Episode 16: A Family Divided

Listeners are advised that this podcast series contains course language and adult themes. This podcast series is brought to you by me Headley Thomas and The Australian. Andy Reid sounded agitated when he called a few days before the release of this episode to talk about breaking news of a spate of murders and a purported serial killer. The banner headline on page one of the Sydney Daly Telegraph put

We discussed dissect and dalve into crimes of the past.

Season two of Bronwyn has over four million downloads and Jordi Us once again is bromwin Winfield's second cousin, the very talented young Maddi Walsh. What you've been doing is unbelievable them Maddie. What's been happening in your world?

There is just still so much information to dive into and dig through, just working towards getting justice for Bromwell. Everyone in Lennox Head is talking about it. Every week more information comes out.

Have most people in and around that area, to your knowledge, we've heard this podcast.

Is that you're understanding.

It's been the talk of the town.

I think there is only one conclusion that they are all standing by, and that is her husband may have something to do with it.

You would imagine that the police are listening closely to this because after the Teacher's pet we know what happened. Chris Dawson was down guilty.

Casseroted. Is there any contact with the police.

Do you keep them updated, do they contact you or are they just sort of standing from afar at the moment.

Sometimes they ask for information and they come and ask for interviews. With Judy Singh, who came forward in the last season about witnessing a body in the back of the car, so it is looking promising from the police perspective.

I don't know if you've seen the front pages of Daily Telegraph today, have you read that story saying that sixty women who were brutally murder or disappeared on the New South Wales North Coast Wow in cases where the perpetrators were never caught can be revealed for the first time in fears some of the women were victims of serial killers. This has just come to light today.

Maddie started to hoset the serial killer theory down.

Is there something you could investigate now?

Knowing Bromwin's case and her circumstances, the chances that a serial killer was involved in her disappearance very very minuscule and just based on all the evidence I have seen and what we know to be what happened to bromwhen the night she went missing and her husband being the last person to see her alive, I don't think there is a serial killer involved in her disappearance.

I'm not saying it's not possible.

However, I just don't think it's really in the cars for Bronwin's.

Gross John Winfield's still up there. Isn't he a bit of a recluse? I just can't fathom why he would still be there.

And he stays there, he knows people talk about him. She's still surfing and still living his life.

Obviously, the loss of Bromwin, that's the first and foremost thing. Has he something to do with it?

That's a tragedy that he would be still ramming around in the event that he has nothing to do with it. That's a tragedy that he will be tired with that sort of things. We may never know the truth of his story. So the whole thing, Mattie, is just a complete travesty and tragedy.

The fallout from the podcast and the separate linking of Bronwin's disappearance to a supposed serial killer are taking a toll. Bronwin's eldest daughter, Crystal responded by posting on Facebook.

Interesting read in today's paper?

Did a serial killer kill my mom?

She's one of the women listed.

In this article as possible victims, and it's good to see are the possibilities being explored.

Sentiments like these from Crystal are difficult for Brohman's brother Andy and his wife Michelle to read.

And hear.

In the two subscriber episodes of eleven and twelve, you heard Crystal's perspective on the case and how Crystal lost her life savings to a self proclaimed soul doctor.

She was asked to purchase a large number of gold bullion, and that gold bullion is no longer gold bullion. It is now actually a container full of cement.

Well, how does that happen?

Whilst they were actually sitting with her in a park, they have actually shown her a magic trick, and whilst she's been blown away by the magic trick and she's not paying attention, they have switched the container that had the gold in it and have actually replaced it with a container of the same exact likeness and it has ce mention.

It is that sort of money, three hundred to three hundred and fifty thousand dollars very important and significant for Crystal. Yes, relationships are under strained. There is an elderly woman called Vapu who knew Bromman when she was a girl and Andy was just a little fella. Vapoo and the Reed family were neighbors and Vapo has strongly suspected for a long time that John killed Broman In May nineteen ninety three, John, of course, emphatically denies wrongdoing. When Crystal posted on Facebook

These are Lauren's words. It's not her voice.

It's all just entertainment for people like you, isn't it? Three laughing emojis? Is that one for each of Bromwin's daughters, who you know will see this. Too many gutless keyboard bullies who think they're detective heroes, and too many gullible idiots. Also, Us daughters have had enough of people like you not only disrespecting us, but you're disrespecting every single one of these sixty women and their families.

Crystal recently unfriended me, having sent me a Facebook request some months.

Ago, but I'm not family.

Maddie has always got along well with Crystal, and now they're not on speaking terms. Maddie's auntie Meghan, has been unhappy too, because her twenty one year old forensic science graduate niece spoke her mind about evidence which suggested that Megan had said things about Bromin to Detective Graham Diskin in the original police investigation. You heard this in the

Look, coming into this, I knew that it would be difficult with my situation. In my position, I wasn't alive when Bromwin was alive, so I'm able to kind of separate myself from the emotional impacts that Andy Michelle have and Crystal have and other family members have. Showing my opinion on what I think is the case and my opinion based on the evidence I'm seeing. With Crystal especially,

I got a telephone call from Andy about this and he was a bit disappointed that this prospect had even been raised in relation to Bromin Well.

I've spoken to Andy as well and Michelle, and they both expressed the disbelief that a serial killer could have been involved in Brownwin's disappearance. From what they were saying in this article, there are so many missing and murdered women from Newcastle all the way up to the border. They've come to this conclusion that it's a possibility that there could be a serial killer.

A lot of these.

Women were eighteen, nineteen up to twenty years old, and there were hitch hiking, which we know is not the case for Bromwyn. It was a bit of a reach. I don't think it has any connection to Bromwin's case. Everyone's got their viewpoint, everyone's got their opinion, and Crystal has hers.

It's as if she is really embracing this proposition that a serial killer was responsible.

I did see on Facebook that Crystal posted about this article, and she seemed very open to this idea that a serial killer could be responsible.

Instead of her step Fowler.

She has always been looking for other possibilities.

It's hard to come to that kind of conclusion that someone so close to her could have possibly done something so terrible, Like she's kind of glad that this has come out and grouped with all these other missing and murdered women.

Do you feel like you could talk to her about this and try to express the.

Country, I mean, probably not.

She's so against the possibility of John being possibly involved in Bromwin's disappearance. I don't think she wants to hear anything else about it. I mean, she says she is disconnected from the podcast. Her and sisters don't want anything to do with it. They they don't have any part in it. So for her family members to outright say to her, look, the possibility of a serial killer being involved in your mum's disappearance is very, very far fetched.

It probably wouldn't go over well.

She doesn't want her dad to be the only suspect in this case. That's what she believes, and that maybe brings her a bit more peace. That's where it becomes a really difficult situation, because you have most of the families really sitting by this one possibility of what happened when we have only ever had one suspect this entire time, we have really reviewed this entire case. No one else

There's nothing, it's just a figment.

So for the Telegraph to just group bromwent into this, it kind of creates this weird situation where it's, in my opinion, creating false hope. But what they're not considering other circumstances around her disappearance. It's just very far fetched, especially if we consider John's story of Bromwin said she needed a break and she walked out the door and got into a car. I doubt you get into a

The tensions in the family are still there.

I think closure will heal a lot of wounds with the family, and I think it will.

Bring a lot of us back together, but unfortunately people will be caught in the crossfire.

We know that Robin's cakes was very poorly investigated, and we know that only one person was found by the former deputy state coroner to have been possibly responsible. It actually reminds me of one part of the inquest that was held and Lynn Dawson as she was then known, was missing. She'd been missing by them for just over twenty years.

I recall it.

Chris Dawson's brother, who was also his solicitor, was suggesting that the serial killer Ivan Malatt may have been responsible for Lynn's disappearance. I dealt with some of this in the Teacher's Pet podcast series when we reconstructed evidence from the two thousand and three inquest. The detective Damian Lehne was in the witness box.

Ivan Mullatt's monstrous appetite for sex and death marks him out as one of the country's most notorious serial killers.

Did you investigate any of the suggestions that Ivan Malatt was in that area at the time.

It's like saying, how long is a piece of string? Mister Dawson.

Damien and the coroner believed that Peter Dawson was clutching at straws. Here. Malat's victims were raised nineteen to twenty two, and his killing spree occurred between nineteen eighty nine and nineteen ninety three. He hunted in Sydney's west, far from Sydney's northern beaches and the central coast farther north.

I have nothing to lead me in that area, and I have to discount it. There is nothing to suggest that mister Malatt was in Bayview on nine or ten January. He may be. I don't know that.

No one knows that the lawyer tried to paint Damien as a cop suffering from tunnel vision, of being fixated on Chris Dawson as the probable killer without asking him for more facts. Why hadn't he made Ivan Mulatter suspect. Now let's go back to Glen Taylor's interview with John Winfield in the Ballona Police station. It's early August nineteen ninety eight. What about keys to the house. Do you know whether she took any keys?

Has she still got them?

Whether she took the keys on that night?

I look, they would have been in her handbag. I guess you know.

But you've never since that, Tom, You've never located anything.

No.

Yeah, well she's been back to the house since then, because she brought she came back to the house sometime later, I can't remember when, and she picked up clothes, and she picked up Medicare. She dropped off a Medicare check, and she would have and she didn't break into the house, so she would have had keys to get into it.

Glenn Taylor circled back to John's decision to drive the kids to Sydney.

What time did I decide to go? Yes, So Graham asked me this, and I sort of said to him, I bought petrol in Balliner. Would that have been long after she left? Maybe half an hour? I don't know, maybe half an hour. But the reason why is because I think I gave my bank card stuff to Graham to show him I bought petrol in Balaner on the way through at the endpole there and it showed the

You know, it appears that John has momentarily forgotten that he purchased fuel at eleven oh six pm something he was at pains to highlight to Andy and Michelle back in nineteen ninety three when he arrived at the house in the Shire in Sydney on the afternoon of Monday May seventeen.

I think there was a docket here.

Yeah, there's a bank card docket. I remember he asked me about it.

John volunteered that he bought petrol again at a town called Kempsey, about a four hour drive south of Ballina.

See that car ran on petrol and gas. I used to I can't remember if I had it this, but I used to fill it up with petrol and gas at once. Yes, I used to only have to stop once between here and Sydney, whenever I used to go to Sydney.

You know when you left with the children, did you obviously had to carry them out to the car and put them in the vehicle.

Yeah.

Yeah, Did you take some clothes for them?

Oh? Yeah, yeah, pack clothes. Yeah.

Here's Michelle's recollection about that, and her account is backed up by Bromwin's half sister Melissa.

It was just really, really strange that he packed up and through clothes that weren't even appropriate for Sydney weather. And inside pillowcases were just kids cloth pillow case here, in a pillowcase there, And there might have been a smallish bag of some sort. Melissa and I went shopping so they could have something to wear, because nothing in it was appropriate to wear.

Did you leave any nate or anything to say that you'd taken the children? No is here any reason you didn't.

Didn't think of it. I was sort of I don't know, I just didn't think of it. Just took the kids, you know.

So you drove right through night?

Yeah? Yeah.

Do you know what time you would have arrived at Sydney.

Ah?

Yeah. I was going through Sydney at peak hour traffic, so usually takes me nine or ten hours, So I was probably going through Sydney, I don't know, eight in the morning, something like that, eight or nine.

Can you tell me.

I know the car was unregistered too, because I once I got to Sydney, I had to go straight and get a pink slip straight away and get it registered.

We know that John was very careful with money. He kept a tight grip on the family finances while he was away working in Sydney. The registration on the Ford Falcon expired. John had bought the car on May seven, the year before.

It is probable that the.

Annual registration ran out exactly a year later, so on Friday May seven, nine days before Bromin's disappearance. It is also likely that the subject of the expired registration came up when John went to the house on the evening of Sunday May sixteen. Perhaps John expected Bromin to pay for the registration out of her own funds as she

I think at one stage they went into the bedroom and they were talking in there. I remember mom and Dad were talking about on paid bills and Mum saying something along the lines about not talking about it in front of Lauren and myself. The next thing that I remember was Mum telling myself and my sister Lauren to clean our teeth and go to bed.

I think we normally went to.

Bed about eight thirty pm each night. After I went to bed, I heard Mum and Dad arguing in the kitchen. I could hear Mom crying at the same time. I don't recall what was being said between Mum and Dad, but I could tell that they were arguing. I could hear them arguing until I must have fell asleep. My next recollection that night was being woken by my father. Dad told me that he was taking Lauren a night to Sydney.

Crystal was recalling the events surrounding John's arrival at the house and the last time she saw her mother was one of the unpaid bills the registration for the Ford Falcon. John knew on Monday May seventeen, when he arrived in Sydney after his drive through the night, that the registration had expired because he made arrangements to pay it that day. For me, this event reinforces Glenn's suspicion about John having gone into flight mode or a panic state on the

Can you tell me where you went to? First of all? First of all, did you go to a relative's house or friend's house, just trying to think. I went to.

I don't know whether this is in order, but I know A called into my daughter at her work. I had the kids with me.

Or think is that the hairdressing salon?

Yeah? Yeah, I called into Michelle's place. I think I think it was Michelle or that afternoon I called into Michelle and Andrew. That's Bronwin's sister in law and brother. I called into their place that afternoon.

But the first point, first person you think might have been Judy. Did you say it at the hairdressing salon?

I can't remember. Probably, yeah, probably, I don't know. I can't remember where I first. And then I mean we had breakfast somewhere, and then I had to go. I went straight and got a pink well not straight, but sometime that day I got a pink slip from the service station in Crinulla, and then I went to the motor registry at and then no, I got a pink

John has failed to mention a very important stop that he made after his purported visit to the salon it which Jodie worked on that Monday morning. He has failed to disclose to the detectives in the ball and a police station that in fact, he went to the home of his former wife, Jenny Mason, but she was out shopping and John implored her mother in law, a woman whom he had never met before, to take the two girls for several hours so that he could go and

That blew me away, loom me away.

But he didn't tell you that.

No, these kids, they would never have met Jenny, let alone Jenny's.

Mother in law.

He made out that he come to Sydney, and he come to us bombshell.

That was to us.

The natural thing to do would have been to go to Bromwin's brother and law. Course, but he went to his ex wife's home.

The mother in law was down visiting. He had no idea who this random bloke was.

Here's the former detective Sergeant Glenn Taylor talking to me during the production of this episode sixteen.

There was certainly a lot of things we didn't know in a lot of things he didn't reveal during the interview, the things like his movements when he first got down to Sydney, or he was extremely vague in the interview. Yes, there had been five years, but some things, I mean you just think, well, how could.

You forget that?

No mention of going to the ex wife's home and two kids in pajamas, I mean you think that would have to be still fresh in your mind even after five years.

It was such an unusual thing for him to do, to turn up at his ex wife's place when the interview, we weren't aware of that.

Would you never know that?

These people alone?

We had to get more information about here we'd been previously married to you, and then we had to work out how we're going to contact these people shift they'd be willing to be interviewed.

And yes, I mean, why would you do that? Why would you go there? Why would you go the ex wif's place?

Why wouldn't you go to the immediate family members, go to Michelle and Andrews and give them a ring and say, look, I'm in a dilama Bromin's taken off for a couple of weeks. Let me with the kids, can't your gob out. But the woman that was there, he'd never met her before. The kids point for me with her. I think it was the mother in law of the ex wife from the new partner. Lady had never let the keys or him.

I think he'd already been to see Jodi at that state. He said he went to see JD but we don't have any proof. So he sad several hours on his own. Someday. Have you wondered or questioned since discovering his movements why he would have omitted such an unforgettable thing as to the visit to his ex wife's house. I think he wanted to hopefully we don't discover what he did, which movements and all that day. I agree, But.

Why that's probably only an answer that John Winfield knows.

Why Why is he trying to distance the police from his movements on that Monday in Sydney when he's driving and he gets rid of the children at his ex wife's mother in law's place. Why does he not want you to discover this? That's what I'm curious and auspicious about.

I'm curious. I think I've thought about that since nineteen ninety eight. Why did he do that?

There's so many things. And you've seen him around Lennox in recent days and weeks, seending a number of times. His green station wagon he's getting in.

He's good friends with a concrete He just lives around the corner from us. He's a regular visitor, both myself and my wife in her own cars, within five minutes of each other, both your one and home of the day. And he was seated in his car with his cap on and outside the concrete his house.

He happened to stare at me, and then he stared at my wife. As coming to the street, Glenn Taylor arrived seeing John out driving on another very recent day, we.

Just happened to come up behind his car and I said, oh, what he's doing.

I'll just be interested to see where he's going.

And he went left and then he just went left, left, left, and then he came right back. Commander, Well, at first scene, I mean town a couple of weeks ago, his tunne of a trailer, and I think he's sort of watching his back all the time.

Do you think he was deploying samanti surveillance?

For sure? It was classic Andy surbilance and then after one surbilance on suspects numerous times in my career, both as a police officer and also a private investigator, and it might be just an innocent person behind him to go in the same direction, but he'd probably pull over and think someone's falling in a registry office.

Four vehicles in the Southern Shire was in Miranda, and John was asked by the detectives when he went there.

It was in the afternoon. I suppose did you.

Try ringing the family home at Lenox Head during the course off of state.

I don't know if I did personally, but I probably when we went and visited Andrew and Michelle that afternoon, probably we tried to ring. Then I suppose and the phone was off the hook.

Right, Okay, when you go to that night to stay, who were you staying.

With with my daughter Jodie her place?

Jady was living in Sydney at that stage.

Yeah, I stayed in that She was at a place called I think it was Marlowe Road, a unit in Marlowe Road.

Where did the children sleep?

Yeah, they were sleeping on the floor.

The strong recollection of Michelle and Andy Reid, however, is that the children and John stayed at their house. John didn't stay the whole time, though.

So you think you tried to ring the family home at Lenox Head from Michelle Rhid's plug.

Yeah, they'll be able to verify that because I know Andrew well, it was their phone. I think that Andrew was the one that rang first and the phone was engaged.

You know when you took the children to Sydney. Yeah, how long was it your intention for them to stay in Sydney for? Oh?

They I can't remember having any intention, really, any intention at all.

That recall about the conversation with Bromwin about her having a break from the children.

I know someone said that about that in the letter. I think she might have said she wanted a break. She was, Oh, I really can't remember. Honestly, I can't. I really can't remember. I can't remember what we talked about.

Here John distanced himself again from what he had previously told a number of people about what Bromwin purportedly told him.

We were standing on our little front Feranda just to here, you know, he said, oh, Brolin left me, and I went, oh, okay.

He was like jittery and all of that.

And then he said, well, actually she needed a break. She's going on a holiday. And I thought to myself, is she on a holiday or.

Has she left him? Like, in my head, I'm thinking that's weird.

It's just my nature to be a little bit suspicious and stuff.

But to your knowledge, she had already left it.

And then he switched it to she needed a break, she needs a break, and she's going to get her head together for her and so he brought the kids to sitting.

It is as if John no longer wants to own responsibility for these things. Instead, I think that he wants the detective to focus on Bromwin's own written words about a break. You heard in episode ten that the break Bromwin had briefly written about was her plan to visit her mother, Barbara and her grandmother. Here's Bromwin's mother's sister,

That's probably when she was going to mums to Hobart.

Before she rang mum, she'd spoken to Barb a couple of times regarding what was going on, and bab was quite distressed about it.

And then she rang Mum and then asked her first some money.

That the plan was, according to my mum, that she was coming over to Hobart.

So you didn't have any sect thing in your mind that you were going to be sitting for a week or two weeks.

Or not really, no, No, I just sort of went, you know, sort of like I said, it may have been school holidays. I can't remember. I really can't remember that time.

What did you do in you know, over that ten days.

Or so, probably just hang about just sort of sightseeing and everything, you know.

Now, according to the builder Glenn Webster, who had employed John as a bricklayer. John was back on the job doing work for Glenn at what was then a relatively isolated building site in Illawong during this period when John was back in Sydney with the girls. Here's what Glenn Webster put in his statement in September nineteen ninety eight when Detective Sergeant Glenn Taylor spoke to him.

It didn't take long before John was back in Sydney. It may have only been two or three days that he'd been absent.

I recall that he.

Came to my home driving a white Falcon Sedan. He had with him his two girls, Crystal and Lauren. From memory, John and the girls stayed with us at our home for.

One or two days.

I don't recall the reasons John gave the girls with him. I probably would have asked him why he brought the children to Sydney, but at this point I don't remember what he told me. I don't have any recollection of John mentioning anything about Bronwyn After he came with the girls. I think he organized some other people to look after the girls whilst he did a bit more work on my house. I vaguely recall him telling me that he

John's failure to mention the work that he did at Glenn's house might be a coincidence. He might have forgotten in the same way that he might have forgotten the very unusual decision he made to visit his former wife's house. Alternatively, those two omissions could be deliberate avoidance, evidence of John having deliberately edited part of the reality of that day to minimize scrutiny.

Why was it.

Because he did not want to draw attention to his movements that day and to the house that he had been building in Illawan in the Shire where a concrete poor was imminent.

Did you try to ring Bromley on occasions?

Well, we found out like the phone was engaged for some reason. He was engaged for probably a couple of days, right, So I rang my next door neighbor and got him to get into the house. He broke a back window and just had to look inside the house, you know, And that's when he found out the phone was off the hook. And he was the one he told us who was that Murray Nolan.

So I've got the court. He said, would you mind going up the house? Would you mind going up to the house and breaking in for me. There's a glass panel next to the back door. He said, put your hand open the door and get in. And I said that's fine.

I think I'll do that.

He said, yeah, because I've been trying to ring Bromlin and I want you to little see the robins there. Because I've been ringing, I'm getting all answer. John said to me, I'll ring you back in twenty minutes. So I'm Sussagan.

You never left the phone off the hook after you left the house, did you?

No, no, no, no. I only made those two calls earlier, like what Graham said, after I had left with the kids at what eleven o'clockish. Apparently she had come back to the house and made that zero zero five five number. That's what that's where Graham had established anyway, because it was the same number as she'd been ringing on her phone bill at forty two Byron Street, and that from my memory, that zero zero five five number was made in the early hours of the next morning. But that's

At a certain point in time, did you decide to come back to Lennox Head with.

The kids, Yeah, we came back and tell me when that gate was ge well, it would be in there and whatever it was, that's the day.

I think it was around about approximately two weeks.

Okay, well that's what it was. Yeah.

Did you drive direct reach here the family home?

Yeah?

Yeah, I think so. No one was there. The back window had a piece of ply over it, you know, because it had been broken. There's glass all through the house because Murray he broke the window, but he had a bad back of the time, so he didn't bother cleaning up. There was a medicare check on the front, not the front, the kitchen bench, on the island bench right a medicare check sitting there, signed and it was a check.

Signed by who her? And you believe that chick was definitely not at the house at time when you left.

Definitely not. I know it wasn't there when I left. No way, have you any idea when it was dated?

The check?

Well, it's in it's in Graham stuff. There are you willing to give us that check? Again, Sure, I'll give it back to you. Well, I don't know if I'll give it back to you, but I'll give you a photostat copy, you know.

John then described dealing with the furniture and the other contents of the house. He estimated that ninety percent of what Bromin had taken away when she left Sandstone Crescent had been brought back when she returned to the house and started moving back in on Friday, May fourteen.

And she left the rest down there, you know, and the landlord put it in the storage place in one of her garages out the back, you know, and eventually she gave it back to me. Right, So I got it all. There was a few pots and pans, There was bags of clothes. There was just a lot of crap that she left there, you know. So over a period of time, I carted that stuff up and just put it in a pile inside the garage, right, And then I took the kids to Sydney. Right. So I

The first time you come back, did you report her missing to the police?

I took the kids to Sydney, Yes, came back with by was it two weeks later, Yes, and then reported her missing downstairs to the lady policewoman.

Yes.

Devan Murray Nolan have told me how they recalled the lead up to this.

There are certain things I do remember exactly what I said and what it was said. And he stood on the back Brandy here and we're chatting, and I said, John, I am really concerned about Bromin.

We need to report her missing. No, no, no, no, no, I'm not going to do that sip for John. No one's hurt from us. I'm really concerned about it. You need to report her missing.

Him being the next akin, I thought, well, he asked to door anyway, so no, he was not going to do it.

He was just.

Artamently no no, no, no, no.

No, no, it's all good, it's all lood Ya should come back and all this, And I'm like thinking, he doesn't.

Want her report. Did this scene composed?

Yeah, not at all concerned.

And I thought, I'm free to hear about this woman because as I said, no mobile phone's back then, so you couldn't find anybody.

I thought, where is she?

I thought, maybe she's done something to herself. I said, all right, John, it's like this. If you don't report the missing, I will, and he's gone, no, No, if anyone's going to do it, it'll be me. I said, right, And we were at home here and you can correct me if I'm wrong here.

But he either came down or irraineus came now.

He came downhall.

He said, I'm going into report problem missing, and why do you come up and watch the kids? And I said, yeah, sure, yeah, all right, okay, and I think you went up because I say here with our kids, and you ended up going up there watching.

The two girls.

They were in a bit, weren't they.

He did say something like I want to report this well as fresh in my mind.

I'm thinking he's had time to contrupt some story.

So he went in and.

He reported and missing that night, and I think you said him, why don't you go in the morning, John, And that's when he said, now, I want to do it now, wants fresh in my mind, which was odd in himself, but he'd probably been near full well as Nur Detective Sarah, and I don't know it would have been just the constable on the desk which was Julie Donovan at the time.

In episode six, you heard about some of the details which were written down by the then Constable Julie Donovan in the missing person report which she filled in that night with information coming from John Winfield. I've been studying a one page document typed in Ballener police station at the time John Winfield reported his wife as missing. It is an account of the purported facts and circumstances as John explained them to the police officer who was on duty,

Person of interest was last seen at nine thirty pm on sixteen May nineteen ninety three, after making several phone calls from the above address after husband Jonathan was in Sydney. Apparently the jew had been officially separated since twenty two March nineteen ninety three. On the night of sixteen May, the person of interest had a conversation with her ex husband and informed him that she was leaving. She stated that she was leaving and going for a couple of weeks holiday.

In the first notification to police. John has asserted that bromwin had said she was having a break of a fortnight, whereas he told Broman's brother Andy and sister in law Michelle, as well as Debbie and Murray that she was going for a break of a few days.

I got a phone call from Julie Donovan asking me to come in and have a chat because John give him my name as somebody to talk to Janise Barnard and I winning on the Saturday the following Saturday and met with Julie Donovan, who was just a death comnstable. And then when we started to give our version of what we've been told from him, she went on says nothing what is told me? This is going to have to go upstairs. So it went up to the detectis.

Julie Donovan's name is featured in a number of the entries in the police running sheets in nineteen ninety three because of some of the early inquiries she made with detectives Discan and Wayne Temby. Then, now let's return to the police interview between Glen Taylor and John Winfield.

All right, and then I ran up all her stuff that she left down at forty two Byron Street, and I put it all in the garage and then maybe maybe that was the next school holidays or something, or so we went to Sydney again for two weeks, and it was during that two weeks that she came back, took clothes and left a Medicare check.

This is the second occasion. Yeah, it wasn't the first time you come back that you saw the Medicare chip.

No, No, it's the second time. It's all in. It's all in the report there.

Well, I'll certainly have a look at that.

It's hard to know now what report John Winfield is referring to. If it is a reference to a comprehensive report by the detective Graham Diskin in nineteen ninety three, we have not seen it. Glenn Taylor doesn't recall such a document, but you have heard several references to a Medicare check. Andy and Michelle Reid and Andy's sister Kim Marshall are confident that the evidence around this Medicare check is very important. John relies on this check to claim

Went around to a few of her girlfriends, spoke to them to find out as much as I could find out. Reported her missing down here to the lady policewoman.

At that time when you reported her missing, Yeah, was there any clothes of hers missing at that stage that you noticed?

Not that I noticed, Not that I noticed. And during that time, I don't know what period of time, it might have been three or four weeks, I don't know, but this Shirley Taylor eventually gave me back everything that was left down in the wrenched premises, right, you know, there was you know, there was bags of clothes, and there was pots and pans everything. She eventually gave them to me, you know, and I put them all in

How did you know it was her?

Well, I don't That's what I said to Graham. I said, I don't know it's her, But I mean, no one knows it's her because no one saw her. All I know is that the house wasn't broken into.

But the indication is the check was dated after the sixteenth to May.

John didn't confirm the date of the check. He said that the check was originally posted to Bromwin's temporary address at the flat in Byron Street. That flat had lockable mailboxes or the tenants before she disappeared, Bromwin hadn't returned

Did you feel it's strange act she hadn't made any attempt to contact the children.

Oh, sure, you know, I mean it doesn't. I mean I used to think about it all the time, But I mean it's sort of like I said, I've sort of moved on in life and I don't think about it anymore.

To tell you the truth, you mea just some photo aggress that might have been wishing.

Yeah, family photos? Were they in frames or well? See, we've got in the Loundes room. There's a big buffet right, drawers on one side and three doors on the other and four drawers, and that's where all the photos are kept, you know.

And some of those were missing.

Yeah, I couldn't tell you which photos.

Are you aware of a phone call allegedly made by Bronwin to Jerdy's hairdressing seller.

Yeah, I heard about that.

What did Jeredy have to say about that?

Well, Jodie didn't take the call. Some other girl took it. Oh I can't. I can't remember her name. I never spoke to the girl personally, Jody told me. I told Andrew. And Andrew drove down to the hairdressing shop and spoke to this girl personally, that's Andrew her brother Glenn Taylor.

Asked whether any other things from the house had gone missing.

No, you have never had any contact with your wife. No, No, to your knowledge about it. Count that's your operator to the bank where there was about one thousand or two thousand of the bank has never been operated.

Well, last time I spoke to Graham, which was quite a number of years ago, he said it hadn't been so, but I haven't checked up. I've got authority to check up on that, so they wouldn't tell me anyway, you know. But well I spoke to Graham probably, I don't know when it was. It was a few years ago now, and he said it hadn't been touched.

John was then asked about something he had raised with the detectives before the police interview had started. Before the tape was rolling about a woman called Diane in Sydney.

Well, she rang me. I remember when it was because I just got ross River fever, That's how I remember. And it was January of ninety six and it was in the mid afternoon and she rang me and I was just she took me by surprise, you know, and virtually said that she reckons that she saw her in Cronulla, but she ignored her this.

Diane has alleged that she saw Brawman in Cronella in around early nineteen ninety six.

Well, that's why I rang, like when you rang me, yes today, I rang Diane to sort of clarify it, you know. I said, listen, there's probably going to be a guy called Glen Taylor give you a ring. And I said to her, do you remember when it was? And she said she thought it was in the winter. And I said, why do you say that? And she said, because I remember she was wearing warm sort of clothes. I said, I'll tell Glen Taylor and you can sort it out with him, you know.

Okay, to your knowledge, besides this possible signing by Diane, has it ever been any other?

No, not that, not that I can remember. I mean, there's been sort of Oh I can't remember. Every time I heard a story. I used to ring Graham up and tell him. But you know there's stories going around everywhere, left right and center.

You know.

Have you fallen an opinion of what's happened to your boy? No?

I don't think about it. I think about it. I just say that one day I hope she'll pop up because her mother did the same thing and her mother can you.

Tell us about that? I know you mentioned that her mother suffered from schizophrenia, still does.

Yeah, apparently there.

Was a circumstance many years ago when Bromwin's mother went missing as well.

Yeah, we're missing at now. This is from Bromwin, and I have clarified it with her brother. She's my mother in law really, but I only met the woman once in my life. You know, Bronwin and her didn't really have a very close relationship. You know, they sort of because I think of her mother's illness, you know, they sort of didn't have much to do with each other. So consequently, I've only met this woman once in my life, and my two daughters, Crystal and Lauren, have never met

Do you know any information about a clearvoyant.

Yeah, that's you know. Apparently she was seeing a clairvoyant Kriikey. I can't remember the name, some guy that lives at Sunrise Place at Lennox Head. She'd been seeing him for quite a while, apparently, and at one stage she said to one of her girlfriends that she thought this clairvoyan was her father, you know, sort of like I said, her father's already passed away years ago.

Were you aware she was seeing a clear voyant at the time? What did you find out?

Sorry? No, I only found out later on from her girlfriends. You know. Apparently she used to pay this bloke thirty dollars a pop.

The detective asked about the whereabouts of Jacko too. You will recall that after Bromwin and John separated, she told Gary Jackson that she was interested in him. He spoke in episode five, we kiss and that's all we did.

We did.

I loved her and it was awesome sexual because we didn't have sex.

Who was bore them?

Friendship?

You know?

But John was always ran Bush. We couldn't gold anywhere.

John was out there sitting in his watching us. John Kilga. But they can't pour in the body.

The police didn't do their job.

No, never saw him again, never heard from him again. And the clairvoyant I went around it his place. I don't think I ever met him actually, and then I know Graham saw him a couple of times.

I think, if necessary, would you give the police authority to examine your bank accounts in relation to your bank cards, just in relation to transaction reports?

Yeah, yeah, no problem.

Have you got any other information that you can provide us with at this point in time? No, no, okay. You mentioned earlier in the interview that you were very concerned about the police approaching the media.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, very concerned.

Yeah, okay, it's an opportunity.

Now.

You said that you don't want the police to provide details to the media about the disappearance of your wart.

Yeah.

Can you tell us now again about that?

Well, like I said before, from my recollection, there's been probably five or six media attempts and they range from newspaper and photo and the Brisbane paper, radio casts in Sydney, newspaper article here locally, television here locally, and radio here locally. And when all that was going on, my kids went through a bad time at school, and I mean over the past five years, they've adjusted quite well, and I just want to keep it that way.

You understand that the media is available too in trying to locate missing people.

I realized that, but I mean, I guess after all avenues were exhausted and all of the investigations, I might reconsider it. But at this stage, Okay, do you agree I told you that I gave you a verbal assurance that there won't be be a new decision media outlets until we exhaust our current inquiries, and that entail speaking to all family members and anyone else. Yeah, and then before I'm making you further decision, I would consult you

You know, do you think your wife might be deceased?

No, No, no reason for me to think that way.

So you think she's somewhere in this country under another identity.

Well, well, I mean I'll tell you the truth. I reckon I could go anywhere I like and assume another identity. I don't see why anyone else can. I mean, it wouldn't be hard.

Bronwyn is written and investigated by me Headley Thomas as a podcast production for The Australian. If anyone has information which may help solve this cold case, please contact me confidentially by emailing Bronwyn at the Australian dot com dot au. You can read more about this case and see a range of photographs and other artwork at the website Bronwyn podcast dot com. Our subscribers and registered users here episodes first.