Speaker 1: The public has had a long held fascination with detectives.
Speaker 1: Detective see a side of life the average person is
Speaker 1: never 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 talk 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.
Speaker 1: Welcome back to part two of my chat with retired
Speaker 1: Detective Superintendent Mark Ainsworth. Welcome back, Mark, Thanks Gerry again.
Speaker 1: Even during the break, I was thinking about the stuff
Speaker 1: that you were talking about, youth crime. So it's given
Speaker 1: me a lot the thoughts on different approaches. Well, I
Speaker 1: want to talk about now, and I think it will
Speaker 1: lead us into another topic of domestic violence and issues
Speaker 1: across the country happening. But there was a high profile
Speaker 1: murder investigation that you oversaw, and that was the murder
Speaker 1: of Alison baden Clay in twenty twelve. I believe it was.
Speaker 2: That's correct.
Speaker 1: Can you tell our listeners about that crime, just how
Speaker 1: it started and about the investigation, just the breakdown of
Speaker 1: what happened.
Speaker 2: No problems. I was actually started on the Saturday as
Speaker 2: relieving sorry back in the Moral as the regional crime coordinator,
Speaker 2: Detective Superintendent. I'd been on holidays and that Friday afternoon
Speaker 2: I've got a phone call the last day of leave
Speaker 2: that we'd had this missing person that looked a bit suspicious.
Speaker 2: Saturday morning, gone into where our major Instrument room was
Speaker 2: set up and got the details. The whole investigative investigative
Speaker 2: team were there and we started and started a full
Speaker 2: full bloind major incident room, and in conjunction with that,
Speaker 2: we had a Ford command post set up at the
Speaker 2: Brookfield Showgrounds where we had people searching for Allison. Basically
Speaker 2: how it started was on the Friday morning, Allison's husband, Jared,
Speaker 2: had rang police and said my wife's gone for a
Speaker 2: walk and she hasn't come home and I'm concerned about
Speaker 2: where she is. Uniform police attended his place and did
Speaker 2: a sensational job. When they got there, he was very
Speaker 2: aloof and they noticed some scratch marks on his face,
Speaker 2: which he said that yeah, there was a razor cut.
Speaker 2: He spoke about an extra marital affair that he had
Speaker 2: to the uniform police. The uniform police called their supervisor,
Speaker 2: who called the CIB who attended the scene and from
Speaker 2: the great work initially from the uniform officers, full major
Speaker 2: Incident room was set up. The house that Jared was
Speaker 2: in was declared a crime scene and we held that
Speaker 2: crime seen for a week to allow the forensic officers
Speaker 2: to do a thorough investigation.
Speaker 1: Mark, can I just interrupt? That's great, you're relaying how
Speaker 1: it happened. But with the uniform guys going there, did
Speaker 1: they guys and girls? Was there something suspicious about him
Speaker 1: from the start that that didn't feel like it added up?
Speaker 1: What was he saying that his wife just went for
Speaker 1: a walk and she hasn't returned. How long had she
Speaker 1: been missing for.
Speaker 2: She'd only gone What he claimed was she got up
Speaker 2: and went for a walk every morning at six o'clock.
Speaker 2: At this particular day, she was to go to a
Speaker 2: real estate convention down the Gold Coast, and he was
Speaker 2: concerned that she hadn't come home from her walk. Uniform
Speaker 2: so what time of day was that it was around?
Speaker 2: I think it was around from memory, around seven am
Speaker 2: or a little bit before seven am. Told the police
Speaker 2: said he'd been out driving around trying to find her.
Speaker 2: He'd been trying to wring her mobile phone, no answer,
Speaker 2: and it was totally out of character for her to
Speaker 2: disappear under those circumstances. The big thing that raised the
Speaker 2: suspicion of the uniform was the scratches on his face.
Speaker 2: Him talking about an extra marital affair, and that's that
Speaker 2: was their big suspicions.
Speaker 1: And just as generally, what are we talking about with
Speaker 1: the scratches? How significant were they?
Speaker 2: They were very significant, the scratches like it looked like
Speaker 2: if he claimed his claim was true, the raisor blabe
Speaker 2: was certainly out of control. It left massive, big scratches
Speaker 2: and just depicted in media down the side of his
Speaker 2: face there very much inconsistent with the razor cut.
Speaker 1: And then talking about the extra marital affair that he had.
Speaker 1: It's like he's going on the on the fenceive putting
Speaker 1: the putting the defense up straight away, like if you
Speaker 1: dig deep, you're going to find this. So he told
Speaker 1: the police there when he's reporting his wife missing.
Speaker 2: Yeah, there was just a range of scenarios that raised
Speaker 2: their suspicion, which you forced him to contact the local
Speaker 2: to O actives.
Speaker 1: I'm just putting my sort of homicide had on too,
Speaker 1: and like at seven am, or go for a work
Speaker 1: at six am, and it's pretty quick that he's called
Speaker 1: the police. Hasn't foanned anyone else, And yeah, it.
Speaker 2: Through red flags as the investigation started. There were a
Speaker 2: number of other phone calls and one of those was
Speaker 2: to his lawyer. Now, if your wife or partner had
Speaker 2: gone missing, would you be ringing the lawyer straight up?
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: The other one was's checks on the fifth amendments right
Speaker 2: to silence. So there was red flags once the investigation started,
Speaker 2: from the minute he jumped on the phone to reporting
Speaker 2: it to the police all the way through.
Speaker 1: Okay, now you said the place was set up as
Speaker 1: a crime scene. Was anything found in the crime scene? No?
Speaker 2: What there was three vehicles there. We seized all the
Speaker 2: vehicles for crime scene examination. In the house, there was
Speaker 2: no evidence of tissues or anything which consistent for razor cut,
Speaker 2: you know, the blood, anything like that, and inside the
Speaker 2: house was pretty much unremarkable from a crime scene point
Speaker 2: of view. As it transpired later on, there was a
Speaker 2: white Captiva which was only I think from memory was
Speaker 2: eight weeks old, which that was the car that Allison
Speaker 2: was driving, and as the investigation progressed, that came up
Speaker 2: some significant evidence in that regard. What happened was a
Speaker 2: full scientific examination was done of the car and there
Speaker 2: was bloodstains found in the rear driver's side area against
Speaker 2: a metal clip which is used for clipping seats back in.
Speaker 2: An examination of that showed blood coming from that clip
Speaker 2: running down in a downward direction, and as investigation progressed,
Speaker 2: that was identified through DNA as being Allison's blood. Interestingly,
Speaker 2: in the back of that car was a number of
Speaker 2: kid's toys that was stacked neatly in the back of
Speaker 2: the car. When we interviewed a housekeeper, she said those
Speaker 2: toys have never been removed underneath the house for a
Speaker 2: number of months because the kids had outground them. They
Speaker 2: were in the car. So that that as investigation progressed along,
Speaker 2: you know, Ellison's body was found and it was found
Speaker 2: in an area.
Speaker 1: Yes, sorry, Mark, just on that. What was I would
Speaker 1: imagine there would have been the inquiries about the relationships
Speaker 1: I had. Was there any issues with the relationships, had
Speaker 1: there been any history of violence? And looking at the husband,
Speaker 1: who I think it would be fair to say was
Speaker 1: a suspect right from the start. Was there anything else
Speaker 1: that jumped out in those inquiries that added to the suspicion.
Speaker 2: The big, big thing that really jumped out was his
Speaker 2: lawyer attending and saying, my client will not be answering
Speaker 2: any questions. Now, interesting, is that is normal advice or
Speaker 2: normal behavior if the if your partner has gone for
Speaker 2: a walk. So that part was significant. There's no history
Speaker 2: of domestic violence on any police database at that address
Speaker 2: or with the people involved. Jared was in the Kenmare
Speaker 2: Chamber of Commerce and pretty much respected amongst the business
Speaker 2: people in the area. He ran a local real estate agent,
Speaker 2: not a very successful one as we later found out. Yeah,
Speaker 2: so that's that was very interesting from the word go. Look,
Speaker 2: you know, even suggestions were made to his lawyer along
Speaker 2: the line. So you know, Jared's had an argument with
Speaker 2: Alison and he's done something dreadful. Now is the time
Speaker 2: to tell us, but it just will not be cooperating
Speaker 2: and that was all the way through, right even up
Speaker 2: to the end of the trial.
Speaker 1: Did he go on TV? And I seem to have
Speaker 1: a recollection of him going on TV and making an
Speaker 1: appeal for the public.
Speaker 2: He certainly did when I on the Saturday morning when
Speaker 2: we kicked off the Major Incident room, which spoken to
Speaker 2: We've spoken to him about doing an appeal for Allison
Speaker 2: if she's out there, to come forward. He refused to
Speaker 2: do that, putting up Jeff and Priscilla, Allison's parents to
Speaker 2: do that, to that appeal for Allison to come home.
Speaker 2: And you had an information to come forward, I think
Speaker 2: you know, the significant public interest in the matter. The
Speaker 2: media kept hounding Jared and his sister and family to
Speaker 2: the point that he decided to make a public appeal,
Speaker 2: but that was off his own back, nothing to do
Speaker 2: with any request from police. And we were we were
Speaker 2: made aware of it obviously by the media that he'd
Speaker 2: made a little little appearance.
Speaker 1: A fewcodile crocodile tears there. Okay, so what just giving
Speaker 1: people that an understanding. How many how many staff did
Speaker 1: you have working on that investigation and what was the
Speaker 1: breakdown of the investigative team and was called a strike force.
Speaker 2: Note it was a task force. It was two separate parts.
Speaker 2: In the initial part Allison, we had to try and
Speaker 2: locate her, so the brook Showgrounds was probably about five
Speaker 2: hundred meters from her house where he claimed she's left
Speaker 2: to go for a walk. We had a Ford command post,
Speaker 2: there were searchers involving multiple police, We had recruits from
Speaker 2: the academy, a lot of gold mines around that area,
Speaker 2: so we had expertise from the local council ses searching
Speaker 2: for her. And that search went for eleven days, so
Speaker 2: we've got full on there every single day. Allison's parents
Speaker 2: were at that place. His parents, sorry, Jared did not
Speaker 2: turn up there the consistent. At the same time as
Speaker 2: running that, we had the Major Incident Room, which involved
Speaker 2: the probably at its peak probably forty detectives following things through.
Speaker 2: We're getting a lot of information. I think in total,
Speaker 2: fifteen hundred pieces of information from crime stoppers came in.
Speaker 2: Every single piece of that information was run out. Also
Speaker 2: at the time, you know, there was electronics, violence and
Speaker 2: physical surveillance being undertaken, and examination of computers and mobile phones.
Speaker 1: The magnitude of an investigation like that, and yeah, there's
Speaker 1: red flags that you guys had picked up right from
Speaker 1: the start. But red flags are one thing. It's about
Speaker 1: gathering the evidence that you got sufficient evidence to charge
Speaker 1: him with the incident. Room running like that. The search
Speaker 1: over eleven days, Was it eleven days that Allison's body
Speaker 1: was found.
Speaker 2: Yes, eleven days. We had a fellow that was kayaking,
Speaker 2: kayaking up off a tribute off the Brisbane Reverend Collo
Speaker 2: Creek and that's when he was the one that discovered
Speaker 2: Allison's body on the mud banks there.
Speaker 1: And what the crime scene set up there, what was
Speaker 1: revealed about Allison's body.
Speaker 2: It had been there for the duration, what had happened.
Speaker 2: As part of the investigation, we set up a time
Speaker 2: lapse camera because it was tidal at the tart part
Speaker 2: of the creek and where the body was dumped, that
Speaker 2: was above the high tide mark. So I think that
Speaker 2: was one mistake that Jared made when he dumped Allison's body,
Speaker 2: that he couldn't even get the tides right. Had she
Speaker 2: ended up in the tides there and the Brisbane Review
Speaker 2: Tribute was about two hundred meters away, the body could
Speaker 2: have ended up anywhere. Unfortunately, during the period of time
Speaker 2: we're looking for her, we had quite a ray of
Speaker 2: weather patterns. There's a lot of rain, very hot days,
Speaker 2: so the body was very much decomposed and from that
Speaker 2: decomposition we were not able to obtain any sufficient evidence
Speaker 2: like fingernail scratches or skin or anything under the fingernails.
Speaker 2: We sent away some samples of bone to a professor
Speaker 2: in Western Australia to see whether or not he could
Speaker 2: determine whether there was any consistency with drowning or death beforehand.
Speaker 2: That came back that there's no evidence of drowning. We
Speaker 2: never had a cause of death the decomposition, which was
Speaker 2: a bit of a challenge in moving forward to charge,
Speaker 2: as she'd be aware of. But during the investigation we
Speaker 2: talked earlier about the teamwork and I relied solely on
Speaker 2: my detective, senior sergeant and the crew, and I must
Speaker 2: say they are absolutely brilliant, you know, from the investigators,
Speaker 2: from the scenes of crime people, from everyone that had
Speaker 2: an involvement, The commitment and dedication was second to none.
Speaker 2: You've got a mother that's gone missing that stage. She
Speaker 2: had three young girls, I think they were about eight,
Speaker 2: six and four hadn't seen their mother. The father, you know,
Speaker 2: as a suspect in our eyes, and his behavior was
Speaker 2: a bit of radic shortly after she went missing, and
Speaker 2: it really motivated police to really dig in.
Speaker 1: I can picture what it would be like, the dynamics
Speaker 1: of an investigation of that nature and the way you
Speaker 1: describe it and the suspicions attached. So obviously jump up, Yeah,
Speaker 1: calling the police after an hour solicitor and affair scratch
Speaker 1: marks and that it's circumstantial evidence. It's enough to add
Speaker 1: a suspicion. You've recovered the body, but that's not revealing much.
Speaker 1: There's still so much work to do and it needs
Speaker 1: the attention at tension to detail. So you had a
Speaker 1: detective senior sergeant running the team, Yes, that's correct, ye,
Speaker 1: and then for the or say at different times on
Speaker 1: the investigation, how long did the investigation run before there
Speaker 1: was a serious discussion about whether we've got sufficient evidence
Speaker 1: to charge him?
Speaker 2: Right up until the thirteenth of June is when we
Speaker 2: went and picked him up and charged him.
Speaker 1: Even so, what's that two months?
Speaker 2: Just under two months, And it was that morning we
Speaker 2: put a strategy into place, and at that morning, after
Speaker 2: our strategy ran out, we made a determination to arrest
Speaker 2: him with that stuff age. There was a lot of
Speaker 2: toing throwing between people a little bit more senior to
Speaker 2: me giving advice that you haven't got a cause of death,
Speaker 2: how are you going to charge? You know, the usual
Speaker 2: experts coming in that have no involvement in it with
Speaker 2: their opinion. But the team we had twenty three pieces
Speaker 2: of circumstantial evidence and we were one hundred percent committed
Speaker 2: that we had sufficient to charge. And what put the
Speaker 2: icing on the cake for us is during this investigation,
Speaker 2: as we said before in your briefings, you get information
Speaker 2: or you get suggestions from that team, and we engaged
Speaker 2: a botanist who was leading botanist in Queensland. Because when
Speaker 2: Allison was found she had bits of foliage in her hair.
Speaker 2: He was able to examine that foliage and determine the
Speaker 2: types of plant material that that was. And interestingly, when
Speaker 2: we went back to the baden Clay house, each one
Speaker 2: of those plants were at the rear of the house
Speaker 2: and significantly there was a cat's claw I think it
Speaker 2: was called, which was dangling over the back of the
Speaker 2: garage near where the Captiva had been parked. So when
Speaker 2: he lifted Allison up to put her in the back,
Speaker 2: of that captiva, the cat claw according to her hair.
Speaker 2: The work of that botanist was absolutely significant, and really,
Speaker 2: you know, we're talking about circumstantial evidence, but that was
Speaker 2: really high level circumstantial evidence that he came up with.
Speaker 2: Fortunate for us, the botanist lived in that vicinity of
Speaker 2: that area, and he knew the area at the back
Speaker 2: of his hand, and there was no other pieces of
Speaker 2: foliage that was found in her hair anywhere in the
Speaker 2: near vicinity of where which she was found, So his
Speaker 2: evidence was significant.
Speaker 1: I can see why that had been an exciting moment
Speaker 1: getting that piece piece of evidence and linking it. But
Speaker 1: again that's the attention to detail. And I think you
Speaker 1: mentioned twenty three pieces of circumstantial evidence. Look at circumstantial
Speaker 1: evidence like on its own, that doesn't really paint a picture,
Speaker 1: but when you add them all up together and you
Speaker 1: sit down and look at them, and it's interesting. You
Speaker 1: were talking about, you know, the decision to charge or not,
Speaker 1: because sometimes that's the hardest part of being a homicide detective.
Speaker 1: That Okay, let's break it down. What have we got here,
Speaker 1: And you're looking and you think it's one thing to
Speaker 1: think a person's done at crime it's another thing to
Speaker 1: be able to prove that person has done a crime.
Speaker 1: I can imagine there would have been the naysayers. There
Speaker 1: always is when you're trying to make decisions, whether that
Speaker 1: comes from above or below, there's always you know, it's
Speaker 1: a robust decision to make. You guys obviously felt as
Speaker 1: a team that there was sufficient evidence to charge. When
Speaker 1: he was arrested, what was his attitude. I would imagine
Speaker 1: someone like that would still be denying it.
Speaker 2: One hundred percent. Gary, You're still denying it. And he
Speaker 2: called his solicit up and wouldn't talk to us. Look,
Speaker 2: he was a bloke that was full of his own
Speaker 2: self importance and thought he could beat everything. But he
Speaker 2: stuffed up a few ways along the line. One is
Speaker 2: that we had an order a fornzic order to get
Speaker 2: samples and everything off him because we'd seized his vehicles.
Speaker 2: On the way to the police station, he drove into
Speaker 2: a shopping center wall, no evidence of any breaking and
Speaker 2: on the front page in the front seat of the
Speaker 2: car was page three, a big article about Allison. He
Speaker 2: got a few minor injuries from that accident, but we
Speaker 2: were able to use that to our benefit in that
Speaker 2: we had a full mental health assessment of him done
Speaker 2: at the hospital, which, as you're aware, it can be
Speaker 2: quite important later on if he wants to make that
Speaker 2: claim and he's deemed to be of sound mind. So
Speaker 2: as that part of it, he took himself to a
Speaker 2: local doctor a couple of days after Allison disappeared, informing
Speaker 2: the doctor, I'd like, you know, the police want me
Speaker 2: to have a look at these razor cuts on my face.
Speaker 2: Unfortunately for Jered, that doctor had examined about five hundred
Speaker 2: rasor biopsis during a training period as part of a project,
Speaker 2: and she was clearly able to say they weren't consistent. Interestingly,
Speaker 2: this is only a couple of days after He's left
Speaker 2: his business card with the doctor and said if you
Speaker 2: want to catch up for a coffee, I'd be interested.
Speaker 2: During the physical examination we conducted of him, there was
Speaker 2: other scratches and wounds on his chest. He said they
Speaker 2: were caused by a caterpillar the day before Allison's disappearance
Speaker 2: when the girls were running in a cross country. So
Speaker 2: we found the area where that was where he claimed
Speaker 2: this killer caterpillar had got on to him, and we
Speaker 2: got a caterpillar expert to that area along with the
Speaker 2: botanist to determine if there were any caterpillars in that
Speaker 2: area and whatsot they were. Interestingly, there was no caterpillars
Speaker 2: that would cause that sort of injury, so we were
Speaker 2: able to knock that down. We found evidence on his
Speaker 2: laptop of an extramarital affair with a woman there and
Speaker 2: they were communicating covertly on that laptop, which led us
Speaker 2: to tracking her down. She was very, very staunch with
Speaker 2: Jared until we threatened her with arrest and she decided
Speaker 2: to cough up a full story. Everything we put in
Speaker 2: place and tried. He thought it could out smartest. But
Speaker 2: his biggest mistake, again we're talking about circumstantial evidence, was
Speaker 2: inquiries to the insurance company to see what Dallison's life
Speaker 2: insurance policy was worth prior to her disappearing. And I
Speaker 2: think that was around the from memory of the fourteenth
Speaker 2: or fifteenth of April, the day that we located Alison.
Speaker 2: That afternoon, a further inquiry was made by him in
Speaker 2: relation to the life insurance policy. The big thing that
Speaker 2: was very important in this and you know, the whole
Speaker 2: world was watching it. You know that forty five that
Speaker 2: this matter was in the paper it was queens End,
Speaker 2: New soth Wales, Queens and Australia and internationally interest in it.
Speaker 2: We did a peer review of every section of the
Speaker 2: investigation to make sure we were one hundred percent accurate.
Speaker 2: Fortunately we did that, so toxicology came back but a
Speaker 2: decimal point in relation to a substance antidepressant in Allison's
Speaker 2: body had been put in the wrong place. We had
Speaker 2: that piece of information reviewed by a toxicology expert in
Speaker 2: Victoria who corrected it, which was substantial. Okay, So the
Speaker 2: critical part of the peer review I think, you know,
Speaker 2: really gave us a lot of confidence in moving forward with.
Speaker 1: Charging and mark on that. And I like the idea
Speaker 1: of peer reviews and investigations I've been involved in. We've
Speaker 1: had that type of thing to have a look because
Speaker 1: sometimes you're in it, you're looking, and sometimes you need
Speaker 1: other people to have a look and cross everything you've
Speaker 1: got because these type of mistakes, and you talk decimal
Speaker 1: point or whatever. If you went to trial, and I'm
Speaker 1: surmising here, so we're talking hypothetically, if you went to
Speaker 1: trial with a circumstantial brief of evidence and you're in
Speaker 1: front of a jury, murder trial, a lot of pressure
Speaker 1: on high profile and then through no fault of the
Speaker 1: police or anyone really as human error, a decimal point
Speaker 1: in the wrong point, the amount that the defense would
Speaker 1: make of that, How can we trust anything that police
Speaker 1: have presented here? When they're presented this, it's been shown
Speaker 1: and I can just imagine the dramatics in the court,
Speaker 1: the paper with the in the hand waving that the
Speaker 1: jury it's wrong, it's false. So the thoroughness and that
Speaker 1: attention to the detail and the little things, and I'm
Speaker 1: fascinated by the story of it. I didn't realize a
Speaker 1: lot of the nuances with the way the investigation played out,
Speaker 1: but I know you speak highly of the team and
Speaker 1: proud of the team, and I can understand why, because
Speaker 1: that's the type of investigation that could slip through the
Speaker 1: cracks if you didn't get those things like the botanists
Speaker 1: with the plant sample and different things that you picked
Speaker 1: up on running an investigation. Overseeing an investigation of that
Speaker 1: high profile investigation, it brings other pressures to you of
Speaker 1: that normally you don't associate with the media interest, and
Speaker 1: once you've got the media interest, you've got the command's interest.
Speaker 1: Who whichever level that sits above you you have politicians
Speaker 1: being involved. Was there a lot of that type of
Speaker 1: pressure on the investigation when you're working on that.
Speaker 2: There was, in particular some inaccurate reporting from a certain
Speaker 2: media person who had run a story and rang me
Speaker 2: to verify the story was accurate the next day and
Speaker 2: said your story is not accurate and don't bother ring
Speaker 2: at me again. So she's run up to the bosses
Speaker 2: uptown and I had a phone call saying that, you know,
Speaker 2: we've got to include her. I pushed back against in
Speaker 2: saying that majority of the media were brilliant. Your media
Speaker 2: is your best source of getting material as you know,
Speaker 2: they're your best source to get material out, and you
Speaker 2: just want to work in closely and together with them.
Speaker 2: You know, you can't tell them everything and they know that,
Speaker 2: but the information feedingback from them was good. We did
Speaker 2: have an issue there where he was very closely aligned
Speaker 2: with a state politician based on the ken MO the
Speaker 2: ken More Chamber of Commerce. So dealing with that, I
Speaker 2: was very very fortunate that I had an assistant commissioner
Speaker 2: above me who was five hundred percent behind me and
Speaker 2: very very supportive. He managed a lot of the politics
Speaker 2: at a higher level, leaving us alone to do what
Speaker 2: we had to do. And I think, as I said
Speaker 2: earlier in the piece, as a superintendent or inspector in
Speaker 2: charge of it, you've got to make sure your team resource,
Speaker 2: they've got what they want, they need, and support them.
Speaker 2: And I was just very, very fortunate that I had
Speaker 2: a great team, and you know, everyone was singing in
Speaker 2: the same direction. We briefed in the mornings, we briefed
Speaker 2: in the afternoons. We come up with some different ideas
Speaker 2: and different suggestions, and it worked effectively.
Speaker 1: You've mentioned that a couple times during the podcast. Brief
Speaker 1: in the morning's brief in the afternoons. I won't say ridiculed,
Speaker 1: that's too strong, but yeah, probably the piss taken out
Speaker 1: of me how many briefings I'd have on investigations, But
Speaker 1: I think they're crucial in an investigation to make sure
Speaker 1: everyone knows that we're heading what direction we're heading in
Speaker 1: there's no misinformation missed. And when I've been involved in investigations,
Speaker 1: whether I'm leading it or just part of the team,
Speaker 1: when there's been mistakes done, invariably it's because the communication
Speaker 1: hasn't been there. We haven't had the briefings, and sometimes
Speaker 1: it's quite annoying. What the boss wants another briefing? Does
Speaker 1: he and you bring everyone into the room. Might only
Speaker 1: take twenty minutes half an hour, but it was crucial
Speaker 1: to make sure everyone was on the same page and
Speaker 1: heading in the right direction. Would you agree with my
Speaker 1: thoughts on the importance of briefing.
Speaker 2: One hundred percent? You've got to have everyone who's got
Speaker 2: to be well informed. They need to know exactly what's
Speaker 2: going on. Because they go out and interview a witness
Speaker 2: at six o'clock that night and they're not aware of
Speaker 2: what's happened during the day, you're off track. So it's
Speaker 2: getting ahead of the game, making sure that everyone is
Speaker 2: fully aware. Even the use of a rolling video screen
Speaker 2: in the major instidant room updating where people can have
Speaker 2: a look at it getting an idea what's going on.
Speaker 2: But those briefings are a very crucial part in my view,
Speaker 2: morning and afternoon. You're seven in the morning, three in
Speaker 2: the afternoon. You know, for the sake of twenty minutes,
Speaker 2: it's twenty minutes worthwhile spending.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I agree wholeheartedly with you. Mark. The way this
Speaker 1: played out in court a trial, he pleaded not guilty, convicted,
Speaker 1: he appealed, and the appeal was overturned. The convictions are stood.
Speaker 1: How are Allison's children going there?
Speaker 2: The three girls have turned out to be remarkable young ladies.
Speaker 2: They are very very lucky to have the support of
Speaker 2: Allison's parents and close family and friends. And it's a
Speaker 2: real credit to everyone that's helped the girls. And it's
Speaker 2: a real credit to the girls how they've moved on,
Speaker 2: very successful, very genuine down to earth girls who you know,
Speaker 2: from the adversity they've been through. It's absolutely remarkable how
Speaker 2: they've turned out, and they should be extremely proud of themselves.
Speaker 2: They've actually got up at the last few lunches and
Speaker 2: spoken at the lunches and it's an extreme extremely creditible
Speaker 2: to Jeff and Priscilla and all the near family members,
Speaker 2: Vanessa and friends that have really supported the girls to
Speaker 2: get through this horrible time that they would have had.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's beautiful the fact that they get on them.
Speaker 1: The resilience that people that have had tragedies in their
Speaker 1: life like that come through. And what a nice memory
Speaker 1: of Alison. Then tribute to Alison that the children that
Speaker 1: turned out out like that and yeah, it's just so difficult.
Speaker 1: What's a wash out from the whole whole investigation.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you're right. There were examples of it seriously affecting
Speaker 2: police officers, which we dealt with and supported them on
Speaker 2: the way through. I think, I don't know, I've become
Speaker 2: very close to the family, to the girls. In particular,
Speaker 2: there was a charity set up, the Alison Baden Clay Foundation,
Speaker 2: set up at the request of the parents afterwards, specifically
Speaker 2: looking at domestic violence and education towards that. So Allison's
Speaker 2: legacy still lives on that. We have a lunch every year.
Speaker 2: This year was the biggest of four hundred people attended
Speaker 2: and all the funding goes towards that. I think back
Speaker 2: in the day the media, I've never struck it like that.
Speaker 2: Forty five days, during the same time as the regional
Speaker 2: Crime Coordin under there had three other murders in the
Speaker 2: space of around Allison's and the media was solely interested
Speaker 2: in Allison. You could do a media in relation to
Speaker 2: the other and it was always came back to Allison
Speaker 2: because it was like the girl next door type of murder.
Speaker 2: Brookfield Areas is a pretty affluential area with a lot
Speaker 2: of you know, affluential people in Brisbane living that area
Speaker 2: and it's semi rural, and I think talking to some
Speaker 2: of the media people asking what do you think the
Speaker 2: interest was, and they just said because of the environment,
Speaker 2: who lived out there and the girl next door type arrangement. Yeah,
Speaker 2: so it was. It was very, very interesting.
Speaker 1: It's a funny beast the media, and you know, I
Speaker 1: now now work in it, but always I won't say fascinated,
Speaker 1: that's not the right word, but it always intrigued me.
Speaker 1: The type of investigations like that one, like the whole
Speaker 1: country knew about it. Other investigations I've been on, no
Speaker 1: one was interested, even though it's the same type of circumstances.
Speaker 1: I put it down to Mark. I think it's just
Speaker 1: what people can identify with and people might be able
Speaker 1: to relate with Allison for whatever reason. A woman with
Speaker 1: children and she's disappeared and the husband's a suspect, and
Speaker 1: it makes people interested. But yeah, sadly, I say it
Speaker 1: from my experience. You don't have to agree with me,
Speaker 1: but sadly, the media attention also equates to the resources
Speaker 1: you tend to get on investigations I've found as well.
Speaker 1: If there is a media attention on a particular investigation,
Speaker 1: you tend to get more resources than some of the
Speaker 1: other ones.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think that's correct this one here. As I said,
Speaker 2: I was very fortunate to have a very supportive assistant
Speaker 2: commissioner above me, and that was that was helpful coming
Speaker 2: to other resources, you know. But once it got out,
Speaker 2: you know what we're looking at, people came forward. I
Speaker 2: remember public holidays, weekends where police would just turn up
Speaker 2: saying we want to search for Allison on their days off.
Speaker 2: You know, That's that's what sort of happened. But yeah,
Speaker 2: getting back to your question, I think sometimes yeah, I
Speaker 2: think sometimes you're right there that, you know, the media
Speaker 2: attention relations to some of the matters mightn't be there,
Speaker 2: which can affect the police numbers. Yeah, and I think
Speaker 2: probably seeing that more and more now, Like is the
Speaker 2: number of murders that we're seeing, you know, years ago
Speaker 2: when you and I first joined murderers on the front
Speaker 2: page of the paper. Now you know, sometimes it doesn't
Speaker 2: even make the paper, you know.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's right. It depends. But certainly a focus has
Speaker 1: been on domestic related murders of recent times, and you know,
Speaker 1: in the chats I've had with you. You got the
Speaker 1: sense in the timing of it that very much picked
Speaker 1: up after Yeah, what happened with Allison that was a
Speaker 1: domestic related murder. I want to get your thoughts on it.
Speaker 1: But you've got a fascinating insight into domestic violence in
Speaker 1: that you did oversaw a review into thoughts of police
Speaker 1: officers attending domestic violence incidents. Do you want to just
Speaker 1: talk us through your role there and what you found.
Speaker 2: Okay, that happened a couple of years back now where
Speaker 2: the Queensland government instituted a Royal Commissioner Commissioner of Inquiry
Speaker 2: into domestic violence and the response by the Queensland Police Service.
Speaker 2: I wasn't in the police at that stage, but they
Speaker 2: asked me if I would talk to police officers in
Speaker 2: Queensland specifically looking at the culture of police towards domestic violence.
Speaker 2: It was very lucky that I could talk to them that,
Speaker 2: you know, wanting to interview operational frontline police that we're
Speaker 2: dealing with it not only in the Southeast Corner but
Speaker 2: at their first nations areas to one and two people's
Speaker 2: stations to get a holistic view of the police response
Speaker 2: to domestic violence. So, over the four week period, interviewed
Speaker 2: fifty three police from the rank of constable right up
Speaker 2: to I think as two inspectors right across the state
Speaker 2: and had a series of questions that were asked. Everyone
Speaker 2: was asked the same questions and got a very good
Speaker 2: understanding of the effects and domestic violence and police. Now,
Speaker 2: back in that time, about forty percent of calls to
Speaker 2: police with domestic violence related matters.
Speaker 1: Son, what years are we talking? Were talking to years.
Speaker 2: Twenty twenty two, this would have been so, and this
Speaker 2: is prior to course of hearings being legislated and coming
Speaker 2: in a course of control. A lot of the police
Speaker 2: I spoke to, they were very committed with respect to
Speaker 2: domestic violence. There was a lot of frustrations about red
Speaker 2: tape duplicity and look it was it was not surprising that,
Speaker 2: you know, one domestic violence matter could take four hours
Speaker 2: of an officer's shift to deal with. So that's four
Speaker 2: hours that they're in there doing the paperwork, dealing with
Speaker 2: the matter, taking them off the road. I did a
Speaker 2: report and gave evidence that the DV Commission of Inquiry
Speaker 2: with a lot of the recommendations that the people interviewed
Speaker 2: came out front line police. One of the big findings
Speaker 2: I had was they were concerned about duplicity. For example,
Speaker 2: if a person did not turn up to court for
Speaker 2: a DV matter, they had to go and find them
Speaker 2: and serve a notice of a German on them and
Speaker 2: more papers to get them before the court. And in
Speaker 2: areas the First Nation areas Thursday and.
Speaker 1: When you say someone not turning up the victim of
Speaker 1: the domestics.
Speaker 2: Sorry the offender, the offend not turning up so that
Speaker 2: itself had issues. You look at the First Nations areas
Speaker 2: up on Thursday Island. There's forty to fifty islands there
Speaker 2: where the offender could be, so police have got to
Speaker 2: try and find them. One big thing I found, particularly
Speaker 2: in one area, shifts between ten pm and six am.
Speaker 2: The crews would start at ten pm at night and
Speaker 2: there'd be a number of domestic violence matters queued up.
Speaker 2: So you had police going to areas attending to domestic violence.
Speaker 2: But then you also had supervisors who were going to
Speaker 2: domestic violence. One person out at three o'clock in the morning,
Speaker 2: which is a huge risk to the welfare of police
Speaker 2: because as you know, domestic violence matters are very volatile.
Speaker 2: The one big thing was the use of support services.
Speaker 2: There are a lot of support services in Queensland, but
Speaker 2: some of the areas don't get the same level of support.
Speaker 2: For example, one area that I spoke to a First
Speaker 2: Nation area where the police rang adv Support Network on call.
Speaker 2: It was on twenty four to seven for support and
Speaker 2: they just said, look, we've got nothing up there getting
Speaker 2: to sleep at the police station and getting the sleep
Speaker 2: in the car. Recommendations were made in relation to and
Speaker 2: I briefed actually Department or Premier about some of the
Speaker 2: findings from my report, and one recommendation was that they
Speaker 2: relook at the funding for all these domestic violent the
Speaker 2: government funding full these domestic violence organizations around the state
Speaker 2: and trying to align a balance fifteen of the police
Speaker 2: districts to have at least one of those areas in
Speaker 2: the state working twenty four to seven. And that suggestion came.
Speaker 2: It was one that I saw, but it also came
Speaker 2: from some of the police that the advantages they'd see
Speaker 2: of that is that they know the local geography, that'd
Speaker 2: know the local police, they could work with the police will,
Speaker 2: they'd know who the high risk DV offenders are and
Speaker 2: they could work together as a team.
Speaker 1: So mark, in a practical sense, if that's implemented. What
Speaker 1: the recommendations are we talking here that police And I'm
Speaker 1: staggered by the fact that you said forty percent of
Speaker 1: calls to the police station were the domestic violence related,
Speaker 1: which is startling. Police get called the car crew get
Speaker 1: called to a domestic violent situation. And the group that
Speaker 1: you're talking at, the specialists, not police officers. Are you
Speaker 1: suggesting they should attend that location if they're on twenty
Speaker 1: four to seven, attend the location with the police officers.
Speaker 2: No, not necessarily. I think you've got categories. You've got
Speaker 2: the high risk offenders, and you've got the first time
Speaker 2: offenders and the recivitust where police are going back constantly.
Speaker 2: I think you would need it. You know, resources aren't unlimited,
Speaker 2: and I think you and I think you know predominantly
Speaker 2: is the high risk offenders where you know there may
Speaker 2: be an order in place against one, they join back
Speaker 2: up and it's still continuing and doesn't necessarily have to
Speaker 2: be at the time, but an early referral so they
Speaker 2: can go on touch base with them, whether it's the
Speaker 2: next day. I think what we're looking at is just
Speaker 2: the ability for the Queensland Police attending a domestic at
Speaker 2: the back of Charlie Ball, they can touch base for
Speaker 2: the DV person twenty four to seven, that knows area,
Speaker 2: that knows what safe accommodation is available to help in
Speaker 2: that stage. But then secondly follow up with both parties
Speaker 2: involved to assist the police. Police aren't experts in human welfare.
Speaker 2: They go there, they keep the peace, they do their
Speaker 2: best they can, and domestic violence matters, but there needs
Speaker 2: to be some other level where both the receipt, the
Speaker 2: grieved and the respondent can go to for further education,
Speaker 2: can go to for conversations, and that's not the police.
Speaker 1: Yeah, like the police shouldn't be filling the role of
Speaker 1: mediation between the two parties, And yeah, you've got to
Speaker 1: sort it out. I understand what you're saying there. I
Speaker 1: would imagine police and you're the person that's interviewed them
Speaker 1: and get a sense of it. But I imagine they'd
Speaker 1: feel a lot of pressure with the domestic violent situations
Speaker 1: because of the attention that's on and if they're dedicated
Speaker 1: police officers, you know the potential consequence as if there's
Speaker 1: a domestic situation, there's always a chance of something terrible happening.
Speaker 2: One thing that I found really disturbing gary was interviewing
Speaker 2: these police that the level of fearfulness amongst the police
Speaker 2: attending to a domestic violence matter and not dealing with
Speaker 2: it properly, fearing discipline reaction DV. If they make a
Speaker 2: decision at a DV, they've got to get it might
Speaker 2: be a no DV, but they've got to get approval
Speaker 2: from their supervised as a senior sergeant, that it's a
Speaker 2: no DV. And then you've got a senior sergeant or
Speaker 2: sergeant that says, no, I'll just do it as a
Speaker 2: DV to protect your neck because we don't want to discipline.
Speaker 2: So it's had that adverse effect as well. And the
Speaker 2: big thing that I never really saw evidence of police
Speaker 2: showing away from DV because they knew there's such an
Speaker 2: emphasis on it that it had to be done properly.
Speaker 2: This is prior to course of control, so that forty
Speaker 2: percent I gave before course of control legislation comes in.
Speaker 2: And there was some criticism in the inquiry of a
Speaker 2: number of fatal DV matters whether the police hadn't responded
Speaker 2: appropriately properly. My concern is with coercive control, their levels
Speaker 2: that require investigation to establish that, yes there has been
Speaker 2: withholding of money, withholding a bank, accouncil and all this that
Speaker 2: can't be done there and then so how are police
Speaker 2: going to manage that level of scrutiny.
Speaker 1: Well, you made an interesting point there, Mark, and I've
Speaker 1: been talking about coercive control affair bit and on the
Speaker 1: back of and you know it from Queensland, the Hannah
Speaker 1: Clark situation and spoken to her parents and they were
Speaker 1: very much pushing on coercive control, which we're brought in
Speaker 1: New South Wales. I agree with it. I think it's
Speaker 1: something it's a tool that police need, but I hadn't
Speaker 1: even in all honesty, considered the investigation that would require
Speaker 1: to prove that and whether general duties police have got
Speaker 1: the time to do those type of investigations. To me,
Speaker 1: looking at it from the outside, that's a simple solution.
Speaker 1: You'd have experts in that era, specialist police that aka
Speaker 1: coercive control and a domestic unit within the local area
Speaker 1: command or squad that follow up that type of information.
Speaker 1: Because there is a lot that you've got to do.
Speaker 2: There certainly is, and you know, as I said, you know,
Speaker 2: you've got police going from DV to DV. They know
Speaker 2: that their domestic violence matters are banking up, and they
Speaker 2: know they want to get there to make sure that
Speaker 2: the people involved are safe. That's when shortcuts happen, you know,
Speaker 2: and that's that's unfortunate part of life. That's that's when
Speaker 2: things happen. You know, there's a number of scenarios that
Speaker 2: police gave me issues that they hadn't concerned about, you know,
Speaker 2: what was occurring. But look, my whole thing is police
Speaker 2: aren't the answer to everything. Domestic violence mental health is
Speaker 2: a whole community problem. A lot of domestic violence agencies
Speaker 2: are trying to start edgecation the Allison Baden Clay want
Speaker 2: are educating young kids at school. That's fine, but you
Speaker 2: look at the generational DV and one police officer I interviewed,
Speaker 2: she remembers going to domestic violence matters sixteen years ago
Speaker 2: when mum and dad were fighting and the young kids
Speaker 2: were there. Sixteen years later, she's going to domestic violence
Speaker 2: with those young kids. So the perpetrators of the domestic violence.
Speaker 2: So how do we break down that generational DV. How
Speaker 2: can the community work together to deal with this Because
Speaker 2: you know, police have families in that as well, and
Speaker 2: I think the effect on seeing it some of these
Speaker 2: DV matters can affect police in their own lives. I
Speaker 2: just think there has to be a different approach, and
Speaker 2: what that is, I'm not one hundred percent certain, but
Speaker 2: it's got to involve a whole community response.
Speaker 1: I think if you hang on to that, the whole
Speaker 1: community response policing, you can't fix it. If they bring
Speaker 1: in tougher legislation, is z that gan to solve the problem?
Speaker 1: Possibly not that, Yeah, you really need to approach it,
Speaker 1: and yeah you need to circumvent it, prevent it. Prevention
Speaker 1: is obviously better, and then bring in other services to
Speaker 1: to help help people navigate through that. But it's a
Speaker 1: You speak to any police officer and I can attest
Speaker 1: to that the amount of police I've had on the
Speaker 1: podcast and just in my general conversations with police, I
Speaker 1: know mentioned domestics and we all react the same way.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, the pain of attending domestics. It's virtually what
Speaker 1: you cut your teeth on, and it's something that the
Speaker 1: potential ramifications are extreme. So it is something and in
Speaker 1: this day and age, even more so than when I
Speaker 1: was attending domestics, so I can imagine that it does
Speaker 1: have a negative impact on the police involved in it.
Speaker 2: It does, And look, you know, I hope I haven't
Speaker 2: sort of made light of course of control because I
Speaker 2: look back at Allison's case and there was extreme examples
Speaker 2: of course of control, which you know, which has come
Speaker 2: to right now, and it's a critical thing that we
Speaker 2: have to deal with, and you know, early intervention on
Speaker 2: course of control may prevent more serious type arrangements.
Speaker 1: I don't think you've made light on it. Market like
Speaker 1: a lot of the stuff you've said today on the
Speaker 1: show is a good common sense approach. I'm saying, if anything,
Speaker 1: I was not naive, but hadn't considered how much work
Speaker 1: would go into coercive control. Having said that, I support
Speaker 1: it one hundred percent because I think that the trouble
Speaker 1: is police and you would have been there at some
Speaker 1: stage in your career. We've all been in there. We
Speaker 1: walk into a house, no one's been assaulted, there's been
Speaker 1: an argument, you can feel the tension, you can feel
Speaker 1: the fear there, but there was nothing we can do.
Speaker 1: But with coercive control, potentially we could get to the
Speaker 1: bottom of that. If someone's manipulating and controlling someone that
Speaker 1: might might circumvent it. But you make a valid point.
Speaker 1: And you know, when the politicians come in with the
Speaker 1: legislation we've changed theis we've got to be able to
Speaker 1: resource and educate police on how to use that legislation
Speaker 1: to its fullest effect.
Speaker 2: Agree, And I think there has to be a multi
Speaker 2: disciplinary approach, not just a police approach. Look, I can
Speaker 2: remember police don't like going to domestics, you know, probably
Speaker 2: one of the biggest killers of police across history of policing.
Speaker 2: I can remember as a twenty year old going to
Speaker 2: a domestic violence matter where a woman rang up and said,
Speaker 2: my husband's bashing me. We go down there, big fella.
Speaker 2: We got one handcuff on a struggle. We've all ended
Speaker 2: up over the lounge chair. The next minute the wife's
Speaker 2: they're kicking us. Leave him malone, leave him alone. Domestics
Speaker 2: are very, very volatile, and they've got to be handled
Speaker 2: professionally and carefully. And I think this day and age,
Speaker 2: you know, as we've boke before with the different drugs
Speaker 2: and mental health, which wasn't as much back as the
Speaker 2: period I'm talking about, it's just an added risk and
Speaker 2: impose on police attending domestic violence.
Speaker 1: Well, look, I'm glad we're talking about it in the
Speaker 1: the horrendous. Yeah, the consequences at the extreme where people
Speaker 1: have been murdered is just out of control. So at
Speaker 1: least the focus is on it. We've got to find
Speaker 1: a solution we can't put up with if the problems there, like, well,
Speaker 1: how are we going to change it? I like the
Speaker 1: way you approach things, Mark, Yeah, looking at solutions a
Speaker 1: little bit differently, and it's not I get the sense
Speaker 1: that you appreciate things are all not black and white.
Speaker 1: I'm going to ask you with the policing, thirty eight
Speaker 1: years in the police in then, you're still very much
Speaker 1: aware of what's going on now, with the type of
Speaker 1: work you're doing and the interest that you have in it,
Speaker 1: is it a career you would recommend to people.
Speaker 2: It's the I thoroughly enjoyed it. Whilst things have changed
Speaker 2: a lot now. I think the comaraderie and the police,
Speaker 2: the diversity in what you will be attending. And I
Speaker 2: only spoke to a young fellow last night that's coming
Speaker 2: down for interviews on the weekend, and I think the
Speaker 2: same thing you said, mate, You're going to love it.
Speaker 2: I said, you get sick of one area, move to another.
Speaker 2: You're going to see the best and the worst in people.
Speaker 2: You're going to upscull yourself. But more than that, you're
Speaker 2: going to be working with the team and a group
Speaker 2: of people that will have your back. And I think
Speaker 2: that's one big thing that I liked about the police.
Speaker 2: I enjoyed going to work. I enjoyed the challenges. I
Speaker 2: enjoyed not knowing what I was going to be doing
Speaker 2: from day to day. There's no monotony in it. And
Speaker 2: I enjoyed people I work with and some of the
Speaker 2: people I dealt with. One hundred percent, I think it's
Speaker 2: a great career.
Speaker 1: I ask that question to all police I get on there,
Speaker 1: and I think we've probably got about the ninety nine
Speaker 1: percent success rate on saying they recommend it, because I
Speaker 1: thoroughly do. And it saddens me that police forces across
Speaker 1: the country struggling to get resources at the moment. And yeah,
Speaker 1: if people just if they want an interesting, challenging, rewarding life,
Speaker 1: it's there for you in policing. Yeah, I've just listen.
Speaker 1: I see the smile that comes on your face talking
Speaker 1: about aspects of your police career and I see it
Speaker 1: time and time again, so hopefully the right right people
Speaker 1: wanted to get involved.
Speaker 2: It's like the suggestion come up earlier Gary about you know,
Speaker 2: do we have a national police service, you know, the
Speaker 2: ability to transfer and things like that need to be
Speaker 2: brought to the table for the right people to consider
Speaker 2: and suggestions like that which you know could increase recruitment
Speaker 2: and retention. You know. I just think that things like
Speaker 2: that need to be brought to the table and needs
Speaker 2: to be a national discussion on how we recruit, how
Speaker 2: we retain police officers.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Well, Mark, I've really enjoyed your chat. Good luck
Speaker 1: with your career career at the moment. Just sorry before
Speaker 1: we go, what are you doing now, because it seems
Speaker 1: like a kid in the candy store to me.
Speaker 2: Look, I'm doing a little bit of work at Queensland
Speaker 2: Cricket at the moment, integrity framework there, which is enjoyable.
Speaker 2: I love my cricket and just a little bit of
Speaker 2: consultancy work out and about and so it keeps the
Speaker 2: mind active and keeps me out of the wife's hair.
Speaker 2: So that's good.
Speaker 1: Well, you look like you're enjoying yourself and very relaxed
Speaker 1: and in the prep for the podcast and reading the
Speaker 1: type of stuff and the stances you were taking. Again
Speaker 1: a common sense approach. So I want to thank you
Speaker 1: for coming on the Eye Catch Killers podcast. Thank you
Speaker 1: for the service to the people of Queensland and the
Speaker 1: broader areas in which you've worked. And yeah, keep on
Speaker 1: doing what you're doing.
Speaker 2: Great, Thanks very much, Garian, thanks for having me on.
Speaker 2: I think it's what you're doing is fantastic bringing back
Speaker 2: what really happens behind the scenes to the grassroots and
Speaker 2: I think it's really important for people to know that.
Speaker 2: Thank you.
Speaker 1: Thanks Matt. I never got to work with Mark, but
Speaker 1: I know it'd be the type of copper I would
Speaker 1: like working. He has a common sense approach and he
Speaker 1: speaks his mind and I've got to say he raised
Speaker 1: in terms of reducing crime, in particularly youth crime, some
Speaker 1: very very interesting thoughts on how it could be approached.
Speaker 1: Mark is well placed with thirty eight years experience in
Speaker 1: the cops and he has some good ideas