Snowtown

by Jeremy Pudney

  John also asked me for a key to the vault. We agreed that I would leave the key in the bank for John…[he] mentioned that he wouldn’t have to worry about a key as he had a friend who was a locksmith and he’d be able to work it out.

  Bunting agreed to rent the building for sixty dollars a week. He paid two weeks’ rent in advance, along with a cash bond. The rental agreement listed the names John Bunting and Mark Lawrence (Haydon’s former surname).

  On 8 February, Rosemary Michael called in at the bank building. Nothing appeared to have been moved in, although the vault door was now locked:

  A few days later John rang me and said that his locksmith mate had locked the vault and that he had stored all he had to in there.

  For the most part the new tenants paid their rent on time and hardly ever seemed to visit. The men attracted little attention; their comings and goings at odd hours only occasionally stirred the old lady next door.

  Once the lease for the old bank had been signed, the barrels were moved into the vault. Bunting, Wagner and Mark Haydon arrived at Kathy and Simon’s house after dark, a trailer attached to Haydon’s car.

  ‘We’ve come to move the happy roos,’ Bunting joked.

  Not long after that, Simon Jones, who repaired computers and electrical equipment, asked if he could use the bank’s foyer as a storage area. Bunting agreed, as Simon recounted to police:

  The first time that I had gone over to the bank with John and Robert after the barrels had been put in the vault, I saw Robert open the door. There was a strong smell coming from inside, which smelt like rotting meat, and I saw Robert go inside to check the drums. When Robert came out of the vault, he said to John that the roos weren’t happy and that they were very smelly. They both found that very funny.

  At some stage after this, I went into the bank to check the letterbox; it was on this occasion that I could smell the rotting meat coming from the vault. The next time John rang me or came to see me, I told him the smell was getting into the bank. The next time I went to check the mail, I opened the door of the vault and noticed that black plastic had been stuck in the doorway.

  The first James Vlassakis learned of the old bank at Snowtown was in April 1999. On Bunting’s orders he had gone there with Mark Haydon to fetch the rent book and then pay the rent at the local post office.

  When the pair went inside the bank the vault was locked, and they could see nothing untoward.

  Vlassakis’s next visit—about a week later—will be etched in his mind forever:

  It was John Bunting, Robert Wagner, myself and Mark Haydon. We all went up to the bank, but before we went up to the bank, we went to Robert’s place. I was told to take a change of clothes, Robert was told—by John Bunting—to take a change of clothes, same as Mark Haydon.

  The men loaded buckets, hoses and bags of pre-mix cement into Mark Haydon’s car, then set off. On the way, James Vlassakis worried he was being taken there to die:

  They knew I was shitting myself, absolutely shitting myself, because I thought I was going to be knocked that night for sure—to the point where I was shaking in the car and everything like that, and the conversations, I can’t specifically remember the conversations but they were about other—the other previous murders and stuff like that.

  We walked into the bank. I think John asked us about the smell—if it smelt really bad. I think that’s when John placed an air freshener in the bank and went into the vault. John manipulated the lock and then we entered the vault itself. John and Robert were lifting the lids off all the barrels and having a look in there. [There was] liquid in the barrels and they were worse than…before.

  John had a look—I think it was [Elizabeth Haydon’s] barrel—said something along the lines that he couldn’t believe how quick she was rotting—then just went along to all the others and eventually went into…Troy’s barrel and he said something about Troy. There was a lot of laughing by John and Robert.

  They opened up the two doors to the bank; the front main doors—dropped the tailgate of Mark’s [car] and unloaded the car—the concrete, buckets, hoses. I think there was a white shopping bag full of stuff and that was all thrown into the bank.

  John then said that he was going to cut the bodies up so they were smaller and then he was going to put concrete into the bottom of the barrels. He…wanted to put them in a boat and then take them out to sea and just dump them in the sea.

  After everything was unloaded, he went into the bank vault again. When the main doors were open the vault was closed, and then it was reopened again when those doors were closed and the place was locked up, so we were locked inside.

  He [Bunting]—and Robert Wagner—started cutting up Troy. They had two barrels opened. One was where Troy was and then there was another one open. They chopped off [Troy’s] legs and that. Robert cut off all the…muscles and that so it was down to the bone, and threw that into the other barrel.

  During the process…I walked out of the actual vault. I couldn’t handle that, and Mark was outside…having a cigarette. I had a cigarette myself. I was smoking like a train through nerves, fear, and Mark said something like he couldn’t handle it…he couldn’t stomach it. It was too gruesome.

  [I] stayed out of the vault for a while, and then entered the vault again, just to see how long John was going to be. He said…Troy’s balls…they were filthy. I can’t remember the exact words. He cut them off, or started cutting down there, and then just started stabbing with a knife.

  After mutilating Troy Youde’s body, Bunting and Wagner put the lids back on the open barrels and locked the vault. It was getting late; their work would have to be continued another time.

  The four men walked across the nearby rail line to Kathy and Simon Jones’s house. Vlassakis couldn’t wait to scrub himself clean:

  I went and had a shower at Simon and Kathy’s…my clothes reeked; my hair. I was only in the vault for—I don’t know how long but it wasn’t a long time—the stench just got into me.

  For their part, Kathy and Simon Jones didn’t think it odd that their friends had come for a shower. They assumed they’d been over at the bank, working on the ‘kangaroo’ carcasses.

  TWENTY-ONE

  The police investigation had begun in July 1997, as a routine review of a missing persons case: Clinton Trezise. Four months later Barry Lane, another missing person, had been linked to the inquiry. At first there was nothing to suggest foul play and certainly no evidence of murder.

  It was not until July 1998 that Robert Wagner was filmed by a hidden camera, stealing money from Barry Lane’s bank account. Even then it was proof of nothing more than theft, or perhaps fraud. The case was still considered a low priority.

  Surveillance, and the specially trained officers needed to follow the target, were particularly difficult to access. In the six months after being filmed by the security camera, Robert Wagner was physically tagged on less than half a dozen occasions. Keen for more resources to be devoted to his investigation, Detective Craig Patterson even sought the help of a Federal Police surveillance team.

  Telephone intercepts, too, were a problem. Patterson first made an intercept application in October 1998, but SA Police had only six intercept lines, and none was available.

  It was not until Elizabeth Haydon vanished that the inquiry significantly intensified. The disappearances of Suzanne Allen and Ray Davies were also linked to the case and a major police operation began. By January 1999 the telephone intercept lines were made available and the rate of physical surveillance increased—but it was still not daily.

  It is a tragedy that in the course of sixteen months, while police inquiries were under way, the killers were able to claim eight victims: Michael Gardiner, Barry Lane, Thomas Trevilyan, Gavin Porter, Troy Youde, Fred Brooks, Gary O’Dwyer and Elizabeth Haydon.

  However, even with the power of hindsight, it is difficult to see how these deaths could have been prevented. During this time, police had uncovered nothing to suggest that such horrific crimes were
occurring. Most of the victims—because of their isolation or the false impressions created by the killers—had not been reported missing.

  David Johnson’s murder, however, occurred during the intense phase of the police investigation.

  By this point, there was a reasonable suspicion of murder. John Bunting, Robert Wagner and Mark Haydon had been identified as suspects in the deaths of four missing persons—Clinton Trezise, Suzanne Allen, Barry Lane and Elizabeth Haydon. Their disappearances had been declared major crimes.

  Despite all this, the suspects were still not subject to daily surveillance. Between 25 February and 20 May 1999, the killers were watched on about twenty-five occasions—sometimes not even for the whole day.

  Sadly, one of the days when surveillance was not in place was Mother’s Day—9 May 1999. This was the day David Johnson was lured to Snowtown and killed.

  David Johnson was a twin, but from the age of fifteen his life took a tragically different path from that of his identical sibling, Michael. The pair was born in 1975 to parents Carlyne and Marcus Johnson. They had an older brother named Nigel.

  When the twins were three, Carlyne and Marcus divorced. By 1989 Carlyne had remarried and moved across the border to Victoria, taking her sons with her. Marcus had no contact with the boys.

  In his second year of high school, David Johnson began to drift off the rails. It was late 1990 when he declared his intention to return to Adelaide and live with his father.

  Marcus Johnson was stunned when his son and ex-wife turned up without warning, stopping him on the footpath near his work. It was the only way they’d known how to find him.

  Marcus had recently married his longtime partner Elizabeth Harvey and was at first reluctant to have his son live with him. He needed to seek his wife’s permission: she already had her four sons at home. Elizabeth agreed to take David in, but only if his mother handed over furniture and cash.

  Living with his father, Elizabeth Harvey and her sons was not a happy time for David Johnson. He fought with his new stepbrothers and disliked his stepmother, who would claim social security benefits for him but keep the cash for herself.

  David became even more uneasy when John Bunting arrived on the scene. During regular telephone calls, David would describe to his mother how the relationship between Marcus and Elizabeth had become ‘strange’. Carlyne later told police:

  Apparently on some nights, [Elizabeth’s] boyfriend [John Bunting] would come around and stay the night. Marcus would go around to another house they were renting and stay the night there.

  David spoke of Bunting and how he didn’t like being in the house while Bunting was there. Bunting was always threatening to belt David. David fought with [Elizabeth’s] kids and if he ever hit one of them she would complain to Bunting and Bunting would belt him.

  David’s new lifestyle was turbulent and his schoolwork suffered. During his late teens, he drifted between jobs—and homes. He lived with a girlfriend, and then moved back with his father, who had separated from Elizabeth Harvey.

  In 1994 David spent time back in Victoria, first staying with his mother, then with his twin brother Michael. But by the end of that year he was again in Adelaide, living with his dad. David’s stepbrothers Troy Youde and James Vlassakis were regular visitors, often staying for days at a time.

  For almost all the time he lived in Adelaide, David Johnson’s mother feared for her son’s safety. She was plagued by nightmares in which her boy was murdered—she visualised him being strangled:

  In December 1998 David came to Hamilton [Victoria] and told me how Troy [Youde] had disappeared. I asked David if he had been murdered and he said he didn’t think so. He thought that Troy had run away. David and I spent a lot of time discussing Troy’s disappearance.

  David told me that Jamie [James Vlassakis] had said to him that Bunting had murdered someone about ten years ago and had got away with it. I tried to get David to go to the police and tell them that he thought Troy had been murdered and Bunting had murdered someone ten years earlier, but David wouldn’t go. He said Jamie was on drugs and…no one would believe him.

  During her son’s Christmas visit in 1998, Carlyne’s nightmares returned. Again she feared David would be murdered. Two months later, she and husband Ron travelled to Adelaide in a bid to persuade David to come home with them:

  On February 28, 1999, Ron and I went to Adelaide to try and get David to come back with us…I spoke to David about my nightmares about him getting murdered. He would say that I had been watching too much TV. I asked him whether he had heard anything from Troy and…why not? He was starting to see my point…

  He told me Jamie had told him he had helped bury the body of a person that Bunting had killed. He didn’t say where, what sex, or any other details. David did not know whether to believe Jamie or not because he was always on drugs.

  David said that he made sure that he was always in a public place if Bunting was around. I said with all these things happening he should come back to Hamilton. He said that he was making arrangements to move in with Linda [his girlfriend].

  Two days later, David went on an outing with his mum and stepfather.

  David seemed reasonably happy that day. He had decided he would move away from his father and move in with Linda. We had our house on the market and when we sold it we would probably move back to Adelaide and he could live with us. He was looking for a job so that he would become financially independent. At 6.30 p.m. that day was the last time I saw him. I didn’t hear from him again.

  By May 1999 John Bunting and Robert Wagner believed the intense police pressure had subsided; that they had weathered the storm created by Elizabeth Haydon’s disappearance.

  In reality, undercover police operations were in full swing. Surveillance teams had been following the suspects—although not every day. Bunting and Wagner’s mobile telephone records had been scrutinised to see who they’d been calling. Warrants were then obtained, allowing the suspects’ homes and then mobile telephones to be tapped. By law investigators could not listen to the calls as they happened, but recordings were checked by designated ‘monitors’, who then passed on relevant recordings to detectives on the case. This usually occurred within twenty-four hours.

  John Bunting—along with Elizabeth Harvey and her sons—had left Murray Bridge and shifted back to Adelaide, renting a house in the northern suburbs. Unaware he was being so closely monitored, Bunting’s urge to kill had again surfaced. And he had chosen another victim: David Johnson.

  David was living in a flat with his father, Marcus Johnson, and James Vlassakis was a regular visitor. Bunting gave Vlassakis the task of luring David Johnson to his death.

  He [Bunting] turned around and said, ‘Can you go and get David for me?’ And I knew what he wanted straightaway, knew what he was talking about [by] the way he asked.

  Vlassakis told David Johnson about a computer being sold by a ‘mate’. It was a deal too good to miss, only $200. The drawback, Vlassakis explained, was that they’d have to drive to the country to see it.

  It was the evening of 9 May 1999 when James Vlassakis met with David Johnson to make the journey to Snowtown. On the way Vlassakis dropped his mother’s car at home, David following in his own vehicle.

  John Bunting and Robert Wagner were already at Snowtown, waiting for their prey to arrive. At 6.40 p.m., Wagner used his mobile phone to call Vlassakis; their conversation was intercepted by police:

  Wagner: Hello, where are you?

  Vlassakis: I’m just about at my mum’s house and then we are leaving. Just taking the car home.

  Wagner: Are you there?

  Vlassakis: Yeah, just taking the car home, then we are leaving.

  Wagner: Right, so you’ve got puss head with you?

  Vlassakis: Yeah, he’s just behind me. I’m going to get him to park around the corner from Mum’s.

  Wagner: Yeah.

  Vlassakis: Yeah. Where’s your car? Out of sight?

  Wagner: I parked it down ne
ar Kathy’s [the Snowtown house rented by Kathy and Simon Jones].

  Vlassakis: All right. So he won’t see it?

  Wagner: Yeah.

  Vlassakis: Yeah, okay, no dramas.

  Wagner: Puss head’s on his way, isn’t he?

  Vlassakis: Ay.

  Wagner: Hello, hello…

  Vlassakis: Yeah, it’ll be just me and him.

  Wagner: Ring me when you’re leaving.

  Vlassakis: I can’t. I tried to ring you before, and it says your phone is not a contactable service.

  Wagner: Yeah, I was inside the bank.

  Vlassakis: Oh, right, okay. Well um, well give us a ring in ten, fifteen minutes.

  Wagner: No, ring me.

  Vlassakis: Ring you, all right, okay, it’s easier. All right, I’m entering Mum’s street now so it won’t be that long, okay?

  Wagner: All right.

  Vlassakis: All right, I’ll see you after.

  Once Vlassakis had dropped off his mother’s car he joined David Johnson, telling him to drive north out of town.

  At 6.56 p.m., another call was intercepted. This time it was John Bunting talking to Vlassakis:

  Vlassakis: Hello.

  Bunting: Hello.

  Vlassakis: Hello.

  Bunting: This is the voice of happiness.

  Vlassakis: Ha, ha. Yeah, um, we are on the way up there.

  Bunting: Cool.

  Vlassakis: Okay, so it’s still all right for 200?

  Bunting: Yeah, we’ll meet you over there. We will leave the side door open for you.

  Vlassakis: Okay.

  Bunting: Just walk straight in, okay?