, I joined the Queensland Police. I
Speaker 2: went from there to Goodner, which is a tough little
Speaker 2: area and it encompassed quite a large area. So I
Speaker 2: did some a couple of years there in uniform.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Whereabouts is Goodnight, Goodner?
Speaker 2: Is in the western suburbs of Brisbane out towards Ipswich Yep.
Speaker 2: Still a bit of a rough area. It really are
Speaker 2: Pauline Hanson stomping grounds, but so it was a bit
Speaker 2: of a tough area. It was a very isolated area.
Speaker 2: I know, it was still within the confines of a CBD,
Speaker 2: but the amount of police we would have maybe two
Speaker 2: overnight for a really really large area, pretty as big
Speaker 2: as you know, the Northern Beaches, you know, you'd have
Speaker 2: two coppers overnight and that was it. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, how did you find going into policing after the army?
Speaker 1: Did you think it was beneficial for you the background
Speaker 1: that you had had in the army.
Speaker 2: I absolutely think that. I've seen a lot of people
Speaker 2: come from military, particularly army two police. I see very
Speaker 2: few police going back towards military, right, So my only
Speaker 2: thought in my mind was, well, it's got to be better, yeah,
Speaker 2: because we aren't coming back. Yeah, not that it's a backward,
Speaker 2: but I'm just saying they're not going transferring from there
Speaker 2: to military. So they've seen the light and so they're staying.
Speaker 1: There was always something about the military guys when they
Speaker 1: came across to the police and you saw quite a
Speaker 1: few that it seems to be like a natural progression,
Speaker 1: but they carry themselves a little bit different from from
Speaker 1: other police and that you always felt like when there
Speaker 1: was a lot of pressure on that was good. Having
Speaker 1: the bloat that's come from now blake, oral woman, that's
Speaker 1: come from the army, that okay, well they'll they'll crack
Speaker 1: under the pressure of it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, And I think, you know, with that came a
Speaker 2: lot of calculation from them. They knew you know that,
Speaker 2: or they knew how to use resources a little bit better,
Speaker 2: they knew how to communicate a bit better. They worked
Speaker 2: together well, they worked as a team, you know. And
Speaker 2: I just just thought that they it was a good
Speaker 2: natural progression anyway, and they did a good job.
Speaker 1: How did you find going like you retired in the
Speaker 1: army but as a sergeant and you've moved up up
Speaker 1: the rank structure, How did you find going from the
Speaker 1: army where you're you're running the show to an extent,
Speaker 1: then joining the police and starting right at the bottom again,
Speaker 1: how did you find that?
Speaker 2: I thought it was very difficult. Yeah, really I did,
Speaker 2: because I think coming across at the rank level I
Speaker 2: was from the army, you had control of quite a
Speaker 2: lot and a lot of people. You know directly, you know,
Speaker 2: thirty odd people underneath you, and then you come in
Speaker 2: there and you've got a senior Connie, you're a constable.
Speaker 2: They're probably about twenty three years of age, little live
Speaker 2: experience on their own. I just found it difficult, you
Speaker 2: know what I mean, particularly if you had a bit
Speaker 2: of a bum of one of them that thought they
Speaker 2: were a lot better than what they really were. But look,
Speaker 2: at the end of the day, I think we got
Speaker 2: it well on. I hopefully provided some advice and they
Speaker 2: gave me something as well.
Speaker 1: Well. The type of person you're talking about, the sensible
Speaker 1: way and the good type of leadership, I think in
Speaker 1: that situation is that if you've got someone under you
Speaker 1: that's got more experience or who knows something a little
Speaker 1: bit more that than you, they use them, use you
Speaker 1: use your experience. What would you do here? What would
Speaker 1: you do here? Dennis? That type of thing. But I
Speaker 1: think there's a fear and it's not just policing, but
Speaker 1: there's a fear that if you don't know and you're
Speaker 1: in the position of leadership, you've just got to carry on.
Speaker 1: And I see them quite often over compensate, like make
Speaker 1: decisions because I'm the boss. I'm going to tell you
Speaker 1: what to do, even though they haven't got the experience.
Speaker 1: But they've got a team of people underneath them that could, Yeah,
Speaker 1: they could ask for some advice. Yeah.
Speaker 2: And look, and I did find that quite a bit too,
Speaker 2: you know, that they weren't prepared to take advice. Yeah,
Speaker 2: because it looked weak.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Yeah, And obviously a lot of people and I didn't
Speaker 2: realize as particularly in the Queensland place. I don't know
Speaker 2: what was like in the New South Wales. But they
Speaker 2: were looking for comments and they said to me, make
Speaker 2: sure you keep comments. And I said, what do I
Speaker 2: want to keep comments for? I said, someone commidentates to
Speaker 2: me every day. And what they mean is that if
Speaker 2: you turned around and said, oh look, Denners, you've done
Speaker 2: a great job today, thank you very much. Your good
Speaker 2: time management. It's all just made up so that you
Speaker 2: can keep your email put on your resume for a promotion. Yeah,
Speaker 2: you know, mister Geel detectives Google and said that I
Speaker 2: was a good operator and I did good time management.
Speaker 2: Hence KSC one for the resume, and that's all they
Speaker 2: were doing.
Speaker 1: Look, we could talk about this all day, about that
Speaker 1: type of person in policing that's just looking for Oh
Speaker 1: if I do this, I'll look good on my next application.
Speaker 1: There in lies the problem with the leadership in the police.
Speaker 1: I think in that you should just be concentrated on
Speaker 1: doing your work and then the leadership will flow organically
Speaker 1: from that, or that's how it should, but it certainly
Speaker 1: certainly doesn't. What made you what, first of all, as
Speaker 1: a policeman, not a young policeman. So you've gone in
Speaker 1: there with life experiences, but I don't know about you.
Speaker 1: I made a lot of mistakes when you're first in
Speaker 1: the cops because it's a new world and that is
Speaker 1: there anything that you did and you look back and
Speaker 1: go to Jesus, what was I thinking? Yeah?
Speaker 2: There was, and there's still there, still would have been
Speaker 2: should have been in there? Yeah, yeah, Look I remember
Speaker 2: clearly we were a little bit I guess, a bit
Speaker 2: of Alerican. Yeah, that's a little bit of my attitude.
Speaker 2: Unfortunately a lot of people don't dislike it. But we
Speaker 2: had an old inspector and I know this's got nothing
Speaker 2: to do with cream, but it's something to do with
Speaker 2: our alaric. Yeah, and he was just a funny, funny fellow,
Speaker 2: but a nice fellow. And so we waited until he
Speaker 2: left the evening. We're on nightwab and so he sneaked
Speaker 2: in his office and deleted, sorry, shredded all his introy
Speaker 2: And so he came in and he thought, oh this
Speaker 2: is great, someone's done my work and sat back. And
Speaker 2: the next day about the day later there superintendent got
Speaker 2: stuck into him. You know, yeah, don't look at us there.
Speaker 2: We have none to do with it.
Speaker 1: You've got a little bit of laugh. I don't know.
Speaker 1: I can't. We can't encourage that. Don't try that in
Speaker 1: the place. Some mar chaoso goes in there, and I
Speaker 1: don't know. Maybe it's a way of balancing out that
Speaker 1: you can go from that to attending a car accident
Speaker 1: where family's been killed. So it's sort of leaving a
Speaker 1: little bit of steam off. I don't think it's a
Speaker 1: bad thing.
Speaker 2: Yeah, no, I think it's good.
Speaker 1: Yeah. What about playing clothes? What what drew you to
Speaker 1: working in detectives?
Speaker 2: Well, look where it really came from. I was in
Speaker 2: Queens and they give out a bull It's like an
Speaker 2: advertisement of jobs every week I think it was, or
Speaker 2: maybe every fortnight. I think it was every week, and
Speaker 2: you know, if you sort things. And I saw the
Speaker 2: undercover course come through and I thought, that really suits
Speaker 2: to what I used to do. I'll give it a go.
Speaker 2: So I went through the recruiting process for that and
Speaker 2: the betting process and got accepted. So I remember handing no,
Speaker 2: I didn't. I jogged home that afternoon with my pistol
Speaker 2: in my back back because I had to take it
Speaker 2: to the new unit, being the COVID unit, And I've
Speaker 2: got instructions to get on the train at Goodna, get
Speaker 2: off at Rama Street, get on a train to wooll
Speaker 2: and Gabba. Somebody be there to pick me up, and
Speaker 2: then they were half an hour later. Then they took
Speaker 2: me to a warehouse and that was where I would
Speaker 2: be stationed for the period of time I was an undercover.
Speaker 2: And then you came home a day or so later
Speaker 2: in an old bombed up car, a new identity and
Speaker 2: you and you sat at home until they called you
Speaker 2: for a job.
Speaker 1: Okay, so it wasn't part time. It was it was
Speaker 1: full time, full time undercover years working out of the
Speaker 1: covert premises and new identification and all that that would
Speaker 1: have been been exciting times.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it was, you know, and the process of how
Speaker 2: they all these identities came about and all the backstop
Speaker 2: that goes with it. It's a lot more work than
Speaker 2: what people think, you know, and they obviously later on
Speaker 2: I became involved in that as a controller, But that's
Speaker 2: down the track.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah, so what tell me about your first without
Speaker 1: giving away methodology, but you would have found yourself in
Speaker 1: some interesting situations as undercover. Yeah.
Speaker 2: Look, a majority of the cases were for drugs, yep.
Speaker 2: And it's not just small time drugies of course. Obviously
Speaker 2: we get inserted through sources, and human sources much about
Speaker 2: much must vouch for you, because you might't go any
Speaker 2: further if you don't have anyone to vouch for you.
Speaker 2: Those outlook Modell gangs or or big corporate drugs gangs.
Speaker 2: You know, you need somebody to say I've known them
Speaker 2: for a lot of years and this is how I've
Speaker 2: known them. You can trust them. Basically, that's how it works,
Speaker 2: and you're getting inserted and then we try to ditch
Speaker 2: that source a little bit further down to track with.
Speaker 2: Most sources are unreliable drugs themselves, or you know what
Speaker 2: they're in for, whether they're in it for some motivation
Speaker 2: that doesn't really reflect all their friends going down. So
Speaker 2: then you work your way up into the into the group,
Speaker 2: and everything you do is you're recorded in one way
Speaker 2: or another. And once you do a buy, you've got
Speaker 2: to meet up with your control I hand the drugs
Speaker 2: over and then continue on. But it's also very difficult
Speaker 2: to have that, you know, I guess try to portray
Speaker 2: to the gang that you know you're buying that to
Speaker 2: sell it to somebody else. Because you're in a gang,
Speaker 2: they're trying to make money. You've got to give money.
Speaker 2: You can't just be the buyer all the time. So
Speaker 2: it's a big game. It really is a big game.
Speaker 1: It's a complicated game, and there's so many moving parts
Speaker 1: and it takes a lot of planning. So I can
Speaker 1: understand from the intel background in the military and working
Speaker 1: in places like Somalia that it would all these moving
Speaker 1: parts in your head and you'd have to think, think
Speaker 1: on your feet.
Speaker 2: Yeah, And look, I think I was very lucky back
Speaker 2: then because the technology wasn't around when I say that
Speaker 2: is and I don't do it at all, but you know, Facebook, Instagram,
Speaker 2: all those sort of things.
Speaker 1: It's hard to build a legend or a profile, isn't it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, And it doesn't take long for the crooked to
Speaker 2: just jump on. I'll go and have a talk and
Speaker 2: they do face recognition. Now take a picture and I'll
Speaker 2: put it on through your Google app and it'll say, oh,
Speaker 2: Dennis here, he is here.
Speaker 1: What's going on before?
Speaker 2: Exactly? Yeah, So it's not hard. So I was pretty
Speaker 2: lucky really that I was around that period where there
Speaker 2: was very limited social media.
Speaker 1: Yeah, what was the saying that you're undercover persona? What
Speaker 1: what sort of roles did you play?
Speaker 2: The first one I played was a glazier, So I
Speaker 2: was running a glazier business. Yeah, and that was how
Speaker 2: I could get my people that I could sell the
Speaker 2: drugs to just go into the houses and whatnot and
Speaker 2: pull up on the side of the road, so they'd
Speaker 2: give you a little band with glazyer written aside and
Speaker 2: all that sort of stuff and a phone number on
Speaker 2: the side. But go to another I'll bust a detective
Speaker 2: sergeant or detective senior Connie somewhere that would answer the phone.
Speaker 2: And he did all this phone numbers, ringing Bill's glaziers.
Speaker 2: Next one I need to answer it to you know Tom's.
Speaker 1: Pub like I look at I've seen like undercover guys
Speaker 1: and girls. But even when you're running a couple of
Speaker 1: jobs and you've got a couple of phones going on,
Speaker 1: you've got to be switched on the whole time, isn't
Speaker 1: it Absolutely it's high high pressure. Yeah.
Speaker 2: Yeah, Look when I end up doing controlling, I would
Speaker 2: stick little stick at notes on each phone. Yeah, because
Speaker 2: you don't want to ring answer the wrong phone to
Speaker 2: do a different name.
Speaker 1: You know, it makes it hard. Was it conducive to
Speaker 1: having a life outside or did you have to fully
Speaker 1: commit to that lifestyle?
Speaker 2: No, fully committed. You have to, and you very limited
Speaker 2: time at home, especially with the young boundy. You don't
Speaker 2: get home, yeah, you know, and you have to do
Speaker 2: a lot of when you do come home. Yeah, you know,
Speaker 2: you really have to do a lot of surveillance, combative surveillance,
Speaker 2: making sure you probably go about twenty thirty forty k's
Speaker 2: out of your way just to get home. Yeah, you know,
Speaker 2: make sure no one's following you and all that sort
Speaker 2: of stuff. So a lot of times you've got police
Speaker 2: surveillance following you as well.
Speaker 1: As well, because they haven't you haven't been declared to
Speaker 1: place that they've got someone in the exactly.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, any tricky situations you found yourself in.
Speaker 2: Oh, look, I think there's always tricky situations. You know.
Speaker 2: One funny one that I thought I just couldn't do
Speaker 2: was it was going to a nightclub. And it was
Speaker 2: way back when our tape recordings we were wearing weren't
Speaker 2: as COVID as they are today.
Speaker 1: A strap in the brick ground, yes it.
Speaker 2: Was, and you had to watch your watch all the time,
Speaker 2: every thirty minutes. The little C ninety or C sixty
Speaker 2: I think that were the tapes would swap and go overside.
Speaker 2: So here's picting and I think, oh, this is not
Speaker 2: good in a quiet area, you know, especially to say
Speaker 2: at midnight when you're trying to do a deal in
Speaker 2: a park. I think they'll know you've got a tape on.
Speaker 2: So that was hard to get around. But then so
Speaker 2: we want you to go. They would give you know,
Speaker 2: some some agencies. I think this was for the federal police.
Speaker 2: There was a new drug on the Gold Coast and
Speaker 2: I think it was ice at that time, and they said,
Speaker 2: we want to want you to see if we get
Speaker 2: us a sample of ice and we'll see the purity
Speaker 2: and we'll try and find out, you know, if it's
Speaker 2: coming from the same source. And I said, well, you know,
Speaker 2: wearing tapes won't work in a nightclub because you just
Speaker 2: won't hear me and you won't hear the people. Oh video,
Speaker 2: I said, well, how are we going to get a video?
Speaker 2: So I am not joking. I am. They gave me
Speaker 2: a great tool peak hat that you're aware if you're
Speaker 2: running side. There was a little tape record about it's
Speaker 2: because I'll see ninety that you wear around him when
Speaker 2: you go running. Yeah, so I said, no, it's not
Speaker 2: gonna work. I forget it, not doing it.
Speaker 1: It has has improved. I remember I had an informant.
Speaker 1: I'm sending him into bikis and we had the best
Speaker 1: equipment available. And we're not talking methodology because everyone knows
Speaker 1: is completely trained. But it was summer and I swear
Speaker 1: to god, that was the size of half a brick
Speaker 1: and we're taping it around his chest, going now you'll
Speaker 1: be right mate, and he's looking at me going, are
Speaker 1: you fucking kidding? You want me to walking with this?
Speaker 1: And he looked deformed by the time we put it on.
Speaker 1: So yeah, it was. It was a different, different world,
Speaker 1: wasn't it.
Speaker 2: And it doesn't matter how good you are, you cannot
Speaker 2: walk into a situation like that feel threatened for your
Speaker 2: life because they do. They'll kill you if they Yeah,
Speaker 2: if they catch you, Yeah, knowing you've got that on
Speaker 2: it and knowing somebody could see if they closely looked
Speaker 2: at you, and you can't move because it takes a
Speaker 2: hair off your chest.
Speaker 1: And this is just not on the How about when
Speaker 1: you work, I'm not sure how deep you went under
Speaker 1: with different jobs, So I'm sure you made associations and
Speaker 1: friendships for on the surface with people that we're probably
Speaker 1: going to bring down. How'd you feel with that?
Speaker 2: Well, look, I had a really unusual time on the
Speaker 2: last job, and it was I ended up in a
Speaker 2: high rise on the Gold Coast. They put a contract
Speaker 2: on me after they found out I was undercover. Yes,
Speaker 2: we did a bio bus scenario type thing in the
Speaker 2: end and he was sitting there and he had a
Speaker 2: gun on his lap and he said, I wears the
Speaker 2: two hundred thousand dollars. They wouldn't give me two hundred
Speaker 2: thousand dollars. Yeah, they said, he's twenty thousand fluffed up
Speaker 2: to make look two or two hundred, and I thinking, ah, God,
Speaker 2: here we go again. Yeah, well it sort of didn't.
Speaker 2: Sort of didn't. When I showed the bum bag I
Speaker 2: still wear one today, opened the bum bag up, he goes, oh,
Speaker 2: that's good. He said, the drugs are in the safe.
Speaker 2: He said, you're lucky you bought the money. He said,
Speaker 2: I was going to kill you anyway and take the money.
Speaker 2: So and of course my only tracking device then was
Speaker 2: a mobile phone. Didn't work going up in the lift,
Speaker 2: so my control was down in the flour of this building,
Speaker 2: and so are outside and they couldn't hear me. So
Speaker 2: I talked my way out of the room and said, look,
Speaker 2: I'll go back down. I've got something in my car.
Speaker 2: I want to come back up and show you. All right,
Speaker 2: all right, So I straight out and just told them
Speaker 2: you better go up there quick.
Speaker 1: Yeah, get back up there. Yeah.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: But that's yeah, a lot of pressure. You obviously had
Speaker 1: the capability of handling that pressure that you put. Some
Speaker 1: people in that situation, they'd be shaking and yeah, couldn't
Speaker 1: go through it. Is it something in your makeup, or
Speaker 1: it's something you trained for, or.
Speaker 2: I think it's partly a bit of both. I think
Speaker 2: makeup is a little bit. You wouldn't apply for it
Speaker 2: if you didn't think you could do something. But the
Speaker 2: training is very very good. The training is very good.
Speaker 2: The scenarios within the training is very good, very realistic,
Speaker 2: and I would think that even now, the better the
Speaker 2: resources are, the better the equipment you use, confidence you
Speaker 2: will get. Yeah, yeah, you've got to be a little
Speaker 2: bit I think extrovert.
Speaker 1: Yeah yeah, you've got to be able to play that
Speaker 1: role too. I've had I've had jobs in the past
Speaker 1: where it just wasn't the right right fit I had
Speaker 1: and I'm not having a go at them. It was
Speaker 1: quite funny, but I needed someone playing a gay guy
Speaker 1: to spend some time with this person, not think just
Speaker 1: out in public, spend some time. And so the UC's
Speaker 1: came in and this is a long time ago, so
Speaker 1: I'm not telling tales out of the school. They've come
Speaker 1: in and there, you know, he'd be a good bike,
Speaker 1: he he'd be good at this that. Yeah, they came
Speaker 1: in the tough guy persona, and we wanted completely opposite.
Speaker 1: We wanted an uber gay guy to play this, play
Speaker 1: the role that we needed. And I still remember the
Speaker 1: look on their face when we're explaining what we're needed
Speaker 1: with we can't do that. And one of the blokes
Speaker 1: sitting in there, big tough dude with his beard, I reckon,
Speaker 1: if we just trim that beard up and do the
Speaker 1: hair up a little bit, we can get you in there.
Speaker 1: And yeah, they were mortified. I thought of it, playing
Speaker 1: that they were right for the tough guys, but not
Speaker 1: playing the uber gay guy.
Speaker 2: Yeah. The problem I found that with that though, was
Speaker 2: you know, the tougher, the betrayal you gave. Yeah, the
Speaker 2: tougher the response they would give you the crims and
Speaker 2: they expected from you.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, you know.
Speaker 2: And that was another issue I found, particularly being in controller.
Speaker 2: I'm thinking, well, don't it. We'll send you in. That
Speaker 2: would be my part, maybe your part, mate, but I
Speaker 2: think I might ask you to do something that you
Speaker 2: cannot do.
Speaker 1: That's so that's that's a good point because I've had
Speaker 1: people in and not ucs but community sources, so member
Speaker 1: of the public in there, and tough guys, and they
Speaker 1: getting close to what we're looking at, and then they
Speaker 1: get called out and they're getting a call they want
Speaker 1: me to bash this bloke and blah blah, blah, and
Speaker 1: you get called in situations like that, So I see
Speaker 1: where you're coming from that point.
Speaker 2: Knowing that they can't commit an illegality, yeah, yeah, you
Speaker 2: know as such like that. Yeah, they can commit illegality
Speaker 2: is a sanctioned but if it's not sanctioned, you'll go
Speaker 2: down as quick as what they were. Just don't put
Speaker 2: your orb in that situation where you're going to be
Speaker 2: called upon to do it.
Speaker 1: But it's I think it must be one of the
Speaker 1: most emotionally taxing part of policing. And we've had a
Speaker 1: few people that Keith Banks you might have known, know
Speaker 1: he did you see I think sort of a decade
Speaker 1: or so before you were doing it up in Queensland
Speaker 1: and that was rough and ready stages. But we also
Speaker 1: had Joe Pistoni, the real Donnie Brasco on the podcast
Speaker 1: Going under Covering the Mafia, and what a story, what
Speaker 1: a person. But he just he didn't come across as
Speaker 1: a tough guy. He just he was obviously tough physically
Speaker 1: and emotionally, but he didn't project that image and he
Speaker 1: managed to stay in the mafia for that long. And
Speaker 1: Michael France is the mafia dude, I know him and
Speaker 1: him and Jail got a lot of respect for each other.
Speaker 1: That's funny, isn't it how it plays out? Yeah.
Speaker 2: Yeah, Look, the best bit of advice I ever got,
Speaker 2: I think, was for on a controller at that time
Speaker 2: when I was undercover. She said, don't be nice to
Speaker 2: any of the women in the group. She said, no
Speaker 2: one's ever nice to them. She said. If they're nice,
Speaker 2: they like you. Doesn't matter what you look like. They said,
Speaker 2: you know, if you treat them well.
Speaker 1: So if you're going into a group where all the tough,
Speaker 1: bad guys don't treat their women really well when you
Speaker 1: come in and hi, mam or yeah.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, don't treat them nice, he said, treat them
Speaker 2: as rough as they do. And he said, you know,
Speaker 2: she said, and you'll get on well. But if you don't,
Speaker 2: she said, they will either pick you or they'll know
Speaker 2: there's something different about you, because that's not how they
Speaker 2: get treated.
Speaker 1: Okay, that's interesting, fair call.
Speaker 2: I remember that all the time.
Speaker 1: Yeah. The little snippets like that come come with the experience.
Speaker 1: When did you start working on argus?
Speaker 2: I went straight from What they do is they do
Speaker 2: a retegration program for COBT so that when you come out.
Speaker 2: I'll bring it back into the bring it back into
Speaker 2: the real world. In the first couple of days or
Speaker 2: first couple of weeks is as a crime stopper. So
Speaker 2: you can wear a uniform because you'd never want a
Speaker 2: uniform before. Right, they get you back to wearing uniform.
Speaker 1: That's interesting. Let's just wind the wind it back a
Speaker 1: bit before we get onto argus. So I hadn't even
Speaker 1: thought of that. So you've been in there for years,
Speaker 1: you're hanging out and playing, playing a role, and then
Speaker 1: it's not like, okay, well you're transferred here and the
Speaker 1: next day you walk in and put on the uniform.
Speaker 1: It would be you'd have to get decompressed.
Speaker 2: Well they do. And there was a lady, a psychiatrist,
Speaker 2: and she brought me in for psychological interviewing and she goes,
Speaker 2: I do hear? She said, you've got an anger issued
Speaker 2: in it. So I kicked the table and said, who
Speaker 2: fucking told you that? And I should never have done
Speaker 2: that because I was only joke. And you go, oh no,
Speaker 2: she said, people the joke really mean. I said, I'm not.
Speaker 2: I said, I'm so that's what's going on my fire,
Speaker 2: no doubt.
Speaker 1: He tried so high that with humor, Yeah, it was.
Speaker 1: It was quite funny anyway. So yeah, well it's coming back,
Speaker 1: and it's basically I say, come back as a civilian,
Speaker 1: but you've you've gone from playing the role of a
Speaker 1: bad guy or whatever role you had to play into
Speaker 1: back into law enforcement officers. So it is a bit
Speaker 1: of a mind mind change, isn't it It is?
Speaker 2: You know, you go from one day drinking beer at
Speaker 2: six in the morning and whatever, driving your car going
Speaker 2: to get your drugs. You got drugs and your back
Speaker 2: wallet or in your top pocket probably got around about
Speaker 2: you know, ten or fifteen twenty thousand dollars in cash.
Speaker 2: You've got a gun stash underneath it your seat or
Speaker 2: your car. Your car's all tricked up and all this
Speaker 2: sort of stuff, you know. And the next day you're
Speaker 2: sitting your crime stopping and going, yes, how can I
Speaker 2: help you relieve blogs? And you can't go and have
Speaker 2: a coffee because they don't know where you are. You know,
Speaker 2: it's just the whole concept was just not quite right
Speaker 2: to me. But that was the reintegration process.
Speaker 1: Yeah, okay, so you got back in there. Now, okay,
Speaker 1: we'll strike force argus, what tell us what that's about.
Speaker 2: Look, Task Force Argos really was the investigation of child abusers. Yeah,
Speaker 2: that's the end of it. There are different areas within
Speaker 2: child Within some will sit in computers and pretend to
Speaker 2: be ten year old children online. Yeah, that's that's another
Speaker 2: area I didn't didn't get into that. There are a
Speaker 2: special breed of people themselves another area which I think
Speaker 2: they should only be limited time.
Speaker 1: Yeah, some people has to play with your mind.
Speaker 2: Absolutely, it does just leave it leaves the police open
Speaker 2: for big payouts at a later time silliness. But you
Speaker 2: can't tell them, Yeah, I can't tell them. So, but
Speaker 2: I was on the floor. Yeah, and we would just
Speaker 2: get same as you would normally do as a detective.
Speaker 2: You would just get files come through and then you
Speaker 2: pick up the files and run with that, you know.
Speaker 2: So that's that's where I sort of started with the
Speaker 2: pedophilia type. I did a couple of pedophile jobs Willson
Speaker 2: and undercover, but an investigation of them was quite tricky.
Speaker 2: They're very unique individual to pedophile.
Speaker 1: Yeah, is there a type like in the area that
Speaker 1: you work and if you've done under cover work on
Speaker 1: it too. But then going to the strikeforce concentrating on them.
Speaker 1: Is there a type? How would you describe them all?
Speaker 1: The fact that you can't describe.
Speaker 2: Them, well, I don't think you can. I don't did
Speaker 2: there is a type? People say there is, and I
Speaker 2: actually illuminate that with Cowen there was a bit of
Speaker 2: a type, but that was really maybe not the type.
Speaker 2: It was the way they would behave. The behavior was
Speaker 2: similar nature, of course, because their end goal is similar.
Speaker 2: But you know, they could be women, they could be
Speaker 2: children offending against children. They could be adults opending against you.
Speaker 2: The groups of adults opending against children. There was a
Speaker 2: pilot that was involved in the baby club and he
Speaker 2: was in and I never knew this existed. To this,
Speaker 2: it even amazes me today. He was in the baby club.
Speaker 2: So when he went home he would change into a
Speaker 2: nappy and crap his pants and suck on bottles.
Speaker 1: Jesus, and he's flying the plane.
Speaker 2: For us and flying the plane for you, or cooking
Speaker 2: the stake at the local pub. But that's what they
Speaker 2: would get online, and they'd trade little children, and they
Speaker 2: would have their own children that were in nappies to
Speaker 2: be traded. Yeah, he was just bizarre. You know. I
Speaker 2: went into one room and here he is a man,
Speaker 2: not a big man, but a man. Nonetheless, you know,
Speaker 2: thirty five maybe forty years of age, lying in a cot,
Speaker 2: sucking on a bottle in a nappy. The hell is
Speaker 2: going on in Okay? I don't know if I'm laughing,
Speaker 2: crying or whatever I'm doing that. We hear a lot
Speaker 2: on this podcast.
Speaker 1: Shocked. Yeah, I'd be shocked to and you said, what
Speaker 1: did you say to him?
Speaker 2: Honestly, my first question was said, what do you do
Speaker 2: when I go to the toilet? And he looked at
Speaker 2: him other fool. He just said, I shipped myself. Well,
Speaker 2: you're in a nappy?
Speaker 1: I was why not? That's his thing, that's his thing.
Speaker 2: That's just I'm just I'm still shocked to this day
Speaker 2: that that that and still goes on to this day.
Speaker 1: Baby club, baby club, Yeah, okay, just puts a different
Speaker 1: connotation on it. When people say, anyway.
Speaker 2: What was he charged with that he was high, he
Speaker 2: was grooming children?
Speaker 1: Yeah, not charge with dressed in the product, the charge
Speaker 1: for that, no charge, but grooming children?
Speaker 2: Yeah? Well rape was rape and the children.
Speaker 1: How big is that? There's a team, how many members
Speaker 1: on them? What's the reach of it?
Speaker 2: Look back then it was governed by a superintendent who
Speaker 2: at that time was Ross Barnett, who went on to
Speaker 2: be the Assistant Deputy Commissioner. There's a couple of inspectors
Speaker 2: for each area, like for the computers area and the
Speaker 2: general floor. Then there would have been maybe four senior sergeants,
Speaker 2: probably five or six senior sergeants and basically detective constables
Speaker 2: after and senior constables.
Speaker 1: Okay, so it was a fair size.
Speaker 2: It was a fair size. Yeah, there would have been
Speaker 2: maybe forty forty old people.
Speaker 1: And they did a lot of good work. A great
Speaker 1: lot they had, like worldwise as knowledge. The work that
Speaker 1: Task Force ARGUS has done. Absolutely it's a heavy work
Speaker 1: and I think that type of work. I'm not sure
Speaker 1: the numbers on ARGUS, but I know in New South
Speaker 1: Wales child sex crime investigators they always seem to be overworked.
Speaker 1: It didn't really impolicing. I'm not sure if it's changed now,
Speaker 1: but it didn't really give the importance to it that
Speaker 1: was needed and the staff to it. And I always
Speaker 1: felt for people on those because it's such a horrible crime.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and look what I found you were overworked for
Speaker 2: a reason is that you took it personally. Yeah, And
Speaker 2: that's and I think you put more into it than
Speaker 2: what you did at the times. That's what I found
Speaker 2: while I was overworked. Yeah, you know, apart from having
Speaker 2: a lot of files. Yeah, once you got into something
Speaker 2: with a bit of meat about it, you know, I
Speaker 2: would stay from six in the morning till six or
Speaker 2: seven at night and you're only getting paid from eight
Speaker 2: to four. Yeah, and they darn't give you any extra
Speaker 2: you know.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Yeah, I know we went through that in New
Speaker 1: South Wales as well. But you're committed to it. It's
Speaker 1: a vacation, isn't it. It is a passion. And I
Speaker 1: would imagine we've child sex cases too. You can't sort
Speaker 1: of just walk away from because it's five o'clock knockoff. Yeah,
Speaker 1: the kid might be in danger, not to your child
Speaker 1: that gets offended. Yeah, there's so many reasons why you
Speaker 1: need to stay back and put the work work in.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you're dead right.
Speaker 1: So finding your way in that field? Did you ask
Speaker 1: to go into that field or is it just how
Speaker 1: the cards fell.
Speaker 2: Look Once you come out of undercover, they they take
Speaker 2: part of your undercover as detective training.
Speaker 1: Yep.
Speaker 2: So they give you a bit of credit towards being
Speaker 2: a detective.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: So if you wanted to say, well, look I'm not
Speaker 2: going to go that way, I'll stay in uniform, you
Speaker 2: could have stayed in uniform. Yeah, yeah, so I thought, no,
Speaker 2: I'll continue on. Yeah, and so they said, well, look
Speaker 2: we I behooved now to put you in a placement.
Speaker 2: Where would you like to go? I said, well, I'd
Speaker 2: like to go to Cairns, I said. So I went
Speaker 2: up and had a look at a house, got anything
Speaker 2: sorted out, and they said, we're not going to Cans.
Speaker 2: So that all fell apart. I said, where am I going?
Speaker 2: They said, I starting next you are, but you can
Speaker 2: go to Argos.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: I saw what the hell's are gus? And they told them.
Speaker 2: I said okay, I'll start Monday. So that's where we went.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah, okay, fell into it that way. Now, it
Speaker 1: was because of your involvement in Argos. It was while
Speaker 1: you're working there that Daniel Morkham's disappearance. So tell me
Speaker 1: how you became aware of that and how you became
Speaker 1: involved in going to Brett's Cown's. Well.
Speaker 2: Obviously, Daniel went missing early December two thousand and three.
Speaker 2: So then we were a group of people that were
Speaker 2: called upon to go up and continue the investigation because
Speaker 2: it was going to be a little bit protracted. So
Speaker 2: I think it was about two weeks later that we
Speaker 2: were up there, So it would have been probably a
Speaker 2: week before after he was missing, but a week before
Speaker 2: that we went up there that they called us in
Speaker 2: and said, look, your team's going up. This team's going
Speaker 2: up and whatnot. So you get up there and you
Speaker 2: get into your accommodation and then you rock up for
Speaker 2: your briefings and they give you a well, at that time,
Speaker 2: they gave you a series of folders convicted released sex
Speaker 2: offenders in that area, and a whole sole job was
Speaker 2: to go around and check out their bona fighters. You know,
Speaker 2: if they said I was at the shop at that time,
Speaker 2: you would spend half the day going to the shop
Speaker 2: getting CCTV and come back and say, yes, verified alibi
Speaker 2: at that time, and then you can discard that person's
Speaker 2: That's sort of how we come up and whether it
Speaker 2: was fortunate or unfortunate. One of the people in the
Speaker 2: file was Brett Peter Count.
Speaker 1: Okay, do you when you get the file, has the
Speaker 1: background checks being done or you're aware of it, or
Speaker 1: you get the file, he's a name this Blake's a
Speaker 1: pedophile sex offender. Do you then build a profile before
Speaker 1: you go out, prep before you you go out to
Speaker 1: speak to I would like to. Yeah, Sometimes you don't
Speaker 1: get the chance. But we did on a couple of occaves,
Speaker 1: and we did on Cowen. Why we did on Coun
Speaker 1: I couldn't say there was any reason why we did
Speaker 1: it more than we would have others. I do not
Speaker 1: know at that stage, but only because I think that
Speaker 1: going through his criminal history, he had some history in
Speaker 1: Northern Territory. Yeah, you had some history in Pride to
Speaker 1: Ordon Territory, right, and he was brought back from Lordon
Speaker 1: Territory to Queensland to complete his sentence from the one
Speaker 1: in Darwin because you want to be close to family.
Speaker 1: I think it was right something along those lines. For
Speaker 1: the offense in Queensland, we had Darren Edwards on it.
Speaker 1: That you know, and I think you think highly of
Speaker 1: Derek and so that I worked with him. We had
Speaker 1: a couple of crossover investigations. But he locked Brett Cowan
Speaker 1: up for that crime. That was a horrendous crime. So
Speaker 1: you would have seen that type of history when you're
Speaker 1: looking at him before you've gone out to his place.
Speaker 2: Yeah, we did. But there's no detailed about the history. Yeah,
Speaker 2: you know, I mean, there's no storyline behind it.
Speaker 1: I guess just these are the charges, a short title
Speaker 1: of the offense.
Speaker 2: You would like to know that it was first of all,
Speaker 2: in a public toilet. You would like to know the
Speaker 2: injuries to the child. You would like to know what
Speaker 2: age he was at the time, what age the child was,
Speaker 2: the physical description of the child, and that sort of stuff.
Speaker 1: That's what I would like to know all factors in Yeah,
Speaker 1: I suppose, And it's very much the way at different
Speaker 1: stages of terrial investigations approached that perhaps a pedophile is involved.
Speaker 1: The three year old child was a little bit different
Speaker 1: because there wasn't a lot of that type of crime
Speaker 1: to rely on. And I know that what we were
Speaker 1: looking at that pedophiles normally aim for children a little
Speaker 1: bit older, if in an induction type situation. But going
Speaker 1: there you might be able to eliminate the inquiry straight off,
Speaker 1: like you go out there, knock on the door. No,
Speaker 1: I was in prison during that time all this, so
Speaker 1: there might be an alibi that's readily Okay, Well you
Speaker 1: can move on to the next because in jobs like that.
Speaker 1: That's surprising when you're cast a net on all the
Speaker 1: people who are being convicted of child sex offenses. Has
Speaker 1: a lot of people caught up, isn't there?
Speaker 2: Look there is a hell of a lot of people.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Look, Dennis, we might take a take a break
Speaker 1: here because I want to delve into what and when
Speaker 1: you went to Brett Cowan's place. And I've got a
Speaker 1: sense of it, but I think people are going to
Speaker 1: find it fascinating just what happens when police came knock
Speaker 1: on the door for what, for all intents and purposes,
Speaker 1: a routine inquiry. So we might delve into that in
Speaker 1: part two when we come back, if that's all right,