Listeners are advised that this podcast series Broman contains coarse language and adult themes. This podcast series is brought to you by me Headley Thomas and The Australian. There is a smoking garden in this case, one piece of the puzzle which could change everything. The piece is black and white and it's always been blindingly obvious. It is data
for local telephone calls. John's consistent story since he first arted it to stunned Michelle and Andy Reid in the Shire on a Monday afternoon, May seventeen, nineteen ninety three, is that Bronwin went into the bedroom at Sandstone Crescent and made a couple of telephone calls the night before. A car soon arrived, John says, and he heard that car come to the house, but he didn't look at it. Bronwin, he says, then walked out of the house. The car
drove away. John says he heard that happen too, and Bromwin was never seen again. Near the start of episode fifteen, you heard a part of John Winfield's nineteen ninety eight interview in which he disclosed some things about local phone calls to Detective Sergeant Glenn Taylor, but all.
I know is that she went in the bedroom and that it was Graham. That was Graham told me that where the phone calls were going, because I was surprised when he told me, because I didn't know you could trace local phone calls, and I had no idea you could do it, and then he told me you could, and he did it.
You know. According to what John told detective Glen Taylor in nineteen ninety eight, Bromman's purported calls were actually traced by a detective Discan back in nineteen ninety three, and Discan, according to John, had even confirmed this to John. John claimed in nineteen ninety eight, while sitting opposite Glen Taylor, that detective Discn had also told.
Him where the phone calls were going.
Prior to this, all we knew about telephone calls from the house were that two long distance ones were made, one at six point fifty three pm and one at seven h six pm, and they showed up because they were listed on the telephone bill when it was issued by the phone company, but local calls were not listed on the bill. Now right at this moment in the interview, the recording equipment began to beep an alert to police to put new cassette tapes in.
So what I'll do is just get a new set of audio tapes.
Yeah, and we'll study it again. If Bromwin did not make any telephone calls on the night of May sixteenth, nineteen ninety three, John was lying about this. A relevant question when the interview restarted would have been John, what do you say, Detective disk and discovered when he apparently traced those local calls. When the interview tapes in the police station were changed and the interview restarted, the conversation returned briefly to the telephone calls.
Okay, I think where we got up to was talking about what was Drongwen doing. That's right, I know you mentioned that qweening and made a couple or at least one phane call, possibly her solicitor.
John replied, Yeah, that's what Graham told me.
Yeah. Glenn Taylor has perhaps misunderstood the sequence or timing of the calls. He has a running sheet from nineteen ninety three stating that Bromman had telephoned solicitor Chrismicdbitt in the afternoon. For John, it possibly felt like he was being thrown a lifeline. The water was muddied about when Bromman had called her solicitor, and it meant John didn't have to fill in the blanks. Do you know what time that was?
It was only after my phone course to my brother and my daughter sometime after that, right, so it could have been any time to tell you the truth, I don't know, I can't remember.
We know that Bromman had telephoned Chrismic Debitt in the afternoon because her solicitor told police about that conversation. Romwin disclosed to Chrismic Debitt in that conversation that she was really worried about John coming back to the house. According to the solicitor, the call was in the late afternoon on Sunday, and that usually means around four pm to five pm. Mobile phones were not in widespread use. People were much less urgent about contacting each other, particularly on
a Sunday. Anyone making a telephone call after seven to ten pm in Lennox Head was making that call in the evening or nighttime, and in my view, Chrispiic Debit would have remembered an evening call and he would have disclosed that two Detective Graham discin if in fact Bromin had called him in the evening, but the imprecise wording in the detective's entry in the running sheet has sewed confusion.
When Graham Discin made a note of his conversation with Bromwyn solicitor Chris mcdebitt in the police running sheet, the detective wrote this on June three, nineteen ninety three.
On Sunday, May sixteen, in the late afternoon, the missing person contacted him and stated that her husband had returned from Sydney and she was concerned about him being in the house.
And that line has been interpreted by some, including Glenn Taylor, to mean that John was already in the house.
Mcdebittt advised the missing person that she might contact the police and inform them of the situation, and, if need be, have them called by as a precaution in order to prevent a breach of the peace. The missing person seemed happy with that and made an appointment to see mcdebitt at nine am on May seventeen, nineteen ninety three, an appointment she never kept.
In relation to Chris mcdebitt, the solicitor who was called by Bromwin on Sunday, the running sheet says that Browin called him in the late afternoon, and I reckon, that's between all thirty and five point thirty. You assumed that bronwin must have made that telephone call from the house when John was in the house.
Because I think it seems to mention that in a running sheet distance running sheet. Yes, I think we had assumed that she had rang and said johns in the house.
What should I do?
The running sheet it's not written very precisely by Graham Diskin or whoever wrote that line. Glenn Taylor agreed with me that he did make the assumption, starting with his interview of John Winfield in nineteen ninety eight, that bronwin was making the telephone call to her solicitor while John was in the house on the night of Sunday, May sixteenth,
nineteen ninety three. The late afternoon angle kind of knocks that out, and Glenn also agreed with me that in fact, John could not have been back at the house in the late afternoon, considering all the evidence around the timing of John's ANSID Australia flight from Sydney. John's drive from Ballina Airport to the Balloner Police station on the Sunday evening, and then John's detour to Lennox Head to pick up
Becky McGuire. With all of this, it was not possible for John to be in the house in the late afternoon, which is when Chris mcdefitt says Bromwin called him at his home because of her concerns. At an early stage, it appears that Glenn Taylor's new investigation in nineteen ninety eight was misled by a person of interest about the making and the timing of purported local telephone calls that
John says were made by Bromwin. I have asked Glenn about whether his investigation from nineteen ninety eight tried to obtain what we believe is the smoking gun local call data from the phone company. It was known as Telecom in nineteen ninety three. The company changed its name to Telstra in nineteen ninety five.
I'm not sure about local calls, dramink local calls or rooted in most other I think you could check to say which you made local care.
There are no signed statements from Telstra officials in the police brief of evidence which Glenn took to the coroner for the two thousand and two inquest, nor is there mention in Glenn's formal police statement of any investigation by Glenn or Detective Wayne Tembe into the purported local calls.
There is, however, a snippet of evidence from the two thousand and two inquest that shows Glenn asked the police officer while the inquest was unfolding with public hearings, to make an urgent request to Telstra about whether local calls from nine years earlier, that is, nineteen ninety three could
be traced. Glenn has told me that he can't remember having asked for this information during the investigation in the four years prior to the inquest, and because he does not have access to his own running sheets anymore, he couldn't be sure whether he had. He told me that he was of the view that local call data could not be generated by telecom in nineteen ninety three anyway,
due to the limitations of the technology. Karina Berger and I have been investigating this crucial angle because it is now and it has always been one of the most important features of this case. If the local call data had been available in nineteen ninety three, or if it's available now in twenty twenty four, what potential impact would that have on this unsolved case.
If local called ARTA was available, it would be of pivotal importance to this case. It could either support John's version of events, namely that Bronwyn went into the bedroom and made some telephone calls on the night in question, and was collected a short time later, presumably by somebody that she might have phoned. Local call data might lead police to be able to make inquiries of persons that
she reached out to on that night. Conversely, if no local calls were made on that evening, then that would disprove a crucial part of John's version of events. And I think more broadly, local called arta would be very helpful because it would assist in showing who Bronwin was communicating with and who her associates were in the leadup to this night in question, which might also assist the police to consider other theories, such as her starting a new life with a boyfriend.
For example, if.
No local calls were made from the telephone at Sandstone Creator on the night of May sixteen, ninety ninety three, then that's a game changer.
I think so, because that does seem to be a really crucial part of John's version of events. He's told multiple people that that's exactly what happened. Bronwan went and made some telephone calls. You would infer that if she went and made some telephone calls and was collected a short time later, then those calls were most likely to have been local ones.
And again, hypothetically, if local call data was indeed available in nineteen ninety three, then it's possible, if someone knows where to look where it might be stored, that it's still available in twenty twenty four.
It's possible.
I don't feel particularly hopeful that it would still be available, but it would certainly be worse looking. Maybe there's a saint hope that it's out there somewhere.
The idea that Bromwin would wait for John to arrive and enter the house and then make her call to the solicitor to express her concerns doesn't sit right with me. I believe that the call to Chris mcdebit was Bromwin's last minute effort to raise her worries about John's looming arrival. Bromwin perhaps hoped that her solicitor could act quickly with a legal action to stop John from coming near the house.
A woman who has been worried that her husband might hurt her is more likely to take preemptive action and not wait until he is in the house and can potentially overhear a telephone call. But five years later, John's police interview was the last time he was asked anything on the record about Bromwin's purported telephone calls from the house that night. John was able to lay a false trail, including that Detective Graham Discott had used technology to trace
a local call from Bromwin to her solicitor. Here's Glenn Taylor again.
Jade would have alerted Brolin that he's going to come back up. Dad's going to hit the roof when he finds that you've gone back into the house. But why would Bromlin then just hand possession back over to the house after doing that.
John's story is not subtle. It invites police and prosecutors, as well as Bromwin's family and friends, and now hundreds of thousands of listeners to this podcast series to look not at him, but at a purported driver of a mystery car which nobody has cited or described. Bromwyn got into that car, according to John, because he says she had told him she wanted to have a break from
the kids and took only her handbag. Plainly on John's version, if you work out who Bromwyn possibly telephoned that night, you close in on her probable killer, obtain the data in the local calls which Bromwin supposedly made, and cracked the case. But on the other hand, if local call data shows that, in fact no local calls were made from the house at Sandstone Crescent, then John has been lying all along. His story collapses like a house of cards.
In this narrative, I am specifically talking about local calls because we know from the actual telephone bill for the house that only two long distance calls were made on the night of May sixteen, one at six fifty three pm to John's daughter Jody in Sydney, and the other at seven oh six pm to the landline in the house, which belonged to John's brother Peter Winfield. John's story revolves around Bromwin's purported calls being local. He does not suggest
anything else. It's locked inn and that's why this is so infuriating. Since episode fifteen, I've been holding on to another small part of John's interview. I wanted to check it as thoroughly as possible and then bundle it up with other information you'll hear in this episode. For context, Karina Berger and I have been researching and talking to people who used to work for Telecom as it was called before the name changed to Telstra. A few episodesades back.
Karina found the anset Australia Airline May nineteen ninety three timetable, which showed that John's flight would have landed about seven twenty five pm, making it impossible for him to have made those long distance calls at six fifty three pm
and seven h six pm. It is very probable in my view that Bromwin made those long distance calls, possibly because she was panicking about John's imminent return and she wanted Jody and John's brother or sister in law to do something that would mean John lied to police when he claimed that he made those long distance calls. He couldn't have got to the house in time to do this,
But what about local calls sometime after eight pm? Karina and others have been helping me behind the scenes as we try to determine whether data about local calls was actually available in nineteen ninety three. I have previously talked to former detectives, ding retired detective Sergeant Damian Loon, who helped crack the case against wife killer Chris Dawson. These former detectives tell me that, yes, from their memory, local call data could be obtained thirty one years ago four
landline telephones. On the other hand, Detective Sergeant Glenn Taylor, who investigated Bromin's disappearance from August nineteen ninety eight, was skeptical about the availability of local call data in nineteen ninety three. In all of the documents from the original nineteen ninety three investigation by detectives, there is no evidence that detectives Graham Discan and Wayne Tembe actually got local call data from Telecom. There is evidence, however, that Detective
Discan requested data from Telecom. Detective Sergeant Graham Discan did contact Telecom seeking information about the telephone service at Soundstone Crescent.
Yeah, that's right, he did. I don't think we know exactly what he asked for, and the response he seems to have received appears to just include the two STD calls that we've spoken about before, made on the night of the sixteenth of May, and then the double five call that was made on the afternoon of the sixteenth of May, just after two pm.
This is the number which has been misread by detectives in nineteen ninety three. They've assumed wrongly that Bromwin went back to the house at two thirteen am on Monday to make that call. It begs the question, now, might this local call data still exist in storage somewhere? The smoking gun you are going to hear now from Linda Horsefield. Linda emailed me to share some intel from her time working at Telecom and we had a zoom call with Karina Berger. Can you tell me why you wrote to me?
After listening to part of the Bromwin podcast.
I was sitting there listening to it, and I'm thinking to myself, now, he's claiming his wife called a friend, and I would assume it would be somebody locally. Why didn't the police check to make sure that call was made, to see if he's actually telling the truth or not.
It's just so simple. I was sitting there and I was pondering about it for a while, and I thought police may not be aware that they could check local calls. I don't know.
I suppose if you don't know something exists, you might not follow up on it. If I was a coperand somebody's making a claim that something happened, you would make sure what they're saying is right.
It's just common sense.
When Linda first got in touch with me, she said she felt a bit weird emailing, like, as she put it, an armchair detective. But she said she felt agitated because it seemed to her that invests litigators had done what she called a half asked job. I'm glad Linda went to the trouble of sharing her knowledge. She explained in writing and then in our interview that she previously worked for Telecom and then Telstra when it was rebranded. Linda worked there from nineteen ninety four in a role dealing
directly with customer complaints. It meant that she regularly needed to check on the data for customers' local calls. Back then, the routine telephone bills for customers simply stated the number of local calls made from their landline service. The printed telephone bills, which everybody got in the mail, did not display details about when the local calls were made and
to whom. That kind of information was only provided for the long distance calls, say from lenox Head to Sydney, and calls for special information like Lotto resolves, and of course reverse charge calls and international calls. Linda insists, however, that the local call data was available upon request from any complaining customer. She says she saw that data all the time. Because many customers believe that they were being overcharged, they wanted proof of the calls, and Telecom had to
provide it. Hypothetical Linda, I'm a customer in May nineteen ninety three in lenox Head, New South Wales. I want to know all of the local calls that have been made by the telephone that's in my name. I can contact Telstrea or Telecom and say I've got a dispute. I doubt these calls that you're charging me were made, or I want to know what's going on here, And you could provide a list of all those calls with the actual numbers and the time the call were made,
even though they're local calls. Yep, And what's your level of confidence about that?
One hundred?
Legally, you've always got to show what people are being charged for. There were so many issues that people had to be reimbursed.
We had to be able to.
See how much they were entitled to, so we could really get into the nitty gritty of things. So if I've got a complaint from a person and they would say I've got sixty seven calls here on my bill and I'm sure I didn't make them, then you would say, well, we can go through that for you, and.
Then would you have pulled up the local call data yourself.
I had access to pretty much all the systems. What we used to do, especially when there was billing disputes, we had to go through the whole bill. If a person was complaining about dropouts and I wanted to get reimbursed, we would pull the local call data. We could actually see all the calls that people used to make. Sometimes people had line foulds, for example, and they used to say, look, I want to get reimbursed for all those multiple calls
I had to redial. We could then see which number was dialed multiple times in a row, or I was on holidays via Thatt calls on here, or then you can narrow down if calls were made at the time and the customer said that there was nobody in the house. We would then add them up and then reimburse them. Definitely, local calls were itemized, but it wouldn't come up on the bills because people's bills would just be huge if
they make a lot of phone calls. And if people wanted to get it itemized, if they were disputing it, we could send that information to them. They might have sixty four calls made, and if they used to turn around and say, look, I didn't make that many calls, or I had a fold with my line, we could retrieve that information for them.
It was the time that numbers were dialed. They could see that when it the call finished and the number that.
At the time you were aware that the local call data was available, it might have been ninety five, it might have been ninety four. Is it possible that that was a more recent development and that in May ninety three it wasn't available.
No, in all the exchanges, it would have been available around that time.
Yeah, definitely.
Do you know whether the data was stored indefinitely or for a limited period for how long could you get it?
I really don't know.
I did go through historical data at times, and that was generally subpoenas and for things like that as well. One of the staff members one day said, oh, no, we can retreat for archives data way back, but it was more than the seven years. But I don't know exactly how long. Everything was computerized and a lot of it was backed up. You could go on line and bring up a phone number as a staff member. Once you had that approved access, you could just go in whenever and retrieve it.
If the police found themselves in the circumstances that headly described in the episode that you listen to, and they wanted to check the local call records, do you know what they would have asked for from Telstrap?
They would have had to ask for itemised call records, okay, and that would show up every call that was made. You put a dating see what calls were exactly made at what time.
If you could also pull.
Incoming call that as well, which is every item is showing up on the bill for that particular time.
The police have asked for some information about this telephone service and the calls that were made, but it doesn't itemize the individual local calls. I think they might have asked for the wrong information or they didn't realize they could drill down more deeply into the local call data.
I would have just printed it out and sent it to them at.
Your terminal at your workplace. Then you could actually print out all of the individual local call data.
Yeah, your problem is going to be the age now. Even with intels, it wasn't that widely known that they had the archived data. You might not have anybody there that's still aware that that happened in those days.
You sound very definite about your memory of the availability of local call data.
That's the one thing I'm one hundred percent sure about because I used to do that with my job all the time. It's just the matter of how far back can they go, And it gets me frustrated when people have just swept it under the carpet.
So I hope you're going to get where it is. I really don't.
I spoke to another former Telstra staff member who did similar work dealing with customer complaints about the charges for local telephone calls, and she backed Linda up. Although both women were not working there in nineteen ninety three, they are adamant that the data they were obtaining in the nineteen nineties was readily available in nineteen ninety three until recently. I was unaware that the solicitor Chrismic Debitt had provided a statement to police in nineteen ninety eight, five years
after he spoke to the detective Sergeant Graham Discan. You'll recall that it was Discan who reproduced some of the details from that conversation. In early June nineteen ninety three in a running sheet. Glenn Taylor found the November nineteen ninety eight police statement from Chrismicdbitt and shared a copy
with me. Most of the two page statement is unsurprising in light of the detail in the formal legal letter which chrismcdebits sent to John on May fourteen, nineteen ninety three, with a copy to Bromwin, But there are some newer lines of interest. For completeness, a voice actor will read those lines from Chris mcdebitts's police statement.
Missus Winfield instructed me to write a letter to her husband in regard to the family motor vehicle said to be a Ford. Missus Winfield told me that she wanted to register the Ford so that she could keep driving it. The registration was due, and she didn't want to pay the registration if her husband was not going to allow her to keep the car. I have a vague recollection of missus Winfield being quite distressed and agitated when I just saw her prior to sending the letter on the
fourteenth of May nineteen ninety three. My notes indicate that she was going to obtain some further information in relation to their financial situation and then come back and see me so that we can put together a proposal for the property settlement to send to Jonathan Winfield.
After reading he's recently found statement, I emailed chrismkdebit. He replied with more information.
I confirm my recollection that when I last saw Bronwyn, she did appear to be anxious and agitated. I have always had this recollection, and it is my only recollection. Having refreshed my memory from reading my statement given to the police in nineteen ninety eight, it is pretty clear that I discussed with Bronwyn the option of her moving back into the vacant home. I have discussed this option
with many clients in similar circumstances over the years. It often presents as a practical option, even if it may be only temporary pending the finalization of a settlement. I do not know for sure, but it may have been
this discussion that caused Bronwyn to become anxious. In similar circumstances, my advice to clients has been for them to let me know if they decide to move back into the home, so that I could send a letter to the other party and inform them of this and seek appropriate undertakings from them, not to come to the home without my client's consent, not to interfere with my client's occupation of
the home, etc. Pending the finalization of a settlement. It would appear that when Bronwyn left our meeting she was going to consider this option, and her calm to me on the fourteenth of May nineteen ninety three confirms this, and further that she had decided to move back into the home after your initial contact with me. I did contact a former partner at my old firm of Stone and Partners and asked him if archived files from nineteen
ninety three had been retained. His reply was that they were not, and the files were destroyed after seven years. I left Stone and Partners in two thousand. Sorry that I can't be more helpful. I don't recall having a telephone call from Bronwyn on Sunday sixteenth and May nineteen ninety three. However, thirty years ago, it was not unusual for my clients to call me after hours and on weekends.
It seems highly probable that Bromin did call her solicitor on the afternoon of Sunday May sixteen, because that's what Chris mcdebitt recalled when he was asked a fortnight later. It's not surprising that he doesn't recall it now thirty one years later. But more importantly, did broman really make any other local calls just before? According to John's version, she was picked up at the house on Sunday night. Might such crucial evidence of the presence or absence of
local calls still be available? Now? You've looked really hard for documents. You've looked in places that I would never have thought of.
I've done some pretty extensive searches, and I've looked through a lot of contemporaneous documents, things like annual reports for telecom as it was at the time, and your reports for the telecommunications industry Onbunsman.
Karina Berger has been Terry alike in an effort to discover whether police or customers for that matter in nineteen ninety three could receive local call data.
I've looked at inquiry papers into the telecommunications industry and billing, including Telecom submissions to those types of inquiries. I've reviewed case law to see if I can find any references to local call data being used in court cases at about this time.
I have looked at historical.
Legislation to try to work out what obligations Telecom had at the time to retain or keep this type of data. And then I also just did know a lot of general Google searches which led to things like academic papers and other documents that of customer service agreements, those sorts of things which I reviewed, but they just don't give a clear cut answer. Unfortunately. I think it's possible that
Linda's recollection is right. She was so adamant that the data existed in nineteen ninety four when she started with Telecom, and that it would have also been available in nineteen ninety three. At the time, Telecom wanted to resolve billing complaints by having consumers contact Telecom directly and reaching out to customer service offices or complaints officers like Linda, who were then able to interrogate call charges and call data.
We do know that local call data wasn't made widely available to consumers until nineteen ninety seven, and we also do know that Telecom or Telstra had to make some technological advancements to its network to enable that to occur. But what we don't know is whether the data was already available before that time to a smaller group of people like the customer service officers or perhaps to law enforcement officers.
From everything we've heard now from Linda, your own research, as well as the information that I was given by a couple of long retired detectives who said they could obtain local call data. What would you put your money on as to whether or not it was available back then?
I think it's still uncertain. It does sound like the local call data was available. Linda was in a customer service role at the time, dealing with complaints, and she was very clear that from about nineteen ninety four when she started with Telstra Telecom that she could access local call data herself by drilling into the relevant Telstra data bases. Linda could do it in a complaints management's role at
that time. Then, hopefully another part of Telstra that might have been responding to requests from law enforcement would also have been able to access that data. She was very confident in her recollection that the data was available in nineteen ninety four at least when she started her employment with Telstra, and she did come across as being an honest and reliable person. She sounded sensible and sincere. The availability of the data might have been a little bit
patchy depending on where the addressing question was located. It would have been crazy if the complaints part of Telstra could have accessed the local data but the law enforcement part of Telstra couldn't access that set in order to respond to requests from police. Telster actually had an obligation at the time under the Telecommunications Act to assist to law enforcement officers.
Well, there must have been numerous police investigations much earlier than this one and as serious where local call data would be very valuable.
We don't know.
Why the police seem to have been told that the local call data wasn't available for Sandstone present, and whether that's because of a mistake that the Telstra employee has made because they may not have known that the data was in fact available, or there was some other reason behind that advice.
That's the missing piece of the puzzle.
So there's so much interest in local calls in listeners, and rightly so it's a big ticket item. It would be great to have a final answer.
If we get helpful information from Telstra, I will include it in a future episode. Almost three weeks before the release of this episode, I asked Telstra in writing about its policy and practice in relation to local call data and its availability in nineteen ninety three, a Telstra media advisor said that she was trying to find out and
that was the last we heard. Disappointing. Now it is obvious that in his one and only police interview in nineteen ninety eight, John Winfield repeatedly drops the name Graham as in Graham Discin. I asked Glenn Taylor about this. Do you read anything at all into the apparent familiarity of John Winfield with Detective Sergeant Graham Discan where he says Graham and Graham that.
Well, he certainly come across in the interview I had with Ringfield that Grim Diskin and him were like friends. Gryan this Ryan that I mean, it's not professional at all, No evidence to say that they were friends outside of the investigation. It seems very odd that they have this report in.
A regional town like Balana, where I suppose there's less formality than in the city of Sydney. Would there be a more casual connection between detectives in the police force and citizens.
Not If you're potential suspect from murder, you certainly wouldn't they associate with them or treat them as a friend during a likely murder investigation.
In nineteen ninety three, however, the case never did rise to the grave import of a likely murder investigation because it appears that John Winfield was not looked at back then as a potential suspect in his wife's murder. He was treated more like the unfortunate bloke left behind to raise the kids as a result of an erratic woman doing a runner.
Even if you're treatment like did a disappearance, you still wouldn't come across friendly. I mean, you've got to have that distance there.
This is all coming from John, though, isn't it. He's the one saying Graham, Graham, Graham. Check with Graham. He could be potentially attempting to mislead you to think that he's got this relationship with Graham Diskin, and because of that relationship he can be trusted as a person of interest. He wouldn't have done anything wrong. I mean, he could be exaggerating the connection. I have previously tried to interview the former detective Graham Diskin. The offer is still open.
Glenn Taylor has been candid about the fact that he didn't see eye to eye with the police officer who had first started investigating Brohman's disappearance in nineteen ninety three.
I have very little time for disc and when I first came up from a homicide Newcastle to Bowliner, the first time my meeting, he came in and introduced himself on Brian Diskin, and I was said to the despert, I'd just taken up. And this might have been only within the first week or two of me arriving. He'd previously been to sept me sergeing in that position. But he said to me, don't think you're going to get that seat to wall, but I'll be coming back for it.
And I thought, there is this fellow, what a thing to say, just welcoming you to the town. You're going to take the position back that I've just won on promotion. I had very little time for him. He don't feel like you want to rubbish another police officer that you just start looking at least running sheds are thinking how.
Bad is this?
So many red flags here? And the ultimate responsibility for Bromin's investigation nineteen ninety three was solely distance. He's to detect his sergeant. He could say to his people, I want this done, I want formal statements, okay, and then we've got to get Winfield in for an interview, which what should have been done be's one of the same detective training that I would have done. This is the potential crime scene. You've got to get it thoroughly inspected, forensically examined.
Back when it happened, Maddie and I have been talking about a trip and some field work. I'd like to follow up a few leads in the shire next week, maybe even go to Illowong. You'll recall that Illawong, a suburb on the western fringes of the shire, is where John was working laying bricks before his sudden flight from Sydney to Ballina on Sunday May sixteenth. John was helping build a two story family home for Glen Webster, a respected local builder. You know the property I'm talking about, Yeah,
I do. Can we meet up?
Yeah, for sure. I want to see the house in person. Not only that, I'd be very intrigued to know if the owners of this house follow the podcast and have heard of Bromwyn. Obviously it's awful, so think that that place could be her resting place and they've been living there for however long.
You can't really sugarcoat it.
It's shitty regardless whether she's in some body of water, whether she's on the side of the road, or whether she's under a souther concrete. It's terrible. We can only hope that maybe we'll find her remains.
John has always emphatically denied wrongdoing, but since nineteen ninety eight police have strongly suspected that he murdered his estranged wife, Bromwan. If the police case is correct, Broman's body must have been transported at some stage and for some distance in
the Ford Falcon sedan. In earlier episodes, you have heard duty sing and audio from our unsuccessful search of Lake Ainsworth, and you have also heard a theory that Bromwan's body went into the boot of the Ford Falcon Sedan for the sudden road trip to Sydney, and that John's unusual urgency and action in leaving the two girls, Crystal and Lauren, with John's ex wife's mother in law in the Shire late on the morning of Monday May seventeen, gave him
time and opportunity to dispose of Broman's body. One location repeatedly raised in relation to this theory is the building site where John worked alone and where a concrete paw was imminent. Now the Ford Falcon Sedan which belonged to John and Broman was a former taxi. It was powered by petrol and in a separate tank liquefied petroleum gas or LPG. The tank and the piping for the LPG
sat in the boot. There was still a lot of space for luggage, but there is a legitimate question about whether the LPG tank would have made it difficult, perhaps even impossible, to also put a body in the boot. I have been talking with Karna and a crop dusting pilot in the West Australian town of Bunbury. Terry Freeman is an owner and longtime fan of the Ford Falcon Sedan. He has been driving and playing with them for a few decades, and for months Terry has been listening carefully
to the Bromwin podcast series. He is providing valuable advice and help to Broman's brother Andy Reid, Madison Walsh, and to Karina and me. Oh, and he's pretty grateful.
I've got time Headley. Everybody I mentioned to what I'm doing, they pick there.
He is up there, right behind it.
It's the crucial question, isn't it when we theorize about this trip possibly to Willowong, and then you always think, well, would that have even been possible? This idea that the boot could have been used.
I've owned five of these EXF and other related series of that model, which was built in that shape between nineteen seventy nine and nine and eighty eight. Very spacious vehicle and great family tour. I had a good general knowledge of the xfon fairly. Andy on the Spanners, one of those boys that grew up in the eighties and we fixed everything we had back then.
I've owned fourteen aeroplanes. I still owned four.
You sort of get to learn every night and bold in the machine if you want to be successful of what you do.
Really, Terry's wife, Heather is very keen to help too. To demonstrate the capacity of the Ford Falcon's boot or trunk, Terry did some calling around and then Heather climbed into a Ford Falcon with a standard LPG tank in the boot.
I rang the Bumbree autorecords.
When I told them what I was about, they were super keen to get on board, and they said, well, one of our employees has an ex Default, which is the first of those three models jack same body shape, and they made it available to me, but I had to go around to their place that night to do it. Heather and I grabbed a sheet from home they were waiting for us. Let's took some photos of it as
it was. I went and borrowed a sixty letter gas tank from a guy that's a tank setter, stuck that tank in there, and then Heather jumped in the boot.
There's probably enough room for two Heathers in that boot.
Built slightly like bronin was, she easily fitted in to that boot space.
But the standard LPG tank of sixty liters is smaller than the one hundred liter LPG tank which the Ford Falcons had as taxis.
It's a little bit more bolder, so it does protrude out into the boot space, but in my mind it could still fit easily a Bronze Warn or a Heather into that boots space with no trouble whatsoever, but not much.
I just double checked with the missing person report. Now this is assuming that that is accurate. But her height was put down then as five foot eight, which is one hundred and seventy two point seven centimeters. Now, I think you said Heather's one hundred and sixty five centimeters. Is that right?
Five?
Five five five, there's only a seven point seven centimeter difference, let's call it eight centimeters. And looking at that photograph of Heather that you took in the boot, there's plenty of space from either her feet to the side wall of the boot or from her head to account for at least another three or four more inches exactly right.
Her knees were hardly bented all headily.
But Terry is a stubbornly determined man. He and I wanted to run the exercise again with the larger tank and ideally with an Zeff Falcon sedan. We just had to find a Ford Falcon with those unique characteristics. Carina and Terry went looking.
We don't know if the Windfields car did have that tank, but one what a Shamet probably did.
Was it our tank that could potentially hold one hundred leaders, but generally you only put in ninety leaders.
It's actually got an auto shot off valve that stops you putting in any more than ninety leaders. You probably only get eighty eight leaders in it before the auto shutoff valve would plunk and stop the gas from going in.
And the tank that you've photographed is a seventy leter tank that can hold sixty leaders.
Correct.
I thought it might be helpful if Terry could describe where the tank is actually located in the boot of the car.
The tank is situated right in the forward part of the boot space, which is under the sill, and the gas fitter toil that you would have to with the big tanks. You would have to get your foot and shove it riding with your foot to get it in hard.
Up against the back seats of the vehicle.
Did it always have to be located in that exact spot to work or could you move it around potentially?
No, No, it would be hard bolted into that position.
And you think that the body of the car and particularly the boots would have been very similar, if not the same dimensions.
The difference in the burt is that the XD which I took the photo of heather In had a shallow burt because the spare wheel would sit underneath flat in the burt in a wheel well. It looks like they've changed from the XE and the XF to the wheel being mounted on the right hand side in a well up against the side body of the car.
Romwin's brother Andy Reid, has been answering some of Terry's questions over recent weeks. You'll recall that Andy looked inside the boot of the Ford Falcon x F sedan in the late afternoon of Monday, May seventeen. John had arrived a short time earlier with the two girls. Strangely, their clothes were not in suitcases, they were in pillowcases. Andy recalled in a conversation with Terry that the spare wheel was sitting flat in the boot. Andy had previously told
me that the boot space was missing its trim. Here's a reminder from episode nine.
Once I got home, I asked him and we went up to the back at the car and he opened the boot. That's where he got out the two small pillow cases that had three or four items of clothing chucked in each pillow case, but nothing was added touate for Sydney weather. That just struck me how clean the boot was and there was only the metal lighting. I could see the spare tire by line.
You mean no upholstery, do carpet, none of the usual stuff.
Well in the.
Old days, old cast like that. Yeah, they just had like an old vinyl type lining.
Well.
Andy said that the spare wheel was most likely just sitting flat in the boot and there was no trim in the boot. There's usually either a vinyl trim or in all the ones I've seen, there's like a felt trim. I asked him pecifically, now, was that will center bolted flat in the boot or was it just sitting there? And he said he did not recall it being center bolted to the flat part of the boot.
Let's assume that the wheel was in the boot and it was off to the right, as was the case with that model. What do you reckon about someone three to four inches taller than the heather being able to fit into that space within one hundred liters tank holding ninety leaders of gas.
One hundred percent would fit in there, no trouble at all. There's plenty of round for all your suitcases and luggage in a taxi with an one hundred laud a tank.
Very good of you to take this amount of interest, Terry. Do you do this with other cases that you listen to?
Well, I don't, Headley, but this is the second podcast I've ever listened to a mull over things a lot. I sort of come up with these sort of timelines in my brain. Well, if he did this, what would happen and follow it right through to the end. I suppose It's part of what I do with my job. Really, You've got to think ahead all the time. But I'm still open to everything else because we only know what we've been told and what we keep finding out.
It's just experienced headily.
What struck you from that interview about John's makeup?
He can think on the run, he thinks, clearly doesn't share much of his thoughts with anyone at all.
Very shortly before the release of this episode, Terry found a Ford Falcon identical in almost every way to John and Bronwan's old excef Ford Falcon model and the one that Terry found had the larger LPG tank in the boot. Heather and Terry went to work. Terry, could you, just for the record describe the year, make, and model of that vehicle that Heather got into.
That's a nineteen eighty six Ford EXF Falcon, the same as that Winfield's had as even white.
You believe that that gas tank that's in that vehicle is the size of the gas tanks that were commonplace for the taxis correct, Heather, I was wondering whether you could tell me how you got into that space.
I easily, easiley just climbed in and climbed out. I had a lot of rooming there.
When I was looking close at the photo, it looked like your knees were slightly bent. If a woman a bit taller than you, yeap needed to fit into that space. What do you say about whether it's possible?
Oh, easily.
There's an eight centimeter difference then, between Heather and Bromwin. What do you say either about there still being enough.
Room or not easily?
And I had a lot of space around my knees and my body, and.
It looked like too there was a bit of a cavity behind the wheel next to the gas tape there.
Is right, okay, well done, lady.
Luck it didn't slip through everything as I could have, but we managed to get it.
Meanwhile, I went to Sydney. Maddie collected me at the airport for the drive to Andy and Michelle's house in the Shire. We had a lot to do. I fell asleep on the plane. That's good. I got an email from someone and he was talking about dogs. How amazing these dogs are that they picked up a scent?
Would they be able to step through concrete?
I'll go cold. Just got a cold copy.
That'd be great, Michelle.
Thank you.
These documents from the building application file. This is for the house a little long, yep.
And these are the ones that you and Maddie got from the council.
They're the ones we managed to track down. That's the cover shoot of the file.
And then it's just got the dates and times of when various inspections were done, when the plants were approved, when approvals came through and whatnot.
Yeah, and it's just during the building phase of the house.
Slab which also incorporated the front porch.
They're the only three of slabs that were on ground level at the early stage of the job and the garage slam inspection was signed off on Thursday, thirteenth of May.
That means that it.
Was signed off and I got the tick on here and it was.
Approved to be able to pull.
The garage and front porch slabs were given the tick of approval to be able to pull, which we believed from conversations with Glenn was poured on the Tuesday on Wednesday the following.
Week, So that paw is for the garage slab, the garage slab and the front porch. Does that then indicate to you if Bromhan's there, it's under the garard slab all that porch.
Yeah.
I was told that John said he needed to be there for a concrete paw and he was agitated and anxious about that pour. And that was on the Monday that he was saying that there's a concrete pour it's coming. Drawing on your knowledge as a builder, thinking about the slab in the garage first, what would someone need to do if they'd come with a body on a Monday afternoon to a slab that's been ready for pouring of concrete.
What would they need to change the garage slab would have been back filled with dirt. You would have needed to detach the top layer of mesh in a section the reinforcement, and there was no need for footage or anything because the footage are already poured. They would need to lift up the messh in some way, lift back.
The plastic, dick down dim down into the dirt that's below the plastic.
Yes, dig a trend swrong enough that you need to put someone in there and roll the body in underneath there at the dirt back down, spread the dirt around, put the plastic down back down neatly, rather than the mesh back down. Put the dirt back over the top, put the plastic back down, plastic over the top.
And then you pull the concrete.
You've got certainty.
But the thing is how much dirt was that below the plastic and.
The mess we bring loose sweetbers him. It wasn't as if you were digging in the virgin ground. The block of land slapes backwards could have been six hundred mil or seven hundred mil or three foot of loose fill. So that's the garage option. What about the front brot Pauch Just beside that, the same scenario that.
Porch all was part of the same Paul, are you waiting for a call down from Glenn or should we we can? I can just call him. Britt's available. Now let's go and see said He's got three jobs going at once at the moment. We start at intercuts the hair seal on there. We go from there to Jenny Mason's old house where John went where he asked Jenny's
mother in law to look after the kids. And then I want to go directly to the house of el Along that John was helping Glenn Webster build, and hopefully we can also see Glenn Webster.
Any at a.
Yeah, we're right to lave my place when mate?
All right, okay, so ensure it's okay.
Bron has written and investigated by me Headley Thomas, 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 Bromwyn
podcast dot com. Our subscribers and registered users here episodes first, the production and editorial team for Bromwin includes Claire Harvey, Kristin Amiot, Joshua Burton, Bridget, Ryan Bianca, far Marcus, Katie Burns, Liam Mendez, Sean Callanan, Matthew Condon and David Murray. Audio production for this podcast series is by Wasabi Audeo and original theme music by Slade Gibson. We have been assisted
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