Speaker 1: This podcast contains information and details relating to suicide. We
Speaker 1: urge anyone struggling with their emotions to contact Lifeline on
Speaker 1: thirteen eleven fourteen thirteen eleven fourteen or visit them at
Speaker 1: lifeline dot org dot AU. A twenty four year old
Speaker 1: devoted mother of two fleeing a violent relationships am bags
Speaker 1: packed car, running, her daughters strapped into the backseat.
Speaker 2: Mom told me that she needed to go back inside
Speaker 2: to grab something.
Speaker 1: Panic.
Speaker 3: Amy is dead, sir By Amy's.
Speaker 1: Dead eight Confusion World.
Speaker 4: About five minutes they said, NASA suicide.
Speaker 5: One hundred percent. This is emersing.
Speaker 1: What do you think is really the honest truth about Amy?
Speaker 5: The Truth About Amy.
Speaker 6: Episode nineteen.
Speaker 1: I'm Liam Bartlett.
Speaker 6: And I'm Alison Sandy.
Speaker 1: And welcome back out. I thought we'd start today with
Speaker 1: the feedback we've received since starting season two of The
Speaker 1: Truth About Amy podcast. Many of our listeners are probably
Speaker 1: wondering why they haven't heard anything from some of the
Speaker 1: key witnesses for a little while. Well, it just so happens.
Speaker 1: One of the key three, shall we say, Joshua Brydon,
Speaker 1: sent us a very heartwarming message, well sort of. It
Speaker 1: was sent to the Facebook page set up by Amy's
Speaker 1: best friend Aaron Gower, who has been fantastic in her
Speaker 1: support on this. Erin has been unbelievable. I've got to say.
Speaker 1: I mean, if Amy was still alive, she would just
Speaker 1: absolutely love her even more. And this is what the
Speaker 1: message from Joshua Brighton said, and I'm quoting. If my
Speaker 1: name keeps being mentioned on this page, I will be
Speaker 1: taking legal action against this page as well as the
Speaker 1: news cruise behind this anyone that follows this page. I'm
Speaker 1: just reading as his folks, because there's no punctuation on this.
Speaker 1: I have been discriminated, says josh On here, and have
Speaker 1: received threats in messages from it all. I have assisted
Speaker 1: the police every time they have come to talk to
Speaker 1: me or called me. Ewes are no better with what
Speaker 1: yous doing. It is narcissistic behavior, says josh that yous
Speaker 1: are doing, and it is wrong. Yous are no better
Speaker 1: than the gas lighting, violent people you're trying to expose.
Speaker 1: I will say this once. I'm not friends with David anymore.
Speaker 1: He's talking about David Simmons and have nothing to do
Speaker 1: with him whatsoever. Three words on the end there, full stop.
Speaker 1: Now that's Joshua's loving message to the podcast and all
Speaker 1: our listeners, and particularly to Aaron Gower's Facebook page that
Speaker 1: she set up to support Amy Wensley. Now, let me
Speaker 1: just go through this very quickly, and Joshua, good luck mate.
Speaker 1: I'll see you in court anytime you want to bring
Speaker 1: a counsel and try to sue anybody who's part of
Speaker 1: this podcast. I'd welcome that. That would be fantastic because
Speaker 1: we'd love to see you in the stand. And I've
Speaker 1: got some questions of my own. Rather than you running
Speaker 1: away like you did last time I tried to talk
Speaker 1: to you, am need to let it go.
Speaker 7: I don't have to talk.
Speaker 1: To you, but let me just go back, Joshua says.
Speaker 1: If my name keeps being mentioned on this page, I'll
Speaker 1: be taking legal action against his page Blubber as well
Speaker 1: as the news crew is behind this. Well, the news
Speaker 1: crews are only doing their job, Joshua. They're not going
Speaker 1: to be exposed legally anywhere. But I hate to disappoint you.
Speaker 1: I've been discriminated on here, he says, and receive threats
Speaker 1: in messages. Well, threats are no good from anybody. That's
Speaker 1: the only thing in this entire message that I agree with,
Speaker 1: But you certainly haven't been discriminated. What we're trying to
Speaker 1: find is the truth, Joshua. But I'll go on. He says,
Speaker 1: I've assisted the police every time they've come to talk
Speaker 1: to me or called me. We don't know that, and
Speaker 1: we don't know the quality of the assistance you've given police.
Speaker 1: And I, for one, seem to think there are other
Speaker 1: things that perhaps perhaps you have still not shared with
Speaker 1: the police. But look, we'll leave that in abeyance, like
Speaker 1: the rest of the information that I think that you
Speaker 1: have in your back pocket somewhere. He says, what you're doing,
Speaker 1: us are doing. That's all of us. I think he
Speaker 1: means Allison is narcissistic behavior. Narcissistic behavior, Well, that normally
Speaker 1: relates to people loving themselves and being very self indulgent,
Speaker 1: and I think that's probably the wrong word. He then says,
Speaker 1: it is wrong. Yous are no better. Now, this is
Speaker 1: the key to the whole message. Us are no better
Speaker 1: than the gaslighting, violent people you're trying to expose. Well,
Speaker 1: a huge green tick there, Joshua, because yes, yes, we
Speaker 1: are trying to expose them, and they are gaslighting, and
Speaker 1: they are violent people. But how do you know that, Joshua.
Speaker 1: How does Joshua know that the people we're trying to
Speaker 1: expose are gaslighting violent people? And where's he getting that
Speaker 1: information from? Allison? And then he says, I'm not friends
Speaker 1: with David anymore. Why would he say that and include
Speaker 1: that on the same line as the gaslighting violent people.
Speaker 1: That's very interesting choice. Maybe that's just a run of
Speaker 1: conscience that he has when he's composing this little message.
Speaker 1: Who knows again, Joshua, if you'd like to contact us directly,
Speaker 1: more than happy to have you on the podcast and
Speaker 1: you can come in and you can see that we're
Speaker 1: not discriminating against you, and we're more than happy for
Speaker 1: you to have your say in full, not just on
Speaker 1: a Facebook page. But I'll happily sit across the table
Speaker 1: from you and listen to everything you have to say
Speaker 1: and you can pour your heart out. But probably a
Speaker 1: good idea, the third tick in the trifecta, Joshua, is
Speaker 1: that you're not friends with David anymore, because I think
Speaker 1: from the evidence we've presented so far, you're probably not
Speaker 1: a good influence on each other. So it's probably a
Speaker 1: step forward in your personal and social life. That you
Speaker 1: don't associate anymore, you're probably a lot better off, even
Speaker 1: though I'm not a qualified psychologist.
Speaker 6: Now I also have some news, albeit I wish it
Speaker 6: was better. But I reached out to the cleaners Robert
Speaker 6: employed to clean up the scene after Amy's death. Now,
Speaker 6: I've known about these people for a while, and I
Speaker 6: won't name them because you know, they're small business and
Speaker 6: I don't want it to reflect poorly on them.
Speaker 1: They're professional cleaners, are they not?
Speaker 6: Yeah, they're professional cleaners yet okay, And to tell you
Speaker 6: the truth, I didn't hold out much hope because I
Speaker 6: knew Anna had contacted them several years back with no success.
Speaker 6: But Anna spoke to a woman who said her mum
Speaker 6: and sister cleaned the scene and she would ask her
Speaker 6: mom to call her. Now, this never happened, Limb, despite
Speaker 6: Anna leaving at least three voice messages, so unsurprisingly, they
Speaker 6: didn't speak to me either. But like Brydon's make Caid,
Speaker 6: if there was a trial, they would, I would imagine,
Speaker 6: be compelled to give evidence that at least be subpoened.
Speaker 1: Many, Yeah, many would be called.
Speaker 6: Yeah, and there are quite a few, right, there are
Speaker 6: quite a few.
Speaker 1: And I won't caid talk.
Speaker 6: Well, I guess because he doesn't have to do. Okay,
Speaker 6: it's a whole thing.
Speaker 1: Right, He's not compelled. Yeah, yeah, he's.
Speaker 6: Not compelled to talk. And even at an inquest, I
Speaker 6: don't know. They don't have that power.
Speaker 1: But Joshua Bryden's mate cade was at the Serpentine property
Speaker 1: earlier in the day, wasn't he.
Speaker 6: No, no, But he was the one that josh Brien
Speaker 6: said he received text from as he was leaving the
Speaker 6: property and he was supposed to pick him up from
Speaker 6: the train station. It's all very convoluted, there's a lot there,
Speaker 6: but it would be very interesting to hear from him,
Speaker 6: for sure, it absolutely would be.
Speaker 1: And look, I know we've touched on this before, but
Speaker 1: Amy's case is not isolated. There are several suicides and
Speaker 1: what's loosely termed accidents of women reported which are dubious
Speaker 1: at best, and most of those are unfortunately DV related,
Speaker 1: there's no doubt about that. However, statistics were never recorded
Speaker 1: because you know, they fell into that magical bucket of
Speaker 1: mystery and a lot of sort of you know, misadventure
Speaker 1: or natural causes or whatever you want to however you
Speaker 1: want to carve it up. It just wasn't right now now,
Speaker 1: ten years ago that changed. Charrell Moody is an anti
Speaker 1: violence activist, femicide and child death researcher, and the creative
Speaker 1: of Australia's only memorial to women and children lost to violence.
Speaker 1: It's pretty amazing there's only one. Her projects include Australian
Speaker 1: Femicide Watch, the Red Heart Campaign, She Matters, and the
Speaker 1: Australian Femicide and Child Deathmap. Now. Charrell's been documenting the
Speaker 1: killing of women and children since twenty fifteen here in Australia.
Speaker 1: She's also a journalist of incredible note, having won many awards,
Speaker 1: including two Walkleys, and after reporting on so many murders
Speaker 1: of women, Charrell decided she had to do more.
Speaker 5: It started as the Red Heart Campaign, which still exists
Speaker 5: spart Australian Femicide Watch like a I guess it's just
Speaker 5: an extension of that, but essentially about ten years ago,
Speaker 5: as a journalist, I was doing a special campaign I guess,
Speaker 5: on domestic violence for regional papers up in Queensland and
Speaker 5: we were getting a lot of stories from women who
Speaker 5: wanted to tell their stories and fair enough so they
Speaker 5: should be able to editors were giving us kickback though, saying,
Speaker 5: you know, it's too much bleak, it's too much domestic violence.
Speaker 5: We've had enough for this. We can't publish all their stories,
Speaker 5: and so the red Heart campaign started as a space
Speaker 5: where people would share a red heart on their skin
Speaker 5: and tell their stories. IT'SI kind of like to at
Speaker 5: least give a platform for these people I had to
Speaker 5: say no to. And of course a natural part of
Speaker 5: that became documenting the killing of women and children, not
Speaker 5: just as a result of domestic violence, but as a
Speaker 5: result of all violence, because we lose women and children
Speaker 5: in many ways. Yes, around sixty percent of their deaths
Speaker 5: are due to domestic and family violence, but if we
Speaker 5: don't count the other forty percent, we're not tracking their deaths.
Speaker 5: We don't understand what's happening. You know, we can't really
Speaker 5: get a grip on the actual toll of femicide and
Speaker 5: child death in Australia. So yeah, so that's pretty much
Speaker 5: how it started. But the reason that I do specifically
Speaker 5: document the killing of women and children is because it's
Speaker 5: a homage of sorts to the two little girls killed
Speaker 5: by my stepfather. So he murdered Stacy and Tracy and
Speaker 5: Sandra Dorothy Bacon, and it was a way of saying, well,
Speaker 5: let's have a space for them where they can be
Speaker 5: remembered forever, because the headlines no longer exist around them,
Speaker 5: of course, a space for their families and their communities
Speaker 5: to be able to remember and read their stories. I
Speaker 5: guess the whole project is really to kind of pay
Speaker 5: back in the only way that I can for what
Speaker 5: he took away. Clearly, this will never change their stories,
Speaker 5: but I have always believed that their stories can change
Speaker 5: the future for women and girls and children, and so
Speaker 5: that's why the Femocide and child death projects exist.
Speaker 6: Well, so, Charrelle, obviously you were in this space already,
Speaker 6: but when you started to track it, were you surprised
Speaker 6: by what you found out?
Speaker 5: Since I think the things that surprised me was the
Speaker 5: rates that we lose women and children and the contexts,
Speaker 5: like all of the context because all of the discussion,
Speaker 5: almost all the discussion around in particular femicide in Australia
Speaker 5: focuses on domestic and family violence as the context, and look,
Speaker 5: there is no doubt that is the largest context for
Speaker 5: the killing of women in particular. However, what we do
Speaker 5: is we freeze out the discussion around women who are
Speaker 5: killed in other contexts, so associate violence and stranger violence.
Speaker 5: By not having those discussions, we don't talk about forty
Speaker 5: of deaths, and that's a significant number of deaths to
Speaker 5: just ignore, basically, and we don't talk about the funding
Speaker 5: that's needed to prevent those deaths and the policy that's
Speaker 5: needed and the changes in the law that's needed. We
Speaker 5: just ignore an entire section of women killed. And the
Speaker 5: only time that we don't ignore those deaths is when
Speaker 5: there's a death that attracts very high media attention.
Speaker 1: Now I can see where Charelle's coming from here, because
Speaker 1: while often violent deaths are mentioned in the media, very
Speaker 1: few are part of justice campaigns. A lot has to
Speaker 1: line up to make that possible. Charelle also noted that
Speaker 1: while there is a big focus on DV deaths where
Speaker 1: men are the perpetrators, which is understandable because they are
Speaker 1: the majority, let's face it, that's the fact a very
Speaker 1: significant number of femicides don't fit into that category.
Speaker 5: My work is aiming to bring a spotlight onto all
Speaker 5: killings of all women and children, and by putting the
Speaker 5: information out there and having it collected in one place.
Speaker 5: It's a space where policy makers, journalists, politicians, anti violence
Speaker 5: sector where they can access this information and they can
Speaker 5: see the patterns. And one of the things that I
Speaker 5: found with my research, so I have a very extensive
Speaker 5: database offline, the patterns are there. So the same patterns
Speaker 5: that underpin domestic and family violence killings of women actually
Speaker 5: underpin the kill of women by their neighbors, their friends,
Speaker 5: their bosses, their colleagues, by their associates, as well as
Speaker 5: the stranger violence killing. So we can actually see a
Speaker 5: pattern across them, and we see patterns of sexism, misogyny,
Speaker 5: the particular factors, the particular drivers, so factors like alcohol,
Speaker 5: drug use, mental health problems and all of that sort
Speaker 5: of stuff. So we actually get a really good idea
Speaker 5: of what the patterns are, who's doing the killing, what
Speaker 5: the factors are behind them, and what the drivers are,
Speaker 5: and so we get we just get a much better
Speaker 5: overview of why women are being killed.
Speaker 6: So what are the other factors? Mainly are we talking
Speaker 6: alcohol and drugs primarily?
Speaker 5: Yeah, so alcohol, drugs, and mental health are key factors.
Speaker 5: So when we're talking about drivers and factors, it's really
Speaker 5: really important to understand the difference. So the drivers are
Speaker 5: the things at a society or level, the way that
Speaker 5: women are viewed, for example, the way that women have
Speaker 5: into categories like mothering, maternal instinct, the way that we
Speaker 5: have sexist jokes, sexism, misogyny. So those are drivers. Factors
Speaker 5: are those things that elements that played a part in
Speaker 5: the violence. They're not the cause of violence, but they
Speaker 5: were an element of the violence. For example, when someone
Speaker 5: is using ice and they kill a person, that's a factor.
Speaker 5: It doesn't excuse the violence, but we know that this
Speaker 5: drug played a part in it. Yeah, the same as
Speaker 5: obviously gambling, alcohol, and mental health. You know, so usually
Speaker 5: addiction and mental health are the two big factors, very common.
Speaker 5: Mental health and addiction are almost always present in many killings.
Speaker 6: Can I ask you about the statistics of femicide From
Speaker 6: what I see, it seems to be increasing.
Speaker 5: Yes, definitely, definitely. Over the last sixteen months, we've seen
Speaker 5: a huge increase. Last year was the biggest year of
Speaker 5: femosides i've documented in ten years now. My database does
Speaker 5: go back to white settlement. It's not complete because it's
Speaker 5: a very big job to complete it, but I believe
Speaker 5: I've captured every known and suspected femicide since mid nineteen
Speaker 5: nineties to now, so it's definitely the biggest, the biggest level.
Speaker 5: As of today, we're sitting on one hundred and three
Speaker 5: unlawful killings of women last year and we're on twenty
Speaker 5: four unlawful killings of women this year. I believe that
Speaker 5: this year is kind of flattening out, so probably going
Speaker 5: back to the expected one woman killed every four or
Speaker 5: five days. At the start of last year, we saw
Speaker 5: the platforming of some really very bad people. So obviously
Speaker 5: Donald Trump came to the foe again because of his
Speaker 5: big for the presidential position. We saw flicks are actually
Speaker 5: platforming quite a few very bad people. There was a
Speaker 5: whole bunch of them. There was just all of these
Speaker 5: blokes being platformed who have histories of violence. We have
Speaker 5: seen thankfully the old MAT's been moved off, but Andrew
Speaker 5: Tait on Spotify, so the platforming of these men really
Speaker 5: there was just a really huge amount of platforming of
Speaker 5: them last year and it kind of coincided with that
Speaker 5: peak in femocide. But the peak in femocide has been global,
Speaker 5: not just Australia. So something really big shifted last year
Speaker 5: and women paid the price for that, and it feels
Speaker 5: like it's it's still happening. This year, the deaths of
Speaker 5: evened out, Like officially, I feel like the deaths have
Speaker 5: evened out, but it must be. You have to remember
Speaker 5: that I'm actually monitoring multiple deaths that I haven't published
Speaker 5: because I just haven't been able to get solid confirmation.
Speaker 5: But I would say that there's at least six per
Speaker 5: potential femicides that I'm yet to officially declare from this year.
Speaker 6: What are the factors that you have to count in
Speaker 6: for femicide, you know, because we've got suicides and accidents too.
Speaker 5: Yeah, this is the problem. So the organization it's called
Speaker 5: Australian Femicide Watch because most women are killed as a
Speaker 5: result of femicide, so they are killed by men. We
Speaker 5: do need to keep into account that I do actually
Speaker 5: document the killing of women by women very rare, super
Speaker 5: rare occurrences. Last year, for instance, ninety six percent of
Speaker 5: women killed were lost amount violence. But I still document
Speaker 5: those women for a number of reasons. But for me
Speaker 5: to declare it, I need confirmation solidly from family and
Speaker 5: all police. The problem is policemen always declare it. So
Speaker 5: for instance, we have a death in Queensland that I've declared.
Speaker 5: The police have told her family they're investigating her death
Speaker 5: as a homicide, but they haven't declared it officially. So
Speaker 5: it's based on my communication with her family and sources
Speaker 5: within the Queensland Police Force to not every homicide is
Speaker 5: declared officially. Western Australia is really shit at that. They
Speaker 5: often leave deaths out of the public domain and I
Speaker 5: find out about them from family and find out that, hey,
Speaker 5: this person's been charged with murder or manslaughter, but the
Speaker 5: cops never said anything. But yeah, like for me, the
Speaker 5: minimum is police confirmation and all confirmation from family, and
Speaker 5: I'm happy to take police confirmation if it comes as
Speaker 5: a source, if it's not official, as long as there's
Speaker 5: a lining up and everything just coheses.
Speaker 6: Okay, So how do you do that? Do you contact
Speaker 6: the media units? What's your communication channels with police?
Speaker 5: So it's usually just through sources in the police force.
Speaker 5: Almost all deaths are confirmed officially, but some of them
Speaker 5: they won't say to you. The media unit won't tell you,
Speaker 5: and so you go to your source within. So if
Speaker 5: you have a source in homicide, very very helpful, so
Speaker 5: they'll tell you officially off the record. Okay, Yeah, it's
Speaker 5: just about using your contacts. Like as a journalist, that's
Speaker 5: what you do.
Speaker 6: So how do they compare throughout the state. So WA
Speaker 6: isn't they're not as open.
Speaker 5: So in the last two years, I have two deaths,
Speaker 5: one from the year previous one from last year that
Speaker 5: WA police never publicized, and I found out through their families.
Speaker 5: Their families have come to me and said, hey, this
Speaker 5: is my person, this person's charged with manslaughter. Why aren't
Speaker 5: they on your database? And it's simpler because there's been
Speaker 5: no publicity around their deaths, and so you kind of
Speaker 5: you know, you have to work your way backwards and
Speaker 5: really work the contacts to get that confirmation. But WA
Speaker 5: is really it's consistently bad. The rest of their states
Speaker 5: are okay, and territories okay, s WA's the worst in Australia. Yeah,
Speaker 5: for me, definitely, I mean there are just I mean,
Speaker 5: obviously we're chatting about that Amy Wensley situation. But I
Speaker 5: want to give you an example of a death in
Speaker 5: WA that I'm monitoring at the moment. A mum to
Speaker 5: a toddler was found a few months ago dead in
Speaker 5: a water tank. The water tank had a foot of
Speaker 5: water in a maximum. Her toddler was beside her body.
Speaker 5: She was discovered by someone who heard the baby crying
Speaker 5: in the tank. So someone's walking by, they've heard the
Speaker 5: baby crying, they've come to the tank. They found mum dead,
Speaker 5: baby perfectly fine. Police were called in and the first
Speaker 5: thing they said to her family was she killed herself.
Speaker 5: And her family have said to them, but her baby's there,
Speaker 5: and she would never have killed herself, A because she
Speaker 5: has her baby, and b because her baby's next to her.
Speaker 5: So the police then found out that her former partner,
Speaker 5: who had been stalking her, was in the area, was
Speaker 5: within a few kilometers radius, was actually there at the time.
Speaker 5: The police have not advertised this death. They've not publicized
Speaker 5: her death in any way. There's been no public communication
Speaker 5: about it. Her family is the one that's come to
Speaker 5: me and said, we don't know what's going on, we
Speaker 5: don't understand why they're doing this. Is there anything that
Speaker 5: you can do? So I spoke to them about a
Speaker 5: month ago, So for quite a number of weeks after
Speaker 5: her death, they were being told suicide, suicide, suicide. Only
Speaker 5: about a month ago did they bring family members in
Speaker 5: to say oh, we're just gonna do some interviews with you.
Speaker 5: Those interviews are still ongoing, so it took them quite
Speaker 5: a while just to do interviews with family members. It's
Speaker 5: regional detectives who are handling this to a very small
Speaker 5: unit of detectives up in the remote regional area where
Speaker 5: she was found. But the automatic assumption was woman in
Speaker 5: a water tank has killed herself. Her family swears black
Speaker 5: and blue that that is not what's happened. So we
Speaker 5: have so many issues here. We have the police jumping
Speaker 5: to a conclusion, there's no coroner's report, there's no proper investigation,
Speaker 5: and we also have police not actually letting us know
Speaker 5: that a woman has been found dead in a water
Speaker 5: tank or dead under suspicious circumstances.
Speaker 6: Isn't there a legal responsibility for that to occur?
Speaker 5: No, well not to tell us.
Speaker 8: They don't.
Speaker 5: Police don't have to communicate anything to the public.
Speaker 6: So they have to obviously record it internally.
Speaker 5: But yeah, yeah, of course it's got to go through
Speaker 5: to the coroner. Like you know, there's obviously the things
Speaker 5: that they have to follow. But as for putting out
Speaker 5: immedia rely saying a woman's being found dead in suspicious
Speaker 5: circumstances at this location. They don't have to do that.
Speaker 5: There's no obligation. There's absolutely no obligation.
Speaker 6: Can I ask you then about the demographics with this woman.
Speaker 5: She's Aboriginal, she's an Aboriginal woman. That's one of the
Speaker 5: reasons why the investigation is not going to be a
Speaker 5: priority for them. And we know that. We know that
Speaker 5: when Aboriginal women are disappeared or diet suspicious circumstances, there's
Speaker 5: almost no proper investigation. We see it repeatedly. It also
Speaker 5: happens when women where they're known to have addiction, where
Speaker 5: they have mental health, where they are disabled, basically, where
Speaker 5: their background is diverse or disadvantaged.
Speaker 6: All right, so familiar story, right. This is something that's
Speaker 6: recognized across all the forums, all the PEAT bodies who
Speaker 6: represent family, domestic violence or just you know, I don't
Speaker 6: imagine in femicide too. I mean, this doesn't seem to
Speaker 6: change though, and it doesn't seem to be any inroads
Speaker 6: for change.
Speaker 5: No, every time a woman dies and we know about it.
Speaker 5: So for instance, a woman has been found in Sydney
Speaker 5: Harbor this week, right, and the police they're not really
Speaker 5: saying anything, but they'll probably come out and say it's
Speaker 5: not suspicious, and I'm just going to go. But is
Speaker 5: it not suspicious? Because we've seen this over and over again.
Speaker 5: We saw it with Audrey Griffin. She died, she was killed.
Speaker 6: Here is Audrey Griffin's mum.
Speaker 9: She's just everything that you'd ever imagine we want from
Speaker 9: a child.
Speaker 10: It's like you can't breathe. It's like you don't want
Speaker 10: to breathe.
Speaker 8: Do.
Speaker 10: I need to find the strength and I needed to
Speaker 10: find the strength because I wasn't satisfied with what the outcome.
Speaker 7: Was it going.
Speaker 1: Now, just a bit of background here for listeners who
Speaker 1: don't know this case. Nineteen year old Audrey Griffin's fully
Speaker 1: clothed body was discovered in a creek on New South
Speaker 1: Wales central coast in March this year. She'd been reported missing,
Speaker 1: having not come home after going out the previous night.
Speaker 1: Now police initially ruled her death non suspicious and accidental
Speaker 1: drowning to be specific. It's just incredible until video footage
Speaker 1: turned up. And here's the other rub. Police had that
Speaker 1: video footage in their possession for two and a half
Speaker 1: weeks before somebody viewed it, which I just find unbelievable.
Speaker 1: So here's this nineteen year old girl goes missing Saturday night,
Speaker 1: Sunday morning, the parents call it. In Sunday morning, the
Speaker 1: police find her body, and they know that she's been
Speaker 1: out to the pub, the local pub the night before.
Speaker 1: The pub's got CCTV. No one views the CCTV footage
Speaker 1: for two weeks. Two weeks and they've found her body
Speaker 1: and she drowned. Can you believe that? Can you believe it?
Speaker 1: I mean, that's just But again the parallels with Amy
Speaker 1: Wensley and police investigations. This is in March this year.
Speaker 1: I just find this just incredible. Now that video footage
Speaker 1: showed heard leaving the pub and guess what a bloke
Speaker 1: following it. Now it turned out to be a fifty
Speaker 1: three year old man with a long history of violence,
Speaker 1: a long history of violence, and a bloke that should
Speaker 1: have been in jail. But I won't go down that path.
Speaker 1: I mean, it's a complicated story and only recently, you know,
Speaker 1: he killed himself in jail. So that case is now over.
Speaker 1: I'm not sure whether that's good for the family or
Speaker 1: bad for the family, depends on your own particular point
Speaker 1: of view. But the man responsible has taken his own
Speaker 1: life as a result. Eventually, once he was charged, arrested
Speaker 1: and then thrown into remand but here's more from cherrell family.
Speaker 5: He was saying, there's no way she would have died
Speaker 5: in these circumstances. And her friends are saying that. And
Speaker 5: it's her family, her friends, her community who were out
Speaker 5: there finding the evidence and shaking the tree to get
Speaker 5: the police to investigate. And this was a young white
Speaker 5: woman who was exceedingly popular, the kind of woman that
Speaker 5: you would expect the police to bend over backwards to
Speaker 5: get a proper outcome on. They just from the get
Speaker 5: go swept it under the carpet until certain CCTV footage
Speaker 5: was given to them by the person who had the
Speaker 5: CCTV footage. They didn't do it. They didn't do that job.
Speaker 5: And we saw that with Courtney Anderson up in the
Speaker 5: Gladstone area. She's exited a car at speed on a highway.
Speaker 5: Her partner is in the car. He has a history
Speaker 5: of domestic violence against her.
Speaker 10: Courtney Anderson and her partner were in a car heading
Speaker 10: to Rockhampton around five point fifteen yesterday afternoon.
Speaker 8: Somehow she fell from the vehicle.
Speaker 7: It is our understanding that Courtney's partner was driving the vehicle.
Speaker 5: He was planning on leaving. She had for her job,
Speaker 5: She had plans for getting her hair cut the next day.
Speaker 5: Something happened on that highway, and he hasn't been charged.
Speaker 5: He's been charged with having that's it. That's the most
Speaker 5: he's charged with. Her family says she wasn't suicidal. There
Speaker 5: was no indication that she intended on ending her life.
Speaker 5: They swear black and blue that something happened in that
Speaker 5: vehicle and she was either forced to exit in fear
Speaker 5: or she exited willingly. She started investigating that automatically went
Speaker 5: to suicide, and the coroner automatically went to suicide. Her
Speaker 5: family's been advocating for more than a year. So now
Speaker 5: she's been dead since April one, we're thirteen months in
Speaker 5: and only now other police saying to them were instigating
Speaker 5: this as a homicide. But they're still not publicizing that.
Speaker 5: The only reason that they're saying this is because her
Speaker 5: family has been shaking the tree from the day that
Speaker 5: they were told that it was a suicide. They have
Speaker 5: been pushing, pushing, pushing, there's a petition. Her stepmum posts
Speaker 5: every day on social media about Courtney. You know her
Speaker 5: family are speaking at rallies, they're trying to speak to politicians,
Speaker 5: They're doing everything possible to get a proper investigation. Know
Speaker 5: about the Western Australia woman Courtney Anderson. We know with
Speaker 5: Brianna Robinson who fell from a height, Come for her family,
Speaker 5: Caitlin Thornton, South Wales, ed and Westbrook and Tasmania. Like
Speaker 5: that is just a little selection of them.
Speaker 6: You include them on the Themoside.
Speaker 5: Watch, Anderson and Robinson are included. Now Courtney Anderson is
Speaker 5: included because I was able to get conformed that police
Speaker 5: are now getting this as a homicide even though they
Speaker 5: haven't sized that, and I am comfortable with that. Like
Speaker 5: I think it meets the threshold for me. Brianna Robinson
Speaker 5: was considered a suspicious death.
Speaker 1: Okay, so Cherille says, it is a major setback when
Speaker 1: police don't investigate properly from the get go. That's something
Speaker 1: of an understatement, but importantly it's not irredeemable.
Speaker 5: There's two problems. Firstly, is the homicide squad is not
Speaker 5: brought in. So if you're not bringing in a homicide squad,
Speaker 5: which is a dedicated unit of detectives who this is
Speaker 5: what they do. They know their way around suspicious deaths.
Speaker 5: They know how to get to the truth of them.
Speaker 5: If you're not bringing them in from the get go,
Speaker 5: then you're going to miss a lot of vital opportunities.
Speaker 5: So my understanding, in the case of Courtney Anderson, the
Speaker 5: local detective called the homicides squad, They had a chat
Speaker 5: and he basically said to them, no, we reckon, it's
Speaker 5: a suicide. And that was the end of the discussion.
Speaker 5: So the homicide squad was never called in. Never understand
Speaker 5: why that didn't happen in this situation. The other thing
Speaker 5: is just, yeah, if you have local detectives who do
Speaker 5: not have the experience around suspicious deaths, and if they're
Speaker 5: talking to a potential perpetrator and the perpetrators giving them
Speaker 5: the story and they're leaning into that, then there's no
Speaker 5: will to move further.
Speaker 6: How hard is it then, once that determination has been made,
Speaker 6: to get them to then consider it to change that determination.
Speaker 5: Sometimes it takes the advocacy. In a situation with Courtney,
Speaker 5: her family's just constantly rattling the cage. In the situation
Speaker 5: with Audrey Griffin, it's the community, it's a friend, it's
Speaker 5: a family rattling a cage. It shouldn't be like that.
Speaker 5: Every one of these deaths needs to be investigat from
Speaker 5: the get go as a potential homicide. It is better
Speaker 5: to put the resources of the homicide squad into the
Speaker 5: investigation and waste that resource if it turns out to
Speaker 5: be a non suspicious death, then to have a suspicious
Speaker 5: death never investigated properly and no one brought to justice,
Speaker 5: to potentially have a killer out there to deny their
Speaker 5: families the truth.
Speaker 6: Yes, so is Amy Wensley on your list on the femicide?
Speaker 5: Yes, Amy is on the list. And again it's one
Speaker 5: of those really hard ones. One of the big difficulties
Speaker 5: for me is the defamation.
Speaker 6: So what factors did you tick off for Amy?
Speaker 5: Now that the podcast has come out, and now that
Speaker 5: all of the information is coming out, that makes it
Speaker 5: a different story for me, That makes it a different risk.
Speaker 5: I am more comfortable with that risk because I know
Speaker 5: going into a civil court, we can bring the detective
Speaker 5: in if I'm sued for defamation, we can bring these
Speaker 5: people in and they can justify my reasoning for publication.
Speaker 6: I guess that's the whole thing, right, I mean, you'd
Speaker 6: come across this a lot, as you say, from defamation,
Speaker 6: but also a reluctance from authorities necessarily to confirm it.
Speaker 5: When we're talking about the defamation risks, you have to
Speaker 5: understand that every time I add an addition to the
Speaker 5: watch or the red Heart campaign, you know, it's the
Speaker 5: same defamation risks that you have as a journalist working
Speaker 5: in mainstream media. The difference is I don't have a
Speaker 5: deformation fund, and we all know that a person charged
Speaker 5: with murder can still sue for defamation. I'm fine with
Speaker 5: those risks, obviously, very comfortable with adding a person who's
Speaker 5: been charged, But in terms of just what happens if
Speaker 5: I get slammed with ten defamation cases in one year,
Speaker 5: I am fucked, Like I would lose everything. So I just, yeah,
Speaker 5: I'm often really very slow and careful, and I have
Speaker 5: a lawyer, and I go like, mate, do we pass
Speaker 5: the test here? Can we legitimately defend this if it
Speaker 5: goes to court? So yeah, that's why I'm really wary
Speaker 5: about that.
Speaker 6: No, absolutely, but you can say that despite these extraordinary
Speaker 6: statistics that you've collated, it's conservative.
Speaker 5: Yeah, I actually think the femicide toller is significantly higher
Speaker 5: than I have it. It's definitely higher than the government's
Speaker 5: official figures. The government doesn't actually have a femicide told
Speaker 5: by the way, so it's definitely higher than what the
Speaker 5: government says because the way that they document homicide, they
Speaker 5: only document homicide basically, they don't document manslaughter or lesser charges.
Speaker 5: But yeah, I think I think the toller is significantly higher,
Speaker 5: and I think it's because we just have so many
Speaker 5: deaths across Australia that are not being investigated, especially the
Speaker 5: so called suicide deaths.
Speaker 6: What do you think of the laws that are being introduced,
Speaker 6: and I mean obviously in New South Wales it seems
Speaker 6: to be the most progressive. They've got ankle bracelets. Now
Speaker 6: for DV offenders' coercive control laws, what do you think
Speaker 6: are they working and what else needs to be.
Speaker 5: Done so we do have something. Definitely we definitely need
Speaker 5: to be tracking DV offenders for sure. That should be
Speaker 5: right across the country, especially ones where we know that
Speaker 5: there is a high risk of violence. The thing about
Speaker 5: the coersion laws that those are kind of problematic. We
Speaker 5: already see without those laws, we see women who are
Speaker 5: victims of violence being charged with domestic violence offenses because
Speaker 5: they've stood up for themselves, or because basically they've stood
Speaker 5: up for themselves, or because the perpetrator says they've been.
Speaker 6: Violent, they're the aggressor.
Speaker 5: Yeah, the aggressor. And that situation is primarily impacting women
Speaker 5: from disadvantage or diverse background, So again, Aboriginal women, women
Speaker 5: from multicultural communities who don't speak English very well or
Speaker 5: don't speak English at all and are reliant on translators
Speaker 5: from in their communities to get the information across. We're
Speaker 5: also seeing that with women who have disability who struggle
Speaker 5: to communicate, so where there's often communication barriers or the
Speaker 5: situation where Aboriginal women are automatically being declared the offender.
Speaker 5: So those coersion laws are really problematic and a lot
Speaker 5: of people in the sector will tell you that it's
Speaker 5: good to have laws that recognize it, but the laws
Speaker 5: have to not penalize the victim, and that's kind of
Speaker 5: where we're at at the moment. We just have failures
Speaker 5: at every level, especially definitely in the legal area. So
Speaker 5: we have perpetrators being misidentified as victims. We have perpetrators
Speaker 5: being charged with breaching DeVos or assault and then being
Speaker 5: bailed either by the watchhouse or by the magistrate. We
Speaker 5: have perpetrators getting early parole and going on to kill.
Speaker 5: They're not being tracked. We have perpetrators who have entirely
Speaker 5: finished their sentences and there is no way of tracking
Speaker 5: them being out in the community. The thing is that
Speaker 5: this is just one small area of the failures that
Speaker 5: we are facing with violence against women. So we have
Speaker 5: major hurdles with the courts. We have major hurdles with policing.
Speaker 5: We have major hurdles with safe housing or the lack
Speaker 5: of it. We have women who can't get refuge. We
Speaker 5: have women who have nowhere to live. They're living in
Speaker 5: car parks because they've fled. They've fled their home and
Speaker 5: nowhere for them to be. So we have income issues,
Speaker 5: we have accessing service issues. We know that the domestic
Speaker 5: violence services in particular across every Satan territory cannot keep
Speaker 5: up with demand. We have some women calling places like
Speaker 5: Dvconnect and being told come back in two days. We
Speaker 5: don't have enough resources to handle your case. It's a
Speaker 5: shit show from whe to go. There's not enough money
Speaker 5: to resource the safety nets. There's not enough policy to
Speaker 5: protect women. There's not enough policy to turn perpetrator behavior
Speaker 5: around it. It's just a mess. It's a big fat mess.
Speaker 6: It's going to take some doing. And I guess what
Speaker 6: we saw in the federal election, women issues being ignored
Speaker 6: yet again entirely.
Speaker 5: I mean, less than two percent of social media posts
Speaker 5: by both the opposition and labor focused on women's safety,
Speaker 5: less than two percent, And then when questioned about it,
Speaker 5: they would go, well, no, we're focusing on women with
Speaker 5: childcare and you know with pressure price reductions and stuff
Speaker 5: like that. They just don't get it. They honestly don't
Speaker 5: get it. They don't get that the system is broken
Speaker 5: and needs wholesale fixing and wholesale funding support. And that
Speaker 5: funding doesn't come from the federal government. It's also got
Speaker 5: to come from the state and territories. So in the
Speaker 5: Northern Territory, for example, we have a situation where the
Speaker 5: LMP is taking the very small pool of domestic and
Speaker 5: family violence funding and they're moving it into juvenile crime prevention.
Speaker 5: So what they're basically saying is black women's lives don't matter,
Speaker 5: but white people's cars do. They want to protect property
Speaker 5: from young people being naughty, like committing crimes. They don't
Speaker 5: want to protect women who are exceedingly high risker. Also
Speaker 5: in the Northern Territory, there's no space in the watchhouses.
Speaker 5: So we have a situation where a woman died under
Speaker 5: suspicious circumstances up there this year. She had to go
Speaker 5: back to her partner because there was no room in
Speaker 5: refuge none at all. She had nowhere else to go.
Speaker 5: She was pregnant. She went back to him thinking that
Speaker 5: was the only place she could be because she couldn't
Speaker 5: get refuge and she wouldn't have support with the baby.
Speaker 5: He meanwhile, was charged with domestic violence offences and released
Speaker 5: on bail because there was no room in the watchhouse
Speaker 5: to hold him. So no bed in refuge, no room
Speaker 5: in watchhouse. Woman is dead.
Speaker 6: Horrible, horrible, It's very sad. Where do you go from there?
Speaker 6: I guess we can we look at the bigger picture,
Speaker 6: but we're just also trying to deal with the individual
Speaker 6: ones as well. What are your thoughts with Amy's case.
Speaker 5: I don't understand why someone hasn't been charged. What's the
Speaker 5: hold up? What are they doing? What a police?
Speaker 6: Yes, well they are investigating, but the problem is, and
Speaker 6: as you would have come across this before, sometimes these
Speaker 6: things become political.
Speaker 5: Absolutely. I mean, you're not going to get an outcome
Speaker 5: for her family or for Amy if there is no
Speaker 5: charge or there is no coronial ruling that reflects what
Speaker 5: the situation is. The reality is she died under suspicious circumstances,
Speaker 5: there was only one person there when it happened. There
Speaker 5: should be a proper investigation. There should be charges or
Speaker 5: legitimate reason why there's lot of charges, And if there's
Speaker 5: not charges, then there needs to be a thorough coroner's
Speaker 5: inquest to get a proper finding. You can't leave people
Speaker 5: hanging like this, and you can't leave potential killers out
Speaker 5: there without doing something. It's mind boggling that they're not
Speaker 5: doing the bare minimum and you know, investigating and charge
Speaker 5: it doesn't make any sense. The work is made so
Speaker 5: much easier because of the bravery of the families like
Speaker 5: the people who lose women to violence are the most
Speaker 5: courageous human beings. I've never met people like them. And
Speaker 5: every day it's fine to do this job because I
Speaker 5: know that these amazing people are out there fighting much
Speaker 5: bigger demons than I ever will. I mean, unless you've
Speaker 5: actually dealt with a family who has taken up this fight,
Speaker 5: you cannot understand the depth of their courage. You just
Speaker 5: cannot understand it. It is amazing to just keep on
Speaker 5: putting your feet forward, and they're just constantly going over
Speaker 5: these roadblocks and these walls and going through cement wet
Speaker 5: cement to get up every day and continue doing that.
Speaker 5: I don't know. I don't know how they do it,
Speaker 5: but I just cannot how much respect I have for them,
Speaker 5: for any family who's doing this.
Speaker 6: So Cherrelle Moody kept her word and put us in
Speaker 6: touch with Courtney Anderson's family. A few days later, we
Speaker 6: interviewed Courtney's mum, Leanne Rasby, her dad Don Anderson, and
Speaker 6: stepmom Christy Ibbotson.
Speaker 11: A phone call no mother should ever have to receive.
Speaker 6: That same night, the local news ran a story.
Speaker 11: Courtney Page Anderson died on April first last year. The
Speaker 11: official police release said she exited a moving car on
Speaker 11: the Bruce Highway.
Speaker 6: In an interview, Rockhampton journalist Lillly McDougall asked Leanne about
Speaker 6: when she first heard of her daughter's death.
Speaker 7: I had a knock at the door to staffter midnight.
Speaker 9: Our other daughter, Courtney's sister, Kat was living downstairs, and
Speaker 9: she called out to me. She saidly, I need you
Speaker 9: to come down. The police need to talk to you.
Speaker 9: And when I got there, there was two officers with
Speaker 9: torch lights because our outside lights were on, and I said,
Speaker 9: oh my god, it's caught me.
Speaker 7: He's killed her, hasn't he? And what had been told you?
Speaker 9: There had been a roadside incident, So then I started
Speaker 9: to think, I for got this wrong. It's just a
Speaker 9: horrible accident. She was on the road earlier than she
Speaker 9: was supposed to be, and it's just an accident. But
Speaker 9: somebody on Facebook who knew about that accident had put
Speaker 9: a post up, and we then knew that there was
Speaker 9: another person in the vehicle with her.
Speaker 7: She was due to pick somebody up from.
Speaker 9: Rocky on the way up, but the accident happened before Rocky,
Speaker 9: so then we started to think was he in the car.
Speaker 9: As soon as we knew he was in the car,
Speaker 9: alarm bells were ringing right from the very moment. Within
Speaker 9: forty eight hours, eight family members were simultaneously interviewed by
Speaker 9: the CIB. All of those statements outlining her domestic violence
Speaker 9: and our knowledge of her life was submitted to the coroner,
Speaker 9: and the coroner did not acknowledge one word about any
Speaker 9: of it.
Speaker 7: Nothing.
Speaker 9: He said that Courtney most likely had undiagnosed mental health issues,
Speaker 9: which was something that her ex partner had said verbally
Speaker 9: at the scene. Oh she's crazy, She's suicidal. She wasn't suicidal.
Speaker 9: She had a good grip on her life.
Speaker 6: Courtney's parents say their daughter had been in a toxic relationship.
Speaker 6: Sound familiar with her partner, Ashley Campbell for more than
Speaker 6: a decade, and he was volatile.
Speaker 9: And we had an incident where she was supposed to
Speaker 9: be with us Christmas Day, and when she ran late,
Speaker 9: we rang her and rang her. Eventually she picked up
Speaker 9: and said she'd misplaced her keys. If you've misplaced your keys,
Speaker 9: you just rang up and say I can't find my keys,
Speaker 9: Come get me. So I got in the car and
Speaker 9: I went over and I picked her up, and I
Speaker 9: could see she was distressed. But I didn't discuss it
Speaker 9: with her. I didn't I didn't pry. In the end,
Speaker 9: I just loved her. I just bought her home. She
Speaker 9: dressed in matching pajamas with her sister, and we had
Speaker 9: her niece and nephew over and for Christmas, and she
Speaker 9: had a nice time, but we knew something was quite wrong.
Speaker 9: She stayed with us the most of the day and
Speaker 9: spent the afternoon on her bed with her sister. We
Speaker 9: didn't know till the next morning that he had locked
Speaker 9: her out of the house again, and she spent Christmas
Speaker 9: night in her car with no phone, no shoes on
Speaker 9: her feet, and she arrived on our doorstep at Boxing
Speaker 9: Day morning asking her stepfather, my husband, if he could
Speaker 9: come and get her car started and please get her phone.
Speaker 9: So Ian went over there insisted on getting get the
Speaker 9: phone back. And it was a scenario that happened far
Speaker 9: too often, but that was the most recent episode. Within
Speaker 9: a week, Courtney said to me, Mum, we're calling it quits.
Speaker 9: As soon as he gets his license back, repeat, repeat, repeat,
Speaker 9: drug driving, driving without a license. This was just a
Speaker 9: never ending pattern of an eleven year relationship. She said,
Speaker 9: as soon as he gets his license, he's taking the dogs,
Speaker 9: he's taking the van and he's going to Brisbane. I'm
Speaker 9: going to keep the house. It's okay, mum, you know,
Speaker 9: just let me handle it my way. And I said, honey,
Speaker 9: you don't have to explain it to me. I trust you,
Speaker 9: I believe in you. You just manage the best you can,
Speaker 9: and then a couple of short months later she was
Speaker 9: gone again. You know, he only had his license back
Speaker 9: eighteen days, and this time Courtney lost her life.
Speaker 11: And how do you view an you learn that the
Speaker 11: driver didn't call emergency services or try to help her.
Speaker 7: I don't know how to answer that.
Speaker 9: I don't have words for how I feel about about that.
Speaker 9: You claim to love someone for eleven years and you
Speaker 9: don't provide CBO, you don't call for an ambulance, You
Speaker 9: just sit there watching her bleed out until passes by help.
Speaker 9: It took nine months for them to charge him, and
Speaker 9: they only charged him because I threatened to go to
Speaker 9: the press with the fact that he hadn't been charged.
Speaker 9: And why does it take nine months? Why wasn't he charged?
Speaker 9: Why did it take so long? Why does nothing touch
Speaker 9: this man?
Speaker 1: When you read the police report, this is astounding. So
Speaker 1: in the police's report, Ashley Campbell told the officers, and
Speaker 1: I'm quoting here al the couple were at home and
Speaker 1: began arguing. Normally, if they're arguing, they will go for
Speaker 1: a drive and talk shit out, and he would sometimes
Speaker 1: smoke some weed.
Speaker 10: The fighting had been shit all day and it didn't
Speaker 10: get worse, and it didn't get better. He made her
Speaker 10: feel like shit because of the cheating. They left home
Speaker 10: and headed towards Rockhampton. They were in Courtney's gold Toyota
Speaker 10: Highlus and he was driving and she was in the
Speaker 10: passenger seat. Just before dark, they were on the Bruce
Speaker 10: Highway and they were arguing. He couldn't remember what was
Speaker 10: being said other than fuck you back and forth between
Speaker 10: each other. They were driving and hit a straight bit
Speaker 10: with grass on both sides. Courtney opened the door and
Speaker 10: jumped out without warning. It happened too quick and he
Speaker 10: should've grabbed her, but didn't think she would jump out
Speaker 10: after opening the door. They were traveling about eighty kilometers
Speaker 10: per hour. Cambell put the brakes on and pulled over
Speaker 10: and had run back to where the deceased had rolled
Speaker 10: on the grass. The deceased was in a bad way
Speaker 10: and bleeding. He tried to get attention from people passing by,
Speaker 10: but a lot of people didn't stop. He was then
Speaker 10: assisted by people stopping in providing her first aid. He
Speaker 10: then doesn't remember anything as he passed out a few times.
Speaker 10: He stated that the deceased had jumped out of the
Speaker 10: car once before when they were pulled up at roadworks,
Speaker 10: but they ended up speaking to police.
Speaker 6: The report then states that there was no record of
Speaker 6: this on q Prime, which is where QPS lodges all
Speaker 6: of its incidents. No one witnessed the incident only afterwards,
Speaker 6: after Courtney allegedly had already jumped The police report also
Speaker 6: noted that family provided them with six of Courtney's mobile phones,
Speaker 6: which Campbell had allegedly smashed over the years. They were
Speaker 6: only able to turn one of these on as the
Speaker 6: remainder had no power at all. However, attempts to retrieve
Speaker 6: information were unsuccessful. They later attempted to obtain CCTV from
Speaker 6: cameras on the Bruce Highway from Queensland Transport and Main Roads,
Speaker 6: but because they didn't investigate immediately, the footage had already
Speaker 6: been whited. The report was dated first of May, one
Speaker 6: month after Courtney's death.
Speaker 1: One month one month again a slack police investigation. You'd
Speaker 1: have to say, wouldn't you incredible?
Speaker 5: Why does this happened?
Speaker 1: So this guy's got a record of being violent toward her,
Speaker 1: So you've got all this going on, and we're led
Speaker 1: to believe that she just jumped out of the car.
Speaker 6: Yeah, because that happens all the time.
Speaker 1: Not just moving at eighty ks an hour. Yeah, but
Speaker 1: it's a product of arguing. And so if you believe
Speaker 1: his story, she's the one who gave up on the
Speaker 1: argument and just jumped out at the risk of death. Yeah.
Speaker 1: So on October the eleven, Queensland's longest serving coroner, guy
Speaker 1: called David O'Connell, who just clocked up twelve years as
Speaker 1: the state's central coroner, delivered this finding.
Speaker 4: On the first of April twenty twenty four, Miss Anderson
Speaker 4: died after she allegedly alighted from a motor vehicle which
Speaker 4: was then traveling highway speeds. The police conducted an investigation
Speaker 4: into the circumstances of her death. The police established that
Speaker 4: no other vehicle was involved in the incident and from
Speaker 4: seeing evidence and information provided to police.
Speaker 1: Sorry for laughing, as the information provided by the partner.
Speaker 4: It was consistent with her opening the passenger door of
Speaker 4: the vehicle and throwing herself from the vehicle whilst it
Speaker 4: was moving. The driver alleged as they drove along the
Speaker 4: highway they were arguing over alleged infidelity issues. When the
Speaker 4: deceased issued an expletive, indicating she was tired of the argument,
Speaker 4: and she then without warning, opened the door and thre
Speaker 4: through herself from the vehicle.
Speaker 1: Yeah, of course we all do that, and we're sick
Speaker 1: of arguing, we just jump out.
Speaker 4: Her partner said she was usually a person of good
Speaker 4: general health, but when they argued, she had episodes of
Speaker 4: anger and possibly mania, and she may have undiagnosed mental
Speaker 4: health issues.
Speaker 1: This is from the partner. He is the one running
Speaker 1: the entire narrative to police, and they've taken him on
Speaker 1: face value, and then the coroner has taken the police
Speaker 1: report just on face value. How is this doing anything
Speaker 1: for this DV problem? This is just amazing. This just
Speaker 1: continues to be a pattern that is coming out of
Speaker 1: certain authorities, and I've got to say it's very bloody depressing.
Speaker 6: How is this able to happen? This part here really
Speaker 6: triggered my interest when in the report where he said
Speaker 6: that she had episodes of anger and possibly mania and
Speaker 6: may have undiagnosed mental health issues. That's basically code for
Speaker 6: Courtney being unhinged. And for anyone like me who's watched
Speaker 6: the Netflix documentary on Gabby Patito, this narrative is all
Speaker 6: too familiar.
Speaker 1: No, exactly, it's the ultimate gas lighting, isn't it? This
Speaker 1: whole idea that you know they're arguing all day? So
Speaker 1: what's the solution getting the car go for a drive?
Speaker 1: I mean, you know her car too, her car, because
Speaker 1: she's the only one who's got any money, who's got
Speaker 1: the job, the regular job, the regular employment to pay
Speaker 1: for the motor vehicle. So the responsible person in the
Speaker 1: entire relationship, you know, over and above, like there's a
Speaker 1: grand canyon between the responsibility. She's the one who's unhinged.
Speaker 1: Can you believe that? But how come you and I
Speaker 1: can see this and read this from afar when the
Speaker 1: police officers who deal with these sort of people every
Speaker 1: day are not putting two and two together On the ground.
Speaker 4: The scene evidence is consistent with the driver conducting an
Speaker 4: emergency stop of the vehicle off the road shortly after
Speaker 4: she had alighted from it. There was no evidence within
Speaker 4: the vehicle to suggest there had been any sort of altercation.
Speaker 4: An autopsy found she had died due to head injuries
Speaker 4: as a result of a fall from a moving vehicle.
Speaker 4: A toxicology screen detected no blood alcohol, no prescription medications,
Speaker 4: methyl amphetamine, which is an illicit drug, and an increased
Speaker 4: level of acetone in her urine, which is usually consistent
Speaker 4: with a poor nutritional intake. Uses of methyl amphetamine can
Speaker 4: have periods of poor nutritional intake due to methyl amphetamine
Speaker 4: suppressing the natural appetite.
Speaker 1: I've got to say, when you look at the toxicology reports,
Speaker 1: the volume of the meth in her system is absolutely minuscule,
Speaker 1: to the point where it could possibly be a one off.
Speaker 1: Now you can draw your own conclusions from that, and
Speaker 1: she's never had any record of taking stuff like that either,
Speaker 1: Allison from her friends and family and close friends.
Speaker 4: The driver of the vehicle was tested and his toxicology
Speaker 4: screen revealed no blood alcohol, no prescription medications, but the
Speaker 4: presence of illicit drugs methylanphetamine, and also cannabis.
Speaker 1: From his own recollections to believes he admitted smoking for
Speaker 1: most of the day so he was happy to getting
Speaker 1: the car and drive.
Speaker 4: Thenmation available to the police was that on the thirteenth
Speaker 4: of April twenty twenty one, Miss Anderson and the driver
Speaker 4: had another incident when their vehicle was stationary at roadworks.
Speaker 1: Stationary is the key and.
Speaker 4: She suddenly alighted from the vehicle, and her boyfriend then
Speaker 4: got out of the vehicle and got her back into it.
Speaker 4: Apparently it appeared aggressively done.
Speaker 1: Aggressively done, so she was happy to get out of
Speaker 1: the car when it was stopped, but it was aggressively
Speaker 1: done again, his aggression shining out, he made her get
Speaker 1: back in the car.
Speaker 6: Yeah, I can't help it. Jump in here, LIAMB. Do
Speaker 6: you also find it weird that they would point to
Speaker 6: an incident where she had gotten out of the vehicle
Speaker 6: he was driving before on the highway, except it wasn't
Speaker 6: moving at the time.
Speaker 1: It doesn't well, it just doesn't make sense.
Speaker 5: Yeah.
Speaker 6: Well, I don't know about you, but the only time
Speaker 6: I've ever heard of anyone jumping out of a moving
Speaker 6: car is in American action movies. You know, you see
Speaker 6: that a bit, but in real life. So yeah, I
Speaker 6: find it. I find it weird that this wasn't considered
Speaker 6: subitious and lead to a more thorough investigation.
Speaker 1: Well, how could it not trigger a much more thorough investigation? Surely,
Speaker 1: surely just the nature of the relationship and then the
Speaker 1: nature of the incident. I mean, as you say, not
Speaker 1: every day somebody jumps out of a moving car. It
Speaker 1: beggars belief, doesn't it anyway? The coroner goes on to conclude.
Speaker 4: In the circumstances, I find that Miss Anderson, whilst under
Speaker 4: the influence of methyl amphetamine, an illicit drug, whilst arguing
Speaker 4: with her partner, opened the door and alighted from it.
Speaker 4: Because the car was then traveling at highway speed. She
Speaker 4: suffered fatal injuries and died. There is no evidence to
Speaker 4: suggest that the driver in any way forced her from
Speaker 4: the vehicle. It may be that she had undiagnosed health issues,
Speaker 4: perhaps relating to anger management.
Speaker 1: Issues anchor management, but she took.
Speaker 4: No prescription medications to assist with that. It may be
Speaker 4: that methyl amphetamine affected her clarity of rational thinking and
Speaker 4: judgment at the time. Magistrate O'Connell, Central Coroner, even October
Speaker 4: twenty twenty four.
Speaker 1: And I think worth noting here that while this is
Speaker 1: just key passages from the coroner's report, his findings are
Speaker 1: barely barely a page long. But it's the conclusion that
Speaker 1: I find most interesting, where the coron hypothesizes that maybe
Speaker 1: it's the word. Maybe Courtney had undiagnosed health issues, perhaps
Speaker 1: relating to anger management issues, suggesting the absence of prescription
Speaker 1: medications was an issue. Now do you think that's a
Speaker 1: pretty long boat of drawl? What do you think about that?
Speaker 1: So he's suggesting that there was something that was undiagnosed
Speaker 1: and that she should have had some sort of therapy
Speaker 1: via prescription and she would have been okay, what and
Speaker 1: that would have stopped her from jumping out of a
Speaker 1: car doing Addie ksan out down the Bruce Highway.
Speaker 8: What?
Speaker 6: And does he know her? I mean he's going on
Speaker 6: what the partner said, right, who has a long history
Speaker 6: of violence.
Speaker 1: Oh no, No, it's totally his story. It's totally his story.
Speaker 1: It's exactly the same as the Amy Wensley case, where
Speaker 1: everyone has gone on what David Simmons has said. The
Speaker 1: person who's left behind, the person who's still alive, gets
Speaker 1: to completely dictate the narrative.
Speaker 6: This is only last year, and you know the Audery
Speaker 6: Griffins won only this year. I just thought that things
Speaker 6: were getting better, Leam.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Will you'd think that every time a case like
Speaker 1: this comes up, which is all too often, you'd think. Now,
Speaker 1: with all the magnification of things that you know, you
Speaker 1: and I are talking about, I mean all these all
Speaker 1: these different things, you would have people absolutely sort of
Speaker 1: on on on edge. All these investigative bodies would be
Speaker 1: on edge about anything that looked vaguely suspicious. But clearly
Speaker 1: that's not happening. And I dare use a driving metaphor here,
Speaker 1: but a lot of people are asleep at the wheel.
Speaker 1: So also, let's go back to the ice issue right now.
Speaker 1: Given there's such a big focus on Courtney being a
Speaker 1: potential ice addict, because that's essentially what they're saying, let's
Speaker 1: read between the lines. It would be negligent of us
Speaker 1: not to tell you exactly what the toxicology reports were, right,
Speaker 1: let's be scientifically factual about this. According to the certificate
Speaker 1: of analysis, there was a reading of zero point zero
Speaker 1: one milligram of amphetamine. In fact, less than zero point
Speaker 1: zero one milligram of methylamphetamine, which appears to be the
Speaker 1: lowest detection possible. Right, so just registered, no drugs were
Speaker 1: detected in her urine. Very very important, that very important.
Speaker 1: Ashley Campbell's reading was zero point zero two milligrams of
Speaker 1: methamphetamine and zero point zero one four miligrams of cannabis.
Speaker 1: So if you're surmising that less than zero point zero
Speaker 1: one milligrams of metlamphetamine affected the clarity of Courtney's thinking. Right,
Speaker 1: If you're saying that had an influence, then why wouldn't
Speaker 1: you extend that exact same opinion into Ashley Campbell given
Speaker 1: that his reading was twice as high. Right, Yeah, does
Speaker 1: that make sense to you or not?
Speaker 9: Yeah?
Speaker 1: Oh, absolutely, surely that's logic. And remember and remember Courtney
Speaker 1: has no cannabis in her system whatsoever, whereas Ashley is
Speaker 1: high as a kite on top of the metal amphetam. Now,
Speaker 1: if this went to inquest, you'd probably consult an expert
Speaker 1: to provide more context to these readings, right, and they'd
Speaker 1: be able to give you sort of more sort of
Speaker 1: physical and psycho analysis of cause and effect blah blah blah,
Speaker 1: according to the amounts. But here's Courtney's family, because they've
Speaker 1: got a bit to say about us.
Speaker 3: And she got into industry base work with her trainee ship,
Speaker 3: and she was going to Mackay for a two week
Speaker 3: shutdown at a mine the very next day where she
Speaker 3: was going to be drug tested. When they walked through
Speaker 3: the gate, she was definitely not taking drugs.
Speaker 7: She loved that job.
Speaker 3: That job was her out to get away from him,
Speaker 3: Like we were saying before about he had always wanted
Speaker 3: to move away, because after people get to know his lifestyle,
Speaker 3: he always wants to move. And they've moved four or
Speaker 3: five times backwards and boards, Sunshine Case, Go Case, Logan Area,
Speaker 3: back to Gladstone, and it was time for him to
Speaker 3: move on again, and she didn't want to move and
Speaker 3: she was using her trainee ship to say, well, I
Speaker 3: need to finish this, you go and then I'll come.
Speaker 7: That was her out.
Speaker 3: That was the thing that she was trying to do
Speaker 3: that she didn't want us involved in.
Speaker 7: She was pete heady.
Speaker 3: She wanted to do it herself.
Speaker 7: She didn't want our involvement.
Speaker 3: She had never told me that personally, because we had
Speaker 3: an estrange relationship from when I kicked him out of
Speaker 3: a house that they are renting off me back in
Speaker 3: twenty twenty one, when I first became aware of the
Speaker 3: actual physical abuse. Always knew he was controlling, but I
Speaker 3: was never aware of the physical abuse until that day.
Speaker 3: I was in the bank with my other daughter and
Speaker 3: she was getting phone calls and we had to leave
Speaker 3: that appointment to go and pick Courtney up.
Speaker 7: She'd run down the road and.
Speaker 3: She was hiding in a reef boat on someone's boat
Speaker 3: down the road. She was hiding from him, and we
Speaker 3: picked her up and brought her back.
Speaker 7: Here to our house.
Speaker 3: And that day was the day that she actually told
Speaker 3: us of years.
Speaker 1: Of stuff, and it was so in the interests of
Speaker 1: complete transparency. Courtney's stepmom, Christy acknowledges too that she smoked
Speaker 1: cannabis regularly when she was younger, but the reading doesn't
Speaker 1: justify painting her as an isotic.
Speaker 2: I've also done my own research on that, and that
Speaker 2: could easily be passive smoking as well, so I don't
Speaker 2: believe that that would have been her doing that to herself.
Speaker 2: Considering that Leanne and Courtney both decided to get I'm
Speaker 2: very old, I was going to say I shouldn't probably
Speaker 2: tell Leanne's story, she should tell that herself.
Speaker 9: I'm an alcoholic and Courtney was not liking my drinking
Speaker 9: and wanted me to stop. And I said, you smoke dope,
Speaker 9: don't tell me what to do, and she said, if
Speaker 9: I give up, you give up, So we gave up together.
Speaker 9: I'm three years sober and Courtney was sober and clean
Speaker 9: at the time of her death. She went into construction
Speaker 9: in which you are drug tested. We did this together,
Speaker 9: her and I. It was just another part of our relationship.
Speaker 9: So I'm well aware that Courtney was not under the
Speaker 9: influence of drugs in the past couple of years.
Speaker 6: And then Courtney decided to leave him.
Speaker 9: She was getting ready to go away. She called over
Speaker 9: on the Saturday before her death. It was over Easter.
Speaker 9: She picked up some things from her room that she
Speaker 9: was taking to Mackay. She said, Mom, I'll pop in
Speaker 9: and see you Monday before I go Tuesday, and that's
Speaker 9: what I was expecting. I was expecting to see her
Speaker 9: Monday afternoon. Two phone calls were made, one to her
Speaker 9: other sister, Cat saying I'm done, I'm done, I'm out.
Speaker 7: This is it?
Speaker 9: Another to her stepfather and he was mowing the lawns
Speaker 9: and he missed the call. By the time he rang back,
Speaker 9: there was no answer that he couldn't make contact with her.
Speaker 9: So they were fighting badly that day. The police know this.
Speaker 9: He admitted to fighting. We had the proof that they
Speaker 9: were fighting.
Speaker 6: Like Amy Leanne says, Courtney was in the process of
Speaker 6: leaving her violent partner.
Speaker 9: If Courtney wanted to go somewhere, she would have been
Speaker 9: going with her dogs to the beach. She wouldn't have
Speaker 9: been going alone in a car with him. Her car
Speaker 9: was packed with the remainder of her belongings. She was leaving,
Speaker 9: Why was he driving? Why was he in the car
Speaker 9: at all? The coroner ruled that it was Courtney's fault.
Speaker 9: None of the domestic violence was taken into account, none
Speaker 9: of it. Why do we just sweep it under the
Speaker 9: mat like they always do, easier to blame the victim.
Speaker 6: Courtney's dad, Don says they first met when Courtney was
Speaker 6: in year nine at Rockhampton Girl's Grammar. Ashley was seven
Speaker 6: years older than her and was.
Speaker 3: In a friend group with in my nephew's group like
Speaker 3: in primary early high school, but all sort of he
Speaker 3: hung around. We have found entries in HERGGSA She went
Speaker 3: to Rocky Girls Grammar in grade nine, so that would
Speaker 3: have been two thousand.
Speaker 7: Men two nine, I think it would have been, so.
Speaker 3: He would have been a twenty year old. She was
Speaker 3: a fourteen year old, and we have entries in her
Speaker 3: diary where he has attempted to come and act as
Speaker 3: a family member to take her out, and she was
Speaker 3: excited about it. So we believe he was grooming her
Speaker 3: from way back.
Speaker 9: Then it's been in and out of court four or
Speaker 9: five times. He has only just received sentence last week
Speaker 9: and it was three months, three months loss of license,
Speaker 9: an additional four months loss of license because since he's
Speaker 9: had this charge, he's gone for another DD.
Speaker 7: He also took a knife to court on one of
Speaker 7: his appearances and was arrested.
Speaker 9: Two thousand dollars in charges and a combined effort of only.
Speaker 7: Six months loss of license.
Speaker 9: We believe that Courtney deserves more than that, not only
Speaker 9: that he's had three offenses within eighteen months. Our understanding
Speaker 9: of the law is you do jail time for that
Speaker 9: sort of thing. So why is he getting away with this?
Speaker 6: The family says, since contacting the media, a death through
Speaker 6: you is now underway and tens of thousands of people
Speaker 6: have signed a petition.
Speaker 1: Good. Yeah, that's great support, isn't it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, So at the moment we do have a petition
Speaker 2: in place with nearly thirty thousand signatures thanks to Charrell's help,
Speaker 2: and we are petitioning for an inquest. We're also had
Speaker 2: meetings with a lot of people. We've got the Justice
Speaker 2: Clinic in Newcastle run by Peter Goerdy AND's Anthey Mullett
Speaker 2: that have jumped on board with us with their law
Speaker 2: students and we've had a couple of meetings with them
Speaker 2: that they are investigating and once we get more information
Speaker 2: we continue to send that to them. Also spoken to
Speaker 2: Brian Sullivan from the Domestic Family Violence Death Review Unit.
Speaker 2: He also runs Secure Training, he owns Secure Training, sorry
Speaker 2: he trains the QPS into recognizing the signs of domestic violence.
Speaker 2: We've had meetings with Shannon Pantamin as well, that is
Speaker 2: hopefully going to be helping us down the track with
Speaker 2: trying to get an inquest or if not an inquest,
Speaker 2: a proper actual investigation through the Homicide Squad with the
Speaker 2: Domestic Violence Lens so that it's properly investigated. We have
Speaker 2: towns for community lawyers as well that have jumped on
Speaker 2: board that there's two in Queensland that do directly deal
Speaker 2: with the coronial courts that is, and they are one
Speaker 2: of them and they're helping us through this process as well.
Speaker 2: So yeah, we have a few bits and pieces that
Speaker 2: are going on.
Speaker 9: There's also an internal review into the queen Land Police
Speaker 9: handling of Courtney's case, an internal review to see that
Speaker 9: it was handled correctly. We had a four and a
Speaker 9: half hour interview with the CIB and Rocky and they
Speaker 9: told us that they were gearing up to investigate further.
Speaker 9: But the coroner didn't ask for any sort of police statement,
Speaker 9: didn't ask for the body cam.
Speaker 7: The coroner basically shut us down.
Speaker 6: What charges did he get in relation to the incident?
Speaker 2: Just a drug driving charge, driving under the influence of drugs,
Speaker 2: But he.
Speaker 9: Was on his provisional license and the police didn't prosecute
Speaker 9: him properly, so there's another failing well.
Speaker 3: They originally charged him with driving under the influence on
Speaker 3: the first of April for the incident where Courtney passed away.
Speaker 3: They changed that charge to DUI under the influence of
Speaker 3: drugs and he had had his license back, so he
Speaker 3: had his PEA license. He had his license back eighteen days.
Speaker 3: They negated in the charge it Charlie found out in court.
Speaker 3: They negated to charge him as a provisional driver's license,
Speaker 3: which would have held a higher charge. He also got
Speaker 3: charge for the bringing the knife to court and then
Speaker 3: he also got done on the twenty eighth of February
Speaker 3: in Gladstone for another drug driving charge, this time just
Speaker 3: for cannabis. That was eleventh months into that provisional and
Speaker 3: he also got done for drug driving in that and
Speaker 3: they failed to add the provisional charge, which would have
Speaker 3: been a bigger charge.
Speaker 6: Has he denied it? Has he denied any physical coercion
Speaker 6: in the car or anything.
Speaker 2: So on the actual police statements, they asked him about
Speaker 2: the domestic violence and he refuses to speak to them
Speaker 2: about the domestic violence.
Speaker 5: So that was the end of that.
Speaker 6: So there's no actual denial, as Jessair refused to.
Speaker 9: They just released, didn't push, Nobody pushed, Nobody said you
Speaker 9: need to answer.
Speaker 7: They say, I've read.
Speaker 9: Him his rights, He's acted on his right to remain silent.
Speaker 7: There's nothing can be done.
Speaker 1: So, like Charelle said, when police failed to investigate properly
Speaker 1: in the first instance, it's basically up to the family
Speaker 1: to fight for justice for their loved ones, while obviously
Speaker 1: at the same time grieving their loss.
Speaker 7: Courtney was amazing.
Speaker 9: She was just a really beautiful kid that grew into
Speaker 9: a really nice adult. You know, she cared for animals.
Speaker 9: She volunteered at the local animal shelter. Her dogs were
Speaker 9: her world. You know, family was really important. She had
Speaker 9: just got a traineeship she'd been working in industry a
Speaker 9: couple of years and she's got a trainee ship in
Speaker 9: her dream job, so she was very happy. She was
Speaker 9: the most excited we had seen her in years. She
Speaker 9: finally got to where she wanted to be. She just
Speaker 9: bought a brand new car, not brain new, but brand
Speaker 9: new for her and naturally it was a ute so
Speaker 9: she could take her dogs to the beach.
Speaker 6: Leanne says Courtney was also tough.
Speaker 9: She was fiercely loyal, and she was quite outspoken. If
Speaker 9: she thought someone was getting a hard time, she would
Speaker 9: speak up. She would say so as she was genuine
Speaker 9: and caring. And we weren't aware how Courtney had touched
Speaker 9: so many people until her funeral, which was overwhelming. She
Speaker 9: touched everybody's life that she came into contact with in
Speaker 9: a really good way. I know every mother says that
Speaker 9: their child is the best, but she certainly turned out fine.
Speaker 9: So we were very proud of her, and we still
Speaker 9: are very proud of her.
Speaker 6: I realized that coroner's police emergency officers deal with so
Speaker 6: many tragedies liam and maybe some end up suffering from
Speaker 6: victim fatigue, but hearing from the family, it's a really
Speaker 6: important reminder that every life matters. That doesn't mean you
Speaker 6: have to get emotionally involved, but I think it's important
Speaker 6: for people in these really important positions to be self aware.
Speaker 6: It may seem like a lot of work to get
Speaker 6: to the bottom of every case, but you can't become
Speaker 6: blind to certain details which don't ring true. And maybe
Speaker 6: that's what happened here.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and when that happens, it becomes a much bigger
Speaker 1: drain on resources in the long term, doesn't it, because
Speaker 1: you've got to pour in so much extra to then
Speaker 1: get it right and fix the mistakes that you've missed.
Speaker 6: Yeah. Well, if you're in that position, then you've really
Speaker 6: got to take you know, if it's PTSD, like you
Speaker 6: need some therapy, some support, something, you know, you just, yeah,
Speaker 6: you need to take a break anyway. Meanwhile, I caught
Speaker 6: up with Courtney Anderson's former partner, Ashley Campbell, and we
Speaker 6: spoke for about half an hour, but he didn't want
Speaker 6: to go on the record. However, as we heard earlier
Speaker 6: from the police report, he told officers Courtney jumped out
Speaker 6: of the car without warning, regardless of anything. No, Liam,
Speaker 6: people jumping out of a speeding car is not a
Speaker 6: typical event, and it seems nonsensical that at the very
Speaker 6: least it hasn't gone to inquest. I've reached out to
Speaker 6: both the Attorney General Deb Recklington's office and Queensland Police
Speaker 6: Service on this, but they needed a bit more time
Speaker 6: to get back to me with a response.
Speaker 1: Well, I hope they get back with a positive response
Speaker 1: because I totally agree with you. It absolutely needs to
Speaker 1: go to inquest. That's that's the least they can do.
Speaker 1: It absolutely needs to go to w inquest, and if
Speaker 1: it doesn't, there's something wrong with the system. Al what
Speaker 1: was he like? I know this, He's obviously spoken to
Speaker 1: you off the record, so you can't you can't parlay that.
Speaker 1: But what was this guy? Was he consistent with jumping
Speaker 1: out of the car? Or was he all over the place?
Speaker 1: How did you find him?
Speaker 9: No?
Speaker 6: He was you know, he spoke. Yeah, he spoke normally
Speaker 6: in the sense like it wasn't like David Simmons who
Speaker 6: was just all real aggressive. He was a bit more amiable,
Speaker 6: like he wanted to I guess be l liked I
Speaker 6: suppose or believed. But yeah, bells are ringing, bells are ringing. Liam.
Speaker 1: He doesn't want to do an interview on the record.
Speaker 6: No, no, but remember he didn't want to say any
Speaker 6: more to police either. I mean he lawyered up within
Speaker 6: twenty four hours. He removed all all I mean this
Speaker 6: is just from the family. He removed all his belongings
Speaker 6: from the house, like he is in this for the
Speaker 6: long haul.
Speaker 1: All right, Well, let's wait for that response from the
Speaker 1: Attorney General Frecklington's office and also the Queensland Police Service.
Speaker 1: Look forward to that ol Also in the next episode,
Speaker 1: will the Triple C in Western Australia, the Corruption and
Speaker 1: Crime Commission, will they oversee the new investigation into Amy's case,
Speaker 1: and that WA police wait the evidence fairly in its
Speaker 1: report to the DPP. That's the big question.
Speaker 12: I'll hold my own counsel, I have my own communications
Speaker 12: with the Commissioner. But I think when there's an issue
Speaker 12: that is live, it's best that the police be allowed
Speaker 12: to get on and make their investigation. And if the
Speaker 12: Triple CC fit to make an inquiry or look at
Speaker 12: anything in particular, that's a matter for them.
Speaker 1: And what a trial can include that the inquest did not.
Speaker 8: The review concluded that there was insufficient evidence to establish
Speaker 8: the involvement of another person in missus Wendesley's death. When
Speaker 8: I read that, my first thought was, shouldn't that be
Speaker 8: the reverse? Is there insufficient evidence? Well, was it in
Speaker 8: fact suicide? My assumption is you assume foul play and
Speaker 8: work backwards. Keep your mind really open so you don't
Speaker 8: miss anything.
Speaker 1: Until next week. Thanks al.
Speaker 7: Listen your c.
Speaker 3: SO devers now.
Speaker 9: To me.
Speaker 1: If you knew Amy and have information, any information about
Speaker 1: her death, we'd love to hear from you. Just email
Speaker 1: us at The Truth about Amy at seven dot com
Speaker 1: dot au. That's s E V E N The Truth
Speaker 1: about Amy at seven dot com dot Au, or visit
Speaker 1: our website sevenews dot com dot au forward slash the
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Speaker 1: because it really helps new listeners to find us. Presenter
Speaker 1: and executive producer Alison Sandy, presenter and investigative journalist Liam Bartlett,
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