Into the Darkness

by Robin Bowles

  When Phoebe turned up at Clifton Hill about 12.45 a.m. or maybe a bit later, he rang Natalie to tell her Phoebe was safe at their house. Phoebe had been unaware of the multiple calls, but they’d caused him a lot of worry.

  Ms Siemensma asked him if he knew which phone Phoebe had been using.

  ‘She had two phones on her, I saw them both, because she pulled one out of her pocket and one out of her bag.’

  ‘You say in your statement that Phoebe was “edgy, not far short of psychosis”, but she was “functioning”. They don’t seem to fit, Mr Marriott. Could you explain?’

  ‘Well, she was coherent, but very edgy and upset. If you have substances in your system, that can be the case. You don’t have to be incoherent and not in control of yourself to be not right.’

  ‘Why do you say she was upset?’

  ‘She told me she was and she was crying. It was to do with the dinner with Ant earlier in the evening —’

  ‘So this is the Monday night, or more correctly, early Tuesday morning?’

  ‘Yes, she’d had a problem with Ant at the dinner. She’d had a couple of drinks, and she’d been listening to the conversation and decided to join in. And the topic wasn’t one that impressed her partner.’

  ‘Did she tell you all this as soon as she arrived?’

  ‘Yes, because that was why she was so upset.’

  ‘How about “not far short of psychosis”. How did you determine that?’

  ‘Well, she was edgy, angered easily, and had obviously taken drugs.’

  The Coroner asked about hallucinations and hearing voices, but Russell hadn’t seen anything like that.

  Phoebe told him that Bren Hession was waiting for her at the corner, and she made quite a few phone calls in the course of their discussion.

  Russell had said in his statement, which Ms Siemensma read out, ‘She told me she loved Ant to bits, but still wanted to leave him because of the way he behaves when she wasn’t on top of her game.’ He’d also said, ‘I told her just because you love someone doesn’t mean they are right for you.’

  Good advice for anyone, I thought.

  He said he woke Phoebe at 7 a.m. next morning so she could go to work, and she left at 7.45 a.m. But she didn’t go to work. During the afternoon, Ant sent a text asking if he’d seen her, and Russell texted Phoebe but received no reply.

  ‘In the phone log,’ Ms Siemensma said, ‘there is a text from your mobile phone to Phoebe’s at 3.10 p.m. that day, which says: “Hope you are surviving your day in an OK fashion.” Was that because you were worried about her?’

  ‘Yes, because she hadn’t shown up for work.’

  They next spoke about the ‘tomato soup’ text the next morning. Ms Siemensma said that in his statement he’d described it as ‘innocuous’, which received a stinging retort from Russell.

  ‘I’ve never used that word in my life,’ he said crossly. ‘I guess that’s presumption on the part of the person who took the statement.’

  I’ve found that many people sign statements without reading them properly, only to discover later that they’re written in words they’d never use, often in what I call ‘police-speak’. But it’s too late when your ‘own words’ are quoted back at you in court.

  Russell said that nothing at any time had made him think Phoebe might take her own life. He said she was a bit of a ‘monster’ when she’d drunk alcohol. Asked to explain what he meant by ‘monster’, he said, ‘I’m a chef — I’m not as eloquently spoken as most of the people in this room. “Monster” means very difficult to reason with and to get along with at times.’

  Russell was asked about his participation in Lorne’s experiment out at Wastech, putting Viv into the mocked-up garbage chute. He said it was easy.

  The Coroner asked whether Russell felt Phoebe’s mental state had been been deteriorating. ‘Perhaps she could pull out of her depression early on, but in the final period it may have been more difficult. Perhaps not even consciously, but involuntarily. What is your experience?’

  ‘I would disagree with you. With my experience of Phoebe and her depression, she was a lot more proactive, trying to get better, than say someone like myself, and she was always striving in an effort to recover. That week we were all planning Nik’s birthday party, decorations, food, music, she was really up. It was something that she was looking forward to immensely.’

  Russell spoke about Phoebe’s role in the party preparations, lending her creative talent to decorating the house. His Honour asked, ‘Do you have an opinion as to whether Phoebe would have committed suicide at this particular juncture having regard to the birthday party that was being planned for her brother?’

  Russell replied, ‘In my opinion, absolutely not.’

  CHAPTER 13

  THE RETIRED DETECTIVE

  After the three other barristers had asked a few questions of Russell, we broke for lunch. Bob Galbally, whose company I’ve always enjoyed, caught up for a chat. The last time we’d shared a courtroom was during the Adele Bailey inquest in 2000, when he was representing a former police officer. Bob hasn’t changed nearly as much as I have! He was still superbly dressed, confident, urbane, and dogged on behalf of his clients. Despite the iron-coloured hair at his temples, he’d hardly aged a bit.

  He said Ant was keen to give evidence and see the end of this difficult time in his life. He had nothing to hide.

  After lunch, we all resettled in our by now regular spots (it doesn’t take long for people attending a court case to put their stamp on particular seats).

  Lorne Campbell was to be the next witness, and there was a bit of a flurry at the bar table. Ms Siemensma said there were objections to some of the material included in Lorne’s statement.

  Mr O’Neill knew Lorne was less than impressed with the way the police had handled the investigation. Mr Galbally was concerned about Lorne’s thinly veiled suspicions and his various reconstructions and experiments, which could possibly cast shadows over Ant Hampel. He was particularly concerned about a chronology that Lorne had compiled detailing Phoebe’s actions and whereabouts in the two weeks before she died.

  On his feet to object, Galbally argued that it wasn’t usual for a Coroner to use a witness’s chronology. He added, ‘In my submission there’s a selective interpretation of the evidence here and because of when it was compiled, it’s been superseded by more evidence.’

  The Coroner was reluctant to accept this advice, saying that although there may be some inaccuracies, the chronology could constitute ‘an aid to the court and to counsel representing different parties as to matters that there is evidence about’.

  Galbally agreed that the Coroner might be able to ‘intellectually disassociate yourself from matters that are totally irrelevant’, but if the application to exclude the data wasn’t sustained, he hoped the Coroner would agree to a suppression order, because he said he’d ‘find it unpalatable if some of this material entered the media domain’.

  O’Neill had objections too, and Galbally wanted to go through other parts of Lorne’s evidence, but the Coroner said he’d hear the chronology material first. And in case we all had our pens poised, he then addressed the media (and me).

  He said he’d personally found inconsistencies in Lorne’s evidence, such as ‘a comment about conversations with Ms Cohen which don’t appear to be consistent with her statement on the matter, and I’m sure there are other aspects in which, inadvertently, error has been made’.

  He continued that Lorne’s chronology wasn’t evidence but merely ‘a collection of pieces of information which I think perhaps provides some assistance and I wish to emphasise to members of the media who are present, this document which will now become part of Mr Campbell’s statement is not evidence of the truth of its contents. It’s simply an interpretation of events.’

  The Coroner was ‘mindful of the fact that Mr Campbell is a f
ormer police officer’. He said that Lorne had professional skills and that the way his evidence was presented to the court reflected those skills.

  ‘It’s not necessarily the truth of the matter, it is his attempt to assist the court. I see nothing wrong with it. So we will accept the chronology.’

  Galbally and O’Neill weren’t content with this. They wanted the Coroner to suppress bits of the chronology, parts of letters Lorne had written, and some of his comments on the police handling of the investigation. Citing page this and comment that, they both made ambit claims. Were they so argumentative because they were both Irish?

  I couldn’t see why they were fussing, as the Coroner had seen it all anyway, and he was the one making the decision at the end. I guessed Lorne had made comments about the police or Ant Hampel that the lawyers didn’t want the public to hear.

  In any event, after lots of to-ing and fro-ing, the Coroner said, ‘I see nothing offensive. It’s Mr Campbell’s suggestion as to what’s occurred. That matter is being fully tested in this inquest and that’s his response to the queries that I raised with Sergeant Solomon. There’s nothing offensive about that.’

  The queries that had been raised with Sergeant Sol Solomon (a very experienced Homicide detective sergeant) were mostly queries Lorne had raised in connection with the Homicide investigation. Lorne had written a pull-no-punches letter to the head of Homicide, Detective Inspector Potter, lobbing all sorts of grenades over the wall. Potter had referred his letter to the Coroner, who in turn had asked Sol Solomon to have a look at it — to ‘conduct a review’.

  Galbally wanted the letter suppressed because he submitted that Lorne’s complaints had no foundation, and he didn’t want the media to run with speculation.

  In truth, various media outlets probably already had a copy of the letter, but couldn’t publish it unless it was used in court and became a ‘privileged’ document.

  His Honour did, however, say he’d take out several passages that he thought were ‘conjectural and damaging and wholly inappropriate as a conclusion or a connection to the evidence in this case until such time as I make my finding’.

  He read those references out as ‘paragraph beginning x and ending y’. We all noted them down and wondered what they were.

  But Galbally wasn’t finished. He was now standing up for the police as well. He described Lorne’s letter to Detective Inspector Potter as ‘highly offensive and slanderous of judicial officers in this state’.

  The Coroner said that some of Lorne’s comments had already been shown to be incorrect, for example in regard to the CCTV requests. Then he repeated what he’d already said when pulling Mr Moglia up: ‘My primary purpose here is not to conduct an inquest into alleged errors that have been made in the investigation. My duty is to conduct an inquest into the circumstances relating to Phoebe’s death and I would only be commenting on these [other] matters entirely as an incidental aspect of what this examination may disclose.’

  He was therefore not disposed to allow the letter to Inspector Potter in. Moglia objected to that, saying that the correspondence was between two police officers experienced in investigation. He said that some theoretical sections the Coroner had already excluded were agreed, but that the balance should be admitted because it was helpful in showing the value of various criticisms or different interpretations of the evidence. Ms Siemensma agreed too, but Mr O’Neill objected.

  Lorne had also criticised the process the Coroner had adopted in ordering an investigation into the issues Lorne raised. He’d been scathing about the idea of giving the investigation to Sol Solomon, because it meant a police officer was investigating and reporting on his colleagues.

  The Coroner had made up his mind. He said he would exclude the letter to Potter from being included in evidence on the grounds that it would muddy the waters. But he added, ‘Obviously I’m not saying that all of the material here might not be the subject of the questioning of witnesses when evidence relevant to the material is given.’

  He referred the media to his assistant, Ms Gebert, to make sure nobody was in any doubt of his ruling on this matter. She’d written it all down word for word. I had, too!

  O’Neill wanted further exclusions, but I think the Coroner had heard enough and said no. Just before calling Lorne, Ms Siemensma asked, ‘But all other material can be provided?’

  ‘Yes. Unless there’s some subsequent application, I don’t see why that shouldn’t be provided at this point.’

  *

  At last the arguing was over, for the time being at least, and the court summoned Lorne Campbell. He didn’t have far to walk, as he’d been sitting in the front row behind the bar table with Natalie and the rest of the family. None of the legal argument would have come as a surprise to him — he’d been sitting at a bar table too many times during his career to be surprised — but this time was different. This was personal.

  Lorne looks more like the music teacher he is now than the cop he was then. He’s a compact man who seems ill at ease in a suit. His thick white hair lends him gravitas, and there’s pain etched into his angular face. He speaks quietly, and at times his answers were hard to hear.

  Lorne’s statement, with the final paragraph redacted, was read to the court. It was long and thorough, and I had trouble keeping up. He described his shock at hearing only five days after Phoebe’s death that the Homicide investigators had ‘written her off’ as a suicide. On hearing this, he felt it was ‘a premature conclusion’ and decided to ‘thoroughly examine the circumstances’ for himself.

  On his first visit to Balencea, he closely examined the rubbish chute, knowing that Phoebe’s post-mortem blood-alcohol level was .16. He formed an opinion, which he said he still held, that Phoebe wouldn’t have had the ‘necessary balance and coordination to climb unaided into the receiving chute’, even if she could fit through. He decided to test this hypothesis. He returned on 28 January with Phoebe’s friends Viv and Sarah and attempted to re-enact Phoebe’s ‘suicide’ attempt. The experiment was videoed, and the police informant, Detective Payne, was present.

  The court was then shown the video. I realised I was sitting next to Viv.

  ‘Were you scared?’ I whispered.

  ‘Terrified. Even though we had the harness, I kept asking “Have you got me?” It was very hard to climb up and as for sliding down, I don’t know why the door flap wouldn’t have slammed shut on her hands, because hands above head was the only way she would have fitted down. And the door kept hitting Sarah in the head.’

  I told her I thought they were very brave.

  Lorne described his visit to Wastech and the generous cooperation he’d had from Neil Bone, who built the mock-up chute. That test was also videoed. We watched the recording, which showed that Sarah’s shoulders were too broad to slide in, but Viv managed to scramble in and slid straight down. Then, when she was carried over Russell’s shoulders and slid in feet first, she entered the chute easily.

  Lorne told the Coroner that Neil Bone was certain other parties must have been involved, because he couldn’t understand how Phoebe could have passed through the compactor in one piece. I wrote a note to myself — maybe it was still malfunctioning after the service the day before?

  Mr Bone had made a round section of metal chute about 60cm long available to the court. A slim young woman from the bar table stood up and demonstrated that it fitted easily over her body and fell to her feet. No doubt about the chute being big enough to allow the passage of Phoebe’s body, then. Just doubt about whether she could have got into the chute unaided.

  Lorne then went into his concerns over the police investigation — or lack of it, in his opinion. The police had concluded almost immediately that it was suicide; they failed to obtain CCTV footage, which could have been vital; they failed to seize the shared computer from the apartment, even though Phoebe’s blood was on the mouse; they didn’t check her emails and when P
hoebe’s brother Tom checked much later, all her emails had been deleted.

  He said he thought Phoebe’s ‘tomato soup’ message was very strange, especially since, according to what Ant had said, she didn’t have her phone that morning. Ant had taken it to be repaired. Lorne said that Phoebe’s phone must have been functional enough to send that text at around 10 a.m., well after Ant had left home.

  Lorne elaborated on the issues he had with the iPhone. At first, Ant had repeatedly said he’d taken the phone to be repaired while Phoebe was asleep on Wednesday morning. He changed this in a subsequent interview with the police.

  Lorne also said that when Len had tried to phone on Thursday night, Ant told Len that Phoebe had gone out without her keys or her phone, and later told the police the same thing. Lorne said he found Ant’s ‘version of events relating to the iPhone in general to be unsatisfactory’.

  I wondered why Ant’s father had gone to pick it up. Couldn’t Ant have asked someone from his office to get it? Another little mystery.

  Lorne said that Phoebe was affected by alcohol extremely quickly and became unsteady on her feet. He couldn’t envisage her being able to climb into that chute. Nor would she, in his opinion, treat her loved and loving family that way, especially in view of all the imminent family birthdays.

  He reminded the Coroner of the broken glass, blood smears on the apartment wall and the mouse, and the bruises on Phoebe’s wrists and arms. Lorne said he was certain she was ‘criminally killed by one or more people’.

  The day was drawing to a close. The Coroner told the court he’d received an application for a transcript and would consider it over the weekend. I assumed it might be the transcript of Natalie’s taped visit to Ant’s apartment on the Monday after Phoebe’s death. I wondered who’d applied for it.

  Lorne’s family gathered around him. His wife, Amanda, and two kids from his second marriage were there with Natalie, Jeannette, Phoebe’s brothers, and Len. A blended family, I thought. While there was safety in numbers, I made my way over to introduce myself to those I hadn’t met. They all seemed to know who I was already and no one was negative, which was a relief.