Into the Darkness

by Robin Bowles

  Lorne told Natalie he wasn’t going to let it lie. If Homicide had thrown in the towel, he’d investigate the case himself, but he’d need her help. Was she up for it? Natalie agreed. She had no idea what a long haul it would be.

  CHAPTER 7

  MEMORIALS

  The days were going by in a blur for all those caught up in Phoebe’s death and the conflicts that followed. People do strange things when they’re grieving, and the dividing line between grief and anger is often a narrow one.

  On 10 December, Natalie replied to Ant’s email, heading her message ‘I hope you read this’. ‘This is a sensitive time for all of us,’ she wrote. She apologised for being ‘guarded’ with him. ‘What I really want more than anything is to put my arms around you and feel yours around me,’ she wrote, ‘because we both love that girl.’ She explained that her greatest difficulty was that she couldn’t accept that Phoebe would have deliberately ended her own life by putting herself into a rubbish chute, in spite of her depression. Natalie went on:

  I have lived and shared dark times with her for ten years now. Life was a struggle for her often and I supported her in every way I could, just as I know you did …

  There are questions I have that will never be answered. I cannot know what went on for her from Tuesday evening until the time she died in that awful way …

  Part of what has gone wrong for us as a family in relationship to you is that we have the frustration of being unable to talk with you alone. I felt that I couldn’t access you in the personal, gentle way I wanted to … We all came over to see you, only to discover that you were not able to see us. I am not particularly good in social situations at the best of times despite how I may appear, and to make that step with everything we were feeling was very hard.

  Len, myself and the boys have had to stand up and face the ugliness of all this. No-one has protected us from this nightmare. We all viewed her on that table. As hard as that was, we had to do that to try to make it real. I am finding it so hard to erase the impression that has left on me. It was not my daughter lying there, and yet it was.

  On top of all this pain, we have been denied access to information about the circumstances leading to her death right from the beginning of this hell. You were unavailable to talk with, yet you were deemed senior next of kin. Can you imagine for a second how that has felt for us as parents? I am her mother, Len is her father, Tom and Nik are her brothers, I gave birth to her, we have loved her all her life and now she is gone.

  When you finally agreed to speak with me on Monday afternoon, I still couldn’t see you alone even though I had specially requested that … It was very hard to speak about all those things that afternoon, I was desperately trying to contain huge feelings of sadness amongst people I hardly knew. During that meeting, Felicity was very clear to point out that because you were Phoebe’s Power of Attorney, we as a family had no decision-making rights over her cremation. I was reminded twice that our needs would be considered but that you ultimately had the final decision …

  As far as I am aware there has been no ‘slur’ against Felicity. We merely requested that a coroner be appointed who would have no conflict of interest in this case. I can’t see why that would have been a problem for any of you. I am sure if you were the deceased, your parents would have requested the same.

  When you posted your message to ‘all those around the world’ on Facebook we were terribly upset because Facebook is such a public forum and this is such a private matter for us all. At the time you put that up, and as I write this, the case is still being investigated.

  That she died under such horrific circumstances is bad enough, but to advertise such personal information about how and what led to her death without considering the impact on family and friends, I felt was not considerate of us.

  I am aware of feeling anger and helplessness as well as utter devastation. I don’t mean to take any of that out on you because I am sure you are going through the same mix of emotions. We all have different ways of dealing with grief and I am only just learning about mine.

  Natalie closed by thanking Ant for putting their conflict aside and extending an invitation for her to attend the memorial he’d arranged. She reciprocated with an invitation for him to attend the family’s celebration of Phoebe’s life.

  Ant replied the same day with a simple ‘Thank you.’ He and Natalie both pressed on with their separate ceremonies to farewell Phoebe. Natalie later sent both her email and Ant’s reply to Detective Senior Constable Payne.

  Ant’s service was held on 12 December, and he gave a eulogy. Jeannette and Phoebe’s brothers attended. Natalie stayed away, because she didn’t feel up to going through two services. Organising one was traumatic enough.

  Kate Rowland had organised for Ant’s service to be held at the Royal Melbourne Yacht Club. Among the people invited to speak was Phoebe’s schoolfriend Alice. She told me later, ‘There were lots of people there. I was asked to speak, but I’d only just met Ant for the first time a few days before at his apartment.’ She spoke about her memories of Phoebe as a free spirit, a loving and loved friend and someone nobody could own. She thought Ant wasn’t too happy that he didn’t get a mention, but Alice didn’t know anything about their relationship.

  ‘We all stood facing the water for a minute’s silence and then I left,’ she said. ‘I got a parking ticket.’ Shit happens at the most inappropriate moments!

  Later, she was drinking in a bar with a party including Kristina, Sue, and Robert, when she overheard someone say of Phoebe, ‘She was like a bird with a broken wing. She wanted to get into arts, but she was just too weak.’ Stung, Alice retorted, ‘Bullshit! Phoebe wasn’t weak at all! If she wanted to do something, she’d do it!’

  When Alice told me this, I wondered whether getting into that chute might have been something that Phoebe was determined to do. The question gnawed away at me.

  *

  Natalie continued with her own plans to hold a memorial service on 16 December at the Abbotsford Convent, near Sophia Mundi. The convent is no longer a Catholic institution, but it was saved from a developer’s hammer by sustained community action. Its beautiful interior and tranquil gardens now provide a lovely space for the community, particularly artists and other creative people. The Yarra River winds around one side and birds flock in their thousands, singing their joy at such a wonderful space so close to the city.

  Hundreds of people attended the family’s memorial service. Most of those present hadn’t been at Ant’s ceremony, apart from Alice and Ant’s family. Alice didn’t speak that day, but Natalie did, and Len, and several of Phoebe’s friends.

  The vibe was true Steiner. Dozens of candles flickered, mirroring the impermanence of a fragile life. ‘There was a big screen with her photos,’ Alice told me. ‘She looked so much part of what was happening, beautiful and alive, we just couldn’t believe she was gone. Her parents always wanted the best for her, and Phoebe wanted to be free. It was a difficult job, being her parent. She’d always do whatever she wanted.’

  Everyone attending wrote loving messages to Phoebe and put them in an urn to speed her on her new journey.

  The day after the Abbottsford service, Phoebe was cremated at Springvale Crematorium. Crematoria are bleak and bereft spaces, no matter how much effort they put into presenting a pleasant environment. I attended my father’s cremation in 1978, and I’ve never been able to go to another one. Memorials, yes, but a committal service at a crematorium, no.

  There’s something about the way that, just as the last word of the service fades out, someone listening at the back flicks a switch and the electronic mechanisms kick in: the coffin starts moving on a little conveyor belt towards the sombre curtains behind, which part automatically and then close as the coffin disappears. You’re left to imagine the body and coffin being immediately consumed by the furnace. It’s so distressing. I couldn’t even accompany my mother’s c
offin to the crematorium after her funeral, so I had an inkling of how Natalie was feeling. To watch your beautiful, talented, adored daughter sliding away into such finality would be more than most mothers could bear. Ant and his family didn’t attend.

  *

  With Phoebe now truly gone, other arrangements still had to be made. Natalie was keen to bring Phoebe’s belongings home. Once that was done, she felt she could surrender to grieving and face her first Christmas and the rest of her life without Phoebe. She made arrangements to catch up with Ant and his mother at a coffee shop opposite Ant’s apartment on 22 December.

  This meeting went better than the previous one. Lorne had urged Natalie to make a recording, but she’d decided against it. Her anxiety about the previous time had put her off.

  Ant seemed a lot better. He spoke warmly to her and offered to tell her about Phoebe’s last few days. She asked Ant how he thought Phoebe had been feeling.

  ‘Was she happy?’ Natalie asked. Ant said he didn’t think she was ‘happy’, because she was a bit down and hung over from her bender the day before. But he was used to that with Phoebe.

  Ant confided that he was having trouble using the rubbish chute every day. This came as a surprise to Natalie, as previously he’d told her he never, ever wanted to know how Phoebe died.

  Ant gave Natalie a box, which he told her contained all Phoebe’s possessions apart from things they’d jointly acquired, which he wanted to keep for sentimental reasons.

  Afterwards, Natalie felt better than she had for a while. Ant had looked her in the eye, tried to help her understand what he’d seen of Phoebe, and handed over her belongings. All these things eased Natalie’s concerns.

  At home, she took a deep breath and clutched a handkerchief as she opened the box. Tears welled up as she picked through the few remnants she now had of her Tiger Cub. But then she realised that a lot of things were missing. Where were Phoebe’s passport, her birth certificate, her Medicare card, her new wallet, the camera she’d been given by Linley Godfrey, her laptop, and her journals?

  The fact that there was no sign of Phoebe’s current journal especially worried Natalie, because Phoebe carried it with her everywhere, recording bits of her everyday activities. Natalie had been hoping something might emerge from reading Phoebe’s last thoughts.

  She sent Ant an email asking him about the missing items. The family was particularly interested in the journals, she said, and she would also like him to return some items of jewellery she had given Phoebe as birthday presents, including a pair of earrings Natalie had made. Natalie told him that she’d contacted the police to see if they still had any of the personal belongings they took from the apartment on the night of 2 December.

  She suggested the items might be in the basement storage and asked Ant to have a look. He agreed to see if he could hunt them up, and a few days later he handed some more of Phoebe’s stuff over to Tom. Natalie says that the laptop and wallet were returned, but the wallet was almost empty (no licence or credit cards, only a couple of membership cards and a passport photo of Ant) and there was no sign of Phoebe’s passport and other official ID documents. Her journals were also still missing.

  *

  December was a month of cancelled celebrations — for Nik’s eighteenth birthday and Lorne’s seventieth — followed by a desolate Christmas. In the New Year, Lorne made an appointment to see Detective Senior Constable Brendan Payne. Payne hadn’t done any work on the file over the holiday break, but he was willing to meet Lorne, Natalie, and Len to hear what they had to say.

  When he saw them on 6 January, Lorne reiterated all his concerns about the aborted Homicide investigation, and Len and Natalie supported his wish to have the death investigated in more detail. Lorne said he was sure that ‘just following proper procedures’ could shed more light on how Phoebe had died.

  Lorne said his first task would be to ascertain whether a person of Phoebe’s size, height, and weight could fit down the rubbish chute. He said he was going to conduct a test ‘on site’ at Balencea on 28 January, and he invited Brendan to attend. He’d asked a fit young friend of Phoebe’s to re-enact climbing into the chute. She’d be wearing a safety harness, just in case.

  While Lorne was arranging this event, Payne reviewed the file. He also had a look at the CCTV footage, but it only showed him Phoebe leaving and re-entering the building during the first fire alarm. Everything else was gone.

  He then invited Ant Hampel to come to South Melbourne to answer a few questions about the issues Lorne had raised. Payne may have just wanted to have answers at hand in case the family asked again.

  Ant arrived at South Melbourne on 24 January accompanied by his father George, who insisted on being present during the interview. Payne tried to dissuade him, as Ant was an adult and didn’t need a significant other to be present, but George said Ant was still grieving — and hey, who bosses a judge around? The interview was taped and a statement typed up.

  The interview didn’t supply any answers. Ant was now in two minds about whether he’d taken the phone for repair on Wednesday. He said it might have been on Thursday. He was quite certain he’d looked in on Phoebe in the middle of the day on Wednesday, despite the lack of a key-fob record. He had no idea how the record could be missing.

  He said he’d taken away the Stilnox during that visit. This seemed to be a sign that he was concerned Phoebe might overdose, accidentally or otherwise.

  *

  On 28 January, Lorne’s little team assembled in the refuse room on Level 12 of Balencea. Lorne was carrying an industrial safety harness and was accompanied by two of Phoebe’s friends, Sarah ‘Missy’ Howett and Viv Bambino. Sarah was to play Phoebe and Viv was to record the experiment. Brendan Payne was observing.

  Lorne asked Sarah to climb into the chute feet first. To explain how difficult this was, I must describe the chute entrance. We have the same system in our apartment building, and just putting rubbish into the chute isn’t simple. You have to pull down a heavy spring-loaded door with one hand and drop the rubbish in with the other. It has a built-in mechanism to ensure it closes quickly, to prevent large objects, like bodies, getting into the chute.

  The chute door at Balencea is 67 cm off the ground at the bottom hinge, and when the door is fully open, the leading edge sits at an angle, a little over a metre from the floor. It is a stainless-steel door that opens as a flap with supporting side panels, and it’s heavily sprung so that it closes automatically unless someone is holding it open. Around it is a smooth steel frame protruding a centimetre out from the wall — not enough to act as a handhold. There’s nothing else in the rubbish room that could provide a handhold except the inside edges of the open chute door.

  Sarah was very fit and completely sober. She has long legs, and the first stage wasn’t too difficult: she stood on tiptoe and managed to bring one leg up and into the opening. The problem was the second leg. With nothing to hold on to except the side of the door flap she was half-sitting on, she had great difficulty getting her second leg up and into the opening. There wasn’t much room to spare; when the hatch was fully open, the inside top edge was only 22 cm from the wall plate.

  Sarah had to face the wall to get her legs into the opening, which was 53 cm in diameter, but when she sat on the lower part of the tray, her weight produced a cantilevering effect that pressed the hatch door hard against her back and squeezed her forward against the wall.

  At last, with a lot of difficulty, she managed to get into the opening. She and Viv then swapped roles, and Sarah filmed while Viv took her turn. She had the same degree of difficulty, but she too got both legs into the chute after much squirming. Lorne observed that both girls had their hands all over the hatch and its stainless steel surround. Anyone performing this manoeuvre would leave handprints on the polished surface for all to see.

  Brendan Payne left the experiment thinking it was difficult but possible to get into the
chute. Against this, Phoebe’s family argued that no one as intoxicated as Phoebe had been could possibly have had the balance and coordination required to do it. Phoebe reacted strongly to alcohol. Two drinks and she was legless. In that state, how could she possibly do something that two sober, athletic young women had found difficult? When Lorne raised this, the police countered by pointing out that drunk people can be very determined once they set their sights on doing something, but for Lorne the issue was one of capacity, not focus.

  Lorne later produced a report pointing out that this experiment didn’t answer all the questions. In particular, it didn’t establish whether a person who’d got as far as sitting in the chute could make it through the opening into the shaft, which goes down to the compactor in a straight line. It wasn’t possible to test this. The two girls were understandably nervous at getting as far as they did. Watching the experiment on video in court later on, I heard each of them ask nervously, ‘Have you got me?’

  To find out more about the next stage, Lorne drove out to Hallam to see Neil Bone of Wastech. Bone said he was surprised that the police hadn’t asked him for a statement, and disappointed that he hadn’t had a chance to show that his equipment couldn’t have been used in this way. When he told police he didn’t think it was possible for anyone to pass through the compactor in one piece if it was on automatic, they’d simply told him, ‘You’d be amazed what we see in this job.’

  Lorne offered him an opportunity to clear his product’s name. He asked if he’d be willing to create a replica of the twelfth-floor chute entrance on a platform and attach the same chute material, leading down to a mattress for a soft landing. Lorne’s idea was to see if Viv and Sarah could pass through the made-up chute.