Into the Darkness

by Robin Bowles

  When the amount of waste reached a level where the compactor blade couldn’t complete its stroke, the computer in the machine would put it into ejection mode. ‘The compaction blade will retract back slightly, and that releases any pressure of the waste onto that bottom ejection door. Then the door can slide open easily, and the blade will continue its ejection stroke.’

  Bone showed some videos they’d made using lengths of timber. You could see that the top blade, if obstructed, withdrew and had another go if the item hadn’t fallen out into the bin.

  But none of this showed how Phoebe could have passed through the chamber without being pulverised. Given that we accept she did come down the chute, how was she so relatively intact when she fell into the bin? None of it added up to me.

  His Honour was clearly struggling to understand as well. He asked, ‘When it starts to close for the second time, does it repeat the same process?’

  ‘It will go until it either reaches the end of its cycle or until it hits the obstruction, if it hasn’t dropped through.’

  ‘And when it hits that obstruction it will stop? It won’t try and push through that obstruction?’

  ‘It will try and push through, so it will hit that obstruction and go to full pressure, that’s 4.8 tonnes, to try and clear that load.’

  ‘How many times will it try?’ asked Ms Siemensma.

  ‘Just the once, to full system pressure. Actually, no, it might do a second bite, but once it reaches the obstruction, the machine will go out on fault and a little light will come on and start flashing. Then the machine shuts down. Any waste that comes in after that will build up in the waste chute.’ So why didn’t Phoebe block the exit instead of passing through?

  Ms Siemensma asked Neil Bone to look at photos of Phoebe’s injuries. ‘I know that you’re not a doctor, so we don’t seek a medical opinion from you, but from your knowledge of the machine, it would be useful to have your opinion on some aspects.’ Ms Siemensma asked him to focus on the injuries to Phoebe’s hip and thighs. ‘Is there any part of the machine that you could suggest could have caused this horizontal bruising on the left and right leg?’

  Neil Bone peered at the photo. He didn’t seem upset by it; he was looking at it to provide his professional opinion.

  ‘If it was the hydraulic blade,’ he said, ‘I wouldn’t think so, because the leading edge of the hydraulic blade is quite sharp and a bit jagged and it’s got a lot of force, so I would think it would break the skin or leave a very thick defined mark.’

  ‘What about the possibility of the ejection door closing on her thigh?’

  ‘From that distance, the compaction blade would have tried to rotate over, and there would have been a lot of damage up higher.’

  A diagram pointing to some of the injuries appeared on the TV screen above the court.

  ‘Is there any possible explanation for how Phoebe has sustained the injury to her left hip and the near severing of the right leg?’ asked Ms Siemensma.

  ‘Talking about the right leg first, if she came down the chute and stood on that ejection door with the blade open, that’s possible. Then that blade would come across and cut her leg off. And I can’t understand how there was only one foot in there and not two,’ Neil replied.

  He said the injury seemed higher than the ankle, so perhaps she was standing on rubbish already sitting on top of the ejection door awaiting compaction.

  ‘Could she have been crouching or kneeling?’

  ‘I don’t think so, because it would hit other parts of her body.’ Bone said it was possible that, after the blow to her leg, ‘she collapsed to a kneeling position and the blade has caught her on the strongest part of her body, which would be the hips’.

  ‘And that would be the second blow?’

  ‘That would be the second blow. The machine will stop when it strikes a solid object that it can’t compact. If she was sideways, then the machine would have struck that solid hip area, then retracted back to release the load on the eject door, then it would have slid the eject door open. I think the fact that there’s no upper body injuries means she has just dropped straight through.’

  There was quite a lot of discussion about why the blade had only caught one of Phoebe’s legs. Bone speculated that she may have been conscious and able to lift one leg, ‘but there’s nowhere she can hang on to in there. One would assume she would pass out and collapse onto the top of that blade.’

  All this speculation seemed to assume she was able to make life-preserving decisions at the crucial moment when the blade was about to strike, ignoring the effects of alcohol and Stilnox.

  He couldn’t say if Phoebe had collapsed to her knees on the lower ejection door, but if she had, the space was deep enough for the blade to have struck her above that hip, then the door would have opened and dropped her into the bin.

  I’d been looking forward to hearing Neil Bone’s evidence, but now I was wishing I were somewhere else. How did Phoebe go through that system so relatively intact? The second blow with the compacting blade should have squashed her. Neil Bone did seem to know his stuff, but maybe his machine wasn’t working the way it was meant to that day.

  The evidence continued in minute detail as Ms Siemensma explored every possibility for the Coroner. It was so abstract and detailed that you lost sight of what was actually being dissected, until Natalie stood up and left the court. Her departure reminded us we were listening to the possibilities that could have crushed the life out of Phoebe Handsjuk.

  *

  Moglia went through the process again with Neil Bone, and Galbally had no questions, but then O’Neill wanted to ask about a few things. Not more of the same, I hoped! Mostly, they were, but he did ask Bone about his attendance at Balencea on 7 December 2010.

  O’Neill said that in his first statement, Bone had said that none of the police present that day had asked his opinion. It wasn’t until his third statement, which was made in December 2012, two years after the event, that he said he’d told Jason Wallace that he would have expected Phoebe to be more badly injured.

  O’Neill asked, ‘Is it possible that that conversation you say you had with Senior Detective Wallace — that you thought to yourself something along the lines of “I’m surprised there aren’t more serious injuries” but that you didn’t actually say that to Senior Detective Wallace?’ You have to give O’Neill an A for effort, I thought.

  Bone replied, ‘When they said to me that she had gone through the compactor — at that stage there I just thought, “This is incredible. How could someone come through the compactor?” And I said, “If she’d come through the compactor she would’ve been chopped up in small pieces.” That’s why I made the comment about was the machine in auto or manual?’

  O’Neill said he didn’t dispute the thoughts Bone may have had, but that Mr Butterworth, who was there on the day, couldn’t remember Neil saying that, ‘and I anticipate that Mr Wallace and Mr Payne will also say that they don’t have that recollection either. So I just want to ask whether it’s possible that, having those thoughts, you didn’t air them as directly as you have today?’

  Well, three against one and O’Neill obviously knows what Wallace and Payne have to say. That’s bound to create doubt in his mind.

  Sure enough, Bone said, ‘I’m unsure. I did ask the question about manual or auto, and that was connected to knowing how someone came through that machine.’

  Ms Siemensma picked up from O’Neill.

  ‘Can you remember saying you would expect Phoebe to have been more badly injured?’

  Again he said, ‘I’m sure I did, because I was standing there going, “Well, how could this happen?” And that’s why I asked the question about, you know, was the machine in manual or auto. So — yeah. I can’t be a hundred per cent certain, but I was fairly certain that I asked that.’

  The Coroner thanked Neil Bone before excusing him
. ‘Mr Bone, thank you very much for your assistance. I commend you. You’ve been very cooperative right from the start.’

  *

  Jason Wallace was a Detective Senior Constable at Homicide. He’d worked on high-profile cases with legendary detectives, and I was hoping he’d tell us interesting things about What Homicide Did Next. He was tall and thin, with lanky limbs that seemed a bit awkward. He was sporting the favoured Homicide Number 2 buzz-cut, which probably saves time in the mornings, but which created a skull-like effect. He rustled through his notes after he sat down.

  Ms Siemensma asked who had carriage of the investigation in the days after Mark Butterworth finished up at the Balencea.

  Wallace said Butterworth briefed crew sergeant Shane O’Connell on Friday, then O’Connell briefed Clanchy and Wallace on Monday.

  He described the chain of command. Homicide had three or four on-call crews, each overseen by a detective senior sergeant — in their case, Senior Sergeant Shane O’Connell — and below him were two teams of four detective senior constables, each headed by a detective sergeant.

  It seemed that Butterworth had briefed Clanchy as well as O’Connell on 3 December. Ms Siemensma took Wallace to Clanchy’s notes from that meeting. He’d written: ‘Concern — were jeans below knee? How did she get into the garbage chute? Located a note of depressive nature. Advised she had alcohol and depression problems.’

  Wallace thought that Butterworth believed that Phoebe’s death was ‘obviously suicide or misadventure’. After the briefing, ‘we were just to obviously keep an open mind and have a look at it a little bit further’.

  Ms Siemensma asked whether there had been any Homicide investigation before Monday 6 December.

  ‘We’d certainly been notified of it. That’s correct. As far as being allocated, I was allocated on Monday, yes.’

  She put to him that Butterworth had still been keen to know the outcome of the toxicology report. Was he told about that?

  ‘Look, I can’t recall, but it certainly would’ve been a major factor, yeah. Um, and that’s one thing we often have to wait for — post-mortems.’

  Ms Siemensma asked if he’d conducted any other investigations during the rest of that Monday.

  ‘I think one thing that we hadn’t obtained from Butterworth was the CCTV footage,’ Wallace said, referring to his notes to jog his memory. ‘So I think that was still being arranged.’ He said he’d also arranged a meeting at Balencea next day to try to understand how the refuse system worked. He thought Dr Lynch should be there and Neil Bone, as well as relevant police.

  ‘So your tasks on Monday were really a matter of making appointments, contacting people, preparatory work?’

  ‘Yeah, exactly.’

  But by Wednesday morning it was all over, Red Rover. So they must have been pretty busy on Tuesday.

  Ms Siemensma asked about the meeting at Balencea. We all had Neil Bone’s evidence fresh in our minds, and I thought I’d seen Wallace up the back sitting with Brendan Payne during the latter part of it.

  ‘Do you recall Mr Bone commenting on the feasibility of Phoebe’s injuries?’

  He remembered Bernie Carrick, the crime scene investigator, talking to Neil Bone, but said he wasn’t part of the conversation.

  ‘Look, I don’t really recall how much Neil Bone said.’

  ‘Do you recall Mr Bone explaining how the cycle worked?’

  ‘Well, yeah, I do, because that was the reason why I had him there.’

  Ms Siemensma asked him if he remembered Bone questioning police about whether the machine had been set to auto or manual.

  ‘I recall a discussion taking place around the auto and the manual, but I don’t recall the specifics.’

  ‘Let me see if this information triggers a memory for you. Mr Bone also said: “I recall telling Senior Detective Wallace that I didn’t think it was possible for a person to climb into the chute unaided. Detective Wallace said: ‘You’d be amazed at the things we see.’” Do you recall that?’

  ‘No, I don’t.’

  ‘He’s also said that he told you: “If the unit had been in auto mode, someone would’ve had to switch it to manual for the body to pass through in one piece.” He says: “It was suggested to me that the cycle may have been in manual with both blades open.” Do you recall that?’

  ‘No, I don’t.’

  ‘Mr Bone said: “It needs to be noted that if the machine was in manual and the body passed through, then the carousel would not start automatically and rotate, which is what was suggested.” Do you recall that?’

  ‘No, I don’t.’

  ‘Do you recall Mr Bone saying: “If the machine was operating in its normal operation, Phoebe’s body would have been more significantly injured”?’

  ‘No, I don’t.’

  Were Bone and Wallace at the same meeting? I wondered.

  ‘He says he didn’t give the police a statement at that time. Is that true?’

  ‘That’s correct.’

  Ms Siemensma was pretty relentless, and Wallace seemed uncomfortable. He was asked if he remembered whether there was any demonstration of how the compactor worked.

  ‘What do you mean by demonstration, sorry?’

  ‘The machine and its operation — were there demonstrations in the presence or absence of Mr Bone?’

  ‘No demonstrations were asked for. Neil was there, absolutely. Look, I’m struggling to recall whether Mr Bone was still there, but I think he may have left. And I think our discussions probably continued. Um, I mean the whole point of why we were there was to obviously get down to the — you know, the nuts and bolts of was it possible that Phoebe could get into the bin.’

  ‘You’re guessing whether Mr Bone was there or not, are you?’ asked Ms Siemensma.

  ‘I am. Look, I’m sorry, I apologise. But it’s obviously been some time.’

  I looked across at Phoebe’s family. All were tight-lipped and tense. I didn’t blame them.

  His Honour also appeared unimpressed. He said he was inclined to ‘exclude that evidence if it’s based on a guess. The position is that you’re uncertain as to when Mr Bone left, and you’re uncertain as to how long he contributed to the discussion?’

  ‘I am, Your Honour, yes,’ said Wallace, relieved from the relentless questioning.

  There was more tedious evidence about the CCTV footage — when he obtained it; when he watched it; how much he watched; was it in real time or did it have a fast-forward facility. Most of this he couldn’t recall, or resorted to guessing.

  On Tuesday, he became aware that some footage was missing and enquired of ‘either Mark Butterworth or someone else’.

  ‘Again, this is a guess?’ asked Ms Siemensma.

  ‘Yeah, I apologise, but I can only say the footage was unavailable.’

  ‘You didn’t take any steps to obtain the DVR hard drive?’

  Mr O’Neill stood up to rescue Wallace. ‘Your Honour, I object to this line of questioning. In my submission it’s not a productive use of this court’s time to chase down what further steps were taken to recover the hard drive.’

  The Coroner disagreed. He felt it was important to understand what steps were taken for the sake of ‘completeness’. He allowed Ms Siemensma to continue.

  In any event, she only had a couple more questions, which established that Wallace couldn’t remember whether it was from his own experience or because someone told him, but at some stage on either 6 or 7 December he became aware that he had all the footage that was available. He also confirmed that the DVR hard drive wasn’t seized from Balencea under his watch.

  Wallace was excused temporarily, because Ms Siemensma wasn’t finished with him, but we had the trio of medical experts the next morning, one by video link from Sydney, and they were important men whose time had been booked. Wallace would have to come back later in the inque
st and we’d have to listen to more of his ums and ahs, which, if I’d written them all down, would have made his evidence much longer!

  The atmosphere as people left the court was pretty flat. Natalie, Len, and Lorne seemed to be holding in their anger, and Phoebe’s brothers both looked a bit stunned. Sitting for hours listening to evidence that doesn’t reassure you one iota is a marathon for any relative.

  The boys in blue are here to help. You want to believe that, don’t you?

  CHAPTER 19

  LOS TRIOS MEDICOS

  Next morning, we all were eager to hear from the panel of experts who’d been consulted on Phoebe’s possible degree of inebriation and the effects it may have had on her. Their evidence wasn’t only important from the perspective of Phoebe’s death, but also, given the Coroner’s responsibility to make preventive recommendations, it could have much wider social implications at some stage.

  Before the experts were installed in the witness box, Galbally reported back on some issues the Coroner had asked about. His client had been away, but had now returned and had answered the Coroner’s queries. Galbally said the rubbish bag shown in two of the photographs of the compactor room — a white bag with blue markings — was the sort of rubbish bag Ant used.

  The Coroner had also asked about the ‘shrine’ Ant reported seeing when he got home, which none of the police saw. Galbally said two black candles were burning beside the bed next to a photo of Ant, which he’d removed, obviously before police checked the apartment. This was what had constituted a shrine? To himself? Why would he think that? He’s Jewish and there’s nothing about partner worship in Judaism.

  Galbally told the Coroner that Ant’s recollection is that ‘when he arrived home he saw that glass on the corridor floor but didn’t clean it up. Events overtook him.’ It was left as he found it.

  As for a laptop computer shown in another photo of the dining table and some typed notes, ‘The laptop is a laptop which he put there when he arrived home from work. The notes were already there, and he believes they’re notes that Phoebe had as part of her “homework” with her psychologist.’