The Bogle & Chandler Mystery - Sydney, New Year's Day, 1963

[blighted star]

The deaths of Margaret Chandler & Gib Bogle remain unsolved despite countless theories, links to other deaths (like the Tamam Shud mystery which I'll post as well, the Tamum Shud case has been called the world's greatest unsolved mystery) & a new theory of death by hydrogen sulphide (rotten egg gas) that screened a few years back (though police claim they disproved this back in the 60's)


The following is an extract from this book

With its siren wailing, the police-issue Studebaker Lark pulled out across the Pacific Highway against a red light. Working the morning shift on New Year?s Day, Sergeant Arthur Andrews and Senior Constable Nicholls had drawn the short straw. It was just after 10 am and unlike their colleagues, who were likely still sleeping off their celebratory excesses, their job was to clean up the worst of what the dying hours of 1962 and twitching hours of 1963 could muster.

Their vehicle sped down Millwood Avenue, past lifeless brick bungalows, around a long sweeping bend, until the Lane Cove River came into view. Beside an old timber bridge, two grim-faced teenage boys waved the car around the corner to the entrance of the riverside track. The youths led the way. On the left, towering eucalypts clung to sandstone outcrops. To the right, she-oaks whistled in the gentle summer breeze and contorted mangroves crowded the muddy riverbed. Through the discord of vegetation, the River was dark and stagnant.

Like most Chatswood policemen, Andrews had routinely patrolled the secluded track looking for rubbish dumpers and voyeurs who stalked young lovers parked in their cars. This callout, however, sounded far more serious. Ninety yards (eighty two metres) along, on a grassy verge by the riverbank, lay a man in a dark-grey suit, on his stomach. Nicholls ushered the boys back as Andrews inspected the lifeless body. The man?s face, turned side-on, had a blue-purple hue and dry bloodstained mucus below his right nostril. A relatively fresh patch of vomit lay a few inches away. Andrews knelt and gingerly lifted the man?s wrist. The skin was decidedly cold to touch. There was no pulse.

Andrews walked around the body. There was something peculiar about the clothing. The suit was only draped over the man giving the impression he was dressed. Peeling off the coat, there was something even more curious - a rectangular portion of dirty-brown carpet lying on top of his shirt. Lifting off the trousers, the man was naked from the waist down, except for his socks and muddied shoes.

Andrews turned the body onto its side. It was semi-rigid. He looked for signs of injury, but there was nothing to suggest he had met with a violent death.

Nicholls radioed for assistance. Ten minutes later, three more policemen arrived, including Detective Sergeant Henry Parsons, who ran a team of over two-dozen detectives.

Andrews handed Parsons a wallet taken from the dead man?s coat pocket. Parsons returned to Chatswood Police Station to make enquiries, leaving instructions with his men to search the area for evidence.

If the state of the man?s clothing wasn?t puzzling enough, the riverside location was to deliver yet another surprise. Searching downstream, in the direction of the golf links, a constable came across an unusual array of flattened-out beer cartons on the muddy riverbed.

On closer inspection, he noticed a human leg protruding slightly from beneath the cardboard.

?There?s another one down here!? he yelled.

Andrews lifted the cartons, revealing the lifeless face of a pretty woman in her late 20?s, lying on her back. Her clothing was in disarray. Both her rose-patterned, white dress and half-slip were gathered up, exposing the lower half of her body. The shoulder straps of the dress were down at her waist, along with her bra. Her slip, knees and bare feet were stained with black mud. At her feet lay a pair of men?s jockey style underpants, wet and stained with excreta. It was an incongruous sight ? a pretty woman in a white party dress amongst all that mud and reeking of faeces.

Following a radio message, Parsons returned to the crime scene and slid down the grass-covered bank. He lifted the victim?s hand to check for a pulse. There was none.

?Still warm?, he half-whispered.

Again, there were no obvious external signs to suggest how the victim had died. There was also nothing to identify the woman - no handbag or purse. She wore a simple wedding ring, but there was no inscription.

Parsons pondered the crime scene: two bodies less than 20 yards (18 metres) apart, a male on the grassy bank, a female on the exposed riverbed, both half naked and strangely covered, but no signs of violence.

The Daily Mirror?s Bill Jenkins was the first reporter at the scene. He reported: ?The first thing that struck me as the photographer and I trekked down through the bush to the River was the overpowering stench of death. I could smell and see human excreta and vomit. The stifling morning heat seemed to magnify the putrid odour.?

While the previous evening had been cool, it was turning out to be a typical hot Sydney New Year?s Day. But the vagaries of the weather were not something that registered with the dozen detectives and uniformed policemen now traipsing the exposed riverbed for clues. They had what looked like a double murder on their hands and the tide was coming in.

At 2pm, the Government Medical Officer, Doctor Brighton, arrived and examined both bodies. Pronouncing life extinct, he couldn?t determine how either victim had died.

Four decades on, Scientific Detective George Lindsay recalled inspecting both victims? bodies: ?My main job was to search for bullet holes or knife marks or anything like that to determine if they?d been assaulted in some way. There were no marks of any distinction. I had no suspicions how they died. They were just two young bodies. We couldn?t work out the cause of death.?

So began one of the longest homicide and forensic investigations in New South Wales? history.

The lives of the victims and everyone associated with them would soon come under intense police scrutiny. The mystery surrounding the deaths would spark a fierce newspaper war, challenge conservative society, split families, ruin careers, cause mental breakdowns and suicides and drive some people out of the country for good.

Little did anyone realise that a witness to the deaths was still present in the vicinity - a witness whose own story was intimately entwined with the fate of the victims.

[blighted star]

Before the river, the two had attended a New Year's Eve party -


Ken and Ruth Nash


http://www.boglechandler.com/

On New Year's Eve, 1962, Ken and Ruth Nash hosted a New Year's Eve party at their home, at 12 Waratah Street, Chatswood. Their New Year's Eve party was a regular social fixture for them and their friends. Since moving to the house in 1956, they'd held several parties, sometimes with a gimmick to add entertainment to the evening -- for instance, one year partygoers wore fancy dress. The gimmick of the 1962-1963 party was of the "Nash Galleries". Each guest was invited to bring along a piece of "art", created by themselves. If nothing else, these creations could provide a talking point.


Gib Bogle's artwork for the "Nash Gallery" party.

The first of the 20 guests was Dr Gilbert Bogle, aged 38. His piece of "art" was a Picasso-like drawing, which he took with him when he left the party, intending to show it to his children. A former Rhodes Scholar, Dr Bogle was acknowledged as a brilliant scientist, and worked at the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO). He arrived just after 9pm.

once before, at the CSIRO staff barbeque 2 ten days previously. She had hit it off with Bogle, and Geoffrey Chandler said later that the idea of having an affair with him quite appealed to her. Her husband said he told her: "If you want to have Gib as a lover, if it would make you happy, you do it."

The Chandlers, by Mr Chandler's later account, had ideas about marriage that were considered quite unusual in 1962. So long as their marriage was a happy one, there was no reason why each should not have partners outside the relationship. Geoffrey Chandler had had affairs and considered Margaret free to do the same.



The Chandler's as they appeared at the party

At around 11:30pm, Geoffrey Chandler slipped out on the pretext of buying cigarettes. However, whereas his arrival had been well noted, nobody seemed to realise he'd left.

At midnight, those at the party (19 people at that time) linked hands and sang Auld Lang Syne. Ken Nash noted shortly after midnight that Mr Chandler was no longer at the party. Ruth Nash looked for Mr Chandler, and, not finding him, looked for Mrs Chandler. Then Ken Nash, standing in the kitchen, saw Mrs Chandler and Gib Bogle standing outside, a small distance apart, staring at one another. "Partly in jest, from a point of puckish humour, I switched off the light which spilt onto the lawn." The pair immediately returned indoors.

Ken Nash announced that he was no longer acting as bartender. He and Jack Johnson left to drive to Forestville, where they picked up Nanna Day-Hakker. James Day-Hakker would come later to the party.

Meanwhile, with conversation having been interrupted by the change of year, somebody put on the record In A Little Spanish Town.

Bogle, who has been described as the ideal party guest, began to dance a mock-flamenco to the music, making up in enthusiasm what he lacked in technique. The other guests gathered around and applauded. He then started dancing the twist.

Ken Nash and Jack Johnson arrived back at the party, with Nanna Day-Hakker, at around 12:30am. The movements of the next few hours have only been sketchily recorded, but the impression is that they were like those of any normal party.

Mr Chandler returned to the Chatswood party at around 2:30am. Leicester and Frances Cotton, two of the guests, were leaving, the first to do so, at about this time. Mrs Nash handed them a chicken leg each to chew on on the way home, as supper was yet to be served. The Cottons finally left between 2:30am and 2:45am. Those brief few minutes between Chandler arriving and the Cottons leaving would see the party at its most populated, with 21 of the 22 partygoers present. James Day-Hakker was still working as a pianist in a Kings Cross nightclub, due to arrive at the party after 3am. At no time during the evening were all 22 people present.

Ruth Nash returned to the house from seeing off the Cottons, and noticed Geoffrey Chandler for the first time since he'd left earlier in the evening. Supper was not yet served, but was, as Mr Chandler put it, "on the move." Supper was served at 3am. This, and the departure of the Cottons, enabled the time of Mr Chandler's return to the party to be established as 2:30am. Mr Chandler himself was confused about the time, being out by an hour. His confusion was might have been understandable. The timing of certain events at the party, on which much may have later depended, was often confused.

James Day-Hakker finally arrived after 3am, and coffee was served at 3:30am. Both Dr Bogle and Mrs Chandler had coffee. Mrs Chandler mentioned to her husband that Bogle had offered to take her home. Mr Chandler let it be known that he had no objection, and so it was agreed that Margaret Chandler would go with Dr Bogle.

At 3:45am, the Nashes saw Mr and Mrs O'Donnell off. Returning inside, Ken Nash noticed Dr Bogle and Mrs Chandler sitting together. Mr Chandler was not there. This matches with Chandler's evidence that he left a little before 4am.

Mr John Martin, a milk vendor, entered Waratah Street at 4:15am. Mr Chandler's car was no longer there. At 4:20am, Dr Bogle asked Mr Nash for his drawing, then immediately left. He was alone. About 5 minutes later Margaret Beavis left. The Nashes stood on the verandah to see her off. Moments after Ms Beavis left, Mrs Chandler, who was standing at the bottom of the steps, did the same. She looked at the Nashes, then turned slowly, and walked down the garden path and out the gate, and then took 10 or 12 paces to theleft.

After the departure of Mrs Chandler, it was more than an hour before anybody else left the party. At around 7:00am, Dr Bogle's wife rang the Nashes to ask where her husband was. Ruth Nash replied that he had left a little while before. The Johnsons, the last remaining guests, left at about 7:10am. The Nashes then went to bed. The party was over.

[blighted star]

From http://www.boglechandler.com/bcInvestigation.html

The Investigation

With the obvious fact that Dr Bogle and Mrs Chandler had been poisoned, the inevitable question was asked: What form did the poisoning take? There were four possibilities:

double suicide, by Mrs Chandler and Dr Bogle murder and suicide, by either person accidental poisoning double murder, by a person or persons unknown

Of these possibilities, the first two were discounted immediately. Neither Dr Bogle nor Mrs Chandler was the type of person to commit suicide. So the couple were either accidentally poisoned in some way, or they were murdered. Either way, they were poisoned, and the police investigation became a search for the poison. This search was mostly conducted in three areas: the bodies of Bogle and Chandler and the immediate vicinity therein; Bogle's car; and 12 Waratah Street Chatswood, scene of the party.

Having been removed from the crime scene, the bodies of Bogle and Chandler were placed in refrigeration overnight. 24 hours after the discovery of the bodies, Dr John Laing, Director of the NSW Division of Forensic Medicine, with 2 other doctors, conducted post mortem examinations of the bodies. At 10:30am he examined Dr Bogle's body, and later did the same with Mrs Chandler. He later denied at the inquest that the placing of the bodies in refrigeration overnight would have hampered the investigation in any way. Examination of the bodies showed that neither Dr Bogle nor Mrs Chandler had had intercourse in the final hours of their lives.

Above: Police search Bogle's car.


Right: A detective shows where the car key was found. Images supplied by David Bartho

The initial examination ruled out death by violence. A careful search of the bodies found no hypodermic marks (though of course this could never be conclusive), and the few haemorrhages seen on the lungs or in air passages were not consistent with asphyxia. All abrasions were checked, there were no signs of snakebites, and tests showed no evidence of funnel-web venom.

The eardrums were intact, there was no evidence of radioactivity either in the bodies or at Fuller's Bridge, and examination of the tissues revealled no alcohol, sedatives or monoxides that would not be expected.

The N.S.W. Government Analyst, Mr Ernest Stanley Ogg also gave evidence before the inquest on Tuesday, 21 May 1963. From Alan Dower's Deadline p223:

[Ogg] ..examined specimens of the couples' brains, hearts, livers, spleens, kidneys and blood. He used ultra-violet and infra-red rays and radiation monitors to seek ionising influences. Hair was tested for traces of the indestructable arsenic. The use of fluorides was suspected but no impulses came from tests made repeatedly with the stomachs of rabbists and guinea pigs, cats' hearts and the organs of chickens only a few days old.

Mr Ogg also examined tissues for traces of strychnine, aconite, atrophine, carbolic acid and phenyl, cocaine, henbane (or mountain hemp), mercury, nicotine, opium, phosphorus, santonine, poisoned mushrooms and almonds, the venom of Queensland's cone fish, and durata seeds, the food poison of the thugs of western India.

Mr Ogg also tested scrapings from the nails and muscles of Bogle and Chandler.

Roland Thorp, Professor of Pharmacology at Sydney University, offered the resources of his department to the investigation. On the 15th January 1963, he received a portion of Dr Bogle's stomach contents. Tests were negative. On the 18th he received a portion of the stomach contents of Mrs Chandler. Tests were negative.

Every test for poisons continued to yield this same result. In anticipation of more sophisticated testing methods, tissue samples were taken from the bodies of Bogle and Chandler, and preserved. In 1998 it was announced that tests had discovered traces of LSD. However the test suffered problems with cross reactivities and more sensitive tests ruled out LSD as the poison.

Dr Cameron Cramp (Senior Medical Officer with the NSW Health Department) tested the clothing of Bogle and Chandler. Under Section 42 of the Coronor's Act, the publication of this evidence was forbidden. It has since been revealed that tests detected a semen stain on Bogle's coat.

The carpet which covered part of Dr Bogle's body beneath the jacket was officially identified after 17 days as coming from the boot of his car. Graham Richard Digby, a mechanic who had serviced Dr Bogle's car, provided the identification.



Above: Bogle's car parked at Chatswood Police Station.



Note the carpet still in the boot.


Below: The piece of carpet that was found covering Bogle's body.



On the 12 January, four police divers spent three hours searching in the river at the death

Images supplied by David Bartho

scene. They were not looking for anything specific, rather in the hope that something might turn up. It might be pointed out that at 5am on the 1 January, about which time Bogle was believed to have died, the dawn coincided with the low tide. Whether this fact was relevant to the case is not known.

Finally, Mr McAlpine, an expert from the Australian Museum, found no trace of poisonous insects or spiders in the area.

Bogle's car, a green Ford Prefect, registration CLZ-497, was parked on the other side of Millwood Avenue from the track. The ignition key was where Bogle usually left it, tucked behind the sun visor. Under the driver's seat was a case containing Bogle's clarinet. On the back seat was Bogle's drawing.

Oddly, the carpet from the boot did not appear to be missing. A photograph taken after the car was driven to Chatswood Police Station clearly shows a piece of carpet in the boot, which is not the same one that was found covering Bogle's body. This anomaly has not been explained, though it may shed light on why it took police 17 days to identify the carpet on Bogle's body.

Detective-Sergeant Parsons and Constable Turner visited the Nashes just before noon on New Year's Day. At the time of this visit they refused to tell the Nashes what they were investigating, but admitted that it was serious. The Nashes would not learn of the fate of Dr Bogle and Mrs Chandler until later.

Ken and Ruth Nash had not cleaned up the remnants of the party before going to bed, and all the plates, bottles, knives, forks and other items had not been washed. They were seized by police, and tested for poisons, including food poisoning. Once again, the tests were negative. No evidence has been found to connect the poisoning of Bogle and Chandler to the party.

Sergeant Lindsay visited the Chandler house in Croydon, taking numerous bottles of alcoholic beverages, plus some pest exterminators, for analysis. He also took a suitcase which contained Mrs Chandler's handbag. Mrs Chandler didn't take the handbag to the party, because it didn't go with her dress.

Pam Logan's room in Darlington was searched the next day, and later, so was the Bogle house. Items were sent for analysis, but the results were again negative. At the Nash house, the Bogle house, the Chandler house, and Pam Logan's room, not a single clue was found.

[blighted star]

http://www.boglechandler.com/bcSpeculation.html

Speculation

After the initial investigations into the deaths of Dr Bogle and Mrs Chandler had failed to identify the poison that had killed them, the four possible explanations for their deaths were examined. On the grounds that neither of them had any reason to commit such an act, suicide by either party was ruled out. This left what remain as the most popular theories, death by accidental poisoning, or murder by a

Accidental Poisoning

The proponents of the argument that Bogle and Chandler died from accidental poisoning come up with three versions. One is that Bogle and Chandler deliberately took some drug in order to spice up their sexual activities (it should be remembered that neither engaged in intercourse on the morning that they died). The second is that someone, in order to play a practical joke, administered the poison without realising or intending that it would kill them. The third is that something in their environment accidentally killed them.

Bill Jenkings was a crime reporter for the Daily Mirror, and was said to have the best police contacts in Sydney. Detective-Sergeant Jack Bateman was regarded as one of the best detectives of his generation. Both were convinced that dog-worming tablets killed Bogle and Chandler.

Currently the favourite for being the poison that killed Bogle and Chandler, hydrogen sulfide was first considered in 1971, when it was dismissed by investigating police. A documentary broadcast on ABC television on 7 September 2006 firmly reestablished it as being a possible cause of death.

One of the favourites for being the poison that killed Bogle and Chandler, LSD was first suspected soon after they died, and by the 1980s was the favoured candidate. Tests in 1996 showed traces of LSD in the bodies of Bogle and Chandler, but a further test then failed to find any trace of the drug.

The Director of Forensic Medicine for the Hong Kong Police was convinced that yohimbine was the poison. It is recognised as an aphrodisiac.

From nerve gas to shellfish toxin, there were some unusual suggestions as to what might have been the fatal poison.

Murder

Many people believe that Bogle and Chandler were murdered. It would, on the face of it, seem much more likely that a poison would go undetected if the poison was intended to go undetected. Indeed, this line of argument makes the nature of the poison irrelevant, as it is only the identity of the poisoner that matters. Generally, in support of the murder theory, it is supposed that Bogle was the intended victim and that Chandler was simply in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Mr Chandler was suspected of the accidental killing of his wife and Dr Bogle. Many people also suspected him of double murder.


The Chandlers
Margaret Fowler was the famous "mystery woman", who was called to the Bogle-Chandler inquest but never gave evidence. She had had an affair with Bogle, and was obsessed with him. Some of the police who investigated the case were convinced that she was involved.

Margaret Fowler


There has been some speculation that Bogle was assassinated by secret agents, intent on stopping his research and his impending move to the USA. Alternatively, it has been suggested that he was permanently silenced after enquiring too deeply into circumstances surrounding the death of Dr Clifford Dalton. Supporters of the espionage theory point out that the FBI refuses to release 18 pages of their report on Dr Bogle, citing national security grounds.

More recently, in 2006, Geoffrey Chandler admitted to filmmaker Peter Butt that at the time of the case he was both a member of the Communist Party and one of ASIO's people inside the CSIRO

(** added by me -which means he was either reporting on Communist activities to ASIO or ASIO activities to the Communist Party - or both)

Peculiarities

Evidence was presented at the Bogle-Chandler inquest about the exact positions of the cardboard cartons covering Mrs Chandler's body, and the suit covering Dr Bogle. They had not been photographed nor their positions recorded in any formal way, before being disturbed. While this was perhaps inexcusable in the case of Dr Bogle, the officers had no way of knowing that Mrs Chandler was dead. Had she been alive -- and her body was still warm -- then to have stopped to photograph the positions of the cardboard cartons would have been wasting valuable time.

What was not properly explained was why Mrs Chandler was so covered. Three pieces of mouldy cardboard, from a beer carton, covered her except for her leg. There were no other pieces of cardboard in the immediate vicinity, raising the question of how exactly the right amount to all but cover her happened to be close at hand.

The police officers who gave evidence at the inquest tended to the belief that Mrs Chandler had covered herself while ill and in a delusional state of mind. They would not agree that only a contortionist could have arranged pieces of cardboard over herself in the manner that they were found covering Mrs Chandler, but did agree it would be exceedingly difficult.

Mr Chandler, in his book So you think I did it, pointed out that the contact of mouldy cardboard on bare skin would be repulsive for a woman. He also questioned why, if his wife had covered herself, she had also covered her own face. To cover herself with cardboard --as opposed to adjusting her dress -- could conceivably be explained by a deranged state of mind, but even this would fall short of covering her own face. On the other hand, another person would find it quite reasonable to cover her like this. Likewise, Dr Bogle. It would be physically impossible for him to cover himself in the way he was found. These factors suggested that a third person had covered them both.

But then there was the evidence of Dr Bogle's car. It was parked on the other side of Millwood Avenue, 150 metres away, the key behind the sun visor where Bogle normally left it. There were certainly no signs of a third person being present.

The location of the bodies itself, was speculated upon. Had Bogle and Chandler been taken ill on the journey to the Chandler home in Croydon, the logical thing to do would be to keep going. Suppose, however, that they decided to stop at Fuller's Bridge, to be ill. The dirt track would hardly be the place to head for. Besides, if taken ill, surely they would have left the car in a hurry. However, the interior of the car, including the careful placement of the key, suggests that everything was normal when the car stopped. So why stop? Against this, of course, Bogle, even if ill, could have left the key behind the visor out of sheer force of habit.

People have also suggested that it makes no sense that Bogle and Chandler would have stopped at Fuller's Bridge for a romantic liaison. This suggestion may be mistaken. It is true that, according to Mr Chandler, he had made it clear to Bogle that he would not be home. It is also true that the rubbish-strewn dirt track that they were found on was one of the least appealing places in the area, and that in another direction was a park and a much more pleasant, equally private, stretch of riverbank. However, the area was known locally as a lovers' lane, and Dr Bogle and Mrs Chandler were not the first couple to been in the area that morning. While Mr Chandler may have been right in saying that it was not the sort of place that his wife would have wanted to go, he cannot know if the same was true of Bogle.

The piece of carpet found on Dr Bogle's body was baffling. Seventeen days into the investigation it was identified as having come from the boot of Bogle's car. Two uses were proposed for it. It could have been used by the couple to sit on. Equally, Mrs Chandler might have used it to cover Dr Bogle. She was a trained nurse, and might have used the carpet in order to try to keep him warm.

But the first use was unlikely, as it was too small, at 91.5cm by 68.6cm, to sit on comfortably. Surely, too, they would have chosen a better place to sit. The second use is also unlikely, for Mrs Chandler was poisoned in the same manner as Dr Bogle, and for her to have gone to the car, fetched the carpet, and returned, sounds strange. On the other side of the bridge were houses, and other cars were parked off Lady Game Drive. To have fetched a piece of carpet rather than get help defies rationality.

This has remained the continuing problem of the Bogle-Chandler case. For every theory which has a number of clues pointing to it, there are other pieces of evidence to reject it. The eventual verdict at the inquest reflected this. The Coroner, Mr Loomes, returned the official finding that the deceased had died from "acute circulatory failure. But as to the circumstances under which such circulatory failure was brought about, the evidence does not permit me to say."

In simple English, Dr Gilbert Bogle and Mrs Margaret Chandler had died because their hearts had stopped beating, and they had stopped breathing. There was no verdict about death by Person or Persons Unknown. They were certainly dead, but why? The answer may never be known.

[blighted star]

In 2006 a movie aired with a theory so detailed that the NSW Coroner requested a report & it was then discussed on Catalyst, the Australian Broadcasting Corporation's science program -

http://www.abc.net.au/catalyst/stories/s1795448.htm

The case of Dr Bogle and Mrs Chandler is being assessed by the NSW State Coroner, due to sensational new evidence uncovered by documentary film maker Peter Butt.

In the film, Who Killed Dr. Bogle and Mrs Chandler, which screened recently on the ABC and watched by almost 2 million Australians, Peter Butt claimed to have solved the 43 year old mystery surrounding the deaths of scientist Dr Gilbert Bogle and his lover Mrs Margaret Chandler.

The film included startling new evidence that suggested the pair had not been murdered but rather died from breathing in a large amount of Hydrogen Sulphide.

But could Hydrogen Sulphide really have killed them? And, could such a tragedy happen on the banks of the Lane Cove River today?

Tonight, Catalyst presents new eye-witness accounts as both environmental and forensic scientists put a film maker’s claims under the microscope.

Narration: The tranquil waters of the Lane Cove River have a history of abuse, neglect and horrendous pollution.

For forty years this mistreated river has been holding a secret, one that could solve one of Australia’s most baffling murder mysteries.

Peter Butt: What really surprised me was that no one had gone down that track.

Narration: On New Year’s Day 1963, Dr Bogle and Mrs Chandler were found dead in a renowned lover’s lane than ran beside the Lane Cove River.

Dr Bogle lay partially undressed on the river bank, while Mrs Chandler was found 15 metres away on the river bed, naked from the waist up.

There were no signs of physical violence, and no cause of death was ever established.

The case remains officially unsolved, captivating curious locals like documentary maker Peter Butt.

Peter Butt: I’d been collecting information for over 20 years on the case. I grew up near the Lane Cove river. So it was always part of the background of growing up in Sydney. And anyone who was around in the 1960’s could not have missed the Bogle-Chandler case. I suppose I was attracted to it like everybody else.

Narration: Unlike everybody else, Peter had a suspicion about how Dr Bogle and Mrs Chandler died and his recent film made startling claims surrounding the deaths.

Peter Butt: What struck me was that they died near a mangrove. My schoolboy science came into play, where I’d learnt in school that mangroves give off gases. One of those gases was hydrogen sulfide.

Narration: Peter’s research told him mangroves don’t give off enough gas to be lethal, but in a dusty corner of the Lane Cove library, Peter stumbled upon one of the river’s long lost secrets: another more lethal supply of hydrogen sulfide in the river.

Peter Butt: Here it was, and it wasn’t only in excess, it was in dangerous quantities.

Narration: He found a report published just 15 years before Bogle and Chandler’s death that pointed to a starch factory on the river dumping half a tonne of sulfurous waste and organic matter in the river every week.

Peter Butt: Further up the river towards the weir that had been built in the late 1930’s, that’s where it was most concentrated. The tide pushed the waste up the river, hit the weir and stopped. And where Dr Bogle and Mrs Chandler died was right in that spot.

Narration: Bacteria in estuaries like the Lane Cove River use naturally occurring sulphate in the sea water to break down organic material in the river, like leaves and twigs, giving off the foul smell of rotten eggs – hydrogen sulfide. This small amount of gas isn’t a problem. But add huge amounts of sulfurous compounds and organic waste from the nearby factory, and from sewerage overflows and you’ve got a giant, potentially toxic cocktail. But is it enough to kill two people? Hydrogen sulfide expert Professor Michael Moore and I are going to the site of Bogle and Chandler’s death to take a look.

Maryke Steffens: So this is the spot down here they think Bogle and Chandler originally were. They found bits and pieces of clothing down here, which indicated that they were probably lying down here. Now they think that hydrogen sulfide probably pooled in this area. Now why wouldn’t the hydrogen sulfide have just dissipated up into the air? Professor Michael Moore: Well, it wouldn’t because it’s more dense than air. Hydrogen sulfide gas would just sit right down there low down.

Maryke Steffens: Wouldn’t it have been pretty smelly?

Professor Michael Moore: Hydrogen sulfide has a very well-defined affect on the nervous system. It would paralyse the olfactory nerve, and so if you get a sudden big increase in concentrations, you would have paralysis of the nerve and you wouldn’t smell it anymore.

Maryke Steffens: So they never would have known?

Professor Michael Moore: They probably wouldn’t have known.

Professor Michael Moore: The lungs would be affected; the nerves controlling the muscles in your legs and arms, controlling the diaphragm, your capacity to breathe would also be affected. They might not have died immediately but they would pass out and be in situ and be there until eventually they would die.

Narration: Hydrogen sulfide enters the body, attacks the nervous system, and goes without a trace, making it almost undetectable… except for one subtle calling card: occasionally hydrogen sulfide binds to haemoglobin in the blood.

Professor Michael Moore: Because you change the chemistry of the haemoglobin you also have the capacity to change the way in which it absorbs light and therefore the colour that it shows.

Narration: In cases of poisoning, the blood can turn greenish-blue or purple, and when Peter interviewed the original toxicologist on the case, he recalled seeing this strange discolouration.

For Peter, this all but confirmed his theory and was a key piece of evidence in his documentary.

But not everyone is convinced.

Dr Jo DuFlou is the head forensic pathologist at Glebe Mortuary in Sydney. He’s only ever seen one case of hydrogen sulphide poisoning and he and Peter disagree on the odds of enough hydrogen sulphide being released to kill someone.

Dr Jo DuFlou: My impression is that in the 1960’s you were practically lining up and buying tickets to come here at night. You know so you’ve got a very common scenario on the one hand and a vanishingly uncommon event on the other hand.

Peter Butt: At the time no scientists came down here and measured hydrogen sulphide.

Peter Butt : But what we do have from previous years is the testimony of residents who live close to the river, within about you know thirty, forty metres. They were complaining of nausea, vomiting and breathlessness. Now that to me says we have a real, quite a high level of hydrogen sulphide.

Narration: Whether Peter’s evidence is conclusive is yet to be determined. But the question remains, could the river strike today?

Maryke Steffens: Mmmm, nice smell!

Narration: River scientist Stuart Simpson is testing the level of contamination in the river right where Bogle and Chandler died. Dr Stuart Simpson: So now we’re making a measurement of how reduced sediment is, and whether the conditions are conducive to H2S formation.

Maryke Steffens: What have we got?

Dr Stuart Simpson: What have we got? We’re heading towards that sort of zone.

Maryke Steffens: So hydrogen sulfide could be forming in this mud then?

Dr Stuart Simpson: That’s right.

Narration: Stuart will take the mud to his lab for further testing, but the samples taken today won’t tell us much about the river forty years ago, nor whether huge volumes of hydrogen sulfide seeped from the river on that fateful day.

Nevertheless, since Peter’s documentary went to air, several people there on the day
have come forward.

One man described being at the river that morning.

Lindsay Mitchell: I noticed the river was heavily polluted. It wasn’t flowing, it was stagnant and there were dead fish floating belly up. And as I got closer I noticed it stunk.

Narration: Later that same day a family stopped to watch the police activity along the lovers lane when their dog ran off down the river bank.

Derek Foster: I whistled the dog and he came up the river bank and when he got in the car we could not stand the smell it was like 50,000 rotten eggs.

Narration: In spite of this evidence, there’s still no smoking gun.

Dr Jo DuFlou: It leaves no trace in the body, especially if specimens have been looked at for a week or so, there’s nothing left over in the tissues.

Peter Butt : Yes it’s a shame but I guess when you look at the way forensics works I’m sure there has been a lot of cases where circumstantial evidence has actually delivered a conclusion.

Narration: At the CSIRO lab, Stuart’s analysis of the river sediment comes up positive: bacteria ARE producing hydrogen sulphide in the Lane Cove River… but not enough to be alarming.

Dr Stuart Simpson: I think overall it’s a very healthy system. You expect to see hydrogen sulfide building up naturally in these sediments due to these bacterial processes, and they’re not at unusually high levels.

Narration: Today there’s little, if any, evidence lingering in the river that could prove Peter’s theory. Due to the fleeting nature of hydrogen sulphide, we’ll never know for sure. In the end, it’s up to the coroner to decide.

Peter Butt: My report is now with coroner. Of the thousands of theories that are on police files, this is the first one with scientific and historical evidence to back it up. So I’ll wait like everybody else. I just hope that for family’s sake that we can put an end to it

NSW Department of Forensic MedicineThe National Research Centre for Environmental Toxicology The University of Queensland

[blighted star]

There's also this from the Australian National University's "Australian Dictionary Of Biography"& I believe it's theories like this that have lead some to link this case with the Tamum Shud Mystery of 1948 -
(& I had to delete it to fit things in, but earlier I mentioned reading as a teenager in the 80's, a detailed theory of CSIRO/U.S Military experiments with LSD that led to an overdose when it was used as an aphrodisiac, that theory is mentioned below)
http://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/bogl...t-stanley-9534

A jealous Fowler, for three years Bogle's lover, was a suspect against whom no evidence could be produced. She in turn apparently related the deaths in some way to chemical-warfare research. Both Fowler and Geoffrey Chandler later gave credence to never-substantiated allegations by Catherine Dalton, widow of G. C. J. Dalton, that her friend Bogle was assassinated when he was about to disclose Australian Atomic Energy Commission security leaks and American espionage improprieties in Australia. After Peter Wright (a former officer of Britain's M.I.5) claimed that an alleged Soviet spy Sir Roger Hollis had recommended Bogle to the Australian Security Intelligence Organization, Chandler speculated that Bogle had been 'eliminated' as a Soviet agent.

Although discarded in the mid-1960s—along with theories of poisonous gas, dry ice, weed-killer, aphrodisiac and shellfish toxin—the favoured explanation by the late 1980s was death by an accidental overdose (self-administered or unwitting) of lysergic acid diethylamide (L.S.D.); the hallucinogen (supposed to have been produced clandestinely in a C.S.I.R.O. laboratory) would have been untraceable at the time. Bogle's burial in Northern Suburbs cemetery on 13 March 1963, Chandler's cremation two days later and the failure to preserve tissue samples from either body left their deaths a tantalizing enigma.

Will post Tamum Shud as soon as I deal with the tween sleepover in my garden...back soon...

Done, & wtf, it's gotten even weirder since I last read it. I really didn't think that was at all possible ...

http://mydeathspace.com/vb/showthrea...62#post3512562