It's a shame I arrived too late to sign the petitions.
Jay Hart sounds like a total scumbag. Have there been any more children around where he lives missing or murdered? Did they collect forensic evidence that can now be tested for DNA?
It's a shame I arrived too late to sign the petitions.
Jay Hart sounds like a total scumbag. Have there been any more children around where he lives missing or murdered? Did they collect forensic evidence that can now be tested for DNA?
Fibro Fog has taken over. I am in a constant state of dyscognition so please excuse my retardation.
'The worst things in the world are justified by belief'- Raised by Wolves SOI
"Your life is short, it's the longest thing you'll ever do/ the worse the curse was that your dreams came true/
God is a mirror in which each man sees himself/ Hell is place where you don't need anyone's help"
~You got to cry with out weeping. Talk without speaking
Scream without raising your voice~
Yeah, the north coast of NSW has quite a few unexplained missing. Rose Rain Howell has a thread here. A lot of the older ones have been blamed on Ivan Milat, The Backpacker Killer, but the dates are wrong for some - he's been in Goulburn's Super Max prison since the early 90's.
The north coast is semi-tropical, it's little country towns mixed with hippie communes. Some of the strongest marijuana in the world is grown illegally up there. It's a mecca for young overseas tourists, "alternative life-stylers" & streetkids hitching between Melbourne, Sydney & Brisbane. Perfect hunting grounds. Hundreds of thousands of hectares of thick bush - there's bodies they know are in there that can't be found. & the kind of victims people might not ever notice are gone.
When I was a teenager I knocked around Sydney with punks & streetkids. There were always new faces travelling up from Melbourne or down from Brisbane. They'd hang round the squats at Woolloomoolloo for a few weeks or months, move on, turn up again & then one day you'd realise you hadn't seen someone for a while. You couldn't report them missing because you never could pin down when you saw them last. Half the time we only knew nicknames.
Who knows how many might really be missing up there, or down south near Milat's final hunting ground.
Are you saying Jay is in prison, or is it Ivan?
Is there a thread on the Beaumont Children? I thought I posted in it but cannot find on search.
Last edited by u2addict; 05-20-2014 at 07:43 PM. Reason: Beaumont Children
Fibro Fog has taken over. I am in a constant state of dyscognition so please excuse my retardation.
'The worst things in the world are justified by belief'- Raised by Wolves SOI
"Your life is short, it's the longest thing you'll ever do/ the worse the curse was that your dreams came true/
God is a mirror in which each man sees himself/ Hell is place where you don't need anyone's help"
~You got to cry with out weeping. Talk without speaking
Scream without raising your voice~
Ivan (Milat) has been in prison for the past 2 decades (keep forgetting we haven't got a thread) because the Dept Public Prosecutions made the decision to link his crimes at trial. He killed overseas backpackers so it was international headline news in the victim's home countries & embarassing to the government.
Jay Hart has spent the last 2 decades working with a charity group that deals with marginalised teens - because he came up clean when they ran a "working with kids" clearance on him, because he'd never been convicted - because the same DPP didn't see fit to run his trial in the same manner they ran Milat's. The jury in each case weren't allowed to know there were multiple victims/a history of behaviour. Had they known, it's likely he'd have spent the past 2 decades in company with Ivan.
Aha. Thankyou for reminding me to look for updates ...
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2014-05-1...onvict/5446076
An inquiry into the murders of three Aboriginal children has heard that an alleged serial killer is walking free in New South Wales because of a disagreement over the definition of one word in the state Crimes Act.
Evelyn Greenup, 4, and Colleen Walker and Clinton Speedy-Duroux, both 16, were murdered in Bowraville in the early 1990s.
The man police have identified as a prime suspect in all three killings was tried and acquitted over two of the murders, but the cases have never been heard together in one trial.
In 2006, changes were made to double jeopardy legislation in NSW opening the way for a retrial of any person acquitted of a life-sentence offence if "fresh and compelling evidence" was uncovered.
The victims' families believe they meet that criteria, as do lawyers and police.
The lawyers have asked two attorneys-general for a new trial and been rejected by both.
Giving evidence at today's hearing, UTS legal researcher Craig Longman said quibbling over the legal definition of the word "adduced" may have stopped a killer from being brought to justice.
"So after 23 years, two criminal trials, a coronial hearing, two DPPs looking at it, two attorneys-generals looking at it, this is not going anywhere because there is a view that adduced means 'admitted'," he said.
"On the other hand, there is a view that adduced means 'led', and it is essentially that distinction at the heart of disagreement about the A-Gs' opinions."
Earlier this month, Detective Inspector Gary Jubelin told the parliamentary inquiry being conducted by the NSW Government's Standing Committee On Law And Justice that he believed there was fresh and compelling new evidence that had not yet been tested in court.
.Bowraville killings likened to Ivan Milat case
He said that if the three cases were heard in the one trial, then along with the fresh evidence there was a reasonable chance of conviction.
"I don't believe the families, in my dealings with them, will feel that everything has been done, until all three matters are heard at court at the same time," he said.
He compared the case to that of Ivan Milat, the so-called backpacker murderer convicted of killing seven people whose bodies were found in the Belanglo State Forest.
"There is nothing different with the Ivan Milat backpacker case," he said.
"We're talking a serial killer here - [Milat's] trials had all the offences linked together.
"The Bowraville people have not had that luxury, their trials were separated.
"I can say, on good authority, if Ivan Milat's trials were separated, there is a strong likelihood that he would have been acquitted of all offences and perhaps [be] walking the streets."
Lawyers will use this hearing to ask the committee recommend the Crimes Appeal and Review Act be amended to clarify what's considered to be fresh evidence for the purpose of double jeopardy exception.
"The families obviously feel very, very unhappy and much like justice hasn't been done," said company solicitor, Alex Mason.
"I think one of the big issues is that it's difficult to explain to them why it is these matters haven't been heard together, and why it is that we are still facing problems, even though there is an exception to the double jeopardy principle in getting these matters heard together again."
The hearing continues
BBM:
Oy vey, well isn't that scary as hell. Innocent until proven guilty. I have to respect the courts decisions, but I can still have an opinion.
One of my fav. crime family movies is Animal Kingdom. Everytime it recycles on Sundance channel my DVR is ready. Chopper is played a good bit but not as often. I can do without the mutulation scenes. I was shocked when he died of natural causes, he could not be killed at the hand of others. lol
Fibro Fog has taken over. I am in a constant state of dyscognition so please excuse my retardation.
'The worst things in the world are justified by belief'- Raised by Wolves SOI
"Your life is short, it's the longest thing you'll ever do/ the worse the curse was that your dreams came true/
God is a mirror in which each man sees himself/ Hell is place where you don't need anyone's help"
~You got to cry with out weeping. Talk without speaking
Scream without raising your voice~
You should check out "Snowtown" if you haven't seen it.
Ooh! & you just gave my memory a bit of a kick. In the early 90's there was an ABC tv series based very loosely on Bowraville, Something "Heart" (I think). Stupid, I can remember the character who was murdered - Wilga Carmichael, but not the title. It was one of Kate Blanchett's earliest roles, she & Ernie Dingo played the leads & it had a bunch of well-known & not so well known Koori actors - including a bunch of guys we drank with down the local pub in Newtown.
I'll see if I can find it ...
... back soon
ETA got it
HeartLAND. Close
Last edited by blighted star; 05-29-2014 at 06:39 AM.
Blighted, thanks. I will look for Heartland on demand and youtube.
Fibro Fog has taken over. I am in a constant state of dyscognition so please excuse my retardation.
'The worst things in the world are justified by belief'- Raised by Wolves SOI
"Your life is short, it's the longest thing you'll ever do/ the worse the curse was that your dreams came true/
God is a mirror in which each man sees himself/ Hell is place where you don't need anyone's help"
~You got to cry with out weeping. Talk without speaking
Scream without raising your voice~
I missed the first screening of this last night. Will post a link if I find it on ytube etc
http://www.sbs.com.au/news/article/2...tice-continues
ETA derp. I'm an idiot. This is the trailer for the show in the article above.There is hope that the unsolved murders of 3 Aboriginal children killed more than 23 years ago in NSW may be solved if fresh evidence can be brought to light, a lawyer says. By By Andrea Booth 10 AUG 2014 - 4:51 PM* UPDATED*6*HOURS*AGO 0
An application by the Attorney General is required for a case to be heard in the Court of Criminal Appeal, however that application has not yet been made.
?He shouldn?t be making decisions. He should be sending it to the court,? said Professor Behrendt, a UTS professor of Indigenous research and director of documentary Innocence Betrayed that explores the case. ?If the judge turns around and says there?s not enough evidence, at least [the families] had a hearing in court.?
A NSW parliamentary inquiry report about whether or not to reorder a trial for the murder of the children in northern NSW in the early 1990s is expected to be handed down next month.
?There is some hope,? she said. ?My hope is that [the families] could finally have some champions in parliament to ensure this case gets into court.?
A white man was previously brought to trial for the killings of 16-year-olds Colleen Walker-Craig and Clinton Speedy-Duroux, and 4-year-old Evelyn Greenup within a five-month period between late 1990 and early 1991 on Bowraville Mission. He has not been convicted and consistently asserts his innocence.
?I want for [the families] what they want for themselves, which is to get justice for their children ? and they say the only way they can get that is to get the person who murdered their children behind bars.?
Behrendt asks for more awareness about the impact that the search for truth and justice has had on the families and the Bowraville community. ?One of the things I think that compounds the injustice in this case is the failure for any official recognition of what the families have been through,? she said.
Leonie Duroux, the sister-in-law of Clinton Speedy, said in a forum discussing the case on National Indigenous Television: ?It?s just devastating, it?s devastating that these children have been murdered and no one?s ever been held accountable for it, and it appears that no one really cares.?
Experts have been concerned that the legal system was not employing proper measures to ensure Aboriginal witnesses were correctly understood.
In May 2014, Doctor Diana Eades, who specialises in language in the legal process and intercultural communication at the University of New England, recommended that this case uses ?Mildren?s directions? ? assistance for jury to assess evidence given by Aboriginal witnesses to prevent cultural and linguistic differences leading to misunderstandings when interpreting evidence from Aboriginal witnesses.
Detective Inspector Gary Jubelin, head of the ANCUD Taskforce that began in 1997 to investigate the murders, agrees. ?Having worked on the matter for quite some time, I realised that the witnesses weren?t comfortable first of all in a courtroom environment and some of what [was said] was confused or misinterpreted,? he told the forum about witnesses giving evidence in a courtroom environment after the coroner's inquest in 2004.
The unsolved murders are affecting people around the country. ?For the life of me I can?t figure out how three kids on one street can be murdered and you can?t bring the perpetrator to justice,? said equal rights activist Ken Canning who has been following the case since it started.
Innocence Betrayed screens tonight (Sunday 10 August) on NITV at 7pm followed at 8pm with the Justice ?Just Us? Bowraville Special that takes an in-depth look at the case and is moderated by NITV News? Malarndirri McCarthy.
Last edited by blighted star; 08-10-2014 at 10:50 PM. Reason: being a moron. Note to self : don't post while adjudicating kid battles
I missed this when it screened. Will post a link if I find one, there's a short preview available at this article link in the meantine
https://newmatilda.com/2015/04/01/60...s-case-weekend
60 Minutes To Probe Bowraville Murders Case This Weekend
By Amy McQuire
Channel 9's flagship news program is profiling the Bowraville murders, an atrocity committed more than two decades ago, with no-one yet convicted.*Amy McQuire reports.
The only man ever accused – but never convicted - of the murders of three Aboriginal children on the NSW mid-north coast over two decades ago will appear on national television this weekend, as the families continue their campaign to get him before court.
Channel Nine’s 60 minutes program will air a “major investigation” into the Bowraville murders this Sunday, following on from a parliamentary inquiry report tabled in state Parliament last November.
During a six month period from late 1990 to early 1991, three Aboriginal children – Colleen Walker, 16, Evelyn Greenup, 4, and Clinton Speedy Duroux, 16 - went missing from the same stretch of road on Bowraville mission.
There has only ever been one person accused of the crimes – a non-Indigenous man who hung around the mission at the time. Thanks to a bungled police investigation, spurred by a racism that has even been acknowledged by detectives who headed a major review of the case, the man has never been convicted.
It will be the second time the accused killer – previously known as Jay Hart – has been interviewed on television. He has a new name and is living in Newcastle, a few hours drive from Bowraville.
Two years ago Channel Seven’s Today Tonight program confronted Hart in a Newcastle car park, the first time he had been interviewed on television. Hart denied any involvement in the crimes.
He claimed police had the evidence that cleared him to begin with, a theory police have denied. He also refused to comment when asked if he had any suspicions about who was behind the murders.
In a promo for 60 Minutes currently airing on television, Hart is again shown being confronted by a journalist on the street, and this time he’s asked if he’s a serial killer.*
Hart was acquitted of the murder of Clinton Speedy Duroux, but the jury was never allowed to hear key circumstantial evidence that linked all three murders – it was ruled inadmissible. The families have always maintained the best outcome would be if the three trials were linked, as was done in the case of Ivan Milat and the murders of seven backpackers.
After Hart was acquitted of Clinton’s murder, the families campaigned to have the double jeopardy laws overturned, winning an historic Australian (and possibly world) first. But their applications to send the case, with new “fresh and compelling evidence” back to the Court of Criminal Appeal have been knocked back by two Attorney Generals.
After former Attorney General Greg Smith rejected back the families’ application, citing a legal technicality, Greens MLA David Shoebridge called for a parliamentary inquiry, and was successful.
The result was an emotional day in the NSW Legislative Council last year, where all members across the political spectrum called for justice for the Bowraville families, and recommended the NSW Crimes Act be amended to remove the artificial legal barrier preventing the families from returning to the Court of Criminal Appeal.
More than four months on, in the midst of an election, there was no word from the Liberals or Labor about whether these recommendations would be acted upon.
In response, Shoebridge has produced a draft bill clarifying the definition of ‘adduced’, which has held up the application previously. Public submissions can still be made on the bill
Can't find the recent one from 60 Minutes but did find the one from NITV late last year. This might be the better one anyway
There's a comment thread at the link too
https://m.facebook.com/nswcrimestopp...098074/?type=3
Crime Stoppers NSW
UNSOLVED CASE - CHILDREN...
$250,000 reward is on offer for information leading to the arrest and conviction of the person or persons responsible for the deaths of children Colleen Walker (pictured above) Evelyn Greenup and Clinton Speedy-Duroux.
The deaths of three persons in their prime and the fact the killer has not been brought to justice had caused considerable distress to the Bowraville community where all three children lived.
The loss of three children within the space of five months was particularly devastating for this tight-knit community.
The lives of these three young people have been cut tragically short and their loss has left a tragic mark on their families and friends.
Sixteen-year-old Colleen Walker disappeared on 13 September, 1990 and her weighted down clothing was later found in the Nambucca River.
Although her body has never been found, she is presumed dead.
Four-year-old Evelyn Greenup is believed to have been murdered on 4 October, 1990.
Her remains were found in bushland in April 1991.
And sixteen-year-old Clinton Speedy-Duroux was murdered on 1 February, 1991.
His remains were located in bushland a few weeks later.
The three deaths were investigated by Strike Force ANCUD.
Rewards have not previously been offered in relation to the other children.
Detectives investigating the children's deaths have conducted extensive enquiries but have exhausted all leads.
It's hoped that this substantial reward, linking all three cases for the first time, will hopefully now persuade somebody who can help to contact police.
Police want to help the families of these three children put the tragic past behind them and rebuild their lives.
If you have any information that may help please report online at www.nsw.crimestoppers.com.au or call Crime Stoppers on 1800 333 000.
Callers can remain anonymous and information will be treated in the strictest confidence.
This really is embarrassing, there is no good reason the case was so mishandled, the police at the time didn't event try to hide their bias. Sadly they seem to have not changed their ways.
Here's that update they've been waiting on so long ...
https://newmatilda.com/2015/11/26/fa...layed-by-text/
26 Nov 2015
Families Of Murdered Aboriginal Children Have Meeting With Attorney-General Delayed via Text
By Amy McQuire on November 26, 2015 Aboriginal Affairs
The move, labelled ?disrespectful?, has upset the Bowraville families who have already waited a quarter of a century for justice. Amy McQuire reports.
The families of three Aboriginal children murdered on a small NSW mission more than two decades ago have again been left disappointed, after the NSW Attorney-General told them by text message that a long-awaited report which could clear the pathway to justice has been delayed yet again.
The families of Colleen Walker, Evelyn Greenup, and Clinton Speedy-Duroux ? who were aged 16, 4, and 16 respectively at the time they went missing ? have been waiting since May for a report by Justice James Wood that could clear a legal barrier preventing the man accused of killing the children to be put back on the stand.
Representatives of two of the families told New Matilda that it was another ?letdown? in a tragic saga that has stretched on for 25 years. The injustice has strangled the families of the Bowraville children who have been protesting for the past two decades for justice for their murdered children.
Colleen, Evelyn, and Clinton all disappeared within a six-month period between late 1990 to early 1991, on the same stretch of road on Bowraville mission.
There has only ever been one person accused of the crimes ? a non-Indigenous man who hung around the mission at the time. Thanks to a bungled police investigation, underpinned by a racism that has since been acknowledged by the NSW Police force, the man has never been convicted.
A second investigation, headed by high-profile homicide detective Gary Jubelin over a number of years, helped unravel the past mistakes.
The accused man was acquitted of both Clinton and Evelyn?s murders, but has never been charged over Colleen?s death. Her body has never been found, although some of her clothing and belongings were recovered from a nearby river.
In 2006 the families campaigned to have the state?s double jeopardy laws overturned ? a potential world first ? in order to get the man back on the stand using ?fresh and compelling? evidence tendered in one trial but ruled inadmissible in the other.
Despite the victory, that application was knocked back by two previous Attorneys-General over a legal argument around the use of the terms ?adduced? and ?admissible?, which has never been tested in NSW courts.
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Last November, after a series of protests from the families, the NSW Parliament delivered the long-awaited recommendations of an inquiry into the family response to the murders.
The inquiry went a lot further than was expected with many MLAs, including Liberal MP David Clarke, breaking down in tears in Parliament calling for justice for the families of Clinton, Evelyn and Colleen.
The report handed down two recommendations around double jeopardy laws specifically designed to clear the way for the families to take the accused back to court.
After waiting six months for a response from government, a key supporter of the families ? Greens MLA David Shoebridge ? introduced a private member?s bill to implement the recommendations.
NSW Attorney-General Gabrielle Upton.
It occurred in the same week NSW Attorney-General Gabrielle Upton announced the state government would accept all the recommendations of the parliamentary inquiry?s report, and announced a review into the double jeopardy principle to be headed Justice James Wood.
The deadline for the review was November, and Ms Upton?s office had a date to meet with members of the families on Friday to show them the report. For the families it signified hope ? a last shot at long-delayed justice.
But earlier this week the families were given news that there was another setback. A representative of Clinton?s family ? Leonie Duroux ? received a voicemail, and then a text, informing her that the meeting would be set back to a date around Christmas.
The explanation was that the report has to first go to cabinet.
But the families feel that this is just another letdown in a long, drawn-out process.
?To have it delivered the week before Christmas? it?s not good enough,? Ms Duroux told New Matilda.
?Christmas time is when Parliament wants to get rid of things? for us its not a good time. We would rather people just be up front.?
When Leonie informed Clinton?s father Thomas of the news, she said she could hear the disappointment down the phone.
?I know from our family?s point of view? when I told Thomas he just sort of went ?aww?? so for 25 years he?s been building himself up and being let down. Being let down again is not fair. I felt like crying when I was talking to him.?
Evelyn?s brother Lucas Craig Walker told New Matilda it was disappointing.
?We were meant to get a response by now and we?ve waited so long for this. It just feels like another letdown basically. It feels like they are going to keep us waiting and waiting. How long do we have to wait before we get a response,? he said.
?It feels like we?re taking another step backwards.?
Walker said it was also irresponsible to do it by text.
?We could have had a representative of the Attorney-General come along and explain to us what happened, instead of finding out via text message. Especially when it?s so important to us. In a text message, we can?t ask questions, we can?t get a better explanation.?
?It?s like it?s just another work day for them but to us it?s reality. It?s our life. We live with this every day.?
Greens MLA David Shoebridge was savage in a media released on Wednesday.
?After a quarter of a century of disrespect how on earth could the Attorney-General think that it is acceptable to cancel a crucial meeting with the families of three murdered children by text message from a staffer,? he asked.
?Justice Wood?s report is a crucial step in the families? quarter of a century struggle to receive justice for their children, and many had made plans to attend the meeting this week.?
He said the families should know the contents of the report before it went to cabinet.
?Over the past 12 months MPs from every political party have rallied around the families so it is almost incomprehensible to see the Attorney?s office being so disrespectful.
?The cabinet can only properly consider Justice Wood?s report if it has had direct input from those most impacted, namely the families of the children who were murdered and who are relying on a positive response from the government to obtain justice.?
I've avoided posting updates on this, there have been a LOT lately, but this one is so major it has to go in the thread.
https://www.greenleft.org.au/node/61838
(Cont'd >)Bowraville murders suspect to face retrial
Friday, May 27, 2016
By Raul Bassi
Protesters demand justice for the Bowraville murder victims, in Sydney in 2013.
The land between the Clarence and Nambucca Rivers on New South Wales' mid-north coast is Gumbaynggirr country. The Blood Rock massacre took place there in the 1880s, when police surrounded local Aboriginal people and shot them in the waters around Red Rock. A plaque reads: “Gumbaynggirr descendants, especially women, still avoid this headland. The significance of this place, and the rebirthing of our culture, will never been forgotten”.
In September 1990, Colleen Walker-Craig, a 16-year-old Aboriginal girl, was murdered. She disappeared in the town of Bowraville, in Gumbaynggirr country. Within five months of her disappearance, two other children were also taken. Evelyn Greenup was a 4-year-old Aboriginal girl and Clinton Speedy-Duroux was a 16-year-old Aboriginal boy.
In September it will be 26 years since Colleen's mother, Muriel Walker-Craig, last saw her daughter alive. Colleen was last seen walking down the side of the house where she was staying on September 13.
The inquest into Colleen's death was told that the main suspect, Jay Hart — a white man — was seen walking down the other side of the house at about the same time, towards where his mother's car was parked.
When Colleen's mother realised her daughter was missing, she searched the town looking for her, with no results. Then she went to the police, where they refused to make an official report. “Maybe she went 'walkabout',” was their response. She showed them a picture of Colleen and the police joked about her light skin colour: “Are you sure she's yours?”
They did not take her seriously at all, so there were no searches and no investigations. The only searches were organised by her family with no results. There was no official search for Colleen until, six months after she was reported missing, a fisher hooked her clothes. Even so, police just searched the river where her clothes were found; there was no investigation and they did not look anywhere else.
Second victim
Four-year-old Evelyn went missing on October 4, less than three weeks after her cousin Colleen disappeared. She went missing from a house three doors up from where Colleen was last seen. Her mother, Rebecca Stadhams, was drugged and woke in the morning with her clothing interfered with and Evelyn missing. After searching for her, she went to the police station. The reception she received was similar to Walker-Craig's and the results were the same.
When Stadhams told the police that two Aboriginal people had disappeared in three weeks, the response was a classic answer to an Aboriginal person asking for any missing, injured or dead people: “Well, what do you want me to do about it?” In this case, a witness described hearing a child crying inside the room late at night, followed by a sudden thud. Hart was seen walking out of Evelyn's room and leaving the house.
On February 1, Clinton Speedy-Duroux became the third person to go missing. He was last seen alive in Hart's caravan, where he spent the night with his girlfriend. When she woke up, her clothing had also been removed. She never saw Clinton again.
At this point the police were not doing much. On the basis of racial profiling, instead of looking for the victims and the possible culprits, they targeted the families, particularly those of Colleen and Evelyn, with the suspicion that Evelyn had been sold or that Colleen had gone “walkabout”. Police files reveal they put another Aboriginal community in far-west NSW, that was related to Evelyn and Colleen, under surveillance, and detectives asked at least one witness “about the rumours concerning the selling of Evelyn by the family”.
By this time, Clinton's skeletal remains had been found dumped beside a dirt road outside Bowraville. Evelyn's remains were recovered nearby in April 1991. Colleen's body was never found.
The families did not accept the lack of police response and in 1991 they rallied outside parliament, demanding answers. That action was the start of a relentless campaign for justice.
Twenty-five years later, on May 5, hundreds of people, with the three families at the front, marched to NSW parliament once more.
Role of the police
Documents presented in court have shown that police investigating the murders initially put the families under covert surveillance and pursued suspicions that some relatives might have “sold” four-year-old Evelyn. The families of Evelyn, Colleen and Clinton were unaware of this covert operation and were horrified to learn they had been under suspicion.
This shameful police action and the failure to quickly identify the missing children as potential murder victims may mean that vital evidence was lost. The investigations were lazy, late and totally unprofessional.
It can be said with absolute conviction that the police were mounting a case they thought would be resolved by the Department of Community when, in reality, they were dealing with a sexual predator and serial killer.
The police never appreciated that the main suspect was always around when a child disappeared. They finally talked to Hart when Clinton's body was found, but nothing happened. Forensics went to his caravan 10 days after Clinton disappeared. This was plenty of time to hide any proof of wrongdoing.
What makes the racist bigotry more appalling is that they never talked to the families. They were convinced that Aboriginal people are capable of doing these things.
Evelyn's aunt, Michelle Jarrett, said: “It makes me quite angry and disgusted. It's just wrong for the police to assume something like that. If I thought my family had done something to my niece, I would have told police. I would not have covered it up.”
Colleen's mother said: “I really think this is terrible. I'm lost for words, really, to think that [the police] would go to that much length when all of their expertise should have been from somewhere else.”
The police files reveal that detectives eventually began to focus their attention on Hart. He was tried and found not guilty of killing Clinton. Police later charged Hart over Evelyn's death, but he was again found not guilty.
The police began a new investigation in 1996, with the name Strike Force Ancud. Initially they did not accept that there were racist overtones to the original investigation.
But Detective Chief Inspector Gary Jubelin, who has spent 20 years reinvestigating the case, told the 2014 NSW parliamentary inquiry into the killings: “I have been investigating crimes for 20 years and I am still shocked by the lack of interest that has been shown in this matter. I do not say that lightly. We have a serial killer and three children were murdered.
“It has been heartbreaking to see the families' suffering. The only time they seem to get things happening is when they attract the media's attention or when they publicly protest. The families know the reason. The families told me the reason when I first met them in 1997. They said: 'It's because we're Aboriginal.'
“At the time I did not believe them. Unfortunately, the truth of the matter is, having worked with the families now for the past 18 years, I think they identified the problem. It is very unfortunate that [racist] issues have impacted in this investigation. It is very nice for society to say that all victims are treated equally. Unfortunately in this situation, I don't think that is entirely correct.
“The force is now finalising a submission calling for Mr Hart to face a retrial over the murders, arguing that evidence of his alleged links to all three has not been heard together in court.”
Why has the police force taken this path now? They know they made a big mistake with the first investigations; they know this is proof of the racism that pervades the force and they know they will lose all credibility if they do not do something now.
The families of the victims have campaigned for the evidence in all three cases to be heard in a retrial, but the state's double jeopardy laws have proved to be a stumbling block.
Police have now joined them in pushing the government for a retrial and are using every weapon in their arsenal. If you want to know who leaked information to The Australian you don't have to look too far.
Other parts of the justice system in NSW are not exempt from criticism. The original trial judge was unable to see the connection between the two cases. The police also failed to draw the connection in the brief given to the Director of Public Prosecutions and presented in the original trial.
Then-NSW coroner John Abernethy, on the other hand, wrote personally to the DPP in 2004 asking him to “look carefully at all three cases” involved in the Bowraville murders, though they had never been linked in court, because “there are great similarities in the death[s]”.
Earlier this year, police sent a lengthy brief of evidence for the three cases to be heard together in a submission to NSW Attorney-General Gabrielle Upton. The submission detailed links between the killings, including that all three were staying on the same road when they disappeared; all three were at parties on the night before their deaths; the bodies of Evelyn and Clinton, as well as Colleen's clothing, were found in the same remote location; there had been no attempt to conceal the bodies; and Clinton and Evelyn both suffered a penetrating injury to the skull.
Last edited by blighted star; 08-12-2016 at 05:14 PM.
Cont'd
The submission provides evidence of Hart's links to the three deaths, including that he knew all three children; he was the only person at the scene immediately before each child disappeared; his mother's red car was seen where each of the children was last seen alive; following each disappearance, he was allegedly untruthful in describing what took place; and after Hart was charged with murder, there were no further killings of this type in Bowraville.
“I believe we've identified the person responsible for the three murders,” Jubelin said. “To say the three murders aren't linked … I find it offensive. I can't even imagine how offensive it is to the families when they're told these matters might not necessarily be linked.”
Jubelin compared the case to that of Ivan Milat, who was tried for several killings together. Had that not happened, “[he] could still be walking the streets”.
In response, Attorney-General Upton asked the Court of Criminal Appeal to consider whether the murder suspect should be retried over the killings. Hart will now be charged with two of the murders, but it will be up to the Appeals Court to decide if there is adequate fresh evidence to warrant a retrial.
"After careful consideration,” Upton said, “I have decided that there should be no further delay in bringing this matter to court. The best and most transparent way to deal with this tragic case is to make an application for retrial to the NSW Court of Criminal Appeal.
"The court must be satisfied that the evidence is fresh, compelling and that a retrial is in the interests of justice. While there can be no certainty whatsoever about the outcome, this is the course of action that promises a sense of closure for all involved."
Jubelin told the ABC that the families were emotional and very excited about the matter being taken to court.
"They understand that this is just a step in their efforts to get justice, but it is a good feeling for the families. They have been seeking justice for a long, long time and they feel overwhelmed on this decision."
There can be no doubt that this step is due to the commitment and fighting spirit of the three families and their supporters. Their doggedness has forced the hand of the police and the attorney-general. They kept fighting for 25 years and never accepted defeat. They are an example for every fighter in this country.
Vindication finally, after 26 long years. But right now they're no closer to justice, or finding Colleen, than they were in the early 90's. They still need the NSW DPP to do their job properly & they need Jay Hart to grow a conscience & tell them where Colleen is. This is the 2nd case in the last few mths where the NSW DPP has had to be told to take cases involving Aboriginal murder victims to court.
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/nati...63d713142b2475
We should have done more, Scipione tells Bowraville families
Jay Hart, the Bowraville suspect, at the rear of his Windale home in Newcastle yesterday.
The Australian12:00AM August
DAN BOX
Crime reporterSydney
The NSW Police Commissioner has personally apologised to families of three murdered children for his force?s failure to properly investigate their deaths, still unsolved after 25 years.
During an emotional speech in Bowraville, northern NSW, Andrew Scipione used the words ?I am sorry? four times, saying ?We could have done more for your families when these crimes first occurred.
?We should have done more. I know this has added to your pain.?
Mr Scipione?s visit fulfilled his commitment in May, after a campaign by The Australian forced public attention back on the killings (** pfft no Rupert Murdoch, the tireless campaigns led by the family & indy media forced YOUR attention to focus properly on these murders for the first time)
The campaign led Attorney-General Gabrielle Upton to order a man suspected of the murders be sent back to court.
The children, 16-year-olds Colleen Walker and Clinton Speedy-Duroux and four-year-old Evelyn Greenup, disappeared from Bowraville during five months over 1990-91. All three were staying on the same street when they disappeared.
Local police initially told families their children might have gone ?walkabout? and treated each as a missing person rather than a possible murder victim, causing the loss of *potential evidence.
Local man Jay Hart was brought to trial for two of the murders, but found not guilty.
Despite a second police investigation, the state government *repeatedly refused to reconsider the case.
Dozens of the children?s families from across NSW and Queensland gathered yesterday outside the homes from where Colleen and Evelyn disappeared to meet Mr Scipione, who also laid a wreath at a memorial.
?I?m sorry that you had to endure that. No one should have to endure that. It?s important to understand that I?m looking you in the eye and saying that I am sorry,? Mr Scipione said.
?We could have dealt with this and we should have dealt with this differently from the beginning,? he told The Australian afterwards.
?If you didn?t get it right, what?s wrong with saying you didn?t get it right??
Evelyn?s aunt, Michelle Jarrett, wept as she listened to the commissioner?s speech. ?It?s a weight lifted off our shoulders and off our hearts because the police have *finally admitted they done wrong and we weren?t lying all this time, and we were treated badly.?
Clinton?s father, Thomas Duroux, who was among the family members who marched on the local police station demanding *action 25 years ago, said: ?It took a long time coming, but we finally got an apology.?
Colleen?s sister Paula Craig said: ?We just want to keep the momentum going, follow it through, so we can get this to court ... It?s not over.?
A legal team led by Wendy Abraham QC, who prosecuted the Snowtown serial killings in South Australia, will visit Bowraville to meet the families later this month.
Mr Hart continues to insist he had nothing to do with the children?s disappearances.
The case would be heard by the Court of Criminal Appeal, which has power to overturn previous acquittals and order a retrial.
The appeal hearing would be the first time evidence about all three deaths is heard by a criminal court at the same time.
PODCASTS: Bowraville murders
Commissioner Andrew Scipione leads Detective Chief Inspector Gary Jubelin and Inspector Guy Flaherty in laying wreaths to the children yesterday. Picture: John Feder
There are so many Aboriginal families RIGHT NOW having to fight the govt & police before they can even start the on the path to justice that other Australian victims of crime families take for granted. Australia assumes it's justice is freely available to all, but nothing could be further from the truth.
Lots of updates coming from the family campaign pgs at the moment too, they're letting themselves feel hopeful for the first time in decades
https://m.facebook.com/Justice-for-C..._t=notidecades age&_rdr
Pix from the rally in May that kicked all of this off.
I know I said this a few yrs ago, & I'm not taking anything away from these two women, they & their families deserved the level of support they got, but it still kills me to look at the size of the Bowraville rallies & every other rally for an Aboriginal victim, & compare them to the one for Jill Meagher, or even Allison Baden-Clay's. Australians insist it's not race that makes the difference, but what else can it be? Colleen & Evelyn were female victims too, both they & Clinton were so much younger than Jill & Allison & unlike them, they never had justice. There was never any great outcry or public demand that Jay Hart be punished.
Even now, 26 yrs later when the man is STILL working with kids, people won't join the families & protest, not even to protect other kids & women
Jill Meagher march
Thank you for posting about this and keeping it updated, I'm simply too emotionally invested to write anything helpful.
I hear us here in AUS always going on about the US and how they treat each other.. we are no better, just less guns, so seems less dramatic. These are the rightful land owners, the ones who took care of it, the ones who made it possible for everyone else here to exist - yet are less important than dirt. We only become recognised as humans in the late 80's - prior we were actually considered animals. The latest on the Juvi prisons should explain why the above went swept under the rug for so long - it's till very much an issue. Canada looks after their peoples 200% better, yet harp on about it 200% less, NZ also.
BLAH.
Yesssssss
#JusticeForBowraville
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-02-0...ildren/8254188
Bowraville murders: Man charged for second time over deaths of Aboriginal children
: The bodies of Evelyn Greenup and Clinton Speedy-Deroux were found in bushland near Bowraville. (Supplied)
A man who has previously been tried and acquitted of the murders of two Aboriginal children at Bowraville, on the NSW mid-north coast in the early 1990s, has once again been charged with their murder.
The man, who cannot be identified for legal reasons, appeared at Newcastle court on Thursday, over the deaths of four-year-old Evelyn Greenup and 16-year-old Clinton Speedy-Duroux.
Their bodies were found in bushland on the outskirts of the Bowraville Aboriginal Mission in northern NSW.
Whether the case proceeds any further will depend on an application to the NSW Court of Criminal Appeal by the Attorney-General, who is seeking to have the man re-tried.
Outside court, Clinton's father Thomas said the development was the best thing that had happened for a while.
"It's something we've wanted for a long time, it's really good to be here," he said.
"[We've] just got to keep fighting and keep going till we get there.
"I'm really glad it's come to this ? [it's] been a long battle but hopefully we'll get there."
Their deaths have been among the state's most high-profile unsolved crimes, and the subject of significant media attention for the past quarter of a century.
The man who was charged on Thursday has already been acquitted of these murders at two separate trials in the past 20 years.
He stood trial for Clinton's murder in 1994 and Evelyn's murder in 2006 but was cleared both times.
NSW Police have alleged Evelyn and Clinton, along with 16-year-old Colleen Walker, were murdered by the same person within the space of a few months.
PHOTO: Police have alleged Colleen Walker was murdered by the same person who killed Evelyn and Clinton. (AAP)
The three children disappeared within a five-month period from houses on the same street following parties at a section of Bowraville known as "the mission".
No-one has been charged over the suspected murder of Colleen, although a coroner has ruled she is dead.
The families of the three children have campaigned for 25 years to have all three cases heard together in a re-trial, but the state's double jeopardy laws have previously proved a stumbling block.
A major breakthrough came in May 2016, when NSW Attorney-General Gabrielle Upton made the decision to refer the application for a re-trial to the Court of Criminal Appeal, after NSW Police handed over a lengthy brief of evidence for the three cases to be heard together.
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-02-0...opardy/8254682
The case of the three young children murdered in the northern NSW town of Bowraville is long and complex. It is a story of political inertia, racism and fierce debate over the state's double jeopardy laws.
These laws have long been blamed as the reason why the three murders have never been heard together in a single trial.
But the legislative changes needed to re-try the key suspect were passed in NSW more than a decade ago.
Broadly, double jeopardy refers to laws that prevent someone being charged with the same crime twice. It is not unique to NSW — in fact, all Australian states have similar legal protections.
So why has it taken so long for this case to return to court?
First, some background
Bowraville first appeared on the national map in the early 1990s when three Aboriginal children disappeared in the space of five months from the town in the state's north.
Two of the bodies — Evelyn Greenup, 4, and Clinton Speedy-Deroux, 16, were found, separately, in bushland near the town.
The third child — 16-year-old Colleen Walker — has never been found and she was later ruled dead by a coroner.
A man stood trial for Clinton's murder in 1994 and Evelyn's murder in 2006 but was acquitted both times.
Before 2006, double jeopardy meant you could not be charged with the same crime twice.
There's a good reason the laws exist — to stop authorities repeatedly harassing people that have been proven innocent.
So if he didn't do it, what's the problem?
Well, it's not quite that simple.
Many believe the suspect was acquitted because the cases were heard separately and evidence possibly linking all three deaths was not considered by the court.
This fact kickstarted a long and emotional campaign by the victims' families to have all three cases tried together.
Remember — no one has ever been charged over Colleen Walker's disappearance.
The families and their supporters argued that if the cases had been heard together, the suspect would have been more likely to be convicted.
Is there any wiggle room?
There is now, because the double jeopardy laws changed in NSW in 2006 allowing a suspect to be re-tried if "fresh and compelling" evidence came to light.
That development meant a door that was previously shut in the Bowraville case was now open.
However, there was a setback. In 2007 the NSW Director of Public Prosecutions Nicholas Cowdery advised police they did not have enough evidence to support a Bowraville re-trial.
Two more blows came in 2010 and 2013, when Attorneys-General John Hatzistergos and Greg Smith rejected applications to re-try the suspect for the murders of Evelyn and Clinton, and to try him for Colleen Walker's murder for the first time.
Those decisions spurred the families and lead homicide detective Gary Jubelin into action and sparked years of campaigning and protests.
In May 2016, a new Atterney-General, Gabrielle Upton, took matters into her own hands and announced she would refer the entire Bowraville brief of evidence to the Court of Criminal Appeal.
What happens now?
That was the green light Detective Jubelin needed to start the process of re-charging the key suspect.
That man was formally charged with the murders of Evelyn and Clinton when he faced Newcastle Local Court on Thursday.
The case will then go to the Court of Criminal Appeal, which will rule on whether the original acquittals should be quashed and the new charges should be allowed to proceed.
If the court rules in favour of a re-trial, the suspect will be formally charged with the murder of Colleen Walker.
It is important to understand that the Court of Criminal Appeal may find there is not enough evidence to support a re-trial.
But after 25 years, the families of Evelyn, Clinton and Colleen will finally have their day in court.
This update isn't for Bowraville, but it's another Aboriginal family who've had to fight NSW Police for decades to have their child's murder investigated in northern NSW - they're finally starting to see some action too
https://www.buzzfeed.com/allanclarke...dyK#.osnK7rBgZ
Mark Haines
Don Craigie, the uncle of an Indigenous teenage boy who was found dead on railway tracks in regional New South Wales in 1988, has made a desperate plea to the public for information to help solve the mystery.
Allan Clarke / BuzzFeed
?After 28 years we are asking the government to post a reward, asking the police to fully investigate what happened to our boy, my nephew,? an emotional Craigie told BuzzFeed News in Tamworth.
Mark Haines was 17-years-old when he was found dead in January 1988 on railway tracks outside of the regional city of Tamworth in north-western New South Wales.
Haines had said goodbye to his girlfriend at around 3:30am, a train driver discovered his body on the tracks hours later.
Despite massive head trauma, there was only a spot of blood the size of a 50 cent piece at the scene and a stolen car was found nearby.
The death was ruled suspicious and two subsequent coronial inquests returned open findings, failing to identify what caused Haines? injuries.
In 2001, a witness came forward saying she had seen a group of men earlier that night around the stolen car.
This led police to reopen the investigation, but despite their appeals for information, no one has come forward.
The death remains a cold case and Haines? family has always maintained that he was murdered.
"I made a promise that until the day I die I would fight for justice for my nephew and find out what happened to our boy," Craigie says.
Allan Clarke / BuzzFeed
Craigie has fought tirelessly to solve the case ever since he had to identify Haines? body.
The Gomeroi elder has long lobbied the state government to post a reward for information and had made a promise to the teen?s now deceased parents to solve the mystery.
?I promised Mark?s parents before they died that I would find out what happened. So many things don?t add up,? he said.
?The stolen car was not fingerprinted and most evidence at the scene was actually collected by the family and handed to the police. The statements from those with Mark that night lack detail,? Craigie said.
?It?s sad but no one cared about a dead Aboriginal teenage boy in Tamworth in the late eighties?.
Craigie told BuzzFeed News that he?s worried he could die before solving the case, saying there is no one else to carry on his quest for justice.
?In an ideal world, we wouldn?t be waiting so long to know what happened to our boy?.
?After going through two coronial inquests and numerous police consultations about where they?re up too it looks like we?re at a standstill and I just want a resolution?.
?Someone has to know something, please for the sake of our family come forward and do the right thing,? Craigie says.
If you have any information on the death of Mark Haines please call Crimestoppers on 1800 333 000.
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-01-1...-death/8185470
Investigation into death of Aboriginal teenager Mark Haines in Tamworth to be reviewed
ABC New England By Tawar Razaghi
Updated 16 Jan 2017, 4:51pm
Members of the Haines family stand outside a building holding signs.
PHOTO: The Haines family say they need to know what happened to Mark Haines. (ABC News: Tawar Razaghi)
RELATED STORY: Mounting pressure for Aboriginal death to be solved 30 years on http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-10-2...ars-on/7973894
MAP: Tamworth 2340
A review of the investigation into the death of an Aboriginal teenager in Tamworth almost 30 years ago will be conducted by the State Crime Command's Homicide Squad.
The body of Mark Haines, 17, was found near railway tracks outside the town 29 years ago today.
More than a dozen family members of the teen today protested outside Tamworth police station, renewing their calls for the death to be investigated again.
Investigators from Strike Force Puno, which was set up to look into the death, met with family members today to provide them with an update on current lines of inquiry, and announced a full review of investigative records.
Local police investigated the circumstances surrounding the death, which has been subject to two coronial inquiries, both of which returned an open finding.
Any subsequent investigation will depend on the outcome of the review.
Mark's uncle Don Craigie said the family needed to know what had happened to Mark.
"[I] plead to the community and the public to come forward if you got any information. I still ask that today," Mr Craigie said.
"Please come forward and let us rest. We're tired. We need closure."
Greens MP leads lobbying efforts
A cash reward has been suggested as a way to bring forward new witnesses and fresh evidence in the 1988 case.
Greens MP David Shoebridge said Tamworth had been a tough town in the 1980s.
"There were rumours of organised crime, there was undoubtedly a substantial illegal drug business, and it would have been tough to come forward then," Mr Shoebridge said.
"Maybe a cash reward is needed to encourage people to give them that confidence to come forward to say what they know, because somebody knows."
Mr Shoebridge last year wrote to NSW Police commissioner Andrew Scipione, requesting the case be re-investigated by the State Crime Command's Homicide Squad, instead of local police.
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-11-2...in-nsw/9204668
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-02-0...opardy/8254682
A hearing into whether a man should be retried for the murders of two Aboriginal children in the early 1990s has heard he sexually "mauled" another girl, who later disappeared.
The man, who cannot be named for legal reasons, has long been seen by police as the prime suspect in the deaths of four-year-old Evelyn Greenup, Clinton Speedy-Duroux, 16, and Colleen Walker, 16, over a five-month period in 1990 and 1991.
Bowraville and double jeopardy
Everything you need to know about the case of three young children believed murdered in the bush and the complex laws surrounding it.
He was acquitted of the murder of Clinton at a trial in 1994 and the murder of Evelyn at a separate trial in 2006.
The families of the three children, who are all in court today, have long argued that the suspect was acquitted because evidence linking the deaths of Clinton and Evelyn was ruled as inadmissible in court.
No-one has been charged over the suspected murder of Colleen, who has not been seen since 1990.
The families have argued the suspect would be more likely to be convicted if the cases were heard together.
The historic decision to seek a retrial came in May 2016, when then attorney-general Gabrielle Upton announced she would refer the case to the Court of Criminal Appeal to decide whether there was enough fresh and compelling evidence to quash the man's acquittals.
Teen pressured to have sex, court told
Today, the Criminal Court of Appeal (CCA) in Sydney was told if the man was to be retried for the murders of Evelyn and Clinton, Colleen's death should be added so all three matters could be heard together.
Wendy Abraham QC, counsel for the Attorney-General, told the court Colleen had been at a party on the Aboriginal mission the night before she disappeared in September 1990.
Ms Abraham said Colleen had been drinking and "at various times throughout the night she was seen to be talking to [the man at the centre of today's hearing]".
"There is evidence that he was putting pressure on her to have sex with him," she said.
Ms Abraham said Colleen was due to catch a train at 3:00am the next day from Macksville with friends, but was last seen outside the party about midnight.
"When those who were travelling with her came to collect her they couldn't find her," Ms Abraham said.
The court was told that on an earlier occasion known as "the caravan incident", Colleen had gone to the man's caravan near the mission with a girlfriend and after a period of drinking together the two girls went to sleep in the man's bed.
When they woke up in the morning, the man was in the bed too and Colleen told her friend he had "mauled her throughout the night and she had to pull up her pants".
The four-day hearing in the Court of Criminal Appeal will determine whether the suspect's acquittals in the alleged murders of Clinton and Evelyn should be overturned, allowing the new charges to proceed.
The suspect, whose identity is protected by a clause in the Crimes (Appeals and Review) Act, will be represented by senior public defender Mark Ierace.
If the CCA rules in favour of a retrial, it is understood NSW homicide detectives will then charge the suspect with the alleged murder of Colleen.
After that, he would face a criminal trial on all three counts of alleged murder.
Of course, the CCA may rule there is not fresh and compelling evidence to warrant a retrial.
If that happens, the charges against the suspect will be dropped and he will remain free in the community.
It is not known when a decision on the case will be handed down.
Double jeopardy: What is it? And why is it so important with the Bowraville murders?
By police reporter Jessica Kidd
Updated about 7 hours ago
The case of the three young children murdered in the northern NSW town of Bowraville is long and complex. It is a story of political inertia, racism and fierce debate over the state's double jeopardy laws.
These laws have long been blamed as the reason why the three murders have never been heard together in a single trial.
But the legislative changes needed to re-try the key suspect were passed in NSW more than a decade ago.
Broadly, double jeopardy refers to laws that prevent someone being charged with the same crime twice. It is not unique to NSW ? in fact, all Australian states have similar legal protections.
So why has it taken so long for this case to return to court?
First, some background
Bowraville first appeared on the national map in the early 1990s when three Aboriginal children disappeared in the space of five months from the town in the state's north.
Two of the bodies ? Evelyn Greenup, 4, and Clinton Speedy-Deroux, 16, were found, separately, in bushland near the town.
The third child ? 16-year-old Colleen Walker ? has never been found and she was later ruled dead by a coroner.
A man stood trial for Clinton's murder in 1994 and Evelyn's murder in 2006 but was acquitted both times.
Before 2006, double jeopardy meant you could not be charged with the same crime twice.
There's a good reason the laws exist ? to stop authorities repeatedly harassing people that have been proven innocent.
So if he didn't do it, what's the problem?
Well, it's not quite that simple.
Many believe the suspect was acquitted because the cases were heard separately and evidence possibly linking all three deaths was not considered by the court.
This fact kickstarted a long and emotional campaign by the victims' families to have all three cases tried together.
Remember ? no one has ever been charged over Colleen Walker's disappearance.
The families and their supporters argued that if the cases had been heard together, the suspect would have been more likely to be convicted.
Is there any wiggle room?
There is now, because the double jeopardy laws changed in NSW in 2006 allowing a suspect to be re-tried if "fresh and compelling" evidence came to light.
That development meant a door that was previously shut in the Bowraville case was now open.
However, there was a setback. In 2007 the NSW Director of Public Prosecutions Nicholas Cowdery advised police they did not have enough evidence to support a Bowraville re-trial.
Two more blows came in 2010 and 2013, when Attorneys-General John Hatzistergos and Greg Smith rejected applications to re-try the suspect for the murders of Evelyn and Clinton, and to try him for Colleen Walker's murder for the first time.
Those decisions spurred the families and lead homicide detective Gary Jubelin into action and sparked years of campaigning and protests.
In May 2016, a new Atterney-General, Gabrielle Upton, took matters into her own hands and announced she would refer the entire Bowraville brief of evidence to the Court of Criminal Appeal.
What happens now?
That was the green light Detective Jubelin needed to start the process of re-charging the key suspect.
That man was formally charged with the murders of Evelyn and Clinton when he faced Newcastle Local Court in February.
The case will now go before the Court of Criminal Appeal, which will rule on whether the original acquittals should be quashed and the new charges should be allowed to proceed.
If the court rules in favour of a re-trial, the suspect will be formally charged with the murder of Colleen Walker.
It is important to understand that the Court of Criminal Appeal may find there is not enough evidence to support a re-trial.
But after 25 years, the families of Evelyn, Clinton and Colleen will finally have their day in court.
An update that isn't really an update, which has been pretty standard in this case unfortunately
https://www.theguardian.com/commenti...-jeopardy-laws
The families of the murdered Bowraville children have waited too long for justice
More than 25 years after the murders, being made to wait again is insufferable
by Amy McQuire and Karla McGrady
@amymcquire
Sat 7 Jul 2018 09.00 AEST Last modified on Sat 7 Jul 2018 09.51 AEST
The Bowraville families speak of their children ? Colleen Walker, Evelyn Greenup and Clinton Speedy Duroux ? as if they never left. It has been over a quarter of a century since the three Aboriginal children were murdered on Bowraville mission, on the mid-north coast of New South Wales, but it is like it occurred yesterday.
As Aboriginal psychologist Tracey Westerman said at a parliamentary inquiry: ?It was distressing that when we spoke to people we found that, although they were 14 years down the track in their grief, they were still speaking as if the murders had occurred the previous week or very recently.?
Bowraville murders: victims' families refuse to give up fight for justice
The memory of the children is still there, kept close to the hearts of grandmothers, grandfathers, mothers, fathers, aunties, uncles, cousins and even the children who were too young to remember. But the spaces between the memories of their short lives ? of Colleen?s ?strong character?, of Evelyn?s ?shy, sweet, gentle nature?, of Clinton?s ?warm, generous, spirit? ? are filled with the clouds of injustice, overpowered by the memory of a man whom the families want to get before court just one more time.
There has only been one man ever suspected of the three crimes ? a non-Indigenous man who was known to frequent the mission. He was acquitted of Clinton?s murder in 1993 and then of Evelyn?s murder in 2006.
No one has ever been charged over the death of Colleen, but the families have always maintained the trials should have been linked.
After the acquittals, the families campaigned for the overturning of the double jeopardy principle in NSW, which they achieved in 2006. A second police team ? headed by Det Insp Gary Jubelin and tasked with reversing the ineptitude of the original investigation, which was beset by apathy and chronic racism ? found fresh and compelling evidence.
For over a decade, the families have been trying to get the NSW attorney general to refer this evidence to the court of criminal appeal under the new statute. It took another long period of waiting, several knockbacks from two state attorney generals, a number of protests outside the NSW parliament and a parliamentary inquiry for the NSW attorney general at the time, Gabrielle Upton, to refer the case back to the appeals court, which would determine whether the man would be prosecuted.
The families learnt long ago to temper their expectations but there was always hope.
That hearing began in November 2017, and the families were told the decision would be handed down by March. But that deadline came and went, with the only response being that it would be delivered in ?the near future?.
A few months might not seem like a long time, but to the families, it is more salt on a wound that cannot heal. It has characterised this story. The long wait at every critical juncture in their fight was caused by the racism that deems Aboriginal children disposable, and it has only compounded the pain, because with every passing day, the prospect of justice seems even more distant. They waited for the police in the original investigation, they waited for the media, who only recently covered it extensively, and they are now waiting on the courts, yet again.
The families learned long ago to temper their expectations, but there was always hope. Now they are facing a tragedy that they have previously refused to accept ? that this could be the last chance.
Colleen?s brother, Lucas Craig, told the Guardian: ?It?s like, here we are again. Again the waiting. Before, the minimum we would have to wait is a year. But when you get promises that it will be delivered in February or March, you start to get really frustrated ... It?s been very upsetting.
?You try and keep your hopes up, but then another month passes by. I?ve seen it in my mum. It?s like she has come to terms with it. That nothing is going to be done.?
Colleen?s mother, Aunty Muriel Walker, was forced to wait months for police to take her statement when her daughter first went missing, and endured the weight of the thin blue line?s apathy ? they questioned her about whether Colleen was her daughter, and claimed she may have gone ?walkabout?. The family are still waiting for Colleen to be found.
The murders of three Aboriginal children continue to haunt the legal system 25 years after the fact
https://www.theguardian.com/commenti...-jeopardy-laws
Richard Ackland Read more
It has been painful to see how the family has suffered, how their children are growing up with the weight of this injustice on their tiny shoulders.
In addition, the long wait has meant that several witnesses have died. The Australian reported that two potential witnesses have died since the appeal court began its consideration. Since the murders, about 19 potential witnesses have died.
It is a tragic irony that the system that failed the Bowraville families is the system they must turn to for justice. But despite this, they continue to put their faith in it. Meanwhile, they hope to hear a decision soon, with the knowledge that there is not much time left to wait.
? Amy McQuire is a Darumbal and South Sea Islander journalist. Karla McGrady is a cousin of Clinton Speedy Deroux
Picture below : Clarice Greenup (centre), aunt of Evelyn Greenup, one of the victims of the Bowraville murders, is comforted by Raymond Robinson (left) and Marg Campbell in 2013 on a march to NSW Parliament House.
This is so fucked. Making them travel all the way to Sydney to be told "No" again, after almost thirty years of "No".
This also means the murderer of these 3 kids will continue to have no legal impediment to receiving "working with children" clearances, which means he's also free to continue working in fields that bring him into contact with his victims of choice - marginalised kids
https://www.sbs.com.au/news/bowravil...les-no-retrial
Bowraville murders: Families 'devastated? as court rules no retrial
Family and supporters of victims leave the Supreme Court in Sydney, Thursday, September 13, 2018. Source: AAP
A man acquitted of murdering two Aboriginal children in Bowraville in the 1990s will not be retried, a NSW court has ruled.
Relatives of three Aboriginal children who disappeared in Bowraville nearly 30 years ago say they are "devastated but not down" at the NSW government's failed bid to have a man tried for the three murders.
The 52-year-old man, who can't be named for legal reasons, was previously acquitted at separate trials of murdering two of the children - Evelyn Greenup, 4, and Clinton Speedy-Duroux, 16 - in late 1990 and early 1991.
The NSW government had argued that there was fresh and compelling evidence - relating to the disappearance of a third child, Colleen Walker, around the same time - to justify the overturning of the acquittals and the ordering of a retrial.
The Bowraville murders: Why the families are still waiting for justice
Under NSW double-jeopardy laws revised in 2006, a person can be tried for the same crime for which they have already been acquitted provided there's fresh and compelling evidence.
On Thursday, the NSW Court of Criminal Appeal dismissed the attorney general's application.
Outside court, Evelyn's aunty, Michelle Jarrett, said they were devastated but not down and "this is just another day".
"We have been kicked in the guts by the court system and the law but we are going to keep fighting," she said.
Chief Justice Tom Bathurst, and Justices Clifton Hoeben and Lucy McCallum found that all of the evidence relating to the murder of Colleen Walker was available to be tendered at the 2006 trial relating to Evelyn Greenup.
An undated supplied photograph showing 16-year-old Clinton Speedy, whose body was found in bushland within 4km of the Bowraville Aboriginal Mission in 1991.
An undated supplied photograph showing 16-year-old Clinton Speedy, whose body was found in bushland within 4km of the Bowraville Aboriginal Mission in 1991.
There was no other evidence which was both "fresh and compelling" in relation to her murder, they said.
The court then considered whether it could make an order for only one retrial relating to his 1994 acquittal for murdering Clinton Speedy.
But the judges said the attorney-general had conducted his case entirely on the basis that he would only succeed if the man faced a single trial for all three
murders.
On the sixth and final day of the hearing, this changed to a submission that an order could be made for one retrial.
But this was rejected by the judges who said it was not open for him to change the case which he had sought to make.
I thought I already posted about the documentary that was being made. It's finished now & premiered the week before last. NSW is in lockdown so the families didn't even get to attend, which really sux.
I was able to see an online screening of it for NSW & there'll probably be more if anyone's interested in seeing it
This is a fb pg for it
https://www.facebook.com/bowravilledocumentary/
& the trailer
Also, for anyone who followed the William Tyrrell case, Det Gary Jubelin makes several appearances in the doco. NSW Police had him charged & convicted for illegally recording a ph convo with a POI in William's case. But the Bowraville families & their community firmly believe - as do I - that this was just an excuse they used to end his career after he went off the official police script & publicly stated that the families were right all along - NSW Police failed to investigate the murders of their kids & allowed a killer to go free because of systemic racism
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