Speaker 1: The public has had a long held fascination with detectives.
Speaker 1: Detective see a side of life the average persons never
Speaker 1: exposed her. 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 Ted Bathmwaite. In part one, Ted talked us through
Speaker 1: in details the events that led to the murder of
Speaker 1: six people on one night in October nineteen ninety two
Speaker 1: on the Central Coast.
Speaker 2: Welcome back, Welcome back to you, Gary, Thank you.
Speaker 1: Okay, well, in part one, you gave us a very
Speaker 1: detailed description of the lead up and the build up
Speaker 1: to this. Neither of murder and brutality at the level
Speaker 1: that we rarely get to see. And we just touched
Speaker 1: on it briefly. So many red flags, and we have
Speaker 1: the benefit of hindsight, and you would having research for
Speaker 1: the book, but more importantly working on the investigation, you
Speaker 1: would have you would have seen it. This appears to
Speaker 1: be just so many, so many times where if people
Speaker 1: put the hand up, brought it to the attention that
Speaker 1: the police, maybe, just maybe this horror of an evening
Speaker 1: wouldn't have occurred. What's your take on that.
Speaker 2: Well, it's always been a vexed question for me. The
Speaker 2: question is why why didn't anybody speak up? And I
Speaker 2: can only reflect on the context of those individuals lives
Speaker 2: at the time, the one that were given the red
Speaker 2: flag or had an opportunity to do a red flag.
Speaker 2: I think that the deep effect of his coercive control
Speaker 2: over people may have been something that was that they
Speaker 2: that those women in particular, couldn't overcome if I was
Speaker 2: to speak up. They may have thought He's going to
Speaker 2: come for me. And he's always been a bullshit artist.
Speaker 2: He's always talking shit. I don't really believe him, and
Speaker 2: most of them in the book kind of expressed that,
Speaker 2: oh yeah, that's just that's just Malcolm, that's that's just Baker,
Speaker 2: that's just the way he is. Only on one occasion
Speaker 2: with one of the people that he offered a red
Speaker 2: flag to really had a genuine fear that he would
Speaker 2: carry it out. But again, why they didn't speak up
Speaker 2: could be because of their fear of him. The coercive
Speaker 2: control that he had over them, could have been in
Speaker 2: the context of where they were in time, time and
Speaker 2: place in Western Sydney and their attitude towards snitching or
Speaker 2: their attitudes towards the police. It's hard to fathom. It's
Speaker 2: hard to fathim. There's no obvious evidence to the reason
Speaker 2: why no one went straight down to the police station
Speaker 2: and complained. But then again, what are you going to
Speaker 2: complain about. Here's this cranky man who he knows, a
Speaker 2: pain in the ass, cranky man come around having a
Speaker 2: big winge on my shoulder. What offense has he fit?
Speaker 2: Has he committed? You know, he might have a gun
Speaker 2: in the back of his car, but he may or
Speaker 2: may not have the gun that he used on the
Speaker 2: neither murders wasn't in his car, it was at his
Speaker 2: house hid and't at his house.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I suppose when you break it down like that,
Speaker 1: and it potentially could be in isolation, so it's just
Speaker 1: someone voicing an opinion. He's always talking shit like that, Yeah,
Speaker 1: never never carried it out.
Speaker 2: But he's a coward, you know, and they would have
Speaker 2: seen all those people would have seen him as a
Speaker 2: cowardly The cowards have the courage to do. But eventually he.
Speaker 1: Did a tough talk, but that never backs it up
Speaker 1: type thing. But I suppose, and this is why. Yeah,
Speaker 1: in today's society, we're so aware of these things, and
Speaker 1: I don't think it would wash these days. The pub
Speaker 1: tests for the day, people go okay, well you need
Speaker 1: to speak up. But yeah, it's judging people on what
Speaker 1: they could a long time ago.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and don't. I don't hold any judgment to those people.
Speaker 2: I just like to think about into context of where
Speaker 2: it was in their lives at the time and their
Speaker 2: relationships to him, and the broader societal context as well.
Speaker 2: It's not like it is now. It's hopefully much safer
Speaker 2: for women now.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Okay, let's bring it up up to the night.
Speaker 1: So what we left off in part one that he'd
Speaker 1: gone round to Kerry Anne's place, stalking up and down,
Speaker 1: patrolling up and down the street during the course of
Speaker 1: the day. He'd been rejected by Kerry Anne's mother a
Speaker 1: couple of days before when he said he wanted to
Speaker 1: see Kerry Anne and then he's crept up to the
Speaker 1: house and heard carry Anne talking to a mile in
Speaker 1: the bedroom. Yes, on that basis, he's gone back to
Speaker 1: his house. And how far away is his house.
Speaker 2: It's only a five or ten minute drive.
Speaker 1: Okay, that's very close. So gone back to it, driven
Speaker 1: back to his house. Access to firearm that the police didn't.
Speaker 2: Seize Bentley twelve gage shotgun.
Speaker 1: So twelve twelve gauge shotgun. Just people don't understand firearms.
Speaker 1: A shotgun spreads a lot of shots that come out,
Speaker 1: depending on the size of the shells put in there.
Speaker 1: But they do a hell of a lot of damage
Speaker 1: when fired of the person close range.
Speaker 2: Yeah, close range damage that they're designed to kill it
Speaker 2: close range. They're not hunting them.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and it's not just one projectile. Its sprays spray's yeah.
Speaker 2: From memory, the cartridges that he used, there was somewhere
Speaker 2: between sixteen and twenty six shot in each cartridge.
Speaker 1: Okay, so that will spread fairly wide of the close
Speaker 1: close range and signal well, punch a very big hole,
Speaker 1: significant significant damage. He also cut off the stock of
Speaker 1: the firearm. What was that about. He doesn't really explain
Speaker 1: that in the subsequent interviews after his arrest.
Speaker 2: But it would just be for ease, easy to hide,
Speaker 2: it's easy to carry, it's less cumbersome.
Speaker 1: Well, that's that was the old bank robbers tool and trade.
Speaker 1: Cut off the butt of the shotgun so they could
Speaker 1: conceal it.
Speaker 2: Just make it a smaller, smaller weapon. Very in mind.
Speaker 2: It was a pump action shot it's a pump action shotgun.
Speaker 2: So you had two hands on the on the on
Speaker 2: the slide, had one hand on the slide and one
Speaker 2: head on the trigger. The stock was irrelevant. Really, Yeah,
Speaker 2: he never pellowed to his shoulder to ad because it
Speaker 2: was all from the.
Speaker 1: Pips still operate. How many how many cartridges did he take?
Speaker 2: He had a full full had seven up the spout
Speaker 2: as we say, yeah, which is the foot in the firearm.
Speaker 2: And you had a bandolier of twenty plus.
Speaker 1: Okay, so he went there well armed, well armed. Okay,
Speaker 1: Now I just want you and I apologize to people
Speaker 1: listening to it that what we're going to talk about
Speaker 1: is fairly brutal, but this is the nature of what
Speaker 1: happens when a gunman goes on the rampage. So let's
Speaker 1: take it through in the chronology of what happened in
Speaker 1: that night. And this is based on your knowledge from
Speaker 1: the investigation, your research in the book, and stuff that
Speaker 1: he told police.
Speaker 2: Suff he tool police, and subsequent conversations I had with
Speaker 2: three of the victims of the matter.
Speaker 1: Okay, if you just take us through it.
Speaker 2: Okay. So on the night, for whatever reason walking up
Speaker 2: the stairs that has flicked the switch were the previous
Speaker 2: twelve months and all the conversations he's had with people,
Speaker 2: I'm going to do this, I'm going to do that.
Speaker 2: She's a bit, you know, she's ruined my life and whatever.
Speaker 2: For whatever reason, when he heard the conversation with Chris
Speaker 2: gall in the bedroom at seventy five Barnhill Drive, caused
Speaker 2: him to go back to the house straight away, saw
Speaker 2: the butt off, load the gun, get the bandoleer, and
Speaker 2: he didn't go straight back to the house because it
Speaker 2: was daylight saving, so he's spent time going around the town.
Speaker 2: While he's going around Terry Gull waiting for darkness. He
Speaker 2: actually runs into young Tom Gennan, who had been at
Speaker 2: the house prior.
Speaker 1: To Baker, Kerrie Anne's younger brother, Kerrians.
Speaker 2: Young brother, and he'd had a conversation with him. So
Speaker 2: at this point he's down in Terrigle at dusk with
Speaker 2: a loaded firearm which had been modified. Talking to Tom Gannett.
Speaker 2: I'm convinced if he'd had the opportunity then and there,
Speaker 2: but it would have been in public, he would have
Speaker 2: shot young Tom Gannett. Tom Gannon's got away from him. Whatever.
Speaker 2: Baker's then waited for it to get dark. He's come.
Speaker 2: He's slunk up the hill at Grosvenor Revenue, parked out
Speaker 2: of sight and came across come across the Barnhill Road.
Speaker 2: He walked up the stairs stairway, two level stairs, stood
Speaker 2: at the door of seventy seven Barnhill Drive, Barnhill Road. Terrible.
Speaker 2: The front door was closed and he could see at
Speaker 2: the at the the as a timber door and had
Speaker 2: a piece of that opaque glass in the door, like
Speaker 2: a square of opaque glass. He could see shadow figures inside,
Speaker 2: he could hear the TV. And then he just kicked
Speaker 2: the door. He just kicked the door open, charged into
Speaker 2: the house. Lis Agannon was on his left, sitting at
Speaker 2: a couch having something to eat. This is a Lisa
Speaker 2: eight months pregnant. Lisa again and Carrie's sister saw Tom Gannon,
Speaker 2: the senior, at the back of the kitchen. They've He's
Speaker 2: moved forward towards Tom. Tom's moved out of the kitchen,
Speaker 2: had the firearm on his hip. Tom's had a conversation
Speaker 2: with him, Get out, get out, what are you doing here? Bang?
Speaker 2: He shot Tom and the first shot hit Tom in
Speaker 2: the shoulder and the chest. Tom spun around, semi conscious
Speaker 2: and fell on the floor. He's turned immediately to his
Speaker 2: left and virtually on top of Lisa. Gannon fired one
Speaker 2: round into the top of her head.
Speaker 1: And.
Speaker 2: It was with such force that blew the top of
Speaker 2: her head off, killing her instantly. At this point, Carrie
Speaker 2: and Chris Gaure her friend or a boyfriend at the time,
Speaker 2: heard the shots. Carriann's opened and they were in the
Speaker 2: bedroom two rooms down the hallway to the left. Carrie
Speaker 2: Anne's opened the door and she saw Matt or as
Speaker 2: she called him, Mac. Saw Max. It's Mac. It's Max's Mac.
Speaker 2: She closed the door and locked it. He heard her.
Speaker 2: Baker's walked down the corridor, stood at the door, fired
Speaker 2: around into the door of Carrie Anne's bedroom. The door
Speaker 2: swung open. The first person he's seen is Kerrien's boyfriend,
Speaker 2: Chris Gall, standing at the end of the bed. Fired
Speaker 2: a shot at Chris. That shot, has said, Chris into
Speaker 2: the right side of the face, removing basically his right
Speaker 2: cheek and knocking him unconscious. He fell to the floor.
Speaker 2: The Baker when he back at his house earlier on,
Speaker 2: when he was planning to do all this these murders here,
Speaker 2: he had decided that he would not shoot Kerrien, that
Speaker 2: he wanted to kidnap her and take her away, which
Speaker 2: is interesting in the context of what he's always done.
Speaker 2: He wanted to get carry In away from the family
Speaker 2: or any of the obstacles that he had, and it
Speaker 2: had taken with him a piece of nylon rope which
Speaker 2: he had around his waist or over his shoulder. So
Speaker 2: he grabbed Carrie Anne at the bedroom with Chris Gaul
Speaker 2: semi conscious on the floor, and he could hear Chris
Speaker 2: Gore can hear the conversation that He's Baker's having with
Speaker 2: carry Anne, dragged her, got her in her headlock and
Speaker 2: dragged her down the corridor to the lounge room, where
Speaker 2: She's all of a sudden seen her murdered sister Lisa
Speaker 2: on the on the couch, screamed, wrestled, and Baker's scratched
Speaker 2: her neck and tried to choke her. She's got away
Speaker 2: and run back into the bedroom, which is quite bizarre
Speaker 2: in a sense because before she gets to the bedroom
Speaker 2: there was a laundry which had a back door, which
Speaker 2: she could have run down in accord into the backyard
Speaker 2: to escape, but she obviously didn't think of it at
Speaker 2: the time. Baker's followed her back to the bedroom and
Speaker 2: carry Anne stood up to him. He said, I've had enough,
Speaker 2: had enough. If you're going to kill me, just kill me,
Speaker 2: and she turned around and at that point from a
Speaker 2: meet her and a halfway he shot her in the back.
Speaker 2: Carrie has fallen face up and died instantly on the spot.
Speaker 2: That while this was going on in the bedroom with
Speaker 2: carry and Baker, Tom Baker had managed to get up
Speaker 2: remain conscious of father, the father, the eldest Tom sr.
Speaker 2: And he struggled down the front stairs and collapsed unconscious
Speaker 2: on the middle of Barnhill road. As Baker was leaving,
Speaker 2: Baker saw Tom Tom on the road, walked up the
Speaker 2: Tom and at point blank, Raine shot him in the
Speaker 2: back of the head, killing him.
Speaker 1: It's brutal, isn't it.
Speaker 2: It's absolutely brutal.
Speaker 1: What just on this breakdown? A couple of things there.
Speaker 1: How long did this rampage in this house last fall?
Speaker 1: What are we talking? Is the way you've described it's
Speaker 1: virtually in real.
Speaker 2: No more than five minutes. The witness the witness accounts
Speaker 2: have said. It has happened very quickly.
Speaker 1: And the chaos and the sound of a shotgun going
Speaker 1: off and the screens.
Speaker 2: Yes, one, two, three, four, five times five times.
Speaker 1: And so Tom's trying to escape from the house or
Speaker 1: it's help Aul.
Speaker 2: It's unclear what Tom's what Tom was trying to do,
Speaker 2: but he only made it to the middle of the road.
Speaker 2: Tom's relationship Tom soon his relationship with Baker was was
Speaker 2: that were mates, did various jobs together. They probably did
Speaker 2: some criminal activity together, but he that had a falling
Speaker 2: out over some work that Tom had done some time ago.
Speaker 2: But Tom was part of the family group that were
Speaker 2: all encouraging carry to get away from.
Speaker 1: From and so Tom's on the road and he just
Speaker 1: come up and shot him in the.
Speaker 2: Yeah, he was still alive. And then he shot him
Speaker 2: in the.
Speaker 1: Back of the fellow that was in the bedroom with
Speaker 1: Kerry Anne. Now Chris got what did he pass out
Speaker 1: from the injuries.
Speaker 2: He was semi conscious from the injuries, and he could
Speaker 2: hear the conversation. He heard the conversation between carry Anne
Speaker 2: and Baker as he dragged her out of the room
Speaker 2: and dragged her down the hall. And then he heard
Speaker 2: the conversation with carry Anne said just kill me. He
Speaker 2: was unable to move. He was kind of virtually trapped
Speaker 2: under the edge of the fold out bed, a large
Speaker 2: portion of his face missing, bleeding profusely.
Speaker 1: And do you think Baker just thought he was dead.
Speaker 2: I think Baker thought he was dead. But Baker, Baker
Speaker 2: assassinated the people that this this crime scene is all
Speaker 2: about revenge, all about.
Speaker 1: All family memb all family members.
Speaker 2: This kid, Chris Gore wasn't he wasn't fair, so he
Speaker 2: didn't he'd never met him, He didn't even know. Chris
Speaker 2: Gaul is Sylvia Gall one of the ladies from the
Speaker 2: Vocar nursing home. It's her son, Okay, because Sylvia Gall
Speaker 2: invited Kerry Anne to go and stay with her for
Speaker 2: a couple of nights after Baker bashed her in.
Speaker 1: The flat and formed the friendship.
Speaker 2: Formed the friendship from that. So it was her son,
Speaker 2: that's where she met him.
Speaker 1: What how chilling here in carry Anne like, if you're
Speaker 1: going to kill me, just kill me her words? Isn't
Speaker 1: that that just so sad that her wife has come
Speaker 1: to that, this lunatic.
Speaker 2: That she had no option, She had no choice. She
Speaker 2: was twenty four years old, she hadn't she was a
Speaker 2: whole life ahead of her and this man would not stop,
Speaker 2: would not stop, and she was trapped in this bedroom,
Speaker 2: probably thought Chris Gore was dead. What to do and
Speaker 2: then she just called his bluff and lost.
Speaker 1: Just makes me sad even thinking about it. And her
Speaker 1: sister that was eight months pregnant. Yes, the baby didn't survive,
Speaker 1: I'd take it. No.
Speaker 2: Another really sad part of it. Lisa was engaged to
Speaker 2: a serving police officer at the time, Paul Martin, who
Speaker 2: worked in Sydney, and Paul had been at work that
Speaker 2: day and he's on his way home and he'd heard
Speaker 2: about the shooting at Teregul as he got off the
Speaker 2: train at Gosford and he raced to the crime scene
Speaker 2: and obviously a police were on scene it then and
Speaker 2: they were able to control him and look after him
Speaker 2: in a sense. But it took police quite quite a while,
Speaker 2: had to get the dog squad there because I unsure
Speaker 2: where the shooter was. The only evidence that he wasn't
Speaker 2: in the house was gleaned from Chris Gore, but only
Speaker 2: after Chris Gore was extracted from the house because he
Speaker 2: was a potential killer twenty five minutes later by the
Speaker 2: uniform police and he said, oh, Baker, Baker, and he
Speaker 2: drew He couldn't talk, but he drew Baker's name in
Speaker 2: the sand and the guards of the injuries, yeah, because
Speaker 2: of the injuries. So when Paul Martin's turned up, that
Speaker 2: was an hour later. Prior to that, some forty five
Speaker 2: minutes when the amblaster were on the scene and the
Speaker 2: scene was clear, there's no shooter on scene, and the
Speaker 2: police were very comfortable that it was just going to
Speaker 2: be a crime scene. Ambulece officers went inside and did
Speaker 2: a fetal heartbeat, but there was no fetal heart right.
Speaker 2: You know, the medical evidence say you have three minutes,
Speaker 2: three or four minutes after an injury like that before
Speaker 2: to save the baby, and there was no fetal heartbeat.
Speaker 1: Just another sad aspect of this, Okay, So you've got
Speaker 1: that happened, though, would imagine there'd be calls from the neighbors,
Speaker 1: the police would be alerted what was Baker's movements after that.
Speaker 2: So Baker then straightaway he got into his car and
Speaker 2: he drove straight away to Sherwood Close in Bado Bay,
Speaker 2: which is where his son, David Baker was living with
Speaker 2: a de facto partner, Michelle Cooper and her small child,
Speaker 2: Stevie Lee. And he'd been to this place many times.
Speaker 2: He knew where it was. He'd often been seen stalking
Speaker 2: around the place, often been seen parking down the street,
Speaker 2: stereotax starring at the place, particularly subsequent to when David
Speaker 2: subsequent to David Baker disclosing to Malcolm Baker that he'd
Speaker 2: slept with carry.
Speaker 1: So he's lost for vengeance and that wasn't satisfied with
Speaker 1: the chaosity caused it the first place. And now he's
Speaker 1: gone to see gouty son, the killy son.
Speaker 2: Well, that's the interesting thing about that. This night of
Speaker 2: the murders, he said, Well, I'm going to do one.
Speaker 2: I'm going to get them all, and were reflecting on
Speaker 2: conversations that he'd had with the ex wives in his
Speaker 2: Sydney I'm going to kill them all and whatever. It
Speaker 2: was become a parents in hindsight that if he was
Speaker 2: going to do one, he was going to do them all.
Speaker 2: And on this particular night, unfortunately, they were all home
Speaker 2: and they were all available. So he drove to Sherwood Close.
Speaker 2: It was night, it was dark, parked the car around
Speaker 2: the street out of sight because Sherd five Sherwood closes
Speaker 2: a little cul de sac, and he approached the house
Speaker 2: down the left hand side where David's car was. It
Speaker 2: was in darkness. David's dog started barking. David was in
Speaker 2: the house with Michelle Cooper and Stevie Lee, and David's
Speaker 2: dog started barking. At that point, David went outside out
Speaker 2: the back to the back porch to see what was
Speaker 2: making the dog bark. And as David stepped out of
Speaker 2: the back porch looked to his left, the light came on.
Speaker 2: Looked to his left, his father stepped out of the
Speaker 2: darkness and from about three meters fired at him. That
Speaker 2: shot hit him in the chest and knocked him unconscious,
Speaker 2: and he slumped back onto a garden chair in the backyard.
Speaker 2: Baker then walked up to him at point blank range
Speaker 2: and shot him in the head, just the brutale, without
Speaker 2: saying a word, no words for exchange. Michelle Cooper could
Speaker 2: hear the conversation if there was one inside, and she
Speaker 2: heard the shots, she was straight away. She looked out,
Speaker 2: she saw her boyfriend slumped dead in the chair. She
Speaker 2: straight away locked the house and bunkered down. Baker wasn't
Speaker 2: interested in Michelle Cooper. He had no motivation, no reason
Speaker 2: to hurt her. She'd never done anything to stand in
Speaker 2: his way with Kerry Anne. She just happened to be
Speaker 2: in that very short term relationship with David. At that
Speaker 2: point he ran back to his car and he was
Speaker 2: seen reversing his car down the street that he had
Speaker 2: hidden in. The wheel screeched and he drove off.
Speaker 1: Where did he head after that?
Speaker 2: So after that he drove quite some distance from that
Speaker 2: bad Oh Bay to four sixty nine Wyong Road Pacific Highway,
Speaker 2: Wyong North, and that was the house of Ross Smith.
Speaker 1: Heard twenty minutes.
Speaker 2: It's good twenty minutes. Ye, oddly enough, in the book
Speaker 2: you talk about the police response. So all the police
Speaker 2: resources rushed to Terrigle. Police from the Wyon command were
Speaker 2: rushing to Terrigle en route they'd heard about the shooting
Speaker 2: at bad O Bay. They diverted to bad O Bay,
Speaker 2: which was closer. All the police resources were heading south.
Speaker 1: So Gio gradit graphically for people down the stand. You've
Speaker 1: got Terrible south, then Bay northwest, fifteen to twenty minutes northwest,
Speaker 1: and then.
Speaker 2: Wyong's another twenty twenty five minutes northwest.
Speaker 1: So all the police have headed down to what was
Speaker 1: happening at Terrygle, and then when the incidents happened at
Speaker 1: bad Obay, that would have been notified. And then you
Speaker 1: got Baker heading up to wile.
Speaker 2: Well, heading up to Wine and there was no there
Speaker 2: was no he would have passed the blue light police
Speaker 2: cars on his way to wil So you got he
Speaker 2: got to Wine. It was dark, he'd been there plenty
Speaker 2: of times. He'd been seen stalking past the house he'd had.
Speaker 2: This is a house of Ross Ross Ross Smith who
Speaker 2: lived there with his de facto Leslie Joyce Reid. He
Speaker 2: parked his car, which everyone knew about, out in the
Speaker 2: front of the house was like a small property off
Speaker 2: while off the Pacific Highway wiring roads. It wasn't like
Speaker 2: a house per se. It was a farmhouse set back
Speaker 2: onto a property.
Speaker 1: And this hatred that he's got of Ross Smith stems
Speaker 1: from that first time you met him. The issue with
Speaker 1: the selling of the house.
Speaker 2: Pure revenge for being ripped off. Well, there's two past
Speaker 2: to it. Being ripped off the money because he was
Speaker 2: obsessed with money, but ross Its inability to do what
Speaker 2: he wanted to do to get the house to Millfield
Speaker 2: caused him his plan to move carry in away from
Speaker 2: the central customers. So it's all interconnected.
Speaker 1: Okay, sorry, So he's headed to Wong.
Speaker 2: And North Wong and so he's parked his car in
Speaker 2: the front yard. Balders Brass, it's all in darkness. Knocked
Speaker 2: on the front door. Ross's de facto Leslie Joyce Reed,
Speaker 2: who he'd never met before, answered the door. He held
Speaker 2: the gun to a chest, asked where's Ross. He frog
Speaker 2: marched it down the down left, down the corridor. As
Speaker 2: he's walking down a corridor to the back room the
Speaker 2: bathrooms on the right, he saw Ross Smith's in the bath,
Speaker 2: naked in the bath, eating some chicken that Kerry at
Speaker 2: Leslie had given him for tea. As he's as Ross
Speaker 2: saw Baker in the doorway with the gunpoint. Ross stood
Speaker 2: up and threw his wallet and threw anything he could
Speaker 2: at Baker. Baker's fired one shot from the door for
Speaker 2: about three meters which has hit Ross Smith in the chest.
Speaker 2: Ross is alive still and slumped down into the bath.
Speaker 2: Ross He's still conscious, slumped down into the bar. He's
Speaker 2: turned back to Leslie, who's in the end of the corridor,
Speaker 2: who's got her arms in the air and basically defenseless.
Speaker 2: Fired a shot at Leslie which has hit her in
Speaker 2: the left shoulder and the right arm. She's collapsed, fallen
Speaker 2: on the floor the into the main bedroom. He's turned
Speaker 2: back to Ross and fired has shot at Rice's close
Speaker 2: range in the head, like he did with his son,
Speaker 2: like he did with Tom kill very similar, just very
Speaker 2: close top of the head. Killed them instantly. Leslie's alive
Speaker 2: in the bedroom. This is a woman he's never met.
Speaker 2: This is the woman he's got no hate for, no
Speaker 2: vengeance for why he shot her. I don't know. They
Speaker 2: could have done the same to Michelle Cooper if he
Speaker 2: wanted to the fact that she was there and she
Speaker 2: saw him, and maybe he was thinking about his own
Speaker 2: skin at this time. I don't want any witnesses to this.
Speaker 2: No one see me yet, they're all dead. She's a witness.
Speaker 2: He stepped into the bedroom and shot her again. She
Speaker 2: lived for an hour, an hour or so witnessed. The
Speaker 2: neighbors came, so he shot her again. Then he he
Speaker 2: drove his car around the back of the house Ross
Speaker 2: Smiths house, stole her car, her little Masda, and left
Speaker 2: the property and headed north again towards Doyleson. What was
Speaker 2: he's playing there, He doesn't Unfortunately, it's not articulated in
Speaker 2: the interviews. I'm of the belief that he stopped at
Speaker 2: Doyleson to get a drink and to get some petrol,
Speaker 2: and he would he was going to then head west
Speaker 2: to kill ross Smith's father and brother who lived nearby.
Speaker 2: Why he didn't do that, he doesn't articulate in the interviews,
Speaker 2: but he said he basically had a moment of clarity.
Speaker 2: I can use that expression. Had a moment of clarity
Speaker 2: at the garage and he decided to go to his
Speaker 2: friend's house, John Thompson, a friend who who was no
Speaker 2: more friendly than anyone. No one was really friends with Baker.
Speaker 2: He didn't really have long friendships. He was an acquaintance
Speaker 2: that that you know, if he was knocking on the
Speaker 2: door and you didn't want to see him, you wouldn't
Speaker 2: answer the door, that sort of acquaintance. But he went
Speaker 2: to John Thompson's ten o'clock this night, knocked on the door.
Speaker 2: It said that John Thompson, I've done it. Done what
Speaker 2: I've done it. I've got them all virtually bragged, but
Speaker 2: I've done it. Thompson took him outside, What have you done?
Speaker 2: And then he revealed that he's parts of what he'd
Speaker 2: done that night, of what who he shot or whatever?
Speaker 2: And how did you do it? No, Thompson said, whose
Speaker 2: car is that? Because he saw the Masda Kerry Leslie's Masda.
Speaker 2: Thomas said, who's car? That's someone's car. I don't know
Speaker 2: who it is. Because he didn't know, Lessie read, I
Speaker 2: just took it. Where's the gun, it's in the car.
Speaker 2: He had it in the boot of the car. They
Speaker 2: went back inside and he tried to calm him down again.
Speaker 2: Baker at the time was quite frantic, quite emotional, quite hyper,
Speaker 2: and somehow, for some reason John said let's go to
Speaker 2: the police station. And Baker said okay, and John Thomas
Speaker 2: said I'll drive. He said, no, I'll take this car.
Speaker 2: Thompson was under clear whether Baker was then going to
Speaker 2: scoot off, but as we know in the book, he
Speaker 2: followed John Thompson to the police station.
Speaker 1: Can I just stop you there?
Speaker 2: Ted?
Speaker 1: Like, I know, he did go to the police station.
Speaker 1: But I just want to, first of all, thank you
Speaker 1: for articulating that. I've been silent because he took me
Speaker 1: right into it. Just the brutality of what was inflicted
Speaker 1: that night is unforgettable. Yeah, it is unforgetable. I just
Speaker 1: want to before we carry on about what happens when
Speaker 1: he got to the police station. I'm curious because and
Speaker 1: I think this is the copying me. When that type
Speaker 1: of stuff is going down, the radio is going bizarre,
Speaker 1: people are getting called out, left, right and center. You've
Speaker 1: got to shoot her on the run. That's just going
Speaker 1: and killing people. And no one at that particular point
Speaker 1: in time had an expectation that's going to hand himself
Speaker 1: into a police station. So you got called out that
Speaker 1: night he did, ye, explain your role and explain the
Speaker 1: chaos of the night when that type of thing happens,
Speaker 1: because it's very rare in the policing career that you
Speaker 1: get caught up in that type of chaos when things
Speaker 1: are happening in real time, and that literally you better
Speaker 1: switch on and get your job done because otherwise more
Speaker 1: people are going to be killed. So what was the
Speaker 1: pressure and what was the circumstances.
Speaker 2: So I was at home off Judy, We've got a
Speaker 2: call from Detective Sergeant Bill Erickson to get to pick
Speaker 2: up the A list Steve Potter and raced down to
Speaker 2: the crime scene at North Wyl where Bill was waiting
Speaker 2: with the other detectives, Senior Comfortable Peter Donaldson. At that point,
Speaker 2: while I was en route, Baker had actually headed himself
Speaker 2: into the police station. We weren't aware of that because
Speaker 2: I was in my private car. When I got to
Speaker 2: the scene at North Wyle, two Highway patrol constables were
Speaker 2: meeting a log at the gate and on the gate
Speaker 2: that they were quite traumatized about it, but they were
Speaker 2: quite relieved because they said, oh, they've got him up
Speaker 2: until moments before, nobody knew where he was.
Speaker 1: Nobody knew because at that stage before he's handed him
Speaker 1: self in I would imagine the police radio would have
Speaker 1: been going off, tactical police would have been called from
Speaker 1: all over the place, detectives would have been called out,
Speaker 1: and there would have been car circulated if you had
Speaker 1: the description of the car.
Speaker 2: There was a vague description of a car. There was
Speaker 2: not a lot of details. It was only subsequent to
Speaker 2: him handing himself in the details started to appear.
Speaker 1: He was just a sequence of events on the central case.
Speaker 1: And when we're talking the central case, yeah, this is
Speaker 1: all geographically in the same area and you just got this.
Speaker 1: At any point, was he circulated as a shooter before
Speaker 1: he handed himself in?
Speaker 2: Okay, they didn't even know that. I mean, it was
Speaker 2: an unusual event on that night where when Newcastle Radio
Speaker 2: VKG alerted everyone on the channel, no more communications. The
Speaker 2: only communications now that anyone's allowed to give is in
Speaker 2: relation to this matter. Until it became clear that obviously
Speaker 2: he'd been a.
Speaker 1: Counted and like people went after we've talked for it
Speaker 1: or you have explains what's happened. Would be thinking, well,
Speaker 1: is he circulated as wanted that we're looking for him.
Speaker 1: But when you get to a crime scene like that,
Speaker 1: you first you've got to check that the gunman's not
Speaker 1: still there because it could be an ambush, so that
Speaker 1: that takes time.
Speaker 2: That's correct.
Speaker 1: Whether this one's related to that one, you've got to
Speaker 1: wonder whether they're even related. And then when the third
Speaker 1: ones happened that we have just been cha.
Speaker 2: I think it was Codrek and I mean I had
Speaker 2: a conversation with Bill Erickson at the scene. When they
Speaker 2: arrived at the scene with Bill the Peter Don, they
Speaker 2: were unsure that that scene wasn't hot with the shooter
Speaker 2: active with the shooter, and they approached that with great
Speaker 2: trepidation as well, because nobody knew there was no car there,
Speaker 2: that Baker's Volvo was parked around the back out of sight.
Speaker 2: It was only when they did a perimeter search of
Speaker 2: the of the premises and tried to secure the premises,
Speaker 2: not knowing whether there was a shooter inside, that they
Speaker 2: saw the car. There wasn't enough time for police to
Speaker 2: connect the dots of what Chris Gore was saying when
Speaker 2: he's making those handwritten messages in Garter at Terrygill about
Speaker 2: Malcolm Baker Volvo great cream colored Volvo. That information wouldn't
Speaker 2: have resonated to the uniform police and the detectives at
Speaker 2: Terrrigill at that point, because Chris Gore was the only.
Speaker 1: One that could only survive it was.
Speaker 2: The only one who could tell anybody anything about it.
Speaker 2: Subsequent when the police turned up at Sherwood Close and
Speaker 2: they managed to speak to Michelle Cooper, she would give
Speaker 2: a version of events, still not been able to identify
Speaker 2: Baker as the shooter because she didn't see him or
Speaker 2: hearing the sea his car, but a witness saw the
Speaker 2: car driving away. Subsequent to that, that witness identified the car.
Speaker 2: That timeline to that has extended to the point Baker's
Speaker 2: already gaunted to north Woong, He's already killed Ross Smith
Speaker 2: and Leslie Reed, he's already driven to Dyleson and he's
Speaker 2: contemplating his future. It was only those two little bits
Speaker 2: of evidence that at those two crime scenes that would
Speaker 2: have identified him, which made it even harder for police
Speaker 2: across the coast to know who they're looking for.
Speaker 1: Okay, you've been called out, you're in your private car,
Speaker 1: you get to the crime scene. By that stage you
Speaker 1: notified that the shoe that has handed himself in, So
Speaker 1: you're looking at the crime scene. What's got to be done?
Speaker 1: There talk us through the crime scene. Explain what you
Speaker 1: saw and what you did there.
Speaker 2: Yeah, So it was the starkest memory I have of
Speaker 2: it is when I walked up to the porch and
Speaker 2: spoke to Bill Ericson and Peter Donaldson. You could still
Speaker 2: smell the gunpowder. You can still smell that smell in
Speaker 2: the air because it was a small house. Bill gave us,
Speaker 2: Steve Potter and I strict instructions about the managing the
Speaker 2: crime scene. Obviously, now this was going to be a
Speaker 2: big media event. Bill had told me it only just
Speaker 2: found out about Baker heading himself in and Bill Bill
Speaker 2: let Bill had. Bill felt an obligation to Leslie Read,
Speaker 2: who was still alive, and she was transported from the
Speaker 2: crime scene in a hospital to Gosford Hospital. Bill felt
Speaker 2: an obligation to find out about her. He left me
Speaker 2: and Potter in charge of the crime scene. He and
Speaker 2: Donaldson and drove to the hospital at Wile to try
Speaker 2: and make some contact with Gosper to get the situation
Speaker 2: of Leslie Read. Unfortunately, Leslie Reid died very shortly after
Speaker 2: she was admitted to Gospel Hospital from the wounds and
Speaker 2: then in the in the In that process, he'd become
Speaker 2: aware of Baker henning himself in and he moved to
Speaker 2: He then went to Terrogo Police Station. Potter and I
Speaker 2: it was a huge thing for both of us. It
Speaker 2: was a massive crime scene, the biggest thing we've ever
Speaker 2: been thrown. We're given the responsibility by a particular sergeant
Speaker 2: to manage this crime scene. Don't let any media in,
Speaker 2: don't let You've got witnesses on both sides. Go and
Speaker 2: interview these witnesses. This is before laptops and iPads or whatever,
Speaker 2: so they're all handbook, handbook interviews. Make sure that that
Speaker 2: crime scene is intact. So Potter and I did a
Speaker 2: perimeter search. We made sure we secured the car, secured
Speaker 2: there's a dog at the back. Secured the dog. We
Speaker 2: entered the crime scene and we could see that that
Speaker 2: the house was quite a disheveled house, but it was
Speaker 2: cozy in a sense. The TV was on, there was
Speaker 2: a there was a pet cat sleeping on the couch
Speaker 2: in front of the TV. We went down the corridor
Speaker 2: towards the back room Ross Smith. You could see you
Speaker 2: could see all the food and the wallet and the
Speaker 2: belt that he'd thrown at Baker. You could see the
Speaker 2: empty cartridges on the floor. Unfortunately, Ross was in the bath.
Speaker 2: He slumped over the bath like that. The Supreme Court
Speaker 2: judge mentions it, mentions it. There's the famous painting of
Speaker 2: a man who's died in a bath whose arms slunk
Speaker 2: over the edge. I can't remember the name of it,
Speaker 2: but it was quite weird for the Supreme Court judge
Speaker 2: to do that. But he was slumped over at the
Speaker 2: edge of the bath with his brain matter on the floor,
Speaker 2: completely dead.
Speaker 1: Just on the personal thing, like and we're cops, so
Speaker 1: we've all been to these horrific crime scenes. But it's
Speaker 1: not very nice. Is that the smell? You forget you're
Speaker 1: seeing bits and pieces of body parts. You shouldn't see
Speaker 1: a shotgun blast of the head. I would imagine you
Speaker 1: looking at pieces of the skull and the brain.
Speaker 2: It was all over the place. So it was. It was.
Speaker 2: It was my first experience with firearms, serious firearms injuries.
Speaker 2: Been to a lot of hangings and stabbings and you've
Speaker 2: seen a lot of dead people at that point, but
Speaker 2: never the power and the effect of that on an
Speaker 2: individual was unforgettable. I'll never I'll never forget it. Cannet
Speaker 2: just talking about it now. I can still smell it.
Speaker 2: You can still you know you've been to crime since.
Speaker 2: You can still smell that. The smell of death or
Speaker 2: whatever you want to call it.
Speaker 1: It's got a particular smell.
Speaker 2: It has a particular smell. It's not like a moorg
Speaker 2: it's different to a morgue, but it's it is.
Speaker 1: Than the unforgettable, the blood and the blood and the bath.
Speaker 2: And but the bath was full of blood. And you know,
Speaker 2: as I said, Brain met on the floor the piece
Speaker 2: of skull. And I didn't know at that time that
Speaker 2: Ross had been shot in the chest. It was only
Speaker 2: after when, with hours and hours later, when the crime
Speaker 2: soon had been recorded, that that I helped the government
Speaker 2: contractors lift Ross out of the and when we picked
Speaker 2: him up, we could see the ward of that shell
Speaker 2: had been bedded in his chest. That wouldn't have killed him,
Speaker 2: That would have messed him up, but wouldn't have killed him.
Speaker 2: And then then we walked into the back bedroom and
Speaker 2: you could seal the trail of blood where Leslie had been.
Speaker 2: You could see all up the wall where parts of
Speaker 2: Leslie's arm and shoulder would sprayed up the war from
Speaker 2: the shotgun, and you could seal the trail of blood
Speaker 2: where she crawled into the bedroom, and then obviously all
Speaker 2: the ambulance refused that was there, but they tried to
Speaker 2: save her on the floor before they took her to
Speaker 2: the hospital. And then and then we secured the crime scene.
Speaker 2: And then it was just a long list of the videographers,
Speaker 2: crime scene experts, commanding police with some authority, all wanted
Speaker 2: to come and check out the crime scene. I did
Speaker 2: a walk through with one of the victims to make
Speaker 2: sure what they told us in the statement was true
Speaker 2: or accurate to their recollections. And then yeah, we're seventeen hours,
Speaker 2: fifteen hours later, we managed to extract from the bath.
Speaker 1: And all this and people probably don't understand we've talked
Speaker 1: this through. We'll talk about what was said when you
Speaker 1: went to the police station handed himself in. But you
Speaker 1: think like it's a laid down is that as in,
Speaker 1: you've caught the person or you've got the person, but
Speaker 1: there is still so much work.
Speaker 2: You've got to convict him.
Speaker 1: You've you've got to convict him, you've got to present everything,
Speaker 1: you've got to gather the evidence, and yeah, there's so
Speaker 1: much work to do there. I'm just I'm sitting here
Speaker 1: talking about hearing you talk about that just brings me
Speaker 1: back to those days of so much to the so
Speaker 1: much to do with that. You had three crime scenes
Speaker 1: on a huge scale. It would have been a long,
Speaker 1: long and attire in twenty four hours.
Speaker 2: It was for pretty much everyone on the central coast.
Speaker 2: We had three, three or four patrols local areas la
Speaker 2: c's whatever they were called at the time. And you
Speaker 2: know there was a lot of police involved and a
Speaker 2: lot of police were adversely affected by day over time
Speaker 2: and yeah, it was, it was.
Speaker 1: It was pretty Did you did you stay on the
Speaker 1: strike force like the investigation.
Speaker 2: Yeah we did. We were with Newcastle Homicide Squad through
Speaker 2: Garth Christian and Scott Casey came and led the investigation.
Speaker 2: After the initial interview because Bill, Bill, Bill Erickson and
Speaker 2: Donaldson went to the police station.
Speaker 1: What was it, let's let's go, let's go police take
Speaker 1: to the police station. So he's handed himself, Well, he's.
Speaker 2: Walked up the stairs at Tukeley Plice station with John
Speaker 2: Thompson and John there was a there was an amazing
Speaker 2: uniform sergeant there called Ronnie Beard who ron did thirty
Speaker 2: years in Redfern was basically come to the Central Coast
Speaker 2: to retire. And Ron was on the counter this night
Speaker 2: at Tukeley. Nothing nothing raddles Ronnie Beard and Ron saw
Speaker 2: Baker was covered in body matter down his legs and whatever.
Speaker 2: They had a conversation. Ron straight away took him into
Speaker 2: the room, got him a cup of tea or a
Speaker 2: cup of coffee or whatever, and then sat down with
Speaker 2: him and asked him and made a handwritten contemporarious of
Speaker 2: what Baker's version of events were. In the introim, Bill
Speaker 2: Erickson's turned up, had a conversation with Ron and they've
Speaker 2: have got other police to go and get the gun secured,
Speaker 2: the firearm which is still in the car and the
Speaker 2: band of there and then right Bill Erickson and Peter
Speaker 2: Donaldson have had a conversation with Baker to make sure
Speaker 2: that Baker would sign. And John Thompson witnessed Ron Ron
Speaker 2: Beard's contemporary snakes because if Baker said nothing else over
Speaker 2: the course of the investigation, that was the most important admissions.
Speaker 2: Basically something we did talk at nauseum because of his
Speaker 2: ego down the track as we talked about, but that
Speaker 2: that the precience of of of of the sergeant on
Speaker 2: the desk on that night. To do to get that
Speaker 2: admission in writing and signed was you know, was.
Speaker 1: Was well, it's with all all that happens, you've got
Speaker 1: to get that admission and get that admission. That's right,
Speaker 1: the earliest opportunity, especially when they're talking and then yeah,
Speaker 1: they might have a change of change.
Speaker 2: Said not have said another word, not said another word,
Speaker 2: and if you hadn't said another word, that's the ad mission.
Speaker 2: You go. You know, you're thinking about, well, this is
Speaker 2: going to go to a hearing matter, it's going to
Speaker 2: go to a full jury matter in a supreme court.
Speaker 2: You need to dit every eye across everybody. He's got
Speaker 2: to prove, got to prove everything.
Speaker 1: So just in summary, he did. He did the interview
Speaker 1: with the detectives and then there was another it was
Speaker 1: electronic recorded interviews.
Speaker 2: There was any Garth Christian and Scott Casey from the
Speaker 2: homicide decided to take him to Gosford. Gossip was the
Speaker 2: head station.
Speaker 1: This is when they're just for people listening. This is
Speaker 1: just around the time when they're starting to bring in
Speaker 1: their electronic recording of suspects. That's right in the police station.
Speaker 1: That's not every police station had.
Speaker 2: Not everyone toually did have one, but I think it was.
Speaker 2: It was quite clever of Garth and Scott to want
Speaker 2: to take him to the bigger stations where it could
Speaker 2: have been booked into custody, though obvious thinking about making
Speaker 2: sure they get everything right procedurally and procedurally everything was covered.
Speaker 2: They had a Garth had a conversation with Baker in
Speaker 2: the car between Tukeley and Gosford, which was also quite insightful,
Speaker 2: but obviously there was not conversation that was recorded. Garth
Speaker 2: would have made it contemporarious note of it. But when
Speaker 2: he went to Gosford he was he presented as someone
Speaker 2: who was quite defeated. He did exhausted the venom, he'd
Speaker 2: exhausted the hate, he'd exhausted the passion to kill, and
Speaker 2: he was quite a hollow man at Gospeld Police station
Speaker 2: and so that procedure they booked him in and whatever
Speaker 2: thing because it was getting quite late in the night
Speaker 2: and Garth and Scott's case as good detectives were getting
Speaker 2: information from the three crime scenes during.
Speaker 1: The course of the evening, during the course yeah, during
Speaker 1: the course of.
Speaker 2: The evening, they were relying on just what Baker was saying,
Speaker 2: they were relying on the crime scene evidence and whatever,
Speaker 2: and they did the initial e respue of you at
Speaker 2: some time early in the morning of the twenty eighth.
Speaker 1: And one thing that you get the admissions, but one
Speaker 1: thing you'd also want to demonstrate that he was of
Speaker 1: sound mind absolutely at that point in time.
Speaker 2: Absolutely, and that that was a theme of the first question,
Speaker 2: the first interview with Garth and Scott, and it became
Speaker 2: a recurring theme when the Chief of the Detective Homicide
Speaker 2: Lance Chaffei, reinterviewed him earlier in the morning after he
Speaker 2: went to court, because that was that was the obvious defense.
Speaker 2: We didn't have to hunt this bloke down. We didn't.
Speaker 2: You know, there's no there's no he's making admissions. He's
Speaker 2: headed himself in. Clearly he's going to run a mental
Speaker 2: health defense. So they asked the questions about are you intoxicated,
Speaker 2: so you hadn't hadn't had a drink, your stone cul sober?
Speaker 2: Are you on meds? Yes, he was on juicyne or valium.
Speaker 2: Had you taken any day, hadn't taken any any today?
Speaker 2: The blood tests that they took of him on custody
Speaker 2: confirmed that he was stone cul Saber had no drugs in.
Speaker 1: His body, so negating any mitigating circumstance, any possible.
Speaker 2: Any possible mitigating circumstances, clarified any issues around mental health
Speaker 2: or whatever mental health physical issues he had and mental
Speaker 2: health that issues he had, and it was all unremarkable.
Speaker 1: Okay, well, that's good to know. What were the overview
Speaker 1: of what he said. Did he just try to justify
Speaker 1: his answers to the questions that were put to him
Speaker 1: what his actions were, or do he say why did it?
Speaker 2: He'd always played the victim. It was always someone else's fault,
Speaker 2: like in the line of questioning, which is just covered
Speaker 2: in the book in terms of great detail with the interviews,
Speaker 2: But it was never his fault. I was wrong. They
Speaker 2: did me wrong. I was virtually entitled to do this.
Speaker 2: That nobody nobody believed me. Nobody. He actually brags about
Speaker 2: the fact that nobody believed him, that I told him
Speaker 2: I'd do this. It was their fault. Doesn't get angry,
Speaker 2: doesn't get frustrated. He just just tells it as he
Speaker 2: feels it. And the questioning in both interviews was obviously
Speaker 2: very professional and unprovocative and elicited the type of answers
Speaker 2: that were required to get him to a conviction.
Speaker 1: How did the play out in court?
Speaker 2: So he initially was yeah, he initially went to Gostard
Speaker 2: Court in that morning of the twenty eighth. There it
Speaker 2: was a huge crowd there. It was a big media event.
Speaker 2: Some of the victims families were there and it became
Speaker 2: as you see now on TV. Maybe not so much
Speaker 2: these days, but in those days, you know, the mob
Speaker 2: was there, the TV was there, whatever. So he was
Speaker 2: a completely defeated, shallow man, hollow man in court. People
Speaker 2: had to be ejective from court because they were threatening
Speaker 2: to kill him and swearing at him. But so he
Speaker 2: had the bail hearing refused. Bail was taken to Long Bay.
Speaker 2: Then he had a number of bail hearings. He's officially
Speaker 2: bar refused again or in December nineteen ninety two. He
Speaker 2: had a paper committal at the Gosford Local Court on
Speaker 2: the twin of December where it was flagged by the
Speaker 2: defense that he was going to look for diminished responsibility
Speaker 2: which at the time was available to him, which is
Speaker 2: not available now. He ended up in the Newcastle Supreme
Speaker 2: Court on the third of March where they were preparing
Speaker 2: to go ahead with a trial. Evidence about his psychiatric
Speaker 2: condition other evidence from social workers was tendered. On the
Speaker 2: second of August, when they were going to commence the
Speaker 2: trial before a jury was impanelled, He's decided to enter
Speaker 2: a guilty plea. Over the next four days, a variety
Speaker 2: of witnesses were allowed to give evidence, and on the
Speaker 2: sixth of August in the Newcastle Supreme Court he was
Speaker 2: convicted and given life a life sentence. On the third
Speaker 2: of September ninety ninety five, he appealed to the new
Speaker 2: South Wales Supreme Court on conviction on the sentence that
Speaker 2: the sentence was too harsh. That appeal failed. On the
Speaker 2: ninth of the ninth nineteen ninety six, he appealed to
Speaker 2: the High Court for leave to appeal. There was a
Speaker 2: twenty minute hearing and that was denied.
Speaker 1: Well, I'm glad the court's got that one right.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Well, there was a two to one decision in
Speaker 2: the Supreme Court, so there was one judge who had
Speaker 2: a view about the harshness of the sentencing. But what
Speaker 2: was interesting about that when you read that was that
Speaker 2: there was this issue about because it was truth in sentencing.
Speaker 2: I think that the state. The government had pushed all
Speaker 2: that through, so there wasn't too many of these cases
Speaker 2: that were people getting life for these type of murders.
Speaker 2: And one of the justices said the New South Wales
Speaker 2: Supreme Court had a view that he was not sentenced
Speaker 2: as it wasn't a safe sentence. Was the other two disagreed?
Speaker 1: Yeah, well that's why sometimes I get confused with court. Yeah,
Speaker 1: what society do we have that someone that goes on
Speaker 1: the murderous rampage like that has any right to have freedom?
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's right. But it makes a point though, when
Speaker 2: you and I have been in lots of court cases
Speaker 2: and lots of jury trials and whatever, and the law
Speaker 2: is so labyrinthine, there's so many avenues, there's so many
Speaker 2: ways to get around. A thinks you've just got to
Speaker 2: make sure that you tick every box to keep every
Speaker 2: box legally. You've got all the case law, you've got
Speaker 2: all of the High Court decisions or whatever, and you've
Speaker 2: got to just have That's why I admire the judges
Speaker 2: so much.
Speaker 1: I like them too in that they absorb and they're
Speaker 1: they're they're smart, they're clearly smart. I just always think
Speaker 1: that the justice system when it's all said and done,
Speaker 1: is there to serve the community, and.
Speaker 2: It doesn't always get it right here and that that's
Speaker 2: the thing.
Speaker 1: And I worry sometimes with the legal fraternity hide around
Speaker 1: the technicalities and they're very smart the way they exploit
Speaker 1: them or control things because of the the rules and
Speaker 1: regulations and the legislation that's in place that we all
Speaker 1: agree is needed. But sometimes the courts have got to
Speaker 1: serve serve the community that they're set up to serve.
Speaker 2: They do know, having worked in child sexual site for
Speaker 2: a lot of years and sat in a lot of
Speaker 2: jury trials and the issues of trying to get a
Speaker 2: conviction of a pedophile. Who's the only witness I've got
Speaker 2: is the victim and it happened twenty years ago or whatever.
Speaker 2: There's no crime scene, there's no physical evidence, there's one
Speaker 2: word against another, and there's about thirteen or fourteen different
Speaker 2: escape routes through the New South Wales evidence that before
Speaker 2: any evidence even gets in. It was quite frustrating. So
Speaker 2: I took the winds. Yeah, well that's.
Speaker 1: Probably why you look so relaxed with this one. What's
Speaker 1: he's passed away now?
Speaker 2: Yeah? So he was. He resisted all sorts of psychiatric treatment.
Speaker 2: They to try to give him ant psychotic drugs and whatever.
Speaker 2: So in June twenty four he was moved from the
Speaker 2: super max at Goldbin. Suffering from cancer, he went to
Speaker 2: the Long Bay Hospital for palliative care. He died handcuffed
Speaker 2: to bed on Saturday, the twenty second of June twenty
Speaker 2: twenty four. And the world's a better place. He spent
Speaker 2: thirty two years taxpayer's expense. Yeah.
Speaker 1: I look, when we talk about crimes like this, but
Speaker 1: you know, for each murder, the ramifications, it spreads more
Speaker 1: than just one person. That's all the people connected to
Speaker 1: and the flow on damage and all that. You're talking
Speaker 1: six people's lives taken in one night because of one
Speaker 1: man's rage. And what can you talk about the aftermath
Speaker 1: of the victims. Of you you've got any sense of
Speaker 1: how it's like it's wiping it virtually wiped out a
Speaker 1: family or a large portion of the family, the impact
Speaker 1: that this crime has had on the people.
Speaker 2: I was very fortunate subsequent to his death to be
Speaker 2: able to people reached out to me, and I spoke
Speaker 2: to three of the victims. So I spoke to Paul Martin,
Speaker 2: who was the police officer who's the de fact defiance
Speaker 2: say of Lisa Gannon and his life. He didn't stay.
Speaker 2: He dedicated, tried to dedicate his life to being a
Speaker 2: better policeman subsequent to the murders, but it didn't pan
Speaker 2: out for that much longer, and he's had he's had
Speaker 2: a real struggle for the rest of his life, the
Speaker 2: last thirty years to come to terms with what happened.
Speaker 2: He's done a variety of jobs, been a fossica, worked
Speaker 2: for the United Nations, being quite involved himself in a
Speaker 2: high stress lifestyle, high stress occupation, to the point now
Speaker 2: where he's content in a relationship, living in Victoria, doing
Speaker 2: a bit of foster king and got a job and
Speaker 2: was quite amenable to me talking to him about the story.
Speaker 2: Still has has a memory or a part of the
Speaker 2: child that they lost. They still he still reflects on that.
Speaker 2: So I met him, I spoke to him. I spoke
Speaker 2: to Scool, who was obviously the boy shot in the face,
Speaker 2: lost half his face, and he similarly had had a
Speaker 2: very very rough life style and is still struggling even
Speaker 2: thirty two years later. Chris, Chris was very generous in
Speaker 2: talking to me. Chris was I was very moved and
Speaker 2: humbled to be able to talk to Chris about his experience,
Speaker 2: and he gave me some insight into his version of events.
Speaker 2: And the third person I spoke to was Michelle Cooper,
Speaker 2: who was in the house when David Baker was shot
Speaker 2: at the back. And Michelle has moved on with a life,
Speaker 2: got a new family, still reflects on that night, still
Speaker 2: emotionally affected by that night, but she has a very upbeat,
Speaker 2: positive view of the view of life and was very
Speaker 2: very happy to talk to me. And again I was
Speaker 2: very humble and respected, respectful to talk to her as well.
Speaker 2: So there's three of the people that I had. It
Speaker 2: was quite interesting because when I finished the book, I
Speaker 2: had a real moral dilemma because there's a lot of
Speaker 2: people in this there's a lot of people's lives. Who
Speaker 2: am I? What right have I.
Speaker 1: Got to tell this?
Speaker 2: This is my passion project, this is my therapy, this
Speaker 2: is my movement on from whatever? Who was I? So
Speaker 2: when I first self published the book, I didn't I
Speaker 2: just kept it in house. I gave it to my
Speaker 2: family and friends because I was very proud of it.
Speaker 2: It was only after I had the opportunity to speak
Speaker 2: to those people and get their consent in a way
Speaker 2: that I was able to set the book free and
Speaker 2: you know it's available on Amazon and I sell it.
Speaker 2: So it been able to relate to the people involved
Speaker 2: firsthand and as a policeman, made me feel respectful, gave
Speaker 2: me permission per se to be here today. Like in hindsight,
Speaker 2: if I hadn't spoken to those those three and hadn't
Speaker 2: felt enabled by them, I may not have been comfortable
Speaker 2: doing this.
Speaker 1: I understand that, and full credit to you that you
Speaker 1: look at it from that way, because it is such
Speaker 1: a difficult subject. I look at this. You're telling the
Speaker 1: story like you've done today and on this platform. I
Speaker 1: think it's not glorifying crime. This is chrime and we've
Speaker 1: seen it. Crime's horrendous and the flow on the fact
Speaker 1: and the ramifications. But what it does is show people,
Speaker 1: you know, when we talk about the gun control laws
Speaker 1: after Port Arthur and the shit that happens over in
Speaker 1: America and that we're fortunate that doesn't happen here. The
Speaker 1: laws that they are bringing in for domestic violence, the
Speaker 1: focus on domestic violence, coercive controls and all that. Those
Speaker 1: that might argue and they don't think there's many in
Speaker 1: this day and age those that might argue against that
Speaker 1: sort of control. This is the type of shit that
Speaker 1: can happen when things aren't aren't easily happen. So I
Speaker 1: think what you've done today, and I hope what we're
Speaker 1: doing here talking about it is explaining this is the
Speaker 1: reason we need to go hard on these things and
Speaker 1: these people that are controlling people and breaching AVOs and
Speaker 1: all that we need to crack down on them because
Speaker 1: this is a potential ramatic.
Speaker 2: Case asolutely and we see it, we see it happening.
Speaker 2: We do see it happening. So I dedicated the book
Speaker 2: to all the victims of domestic violence. I don't just
Speaker 2: say female victims. There are they're they're both sides of
Speaker 2: the equation. It's just the majority of female. But they
Speaker 2: dedicated to all the victims. And the last little monologue
Speaker 2: I have at the end, you know, just ask the
Speaker 2: question why. You know why? And I hoped if I
Speaker 2: have a goal about out of this book was one
Speaker 2: to my own help, my own recovery, but two that
Speaker 2: there might be someone that picks this up at an
Speaker 2: airport and reads it and a potential offender. You go, no,
Speaker 2: I'm not going to do that.
Speaker 1: I don't want to be that.
Speaker 2: I don't want to do that. Or there's there's potential
Speaker 2: victims now who are suffering for coercive control and in
Speaker 2: this situation, and they'll see how it happened and that
Speaker 2: they can reach out and speak out if it happens
Speaker 2: to one person. Well, I mean.
Speaker 1: I think it's a I think it's a good messaging
Speaker 1: those crime scenes they are confronting. Did it have an
Speaker 1: impact on you seeing that?
Speaker 2: I certainly had a delayed delayed in paper, because that's
Speaker 2: the time, as you know, being a detective and investigating
Speaker 2: big matters, you're actually in it. You're in the zone.
Speaker 2: Like it's all about the work. It's all about making
Speaker 2: sure that you're right, everybody's right, making sure that you
Speaker 2: don't make any mistakes, making sure that you follow the
Speaker 2: bureaucracy or the paperwork of it. So you don't feel
Speaker 2: anything until until it's til it's till it's over. So
Speaker 2: I was still quite high for days and days and
Speaker 2: days after that, and then Garth and Garth Christian and
Speaker 2: Scott Casey from the homicide squad came back to the
Speaker 2: Central Coast and we all we met and we all
Speaker 2: had we were all given tasks to go out and
Speaker 2: interview these people and find it. So the crime scene
Speaker 2: itself didn't The effect of the crime scene of me
Speaker 2: initially was negligent in that I was still busy, were
Speaker 2: still on the job, We're still doing the investigation. It
Speaker 2: was only after the matter. Actually, I can remember the
Speaker 2: day we were given the four volume brief of evidence
Speaker 2: and I had this moment at why on police station
Speaker 2: and I had these four volumes brief of evidence, which
Speaker 2: is the one I carried around with me for thirty
Speaker 2: years in my hand that I thought, I got emotional
Speaker 2: that I reflect and I actually didn't want to look
Speaker 2: at it, like the vanity was, so go to your part,
Speaker 2: go to the part see your name in lights, you know.
Speaker 2: And I didn't want to look at it, and I
Speaker 2: didn't want to look at it, but I kept it.
Speaker 1: I understand what you're saying there with the confronting crime scene.
Speaker 1: Some people would often ask myself, how do you react
Speaker 1: to that? I really take on board what you're saying.
Speaker 1: You're focusing so much on the work that you do,
Speaker 1: you just you've got the blinkers on in terms of
Speaker 1: I've got a job to do. Focus on that, and
Speaker 1: it might be ages down the track where you reflect
Speaker 1: on it, or when you have a quiet time and
Speaker 1: you go, yeah, that was pretty bad.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you do, you do, and it does come back
Speaker 2: and slap you in a face like a wet fish.
Speaker 2: There's no doubt about that.
Speaker 1: Now you're looking after yourself. And it was good catching
Speaker 1: up with Peter that I hadn't seen for a long
Speaker 1: time over and you both, I've got to say, you
Speaker 1: both look very relaxed, and you're having a bit of
Speaker 1: fun touring on motorbikes and yes, living the good life.
Speaker 1: Tell us through what you're doing. Now, let's finish on
Speaker 1: the high because it's been a heavy staf.
Speaker 2: It has been a heavy and I really appreciate the
Speaker 2: opportunity to let me talk. Gary, really do. But Peter
Speaker 2: and I fell in love in the job. We met
Speaker 2: in the job, and we should never have fallen in love,
Speaker 2: but we fell in love in the job and moved
Speaker 2: to the country and got married and had a beautiful
Speaker 2: child who's got a degree in criminology. Oddly enough, but
Speaker 2: Peter's always been into horses and I've always been into surfing,
Speaker 2: and eventually we moved back to Newcastle because when I
Speaker 2: got sick and had to leave, I needed to be
Speaker 2: a safe place. So Peter and I moved back to
Speaker 2: Newcastle where I grew up, and I reconnected with my
Speaker 2: primary school friends, one of whom I'm about to ride
Speaker 2: a motorbike around New Zealand with and we've known each
Speaker 2: other for sixty years. So when I moved back to
Speaker 2: Newcastle to recover, we did and we had a lovely
Speaker 2: lifestyle there. Peter resigned retired from the cop as well,
Speaker 2: and then the Newcastle lifestyle is very different to anywhere else.
Speaker 2: It's hard to explain if you don't.
Speaker 1: Live you're a Newcastle person or you're not a newcast.
Speaker 1: They talking about I'm not sure if that's a compliment
Speaker 1: or an insult, but.
Speaker 2: They talk about in the job the Newcastle Police was
Speaker 2: because if you go to new Gum, they don't get
Speaker 2: out of there.
Speaker 1: We've seen a lot of police up there and they've
Speaker 1: never come back.
Speaker 2: They've never come back. It's like the triangle of police.
Speaker 2: But over time we've just our daughter's grown up and
Speaker 2: we've recovered from our illness, our mental illness, and happily
Speaker 2: in love and we decided to move to the North
Speaker 2: Coast to be with Peter's mother, and I started writing
Speaker 2: an adventure motorbike a couple of years ago with my
Speaker 2: friends from Newcastle and just fell in love with it.
Speaker 2: The feeling of meditation, feeling of RESTful, being RESTful and
Speaker 2: peace that I feel on an adventure motorbike. They go
Speaker 2: on raid, but they go on dirt as well. And
Speaker 2: I managed to talk Peter into getting a little one
Speaker 2: and as you've got a little bit bigger one, and
Speaker 2: I've just bought her a Murdoguzzy V eighty five t
Speaker 2: t travel, which is her feet can't touch the ground,
Speaker 2: but she's learning. So we do day trips away and
Speaker 2: go and stay up and up around northern New South Wales.
Speaker 2: I ride with my mates, still surf. My daughter's about
Speaker 2: to return to Newcastle and start a law degree jurist doctrip,
Speaker 2: which I'm very proud of. So yeah, we're very We're
Speaker 2: in a very good place.
Speaker 1: Life's going good. Yes, Okay, well we'll put in a
Speaker 1: little advert for joining the cops. You're fine, love have
Speaker 1: an interesting career and end up riding motorbikes around with
Speaker 1: the Woman of the Dreams. Yeah, well that's pretty good.
Speaker 2: Well, it's pretty good. Yeah, you know, it's funny how
Speaker 2: those things come together. Like the psychiatrists have told us
Speaker 2: over the years, this is a codependency. This this is sick.
Speaker 2: This will never last. You can dependent on each other,
Speaker 2: but it actually works because we know each other. We've
Speaker 2: did the same we did the same ship, we've seen
Speaker 2: the same ship.
Speaker 1: Well, I know you guys when you got together, and
Speaker 1: I can see the love hasn't passed out. So well done.
Speaker 1: So I appreciate shout out to both of you. Thanks
Speaker 1: for coming on. I catch Gillers. I've enjoyed the catch
Speaker 1: up and the chat, and it's important getting that messaging
Speaker 1: out there. So thanks very much, Thanks very much, Gery,
Speaker 1: good luck to you and good luck in the future.
Speaker 2: Cheers.
Speaker 1: It's always good catching up with ex colleagues. I enjoyed
Speaker 1: chatting with Ted and so heavy subject that we were
Speaker 1: talking about the murder of six people. I hope people
Speaker 1: listening appreciate the gravity of what can occur when domestic
Speaker 1: violence is not checked and gun control is not kept
Speaker 1: in place. Six innocent people were murdered on one night
Speaker 1: because of one man's rage. It's such an important lesson
Speaker 1: to learn, and my thoughts go out to the people
Speaker 1: who lost their lives because of just one man.