The Frankston Serial Killer

by Vikki Petraitis

  Sharon Johnson had no idea that the detectives had been waiting for her call, that Paul's car had been seen near the bike track on Skye Road at the time Natalie Russell had been murdered, and that Paul was a prime suspect in the murder.

  Although it was daunting sitting in an interview room giving an official statement to two female police officers, Sharon explained how she and Paul had first met at Safeway. She answered questions about Paul's car, telling the officers that she didn't drive and Paul was the only one who ever drove his car. She said it was unregistered and had no number plates, although Paul had a permit to drive it for 28 days, before it had to be registered.

  Sharon went over the previous day's activities telling the officers that Paul had driven her to work and they had spoken briefly on the phone around 9.30am. She said Paul picked up the pay cheque, from her second job, in the late afternoon and phoned her from there. He had said he'd be a bit late picking her up because his car had overheated and he had to fix it. Sharon hadn't pressed him for details and the conversation had been brief.

  Paul picked her up from work at 5.20pm, after cashing the cheque. Sharon got into the car and, as Paul handed her the money from her pay, she noticed that he had lots of cuts on both his hands and a deeper one on the middle finger of his left hand. Instead of inquiring about the cuts, Sharon asked him what happened to the car and Paul explained about the hose coming loose.

  Sharon told the officers that she and Paul stopped off at McDonalds to get something to eat and then drove to their flat so she could change out of her work clothes and grab their dirty washing to take to her mother's. While they visited, Paul did the washing in Sharon's mother's washing machine.

  Bringing her narrative up to date, Sharon described the morning she had just spent with her boyfriend. She had slept until 10.30am. Paul hadn't been home when she awoke but he arrived shortly after with the newspapers.

  At 1pm, they went around to Harvey's Wreckers in Langwarrin to look for a speedo cable for Paul's car. On the drive there, Sharon again noticed the cuts on Paul's hands and this time asked him how they had happened. Paul told her he cut himself on the fan in his car when he had reached in to adjust some cables.

  At the wreckers, while Sharon looked on, Paul had reached in to get a speedo cable and cut himself again.

  Sharon told the officers that Paul had been to visit a couple of wreckers either Thursday or Friday - she couldn't remember.

  When asked about her work hours, Sharon said that for the previous three weeks she had worked two jobs and that, before Paul bought the car, he would catch the train to Moorabbin station every evening and meet her after work. They would both catch the train back to Kananook together.

  Paul had only missed one night, but although she couldn't remember which night it was, she did remember Paul ringing her at work and saying that he had missed the train and he would meet her at Kananook station instead.

  Sharon told the officers that when she had arrived at the Kananook railway station, Paul had been waiting for her and next to him stood two police officers.

  'When I walked up to Paul, one of the policemen started talking to me. He asked if Paul was my boyfriend. I said he was. The policeman said that I was lucky to have someone to meet me at the station.'

  As they walked down the ramp, Sharon had asked Paul what was going on and he told her that the police had been looking for some Maoris who had been causing trouble at the station. Sharon told the officers that she thought it must have been a Thursday night because she remembered telling Paul that the police should have checked the station on a Friday, because that was when the Maoris hang around.

  Having little else to add, Sharon completed and signed her statement.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

  Cell 6, City Watch House

  Colin McKinney had taken promotion to sergeant when he transferred to work at the city watch house. He had been there for a year and had seen some of Victoria's worst prisoners come through, waiting for their preliminary hearings in the adjoining court rooms. The huge Gothic-looking grey building adjacent to the Melbourne Magistrate's Court had been earmarked for closure at the end of 1994 but until then, officers and prisoners alike had to endure its squalid and archaic conditions.

  As McKinney had worked until 11 the night before, he was well aware of the arrest of a suspect for the Frankston murders. His staff were on standby to receive him as soon as homicide detectives had finished with the interview. When McKinney arrived for his 3pm shift on Sunday, the prisoner, Paul Charles Denyer, had already been processed, strip-searched and allocated Cell 6.

  Sergeant McKinney looked up at the cell monitors above the front desk and saw Denyer sitting motionless on a wooden bench inside the cell. He had been classified as a separate-separate, meaning that not only did he have to be separated from the general prison population, but he also had to be kept away from those men who, because of crimes against women or children, were classed as separates. In other words, he was allowed near no one. Because his crimes were against three innocent young women, McKinney and his officers knew that if Denyer was put in with the general prison population, he wouldn't last five minutes.

  Such was the code of honour among Victoria's most-hardened offenders, that anyone who had harmed women or children would be in danger. Because of this, none of the prisoners were informed of Denyer's presence at the watch house.

  One of McKinney's first duties at the beginning of every shift was to check on the prisoners and accordingly, he walked around to Cell 6 after seeing that Denyer's paperwork was in order. He unlocked the huge black metal gate that led into the cell block, and made his way down the bluestone paving to Denyer's cell.

  When he unlocked the cell door and got his first real look at the self-confessed serial killer, McKinney was surprised. He hadn't really known what to expect; after all, what did a serial killer look like? Denyer was still sitting quietly, on the bench against the back wall of the cell, but he looked up when the police officer entered. The sergeant's first impression of Paul Denyer was one of a neatly-dressed young man, overweight but clean cut, who was incredibly cool and calm considering the circumstances under which he was being held.

  'You are?' asked McKinney.

  'Paul Denyer,' the young man replied quietly.

  'Everything okay?'

  'Yeah.' Denyer remained seated while McKinney pushed the heavy door closed again.

  McKinney was mildly disconcerted, because Denyer looked normal and completely unlike a killer. In his experience, it was somehow comforting when a killer looked or at least acted crazy or frightening; but Paul Denyer looked just like anybody else.

  Not long after he checked on Denyer, McKinney received a phone call from Sharon Johnson. She wanted to visit her boyfriend and, because it was outside regular visiting hours, the sergeant contacted the homicide detectives in charge of the investigation to get their approval. It was okayed by them but McKinney also decided to check with Denyer before allowing the visit. When he asked the prisoner if he would like to see his girlfriend, Denyer said quietly that he would. McKinney phoned Sharon back and told her to come in to the watch house.

  A little after 5pm, Sharon rang the intercom buzzer and identified herself to Colin McKinney, who could see her through the heavy metal-framed glass door. Sharon was a large, plain young woman with shoulder-length dyed blond hair. She wore no make-up and was casually dressed.

  McKinney noted that she seemed like a woman on a mission. She didn't ask any of the usual questions that the sergeant had heard hundreds of times: What can I bring him? Does he need anything? She said she just wanted answers.

  McKinney led her to a tiny interview enclosure. Sharon sat uncomfortably on the narrow bench and stared through the mesh to a huge black iron gate that was also meshed.

  A vague burning smell permeated the visiting area, emanating from a wick of tightly screwed toilet paper slung over a bar. The first prisoner to get a light from one of the guards each morning started the wick whi
ch burned for hours, giving the prisoners a way of lighting their cigarettes since matches and lighters were not allowed. Not strictly allowed either, there was no way of preventing the use of the wicks unless the guards banned toilet paper. As fast as they were put out, another one appeared slung over one of the wire gates, leaving the smell of perpetual burning.

  McKinney unlocked the door of Cell 6 and let Paul Denyer out for the first time since he had been processed. Denyer walked quickly to the black iron gate, clutched at the mesh and started to cry in a high-pitched whine as soon as he saw Sharon in the interview area across the corridor.

  Though he rarely observed interviews, Colin McKinney decided that this one would be worth sitting in on, so he told the prisoner that he would wait and listen from the next room, which was connected to the corridor by yet more mesh. From his vantage point, he could see both Denyer and his girlfriend.

  Denyer continued crying until Sharon spoke in a quiet but sharp voice, 'Don't cry Paul. I'm not here to listen to your blubbering. I want some answers.'

  McKinney was surprised at her tone. She sounded a bit like a mother talking to a sulking child.

  Denyer stopped crying immediately.

  'Are you all right now?' she asked. 'I want some answers.'

  Denyer stood silently before his girlfriend while she continued in a business-like voice, 'I want to know, did you kill them, who you killed and where you killed them and why.'

  In the adjoining room, Colin McKinney grabbed a piece of paper and began writing down what both of them were saying. He knew that Denyer had confessed to the murders to the homicide detectives, but he figured that the killer might make further admissions to his girlfriend. He didn't want to miss anything. Sharon Johnson sounded determined to get answers.

  'What about the girl Elizabeth? Did you go out to kill her or did you go to your mum's?' she demanded.

  'I went to Mum's and did it on the way home.' Denyer sounded like a child admitting to stealing lollies from the milk bar.

  'What about the one in the car? Did you wait for her?' Sharon fired her questions faster than McKinney could write them.

  'No, she went into the milk bar. I told the truth. I told them everything.'

  'Did they have any evidence?' Sharon wanted outside corroboration. Paul had lied to her before; he could be lying again.

  'My hands,' Denyer said, showing her the cuts that she had already seen.

  'Was there anything at the unit?' she demanded.

  'Knives.'

  'Were they ours?'

  'The one I put the tape around.'

  'The pocket knife of yours, you chucked it near the service station?'

  'Yes.'

  'Why did you kill them and not rape them?' she asked.

  'Anger, I got off.'

  'What happened with the third one? Did you slice her throat?' Sharon wanted the details.

  'Yes,' Paul admitted, starting to cry again, in what Colin McKinney considered to be a self-pitying way.

  'Don't start crying,' Sharon ordered. 'How did you clean your clothes?' Sharon knew that Paul did most of their washing at her mother's.

  'In the bath at home. I washed them.'

  'Was anyone else involved?'

  'No.'

  'How come you never killed me?' she asked, the emotion at last beginning to show in her voice.

  'Because I loved you; I'd never hurt you,' he told her.

  'Were you going to keep killing?'

  'Possibly. I need help.'

  'You wanted help, didn't you?' her tone became gentle.

  'Yes.'

  'How come you went for two blonds and not brunettes?' Sharon had blond hair.

  Denyer muttered something that Sergeant McKinney couldn't hear and then Sharon asked Paul why he did it.

  Denyer didn't answer. She repeated her question and still he didn't answer her.

  'That's why you were late picking me up. Your car didn't break down.' Sharon was finally beginning to piece together the events and the realisation came to her that the previous Friday when Paul said his car broke down, he had actually been murdering Natalie Russell.

  'Did you kill because you are afraid of dying? You wanted to see someone else die to see what it was like - didn't you?'

  Paul replied, 'Yes, I've always been curious. I'm a serial killer. I've got a problem.'

  McKinney watched through the mesh as Sharon told Paul that even though she didn't agree with what he had done, she still loved him. McKinney thought he heard her say something about God forgiving Paul, but he wasn't sure.

  Finally, when Sharon Johnson had run out of questions, she said, 'I've got some bad news for you.'

  McKinney wondered to himself what possible news could seem bad to a man already charged with three murders and probably facing a life term in prison.

  'I think I'm pregnant,' she said.

  Denyer immediately broke down and wept again.

  'I'll keep it,' she assured her boyfriend who continued to cry.

  When the visit was over, Colin McKinney escorted Denyer back to his cell. This time when he locked the door on his prisoner he did so with a strong feeling of anger.

  It seemed to McKinney that Denyer had absolutely no idea of the consequences of his actions in killing the three young women. The sergeant walked around and led Sharon back to the office. He was curious about her. She seemed so unlike other women who came in to visit their partners. Some of the women he had seen were so distraught that they were incapable of sensible conversation. Sharon was different.

  In the office, McKinney asked her if she had suspected anything and Sharon told him that she had questioned Paul when Donna Vane's cats had been slaughtered. Paul denied killing them but she had been suspicious enough to ask.

  Sharon told McKinney that she and Paul had often discussed the murders, every time the murders were featured on the television. She said that after each one, she had asked Paul what he had been doing on the night.

  After Debbie Fream went missing, Sharon said that Paul's face had been covered in scratches and that when she had come home from work, he had been sitting on a lounge room chair with a piece of coat hanger wire. Paul told her that he had tried to kill himself by scratching at his face. McKinney asked if she thought that was strange and Sharon merely shrugged.

  As Sharon left the watch house, McKinney was aware of feeling a certain anger towards the young woman too. Even if she didn't know that her boyfriend was the killer, she had plenty of occasions to make an educated guess: Paul Denyer walking the streets of Langwarrin the night that Elizabeth Stevens was murdered; scratched after Debbie Fream went missing; and cut after Natalie Russell's murder; his car 'broken down' on the days of the second and third murders; and his frequent talking about the murders. But perhaps the wisdom of hindsight was too much to ask.

  When McKinney left work that night, he was sitll thinking about Paul Denyer. He'd seen hundreds of hardened criminals at the watch house, but Denyer was different. He was so calm and unaffected by his situation. He didn't seem to care about being locked up. He showed no signs of remorse or sorrow - the only emotion he had shown was during Sharon's visit and even then, it seemed that he was only sorry for himself.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

  The girl he wouldn't kill

  Two days later, Sharon Johnson returned to the Frankston police station to give a further statement. She told the officer taking her statement that she had been confused, tired and upset when she had spoken to police on Saturday. She explained that she had now begun to think more clearly and had remembered things that she couldn't think of when she was first interviewed. The fact that Paul had confessed to the killings made her connect events in the last couple of months.

  'I remember telling the police about the night Paul met me at Kananook Railway Station. I can't remember the date but I know it was a Thursday. When I got off the train - I'm not quite sure if it was the same night we saw the police there - I met Paul on the platform. Paul always used to meet me o
n the platform. I walked up to Paul and straight away I saw Paul had scratches on his face. The scratches were everywhere, I think mainly on the right hand side of his face. They were extremely fresh as if he had just cut himself. There wasn't just like two or three, there were heaps of marks and scratches. There were some going down his face. They weren't all going down his face, they were all over the place. I would say they were like random, not specific. There was a big circular red spot in his ear. It was like a cut or something, just red like blood. It looked deep and I think it was either just on the edge of his ear or just inside. There were quite a few scratches on his forehead. His hair covered them but when I moved his hair back, that's when I saw them.'

  Sharon explained that they 'looked all bloody.' She had asked Paul what had happened.

  'Paul said that he must have got them from Trish's clothes line because there was some wire hanging down. Trish lives in the block of units and her clothes line was at the back of the block of units. He said when he was walking around the back of the units, he had got caught on the wire. Then he said when he walked back around he got caught on the wire again. I said to him that I couldn't believe that he would get caught by the same wire twice and that he must be lying.'

  Paul denied lying but Sharon still hadn't believed him. She told the officers that the scratches hadn't looked like they had been made by wire. There had been too many of them.

  'I kept on his back about it and told him to tell the truth. I thought he had been in a fight or something like that and didn't want to tell me about it. I kept whinging at him about how he got the scratches but he just kept saying the same thing. Paul started to get annoyed with me so I eased off asking him questions.'

  Sharon said the following evening they both had dinner at her mother's house and her mother had also asked Paul about the scratches. Paul had explained that he had scratched himself on a coat hanger on the clothes line. Sharon had confronted him about the change to his story. Sharon had kept up her tirade until her mother had given her a look to make her ease off.