November 22, 2024 • 54 mins
Police Commissioner Karen Webb and her top Homicide detectives come under fire.
Bronwyn’s brother, Andy Read, calls out a lack of effort, urgency and competence in the police investigations of his sister’s case, which has been hopelessly bungled all the way back to 1993. Commissioner Webb and her top Homicide detective Danny Doherty look uncomfortable and unwilling to talk about a case which has embarrassed detectives for three decades.
Jon insists that Bronwyn went back to the house in Sandstone Crescent about six weeks after her disappearance, yet nobody saw her. Jon says Bronwyn left behind a Medicare cheque – and he says she must have signed it.
Jon adds that Bronwyn took two bags of her own clothing as well as a pair of Jon’s jeans. It’s proof of life, according to Jon. Andy, Megan and Kim ridicule his claims. The signature on the cheque appears to be a crude forgery.
Read more about this case and see photographs, maps, timelines and more at bronwynpodcast.com.
If you have information which may help solve this cold case, you can – contact our team confidentially by emailing bronwyn@theaustralian.com.au
If you need support, Lifeline can be reached on 13 11 14.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Listeners are advised that this podcast series Bromwin contains course
language and adult themes. This podcast series is brought to
you by Me Headley Thomas and The Australian. I'm just
(00:42):
going to merge this call with Karina. Okay, Karna Berger.
You heard her, she found the handset timetable. All right, eh, yep, yep, Hey,
Kaarina you're there.
Speaker 2 (00:54):
Yeah, I'm here Headley and.
Speaker 3 (00:56):
He's on the line.
Speaker 1 (00:56):
He's very grateful that you found that timetable.
Speaker 4 (01:00):
How Annie, thank you for your diligence forwarding that document.
Speaker 2 (01:04):
Well, that's my pleasure. That's a privileged to be helping
your family.
Speaker 5 (01:08):
That's been fantastic the help we've been getting.
Speaker 2 (01:11):
Well, they's community detectives.
Speaker 4 (01:13):
Hello, I'm seening you a couple of peaks horror up
the ladder than the fleece.
Speaker 1 (01:18):
The day before the release of this episode, Bromman's brother
Andy Reid, hinted at some of his frustration over the
failure of police over many years to give just as
much chance in this case. We were on a call
with Karina Berger, an experienced lawyer who has been giving
her time and expertise to help this podcast investigation into
(01:39):
Bromwin's suspected murder thirty one years ago. Karina and many
other listeners who have become deeply invested in Bronwan are
making a powerful difference. In Episode fifteen, Kaarina's discovery of
a May nineteen ninety three official timetable for Answered Australia
supported our suspicions that John has misled police with his
(02:02):
claims of having made two long distance telephone calls from
the house in Sandstone Crescent shortly before Bromwin disappeared. It
now appears likely that John was in a jet high
above Australia's eastern seaboard when those calls were made, probably
by Bromwin. Another stitch in a pattern of what looks
(02:22):
like interwoven deceits, another apparent example of a failure by
previous police investigations to thoroughly check all the relevant claims
made by someone who has always emphatically denied having murdered
his estranged wife. Words like frustration and disappointment do not
do justice to Andy's view of how police have handled
(02:45):
his sister's case since nineteen ninety three. At times his
emotions boil over and I hear a powerful anger. He
is buoyed that this podcast series and the remarkable efforts
of listeners have produced new leeds and witnesses.
Speaker 4 (03:02):
Joe Putlick and people are quite better at finding things
out and frame more diligen on what they are as
so frustrated.
Speaker 1 (03:12):
But it is a double edged sword because Andy is
sure that his involvement with the podcast has meant that
the new South Wales Unsolved Homicide Units, Detective Inspector Nigel
Warren and other detectives are more wary of Andy telling
him nothing. Just before the Bromwin series started, Andy met
(03:32):
Senior Police with his wife Michelle. The detectives told him
that they would not be able to advance their cold
case investigation without new evidence. That position appears to have
changed with the public interest and revelations in this series.
Detectives flew from Sydney to cool and Gatter to take
(03:53):
a statement from Judy Singh after her revelations in episode
seven about seeing John and what Judy believed was a
body in the back of the Ford Falcon. Detectives have
also taken statements from Judy's friend Kerry McLain and from
Bromwin's neighbor and friend, Virginia Bevers and Inspector Warren has
sought from me and my employer, The Australian, a number
(04:15):
of documents and files, including all of my interviews with
those women. We have provided these. For all we know,
Inspector Warren and the unit's detectives are independently uncovering important
information away from the spotlight and diligently preparing a brief
of evidence to present to the Office of the Director
(04:35):
of Public Prosecutions, the same office which in two thousand
and three rejected a senior coroner's recommendation that John Winfield
should be prosecuted over Bromwin's alleged murder. Andy Reid, however,
still dumbfounded by the hopelessness of the early investigations into
Bromwin's disappearance, is not convinced. He tells me that he
(04:58):
sometimes feels like he is having to alert detectives to
what's going on and lobby them to do their job.
The day before the release of this episode, Andy and
I spoke again. The head of the homicide squad, Danny Doherty,
was at a media conference today with the Police Commissioner
for New South Wales, Karen Webb, and there was a
(05:19):
question from one of my colleagues at The Australian about
Bromin's case. She cleared the rostrum so that he could
talk about it. Danny Doherty stepped up.
Speaker 6 (05:31):
What was his response just in relation time ongoing bronwin podcast?
What's going on with the John Winfield investigation and what
is the force doing in response to the revelations?
Speaker 7 (05:43):
Response in terms of for that matter, that's on investigation
as current investigation and it's well documented.
Speaker 5 (05:49):
There's a podcast in Israel following that story.
Speaker 7 (05:53):
But in terms of the unsold term they have that investigation,
it's current and that's oncoming. Is there any updated all
that we probably read about in an Australia or listened on
the podcast? However, we can't comment on white investignations currents
in terms of why wasn't mister Winfield charged as the
coroner recommended it all those years ago.
Speaker 5 (06:12):
Let's talk about it already.
Speaker 7 (06:13):
I went to the DVP and at this stage in
sufficient evidence to charge any person.
Speaker 5 (06:18):
The strengths will for the role.
Speaker 1 (06:22):
They're obviously playing their cards pretty close to their chest.
Speaker 4 (06:26):
When I'd been messaging Nigel and I was getting those
responses of sorry, I'm not able to disclose anything at
this present time. We will be in touch when we
are in a position, I want to reach out to
him to say, well, who's following, what are you up
to date with what's going on. We had all revelations
(06:49):
regarding the flight inventories and all the rest of it,
and I'm pretty sure that he didn't even know about it.
When I first disclosed about the historical fight records and
all the rest of it, where knocking down doors, breaking barriers,
coming up with you info, he was taken aback by it.
He wasn't aware of any of them. That's when I
(07:12):
pressed him further and then he had to disclose that.
From all the way back at episode seven, Judy, seeing
they still haven't got any official statement from New Zealand.
Speaker 1 (07:29):
From the doctor who corroborated Duty's account of going to
the Byron Bay Police station, correct, how do you feel
about how the police are performing?
Speaker 4 (07:40):
I just can't believe that they can be so slow
on this matter. We've got something that's a major podcast
that's breaking down all sorts of barriers and coming up
with all sorts of information. I don't believe that there
is anyone that is directly involved with Broman's case that
he's up to date.
Speaker 1 (08:02):
It's just bizarre that you've got to tell them what's
already been broadcast to hundreds of thousands of people.
Speaker 5 (08:07):
Bizarre, absolutely bizarre.
Speaker 1 (08:09):
My theory is that they handled this.
Speaker 4 (08:14):
That Paulie and that badly originally that I feel either
they're embarrassed or they don't want it out there in
the limelight. I can't believe that they're not acting on
anything to your knowledge.
Speaker 1 (08:29):
They could be doing things behind the scenes that we're
not aware of. It is beyond dispute now in my
view that the original investigation of bromwin Winfield's disappearance in
nineteen ninety three was utterly abysmal, just like the appalling
early police investigations of wife killer Chris Dawson, who murdered
his wife Lynn in nineteen eighty two. Dawson got away
(08:53):
with it for four decades. In twenty eighteen, New South
Wales Police, under the then Commission Mick Fuller, helped make amends.
His detectives ran a very thorough, painstaking investigation led by
Daniel Poole. Mick Fuller kept close tabs on the Dawson investigation.
(09:14):
He stood up to respond to media questions about it.
He publicly admitted the failure of police to handle it
with professionalism in the first decade, and he repeatedly pledged
the police force's determination to solve the crime. Fuller did
not disclose any operational details that would have been improper,
(09:35):
but he was proactive. He showed leadership and a steely resolve.
By contrast, Fuller's successor, Commissioner Karen Webb, has been completely
silent on Bromin's case.
Speaker 3 (09:48):
She wanted nothing to do with it.
Speaker 1 (09:50):
When the questions were asked in a media conference the
day before this episode, the most senior homicide detective in
the state, Danny Doherty, had next nothing to say. That's
very poor form in my view, how do they think
families like Bromwin's should feel With performances like those, It
(10:10):
is easy to understand why Andy Reid and Bromwin's relatives
and friends believe they are being treated shabbily again by police,
and at the highest levels this time, and why Andy's
dead sister, a mother of two girls, is not getting
the top level attention that she has always deserved. There
(10:54):
is a striking feature in all of the evidence and
information from John For me, It is the sketchiness of
the information. It is the banal generality weaved around, an
absence of detail and the lack of expression of concern
for Bromlin's welfare. Bromin was the mother of John's biological
(11:15):
child Lauren, the mother of John's stepdaughter Crystal, and the
stepmother of John's daughter Jodi. Bromwin must have been his
soulmate for some of the years they were together in
a de facto relationship, and then as husband and wife,
John and Bromwin were obviously estranged and she wanted a divorce.
(11:39):
The marriage was finished. Half of all married couples deal
with this, but it is an extraordinary event when a
young mother completely vanishes five years later. Feelings of remorse
and genuine concern for the woman's welfare would surely be
present for an estranged husband notwithstand the tensions in the
(12:01):
original separation. Five years is the time between Bromwin's disappearance
and John's interview in the Baroner police station. It is
a long time to reflect on the complete absence of
the most significant person in the lives of your young children.
John's presentation in the police interview, however, is cold to
(12:25):
Glenn Taylor, John presents as indifferent to Bromin's whereabouts or fate,
and perhaps it is because, in John's version, the missing
woman to whom he was still legally married, the mother
who had planned to drop her two girls at school
in Lennox Head on the Monday morning, is still alive.
In the previous episode, you heard John being specifically asked
(12:48):
about this by Glenn Taylor in that upstairs interview room
near the Richmond River in nineteen ninety eight. Do you
think your wife might be deceased?
Speaker 8 (12:59):
No, No, no reason for me to think that way.
Speaker 1 (13:03):
So you think she's somewhere in this country under another identity?
Speaker 8 (13:08):
Well, well, I mean I'll tell you the truth. I
reckon I could go anywhere alike and assume another identity.
I don't see why anyone else can't. I mean, it
wouldn't be hard.
Speaker 1 (13:23):
In the transcript of the only formal interview John has
done with police in the thirty one years since Bromin vanished,
something else is clear. The sketchiness in John's story about
Bromlin after her May sixteen disappearance rises to a level
of detail in some crucially important ways, and with the
(13:44):
existence of an actual document. It is when John is
describing some very unusual circumstances surrounding what has become known
as the Medicare check. You heard a small part of
this in the previous episode.
Speaker 8 (14:00):
We went to Sydney again for two weeks and it
was during that two weeks that she came back, took
clothes and left a Medicare check.
Speaker 1 (14:10):
Let's take a few moments to explain what exactly the
Medicare check is or was. In nineteen ninety three, when
Australians like Bromwyn Winfield went to see the doctor, the
federal government picked up most and sometimes all of the
bill through a system known as Medicare. A reserve bank
check would be issued in the name of the payee,
(14:33):
the treating doctor. It must have been a frustrating process
at times for medical practitioners because the check would be
sent by the Federal government or Medicare to the address
of the patient in this case Bromwyn, and it would
be then up to the patient to physically take the
check to the doctor the payee.
Speaker 3 (14:53):
The doctor could then present.
Speaker 1 (14:55):
The Medicare check at the bank and when the check cleared,
the funds would be posited into the doctor's account. In
the case of this particular Medicare check, the amount was
forty dollars and eighty cents.
Speaker 3 (15:09):
I'm looking at a.
Speaker 1 (15:10):
Photocopy of the check. There is capitalized black type for
the paye that's written as doctor F Initial G.
Speaker 3 (15:19):
Hughes.
Speaker 1 (15:20):
The date on the check is May one, nineteen ninety three.
Speaker 3 (15:25):
There is a.
Speaker 1 (15:25):
Medicare logo in the top left hand corner, and the
other detail written on the check comes under the heading reference.
It states simply Missus b Winfield five Stroke forty two
Byron Street, Lennox Head. Of course, that's the address of
the townhouse owned by Shirley Taylor, the one which Bromwin
started renting in March when she and the girls moved
(15:47):
out of the Sandstone Crescent House, and where John changed
a lock so that her keys would not let her
get back in.
Speaker 3 (15:55):
For completeness, is.
Speaker 1 (15:56):
John earlier in his interview with Glenn Taylor mentioning doctor
Hughes the paye for the Medicare check. She reckons.
Speaker 8 (16:05):
She told me just before we separated that she had
a nervous breakdown in the January of nineteen ninety three,
all right, and I said to her, you know, what's
a nervous breakdown? I've heard of it, but can you
tell me what it is? You know, I sort of
didn't understand, but she reckoned. She had a nervous breakdown
(16:26):
and she went to see the doctor in Lenox I
don't know if it was doctor Watson or doctor Hughes.
I don't know which one it was.
Speaker 1 (16:35):
Later Glen Taylor would go to see the doctors bromwin
was known to have consulted, and nobody had any record
or recollection of treatment of bromin for a nervous breakdown.
A voice actor will read the brief statement which doctor
Francis Hughes signed on September seven, nineteen ninety eight, at
(16:56):
the Lenox Head Medical Center, where his clinic was situated.
Speaker 9 (17:00):
My age is seventy seven. I hold the degrees of
Bachelor of Medicine, Bachelor of Surgery, and Bachelor of Arts
and Obstetrics. I graduated from the University of Dublin, Ireland
in nineteen forty seven. On the fifteenth of April nineteen
ninety three, I saw Bronwyn Winfield at my surgery at
(17:23):
the Lennox Head Medical Center. She informed me that she
thought she might have AIDS and requested to be sent
for a blood test. She also informed me that she
was separated from her husband and that he was waking
her up several times at night and she was very tired.
She didn't elaborate any further in relation to this at
(17:46):
the time to my knowledge, and I don't recall asking
her anything further about her domestic matters. I arranged for
her to have a blood test on the twenty first
of April nineteen ninety three. Her blood test results were
received at my surgery, which revealed a negative result. I
(18:07):
do not recall whether she checked up on her test results,
but most people checked by telephoning the surgery a couple
of days later. I do not make a note on
the person's file of whether they have inquired or not.
I did not make any comment on her file as
to her manner or demeanor during that appointment. I have
not seen Bronwyn Winfield since that appointment on the fifteenth
(18:30):
of April nineteen ninety three.
Speaker 1 (18:33):
Before returning to the mystery surrounding the Medicare check, I'll
try to summarize two matters that come out of the
statement of doctor Hughes. His assertion that broman had told
him that her estranged husband, John was waking her up
several times at night, resulting in fatigue. Is similar to
disclosures by Bromman to others that John was telephoning at
(18:56):
all times and harassing her. Here's Bromwin's cousin and good friend,
Megan Reed, speaking to me at her home on Sydney's
Northern Beaches.
Speaker 10 (19:07):
I'd be on the phone talking to her at her
flat when she moved into Bayron Street and you here
screaming outside, let me let me. And she actually tore
the phone off the wall at Montboy to something.
Speaker 1 (19:23):
And Bronwyn's sister Kim Marshall.
Speaker 11 (19:26):
I was even on the phone when he was banging
on the Brewers down at the Fats.
Speaker 1 (19:33):
The reference by doctor Hughes to Bromwin's blood test for
HIV and the negative result has a longer tail. Bromwin
was worried about sexually transmitted disease. She believed that John
had been seeing someone else. I'm not aware of evidence
to confirm this belief. John was not asked about extramarital
(19:56):
relationships during his interview with Detective Taylor. That Bromwin had
been worried about HIV or aides as it was more
commonly known in nineteen ninety three for a couple of years.
Speaker 12 (20:09):
I joined the Lenox Heead Medical Center in April nineteen
ninety and have seen Bronwyn Winfield thirteen times for general
medical care.
Speaker 1 (20:18):
She went to see doctor Susan Mitchell in February nineteen
ninety one in what was described as a highly agitated state.
Speaker 12 (20:27):
Presented highly agitated and requested that this consultation be kept
separate to our usual family group record. She said that
the woman John had had an affair with six years previously,
leading to an earlier marital.
Speaker 2 (20:40):
Separation, had been confirmed.
Speaker 12 (20:42):
HIV positive blood was collected and returned HIV negatives.
Speaker 1 (20:49):
February nineteen ninety one must have been a particularly difficult.
Speaker 3 (20:53):
Time in Bromwin's adult life.
Speaker 1 (20:56):
It was just nine days after she had an abortion,
which doctor Mitchell had helped arrange with a referral to
another doctor. The abortion occurred in the twelfth week of
Bromwin's pregnancy. Bromwin's blood test for HIV in February nineteen
ninety one was, of course negative, and it was negative
(21:16):
in April nineteen ninety three too, when she went to
see doctor Francis Hughes. Bronwyn was in good physical health
when she vanished. Now, Medicare's payments system is much more
advanced now and hardly anyone uses bank checks anymore. John
appeared definite in his nineteen ninety eight interview with Glenn
(21:40):
Taylor that the Medicare check had been signed by Bromwin.
John also appeared definite that the check was not in
the kitchen of the house in Sandstone Crescent when John
returned to the house from Sydney on the evening of Sunday,
May sixteenth, nineteen ninety three, the last time Bromwann was
seen and confirmed to be alive. The Medicare check, according
(22:05):
to John, was not there when he returned to the
house from Sydney again on about May twenty seven, after
some ten days away in Sydney. John's version is that
when he went to Sydney with Crystal and Lauren over
their school holidays in July, Bronwyn came back. On his version,
(22:26):
she must have slipped quietly back into the house. She
must have taken some clothing from the house when she
left again, and thoughtfully. On John's version, Bromwin must have
signed the Medicare check which was payable to doctor Hughes,
but less thoughtfully Bromwyn left the check in the kitchen
for John to deal with. In my view, John's evidence
(22:50):
around the Medicare check, evidence which John spoke to Bromin's
family and friends about in nineteen ninety three and to
police in nineteen ninety eight when he was relying on
it as proof of life for Bromwin, is some of
the most damaging evidence against John because none of it
makes rational sense. And that's before we talk about the
(23:13):
signature purportedly Bronwin's signature, which is suspiciously very different to
her Nolan signature.
Speaker 3 (23:21):
Here's deb Hall and Murray Nolan.
Speaker 13 (23:24):
Because I remember this conversation in July of that year.
John had been in Sydney and said, did I had
I seen Bromwin during the school holidays in the July
school holidays? And I said no, why And he said, well,
she's been back to the house. See what do you
mean because when? And he said, oh, she's been here.
(23:45):
And I said, Pat, do you know that?
Speaker 5 (23:46):
John?
Speaker 4 (23:47):
Oh?
Speaker 13 (23:47):
Well, if I had all these bags of clothes in
the garage and half of them have gone, and there's
a Medicare check being left on the table, and I went, Nah, no,
you know, I'm saying this.
Speaker 2 (24:00):
I can't believe that, John. When did she come back?
Speaker 1 (24:02):
Nobody saw her, nobody heard her.
Speaker 2 (24:04):
How did she get here?
Speaker 13 (24:06):
And why would she not come and tell anybody she's
the back. Oh, she's definitely bet in here, you kept
saying to me, because he went to Sydney in those
July holidays with the kids to get these bags of clothes,
which we found out through Andrew were put in this
little manhole that's twelk foot off the ground to get
up to that manhole to get the bags. How did
she know the clothes were in there? It doesn't make sense.
(24:28):
It's not logical. And not only that, how did she
carry all these bags on her own? We would have
heard something. Murray was home that time during the day.
Was he still recovering from his back injury so he
couldn't work because he was working as a build up.
Speaker 2 (24:40):
I was at work and I certainly didn't see her.
Speaker 13 (24:42):
And if she'd come back at night, surely we would
have hurt some commotion or.
Speaker 4 (24:45):
Something up there.
Speaker 2 (24:47):
You would have heard the garage door goer.
Speaker 13 (24:48):
Because it was a noisy garage anyway, on Saturday when
we were talking about that.
Speaker 2 (24:52):
Again, had bindly dawned on me and I said, well,
how did she get in?
Speaker 13 (24:56):
Because he had the keys in Sydney, and if she's
come back during that time when he wasn't there, I
don't know how she would have got in.
Speaker 1 (25:03):
We know that back on Friday May fourteen, nineteen ninety three,
when Bromin was distressed at being unable to get back
into her own home, she called a locksmith out to
Sandstone Crescent.
Speaker 3 (25:16):
Murray explains it this way, when.
Speaker 1 (25:19):
The Barron locksmith come there and cut her a key
for the front door on the Briday night.
Speaker 5 (25:25):
But they would have just cut one key just to
get her in. They wouldn't have tout two keys. That
is my feury in right from when.
Speaker 13 (25:33):
Actually had the old keys to the house, but she'd
had the feet of the deadlock that John put on
in the Joy school holiday.
Speaker 5 (25:40):
She's apparently come back to the house.
Speaker 2 (25:42):
Well, if he's saying that she'd come back in, so
there's that way she had.
Speaker 3 (25:46):
A couldie how'd she get in?
Speaker 1 (25:49):
John spoke to a number of people about Bromman's purported
visit to the house with a Medicare check. The recollections
of those people are good now. They must have been
even better many years ago when their recollections were put
into police statements during Glenn Taylor's investigation from nineteen ninety
eight and then during George Radmore's cold case review for
(26:13):
the Unsolved Homicide Unit in two thousand and nine and ten.
Speaker 3 (26:18):
Here's Megan reading from one of her statements.
Speaker 14 (26:21):
I distinctly remember John ringing me after riding home and
supposedly finding that Bronwin had returned to the house while
he'd been in Sydney. John was very excited, relieved and elated,
and he stated, guess what. I've just walked into the
house and Bronwin has been home. It's good news. She's okay.
She has left a medicare check which wasn't there before
(26:43):
I left, and taken some photos of the children. She
must have a boyfriend because she's taken a pair of
jeans and a jumper of mine. I actually said to him,
well where is she? He said, well, she's obviously got
a new man, because my jeans and jumper are missing.
Thought that this was suspicious as it did not make sense,
(27:03):
and I thought that he had orchestrated the whole thing.
I also thought it was ridiculous that she would leave
a Medicare check yet still not touch any of her
own bank accounts.
Speaker 1 (27:14):
There are other fundamental problems with John's evidence about Brommin's
purported return to the house in July nineteen ninety three
and her alleged signing of the Medicare check. Will go
through these, but were those problems given a pass by
detectives Graham Diskin and Wayne Temby in nineteen ninety three
(27:36):
because of the misreading of the time of a call
on the Sandstone Crescent telephone bill and as a result,
a misguided belief that Bromwin actually went back to the
house in the early hours of Monday, May seventeen to
use a home phone to check lotto results at two
thirteen in the morning. Here's Glenn Taylor in one of
(27:59):
my meetings with him and lennox Head. They believe that
she'd come back to the house.
Speaker 15 (28:05):
During our reinvestigation and looking at the telephone bill, we
quickly established that it wasn't two thirteen am.
Speaker 1 (28:11):
It was two thirteen pm, and it was the day before.
Speaker 15 (28:15):
It was the afternoon just prior to her disappearance some
weeks later, and the running shirts indicated this. John Winfield
contacted the police, the detectives at that time that we're
looking into the matter and said Roma must have been
back at the house because there's been a Medicare check.
(28:39):
It was addressed to a local doctor, and those were
the days where the lock of the patient goes to
her doctor and then Nedicare would send a check made
parable to the doctor and then the patient pays the
difference of the bill. This particular check was addressed to
a local doctor at Lenox Head, but it or a
(29:00):
signature which should have been a signature for the doctor.
Speaker 1 (29:03):
It had a signature allegedly rom wingfel on the check.
Speaker 3 (29:07):
Just to reflect on that for a moment.
Speaker 1 (29:10):
The check should not have been signed by anyone other
than the payee, doctor Hughes, but a signature which does
not look like Bromwin's signature appeared on that check. Bromwin
regularly saw doctors for herself and her daughters. She dealt
with the Medicare system. It is highly unlikely in my view,
(29:32):
that she would have erroneously believed that she needed to
sign the check. John didn't deal with those administrative things
while Bromwin was his partner. So John declared, look, she's
lean back to the house. She's left a check here
that she.
Speaker 15 (29:49):
Signed was on the table that wasn't here before. And
also she's taken some clothes and she's even taken one
pair of my jeans. So he was trying to indicate
to the He looked, she's very much alive and she's
gone on some extended holiday without contacting the children.
Speaker 1 (30:07):
Here are Michelle and Dandy at their home in the Shire.
Speaker 4 (30:11):
Clarity for me time when he made that phone call
after the school holidays, we only briefly saw the girls
in him on that trip. I believe he stayed out
at his brother Pete and Louise out in Ingodoon, then
returned home to Lennox, to the Sandstone Crescent and he
made a phone call and he said, I've just got
(30:34):
back to the house.
Speaker 1 (30:36):
Bromwin must have been here.
Speaker 4 (30:38):
There's a Medicare check on the bench, and there's two
bags of clothes missing. I remember having that conversation with him,
and I just remember hanging the phone up and I
turned around her. I just looked at Michelle and I
just saw it straight out to myself the bus has
done something that was just clarity straightaway as soon as
(30:59):
that phone call, none of it made sense.
Speaker 1 (31:02):
Did he know that you suspected him over Broman's disappearance
at the early days.
Speaker 4 (31:10):
I think he knew that a minute he hung up
the phone making that phone call all the way back
in July because of the way you spoke to him. Well,
I'm one hundred percent sure I sent you with that
phone called. That just doesn't make sense. Why would she
sneak back into the house while you're away and not
she Debbi next door and tell her and tell someone
in Lenny's head that she's okay?
Speaker 1 (31:31):
What are you thinking?
Speaker 4 (31:33):
I still remember this day hanging up the phone and
turned around at Michelle and just gone that start right.
Speaker 3 (31:39):
No way in the world.
Speaker 1 (31:41):
Why would she sign a check that doesn't need signing?
Speaker 16 (31:43):
Yeah, and she worked in a beat in younger times.
She knew she wasn't silly with checks and naturing you
people didn't sign their own Medicare check. Feasibly that check
was sent to that dress steps on there, which was
Byron's and could possibly have been inside the handbait.
Speaker 1 (32:04):
Well, once you've started.
Speaker 4 (32:06):
Thinking there's a bit of hoot on me here, magically,
go back home, produce this check. That could have been
in the house the whole time. We don't know, but
it could have been in the house the whole time.
Magically produced this check. The police believe that that's a
forward signature.
Speaker 3 (32:23):
Who signed it?
Speaker 4 (32:24):
The bags have closed, he refers to he actually put
inside the manhole in the roost base. How would Bromin
know to find her bags have closed in the roosts base?
Brombin was always someone that was very, very feminine in ways.
There's no one in the world w sister, I know it.
So there's no way the world mysh sister would have
gone and got a step ladder and bring precariously three
(32:45):
meters or two and a half meters in the air,
trying to meanhandle garbage bags, two garbage bags of clothes
out of a manhole. How would you even know to look?
Speaker 1 (32:53):
Bit? None of it makes sense, mate, none of it.
None of it. Well before the release of the first
(33:22):
episode of Bronwin, Kim Marshall told me that she saw
the Medicare check when she visited Lennox Head in June
nineteen ninety three. Her trip was meant to be a
long overdue catch up with Bromwan. They had been planning
it for some time.
Speaker 17 (33:39):
I spoke to her every day on the phone about
my plane flight, what time my plane would rite, when
I'd be going to hair Expo.
Speaker 2 (33:47):
Then I'd be getting on the Greyhound bus.
Speaker 17 (33:49):
We found the buses out together, what time the bus
would arrive in Ballina. Because I'd never had an adult
experience with Ronnie, it was always as the youngest child
wild but this time it was going to be adopt
to adult, and so we had all these wonderful twoks.
Speaker 11 (34:06):
It's going to be so exciting. I'll be able to
show you all my dresses in my wardrobe.
Speaker 1 (34:12):
When Brommin disappeared, neither Kim nor her mother, Barbara, suspected
that John had been involved in foul play, so Kim
ended up staying in the house with Crystal, Lauren and
John in June, just weeks after Broman's disappearance and shortly
before John took the girls to Sydney for the July
school holidays.
Speaker 11 (34:33):
John saying that Bromin's returned to the house and she
signed it. The whole piece of evidence that it's missing
is that I was in the house at week three
after Bromwin, going straight after the June Long Weekend, I
was there that medi Care check was already there.
Speaker 1 (34:51):
You're saying it's the same check.
Speaker 2 (34:54):
Yes, Yes, they.
Speaker 11 (34:56):
Sent the Mediicare check off to Cottognyard, those people that
look at writing, and they said, yes, give us the letters,
all the actual comparisons of handwriting.
Speaker 3 (35:10):
A month before the.
Speaker 1 (35:11):
First episode of Bromwin, Kim talked to me again about
her observations from nineteen ninety three.
Speaker 3 (35:18):
She understood the potential significance.
Speaker 11 (35:21):
What am I to do with my valuable and precious
information about the Medicare check?
Speaker 2 (35:28):
And I can leave that question with you.
Speaker 11 (35:31):
But this is a question I keep asking Andrew all
the time because my information about the Medicare check, I
believe is crucial and very very serious.
Speaker 1 (35:43):
Okay, let's get your information about the Medicare check on
the record, So just describe.
Speaker 3 (35:50):
It for me please.
Speaker 1 (35:52):
Kim explained that, in her view, previous police investigations, including
the most important one by the detective give Sergeant Glenn Taylor,
had effectively sidelined her. As a result, her first hand
knowledge of the Medicare check had not been put into
a formal statement.
Speaker 11 (36:11):
My voice had not been heard by any of the
police force, nor my brother or my sister in law
being the young girl that I was that lived at
the house in Lennox just after Bromwin was no longer there.
That Medicare check I have cited, I have touched, and
(36:34):
please don't think that I'm a horrible human for sayings
My brother and my sister in law followed the police's
directive orders to keep my mother and myself out of
any type of involvement in Brahmin's missing person case or
the inquest.
Speaker 2 (36:52):
It's just been totally ignored.
Speaker 11 (36:55):
Is it because people are scared that they got it
roll by ignoring my infa before all?
Speaker 1 (37:01):
Right, when you were there in the days and weeks
after Bromman disappeared, Yes, you saw the Medicare check at
the house.
Speaker 2 (37:12):
Yes, and had a conversation in depth with Jonathan about it.
Speaker 3 (37:16):
What did you see and what did you talk to
him about?
Speaker 11 (37:20):
The Medicare check was made out to a provider that
Bromman had gone to for a general visit. It was
the refund check for the payment that in the old
days you had to sign and then mail back to
the practitioner. And so that check was signed and that
(37:42):
check was sitting in full view well before Jonason traveled
down to Sydney with the kids in the school holidays,
where he rang me and a number of other family
members saying, Bromwin's been to the house. There's a Medicare
check on the table, and she's removed a few of
(38:02):
her clothes from the wardrobe, and she's taken a pair
of my genes.
Speaker 1 (38:07):
I just need to clarify a couple of things, Kim.
So the Medicare check was there when you went to
the house after Broman disappeared, correct, But then that means
the Medicare check could have been at the house before
you arrived.
Speaker 2 (38:24):
Correct.
Speaker 11 (38:25):
He's used the Medicare check as a form of evidence
that Broman has returned to the house after I visited
and stayed at the house.
Speaker 2 (38:38):
I actually saw it signed, it was all ready to
go back.
Speaker 11 (38:41):
I have a conversation in detail with Jonason about it
because I love the fact of all the letter writing
that's happened over the years that Rowan's crinching is so beautiful,
like my mother's running writing and my own writing. And
I made the comment as how beautiful all of us
(39:04):
ladies in the family have the most beautiful writing.
Speaker 1 (39:07):
You are confident that Bromin did in fact sign that check. Yes,
now here's the rub. Kim is the first to acknowledge
that she is not a handwriting expert. However, when she
saw the check in June nineteen ninety three, it bore
what appeared to her at the time to be Bromwin's signature,
(39:29):
even though there would have been no reason whatsoever for
Bromwin or anyone other than the payee doctor Hughes to
sign it.
Speaker 3 (39:37):
But put that aside for the time being.
Speaker 1 (39:41):
The key thing about what Kim says is that it
directly contradicts John's version about the check turning up at
the house while John and the girls were in Sydney
over the July school holidays. John's reliance on that check
materializing as a new proof of life of Bromwin being
at the house while John, Crystal and Lauren were away
(40:05):
in July is shot to pieces by kim sighting of
the check in June.
Speaker 18 (40:11):
I know that it was there in the house before
he traveled to Sydney and rang everybody and said, Bromwin's
been in the house and Medicare check has appeared in
the house.
Speaker 2 (40:27):
Next day that the check was there before.
Speaker 1 (40:30):
Okay, let me just be Devil's advocate. Why would he
want to rely on that when he knows that you,
if you were questioned by police, would say, well, that's
not true. It was already signed, and John and I
even talked about it while I was staying there.
Speaker 2 (40:48):
I've been always discounted and dismissed.
Speaker 11 (40:53):
In this instance, it's happened again, and I just don't
understand why it's not.
Speaker 2 (41:00):
A significant piece of evidence.
Speaker 11 (41:03):
I raised the Medicare check to them when I was
actually at the Corona inquest.
Speaker 2 (41:09):
I was very politely just told to go away and
keep quiet. They actually asked me not to attend one
of the days.
Speaker 1 (41:19):
Andy Reid has told me that he remembered Kim coming
to him about her observations of the Medicare check during
the inquest. Andy said that he does not know why
a statement was not taken from Kim then, or earlier
or subsequently. I'm going to look at this again in
(41:39):
upcoming episodes when we go through the evidence and testimony
which unfolded over five days of public hearings at the
two thousand and two inquest in the town of Lismore.
West of Lennox Head. There is some remarkable material in
the transcripts and some very vigorous cross examination of key witnesses.
(42:01):
According to KIM, detectives including George Radmore from the Unsolved
Homicide Unit, who subsequently focused on the forged signature angle
with analysis by expert handwriting examiners at New Scotland Yard
in London, have.
Speaker 11 (42:17):
Gone down the wrong part of investigation and their two
embarrassed to reverse it.
Speaker 1 (42:23):
But in my view, George Radmore and his team of
detectives were diligent and professional in sending multiple documents bearing
Bromwin's signature to handwriting examiners in the United Kingdom. Bromwin's cousin,
Megan Reid, was told about the outcome of that analysis.
Speaker 14 (42:41):
The Scotland Yard said it wasn't persecutor.
Speaker 1 (42:45):
For this podcast series, a respected handwriting expert in Australia,
Taraney Dewhurst, looked at just one sample of Bromwin's known
and confirmed signature and the signature on a very poor
photocopy of the Medicare check. Tarney has helped me with
handwriting analysis in the past. Some listeners will have heard
(43:06):
her voice in the Night Driver series Tarney Dewhurst identified
obvious differences in the two Bronwyn Winfield signatures, which, in
her view, warrant further examination with better quality specimens. Lay
people with no expertise in handwriting analysis can readily see
(43:27):
the differences too. Detectives working with George Radmore on the
case obtained good comparison samples during their cold case review
fourteen years ago of Bromwyn's alleged murder. Why isn't it possible, though, Kim,
that John, for example, if we pick up the police case,
(43:48):
that John did forge Bromwin's signature, and that's what you saw,
and he just did a really.
Speaker 3 (43:53):
Good job of it.
Speaker 11 (43:55):
And he could have because I've got an answer for
that as well, because I could forge it.
Speaker 1 (44:00):
So you're not ruling out that he may have forged it.
Speaker 2 (44:03):
Yes, it's correct, most definitely in preparation for use.
Speaker 11 (44:06):
Definitely. No one's put that question to me. Am I
being ignored because I was young? Am I being ignored
because of the mental health? Am I being ignored because
I'm a female? And they're the questions that I live
with every day for many, many years, and they're destroying.
Speaker 1 (44:24):
Kim Marshall was twenty when the trip she had planned
to lennox Head to spend time with her sister Bromwin
went sideways. If there had been a modern police response
to the disappearance of Bromwin, detectives would have descended on
that house and declared it a possible crime scene. They
would have had scientific officers combing it for evidence, but
(44:46):
instead life went on as if nothing much had changed.
In nineteen ninety three. Kim did not know Bromman with
anything like the kind of familiarity of most siblings.
Speaker 3 (44:59):
They had never together.
Speaker 1 (45:01):
Bromwin did not know of Kim's existence until Kim was four,
but they were looking forward to getting to know each
other better during the June visit, and that is another obvious,
although rarely pressed, reason to doubt that Bromwin would suddenly
up and leave with no explanation to Kim, with whom
she had been talking and planning things in their phone
(45:23):
chats between Hobart and lennox Head. It is hard to
fathom now why Kim's visit went ahead in Bromwin's absence,
as she and John had been separated for seven weeks
before she vanished. Kim sleeping under the same roof as
John in Sandstone Crescent under those bizarre circumstances must have
(45:45):
been weird. It's hard to imagine the introverted John welcoming
bubbly Kim, a younger woman whom he would five years
later call the illegitimate one. As a result of many
conversation and interviews, I'm confident that Bromwin's side of the
family harbored a foreboding about John relatively early, from the
(46:08):
third week of May, when Bromwin neither turned up for
work at Eden's Takeaway nor came back from a so
called break. Perhaps the read family suspicions had not become
so serious as to call off Kim's visit.
Speaker 3 (46:22):
In mid June.
Speaker 11 (46:25):
I wrived ten to fourteen days after she'd lost Yeah,
I demanded to go to the police station.
Speaker 2 (46:31):
When I got there, John waited for me at the
bus stop.
Speaker 11 (46:34):
We went up to the house and I said, I
want to go down to the police station now, and
John took me down straight away, only to the police station.
And I can tell you now, after going through everything,
they have not written down a single thing that I said.
Speaker 2 (46:48):
When only to the police station.
Speaker 11 (46:50):
There's a brief mention from Discan that I had visited
the station, and I don't understand why he didn't take
any notes.
Speaker 1 (47:01):
If the police running sheets are accurate in relation to
Kim stay, she arrived in Lenox on June fourteen.
Speaker 11 (47:09):
As I was living there with John, I became very frightened.
John went to be so early because he'd get away
from me as quick as he could, so I'd be
awake in the house by myself.
Speaker 2 (47:23):
I started searching around the house.
Speaker 11 (47:26):
I'd look at the window, thinking she got a knock
on the window and say here, come here quickly.
Speaker 1 (47:33):
A stay of ten days would have seen Kim say
goodbye to John, Lauren and Crystal. On June twenty four
Kim headed north to Surface Paradise on Queensland's Gold Coast.
The timing fits with the police running sheets noting that
John told police he left Lennox head on June twenty
(47:53):
six for the visit to Sydney with Lauren and Crystal.
Speaker 3 (47:58):
Over the course of this pod cast series, you have.
Speaker 1 (48:01):
Only very briefly heard about Bromwin and Andy's younger half sister, Melissa.
Melissa's mother is Jennifer, who married Andy and Bromman's father, Philip.
Melissa lives in Sydney, and she has been privately following
the podcast very closely. While there has been no contact
(48:22):
between Melissa and Andy and other read relations for many years.
Speaker 3 (48:26):
You are going to hear from Melissa in the.
Speaker 1 (48:29):
Next episode because she is breaking her silence.
Speaker 19 (48:33):
Broma would never have left those girls. Barba left Bromwin
when she was very small. It's not something that Bromlin
would have ever wanted to see happen to her children.
We discussed it, We talked about it had happened to her.
She knew how it felt. She would have taken them
if she disappeared. She would have disappeared with those two
young children by her side.
Speaker 2 (48:52):
She would never left those children.
Speaker 1 (48:57):
Melissa and Bromwin were close. Kim recalled that back in
June nineteen ninety three, Melissa was deeply concerned and she
did not want Kim near John because when.
Speaker 11 (49:10):
She found out I was in the house, she thought
that that was inappropriate and that she needed to check
to see if I was okay. We were telling the
police that we were frightened and suspicious that something was
going on.
Speaker 1 (49:27):
It is impossible to know how many police records and
running sheets from nineteen ninety three have gone missing. I
have not cited one which notes the concerns of Melissa
and Kim from that time. Family tensions and unresolved issues
between Kim and Andy are unfortunately always close to the surface.
Speaker 3 (49:51):
In another interview with Kim, she became.
Speaker 1 (49:53):
Emotional while reflecting on her proximity to John in June
nineteen ninety three.
Speaker 2 (50:00):
Only Andrew put me in that house. He put me
in that house. He made me go up there so
I could have eyes on Jonathan. So now I understand,
and this has nothing to do with everything.
Speaker 20 (50:11):
He knew that Jonathan had done something bad and still
set me up to live in that house. And that's
why Melissa got in the car to come up to
make sure it was safe, because she was the only
one that thought it was the Broxic to do.
Speaker 3 (50:26):
I asked Andy about this, so Andie.
Speaker 1 (50:30):
In one of my conversations with Kim, she becomes quite
distressed because in her mind, she's been asked by you.
Speaker 3 (50:41):
Or you've let her go up there.
Speaker 1 (50:45):
In mid June, so that's a month after Bromins disappeared.
Speaker 4 (50:50):
I didn't actually ask let to go to Lennich Head.
I found out about it very very late. I remember
saying to her or maybe you could possibly find out something.
You could possibly find out some information. Anyone that found
out about it would have been advised you to be
(51:10):
very careful, don't push the wrong buttons, don't go too far.
Speaker 21 (51:14):
She makes the point that she was only twenty and
not very worldly wise, with a bit of reflection, she
was probably potentially put it into some certainly an unusual
situation and possibly a dangerous one.
Speaker 4 (51:30):
Well, with what we know now after the fact, one
hundred percent it was a dangerous thing. Learning more and
more from her friends and finding more and more out,
we were one hundred percent very very suspicious by that stage.
Melissa visited on her way back from being on some
sort of break up in Queensland.
Speaker 1 (51:51):
What do you understand Melissa knew and did when she
discovered that Kim was staying at the house in Lennox head.
Speaker 4 (52:00):
Melissa advised King that she thought it was dangerous to
be at the house when she found out that she
was there, and advised that she should get out of it.
Speaker 1 (52:28):
Brown is written and investigated by me Headley Thomas as
a podcast production for The Australian. If anyone has information
which may help solve this cold case. Please contact me
confidentially by emailing Bronwyn at the Australian dot com dot Au.
(52:48):
You can read more about this case and see a
range of photographs and other artwork at the website bronwynpodcast
dot com. Our subscribers and registered users here episodes first.
The production and editorial team for Bromwin includes Claire Harvey,
Kristin Amiet, Joshua Burton, Bridget, Ryan Bianca, far Marcus, Katie.
Speaker 3 (53:13):
Burns, Liam Mendez, Sean.
Speaker 1 (53:16):
Callen, Matthew Condon and David Murray. Audio production for this
podcast series is by Wasabi Audio and original theme music
by Slade Gibson. We have been assisted by Madison Walsh,
a relation of Bromwin Winfield.
Speaker 3 (53:32):
We can only do this kind of journalism with the.
Speaker 1 (53:34):
Support of our subscribers and our major sponsors like Harvey Norman.
For all of our exclusive stories, videos, maps, timelines and
documents about this podcast and other podcasts including The Teacher's Pet,
The Teachers Trial, The Teachers Accuser, Shandy's Story, Shandy's Legacy,
and The Night Driver, go to the Australian dot com
(53:57):
dot Au and subscribe s
Listeners are advised that this podcast series Bromwin contains course
language and adult themes. This podcast series is brought to
you by Me Headley Thomas and The Australian. I'm just
(00:42):
going to merge this call with Karina. Okay, Karna Berger.
You heard her, she found the handset timetable. All right, eh, yep, yep, Hey,
Kaarina you're there.
Speaker 2 (00:54):
Yeah, I'm here Headley and.
Speaker 3 (00:56):
He's on the line.
Speaker 1 (00:56):
He's very grateful that you found that timetable.
Speaker 4 (01:00):
How Annie, thank you for your diligence forwarding that document.
Speaker 2 (01:04):
Well, that's my pleasure. That's a privileged to be helping
your family.
Speaker 5 (01:08):
That's been fantastic the help we've been getting.
Speaker 2 (01:11):
Well, they's community detectives.
Speaker 4 (01:13):
Hello, I'm seening you a couple of peaks horror up
the ladder than the fleece.
Speaker 1 (01:18):
The day before the release of this episode, Bromman's brother
Andy Reid, hinted at some of his frustration over the
failure of police over many years to give just as
much chance in this case. We were on a call
with Karina Berger, an experienced lawyer who has been giving
her time and expertise to help this podcast investigation into
(01:39):
Bromwin's suspected murder thirty one years ago. Karina and many
other listeners who have become deeply invested in Bronwan are
making a powerful difference. In Episode fifteen, Kaarina's discovery of
a May nineteen ninety three official timetable for Answered Australia
supported our suspicions that John has misled police with his
(02:02):
claims of having made two long distance telephone calls from
the house in Sandstone Crescent shortly before Bromwin disappeared. It
now appears likely that John was in a jet high
above Australia's eastern seaboard when those calls were made, probably
by Bromwin. Another stitch in a pattern of what looks
(02:22):
like interwoven deceits, another apparent example of a failure by
previous police investigations to thoroughly check all the relevant claims
made by someone who has always emphatically denied having murdered
his estranged wife. Words like frustration and disappointment do not
do justice to Andy's view of how police have handled
(02:45):
his sister's case since nineteen ninety three. At times his
emotions boil over and I hear a powerful anger. He
is buoyed that this podcast series and the remarkable efforts
of listeners have produced new leeds and witnesses.
Speaker 4 (03:02):
Joe Putlick and people are quite better at finding things
out and frame more diligen on what they are as
so frustrated.
Speaker 1 (03:12):
But it is a double edged sword because Andy is
sure that his involvement with the podcast has meant that
the new South Wales Unsolved Homicide Units, Detective Inspector Nigel
Warren and other detectives are more wary of Andy telling
him nothing. Just before the Bromwin series started, Andy met
(03:32):
Senior Police with his wife Michelle. The detectives told him
that they would not be able to advance their cold
case investigation without new evidence. That position appears to have
changed with the public interest and revelations in this series.
Detectives flew from Sydney to cool and Gatter to take
(03:53):
a statement from Judy Singh after her revelations in episode
seven about seeing John and what Judy believed was a
body in the back of the Ford Falcon. Detectives have
also taken statements from Judy's friend Kerry McLain and from
Bromwin's neighbor and friend, Virginia Bevers and Inspector Warren has
sought from me and my employer, The Australian, a number
(04:15):
of documents and files, including all of my interviews with
those women. We have provided these. For all we know,
Inspector Warren and the unit's detectives are independently uncovering important
information away from the spotlight and diligently preparing a brief
of evidence to present to the Office of the Director
(04:35):
of Public Prosecutions, the same office which in two thousand
and three rejected a senior coroner's recommendation that John Winfield
should be prosecuted over Bromwin's alleged murder. Andy Reid, however,
still dumbfounded by the hopelessness of the early investigations into
Bromwin's disappearance, is not convinced. He tells me that he
(04:58):
sometimes feels like he is having to alert detectives to
what's going on and lobby them to do their job.
The day before the release of this episode, Andy and
I spoke again. The head of the homicide squad, Danny Doherty,
was at a media conference today with the Police Commissioner
for New South Wales, Karen Webb, and there was a
(05:19):
question from one of my colleagues at The Australian about
Bromin's case. She cleared the rostrum so that he could
talk about it. Danny Doherty stepped up.
Speaker 6 (05:31):
What was his response just in relation time ongoing bronwin podcast?
What's going on with the John Winfield investigation and what
is the force doing in response to the revelations?
Speaker 7 (05:43):
Response in terms of for that matter, that's on investigation
as current investigation and it's well documented.
Speaker 5 (05:49):
There's a podcast in Israel following that story.
Speaker 7 (05:53):
But in terms of the unsold term they have that investigation,
it's current and that's oncoming. Is there any updated all
that we probably read about in an Australia or listened on
the podcast? However, we can't comment on white investignations currents
in terms of why wasn't mister Winfield charged as the
coroner recommended it all those years ago.
Speaker 5 (06:12):
Let's talk about it already.
Speaker 7 (06:13):
I went to the DVP and at this stage in
sufficient evidence to charge any person.
Speaker 5 (06:18):
The strengths will for the role.
Speaker 1 (06:22):
They're obviously playing their cards pretty close to their chest.
Speaker 4 (06:26):
When I'd been messaging Nigel and I was getting those
responses of sorry, I'm not able to disclose anything at
this present time. We will be in touch when we
are in a position, I want to reach out to
him to say, well, who's following, what are you up
to date with what's going on. We had all revelations
(06:49):
regarding the flight inventories and all the rest of it,
and I'm pretty sure that he didn't even know about it.
When I first disclosed about the historical fight records and
all the rest of it, where knocking down doors, breaking barriers,
coming up with you info, he was taken aback by it.
He wasn't aware of any of them. That's when I
(07:12):
pressed him further and then he had to disclose that.
From all the way back at episode seven, Judy, seeing
they still haven't got any official statement from New Zealand.
Speaker 1 (07:29):
From the doctor who corroborated Duty's account of going to
the Byron Bay Police station, correct, how do you feel
about how the police are performing?
Speaker 4 (07:40):
I just can't believe that they can be so slow
on this matter. We've got something that's a major podcast
that's breaking down all sorts of barriers and coming up
with all sorts of information. I don't believe that there
is anyone that is directly involved with Broman's case that
he's up to date.
Speaker 1 (08:02):
It's just bizarre that you've got to tell them what's
already been broadcast to hundreds of thousands of people.
Speaker 5 (08:07):
Bizarre, absolutely bizarre.
Speaker 1 (08:09):
My theory is that they handled this.
Speaker 4 (08:14):
That Paulie and that badly originally that I feel either
they're embarrassed or they don't want it out there in
the limelight. I can't believe that they're not acting on
anything to your knowledge.
Speaker 1 (08:29):
They could be doing things behind the scenes that we're
not aware of. It is beyond dispute now in my
view that the original investigation of bromwin Winfield's disappearance in
nineteen ninety three was utterly abysmal, just like the appalling
early police investigations of wife killer Chris Dawson, who murdered
his wife Lynn in nineteen eighty two. Dawson got away
(08:53):
with it for four decades. In twenty eighteen, New South
Wales Police, under the then Commission Mick Fuller, helped make amends.
His detectives ran a very thorough, painstaking investigation led by
Daniel Poole. Mick Fuller kept close tabs on the Dawson investigation.
(09:14):
He stood up to respond to media questions about it.
He publicly admitted the failure of police to handle it
with professionalism in the first decade, and he repeatedly pledged
the police force's determination to solve the crime. Fuller did
not disclose any operational details that would have been improper,
(09:35):
but he was proactive. He showed leadership and a steely resolve.
By contrast, Fuller's successor, Commissioner Karen Webb, has been completely
silent on Bromin's case.
Speaker 3 (09:48):
She wanted nothing to do with it.
Speaker 1 (09:50):
When the questions were asked in a media conference the
day before this episode, the most senior homicide detective in
the state, Danny Doherty, had next nothing to say. That's
very poor form in my view, how do they think
families like Bromwin's should feel With performances like those, It
(10:10):
is easy to understand why Andy Reid and Bromwin's relatives
and friends believe they are being treated shabbily again by police,
and at the highest levels this time, and why Andy's
dead sister, a mother of two girls, is not getting
the top level attention that she has always deserved. There
(10:54):
is a striking feature in all of the evidence and
information from John For me, It is the sketchiness of
the information. It is the banal generality weaved around, an
absence of detail and the lack of expression of concern
for Bromlin's welfare. Bromin was the mother of John's biological
(11:15):
child Lauren, the mother of John's stepdaughter Crystal, and the
stepmother of John's daughter Jodi. Bromwin must have been his
soulmate for some of the years they were together in
a de facto relationship, and then as husband and wife,
John and Bromwin were obviously estranged and she wanted a divorce.
(11:39):
The marriage was finished. Half of all married couples deal
with this, but it is an extraordinary event when a
young mother completely vanishes five years later. Feelings of remorse
and genuine concern for the woman's welfare would surely be
present for an estranged husband notwithstand the tensions in the
(12:01):
original separation. Five years is the time between Bromwin's disappearance
and John's interview in the Baroner police station. It is
a long time to reflect on the complete absence of
the most significant person in the lives of your young children.
John's presentation in the police interview, however, is cold to
(12:25):
Glenn Taylor, John presents as indifferent to Bromin's whereabouts or fate,
and perhaps it is because, in John's version, the missing
woman to whom he was still legally married, the mother
who had planned to drop her two girls at school
in Lennox Head on the Monday morning, is still alive.
In the previous episode, you heard John being specifically asked
(12:48):
about this by Glenn Taylor in that upstairs interview room
near the Richmond River in nineteen ninety eight. Do you
think your wife might be deceased?
Speaker 8 (12:59):
No, No, no reason for me to think that way.
Speaker 1 (13:03):
So you think she's somewhere in this country under another identity?
Speaker 8 (13:08):
Well, well, I mean I'll tell you the truth. I
reckon I could go anywhere alike and assume another identity.
I don't see why anyone else can't. I mean, it
wouldn't be hard.
Speaker 1 (13:23):
In the transcript of the only formal interview John has
done with police in the thirty one years since Bromin vanished,
something else is clear. The sketchiness in John's story about
Bromlin after her May sixteen disappearance rises to a level
of detail in some crucially important ways, and with the
(13:44):
existence of an actual document. It is when John is
describing some very unusual circumstances surrounding what has become known
as the Medicare check. You heard a small part of
this in the previous episode.
Speaker 8 (14:00):
We went to Sydney again for two weeks and it
was during that two weeks that she came back, took
clothes and left a Medicare check.
Speaker 1 (14:10):
Let's take a few moments to explain what exactly the
Medicare check is or was. In nineteen ninety three, when
Australians like Bromwyn Winfield went to see the doctor, the
federal government picked up most and sometimes all of the
bill through a system known as Medicare. A reserve bank
check would be issued in the name of the payee,
(14:33):
the treating doctor. It must have been a frustrating process
at times for medical practitioners because the check would be
sent by the Federal government or Medicare to the address
of the patient in this case Bromwyn, and it would
be then up to the patient to physically take the
check to the doctor the payee.
Speaker 3 (14:53):
The doctor could then present.
Speaker 1 (14:55):
The Medicare check at the bank and when the check cleared,
the funds would be posited into the doctor's account. In
the case of this particular Medicare check, the amount was
forty dollars and eighty cents.
Speaker 3 (15:09):
I'm looking at a.
Speaker 1 (15:10):
Photocopy of the check. There is capitalized black type for
the paye that's written as doctor F Initial G.
Speaker 3 (15:19):
Hughes.
Speaker 1 (15:20):
The date on the check is May one, nineteen ninety three.
Speaker 3 (15:25):
There is a.
Speaker 1 (15:25):
Medicare logo in the top left hand corner, and the
other detail written on the check comes under the heading reference.
It states simply Missus b Winfield five Stroke forty two
Byron Street, Lennox Head. Of course, that's the address of
the townhouse owned by Shirley Taylor, the one which Bromwin
started renting in March when she and the girls moved
(15:47):
out of the Sandstone Crescent House, and where John changed
a lock so that her keys would not let her
get back in.
Speaker 3 (15:55):
For completeness, is.
Speaker 1 (15:56):
John earlier in his interview with Glenn Taylor mentioning doctor
Hughes the paye for the Medicare check. She reckons.
Speaker 8 (16:05):
She told me just before we separated that she had
a nervous breakdown in the January of nineteen ninety three,
all right, and I said to her, you know, what's
a nervous breakdown? I've heard of it, but can you
tell me what it is? You know, I sort of
didn't understand, but she reckoned. She had a nervous breakdown
(16:26):
and she went to see the doctor in Lenox I
don't know if it was doctor Watson or doctor Hughes.
I don't know which one it was.
Speaker 1 (16:35):
Later Glen Taylor would go to see the doctors bromwin
was known to have consulted, and nobody had any record
or recollection of treatment of bromin for a nervous breakdown.
A voice actor will read the brief statement which doctor
Francis Hughes signed on September seven, nineteen ninety eight, at
(16:56):
the Lenox Head Medical Center, where his clinic was situated.
Speaker 9 (17:00):
My age is seventy seven. I hold the degrees of
Bachelor of Medicine, Bachelor of Surgery, and Bachelor of Arts
and Obstetrics. I graduated from the University of Dublin, Ireland
in nineteen forty seven. On the fifteenth of April nineteen
ninety three, I saw Bronwyn Winfield at my surgery at
(17:23):
the Lennox Head Medical Center. She informed me that she
thought she might have AIDS and requested to be sent
for a blood test. She also informed me that she
was separated from her husband and that he was waking
her up several times at night and she was very tired.
She didn't elaborate any further in relation to this at
(17:46):
the time to my knowledge, and I don't recall asking
her anything further about her domestic matters. I arranged for
her to have a blood test on the twenty first
of April nineteen ninety three. Her blood test results were
received at my surgery, which revealed a negative result. I
(18:07):
do not recall whether she checked up on her test results,
but most people checked by telephoning the surgery a couple
of days later. I do not make a note on
the person's file of whether they have inquired or not.
I did not make any comment on her file as
to her manner or demeanor during that appointment. I have
not seen Bronwyn Winfield since that appointment on the fifteenth
(18:30):
of April nineteen ninety three.
Speaker 1 (18:33):
Before returning to the mystery surrounding the Medicare check, I'll
try to summarize two matters that come out of the
statement of doctor Hughes. His assertion that broman had told
him that her estranged husband, John was waking her up
several times at night, resulting in fatigue. Is similar to
disclosures by Bromman to others that John was telephoning at
(18:56):
all times and harassing her. Here's Bromwin's cousin and good friend,
Megan Reed, speaking to me at her home on Sydney's
Northern Beaches.
Speaker 10 (19:07):
I'd be on the phone talking to her at her
flat when she moved into Bayron Street and you here
screaming outside, let me let me. And she actually tore
the phone off the wall at Montboy to something.
Speaker 1 (19:23):
And Bronwyn's sister Kim Marshall.
Speaker 11 (19:26):
I was even on the phone when he was banging
on the Brewers down at the Fats.
Speaker 1 (19:33):
The reference by doctor Hughes to Bromwin's blood test for
HIV and the negative result has a longer tail. Bromwin
was worried about sexually transmitted disease. She believed that John
had been seeing someone else. I'm not aware of evidence
to confirm this belief. John was not asked about extramarital
(19:56):
relationships during his interview with Detective Taylor. That Bromwin had
been worried about HIV or aides as it was more
commonly known in nineteen ninety three for a couple of years.
Speaker 12 (20:09):
I joined the Lenox Heead Medical Center in April nineteen
ninety and have seen Bronwyn Winfield thirteen times for general
medical care.
Speaker 1 (20:18):
She went to see doctor Susan Mitchell in February nineteen
ninety one in what was described as a highly agitated state.
Speaker 12 (20:27):
Presented highly agitated and requested that this consultation be kept
separate to our usual family group record. She said that
the woman John had had an affair with six years previously,
leading to an earlier marital.
Speaker 2 (20:40):
Separation, had been confirmed.
Speaker 12 (20:42):
HIV positive blood was collected and returned HIV negatives.
Speaker 1 (20:49):
February nineteen ninety one must have been a particularly difficult.
Speaker 3 (20:53):
Time in Bromwin's adult life.
Speaker 1 (20:56):
It was just nine days after she had an abortion,
which doctor Mitchell had helped arrange with a referral to
another doctor. The abortion occurred in the twelfth week of
Bromwin's pregnancy. Bromwin's blood test for HIV in February nineteen
ninety one was, of course negative, and it was negative
(21:16):
in April nineteen ninety three too, when she went to
see doctor Francis Hughes. Bronwyn was in good physical health
when she vanished. Now, Medicare's payments system is much more
advanced now and hardly anyone uses bank checks anymore. John
appeared definite in his nineteen ninety eight interview with Glenn
(21:40):
Taylor that the Medicare check had been signed by Bromwin.
John also appeared definite that the check was not in
the kitchen of the house in Sandstone Crescent when John
returned to the house from Sydney on the evening of Sunday,
May sixteenth, nineteen ninety three, the last time Bromwann was
seen and confirmed to be alive. The Medicare check, according
(22:05):
to John, was not there when he returned to the
house from Sydney again on about May twenty seven, after
some ten days away in Sydney. John's version is that
when he went to Sydney with Crystal and Lauren over
their school holidays in July, Bronwyn came back. On his version,
(22:26):
she must have slipped quietly back into the house. She
must have taken some clothing from the house when she
left again, and thoughtfully. On John's version, Bromwin must have
signed the Medicare check which was payable to doctor Hughes,
but less thoughtfully Bromwyn left the check in the kitchen
for John to deal with. In my view, John's evidence
(22:50):
around the Medicare check, evidence which John spoke to Bromin's
family and friends about in nineteen ninety three and to
police in nineteen ninety eight when he was relying on
it as proof of life for Bromwin, is some of
the most damaging evidence against John because none of it
makes rational sense. And that's before we talk about the
(23:13):
signature purportedly Bronwin's signature, which is suspiciously very different to
her Nolan signature.
Speaker 3 (23:21):
Here's deb Hall and Murray Nolan.
Speaker 13 (23:24):
Because I remember this conversation in July of that year.
John had been in Sydney and said, did I had
I seen Bromwin during the school holidays in the July
school holidays? And I said no, why And he said, well,
she's been back to the house. See what do you
mean because when? And he said, oh, she's been here.
(23:45):
And I said, Pat, do you know that?
Speaker 5 (23:46):
John?
Speaker 4 (23:47):
Oh?
Speaker 13 (23:47):
Well, if I had all these bags of clothes in
the garage and half of them have gone, and there's
a Medicare check being left on the table, and I went, Nah, no,
you know, I'm saying this.
Speaker 2 (24:00):
I can't believe that, John. When did she come back?
Speaker 1 (24:02):
Nobody saw her, nobody heard her.
Speaker 2 (24:04):
How did she get here?
Speaker 13 (24:06):
And why would she not come and tell anybody she's
the back. Oh, she's definitely bet in here, you kept
saying to me, because he went to Sydney in those
July holidays with the kids to get these bags of clothes,
which we found out through Andrew were put in this
little manhole that's twelk foot off the ground to get
up to that manhole to get the bags. How did
she know the clothes were in there? It doesn't make sense.
(24:28):
It's not logical. And not only that, how did she
carry all these bags on her own? We would have
heard something. Murray was home that time during the day.
Was he still recovering from his back injury so he
couldn't work because he was working as a build up.
Speaker 2 (24:40):
I was at work and I certainly didn't see her.
Speaker 13 (24:42):
And if she'd come back at night, surely we would
have hurt some commotion or.
Speaker 4 (24:45):
Something up there.
Speaker 2 (24:47):
You would have heard the garage door goer.
Speaker 13 (24:48):
Because it was a noisy garage anyway, on Saturday when
we were talking about that.
Speaker 2 (24:52):
Again, had bindly dawned on me and I said, well,
how did she get in?
Speaker 13 (24:56):
Because he had the keys in Sydney, and if she's
come back during that time when he wasn't there, I
don't know how she would have got in.
Speaker 1 (25:03):
We know that back on Friday May fourteen, nineteen ninety three,
when Bromin was distressed at being unable to get back
into her own home, she called a locksmith out to
Sandstone Crescent.
Speaker 3 (25:16):
Murray explains it this way, when.
Speaker 1 (25:19):
The Barron locksmith come there and cut her a key
for the front door on the Briday night.
Speaker 5 (25:25):
But they would have just cut one key just to
get her in. They wouldn't have tout two keys. That
is my feury in right from when.
Speaker 13 (25:33):
Actually had the old keys to the house, but she'd
had the feet of the deadlock that John put on
in the Joy school holiday.
Speaker 5 (25:40):
She's apparently come back to the house.
Speaker 2 (25:42):
Well, if he's saying that she'd come back in, so
there's that way she had.
Speaker 3 (25:46):
A couldie how'd she get in?
Speaker 1 (25:49):
John spoke to a number of people about Bromman's purported
visit to the house with a Medicare check. The recollections
of those people are good now. They must have been
even better many years ago when their recollections were put
into police statements during Glenn Taylor's investigation from nineteen ninety
eight and then during George Radmore's cold case review for
(26:13):
the Unsolved Homicide Unit in two thousand and nine and ten.
Speaker 3 (26:18):
Here's Megan reading from one of her statements.
Speaker 14 (26:21):
I distinctly remember John ringing me after riding home and
supposedly finding that Bronwin had returned to the house while
he'd been in Sydney. John was very excited, relieved and elated,
and he stated, guess what. I've just walked into the
house and Bronwin has been home. It's good news. She's okay.
She has left a medicare check which wasn't there before
(26:43):
I left, and taken some photos of the children. She
must have a boyfriend because she's taken a pair of
jeans and a jumper of mine. I actually said to him,
well where is she? He said, well, she's obviously got
a new man, because my jeans and jumper are missing.
Thought that this was suspicious as it did not make sense,
(27:03):
and I thought that he had orchestrated the whole thing.
I also thought it was ridiculous that she would leave
a Medicare check yet still not touch any of her
own bank accounts.
Speaker 1 (27:14):
There are other fundamental problems with John's evidence about Brommin's
purported return to the house in July nineteen ninety three
and her alleged signing of the Medicare check. Will go
through these, but were those problems given a pass by
detectives Graham Diskin and Wayne Temby in nineteen ninety three
(27:36):
because of the misreading of the time of a call
on the Sandstone Crescent telephone bill and as a result,
a misguided belief that Bromwin actually went back to the
house in the early hours of Monday, May seventeen to
use a home phone to check lotto results at two
thirteen in the morning. Here's Glenn Taylor in one of
(27:59):
my meetings with him and lennox Head. They believe that
she'd come back to the house.
Speaker 15 (28:05):
During our reinvestigation and looking at the telephone bill, we
quickly established that it wasn't two thirteen am.
Speaker 1 (28:11):
It was two thirteen pm, and it was the day before.
Speaker 15 (28:15):
It was the afternoon just prior to her disappearance some
weeks later, and the running shirts indicated this. John Winfield
contacted the police, the detectives at that time that we're
looking into the matter and said Roma must have been
back at the house because there's been a Medicare check.
(28:39):
It was addressed to a local doctor, and those were
the days where the lock of the patient goes to
her doctor and then Nedicare would send a check made
parable to the doctor and then the patient pays the
difference of the bill. This particular check was addressed to
a local doctor at Lenox Head, but it or a
(29:00):
signature which should have been a signature for the doctor.
Speaker 1 (29:03):
It had a signature allegedly rom wingfel on the check.
Speaker 3 (29:07):
Just to reflect on that for a moment.
Speaker 1 (29:10):
The check should not have been signed by anyone other
than the payee, doctor Hughes, but a signature which does
not look like Bromwin's signature appeared on that check. Bromwin
regularly saw doctors for herself and her daughters. She dealt
with the Medicare system. It is highly unlikely in my view,
(29:32):
that she would have erroneously believed that she needed to
sign the check. John didn't deal with those administrative things
while Bromwin was his partner. So John declared, look, she's
lean back to the house. She's left a check here
that she.
Speaker 15 (29:49):
Signed was on the table that wasn't here before. And
also she's taken some clothes and she's even taken one
pair of my jeans. So he was trying to indicate
to the He looked, she's very much alive and she's
gone on some extended holiday without contacting the children.
Speaker 1 (30:07):
Here are Michelle and Dandy at their home in the Shire.
Speaker 4 (30:11):
Clarity for me time when he made that phone call
after the school holidays, we only briefly saw the girls
in him on that trip. I believe he stayed out
at his brother Pete and Louise out in Ingodoon, then
returned home to Lennox, to the Sandstone Crescent and he
made a phone call and he said, I've just got
(30:34):
back to the house.
Speaker 1 (30:36):
Bromwin must have been here.
Speaker 4 (30:38):
There's a Medicare check on the bench, and there's two
bags of clothes missing. I remember having that conversation with him,
and I just remember hanging the phone up and I
turned around her. I just looked at Michelle and I
just saw it straight out to myself the bus has
done something that was just clarity straightaway as soon as
(30:59):
that phone call, none of it made sense.
Speaker 1 (31:02):
Did he know that you suspected him over Broman's disappearance
at the early days.
Speaker 4 (31:10):
I think he knew that a minute he hung up
the phone making that phone call all the way back
in July because of the way you spoke to him. Well,
I'm one hundred percent sure I sent you with that
phone called. That just doesn't make sense. Why would she
sneak back into the house while you're away and not
she Debbi next door and tell her and tell someone
in Lenny's head that she's okay?
Speaker 1 (31:31):
What are you thinking?
Speaker 4 (31:33):
I still remember this day hanging up the phone and
turned around at Michelle and just gone that start right.
Speaker 3 (31:39):
No way in the world.
Speaker 1 (31:41):
Why would she sign a check that doesn't need signing?
Speaker 16 (31:43):
Yeah, and she worked in a beat in younger times.
She knew she wasn't silly with checks and naturing you
people didn't sign their own Medicare check. Feasibly that check
was sent to that dress steps on there, which was
Byron's and could possibly have been inside the handbait.
Speaker 1 (32:04):
Well, once you've started.
Speaker 4 (32:06):
Thinking there's a bit of hoot on me here, magically,
go back home, produce this check. That could have been
in the house the whole time. We don't know, but
it could have been in the house the whole time.
Magically produced this check. The police believe that that's a
forward signature.
Speaker 3 (32:23):
Who signed it?
Speaker 4 (32:24):
The bags have closed, he refers to he actually put
inside the manhole in the roost base. How would Bromin
know to find her bags have closed in the roosts base?
Brombin was always someone that was very, very feminine in ways.
There's no one in the world w sister, I know it.
So there's no way the world mysh sister would have
gone and got a step ladder and bring precariously three
(32:45):
meters or two and a half meters in the air,
trying to meanhandle garbage bags, two garbage bags of clothes
out of a manhole. How would you even know to look?
Speaker 1 (32:53):
Bit? None of it makes sense, mate, none of it.
None of it. Well before the release of the first
(33:22):
episode of Bronwin, Kim Marshall told me that she saw
the Medicare check when she visited Lennox Head in June
nineteen ninety three. Her trip was meant to be a
long overdue catch up with Bromwan. They had been planning
it for some time.
Speaker 17 (33:39):
I spoke to her every day on the phone about
my plane flight, what time my plane would rite, when
I'd be going to hair Expo.
Speaker 2 (33:47):
Then I'd be getting on the Greyhound bus.
Speaker 17 (33:49):
We found the buses out together, what time the bus
would arrive in Ballina. Because I'd never had an adult
experience with Ronnie, it was always as the youngest child
wild but this time it was going to be adopt
to adult, and so we had all these wonderful twoks.
Speaker 11 (34:06):
It's going to be so exciting. I'll be able to
show you all my dresses in my wardrobe.
Speaker 1 (34:12):
When Brommin disappeared, neither Kim nor her mother, Barbara, suspected
that John had been involved in foul play, so Kim
ended up staying in the house with Crystal, Lauren and
John in June, just weeks after Broman's disappearance and shortly
before John took the girls to Sydney for the July
school holidays.
Speaker 11 (34:33):
John saying that Bromin's returned to the house and she
signed it. The whole piece of evidence that it's missing
is that I was in the house at week three
after Bromwin, going straight after the June Long Weekend, I
was there that medi Care check was already there.
Speaker 1 (34:51):
You're saying it's the same check.
Speaker 2 (34:54):
Yes, Yes, they.
Speaker 11 (34:56):
Sent the Mediicare check off to Cottognyard, those people that
look at writing, and they said, yes, give us the letters,
all the actual comparisons of handwriting.
Speaker 3 (35:10):
A month before the.
Speaker 1 (35:11):
First episode of Bromwin, Kim talked to me again about
her observations from nineteen ninety three.
Speaker 3 (35:18):
She understood the potential significance.
Speaker 11 (35:21):
What am I to do with my valuable and precious
information about the Medicare check?
Speaker 2 (35:28):
And I can leave that question with you.
Speaker 11 (35:31):
But this is a question I keep asking Andrew all
the time because my information about the Medicare check, I
believe is crucial and very very serious.
Speaker 1 (35:43):
Okay, let's get your information about the Medicare check on
the record, So just describe.
Speaker 3 (35:50):
It for me please.
Speaker 1 (35:52):
Kim explained that, in her view, previous police investigations, including
the most important one by the detective give Sergeant Glenn Taylor,
had effectively sidelined her. As a result, her first hand
knowledge of the Medicare check had not been put into
a formal statement.
Speaker 11 (36:11):
My voice had not been heard by any of the
police force, nor my brother or my sister in law
being the young girl that I was that lived at
the house in Lennox just after Bromwin was no longer there.
That Medicare check I have cited, I have touched, and
(36:34):
please don't think that I'm a horrible human for sayings
My brother and my sister in law followed the police's
directive orders to keep my mother and myself out of
any type of involvement in Brahmin's missing person case or
the inquest.
Speaker 2 (36:52):
It's just been totally ignored.
Speaker 11 (36:55):
Is it because people are scared that they got it
roll by ignoring my infa before all?
Speaker 1 (37:01):
Right, when you were there in the days and weeks
after Bromman disappeared, Yes, you saw the Medicare check at
the house.
Speaker 2 (37:12):
Yes, and had a conversation in depth with Jonathan about it.
Speaker 3 (37:16):
What did you see and what did you talk to
him about?
Speaker 11 (37:20):
The Medicare check was made out to a provider that
Bromman had gone to for a general visit. It was
the refund check for the payment that in the old
days you had to sign and then mail back to
the practitioner. And so that check was signed and that
(37:42):
check was sitting in full view well before Jonason traveled
down to Sydney with the kids in the school holidays,
where he rang me and a number of other family
members saying, Bromwin's been to the house. There's a Medicare
check on the table, and she's removed a few of
(38:02):
her clothes from the wardrobe, and she's taken a pair
of my genes.
Speaker 1 (38:07):
I just need to clarify a couple of things, Kim.
So the Medicare check was there when you went to
the house after Broman disappeared, correct, But then that means
the Medicare check could have been at the house before
you arrived.
Speaker 2 (38:24):
Correct.
Speaker 11 (38:25):
He's used the Medicare check as a form of evidence
that Broman has returned to the house after I visited
and stayed at the house.
Speaker 2 (38:38):
I actually saw it signed, it was all ready to
go back.
Speaker 11 (38:41):
I have a conversation in detail with Jonason about it
because I love the fact of all the letter writing
that's happened over the years that Rowan's crinching is so beautiful,
like my mother's running writing and my own writing. And
I made the comment as how beautiful all of us
(39:04):
ladies in the family have the most beautiful writing.
Speaker 1 (39:07):
You are confident that Bromin did in fact sign that check. Yes,
now here's the rub. Kim is the first to acknowledge
that she is not a handwriting expert. However, when she
saw the check in June nineteen ninety three, it bore
what appeared to her at the time to be Bromwin's signature,
(39:29):
even though there would have been no reason whatsoever for
Bromwin or anyone other than the payee doctor Hughes to
sign it.
Speaker 3 (39:37):
But put that aside for the time being.
Speaker 1 (39:41):
The key thing about what Kim says is that it
directly contradicts John's version about the check turning up at
the house while John and the girls were in Sydney
over the July school holidays. John's reliance on that check
materializing as a new proof of life of Bromwin being
at the house while John, Crystal and Lauren were away
(40:05):
in July is shot to pieces by kim sighting of
the check in June.
Speaker 18 (40:11):
I know that it was there in the house before
he traveled to Sydney and rang everybody and said, Bromwin's
been in the house and Medicare check has appeared in
the house.
Speaker 2 (40:27):
Next day that the check was there before.
Speaker 1 (40:30):
Okay, let me just be Devil's advocate. Why would he
want to rely on that when he knows that you,
if you were questioned by police, would say, well, that's
not true. It was already signed, and John and I
even talked about it while I was staying there.
Speaker 2 (40:48):
I've been always discounted and dismissed.
Speaker 11 (40:53):
In this instance, it's happened again, and I just don't
understand why it's not.
Speaker 2 (41:00):
A significant piece of evidence.
Speaker 11 (41:03):
I raised the Medicare check to them when I was
actually at the Corona inquest.
Speaker 2 (41:09):
I was very politely just told to go away and
keep quiet. They actually asked me not to attend one
of the days.
Speaker 1 (41:19):
Andy Reid has told me that he remembered Kim coming
to him about her observations of the Medicare check during
the inquest. Andy said that he does not know why
a statement was not taken from Kim then, or earlier
or subsequently. I'm going to look at this again in
(41:39):
upcoming episodes when we go through the evidence and testimony
which unfolded over five days of public hearings at the
two thousand and two inquest in the town of Lismore.
West of Lennox Head. There is some remarkable material in
the transcripts and some very vigorous cross examination of key witnesses.
(42:01):
According to KIM, detectives including George Radmore from the Unsolved
Homicide Unit, who subsequently focused on the forged signature angle
with analysis by expert handwriting examiners at New Scotland Yard
in London, have.
Speaker 11 (42:17):
Gone down the wrong part of investigation and their two
embarrassed to reverse it.
Speaker 1 (42:23):
But in my view, George Radmore and his team of
detectives were diligent and professional in sending multiple documents bearing
Bromwin's signature to handwriting examiners in the United Kingdom. Bromwin's cousin,
Megan Reid, was told about the outcome of that analysis.
Speaker 14 (42:41):
The Scotland Yard said it wasn't persecutor.
Speaker 1 (42:45):
For this podcast series, a respected handwriting expert in Australia,
Taraney Dewhurst, looked at just one sample of Bromwin's known
and confirmed signature and the signature on a very poor
photocopy of the Medicare check. Tarney has helped me with
handwriting analysis in the past. Some listeners will have heard
(43:06):
her voice in the Night Driver series Tarney Dewhurst identified
obvious differences in the two Bronwyn Winfield signatures, which, in
her view, warrant further examination with better quality specimens. Lay
people with no expertise in handwriting analysis can readily see
(43:27):
the differences too. Detectives working with George Radmore on the
case obtained good comparison samples during their cold case review
fourteen years ago of Bromwyn's alleged murder. Why isn't it possible, though, Kim,
that John, for example, if we pick up the police case,
(43:48):
that John did forge Bromwin's signature, and that's what you saw,
and he just did a really.
Speaker 3 (43:53):
Good job of it.
Speaker 11 (43:55):
And he could have because I've got an answer for
that as well, because I could forge it.
Speaker 1 (44:00):
So you're not ruling out that he may have forged it.
Speaker 2 (44:03):
Yes, it's correct, most definitely in preparation for use.
Speaker 11 (44:06):
Definitely. No one's put that question to me. Am I
being ignored because I was young? Am I being ignored
because of the mental health? Am I being ignored because
I'm a female? And they're the questions that I live
with every day for many, many years, and they're destroying.
Speaker 1 (44:24):
Kim Marshall was twenty when the trip she had planned
to lennox Head to spend time with her sister Bromwin
went sideways. If there had been a modern police response
to the disappearance of Bromwin, detectives would have descended on
that house and declared it a possible crime scene. They
would have had scientific officers combing it for evidence, but
(44:46):
instead life went on as if nothing much had changed.
In nineteen ninety three. Kim did not know Bromman with
anything like the kind of familiarity of most siblings.
Speaker 3 (44:59):
They had never together.
Speaker 1 (45:01):
Bromwin did not know of Kim's existence until Kim was four,
but they were looking forward to getting to know each
other better during the June visit, and that is another obvious,
although rarely pressed, reason to doubt that Bromwin would suddenly
up and leave with no explanation to Kim, with whom
she had been talking and planning things in their phone
(45:23):
chats between Hobart and lennox Head. It is hard to
fathom now why Kim's visit went ahead in Bromwin's absence,
as she and John had been separated for seven weeks
before she vanished. Kim sleeping under the same roof as
John in Sandstone Crescent under those bizarre circumstances must have
(45:45):
been weird. It's hard to imagine the introverted John welcoming
bubbly Kim, a younger woman whom he would five years
later call the illegitimate one. As a result of many
conversation and interviews, I'm confident that Bromwin's side of the
family harbored a foreboding about John relatively early, from the
(46:08):
third week of May, when Bromwin neither turned up for
work at Eden's Takeaway nor came back from a so
called break. Perhaps the read family suspicions had not become
so serious as to call off Kim's visit.
Speaker 3 (46:22):
In mid June.
Speaker 11 (46:25):
I wrived ten to fourteen days after she'd lost Yeah,
I demanded to go to the police station.
Speaker 2 (46:31):
When I got there, John waited for me at the
bus stop.
Speaker 11 (46:34):
We went up to the house and I said, I
want to go down to the police station now, and
John took me down straight away, only to the police station.
And I can tell you now, after going through everything,
they have not written down a single thing that I said.
Speaker 2 (46:48):
When only to the police station.
Speaker 11 (46:50):
There's a brief mention from Discan that I had visited
the station, and I don't understand why he didn't take
any notes.
Speaker 1 (47:01):
If the police running sheets are accurate in relation to
Kim stay, she arrived in Lenox on June fourteen.
Speaker 11 (47:09):
As I was living there with John, I became very frightened.
John went to be so early because he'd get away
from me as quick as he could, so I'd be
awake in the house by myself.
Speaker 2 (47:23):
I started searching around the house.
Speaker 11 (47:26):
I'd look at the window, thinking she got a knock
on the window and say here, come here quickly.
Speaker 1 (47:33):
A stay of ten days would have seen Kim say
goodbye to John, Lauren and Crystal. On June twenty four
Kim headed north to Surface Paradise on Queensland's Gold Coast.
The timing fits with the police running sheets noting that
John told police he left Lennox head on June twenty
(47:53):
six for the visit to Sydney with Lauren and Crystal.
Speaker 3 (47:58):
Over the course of this pod cast series, you have.
Speaker 1 (48:01):
Only very briefly heard about Bromwin and Andy's younger half sister, Melissa.
Melissa's mother is Jennifer, who married Andy and Bromman's father, Philip.
Melissa lives in Sydney, and she has been privately following
the podcast very closely. While there has been no contact
(48:22):
between Melissa and Andy and other read relations for many years.
Speaker 3 (48:26):
You are going to hear from Melissa in the.
Speaker 1 (48:29):
Next episode because she is breaking her silence.
Speaker 19 (48:33):
Broma would never have left those girls. Barba left Bromwin
when she was very small. It's not something that Bromlin
would have ever wanted to see happen to her children.
We discussed it, We talked about it had happened to her.
She knew how it felt. She would have taken them
if she disappeared. She would have disappeared with those two
young children by her side.
Speaker 2 (48:52):
She would never left those children.
Speaker 1 (48:57):
Melissa and Bromwin were close. Kim recalled that back in
June nineteen ninety three, Melissa was deeply concerned and she
did not want Kim near John because when.
Speaker 11 (49:10):
She found out I was in the house, she thought
that that was inappropriate and that she needed to check
to see if I was okay. We were telling the
police that we were frightened and suspicious that something was
going on.
Speaker 1 (49:27):
It is impossible to know how many police records and
running sheets from nineteen ninety three have gone missing. I
have not cited one which notes the concerns of Melissa
and Kim from that time. Family tensions and unresolved issues
between Kim and Andy are unfortunately always close to the surface.
Speaker 3 (49:51):
In another interview with Kim, she became.
Speaker 1 (49:53):
Emotional while reflecting on her proximity to John in June
nineteen ninety three.
Speaker 2 (50:00):
Only Andrew put me in that house. He put me
in that house. He made me go up there so
I could have eyes on Jonathan. So now I understand,
and this has nothing to do with everything.
Speaker 20 (50:11):
He knew that Jonathan had done something bad and still
set me up to live in that house. And that's
why Melissa got in the car to come up to
make sure it was safe, because she was the only
one that thought it was the Broxic to do.
Speaker 3 (50:26):
I asked Andy about this, so Andie.
Speaker 1 (50:30):
In one of my conversations with Kim, she becomes quite
distressed because in her mind, she's been asked by you.
Speaker 3 (50:41):
Or you've let her go up there.
Speaker 1 (50:45):
In mid June, so that's a month after Bromins disappeared.
Speaker 4 (50:50):
I didn't actually ask let to go to Lennich Head.
I found out about it very very late. I remember
saying to her or maybe you could possibly find out something.
You could possibly find out some information. Anyone that found
out about it would have been advised you to be
(51:10):
very careful, don't push the wrong buttons, don't go too far.
Speaker 21 (51:14):
She makes the point that she was only twenty and
not very worldly wise, with a bit of reflection, she
was probably potentially put it into some certainly an unusual
situation and possibly a dangerous one.
Speaker 4 (51:30):
Well, with what we know now after the fact, one
hundred percent it was a dangerous thing. Learning more and
more from her friends and finding more and more out,
we were one hundred percent very very suspicious by that stage.
Melissa visited on her way back from being on some
sort of break up in Queensland.
Speaker 1 (51:51):
What do you understand Melissa knew and did when she
discovered that Kim was staying at the house in Lennox head.
Speaker 4 (52:00):
Melissa advised King that she thought it was dangerous to
be at the house when she found out that she
was there, and advised that she should get out of it.
Speaker 1 (52:28):
Brown is written and investigated by me Headley Thomas as
a podcast production for The Australian. If anyone has information
which may help solve this cold case. Please contact me
confidentially by emailing Bronwyn at the Australian dot com dot Au.
(52:48):
You can read more about this case and see a
range of photographs and other artwork at the website bronwynpodcast
dot com. Our subscribers and registered users here episodes first.
The production and editorial team for Bromwin includes Claire Harvey,
Kristin Amiet, Joshua Burton, Bridget, Ryan Bianca, far Marcus, Katie.
Speaker 3 (53:13):
Burns, Liam Mendez, Sean.
Speaker 1 (53:16):
Callen, Matthew Condon and David Murray. Audio production for this
podcast series is by Wasabi Audio and original theme music
by Slade Gibson. We have been assisted by Madison Walsh,
a relation of Bromwin Winfield.
Speaker 3 (53:32):
We can only do this kind of journalism with the.
Speaker 1 (53:34):
Support of our subscribers and our major sponsors like Harvey Norman.
For all of our exclusive stories, videos, maps, timelines and
documents about this podcast and other podcasts including The Teacher's Pet,
The Teachers Trial, The Teachers Accuser, Shandy's Story, Shandy's Legacy,
and The Night Driver, go to the Australian dot com
(53:57):
dot Au and subscribe s
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