Speaker 1: Just before nine o'clock last night, the jury returned guilty
Speaker 1: verdicts against all three defendants.
Speaker 2: It was absolute shambles, to tell you the truth, just
Speaker 2: absolutely really paman.
Speaker 3: Blood on his clothing the day after the alleged a top.
Speaker 4: On a shallow mud bank and it fits.
Speaker 3: Through a river.
Speaker 5: Basically, I think most of the people are used to
Speaker 5: me are good people.
Speaker 4: I think a really important question we need to ask
Speaker 4: is how many Indigenous prisoners in Australia are innocent.
Speaker 2: This is Curtain, a podcast where we pulled back the
Speaker 2: blinds to shine a light on the darkest parts of
Speaker 2: our justice system and ask who are the victims. I'm
Speaker 2: Amy Maguire and.
Speaker 4: I'm Martin Hodgson, a senior advocate for the Foreign Prisoner
Speaker 4: Support Service. And a warning. This series contains the names
Speaker 4: of deceased peoples and has distressing content that might upset
Speaker 4: some listeners.
Speaker 5: In nineteen eighty eight, seventeen year old Aboriginal teenager Mark
Speaker 5: Haynes was found dead on train tracks in Tamil Worthy.
Speaker 3: Do not believe me and went out there and laid down.
Speaker 5: Rumors of corruption, racism and murder have swirled around the case.
Speaker 4: Something happened that he got hurt.
Speaker 5: The most basic police in word had not been done.
Speaker 5: He BuzzFeed News and NTV special investigation Cold Justice, starts
Speaker 5: Tuesday nine point thirty pm on NATV.
Speaker 1: That was the voice of Aboriginal journalist Alan Clark. Welcome
Speaker 1: to this week's episode of Curtin the Podcast. This week,
Speaker 1: Amy and I sat down with Alan to speak to
Speaker 1: him about his three part documentary series called Cold Justice.
Speaker 1: It's about the death of an Aboriginal teenager in rural Australia,
Speaker 1: Mark Haines, and his family's battle for the truth. Mark
Speaker 1: died in nineteen eighty eight, just a few years before
Speaker 1: Linda was tragically killed in Rockhampton. Sadly, so many of
Speaker 1: the issues we've raised in this podcast are raised again
Speaker 1: in Alan's documentary series, police incompetence, family trauma, and a
Speaker 1: distinct and clear lack of care and respect for Indigenous lives. Now,
Speaker 1: before we play the interview, here's a grab from the
Speaker 1: documentary series with Alan speaking to Mark's uncle, Don Craigie.
Speaker 5: So the inference is that you know, an Aboriginal boy
Speaker 5: is likely to do something like that.
Speaker 3: Well, this is the way any Aboriginal person is treated,
Speaker 3: whether it's within the law or outside of the law.
Speaker 3: Is you know, we feel like we're we're third, if
Speaker 3: not fourth class citizens in our own land. From the
Speaker 3: OU said, this is right out a character from Mark,
Speaker 3: and no, we believe he's met with foul play. We
Speaker 3: do not believe he has went out there and laid
Speaker 3: down and of his own volition and was hit by
Speaker 3: the train by some misadventure.
Speaker 5: It's impossible to talk about Mark's murder without talking about
Speaker 5: his uncle John Craigie, known to everyone as Duck.
Speaker 3: He was killed all instantaneously.
Speaker 5: Don is an unstoppable force when it comes to the case.
Speaker 3: With my last breath, you know, I will still be
Speaker 3: looking to find out what has happened.
Speaker 5: I truly believe if it wasn't for Don, Mark's case
Speaker 5: would have faded into the past and he would have
Speaker 5: become another statistic.
Speaker 3: If anything any read percussions. As I said to my
Speaker 3: younger brothers, I said, I take full responsibility for it.
Speaker 5: From the very beginning, he has doggedly been asking questions,
Speaker 5: lobbying politicians, and demanding answers from the local police. How
Speaker 5: did the police immediately kind of treat the family In
Speaker 5: the following months, afterwards.
Speaker 3: You know when you get something stuck on the bottom
Speaker 3: of your shoe, Yeah, you know, and you try to
Speaker 3: scrape it off or whatever.
Speaker 1: It's just like.
Speaker 3: They just didn't want to have a bar of us.
Speaker 3: You know, We've got all we need, you know, as
Speaker 3: far as we're concerned. The cases closed, so words of
Speaker 3: that effect.
Speaker 5: And at the inquest, how did they treat you badly?
Speaker 3: Nothing happened. I kept going back to the police station.
Speaker 3: I kept running into the superintendent. He keep saying, well done.
Speaker 3: You never know what a seventeen year old boy would do.
Speaker 3: You never know what a seventeen year old Aboriginal boy
Speaker 3: would do. They just weren't interested in investigating the any further.
Speaker 2: Oh, I was just worrying sort of a remember journalistic perspective,
Speaker 2: What was it about this story that made you just
Speaker 2: want to.
Speaker 6: Keep following it?
Speaker 4: Were you've been doing it for about four years?
Speaker 2: What was it about this story specifically that really spoke
Speaker 2: to you.
Speaker 5: Yeah, there were several things that I guess you could
Speaker 5: say dru In.
Speaker 6: In the beginning. First of all, I had no.
Speaker 5: Sort of preconceived idea of what the how did the
Speaker 5: story would go?
Speaker 6: When I first assigned it.
Speaker 5: I was actually working out living in black when it
Speaker 5: was under SPS, that's how long ago. And they sent
Speaker 5: me up there because it was the anniversary of Mark's
Speaker 5: death and the family were appealing to the partlet for
Speaker 5: an information.
Speaker 6: So it was a very sort of routine story, I guess.
Speaker 5: When I arrived in Hamworth and met Don Craigie, who
Speaker 5: is Mark's uncle, this is really amazing Gomorroy elder there,
Speaker 5: he immediately his his grief, his anger, all of these emotions,
Speaker 5: his heightened emotions sort of role is his one big
Speaker 5: ball and all stemmed from not being able to have
Speaker 5: the justices and listen to the family. That that immediately
Speaker 5: kind of really grabbed me, you know, not only as
Speaker 5: an as a journalist, but also as an aboriginal person
Speaker 5: as a quarry. And for me, Mark's family where exactly
Speaker 5: like my family. We're both from regional New south West.
Speaker 5: In fact, I'm worried that I'm gone Roy as well,
Speaker 5: and Mark was Mark was Gomroy as well.
Speaker 6: I'm related to.
Speaker 5: Don's wife's family through our connections out west here.
Speaker 6: So there are many things, and I think.
Speaker 5: The story itself as a journal was a good story.
Speaker 5: In one I really wanted to tell. But secondly, I
Speaker 5: also wanted to get justice of the family as an
Speaker 5: Aboriginal person myself, and you know, it's hard not to
Speaker 5: think of when you're covering story like that, Well, if
Speaker 5: that was me found on dead on train tracks like Mark,
Speaker 5: would my family have to go through all of this
Speaker 5: and endure all of this just to get some basic
Speaker 5: answers from the police. And that thought spurred me on,
Speaker 5: I guess for the last four years.
Speaker 1: For regular listeners of Curtin obviously would know that Amy
Speaker 1: has a particular connection to rock Hampton, and we've just
Speaker 1: heard that Alan has a particular connection to this case
Speaker 1: as well. Alan, I'm just wondering, what was the first
Speaker 1: incident or piece of evidence or information that made you
Speaker 1: think the official version of events just don't stack up.
Speaker 6: Well.
Speaker 5: So the first time I went there, first of all,
Speaker 5: there was a family that was obviously breathing and morning
Speaker 5: Mark's death, and that immediately as a journalists you kind
Speaker 5: of say, okay, that's understandable. But when you start to
Speaker 5: then see the documents, and for me, it was the
Speaker 5: first thing that I saw was the inquest transcript and
Speaker 5: I remember very clearly sitting in my motel.
Speaker 6: Room at night, late at night, reading that in.
Speaker 5: Quest transcript and just shaking my head, just getting really frustrated.
Speaker 5: Was like watching you know, it was like watching a
Speaker 5: movie and you know, sort of saying, don't do that,
Speaker 5: don't do that, don't do it, you know, and it's.
Speaker 6: Just funny, unbelievable. Basically, the interview, sorry, the inquest.
Speaker 5: Transcript highlighted just how how little the Oxley Local Area Command,
Speaker 5: which the local Timworth Police are apart of, actually did
Speaker 5: when it came to the Mark's death, despite all of
Speaker 5: these suspicious things at the scene of the body decided
Speaker 5: for the body, uh, like crucial what I would think
Speaker 5: was crucial evidence that the police failed to do. That
Speaker 5: kind of in my mind that thements basic police woke
Speaker 5: and you could see that very clearly in that in
Speaker 5: quest transcript. I think that was my jumping off point.
Speaker 1: And then of.
Speaker 5: Course after that the search was to find witness statements,
Speaker 5: find actual witnesses from the time who would talk.
Speaker 6: And then you know, you go further and further down
Speaker 6: that rabit a hole.
Speaker 5: But essentially it was that in quest transcript and very
Speaker 5: clearly in black and white you can read, you know,
Speaker 5: the the police that the police take the stand and
Speaker 5: you know, kind of incredul incredibiously sort of dismiss their actions.
Speaker 5: So one of the things is there was there was
Speaker 5: a towel found underneath Mark's.
Speaker 6: Head, really bizarre. Mark was lying on training tracks.
Speaker 5: There was a towel. Everybody who went to the scene
Speaker 5: is that a training driver?
Speaker 6: Who who drove the train that went over Mark?
Speaker 5: The ambulance people that the police, and the police themselves
Speaker 5: said the towel was really odd and very strange and
Speaker 5: it looked like it had been put under the Mark's head.
Speaker 6: But when they were asked did they did they take it?
Speaker 6: They said no, and then they admitted.
Speaker 5: That it was lost. They had no idea where it was.
Speaker 5: That was for me kind of that that was the.
Speaker 6: Moment of going, oh my god, like, you.
Speaker 5: Know, you should have taken that towel. And then there
Speaker 5: was a stolen car that was found nearby, and that
Speaker 5: car would never feeding it printed and it was never
Speaker 5: to take Well, it sat out there for at least
Speaker 5: six weeks, the family claims, and any inquest, the officer says, yeah,
Speaker 5: they didn't bother it feeding it printed because it had
Speaker 5: rained the night before. He thought it would be useless,
Speaker 5: and even when he asked, but what about any started
Speaker 5: the carrier that I don't know whether it was drying
Speaker 5: or not, So things like that you kind of go
Speaker 5: outrageous really in my mind, and knowing the backstory, the
Speaker 5: knowing that Mark couldn't drive.
Speaker 6: In fact, everyone knew it and thought it was hilarious.
Speaker 5: Because in Tamworth, you know, a seventeen year old boy
Speaker 5: is normally obsessed with the cars, but Mark just couldn't.
Speaker 6: And yet there was a stolen carting.
Speaker 5: Buy, it was odd towel under his head and that
Speaker 5: was just the stuff of the anomalies. But yeah, it
Speaker 5: was all in the black and white, all publicly accessible
Speaker 5: in any question transcripts, So at that point anyone could
Speaker 5: have seen that and started strowing the dots.
Speaker 6: But yeah, that was my jumping off point.
Speaker 2: It's really interesting when you talk about how you actually
Speaker 2: got into the story and seeing all of the inconsistencies
Speaker 2: police testimonally, because it really parallels a lot about our
Speaker 2: own investigations. It couldn't And the thing I found really
Speaker 2: interesting about the first part of your documentary was you
Speaker 2: talked it all over the background of police sitting and
Speaker 2: newf Well at the time, and so I died an
Speaker 2: a eight in ninety nine, nine ninety one of the
Speaker 2: Barribles children went nursing and were found murdered. And for
Speaker 2: the time that happened to Linda in Rock Camp and
Speaker 2: happened to nine ninety one, what was it about that time?
Speaker 2: Do you tell to me how police were actually treating
Speaker 2: Aboriginal people in New Stuff.
Speaker 6: At that time?
Speaker 5: Yeah, I mean that's really interesting and I think for
Speaker 5: me as as an Aboriginal reporter, it's a context is
Speaker 5: key when I'm talking about Mark's case, because it was
Speaker 5: a very different police force in the late eighties nineties
Speaker 5: in New South.
Speaker 6: Wales and all around Australia.
Speaker 5: And you know, I didn't want to say Anne indigenous
Speaker 5: audience or people out there to say, oh, you know,
Speaker 5: just typical black follows and bit a chip on their shoulder,
Speaker 5: like you know, there are.
Speaker 6: White victims too. I really wanted to ram home the
Speaker 6: fact that there.
Speaker 5: Was institute visualized racism at that time. You know, don't
Speaker 5: ask me, don't ask for the community. Go on and
Speaker 5: look at the Royal Commission Average Custody and read you
Speaker 5: know what they were.
Speaker 6: Uncovering at that time. You know, they passed.
Speaker 5: Through Regional and all the New South Wales, and there
Speaker 5: are some horrific stories about the treatment of communities by
Speaker 5: the police at that time. So you know, all Aboriginal
Speaker 5: people were dying in custody.
Speaker 6: And so why were we at the police force at that
Speaker 6: time and.
Speaker 5: Then fully commit their resources to their Aboriginal boy. You know,
Speaker 5: it's just you know, so with a quot for me
Speaker 5: explaining that context. The Wood Royal Commission also from that
Speaker 5: period uncovering police corruption in South Wales, really widespread police corruption.
Speaker 5: Timworth is mentioned several times in that in that Royal Commission. However,
Speaker 5: we don't the Wood Royal Commissions full documents have not
Speaker 5: been released yet.
Speaker 6: Happened, and I guess in the next decade.
Speaker 5: Or so, but it'd be really interesting to find out
Speaker 5: the specifics of that at that time because it falls
Speaker 5: right around when Mark died and I'm habitating against that
Speaker 5: there must that it wouldn't have.
Speaker 6: Been quite widespread.
Speaker 5: But yeah, I thought it was important to really said
Speaker 5: that tone and and getting people an understanding, and also
Speaker 5: that the Bison henry was happening at that time. People
Speaker 5: were celebrating in the streets like Mark's body was literally
Speaker 5: I was celebrating and also at the time with the
Speaker 5: country music first of all, at time when was no
Speaker 5: one for this country music what's.
Speaker 6: Happening as well? So like like his uncle said, is
Speaker 6: the last thing anyone cared about it was a dead
Speaker 6: Aboriginal boy. And sadly for that time, definitely true.
Speaker 5: And I think the problem in this case is that
Speaker 5: the more I look for, the more easily solvable is.
Speaker 5: But the more time goes on, the more complicated it
Speaker 5: gets to actually solve it. So you know, even if
Speaker 5: you had to detect it, who who really wanted to
Speaker 5: solve it? I mean, things have been messed up so
Speaker 5: much from the part that it's very hard for someone
Speaker 5: to do it without the resources.
Speaker 6: So and I have spoken with detectives over the years who.
Speaker 5: Taken on the case and really, you know, part of
Speaker 5: the new police force, you say, who.
Speaker 6: Wanted to do the right thing.
Speaker 5: But they they've told me that they just weren't give
Speaker 5: allocated time to work on it.
Speaker 6: So sadly it just sits on the shelves.
Speaker 1: Regular listeners to Curtin will also be shocked at some
Speaker 1: of the similarities in the evidence between Curtain's case and
Speaker 1: Mark's case, there's the issue of mud that both of
Speaker 1: them should have had on them and didn't. There's the
Speaker 1: issue of a car nearby that was never forensically checked,
Speaker 1: issues of missing evidence that contained blood. Alan, I'm wondering,
Speaker 1: what do the police who were there at the time,
Speaker 1: who was supposed to have investigated this say about why
Speaker 1: they didn't do a proper forensic investigation.
Speaker 5: Well, you're right, I mean, shockingly, it's a very basic explanation.
Speaker 5: So the detective sergeant who was in charge of who
Speaker 5: was working as a physical evidence you know at time
Speaker 5: worth at the time, whose job was to actually, you know,
Speaker 5: forensic look at things, says very clearly, well, I didn't
Speaker 5: think it printed because I had been raining heavily the
Speaker 5: night before. And then he's asked, well, you know, even
Speaker 5: the inside he said, well he could have been. I
Speaker 5: mean it could have. He just admitted that he didn't
Speaker 5: know because they did in check. And then when I
Speaker 5: asked him, in your opinion, would there be anything there
Speaker 5: worth printing, and he just said, well, no, they're in
Speaker 5: my opinion there wasn't worth thinking of a printing. And that,
Speaker 5: I think that just shows you that adds you at
Speaker 5: the time, and no one pursues that, I mean, this
Speaker 5: is the thinking about the inquest. No one sort of
Speaker 5: really goes hard on the police and keeps questioning them about.
Speaker 6: These basic flaws in the investigation. But essentially that was
Speaker 6: his reasoning.
Speaker 5: That well, he just thought the white mother and he
Speaker 5: said that, you know, the thinking of a print brushes
Speaker 5: are expensive and water damages them, so if they try
Speaker 5: to do it, it would have damaged some of these
Speaker 5: expensive thinning of the print brushes. So outrageous, the family
Speaker 5: were going back and forth to the scene in the
Speaker 5: weeks afterwards, and that cast out there in the elements
Speaker 5: for at.
Speaker 4: Least six weeks.
Speaker 5: The family of themselves, even prior to the boot open,
Speaker 5: took the mat from the boots to the police stations
Speaker 5: that had looking and we think there's blood on this.
Speaker 6: They were dismissed about that.
Speaker 5: They even took other evidence, could tantial evidence from the scene.
Speaker 5: One was a cigarette lighter and a pocket home. They
Speaker 5: took about it into the police station and then the
Speaker 5: police took about into evidence, and then the inquest said
Speaker 5: that they had taken it. And when they were sort
Speaker 5: of caught out or not caught out, I generally think
Speaker 5: they just didn't remember it when they were reminded that
Speaker 5: the family bought and they said, oh well, and it
Speaker 5: might have fell out of the evidence bag at the time,
Speaker 5: and then the found just kind of along and picked
Speaker 5: it up.
Speaker 6: So things like that.
Speaker 5: It just shows you really just really no comment into
Speaker 5: a duty of care at all. From the beginning. They
Speaker 5: pursued the theory of that.
Speaker 6: Market, sold in that car and crashed it, decided to walk.
Speaker 5: In the opposite direction from town at in the middle
Speaker 5: of the night in the following rain, and then somehow
Speaker 5: lie down on training tracks, and.
Speaker 4: Yeah, it is that.
Speaker 6: It's really outrageous.
Speaker 5: I mean at the time, then when the coroner returned
Speaker 5: open findings, you know, the police still kind of didn't.
Speaker 6: Really think it was it was suspicious because the open
Speaker 6: binding is kind of they get away there because it's like,
Speaker 6: could be suicide, but it could be I don't know, so.
Speaker 5: Yeah, and I think the coroner that might have had
Speaker 5: a different outcome. If we've a thousand medical issues in
Speaker 5: marks a copy. He had an injury, it's not only
Speaker 5: consistent with assault, but that injury wasn't brought up at
Speaker 5: the inquest. And I often think, well, if the doctor
Speaker 5: was after or if the doctor talked about that injury,
Speaker 5: I think the outcome of the inquests might have been
Speaker 5: very different and it might have leant towards suspicious death.
Speaker 2: It's really interesting when you were talking about him. When
Speaker 2: I saw the documentary about the family actually gathering evidence,
Speaker 2: in the family having to do everything just to get
Speaker 2: police to even try to take it seriously, it reminds
Speaker 2: me of the case up in.
Speaker 6: Darwin that I did just around a lot of.
Speaker 2: Time as a young boy who was killed in a
Speaker 2: borolula and then the family actually had to go and
Speaker 2: find tracks, they actually helped find evidence. It was just this,
Speaker 2: you know, would any other victim of his family have
Speaker 2: to do this?
Speaker 5: Alan?
Speaker 2: Why does this continually happen to Aboriginal people?
Speaker 5: And I remember that case very well, and I think
Speaker 5: I remember that the police shirking.
Speaker 6: It off, saying that these kids are also.
Speaker 5: Almost continueing they go and walk it out or something
Speaker 5: like that, all gone off and play as if Abaginal
Speaker 5: kids just disit here all the time, saying in Barroville,
Speaker 5: you know, you get the police dismissing as not for.
Speaker 6: Alarm, and then a family knowing something was wrong.
Speaker 5: I think, and particularly in you know, yeah, this would
Speaker 5: have never happened with the non indigenous victims.
Speaker 7: Or I should also say, you know a lot of
Speaker 7: also very say poor white people who who don't get
Speaker 7: the carriage they deserve either when they can't all investigations,
Speaker 7: they deserve it.
Speaker 5: But what's in cities though original victims is that often
Speaker 5: an a elicit less sympathy or empathy from the public.
Speaker 6: And part of the theory explores and my.
Speaker 5: Investigation is speaking with literas of the barons about this issue. Yaba,
Speaker 5: how instead of learning at university technology did a study
Speaker 5: about me when it came to the barrel of murder
Speaker 5: victims and found that you know, overwhelmingly there was just
Speaker 5: very little empathy for dead original children, which is just
Speaker 5: horrific indictment I think on our society. But you know,
Speaker 5: you would never like it would be it would be
Speaker 5: everywhere if say William Tyrell family had to go out
Speaker 5: and collect evidence and bring it to the to the police,
Speaker 5: you know, very famous and just look back at all
Speaker 5: our very famous murder cases, visit in person cases. I
Speaker 5: mean if they were a non indigenous family who had
Speaker 5: to go out do their own investigations, that it just
Speaker 5: wouldn't fly there would be outraged.
Speaker 6: I mean, people would be protesting at the front of
Speaker 6: police stations.
Speaker 5: But sadly, I think, you know, aberdaging victims just seemed
Speaker 5: to not really matter to the to the er Australian public,
Speaker 5: and the same in Don's family. Duct Yeah, Don has
Speaker 5: had to him and his brothers went out initially and.
Speaker 6: They walked to the scene. They did all of the things
Speaker 6: that the police should have done. They walked from the.
Speaker 5: Car to the site to see the very steep rail bridge,
Speaker 5: to see whether you cross it there was, They went around,
Speaker 5: made inquiries and what's astounding is the detectives encouraged that
Speaker 5: for them in the weeks after to go around and
Speaker 5: make their own inquiries and essentially.
Speaker 6: On the speaking to us so you should go into it.
Speaker 5: And of course that put them in a great personal
Speaker 5: danger to the small town.
Speaker 4: Uh.
Speaker 6: Don the uncle had his draw broken and was told that.
Speaker 5: One of the suspects was waiting with the rifle outside
Speaker 5: and then you know, so it's just outraged. And then
Speaker 5: also the police orchestrated or approved somehow in a meeting
Speaker 5: with one of the suspects that one of the the
Speaker 5: two of the suspects and the and two of the
Speaker 5: uncles as a form of mediation, and this is within
Speaker 5: six months of their death, and that was organized where
Speaker 5: they originally aim So, you know, speaking with some of
Speaker 5: the I spoke with the forming of New South Wales's
Speaker 5: assistant and Police Commissioner Class Small about that and he
Speaker 5: had real issues with that meeting taking place, saying it
Speaker 5: could you know, jeopardize future legal proceedings. So you know,
Speaker 5: the police happily sat back and let the family go
Speaker 5: under their own investigation and.
Speaker 6: Then and then later on you know, sort of just
Speaker 6: close up the case. So sadly, I think this wouldn't
Speaker 6: flag kid definitely.
Speaker 1: One of the things you're reporting has shown both on
Speaker 1: this case and in the documentary more broadly, is as
Speaker 1: you've just spoken about what the family has to do
Speaker 1: to try and solve the crime. But I was wondering
Speaker 1: if you can explain to us and tell our listeners
Speaker 1: the trauma too, because clearly, for someone that goes through
Speaker 1: this normally and non indigenous family, there's purely the trauma
Speaker 1: of the loss. But here you've got thirty years of
Speaker 1: never knowing the truth being dismissed. You have a family
Speaker 1: member who's trying to investigate it being assaulted and threatened.
Speaker 1: I had to stay to add do you think to
Speaker 1: the overall trauma to Indigenous families and community overall?
Speaker 3: Uh?
Speaker 5: Yeah, the trauma is is ever present. And you know,
Speaker 5: we are original people. We have need to generate trauma already.
Speaker 5: So that's that's that's.
Speaker 6: There already, and this compounds it.
Speaker 5: And it's really particularly in this case, it's really compounded
Speaker 5: a lot more because a family who were living in
Speaker 5: at the time, so the cold.
Speaker 6: Hour was the average community and the wider the.
Speaker 5: Community called it Vegeman Village literally on the other side
Speaker 5: of the train tracks, you know, sort of like a
Speaker 5: suburb that formerly a mission kind of thing.
Speaker 6: But there's already that idea that you know, people already
Speaker 6: feel lesser than the rest of the town.
Speaker 5: And then then they're dealing with the loss of their son,
Speaker 5: their grandson and nephew and their brother.
Speaker 6: At the same time they're being dismissed by the police.
Speaker 5: So it is that inter generations from coming back up
Speaker 5: again saying well, you know, your your lives aren't worth
Speaker 5: it as much as as those on the other side
Speaker 5: of the training tracks. And then I mean that just
Speaker 5: that he can to the fires, and that also splits
Speaker 5: families at the part because often you'll find and in
Speaker 5: this case particularly, you'll find their affair certain family members
Speaker 5: to who then shoulder a wilder for the burden say no, no, no,
Speaker 5: I'll take it on you guys, won't you know, I
Speaker 5: don't want anyone else to, you know, kind.
Speaker 6: Of get hurt by this.
Speaker 5: And in this case it was done the main uncle
Speaker 5: and his and then Mark's parents passed away before they
Speaker 5: ever knew what happened to Mark, and he made them
Speaker 5: a promise.
Speaker 6: That he would find out what happened to Mark.
Speaker 5: The thing is once he did that, and he from
Speaker 5: the beginning he was the older and stronger brother, I guess,
Speaker 5: and wanted to take it all.
Speaker 6: He took all that trauma on.
Speaker 5: But then at the same time also the created a
Speaker 5: tension later on when family members wanted to help. And
Speaker 5: you can see this the system splitting people up, and
Speaker 5: you know, family members move away and time goes by.
Speaker 5: When I was really doing the series, I went and
Speaker 5: met with everyone and they all came together for the
Speaker 5: first time in years at the anniversary of Mark's death.
Speaker 5: It was incredibly emotion. There was so much trauma. It
Speaker 5: is incredibly powerful and very sad to witness and then
Speaker 5: you know, Don dene cold he's not alone anymore. But
Speaker 5: also the injustice of our history of how we've been
Speaker 5: made to feel less than that all just came out
Speaker 5: in this huge greeting process and that trauma. So it's really, yeah,
Speaker 5: it's a very powerful thing.
Speaker 6: Definitely. Oh, thank you so.
Speaker 7: Much for pointing out, because I.
Speaker 2: Think I see similarities in so many cases that have
Speaker 2: recorded in relation to how it's actually affected the family
Speaker 2: and ends up causing and compounding further trouble a lot
Speaker 2: of these issues, And I was just wondering, you know,
Speaker 2: a lot of you were reporting.
Speaker 6: Has led to reopening of the case.
Speaker 2: You've actually had witnesses from back then approach you after reading.
Speaker 3: Your stories on buzz Seed.
Speaker 2: What's actually going to happen now?
Speaker 6: Like what actually.
Speaker 2: Legal avenues are available for Marquin's family.
Speaker 5: There's a couple of things that it could happen, but
Speaker 5: I guess that the main goal for everyone at the
Speaker 5: moment is for the new South Wales States Crime Commands
Speaker 5: homicides to what was to take it on now. The
Speaker 5: State Crime Commander.
Speaker 6: Are an elite unit based in Sydney and they have.
Speaker 5: Sole resources, solely dedicated to solving homicidence or cold cases,
Speaker 5: and they've had a lot of success in the past.
Speaker 5: But for that to happen and they have to review
Speaker 5: the local police investigations into marketday. Yeah, so I guess
Speaker 5: what happened when that league came forward last year after
Speaker 5: reading my work. She then basically if we kept following
Speaker 5: up and we found out almost a year down on
Speaker 5: the track that the police hadn't taken a statement, and
Speaker 5: that's when ill, this is ridiculous. So that's when I
Speaker 5: got David shoe Bridge involved for the Green MP and said, look.
Speaker 6: You know that this is this is really, this is terrible.
Speaker 5: After ten years, this whole case is acted once again
Speaker 5: and yeah, the police couldn't bother it to take a
Speaker 5: statement from.
Speaker 6: The league the local police.
Speaker 5: So he then lobbied for the family to get the
Speaker 5: State Crime Command to review the case. And that's where
Speaker 5: we're out at the moment. They are currently reviewing the families.
Speaker 6: The local police investigations.
Speaker 5: If they find any of them were inadequate, then they
Speaker 5: will take in the case.
Speaker 6: I think at the moment, the family like this might
Speaker 6: be a last resort, and so they're really.
Speaker 5: Got their hopes, but there is ability they won't take
Speaker 5: it on either. So you know, it's a very precarious
Speaker 5: situation because you know, after all.
Speaker 6: Of this, the local police still have it.
Speaker 5: I guess there's nothing to say that they won't continue
Speaker 5: their pattern of just you know, kind of pushing it
Speaker 5: aside while they're focused on other cases. But the State
Speaker 5: Crime Command definitely we're hoping take it on, and I
Speaker 5: have no doubt if they do, they will have someone
Speaker 5: arrested or particulars pointed out within a year, because I
Speaker 5: think the evidence is there. The transcript to there mean,
Speaker 5: it's it's evident to anyone who reads them that they
Speaker 5: are the same. People's name come out of time and
Speaker 5: time again, so.
Speaker 6: I think yeah.
Speaker 5: And the State Crime Command also talk on the Barrabal case.
Speaker 5: The Gary Jubilan is attached to that. The detective who
Speaker 5: then stood decided the families that I'm going to help you.
Speaker 5: And once that happened, once this unit took it on,
Speaker 5: things started to happen and again, so there's a real
Speaker 5: hope that they take on this case as well.
Speaker 1: That was Aboriginal journalist Alan Clark, whose incredible three part
Speaker 1: documentary series Cold Justice is currently featuring on NITV. The
Speaker 1: final episode will air tonight, June the first, at nine
Speaker 1: point thirty on NITV, and you can go to SBS
Speaker 1: on demand and catch the first two episodes before you
Speaker 1: watch that final one. And I'd also encourage you all
Speaker 1: to go back and look at Alan's work on this
Speaker 1: case and other cases, his writing and the writing also
Speaker 1: of my co host Amy McGuire on these issues, and
Speaker 1: what you start to learn is that not only is
Speaker 1: there the case of mar Hains, not only is there
Speaker 1: the case of Kevin Henry and the tragic loss of
Speaker 1: Linda's life. These cases right around Australia, and the same
Speaker 1: issues continue to come up. Racism and policing, competence, a
Speaker 1: lack of care and total disregard for Indigenous life, the
Speaker 1: media outside of the Indigenous media doing nothing to hold
Speaker 1: people in power to account, and families suffering for decades.
Speaker 1: None of this will change until these issues are brought
Speaker 1: to light and these families get the justice they deserve.
Speaker 1: Join us next week for Curtain