November 17, 2024 • 58 mins
The police zero in on a person of interest.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Now, the turial case was perplexing because there wasn't a
Cleaves suspect.
Speaker 2 (00:05):
This is hands rap.
Speaker 1 (00:06):
There was an initial phase searching for the lost child.
Speaker 2 (00:11):
The detective who was in charge of the investigation into
William Toole's disappearance right from the beginning.
Speaker 1 (00:18):
And that went on for a couple of weeks and
that bore no fruit at all. So clearly there was
something more to the situation than a little boy lost
in the bush.
Speaker 2 (00:28):
But Hans doesn't want to talk to me for this podcast.
Speaker 1 (00:32):
He clearly didn't wander off by himself.
Speaker 2 (00:34):
So this interview you're listening to was conducted by a
colleague of mine, Caroline Overington, a few years ago now,
for her own reporting on William's disappearance.
Speaker 1 (00:45):
What is it that prompts that feeling there's something.
Speaker 3 (00:49):
More to this?
Speaker 1 (00:50):
It was the only logical explanation. He didn't wander off.
We know he didn't wander off, so what else could
there be?
Speaker 3 (00:58):
What was your feeling?
Speaker 1 (01:00):
Well, I think that someone grabbed him off the straight,
bundled him into a car and he just disappeared, which
is really really sad.
Speaker 2 (01:09):
Hans has got good reason for thinking William was abducted
for one thing, he's a veteran policeman.
Speaker 1 (01:16):
Look I joined in February of nineteen seventy four, so
it's been a career of forty one years.
Speaker 2 (01:22):
Forty one years, first in uniform and then as an investigator.
Speaker 1 (01:26):
I went a plane clothes in the late seventies, ninety
seventy nine, and I went to the CIBA in nineteen
ninety two.
Speaker 2 (01:33):
CID means Hans was a detective and he spent the
decades since carving out a reputation as a tough, hard
working operator working on the biggest crimes.
Speaker 1 (01:46):
I think it was about nineteen ninety two I went
to the homicide squad, so effectively for the last thirty years,
I've investigated bag robbers and murderers.
Speaker 2 (01:55):
Meaning Hans knows what he's talking about, and I don't
read anything into the fact that he doesn't want to
talk to me when I call him. It's ten years
since William Tyrrel was reported missing, and almost ten years
since Hans himself retired from the New South Wales Police.
When he was put in charge of the investigation into
(02:15):
William's disappearance, Hans was only a few months off retirement,
so he explains he's been out of the loop for
almost a decade. Talking to Caroline a few years earlier, however,
Hans still had some strong opinions.
Speaker 1 (02:34):
Murderers don't murder strangers. As a rear event.
Speaker 2 (02:38):
Murderers don't typically murder strangers. He says.
Speaker 1 (02:41):
People always kill someone they know, whether that's a loving
relationship or a domestic relationship or a business relationship that's
gone bad. Something there's something to tie the offender to
the victim.
Speaker 2 (02:53):
The detective's job is usually finding out that thing tying
offender to victim. H except William's case was different.
Speaker 4 (03:05):
That's not your belief.
Speaker 1 (03:06):
No, absolutely, this has got nothing to do with the
turk cause at all. Your feeling was always that it
was the stranger. Absolutely, there was stranger involved. I don't
think any member of the family involved at all.
Speaker 2 (03:18):
No, So Hans is certain it was a stranger who
took William and his family were not involved at all.
Early decisions are critical in long police investigations. Even though
Hans worked on William's case for only a few months,
he still had a massive impact on the years that followed.
Speaker 1 (03:42):
You retire, didn't you after four months on that case?
So you weren't able to see it through. Do you
think if you had, or would we have a result?
That's impossible for me to say. I don't know, but
I know when I left it, I think it was
in good hands.
Speaker 2 (03:59):
Hans says he's happy with the way he left the
William Tyrell investigation.
Speaker 1 (04:04):
Look, I don't dwell on the ones that've got a wagon,
but look, I'm happy with what I've achieved, and that's
pretty good. And now this is a different stage of
my life.
Speaker 2 (04:18):
But not everyone agrees the investigation was in a good
place when Hans left it. You're about to hear from
the detective who took it over, the homicide squad commander
who oversaw this transition, and the man at the very
center of the police investigation who describes it as a
(04:38):
poisoned chalice. I'm Dan box and from news dot com
dot Au. This is Witness William Tyrell, Episode seven, Malicious Prosecution.
Speaker 3 (04:55):
Hello, Justing, wonder is rue? It's a good question, um coffee.
Speaker 2 (05:02):
Bill Spedding describes himself as not the kind of man
to draw attention to himself. He hopes people see him
as a pretty straightforward guy, an ordinary grandfather at home.
He and his wife, Margaret, drive an ordinary maroon colored
Ford Fairline which they call Myrtle. But really nothing about
(05:25):
the Spedding's life has been ordinary over the past ten years.
I might just wait for Peter, which is why we're
meeting not at Bill's home but in the offices of
his lawyer in Sydney, because within months of William's disappearance,
(05:46):
Bill would become front page news right across the country,
and his lawyer is now sitting listening to this interview
with Bill and Margaret just thinking back to before William
went missing. What was life like for you then? Was
it happy? Was it going well? Yeah?
Speaker 3 (06:05):
Oh well it was good at the time. Yes. Businesses
doing well, successful in the community. The kids are in
the forty teams in their weekend sport. We had soccorns
that had died as in IFL on Sundays and middle
marvelous group of parents on the other children in the teams.
Speaker 2 (06:28):
While they had good friends where they were living. The
Spedding's family history is complicated. Bill and Margaret have each
been married before with kids from previous relationships, and there
had been falling out within their families, some more bitter
than others.
Speaker 3 (06:45):
Yes, what were you looking forward to then, well, just
retiring down that area.
Speaker 2 (06:52):
That area was the mid north coast of New South Wales.
The Speddings lived in Bonnie Hills, a village about twenty
minute drive from where William was reported missing. Bill worked
as a white goods repairman, installing air conditioners fixing fridges.
Three days before William's disappearance, he was called to look
(07:13):
at the washing machine in a house on a dead
end road called Benerun.
Speaker 3 (07:17):
Drive, and I just calmed in there and had to
go back later on to finish the job off. Our
first knowledge of the disappearance was by the news newscast
that evening of the six o'clock news, and there didn't
(07:40):
mean anything to us other than the fact that a
child had disappeared in the local community. And the name
didn't mean anything to me because the name of Dural
was not my customer's name. So nothing fill into place,
nothing twigged.
Speaker 2 (07:58):
Bill would later write a book about what happened, although
it's never been published. I've got a copy. The book
says Bill had ordered the parts to fix the washing
machine and was waiting for them to be delivered when
he got a call from the house on the morning
William was reported missing. Bill didn't pick up when he
(08:19):
saw the missed call. He called back, no answer, But
there were other phone calls between Bill and the house
both that day and later.
Speaker 3 (08:30):
And I was quite surprised and be told mind the
police because they rang me and said that I was
not to mention or disclose William had disappeared from the house.
And then I said, well, how was I supposed to
know that when it wasn't there when I was there.
Speaker 2 (08:52):
Four months later, January twenty fifteen, Bill and Margaret were
sitting on their back verandah when the police arrived to
search his house.
Speaker 3 (09:02):
The search all of our house wasn't no surprise at all,
no surprise because I knew that they were doing searches
and around the area, and when they turned up, we
weren't unduly surprise. I thought we are fair enough to
investigating their disappearance and come on in, guys, you know,
do your thing and we we'll get out of your way.
Speaker 2 (09:24):
But the media found out about it.
Speaker 5 (09:28):
Police arrived at their Bonnie Hills home at seven point
thirty on Tuesday morning. They spent forty eight hours excavating
the backyard and emptying a sceptic Tam.
Speaker 6 (09:36):
Morning, Sean, what's the latest on that. We have fresh
pitchures that are coming to you now as we go
to wear So this is the latest development. It's believed
this semi rural property is linked to another property that
was rated yesterday. Here at Laureenton where we are a
flat where items were taken.
Speaker 7 (09:54):
They took computers out, they took a mattress out, and
they took a ton.
Speaker 2 (09:57):
Of stuff out.
Speaker 8 (09:58):
Actually they filled the back of a a wagon up.
Speaker 5 (10:00):
Detectives have sent away three cars, mobile phones, a mattress
and computer equipment for forensic testing.
Speaker 2 (10:07):
Those raids and the media reporting would change everything in
Bell's life.
Speaker 3 (10:14):
I didn't realize that things were so intense except Tom
when during the first record or police interview and the
question he was relentless.
Speaker 9 (10:26):
I believe you went to that address better and drive
Kendall on the twelfth of September twenty fourteen.
Speaker 3 (10:34):
I never went near there.
Speaker 2 (10:37):
This is a recording of Bill Spadding's police interview.
Speaker 9 (10:40):
You were there to fix that washing machine. Perhaps you
didn't make it to the house because as we know,
William Tyrrell was wandering around the front yard of his
grandmother's house on his own. He had no supervision bondy
parent at that time. For a few minutes. We know that, Okay,
(11:04):
we believe you were there.
Speaker 3 (11:05):
I wasn't there. And the police are really getting upset
with me because they were asking questions which I had
no knowledge of the content, and asking what happened to
certain phone calls? And I said not that. I've got
no idea.
Speaker 9 (11:26):
I'm telling you on your official records, you've got a
phone call at nine o three am, but it isn't
here is anything you can tell me about that? No,
what this indicates to us, So that specific phone call
you received you deleted from that phone.
Speaker 3 (11:42):
You can't delete it.
Speaker 9 (11:44):
You deleted that number. You can delete it that incoming call,
so that when police extracted your phone they wouldn't find
it in the extraction of the phone. Why is that
phone call not in your incoming calls on the twelfth
of September twenty fourteen at nine o three am, I
don't know. Did you delete that phone call now? You
can't delete Did you delete that phone call from your
(12:06):
telephone number from your bill telephone now to show the
police that that phone call did not occur for whatever reason.
Speaker 3 (12:12):
I don't know. I didn't delete anything.
Speaker 2 (12:16):
In his book. Bill says that was the call about
fixing the washing machine at the house where William was staying.
He says it didn't show up in his phone records
because he used the automated answer phone service. Bill pressed
one oh one to listen to the message, then pressed
twenty two to redial the number. So it wasn't like
(12:36):
a normal phone call. But it went beyond asking you
certain questions. They said to you, we believe that you
may have grabbed William.
Speaker 9 (12:48):
We believe that you may have grabbed William from that
front address, from the front yard of that address, may
have left the area then anyone knowing. I'm sorry, I
wasn't they did you take William?
Speaker 3 (13:04):
Til No. I just sat there and thought, what are
you talking about? I wasn't there.
Speaker 2 (13:11):
Were you frightened?
Speaker 3 (13:13):
Oh? I was bewildered, very much bewildered in the questioning.
Speaker 2 (13:20):
And if Bill says he was bewildered by the questions
asked in the recorded police interview. What the detectives asked
him when they turned off the tape must have been
even more confusing. There was one point when I think
the police were driving you from your house to the
police station on that day, and in the car they
(13:41):
asked you if you knew any pedophiles, yes, and you said,
you know, I don't know the names are people you
knew from the past related? And they said, what about
Jeffrey meaning Jeffrey Hillsley Free. Hillsley was Bill's former brother
(14:02):
in law from a previous marriage. At that time, Jeffrey
was serving a life sentence for raping a ten year
old girl and murdering her stepfather. But did you think
at that point they're asking me about budophiles? Did that
start to what did you think? Then?
Speaker 3 (14:22):
I was very naive. I was totally overwhelmed, very nive
about please question me. And I hadn't done anything to
feel guilty about. And so I'm thinking, well, well, they're
just asking normal questions.
Speaker 2 (14:40):
After you left the police station that day you interviewed
for six hours, Yes, and you left the police station.
And as you left, you've given evidence saying that one
of the detectives shouted at you, we know you did it.
We're going to get you. I'm going to arrest you.
Speaker 3 (14:56):
Yes, one detective did, and that was about William Tyrell.
Speaker 2 (15:04):
Right, Okay, So there's a lot to unpack here. At
this point, all Bill knows is the police have turned
up at his door, raided his house and later his
business office. They've driven him away asking about pedophiles and
spent six hours questioning him, including saying they believe he
(15:26):
took William. But why are the police so focused on him?
Speaker 8 (15:34):
Well, by this stage, the disappearance of William Urrel had
saturated the press.
Speaker 2 (15:41):
This is Bill Spedding's lawyer Peter O'Brien speaking in a
separate interview.
Speaker 8 (15:46):
It had permeated well into the community psyche. It worried appearance,
It worried anyone in our community who's right minded and
thinking of that, the welfare of this poor child who
god missing in such mysterious circumstances. And the police response
(16:08):
was naturally and correctly to do whatever they could.
Speaker 1 (16:12):
The problem, I think.
Speaker 8 (16:16):
In some respects with the approach that they took is
that they focused through heavily on Bill Spedding once they
had what was probably a distorted piece of fabricated information
on an anonymous tip.
Speaker 2 (16:33):
That anonymous tip was made within days of William Tyrrell
being reported missing. According to police records, the cops received
at least one call claiming Bill has a history of
alleged involvement in some really awful offenses. I'm not going
to say what those alleged offenses are, because here's the
(16:54):
thing about them, they'd already been thrown out in court
decades early, when a judge said the person making these
allegations against Bill was quote obsessive, compulsive, and bizarre. It's
all tied up in that complicated family history and the
(17:14):
falling outs I mentioned at the start of the episode.
The judge said this person's evidence quote contained inconsistencies which
were so numerous that I cannot now take the time
to refer to them. He also said this person programmed
and tutored others to make allegations against Bill, allegations the
(17:36):
judge said he was reasonably satisfied, were not true, which
is a problem because if the police were following that
anonymous tip, they should have known this, and if they
didn't know it before they raided Bill's house, they certainly
should have done so after. Because a copy of the
(17:58):
court records containing the judge's damning demolition of the case
was seized during the police raid on Bill's office. Looking
back at it, Now, how much damage do you think
that has done to Bill and the people he was
living with at the time.
Speaker 8 (18:20):
Well, incalculable amount of damage. But what it seems to
have done in this case is put him at the center,
and entirely by coincidence, for the fact that he was
a washing machine, a peerman, going about his ordinary daily
work that has brought him to the center of the
disappearance of a child. That's raised the entirety of a
(18:43):
stratus concerns.
Speaker 2 (18:45):
That, however, isn't even the worst of it, to my mind.
The worst thing is that the police raids on Bill's
house and business, which put his face on the TV
and the front page of the papers, launched before the
cops properly checked Bill's alibi. For the morning, William was
(19:06):
reported missing, meaning no one confirmed if Bill actually was
where he said he was in this statement.
Speaker 3 (19:15):
He gave detectives on Friar the TWLL for Sotember two
thousand and forty and I'll dropped the boys to the
bus stop and went back home.
Speaker 2 (19:22):
That was in the early morning before school. The last
known photograph of William Tyrrell was taken at nine thirty
seven am at nine forty four Bill's bank records show
he bought coffees to him and Margaret at a cafe
in Lorryton, a town a short drive from where William
was staying.
Speaker 3 (19:43):
One hundred and I went to the school, assumingly at
Laura and Published school. This would have been about ten
am and finished at about twelve thirty pm. I spoke
with some of the parents that were there and also
spoke to the precible and one of their teachers.
Speaker 2 (19:57):
After the school assembly, Bill says he went to his
offic which.
Speaker 3 (20:01):
Is located a Ball Street lord So I fiershedut at
the office, cycled pick up the kids from school at
three point thirty. I had no dealings with the female
foster care as mother family on that day. In fact,
I had no contact with them from the night of
the fifteenth September twenty fourteen.
Speaker 2 (20:19):
If Bill's alibi checked out, it was physically pretty much
impossible for him to be involved in what happened to William.
Speaker 3 (20:29):
They also had my written diary which they had photographed
and photo cobbied, and in it was quite I had
appointments written, and I had appointments which were moved around
so that I could attend the assembly on the twelfth
of September.
Speaker 2 (20:48):
Did you trust the police at that point?
Speaker 4 (20:51):
I did at first because a little boy went missing
and I knew they had to look for this little fellow.
Speaker 2 (20:58):
Do you trust them now?
Speaker 1 (20:59):
No?
Speaker 2 (21:00):
It you say that with a smile, I'm guessing you
weren't always smiling about it. Do you trust them?
Speaker 3 (21:11):
Don't trust them? I had not, well, not one way
on the other. I was just confusers to the what
they are up to.
Speaker 2 (21:25):
Bill wasn't the only person wondering what the police were
up to at this point. It's worth saying these decisions
who to target and how in major cases don't get
decided by any one detective. They reported up and signed
off by senior police commanders. But the detective running the
(21:46):
investigation into William's disappearance was hands rup Well.
Speaker 1 (21:51):
I think that someone grabbed him off the street, bundled
him into a car and he just disappeared.
Speaker 2 (21:57):
And at least one person inside the police force was
starting to question what Hans was doing. That person was
another detective. Introduce yourself, Tell me who you are.
Speaker 7 (22:14):
Gary Jublin, retired detective now working in the media.
Speaker 2 (22:18):
But who were you before you retired?
Speaker 7 (22:22):
I was a police officer for thirty four years, specializing
as a homicide detective.
Speaker 10 (22:28):
That was my passion, that was my drive.
Speaker 2 (22:31):
At the time, Hans is planning the raid on Bill Spedding.
He's only a few weeks off retirement. Gary is due
to take the case over. When he hears about the
planned raid, Gary tries to stop it.
Speaker 7 (22:46):
I had concerns before I took it over because the
whole focus of the investigation that that stage was on
Bill Spending. They were going to execute the search warrant
on his place, and once the search warrants executed that.
Speaker 10 (22:58):
He would know that we were looking at him.
Speaker 7 (23:01):
I spoke to senior police and said, could we put
a hold on that and stop that occurring? And I
suppose I'm over stepping the mark to a degree because
I wasn't in charge of the job at that time.
I was puting a place firmly put him a place
and told, don't you worry about it now. When you
take it over, you can then run it the way
(23:21):
you want to run it.
Speaker 2 (23:22):
So you tried to stop the search warrant being executed? Yes, why?
Speaker 7 (23:27):
Because I didn't believe all the stuff that needed to
be done. I wanted to approach it a little bit differently,
not so overtly. I wanted to approach it more covertly.
Once you've executed the search warrant, you've put your hand
up and said basically, we think you're the suspect for it.
Speaker 10 (23:42):
I didn't want it to go down that path.
Speaker 2 (23:45):
Gary called up his boss, the homicide squad commander.
Speaker 7 (23:48):
I said, can we find Mick Willing who was at home?
And then your leave. He was a boss and I
explained it to him, and I was basically told words
to the effect of tubes, just wait till you take
it over.
Speaker 10 (24:00):
Let Hands retire in peace.
Speaker 7 (24:03):
And so I just stepped aside and they did the
did the search warrant on Bill Spenning's place.
Speaker 2 (24:09):
It's not just Gary Jubilin saying this. His version is
backed up by the person he spoke to, Michael Willing.
And you were the homicide commander at the time William
two or went missing.
Speaker 1 (24:20):
That's right.
Speaker 2 (24:20):
Do you remember that happening?
Speaker 1 (24:22):
I do.
Speaker 2 (24:22):
How would you describe.
Speaker 11 (24:23):
Hans Hands, You know, old score homicide squad Detective Hands
had an abrupt but really effective style to be honest,
you know, but he was determined and you know he
worked up until the last day that he had in
the detective's office at the homicide Squad, he was working
his backside off.
Speaker 2 (24:40):
You know, you said he was a hard working detective.
Was he a good detective? How was his management?
Speaker 11 (24:46):
He was a very respected detective, certainly respected across the
police force, respected within the homicide squad, respected by his team.
Speaker 2 (24:56):
Decision was made under Hands were up to raid Bill's
home and his office. Were you aware at that point
whether or not Bill's alibi had been checked?
Speaker 11 (25:07):
I wasn't personally aware. I was being advised as the
homicide squad commander by Hands in terms of what he
thought he was working on.
Speaker 2 (25:18):
Did Gary ask you not to do it?
Speaker 11 (25:20):
I recalled Gary in the last days before Hans retired.
I think I was on leave and Gary wanted to
jump in and take it straight away.
Speaker 2 (25:31):
Did you tell Gary to leave it, to let the
raids go ahead, and to let Hands retire in peace?
Speaker 1 (25:40):
Yes?
Speaker 2 (25:41):
Did the right decision? Looking back?
Speaker 1 (25:43):
Oh, I don't know.
Speaker 11 (25:44):
You know at the end of the day too, Hans
was an extremely experienced investigator, and I had no doubt
or no reason to question anything that he was doing.
Speaker 2 (25:53):
But Gary Jubilin kept asking questions.
Speaker 10 (25:57):
There was no investigation plan on this investigation.
Speaker 2 (26:00):
When you took it over.
Speaker 10 (26:01):
There was no investigation plan.
Speaker 7 (26:04):
Now, I say that with a certain tone because I'm
so surprised that I consider it was the state's highest
profile investigation, if not the country's most high profile investigation.
Speaker 2 (26:18):
An investigation plans are written document that essentially says how
we are going to conduct this investigation.
Speaker 7 (26:23):
How are we going to conduct the investigation, and the direction,
the strategies, the approach to the investigation. That it's like
a framework for an investigation.
Speaker 2 (26:32):
Do you remember seeing an investigation plan that Hans driver.
Speaker 11 (26:37):
I can't specifically recall it, but that's part and parcel
of any investigation.
Speaker 2 (26:42):
You would have expected that to be one.
Speaker 11 (26:45):
I would have expected there to be one.
Speaker 2 (26:47):
What were you told by your commander when you were
given this job.
Speaker 7 (26:55):
My commander Mick Willing, Detective superintendent at the time, he
told me that it's a bit of a cluster, meaning
meaning that I needed to sort it out.
Speaker 10 (27:08):
When I took it over.
Speaker 2 (27:10):
Did you say to him words to the effect, this
investigation is a mess. I need you to come in
and sort it out.
Speaker 11 (27:19):
Look, that's been raised in various actual proceedings. To be honest,
I can't recall saying that to him. I did have
concerns about the investigation. I can't recall saying those words.
Police documents from that time show Gary recorded written concerns
about the previous running of the investigation into William's disappearance,
(27:42):
which seemed to have shifted its attention away from and
back to Bill Spedding over time, possibly to the detriment
of other lines of inquiry. Gary wrote, but Bill's name
was out there and it was everywhere in.
Speaker 2 (28:00):
Bulletins and news reports. Given what had happened, the police
records show Gary decided to focus on Bill, with quote
as many resources as are available to gather evidence of
his involvement or exclude him from involvement. Can I ask
(28:21):
you how you feel about Gary Jubilin now.
Speaker 3 (28:26):
What only name? Was a very aggressive policeman. I don't
know him personally, and I think he was handed a
poison chalice. He was handed something that was going to
cause him a lot of grief.
Speaker 2 (28:57):
Do you remember on the day you were arrested, Yes,
when in the morning outside your house there was a
line of cars around the corner which was full of media. Yes,
I was in one of those cars. This was April
twenty fifteen, a few months after Gary Jubilin took over
(29:19):
the investigation into William's disappearance. I was a reporter covering
the case for a newspaper.
Speaker 3 (29:26):
The thing was that I said to Margaret early one,
there's something up, because there's media everywhere.
Speaker 2 (29:33):
Were apprehensive. At that point.
Speaker 3 (29:36):
I knew something was up, but I had nothing to
feel guilty about. If I had been a criminal, I'll
be out there panicking. But I wasn't a criminal, right
And the thing is that, Yi, the media's out there.
Why are they out there? Oh, well, it's another day
(29:56):
media out there.
Speaker 2 (29:58):
It wasn't just some media out there. All the media
were out there, A line of cars and TV trucks
down the road and round the corner, and I was
in them. I found out Bill Spedding was going to
be arrested before it happened, from another journalist. Everyone seemed
(30:18):
to know it was coming. I tried to get Gary
jubil In to confirm it, but he wouldn't. Sometime in
the mid morning, Bill left the house and drove off.
We all panicked. Do you remember when I think you
left and went into Port Macquarie. Yes, do you remember
what happened?
Speaker 3 (30:39):
Yes, there was an absolute chaos.
Speaker 2 (30:44):
It was chaos. We followed Bill in a convoy. None
of us knew where he was going or why the
police hadn't turned up yet to arrest him. But all
of us were desperate not to miss the next big
break in the William Tyrrell instigation. And I think at
one point you sped up to try and get away
from us, and we were overtaking cars. We may have
(31:09):
jumped lights. The Sydney Morning Herald nearly crashed into my car,
and I remember feeling at the time this was basically harassment.
It was it was I think you got out of
the car in Port Macquarie and reporters jumped out of
cars and surrounded you, and then I think you got
straight back into the car.
Speaker 3 (31:30):
I've thought to yourself, well, we'll just get back in
the car and go home.
Speaker 2 (31:33):
What was it like driving along the road with a
convoy of reporters following you?
Speaker 3 (31:38):
What can I do to.
Speaker 2 (31:41):
At one point you were almost lost us. I think
you went over around about and then a car came
around and cut us off. But then we sped up,
so we were breaking speed limits.
Speaker 3 (31:52):
To catch up very bad boys.
Speaker 2 (31:57):
Yeah we were pretty bad that day, but arguably so
was whoever in the police force tipped off the media
that Bill was going to be arrested. That's not normal
for a homicide investigation. Like I said, I heard it
from another journalist, and Gary Jubilin refused to confirm it.
(32:17):
But in the years since, he's been the person blamed
publicly for this leap, including by the state government and
more than one judge. All of that happened later when
the decision to arrest Bill's Spedding was torn apart in court.
(32:38):
At this point, I need to be open. Gary Jubilin
and I go back a long way to before William
being reported missing, when I was a newspaper reporter covering
other of his investigations, like the serial killing of three
children in a town called Bauerville, not far from where
William would disappear. Years later, I left the paper, Gary
(33:01):
and I co wrote a couple of books together, which
were basically his memoirs. After that, I got another job
working in podcasts, including overseeing one where Gary was the host.
So he and I get on. We don't always agree,
and I've told him when I think he's done the
(33:24):
wrong thing, including on this investigation. He doesn't always listen.
But given he and I have this history together, the
question is whether you think I can be fair and
honest in the way I report on Gary in this podcast.
All I can do is lay it out for you
(33:45):
and let you be the judge. It was Gary Jubilin
who turned up at Bill's house that day to arrest him,
saying it was the historical offenses.
Speaker 4 (34:03):
When they took him away, I just lost it. I
didn't know what I was doing. I locked myself in
the house for days. I wasn't a game to go
outside because of the media and everything.
Speaker 2 (34:17):
Did the media treat you fairly?
Speaker 1 (34:19):
Yeah?
Speaker 4 (34:20):
They just were there. We couldn't move, We couldn't go anywhere.
They were following us everywhere every day, and every morning
we get up, they'd be at the front.
Speaker 2 (34:32):
How bad did it get with the way people treated
you after your name was made public?
Speaker 3 (34:38):
Were in a fish birdcage or a fish tank?
Speaker 4 (34:42):
Everyone steering in like just coming down to court. You
could see people being on the TV and the papers
and you could see them steering.
Speaker 2 (34:53):
This wasn't only local news. Bill's name and face were
plastered across the country after he was a I was
in the media pack the next day for his first
court appearance. Afterwards, outside the court, someone from the police
gave all of the journalists photocopies of a court document
(35:14):
describing in graphic detail the Offense's police were saying, Bill committed.
Did you know that was happening?
Speaker 3 (35:23):
No, of course not.
Speaker 2 (35:24):
In that court document were the same allegations that had
come up already decades earlier and had been dismissed once
before by a judge. And no, it wasn't Gary jubilin
handing out that document though.
Speaker 3 (35:39):
We're using that as a liverageal pressure or something to
create inverted comos, a breakthrough.
Speaker 2 (35:49):
The story exploded. What was the worst of it?
Speaker 3 (35:53):
Holding the car with marg and this fellow got out
of the car in front and I made the gun
symbol at me.
Speaker 4 (36:03):
And what about the pathology?
Speaker 3 (36:06):
Oh yeah, is this called at the pothologist?
Speaker 2 (36:08):
Yes, you asked to leave?
Speaker 3 (36:11):
Oh yes, yes, he read it.
Speaker 4 (36:13):
His name Bill Spidding.
Speaker 2 (36:18):
How did your business go?
Speaker 3 (36:20):
When?
Speaker 4 (36:21):
When?
Speaker 3 (36:22):
And wait to be gone? Dropped to nothing almost overnight?
Speaker 2 (36:26):
So your business is gone gone? This means your income's gone. Yes,
I mean, what does that do to you in terms of.
Speaker 3 (36:35):
Well, financially, we're screwed.
Speaker 2 (36:38):
After a few months, Bill got bail, meaning he was
released from prison while waiting for a trial to take place.
Things got so bad he and Margaret moved house, but
his name was now tied up in the public imagination
with William's disappearance.
Speaker 1 (36:55):
I really would appreciate if you were never out of
the front of the children around. You will not do
it if you see children.
Speaker 2 (37:03):
A neighbor told Bill she didn't want him outside with
her children.
Speaker 1 (37:09):
I just would like to know that you would never
have a myeball out here in case you're bringing my children,
if you're viewing any of my children or their friends. No,
I don't want the lines both while playing out.
Speaker 12 (37:24):
Because I just.
Speaker 1 (37:26):
Want you around when there's so many children here.
Speaker 2 (37:31):
Somehow strangers got hold of Bill's phone number. He got
death threats. Bill reported these threats to the police, but
nothing happened. One day, walking down the road, a man
asked if he was Bill Spedding. Bill said yes, and
the man lurched towards him, grabbing Bill's throat. Bill reported
(37:53):
this to the police as well. He doesn't know if
anyone got charged.
Speaker 3 (37:59):
I don't know.
Speaker 4 (38:00):
It's just been just been a lot on us. The
kids are still feeling it as much as what we did.
Speaker 2 (38:10):
Bill's wife, Margaret says the worst impact was on the kids.
Speaker 4 (38:14):
Because they were happy when they were with us, we
had they were really good, but after they just sort
of went downhill.
Speaker 2 (38:23):
Bill was prevented from seeing the kids after the first
police raid after being arrested. His bail conditions stopped him
from seeing any children.
Speaker 4 (38:34):
They weren't happy before.
Speaker 2 (38:38):
William went missing. Those kids who were living with you,
were they doing well, very well?
Speaker 4 (38:44):
They were done well at school. The teachers just loved
them and loved the work we're doing with them.
Speaker 2 (38:53):
And did it then have an impact on them as well?
Speaker 4 (38:57):
Did big time?
Speaker 3 (38:59):
Yes? Terrible impact in one way. Well, they were pulled
out from the stable home do a completely unstable environment.
They were severed from their friends, severed from their sporting activities,
their family which was us, and there was a lot
(39:21):
of rebellion generated because of that.
Speaker 2 (39:26):
So all that time between the original raid on your
house and the end of the child, which I think
was about three years, you couldn't talk to them.
Speaker 3 (39:36):
Well, I was prohibited from contacting anyone under eighteen.
Speaker 2 (39:42):
Has that had an impact on your relationship with them?
Speaker 3 (39:47):
With the children when they were differ say.
Speaker 4 (39:50):
Don't yeah, Well, they keep saying while they were with us,
they'd never been so happy when they were living with us,
and then when that got taken away, they went downhill.
Speaker 2 (40:05):
So if you're counting up the number of lives damaged
by the investigation into William Tirell's disappearance, you have to
add these four kids as well. All that damage might
be one thing if Bill was found guilty of the
offenses he was charged with. But on the fifth of
(40:28):
March twenty eighteen, three years after the first police raid
on his house, Bill Spedding was found not guilty. Four
years later, December twenty twenty two, he was awarded almost
two million dollars in compensation by the New South Wales
Supreme Court, which found quote there was no reasonable or
(40:50):
probable cause to institute or maintain the criminal prosecution against
mister Spedding, and the material available supported an overwhelming influence
that the allegations were concocted and false. The court directly
criticized the police involved, saying quote the officers had material
(41:14):
that must and certainly should have led them to doubt
the viability of the case. Hey, Gary, can you hear me? Yes, Dan,
I'm not in the country at the time of the
(41:36):
court's decision, so I talked to Gary Jubilin on a
zoom call.
Speaker 12 (41:40):
You sound like you have got a lot on Ah.
Speaker 3 (41:45):
Yes.
Speaker 12 (41:46):
Have you had time in order that to read through
the judgment in the Bill Spedding matter?
Speaker 7 (41:51):
Yeah, I eighty seven pages, so by playing through what
I consider relevant.
Speaker 2 (41:56):
Yeah, Gary Jubilin oversaw the investigation into William Tyrell's disappearance,
but he wasn't the officer in charge of the prosecution
of Bill Spedding over these separate offenses. That was a
more junior detective who was part of Gary's strike force.
And everything the strike force did was written up in
(42:18):
progress reports, dozens of them signed off by senior commanders,
and the decision to charge Bill Spedding was assessed by
other specialist detectives and the police force's own lawyers. But
it's Gary's name that keeps coming up for criticism in
the court's judgment.
Speaker 7 (42:38):
It seems to be that the essence of the judge's
decision is that I and I say I because it
does a lot seems to come beck on me.
Speaker 2 (42:48):
In essence, the court found Gary's strike force charged Bill
Spedding with other unrelated offenses, offenses that had already been
rejected decades earlier by another judge as a way of
putting pressure on Bill to see if he or someone
close to him would crack about William.
Speaker 10 (43:10):
I've been at Corbyn door camp.
Speaker 7 (43:11):
From what junior officers are doing under my command, no
one above me has been called into a camp what
I was doing.
Speaker 12 (43:18):
So there's a document the judge flags which you wrote,
called the Strikeforce Roseanne proposed operational Phase. But what bothers
me about it is that describes the arrest of Bill
Spedding as being phase five in a series of phases
that are part of the investigation into what happened with
(43:39):
William Tyrol. So it very much looks in that document
that you are arresting Bill Spedding on these unrelated offenses
as part of your investigation into what happened to William. Yeah,
I mean in that document it absolutely looks like that's
the case.
Speaker 3 (43:58):
Okay.
Speaker 7 (43:58):
And to answer that this is chicken before the egg
and I'm not making this offense up.
Speaker 12 (44:04):
These are serious offenses.
Speaker 7 (44:06):
So yes, I'm going to use the fact that we've
got primer facy case on a person that in the
timing of it, it is a face.
Speaker 10 (44:15):
But that to me, and this.
Speaker 7 (44:16):
Is this is what really agrees me about this decision.
I think that was some of the best police work
I've done in my career. I had to there were
so many moving parts that I'm using every available resource,
technique and strategy I had available to me.
Speaker 12 (44:33):
You can't do that though, as a cop, can you
You can't charge someone with unrelated offenses in order to
pursue a different investigation.
Speaker 7 (44:45):
Let me say this, if you're going to have to
charge that person, do you think it's acceptable that if
I charged Bill Spending, I didn't have a conversation with
him after that point in time about William Tyrell. Do
you think I should have just charged because this is
where I think it comes down to.
Speaker 12 (45:02):
Okay, Yeah, I'm saying you can't do what you say
you did, and you're saying I couldn't have done the alternative.
I would have been wrong not to charge him and
not ask him about William.
Speaker 7 (45:17):
I could imagine being in the coroner's court with the
family looking at this investigation and being asked, so you
were looking for the person responsible for abducting a three
odd child, yes, and there was a person of interest
that you were looking at. Yes, and you didn't think
it was worthwhile speaking to him about the abduction case.
Speaker 2 (45:38):
Like Unsurprisingly, Bill Spedding's lawyer feels differently about this.
Speaker 8 (45:45):
That suggestion by Gary Jubilan that the matters were distinct,
that he was going to bring bear on charges that
were already open him to charge has been made a
nonsense of Now, I don't understand that if police officers
(46:07):
have somewhat that they suspect for one thing, and they
have reasonable probable cause to charge them with another thing,
that they might well bring those charges in order to
put pressure. But that wasn't this case. This was the
case where the chargers have been demonstrated to have been
(46:31):
probably false and should never have been.
Speaker 2 (46:33):
Laid, and that is what the court found. Reading through
the judgment, you can see the alleged victims accounts of
what happened change. A crucial eyewitness refuses to cooperate with
the police for months, and when he finally does, his
evidence is that the offenses didn't happen. The case fell away.
Speaker 8 (46:58):
The case fell away as long as as it went,
but there was also a failue to disclose by place.
Speaker 2 (47:05):
The different problems with the case are not all included
in police documents, including those provided to the prosecution lawyers.
Speaker 8 (47:14):
The failed to disclose demonstrated further, the court found the
malice that had initially swept them up.
Speaker 2 (47:26):
Although the person described in the court judgment as having
failed to disclose this information isn't Gary Jubilin. Gary was
in overall command.
Speaker 12 (47:38):
Okay, just to put some of the things you are
alleged to have done to you, and these are things
you alleged to have done directly rather than as a super
The judge says that you or someone working for you
leaked to the media that Bill Spedding was going to
be arrested.
Speaker 7 (47:58):
Yeah, out, both you and I know that is a joke.
Speaker 12 (48:03):
Well, I know you didn't lead to me because I
was trying to get you to tell me and you
wouldn't tell me.
Speaker 3 (48:09):
Yeah.
Speaker 7 (48:10):
When I found out that the media were there, I said,
someone from above has leaked this.
Speaker 12 (48:16):
So you're sure you're saying it was leaked by somebody
above you? Yes, So, Bill Spedding says at one point
when you came to arrest him, he was actually on
the phone to his solicitor and he said this to you,
and you said, I don't care what fucking cunt you
have on the phone. I can believe you're using that language.
Speaker 7 (48:36):
I probably would run the pub when I'm arresting someone
and then doing that doing place work that wouldn't be used.
Speaker 2 (48:45):
Bill Spedding's draft book describes the moment when he was
arrested by Gary, but doesn't mention Gary using this language,
which is something that was claimed later in court. Nor
does Bill's book describe something else said in court that
Gary threatened Bill, saying mister nice washing machine man, I
(49:06):
am going to ruin you.
Speaker 12 (49:09):
I can see you saying, mister nice washing machine repairmer.
Speaker 7 (49:14):
I can't recall saying that. I can't just but I
put it in the context of a conversation. I am
trying to find a three year old boy that could
possibly be alive. So it wasn't a it wasn't an
inappropriate conversation, but it wasn't a comfortable conversation.
Speaker 12 (49:31):
And I think that's the way what you were saying
you didn't say, is the bit that is a threat
I am going to ruin you.
Speaker 7 (49:37):
I can't make any threat, promise or inducement.
Speaker 2 (49:41):
Who said what is really a relatively minor issue. The
fact is the court found Bill Spedding should not have
been prosecuted in the first place, and that once he
had been, that prosecution should never have continued, and that
the result did ruin Bill's life. Bill's own book wasn't
(50:04):
read out in the Supreme Court, but our book was
the one Gary and I wrote together. In it, we
described how Gary wrestled with this decision about charging Bill Spedding.
We wrote, quote, I'm about to pull the trigger on
a guy's life. Get it wrong, and I'd destroy him.
(50:27):
The judge found Jubilin knew if he got it wrong,
it would destroy mister Spedding. The public linking of his
name to the William Tyrell investigation was one thing. Jubilin
knew exactly what he was doing. If he got it wrong,
it would destroy him, and it did destroy him. Looking back,
(50:50):
I think that book we wrote together hurt Gary because
it was honest. In time, the Supreme Court's verdict would
be upheld by the Appeal Court, which described the pursuit
of Bill Spedding as the worst case of malicious prosecution
in the history of New South Wales.
Speaker 8 (51:12):
Is in fact the highest award of damages in the
country for a malicious prosecution in those circumstances. Well, the
judges got it right.
Speaker 2 (51:26):
That's Bill Spedding's lawyer, Peter O'Brien, Gary himself is unrepentant.
Speaker 12 (51:34):
My last question, given what you now know in the
damage Bill Spedding says he's suffered, do you feel sorry
for Bill Spedding.
Speaker 10 (51:47):
I don't want people. If people do listen to.
Speaker 7 (51:50):
This, I don't want them to misinterpret that we're going
to accept the ruling of the court.
Speaker 10 (51:55):
But me personally, no, I don't.
Speaker 2 (52:01):
But that's not the end of the story. After Bill
was arrested and before he was found not guilty, he
spent time in Cesnox jail, a few hours south of
Kendall where William went missing. Bill's cellmate was a man
called Tony Jones. And in jail, you were putting a
(52:22):
cell with a guy called Tony Jones who used to
be a neighbor of Bill's from years before.
Speaker 3 (52:28):
And I hadn't seen or heard of him since, and
I didn't recognize him. He had a bid put on.
Speaker 2 (52:33):
Late Tony was serving time for child sex offenses.
Speaker 3 (52:38):
I said, doing what's what you said? We're probably being recorded.
Speaker 2 (52:41):
Their conversations were recorded. It was another of Gary Jublin's operations.
Tony Jones had been given a script to work to
and a bunch of false documents claiming to show police
had new technology that allowed them to track where somebody
had been years earlier using their mobile phone. So the
(53:02):
police were listening to the conversation when Bill said, well,
that means they'll be able to tell I wasn't anywhere
near the house on the morning William went missing. It's
there in the internal police records from the time. Gary
Jublin updates the investigation plan to say that he accepts
(53:24):
on the balance of probabilities, Bill Spedding was not involved
in William's disappearance and the police now needed to refocus
the investigation on someone else. In his unpublished book, Bill
lays out different theories of what might have happened to
William and concludes this case has all the hallmarks of
(53:47):
a targeted abduction, So we've ended up in the same place.
This episode started with the first detective who oversaw the
raid on Bill's home hands Rupp, who also said it
was an abduction.
Speaker 1 (54:02):
It was the anti logical explanation. He didn't wander off.
We know he didn't wander off, So what else could
there be?
Speaker 3 (54:10):
What was your feeling?
Speaker 1 (54:11):
Well, I think that someone grabbed him off the street,
bundled him into a car and he just disappeared, which
is really really sad.
Speaker 2 (54:20):
How much of you lost over the course of this process?
Speaker 3 (54:24):
Too uge?
Speaker 2 (54:25):
What's your overwhelming emotion.
Speaker 3 (54:33):
I'm tired, very tired. I'm just the whole lot to
go away.
Speaker 2 (54:39):
Margaret, Well, I'm glad it's ober. Is it over?
Speaker 3 (54:48):
Isn't it? Know?
Speaker 2 (54:50):
You once said that you said that there should be
a parliamentary inquiry into the way the investigation of William's
disappearance has been conducted.
Speaker 3 (55:04):
I think so. I think the myth is should be.
Speaker 2 (55:08):
Do you know the one other person who also thinks
there should be a parliamentary inquiry into this investigation, it's
Gary Jubilin.
Speaker 3 (55:22):
I think so, because he was allowed to do what
he was what he did, so it goes up to
the higher police hierarchy that he was submitting his plan
of action to his superiors and at no point was
a plan of action, questioned, so maybe they should be
(55:48):
the inquiry into that, So.
Speaker 2 (55:50):
It goes up to the senior police year. Bill Spedding
is an old man now and has spent several years
in different courtrooms since William was reported missing. In the
appeal court last year, I noticed he now wears a
hearing aid and sat often with his eyes closed, his
(56:11):
head nodding forward as the court chewed over his malicious prosecution.
But what struck me listening to the details of how
Bill was put under pressure by the media, by the public,
put under surveillance, charged with other offenses, and had his
old neighbor sent in undercover. Wasn't that this was a straightforward,
(56:36):
mistaken police investigation, but rather this was a playbook, a
set of tactics that the police would use again and
again in the William Tyrrell investigation. Because even while Bill
Spedding was still awaiting trial, the lead detective Gary Jubelin,
(56:58):
had moved on, had refocused, and was working on another
potential suspect. He once told me that when you're working
a homicide investigation, you're going like a bulldozer and people
will get hurt. Yep, what did you mean by that?
Speaker 7 (57:17):
The very nature of homicide investigation. If people think you
can tip reund the homicide investigation, you're living in La
La Land. Homicide investigation is about finding out what's happened.
I'm not talking about breaking rules here or going too far.
I'm talking about you've got to go after a person.
You've got to hunt that person, find that person and
(57:38):
gather the evidence. And to do that, you're going to
hurt people.
Speaker 2 (57:43):
That's next time on Witness, William Tyrrel. A lot of
different people have been involved in making this series. Among them,
the executive producer is Nina Young. The sound design was
by Tiffany Dimack. The producers have been Emily Pigeon, Nicholas Adams,
Jazz Bar, Phoebe Zakowski Wallace and Tabby Wilson. Research by
(58:08):
Adan Patrick, original music by Rory O'Connor. Our lawyer is
Stephen Coombs. The editor at news dot com dot Au
is Kerry Warren. I'm Dan Box
Now, the turial case was perplexing because there wasn't a
Cleaves suspect.
Speaker 2 (00:05):
This is hands rap.
Speaker 1 (00:06):
There was an initial phase searching for the lost child.
Speaker 2 (00:11):
The detective who was in charge of the investigation into
William Toole's disappearance right from the beginning.
Speaker 1 (00:18):
And that went on for a couple of weeks and
that bore no fruit at all. So clearly there was
something more to the situation than a little boy lost
in the bush.
Speaker 2 (00:28):
But Hans doesn't want to talk to me for this podcast.
Speaker 1 (00:32):
He clearly didn't wander off by himself.
Speaker 2 (00:34):
So this interview you're listening to was conducted by a
colleague of mine, Caroline Overington, a few years ago now,
for her own reporting on William's disappearance.
Speaker 1 (00:45):
What is it that prompts that feeling there's something.
Speaker 3 (00:49):
More to this?
Speaker 1 (00:50):
It was the only logical explanation. He didn't wander off.
We know he didn't wander off, so what else could
there be?
Speaker 3 (00:58):
What was your feeling?
Speaker 1 (01:00):
Well, I think that someone grabbed him off the straight,
bundled him into a car and he just disappeared, which
is really really sad.
Speaker 2 (01:09):
Hans has got good reason for thinking William was abducted
for one thing, he's a veteran policeman.
Speaker 1 (01:16):
Look I joined in February of nineteen seventy four, so
it's been a career of forty one years.
Speaker 2 (01:22):
Forty one years, first in uniform and then as an investigator.
Speaker 1 (01:26):
I went a plane clothes in the late seventies, ninety
seventy nine, and I went to the CIBA in nineteen
ninety two.
Speaker 2 (01:33):
CID means Hans was a detective and he spent the
decades since carving out a reputation as a tough, hard
working operator working on the biggest crimes.
Speaker 1 (01:46):
I think it was about nineteen ninety two I went
to the homicide squad, so effectively for the last thirty years,
I've investigated bag robbers and murderers.
Speaker 2 (01:55):
Meaning Hans knows what he's talking about, and I don't
read anything into the fact that he doesn't want to
talk to me when I call him. It's ten years
since William Tyrrel was reported missing, and almost ten years
since Hans himself retired from the New South Wales Police.
When he was put in charge of the investigation into
(02:15):
William's disappearance, Hans was only a few months off retirement,
so he explains he's been out of the loop for
almost a decade. Talking to Caroline a few years earlier, however,
Hans still had some strong opinions.
Speaker 1 (02:34):
Murderers don't murder strangers. As a rear event.
Speaker 2 (02:38):
Murderers don't typically murder strangers. He says.
Speaker 1 (02:41):
People always kill someone they know, whether that's a loving
relationship or a domestic relationship or a business relationship that's
gone bad. Something there's something to tie the offender to
the victim.
Speaker 2 (02:53):
The detective's job is usually finding out that thing tying
offender to victim. H except William's case was different.
Speaker 4 (03:05):
That's not your belief.
Speaker 1 (03:06):
No, absolutely, this has got nothing to do with the
turk cause at all. Your feeling was always that it
was the stranger. Absolutely, there was stranger involved. I don't
think any member of the family involved at all.
Speaker 2 (03:18):
No, So Hans is certain it was a stranger who
took William and his family were not involved at all.
Early decisions are critical in long police investigations. Even though
Hans worked on William's case for only a few months,
he still had a massive impact on the years that followed.
Speaker 1 (03:42):
You retire, didn't you after four months on that case?
So you weren't able to see it through. Do you
think if you had, or would we have a result?
That's impossible for me to say. I don't know, but
I know when I left it, I think it was
in good hands.
Speaker 2 (03:59):
Hans says he's happy with the way he left the
William Tyrell investigation.
Speaker 1 (04:04):
Look, I don't dwell on the ones that've got a wagon,
but look, I'm happy with what I've achieved, and that's
pretty good. And now this is a different stage of
my life.
Speaker 2 (04:18):
But not everyone agrees the investigation was in a good
place when Hans left it. You're about to hear from
the detective who took it over, the homicide squad commander
who oversaw this transition, and the man at the very
center of the police investigation who describes it as a
(04:38):
poisoned chalice. I'm Dan box and from news dot com
dot Au. This is Witness William Tyrell, Episode seven, Malicious Prosecution.
Speaker 3 (04:55):
Hello, Justing, wonder is rue? It's a good question, um coffee.
Speaker 2 (05:02):
Bill Spedding describes himself as not the kind of man
to draw attention to himself. He hopes people see him
as a pretty straightforward guy, an ordinary grandfather at home.
He and his wife, Margaret, drive an ordinary maroon colored
Ford Fairline which they call Myrtle. But really nothing about
(05:25):
the Spedding's life has been ordinary over the past ten years.
I might just wait for Peter, which is why we're
meeting not at Bill's home but in the offices of
his lawyer in Sydney, because within months of William's disappearance,
(05:46):
Bill would become front page news right across the country,
and his lawyer is now sitting listening to this interview
with Bill and Margaret just thinking back to before William
went missing. What was life like for you then? Was
it happy? Was it going well? Yeah?
Speaker 3 (06:05):
Oh well it was good at the time. Yes. Businesses
doing well, successful in the community. The kids are in
the forty teams in their weekend sport. We had soccorns
that had died as in IFL on Sundays and middle
marvelous group of parents on the other children in the teams.
Speaker 2 (06:28):
While they had good friends where they were living. The
Spedding's family history is complicated. Bill and Margaret have each
been married before with kids from previous relationships, and there
had been falling out within their families, some more bitter
than others.
Speaker 3 (06:45):
Yes, what were you looking forward to then, well, just
retiring down that area.
Speaker 2 (06:52):
That area was the mid north coast of New South Wales.
The Speddings lived in Bonnie Hills, a village about twenty
minute drive from where William was reported missing. Bill worked
as a white goods repairman, installing air conditioners fixing fridges.
Three days before William's disappearance, he was called to look
(07:13):
at the washing machine in a house on a dead
end road called Benerun.
Speaker 3 (07:17):
Drive, and I just calmed in there and had to
go back later on to finish the job off. Our
first knowledge of the disappearance was by the news newscast
that evening of the six o'clock news, and there didn't
(07:40):
mean anything to us other than the fact that a
child had disappeared in the local community. And the name
didn't mean anything to me because the name of Dural
was not my customer's name. So nothing fill into place,
nothing twigged.
Speaker 2 (07:58):
Bill would later write a book about what happened, although
it's never been published. I've got a copy. The book
says Bill had ordered the parts to fix the washing
machine and was waiting for them to be delivered when
he got a call from the house on the morning
William was reported missing. Bill didn't pick up when he
(08:19):
saw the missed call. He called back, no answer, But
there were other phone calls between Bill and the house
both that day and later.
Speaker 3 (08:30):
And I was quite surprised and be told mind the
police because they rang me and said that I was
not to mention or disclose William had disappeared from the house.
And then I said, well, how was I supposed to
know that when it wasn't there when I was there.
Speaker 2 (08:52):
Four months later, January twenty fifteen, Bill and Margaret were
sitting on their back verandah when the police arrived to
search his house.
Speaker 3 (09:02):
The search all of our house wasn't no surprise at all,
no surprise because I knew that they were doing searches
and around the area, and when they turned up, we
weren't unduly surprise. I thought we are fair enough to
investigating their disappearance and come on in, guys, you know,
do your thing and we we'll get out of your way.
Speaker 2 (09:24):
But the media found out about it.
Speaker 5 (09:28):
Police arrived at their Bonnie Hills home at seven point
thirty on Tuesday morning. They spent forty eight hours excavating
the backyard and emptying a sceptic Tam.
Speaker 6 (09:36):
Morning, Sean, what's the latest on that. We have fresh
pitchures that are coming to you now as we go
to wear So this is the latest development. It's believed
this semi rural property is linked to another property that
was rated yesterday. Here at Laureenton where we are a
flat where items were taken.
Speaker 7 (09:54):
They took computers out, they took a mattress out, and
they took a ton.
Speaker 2 (09:57):
Of stuff out.
Speaker 8 (09:58):
Actually they filled the back of a a wagon up.
Speaker 5 (10:00):
Detectives have sent away three cars, mobile phones, a mattress
and computer equipment for forensic testing.
Speaker 2 (10:07):
Those raids and the media reporting would change everything in
Bell's life.
Speaker 3 (10:14):
I didn't realize that things were so intense except Tom
when during the first record or police interview and the
question he was relentless.
Speaker 9 (10:26):
I believe you went to that address better and drive
Kendall on the twelfth of September twenty fourteen.
Speaker 3 (10:34):
I never went near there.
Speaker 2 (10:37):
This is a recording of Bill Spadding's police interview.
Speaker 9 (10:40):
You were there to fix that washing machine. Perhaps you
didn't make it to the house because as we know,
William Tyrrell was wandering around the front yard of his
grandmother's house on his own. He had no supervision bondy
parent at that time. For a few minutes. We know that, Okay,
(11:04):
we believe you were there.
Speaker 3 (11:05):
I wasn't there. And the police are really getting upset
with me because they were asking questions which I had
no knowledge of the content, and asking what happened to
certain phone calls? And I said not that. I've got
no idea.
Speaker 9 (11:26):
I'm telling you on your official records, you've got a
phone call at nine o three am, but it isn't
here is anything you can tell me about that? No,
what this indicates to us, So that specific phone call
you received you deleted from that phone.
Speaker 3 (11:42):
You can't delete it.
Speaker 9 (11:44):
You deleted that number. You can delete it that incoming call,
so that when police extracted your phone they wouldn't find
it in the extraction of the phone. Why is that
phone call not in your incoming calls on the twelfth
of September twenty fourteen at nine o three am, I
don't know. Did you delete that phone call now? You
can't delete Did you delete that phone call from your
(12:06):
telephone number from your bill telephone now to show the
police that that phone call did not occur for whatever reason.
Speaker 3 (12:12):
I don't know. I didn't delete anything.
Speaker 2 (12:16):
In his book. Bill says that was the call about
fixing the washing machine at the house where William was staying.
He says it didn't show up in his phone records
because he used the automated answer phone service. Bill pressed
one oh one to listen to the message, then pressed
twenty two to redial the number. So it wasn't like
(12:36):
a normal phone call. But it went beyond asking you
certain questions. They said to you, we believe that you
may have grabbed William.
Speaker 9 (12:48):
We believe that you may have grabbed William from that
front address, from the front yard of that address, may
have left the area then anyone knowing. I'm sorry, I
wasn't they did you take William?
Speaker 3 (13:04):
Til No. I just sat there and thought, what are
you talking about? I wasn't there.
Speaker 2 (13:11):
Were you frightened?
Speaker 3 (13:13):
Oh? I was bewildered, very much bewildered in the questioning.
Speaker 2 (13:20):
And if Bill says he was bewildered by the questions
asked in the recorded police interview. What the detectives asked
him when they turned off the tape must have been
even more confusing. There was one point when I think
the police were driving you from your house to the
police station on that day, and in the car they
(13:41):
asked you if you knew any pedophiles, yes, and you said,
you know, I don't know the names are people you
knew from the past related? And they said, what about
Jeffrey meaning Jeffrey Hillsley Free. Hillsley was Bill's former brother
(14:02):
in law from a previous marriage. At that time, Jeffrey
was serving a life sentence for raping a ten year
old girl and murdering her stepfather. But did you think
at that point they're asking me about budophiles? Did that
start to what did you think? Then?
Speaker 3 (14:22):
I was very naive. I was totally overwhelmed, very nive
about please question me. And I hadn't done anything to
feel guilty about. And so I'm thinking, well, well, they're
just asking normal questions.
Speaker 2 (14:40):
After you left the police station that day you interviewed
for six hours, Yes, and you left the police station.
And as you left, you've given evidence saying that one
of the detectives shouted at you, we know you did it.
We're going to get you. I'm going to arrest you.
Speaker 3 (14:56):
Yes, one detective did, and that was about William Tyrell.
Speaker 2 (15:04):
Right, Okay, So there's a lot to unpack here. At
this point, all Bill knows is the police have turned
up at his door, raided his house and later his
business office. They've driven him away asking about pedophiles and
spent six hours questioning him, including saying they believe he
(15:26):
took William. But why are the police so focused on him?
Speaker 8 (15:34):
Well, by this stage, the disappearance of William Urrel had
saturated the press.
Speaker 2 (15:41):
This is Bill Spedding's lawyer Peter O'Brien speaking in a
separate interview.
Speaker 8 (15:46):
It had permeated well into the community psyche. It worried appearance,
It worried anyone in our community who's right minded and
thinking of that, the welfare of this poor child who
god missing in such mysterious circumstances. And the police response
(16:08):
was naturally and correctly to do whatever they could.
Speaker 1 (16:12):
The problem, I think.
Speaker 8 (16:16):
In some respects with the approach that they took is
that they focused through heavily on Bill Spedding once they
had what was probably a distorted piece of fabricated information
on an anonymous tip.
Speaker 2 (16:33):
That anonymous tip was made within days of William Tyrrell
being reported missing. According to police records, the cops received
at least one call claiming Bill has a history of
alleged involvement in some really awful offenses. I'm not going
to say what those alleged offenses are, because here's the
(16:54):
thing about them, they'd already been thrown out in court
decades early, when a judge said the person making these
allegations against Bill was quote obsessive, compulsive, and bizarre. It's
all tied up in that complicated family history and the
(17:14):
falling outs I mentioned at the start of the episode.
The judge said this person's evidence quote contained inconsistencies which
were so numerous that I cannot now take the time
to refer to them. He also said this person programmed
and tutored others to make allegations against Bill, allegations the
(17:36):
judge said he was reasonably satisfied, were not true, which
is a problem because if the police were following that
anonymous tip, they should have known this, and if they
didn't know it before they raided Bill's house, they certainly
should have done so after. Because a copy of the
(17:58):
court records containing the judge's damning demolition of the case
was seized during the police raid on Bill's office. Looking
back at it, Now, how much damage do you think
that has done to Bill and the people he was
living with at the time.
Speaker 8 (18:20):
Well, incalculable amount of damage. But what it seems to
have done in this case is put him at the center,
and entirely by coincidence, for the fact that he was
a washing machine, a peerman, going about his ordinary daily
work that has brought him to the center of the
disappearance of a child. That's raised the entirety of a
(18:43):
stratus concerns.
Speaker 2 (18:45):
That, however, isn't even the worst of it, to my mind.
The worst thing is that the police raids on Bill's
house and business, which put his face on the TV
and the front page of the papers, launched before the
cops properly checked Bill's alibi. For the morning, William was
(19:06):
reported missing, meaning no one confirmed if Bill actually was
where he said he was in this statement.
Speaker 3 (19:15):
He gave detectives on Friar the TWLL for Sotember two
thousand and forty and I'll dropped the boys to the
bus stop and went back home.
Speaker 2 (19:22):
That was in the early morning before school. The last
known photograph of William Tyrrell was taken at nine thirty
seven am at nine forty four Bill's bank records show
he bought coffees to him and Margaret at a cafe
in Lorryton, a town a short drive from where William
was staying.
Speaker 3 (19:43):
One hundred and I went to the school, assumingly at
Laura and Published school. This would have been about ten
am and finished at about twelve thirty pm. I spoke
with some of the parents that were there and also
spoke to the precible and one of their teachers.
Speaker 2 (19:57):
After the school assembly, Bill says he went to his
offic which.
Speaker 3 (20:01):
Is located a Ball Street lord So I fiershedut at
the office, cycled pick up the kids from school at
three point thirty. I had no dealings with the female
foster care as mother family on that day. In fact,
I had no contact with them from the night of
the fifteenth September twenty fourteen.
Speaker 2 (20:19):
If Bill's alibi checked out, it was physically pretty much
impossible for him to be involved in what happened to William.
Speaker 3 (20:29):
They also had my written diary which they had photographed
and photo cobbied, and in it was quite I had
appointments written, and I had appointments which were moved around
so that I could attend the assembly on the twelfth
of September.
Speaker 2 (20:48):
Did you trust the police at that point?
Speaker 4 (20:51):
I did at first because a little boy went missing
and I knew they had to look for this little fellow.
Speaker 2 (20:58):
Do you trust them now?
Speaker 1 (20:59):
No?
Speaker 2 (21:00):
It you say that with a smile, I'm guessing you
weren't always smiling about it. Do you trust them?
Speaker 3 (21:11):
Don't trust them? I had not, well, not one way
on the other. I was just confusers to the what
they are up to.
Speaker 2 (21:25):
Bill wasn't the only person wondering what the police were
up to at this point. It's worth saying these decisions
who to target and how in major cases don't get
decided by any one detective. They reported up and signed
off by senior police commanders. But the detective running the
(21:46):
investigation into William's disappearance was hands rup Well.
Speaker 1 (21:51):
I think that someone grabbed him off the street, bundled
him into a car and he just disappeared.
Speaker 2 (21:57):
And at least one person inside the police force was
starting to question what Hans was doing. That person was
another detective. Introduce yourself, Tell me who you are.
Speaker 7 (22:14):
Gary Jublin, retired detective now working in the media.
Speaker 2 (22:18):
But who were you before you retired?
Speaker 7 (22:22):
I was a police officer for thirty four years, specializing
as a homicide detective.
Speaker 10 (22:28):
That was my passion, that was my drive.
Speaker 2 (22:31):
At the time, Hans is planning the raid on Bill Spedding.
He's only a few weeks off retirement. Gary is due
to take the case over. When he hears about the
planned raid, Gary tries to stop it.
Speaker 7 (22:46):
I had concerns before I took it over because the
whole focus of the investigation that that stage was on
Bill Spending. They were going to execute the search warrant
on his place, and once the search warrants executed that.
Speaker 10 (22:58):
He would know that we were looking at him.
Speaker 7 (23:01):
I spoke to senior police and said, could we put
a hold on that and stop that occurring? And I
suppose I'm over stepping the mark to a degree because
I wasn't in charge of the job at that time.
I was puting a place firmly put him a place
and told, don't you worry about it now. When you
take it over, you can then run it the way
(23:21):
you want to run it.
Speaker 2 (23:22):
So you tried to stop the search warrant being executed? Yes, why?
Speaker 7 (23:27):
Because I didn't believe all the stuff that needed to
be done. I wanted to approach it a little bit differently,
not so overtly. I wanted to approach it more covertly.
Once you've executed the search warrant, you've put your hand
up and said basically, we think you're the suspect for it.
Speaker 10 (23:42):
I didn't want it to go down that path.
Speaker 2 (23:45):
Gary called up his boss, the homicide squad commander.
Speaker 7 (23:48):
I said, can we find Mick Willing who was at home?
And then your leave. He was a boss and I
explained it to him, and I was basically told words
to the effect of tubes, just wait till you take
it over.
Speaker 10 (24:00):
Let Hands retire in peace.
Speaker 7 (24:03):
And so I just stepped aside and they did the
did the search warrant on Bill Spenning's place.
Speaker 2 (24:09):
It's not just Gary Jubilin saying this. His version is
backed up by the person he spoke to, Michael Willing.
And you were the homicide commander at the time William
two or went missing.
Speaker 1 (24:20):
That's right.
Speaker 2 (24:20):
Do you remember that happening?
Speaker 1 (24:22):
I do.
Speaker 2 (24:22):
How would you describe.
Speaker 11 (24:23):
Hans Hands, You know, old score homicide squad Detective Hands
had an abrupt but really effective style to be honest,
you know, but he was determined and you know he
worked up until the last day that he had in
the detective's office at the homicide Squad, he was working
his backside off.
Speaker 2 (24:40):
You know, you said he was a hard working detective.
Was he a good detective? How was his management?
Speaker 11 (24:46):
He was a very respected detective, certainly respected across the
police force, respected within the homicide squad, respected by his team.
Speaker 2 (24:56):
Decision was made under Hands were up to raid Bill's
home and his office. Were you aware at that point
whether or not Bill's alibi had been checked?
Speaker 11 (25:07):
I wasn't personally aware. I was being advised as the
homicide squad commander by Hands in terms of what he
thought he was working on.
Speaker 2 (25:18):
Did Gary ask you not to do it?
Speaker 11 (25:20):
I recalled Gary in the last days before Hans retired.
I think I was on leave and Gary wanted to
jump in and take it straight away.
Speaker 2 (25:31):
Did you tell Gary to leave it, to let the
raids go ahead, and to let Hands retire in peace?
Speaker 1 (25:40):
Yes?
Speaker 2 (25:41):
Did the right decision? Looking back?
Speaker 1 (25:43):
Oh, I don't know.
Speaker 11 (25:44):
You know at the end of the day too, Hans
was an extremely experienced investigator, and I had no doubt
or no reason to question anything that he was doing.
Speaker 2 (25:53):
But Gary Jubilin kept asking questions.
Speaker 10 (25:57):
There was no investigation plan on this investigation.
Speaker 2 (26:00):
When you took it over.
Speaker 10 (26:01):
There was no investigation plan.
Speaker 7 (26:04):
Now, I say that with a certain tone because I'm
so surprised that I consider it was the state's highest
profile investigation, if not the country's most high profile investigation.
Speaker 2 (26:18):
An investigation plans are written document that essentially says how
we are going to conduct this investigation.
Speaker 7 (26:23):
How are we going to conduct the investigation, and the direction,
the strategies, the approach to the investigation. That it's like
a framework for an investigation.
Speaker 2 (26:32):
Do you remember seeing an investigation plan that Hans driver.
Speaker 11 (26:37):
I can't specifically recall it, but that's part and parcel
of any investigation.
Speaker 2 (26:42):
You would have expected that to be one.
Speaker 11 (26:45):
I would have expected there to be one.
Speaker 2 (26:47):
What were you told by your commander when you were
given this job.
Speaker 7 (26:55):
My commander Mick Willing, Detective superintendent at the time, he
told me that it's a bit of a cluster, meaning
meaning that I needed to sort it out.
Speaker 10 (27:08):
When I took it over.
Speaker 2 (27:10):
Did you say to him words to the effect, this
investigation is a mess. I need you to come in
and sort it out.
Speaker 11 (27:19):
Look, that's been raised in various actual proceedings. To be honest,
I can't recall saying that to him. I did have
concerns about the investigation. I can't recall saying those words.
Police documents from that time show Gary recorded written concerns
about the previous running of the investigation into William's disappearance,
(27:42):
which seemed to have shifted its attention away from and
back to Bill Spedding over time, possibly to the detriment
of other lines of inquiry. Gary wrote, but Bill's name
was out there and it was everywhere in.
Speaker 2 (28:00):
Bulletins and news reports. Given what had happened, the police
records show Gary decided to focus on Bill, with quote
as many resources as are available to gather evidence of
his involvement or exclude him from involvement. Can I ask
(28:21):
you how you feel about Gary Jubilin now.
Speaker 3 (28:26):
What only name? Was a very aggressive policeman. I don't
know him personally, and I think he was handed a
poison chalice. He was handed something that was going to
cause him a lot of grief.
Speaker 2 (28:57):
Do you remember on the day you were arrested, Yes,
when in the morning outside your house there was a
line of cars around the corner which was full of media. Yes,
I was in one of those cars. This was April
twenty fifteen, a few months after Gary Jubilin took over
(29:19):
the investigation into William's disappearance. I was a reporter covering
the case for a newspaper.
Speaker 3 (29:26):
The thing was that I said to Margaret early one,
there's something up, because there's media everywhere.
Speaker 2 (29:33):
Were apprehensive. At that point.
Speaker 3 (29:36):
I knew something was up, but I had nothing to
feel guilty about. If I had been a criminal, I'll
be out there panicking. But I wasn't a criminal, right
And the thing is that, Yi, the media's out there.
Why are they out there? Oh, well, it's another day
(29:56):
media out there.
Speaker 2 (29:58):
It wasn't just some media out there. All the media
were out there, A line of cars and TV trucks
down the road and round the corner, and I was
in them. I found out Bill Spedding was going to
be arrested before it happened, from another journalist. Everyone seemed
(30:18):
to know it was coming. I tried to get Gary
jubil In to confirm it, but he wouldn't. Sometime in
the mid morning, Bill left the house and drove off.
We all panicked. Do you remember when I think you
left and went into Port Macquarie. Yes, do you remember
what happened?
Speaker 3 (30:39):
Yes, there was an absolute chaos.
Speaker 2 (30:44):
It was chaos. We followed Bill in a convoy. None
of us knew where he was going or why the
police hadn't turned up yet to arrest him. But all
of us were desperate not to miss the next big
break in the William Tyrrell instigation. And I think at
one point you sped up to try and get away
from us, and we were overtaking cars. We may have
(31:09):
jumped lights. The Sydney Morning Herald nearly crashed into my car,
and I remember feeling at the time this was basically harassment.
It was it was I think you got out of
the car in Port Macquarie and reporters jumped out of
cars and surrounded you, and then I think you got
straight back into the car.
Speaker 3 (31:30):
I've thought to yourself, well, we'll just get back in
the car and go home.
Speaker 2 (31:33):
What was it like driving along the road with a
convoy of reporters following you?
Speaker 3 (31:38):
What can I do to.
Speaker 2 (31:41):
At one point you were almost lost us. I think
you went over around about and then a car came
around and cut us off. But then we sped up,
so we were breaking speed limits.
Speaker 3 (31:52):
To catch up very bad boys.
Speaker 2 (31:57):
Yeah we were pretty bad that day, but arguably so
was whoever in the police force tipped off the media
that Bill was going to be arrested. That's not normal
for a homicide investigation. Like I said, I heard it
from another journalist, and Gary Jubilin refused to confirm it.
(32:17):
But in the years since, he's been the person blamed
publicly for this leap, including by the state government and
more than one judge. All of that happened later when
the decision to arrest Bill's Spedding was torn apart in court.
(32:38):
At this point, I need to be open. Gary Jubilin
and I go back a long way to before William
being reported missing, when I was a newspaper reporter covering
other of his investigations, like the serial killing of three
children in a town called Bauerville, not far from where
William would disappear. Years later, I left the paper, Gary
(33:01):
and I co wrote a couple of books together, which
were basically his memoirs. After that, I got another job
working in podcasts, including overseeing one where Gary was the host.
So he and I get on. We don't always agree,
and I've told him when I think he's done the
(33:24):
wrong thing, including on this investigation. He doesn't always listen.
But given he and I have this history together, the
question is whether you think I can be fair and
honest in the way I report on Gary in this podcast.
All I can do is lay it out for you
(33:45):
and let you be the judge. It was Gary Jubilin
who turned up at Bill's house that day to arrest him,
saying it was the historical offenses.
Speaker 4 (34:03):
When they took him away, I just lost it. I
didn't know what I was doing. I locked myself in
the house for days. I wasn't a game to go
outside because of the media and everything.
Speaker 2 (34:17):
Did the media treat you fairly?
Speaker 1 (34:19):
Yeah?
Speaker 4 (34:20):
They just were there. We couldn't move, We couldn't go anywhere.
They were following us everywhere every day, and every morning
we get up, they'd be at the front.
Speaker 2 (34:32):
How bad did it get with the way people treated
you after your name was made public?
Speaker 3 (34:38):
Were in a fish birdcage or a fish tank?
Speaker 4 (34:42):
Everyone steering in like just coming down to court. You
could see people being on the TV and the papers
and you could see them steering.
Speaker 2 (34:53):
This wasn't only local news. Bill's name and face were
plastered across the country after he was a I was
in the media pack the next day for his first
court appearance. Afterwards, outside the court, someone from the police
gave all of the journalists photocopies of a court document
(35:14):
describing in graphic detail the Offense's police were saying, Bill committed.
Did you know that was happening?
Speaker 3 (35:23):
No, of course not.
Speaker 2 (35:24):
In that court document were the same allegations that had
come up already decades earlier and had been dismissed once
before by a judge. And no, it wasn't Gary jubilin
handing out that document though.
Speaker 3 (35:39):
We're using that as a liverageal pressure or something to
create inverted comos, a breakthrough.
Speaker 2 (35:49):
The story exploded. What was the worst of it?
Speaker 3 (35:53):
Holding the car with marg and this fellow got out
of the car in front and I made the gun
symbol at me.
Speaker 4 (36:03):
And what about the pathology?
Speaker 3 (36:06):
Oh yeah, is this called at the pothologist?
Speaker 2 (36:08):
Yes, you asked to leave?
Speaker 3 (36:11):
Oh yes, yes, he read it.
Speaker 4 (36:13):
His name Bill Spidding.
Speaker 2 (36:18):
How did your business go?
Speaker 3 (36:20):
When?
Speaker 4 (36:21):
When?
Speaker 3 (36:22):
And wait to be gone? Dropped to nothing almost overnight?
Speaker 2 (36:26):
So your business is gone gone? This means your income's gone. Yes,
I mean, what does that do to you in terms of.
Speaker 3 (36:35):
Well, financially, we're screwed.
Speaker 2 (36:38):
After a few months, Bill got bail, meaning he was
released from prison while waiting for a trial to take place.
Things got so bad he and Margaret moved house, but
his name was now tied up in the public imagination
with William's disappearance.
Speaker 1 (36:55):
I really would appreciate if you were never out of
the front of the children around. You will not do
it if you see children.
Speaker 2 (37:03):
A neighbor told Bill she didn't want him outside with
her children.
Speaker 1 (37:09):
I just would like to know that you would never
have a myeball out here in case you're bringing my children,
if you're viewing any of my children or their friends. No,
I don't want the lines both while playing out.
Speaker 12 (37:24):
Because I just.
Speaker 1 (37:26):
Want you around when there's so many children here.
Speaker 2 (37:31):
Somehow strangers got hold of Bill's phone number. He got
death threats. Bill reported these threats to the police, but
nothing happened. One day, walking down the road, a man
asked if he was Bill Spedding. Bill said yes, and
the man lurched towards him, grabbing Bill's throat. Bill reported
(37:53):
this to the police as well. He doesn't know if
anyone got charged.
Speaker 3 (37:59):
I don't know.
Speaker 4 (38:00):
It's just been just been a lot on us. The
kids are still feeling it as much as what we did.
Speaker 2 (38:10):
Bill's wife, Margaret says the worst impact was on the kids.
Speaker 4 (38:14):
Because they were happy when they were with us, we
had they were really good, but after they just sort
of went downhill.
Speaker 2 (38:23):
Bill was prevented from seeing the kids after the first
police raid after being arrested. His bail conditions stopped him
from seeing any children.
Speaker 4 (38:34):
They weren't happy before.
Speaker 2 (38:38):
William went missing. Those kids who were living with you,
were they doing well, very well?
Speaker 4 (38:44):
They were done well at school. The teachers just loved
them and loved the work we're doing with them.
Speaker 2 (38:53):
And did it then have an impact on them as well?
Speaker 4 (38:57):
Did big time?
Speaker 3 (38:59):
Yes? Terrible impact in one way. Well, they were pulled
out from the stable home do a completely unstable environment.
They were severed from their friends, severed from their sporting activities,
their family which was us, and there was a lot
(39:21):
of rebellion generated because of that.
Speaker 2 (39:26):
So all that time between the original raid on your
house and the end of the child, which I think
was about three years, you couldn't talk to them.
Speaker 3 (39:36):
Well, I was prohibited from contacting anyone under eighteen.
Speaker 2 (39:42):
Has that had an impact on your relationship with them?
Speaker 3 (39:47):
With the children when they were differ say.
Speaker 4 (39:50):
Don't yeah, Well, they keep saying while they were with us,
they'd never been so happy when they were living with us,
and then when that got taken away, they went downhill.
Speaker 2 (40:05):
So if you're counting up the number of lives damaged
by the investigation into William Tirell's disappearance, you have to
add these four kids as well. All that damage might
be one thing if Bill was found guilty of the
offenses he was charged with. But on the fifth of
(40:28):
March twenty eighteen, three years after the first police raid
on his house, Bill Spedding was found not guilty. Four
years later, December twenty twenty two, he was awarded almost
two million dollars in compensation by the New South Wales
Supreme Court, which found quote there was no reasonable or
(40:50):
probable cause to institute or maintain the criminal prosecution against
mister Spedding, and the material available supported an overwhelming influence
that the allegations were concocted and false. The court directly
criticized the police involved, saying quote the officers had material
(41:14):
that must and certainly should have led them to doubt
the viability of the case. Hey, Gary, can you hear me? Yes, Dan,
I'm not in the country at the time of the
(41:36):
court's decision, so I talked to Gary Jubilin on a
zoom call.
Speaker 12 (41:40):
You sound like you have got a lot on Ah.
Speaker 3 (41:45):
Yes.
Speaker 12 (41:46):
Have you had time in order that to read through
the judgment in the Bill Spedding matter?
Speaker 7 (41:51):
Yeah, I eighty seven pages, so by playing through what
I consider relevant.
Speaker 2 (41:56):
Yeah, Gary Jubilin oversaw the investigation into William Tyrell's disappearance,
but he wasn't the officer in charge of the prosecution
of Bill Spedding over these separate offenses. That was a
more junior detective who was part of Gary's strike force.
And everything the strike force did was written up in
(42:18):
progress reports, dozens of them signed off by senior commanders,
and the decision to charge Bill Spedding was assessed by
other specialist detectives and the police force's own lawyers. But
it's Gary's name that keeps coming up for criticism in
the court's judgment.
Speaker 7 (42:38):
It seems to be that the essence of the judge's
decision is that I and I say I because it
does a lot seems to come beck on me.
Speaker 2 (42:48):
In essence, the court found Gary's strike force charged Bill
Spedding with other unrelated offenses, offenses that had already been
rejected decades earlier by another judge as a way of
putting pressure on Bill to see if he or someone
close to him would crack about William.
Speaker 10 (43:10):
I've been at Corbyn door camp.
Speaker 7 (43:11):
From what junior officers are doing under my command, no
one above me has been called into a camp what
I was doing.
Speaker 12 (43:18):
So there's a document the judge flags which you wrote,
called the Strikeforce Roseanne proposed operational Phase. But what bothers
me about it is that describes the arrest of Bill
Spedding as being phase five in a series of phases
that are part of the investigation into what happened with
(43:39):
William Tyrol. So it very much looks in that document
that you are arresting Bill Spedding on these unrelated offenses
as part of your investigation into what happened to William. Yeah,
I mean in that document it absolutely looks like that's
the case.
Speaker 3 (43:58):
Okay.
Speaker 7 (43:58):
And to answer that this is chicken before the egg
and I'm not making this offense up.
Speaker 12 (44:04):
These are serious offenses.
Speaker 7 (44:06):
So yes, I'm going to use the fact that we've
got primer facy case on a person that in the
timing of it, it is a face.
Speaker 10 (44:15):
But that to me, and this.
Speaker 7 (44:16):
Is this is what really agrees me about this decision.
I think that was some of the best police work
I've done in my career. I had to there were
so many moving parts that I'm using every available resource,
technique and strategy I had available to me.
Speaker 12 (44:33):
You can't do that though, as a cop, can you
You can't charge someone with unrelated offenses in order to
pursue a different investigation.
Speaker 7 (44:45):
Let me say this, if you're going to have to
charge that person, do you think it's acceptable that if
I charged Bill Spending, I didn't have a conversation with
him after that point in time about William Tyrell. Do
you think I should have just charged because this is
where I think it comes down to.
Speaker 12 (45:02):
Okay, Yeah, I'm saying you can't do what you say
you did, and you're saying I couldn't have done the alternative.
I would have been wrong not to charge him and
not ask him about William.
Speaker 7 (45:17):
I could imagine being in the coroner's court with the
family looking at this investigation and being asked, so you
were looking for the person responsible for abducting a three
odd child, yes, and there was a person of interest
that you were looking at. Yes, and you didn't think
it was worthwhile speaking to him about the abduction case.
Speaker 2 (45:38):
Like Unsurprisingly, Bill Spedding's lawyer feels differently about this.
Speaker 8 (45:45):
That suggestion by Gary Jubilan that the matters were distinct,
that he was going to bring bear on charges that
were already open him to charge has been made a
nonsense of Now, I don't understand that if police officers
(46:07):
have somewhat that they suspect for one thing, and they
have reasonable probable cause to charge them with another thing,
that they might well bring those charges in order to
put pressure. But that wasn't this case. This was the
case where the chargers have been demonstrated to have been
(46:31):
probably false and should never have been.
Speaker 2 (46:33):
Laid, and that is what the court found. Reading through
the judgment, you can see the alleged victims accounts of
what happened change. A crucial eyewitness refuses to cooperate with
the police for months, and when he finally does, his
evidence is that the offenses didn't happen. The case fell away.
Speaker 8 (46:58):
The case fell away as long as as it went,
but there was also a failue to disclose by place.
Speaker 2 (47:05):
The different problems with the case are not all included
in police documents, including those provided to the prosecution lawyers.
Speaker 8 (47:14):
The failed to disclose demonstrated further, the court found the
malice that had initially swept them up.
Speaker 2 (47:26):
Although the person described in the court judgment as having
failed to disclose this information isn't Gary Jubilin. Gary was
in overall command.
Speaker 12 (47:38):
Okay, just to put some of the things you are
alleged to have done to you, and these are things
you alleged to have done directly rather than as a super
The judge says that you or someone working for you
leaked to the media that Bill Spedding was going to
be arrested.
Speaker 7 (47:58):
Yeah, out, both you and I know that is a joke.
Speaker 12 (48:03):
Well, I know you didn't lead to me because I
was trying to get you to tell me and you
wouldn't tell me.
Speaker 3 (48:09):
Yeah.
Speaker 7 (48:10):
When I found out that the media were there, I said,
someone from above has leaked this.
Speaker 12 (48:16):
So you're sure you're saying it was leaked by somebody
above you? Yes, So, Bill Spedding says at one point
when you came to arrest him, he was actually on
the phone to his solicitor and he said this to you,
and you said, I don't care what fucking cunt you
have on the phone. I can believe you're using that language.
Speaker 7 (48:36):
I probably would run the pub when I'm arresting someone
and then doing that doing place work that wouldn't be used.
Speaker 2 (48:45):
Bill Spedding's draft book describes the moment when he was
arrested by Gary, but doesn't mention Gary using this language,
which is something that was claimed later in court. Nor
does Bill's book describe something else said in court that
Gary threatened Bill, saying mister nice washing machine man, I
(49:06):
am going to ruin you.
Speaker 12 (49:09):
I can see you saying, mister nice washing machine repairmer.
Speaker 7 (49:14):
I can't recall saying that. I can't just but I
put it in the context of a conversation. I am
trying to find a three year old boy that could
possibly be alive. So it wasn't a it wasn't an
inappropriate conversation, but it wasn't a comfortable conversation.
Speaker 12 (49:31):
And I think that's the way what you were saying
you didn't say, is the bit that is a threat
I am going to ruin you.
Speaker 7 (49:37):
I can't make any threat, promise or inducement.
Speaker 2 (49:41):
Who said what is really a relatively minor issue. The
fact is the court found Bill Spedding should not have
been prosecuted in the first place, and that once he
had been, that prosecution should never have continued, and that
the result did ruin Bill's life. Bill's own book wasn't
(50:04):
read out in the Supreme Court, but our book was
the one Gary and I wrote together. In it, we
described how Gary wrestled with this decision about charging Bill Spedding.
We wrote, quote, I'm about to pull the trigger on
a guy's life. Get it wrong, and I'd destroy him.
(50:27):
The judge found Jubilin knew if he got it wrong,
it would destroy mister Spedding. The public linking of his
name to the William Tyrell investigation was one thing. Jubilin
knew exactly what he was doing. If he got it wrong,
it would destroy him, and it did destroy him. Looking back,
(50:50):
I think that book we wrote together hurt Gary because
it was honest. In time, the Supreme Court's verdict would
be upheld by the Appeal Court, which described the pursuit
of Bill Spedding as the worst case of malicious prosecution
in the history of New South Wales.
Speaker 8 (51:12):
Is in fact the highest award of damages in the
country for a malicious prosecution in those circumstances. Well, the
judges got it right.
Speaker 2 (51:26):
That's Bill Spedding's lawyer, Peter O'Brien, Gary himself is unrepentant.
Speaker 12 (51:34):
My last question, given what you now know in the
damage Bill Spedding says he's suffered, do you feel sorry
for Bill Spedding.
Speaker 10 (51:47):
I don't want people. If people do listen to.
Speaker 7 (51:50):
This, I don't want them to misinterpret that we're going
to accept the ruling of the court.
Speaker 10 (51:55):
But me personally, no, I don't.
Speaker 2 (52:01):
But that's not the end of the story. After Bill
was arrested and before he was found not guilty, he
spent time in Cesnox jail, a few hours south of
Kendall where William went missing. Bill's cellmate was a man
called Tony Jones. And in jail, you were putting a
(52:22):
cell with a guy called Tony Jones who used to
be a neighbor of Bill's from years before.
Speaker 3 (52:28):
And I hadn't seen or heard of him since, and
I didn't recognize him. He had a bid put on.
Speaker 2 (52:33):
Late Tony was serving time for child sex offenses.
Speaker 3 (52:38):
I said, doing what's what you said? We're probably being recorded.
Speaker 2 (52:41):
Their conversations were recorded. It was another of Gary Jublin's operations.
Tony Jones had been given a script to work to
and a bunch of false documents claiming to show police
had new technology that allowed them to track where somebody
had been years earlier using their mobile phone. So the
(53:02):
police were listening to the conversation when Bill said, well,
that means they'll be able to tell I wasn't anywhere
near the house on the morning William went missing. It's
there in the internal police records from the time. Gary
Jublin updates the investigation plan to say that he accepts
(53:24):
on the balance of probabilities, Bill Spedding was not involved
in William's disappearance and the police now needed to refocus
the investigation on someone else. In his unpublished book, Bill
lays out different theories of what might have happened to
William and concludes this case has all the hallmarks of
(53:47):
a targeted abduction, So we've ended up in the same place.
This episode started with the first detective who oversaw the
raid on Bill's home hands Rupp, who also said it
was an abduction.
Speaker 1 (54:02):
It was the anti logical explanation. He didn't wander off.
We know he didn't wander off, So what else could
there be?
Speaker 3 (54:10):
What was your feeling?
Speaker 1 (54:11):
Well, I think that someone grabbed him off the street,
bundled him into a car and he just disappeared, which
is really really sad.
Speaker 2 (54:20):
How much of you lost over the course of this process?
Speaker 3 (54:24):
Too uge?
Speaker 2 (54:25):
What's your overwhelming emotion.
Speaker 3 (54:33):
I'm tired, very tired. I'm just the whole lot to
go away.
Speaker 2 (54:39):
Margaret, Well, I'm glad it's ober. Is it over?
Speaker 3 (54:48):
Isn't it? Know?
Speaker 2 (54:50):
You once said that you said that there should be
a parliamentary inquiry into the way the investigation of William's
disappearance has been conducted.
Speaker 3 (55:04):
I think so. I think the myth is should be.
Speaker 2 (55:08):
Do you know the one other person who also thinks
there should be a parliamentary inquiry into this investigation, it's
Gary Jubilin.
Speaker 3 (55:22):
I think so, because he was allowed to do what
he was what he did, so it goes up to
the higher police hierarchy that he was submitting his plan
of action to his superiors and at no point was
a plan of action, questioned, so maybe they should be
(55:48):
the inquiry into that, So.
Speaker 2 (55:50):
It goes up to the senior police year. Bill Spedding
is an old man now and has spent several years
in different courtrooms since William was reported missing. In the
appeal court last year, I noticed he now wears a
hearing aid and sat often with his eyes closed, his
(56:11):
head nodding forward as the court chewed over his malicious prosecution.
But what struck me listening to the details of how
Bill was put under pressure by the media, by the public,
put under surveillance, charged with other offenses, and had his
old neighbor sent in undercover. Wasn't that this was a straightforward,
(56:36):
mistaken police investigation, but rather this was a playbook, a
set of tactics that the police would use again and
again in the William Tyrrell investigation. Because even while Bill
Spedding was still awaiting trial, the lead detective Gary Jubelin,
(56:58):
had moved on, had refocused, and was working on another
potential suspect. He once told me that when you're working
a homicide investigation, you're going like a bulldozer and people
will get hurt. Yep, what did you mean by that?
Speaker 7 (57:17):
The very nature of homicide investigation. If people think you
can tip reund the homicide investigation, you're living in La
La Land. Homicide investigation is about finding out what's happened.
I'm not talking about breaking rules here or going too far.
I'm talking about you've got to go after a person.
You've got to hunt that person, find that person and
(57:38):
gather the evidence. And to do that, you're going to
hurt people.
Speaker 2 (57:43):
That's next time on Witness, William Tyrrel. A lot of
different people have been involved in making this series. Among them,
the executive producer is Nina Young. The sound design was
by Tiffany Dimack. The producers have been Emily Pigeon, Nicholas Adams,
Jazz Bar, Phoebe Zakowski Wallace and Tabby Wilson. Research by
(58:08):
Adan Patrick, original music by Rory O'Connor. Our lawyer is
Stephen Coombs. The editor at news dot com dot Au
is Kerry Warren. I'm Dan Box
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