Between them, veteran 7NEWS journalist and The West’s legal affairs editor Tim Clarke have decades of court reporting experience behind them. They’ve covered everything from murder, dodgy politicians, bikies and everything in between. But this case is as big as they come. Tim Clarke has followed the case in the courts since Bradley Edwards was arrested three years ago, and Alison Fan has followed the case since the very beginning, and even helped search for the Sarah Spiers, Jane Rim...
Mar 02, 2020•23 min
The details of just how widespread contamination was in DNA testing for the Claremont Serial Killer case was detailed on day 54. At least seven exhibits were found to have been contaminated, six with the DNA of the very scientists analysing them, and one with the DNA of a victim of a completely unrelated crime. The details of how the contamination occurred were laid out by PathWest scientist Scott Egan, who himself is one of the contributors of the contamination. It’s, as Tim Clarke says i...
Feb 28, 2020•34 min•Season 2Ep. 54
It was the random testing of a silk kimono in 2016, which led police to their breakthrough in Australia’s most expensive and longest running investigation, and the dramatic arrest of Bradley Robert Edwards. Today, on day 53, the scientist who tested that kimono took the stand. Scott Egan, who was a scientist at Pathwest in 2016, told the court the kimono, which was taken out of storage by a cold case police officer, was tested by him on November 23, 2016. The silk kimono was left behind du...
Feb 27, 2020•27 min•Season 2Ep. 53
Whenever there’s a big event, there’s bound to be news crews. That was no exception when police descended on the accused Claremont Serial Killer’s house on December 22, 2016. But unlike now, those news crews had no idea just how big that raid would be. With special guests, veteran 7NEWS cameramen Ray Raab and The West Australian photographer Justin Benson-Cooper joining Natalie Bonjolo and Tim Clarke, they discuss, even when the opposition got a shot of ‘a man’ bein...
Feb 26, 2020•30 min
December 22, 2016. The day police had hoped for, for more than 20 years. That was the day they arrested the man they thought was Claremont serial killer. Bradley Robert Edwards. As he was arrested in the early morning raid and taken for questioning, police spent 2 days sifting through every item in his house. What they found was a handwritten notebook with copies of bank statements inside. The court has previously been told that notebook belong to Bradley Edwards' second wife. She said she copie...
Feb 25, 2020•28 min•Season 2Ep. 52
THAT moment, the phone call which changed the Claremont Serial Killings investigation after almost two decades of nothing, was described by the police officer, that took the call from UK scientists who said male DNA had been found with Ciara Glennon’s fingernail samples. That officer was former head of MACRO, Jim Stanbury, who took the stand today. What followed the call would change the whole investigation. Police no longer had to rely on alibis or witnesses. The DNA doesn’t lie, an...
Feb 24, 2020•39 min•Season 2Ep. 51
When Claremont exhibits were sent over the to the UK for expert low copy number testing, the exhibits which are now seen as crucial to the prosecution’s case - Ciara Glennon’s fingernails - went missing. It turns out they were never ‘missing’, just separated from the other exhibits and placed in a fridge for storage. As Tim Clarke explains, there must have been a sense panic that went through that lab in the time the exhibits were thought to be missing. The scientists did...
Feb 21, 2020•28 min•Season 2Ep. 50
The two lead lawyers on WA’s mammoth case have been working for 49 days and nights every day of the Claremont Serial Killings trial. After 49 days, it seemed - as The West’s Emily Moulton pointed out in this episode - that they were getting tired. As the day was drawing to a close, a new witness, from the MACRO Taskforce took the stand. Just as soon as Senior Sergeant George Paton started his evidence, defence lawyer Paul Yovich objected, which led to a 20-minute legal argument betwe...
Feb 20, 2020•30 min•Season 2Ep. 49
In 2008, exhibits from Jane Rimmer and Ciara Glennon were sent for testing in a state-of-the-art lab in the UK. Paperwork attached to the samples left no questions about what they were investigating: “The three women are believed to have fallen victim to a serial killer”. When the samples got to the Forensic Science Service, they were tested in an air-tight lab, which was known as the clean room. We heard anyone who left the ‘clean’ room and became ‘dirty’, th...
Feb 19, 2020•31 min•Season 2Ep. 48
It’s been revealed a blood-stained brick was found near Ciara Glennon’s body in Eglington in 1997. A stray bundle of hair was also found in a boot two weeks after her body was found, and tested against her samples. Why are we hearing about this now? These were part of an email chain between forensic scientist Aleks Bagdonavicius and police. The brick, in particular, was labelled as high on the WA police priority list for DNA testing at PathWest. But what we haven't found out - is wha...
Feb 18, 2020•25 min•Season 2Ep. 47
Two never-before-heard about leads police were following up on during the mammoth investigation were revealed to the court on day 46. A leather glove which had been found near Jane Rimmer’s body when she was found in Wellard bushland on August 3, 1996, and two fingernail clippings which were found in a taxi. Both were revealed during forensic scientist Aleks Bagdonavicius’ cross examination by defence lawyer Paul Yovich today. At this stage it’s unclear whether the leather glov...
Feb 17, 2020•35 min•Season 2Ep. 46
In this episode, Alison Fan tells us some of the theories she’s heard from friends, strangers and people attending the public gallery at court, as she and the team try and put some of those questions into context - some of which have come up in the trial and left open-ended, or not answered at all. Such as the question raised earlier in the week, during evidence about Ciara Glennon's fingernails being sent to New Zealand - who’s female DNA contaminated the blank control samples which...
Feb 14, 2020•24 min•Season 2Ep. 45
In the last hour of day 44’s evidence, the prosecution began reading out statements from the former PathWest manager, senior DNA analyst Laurie Webb, who was sacked from his role in 2016 for breaching testing protocols and cutting corners. He’s not giving evidence in court, and as Tim Clarke explained last week as he broke the story, it’s not likely we’ll find out why. But what we did find out was that he was the person who had that ‘eureka moment’ - he was th...
Feb 13, 2020•23 min•Season 2Ep. 44
Around 17,000 people had their DNA tested during the largest and most expensive investigation in Australia’s history. They included thousands of taxi drivers, MACRO Taskforce’s prime suspect Lance Williams and even the former mayor of Claremont. But what we don’t know is if any Telstra workers were asked to give their DNA. We probably won’t find out, because as Tim Clarke explains in this episode, unless something extraordinary happens, those 17,000 names won’t be r...
Feb 12, 2020•21 min•Season 2Ep. 43
***WARNING: Distressing Content*** On February 11, 1995 a teenager’s life was changed forever. It was the night Bradley Robert Edwards brutally raped the 17-year-old, snatching her as she walked home after a night out with friends. The stuff of nightmares. We can say this because Edwards' admitted the crime, pleading guilty to the horrific assault at Karrakatta Cemetery just weeks before his trial for rape and murder was due to start late last year. In archived stories from The West Austra...
Feb 11, 2020•46 min
Day 42 of the Claremont Serial Killings trial started with a revelation which immediately led to a delay of proceedings for at least two days. That revelation was the discovery of more than 400 documents relating to testing of the crucial evidence - Ciara Glennon’s fingernails. Prosecutor Carmel Barbagallo started off proceedings by admitting the blunder to the court, which Justice Hall called ‘extremely unsatisfactory’. Ms Barbagallo revealed the documents were discovered duri...
Feb 10, 2020•28 min•Season 2Ep. 42
Just days before what would have been Ciara Glennon’s 28th birthday in November 1997, her grieving family were given a gift from A MACRO detective and pathologist Dr Karin Margolius - a bit of their daughter back. A lock of her hair. Detectives on the case had become close to the families as the massive investigation spanned months, turning into years, and this - as it was with Jane Rimmer’s family - an act of compassion. This act, however has somewhat divided our podcast team, with ...
Feb 07, 2020•31 min•Season 2Ep. 41
The defence honed in on potential DNA contamination from samples sent to a lab in New Zealand on day 40 of WA’s trial of the century. During cross examination, defence lawyer Paul Yovich pointed out to Dr SallyAnn Harbison, who was on the stand for a second day, that when testing Ciara Glennon’s fingernail samples, four blank control samples were found to be contaminated with another woman’s DNA. Forensic DNA expert Brendan Chapman joins us for this episode, and as he explains,...
Feb 06, 2020•37 min•Season 2Ep. 40
Lance Williams was the main suspect as being the Claremont Serial Killer for 10 years, and today it was revealed scientists once believed they found a possible match between his hair and that found on the third victim, Ciara Glennon. During his final day on the stand, retired forensic scientist Martin Blooms revealed in 2002, scientists did suspect a match had been made between the hair from Lance Williams and hairs found on Ciara Glennon’s body, following testing on Mr Williams hair after...
Feb 05, 2020•33 min•Season 2Ep. 39
A former senior forensic scientist has defended his work practices in the 1990s, maintaining he never took shortcuts and followed the protocols of the time. During day 38 of the Claremont Serial Killings trial, Martin Blooms rather cheekily said on the stand that DNA doesn’t ‘just fly around’ when asked whether there was any chance DNA samples from the Karrakatta rape victim could have come into contact with intimate samples from Ciara Glennon, both of which he tested. The tria...
Feb 04, 2020•24 min•Season 2Ep. 38
It was a seemingly out-of-the-blue, random question made by defence lawyer Paul Yovich on Day 37 of the trial, but as put by our criminal defence lawyer guest Shane Brennan, it’s a clever one. That question: In 1996 and 1997, did the PathWest lab - which tested both the Karrakatta rape victim’s and Ciara Glennon’s fingernail samples - have a telephone? With the follow-up question if the phone had ever been maintained during the late 1990s. The accused Claremont Serial Killer Br...
Feb 03, 2020•35 min•Season 2Ep. 37
It’s seen as probably the most crucial piece of evidence the prosecution have to try and prove Bradley Edwards as being the Claremont Serial Killer - Ciara Glennon’s fingernail clippings. Anna-Marie Ashley, the forensic scientist who extracted the DNA from those fingernails spent her second day on the stand, detailing how the DNA was extracted, and whose DNA they found. Just as crucially, she was also asked about how the evidence was stored, and as Tim Clarke and Alison Fan explain, ...
Jan 31, 2020•35 min•Season 2Ep. 36
The forensic scientist who tested the evidence which is crucial to the prosecution’s case today took the stand. Anna-Marie Ashley from Path West, detailed in painfully intricate detail of how she extracted the DNA from the Karrakatta rape victim’s intimate swabs, which revealed DNA which we now know is Bradley Edwards’ - for the first time. She also tested Ciara Glennon’s fingernail samples - the crucial piece of evidence which the prosecution say links the Karrakatta rap...
Jan 30, 2020•31 min•Season 2Ep. 35
Forensic pathologist Dr Clive Cooke told the court during his fourth day on the stand that Jane Rimmer and Ciara Glennon suffered similar injuries on their necks and hands, and that they both likely died as a result of having their necks cut with a knife. That information isn’t new to the trial, but as Tim Clarke explains in this episode, it’s significant because it’s the first time an expert witness has been asked - and explained - injuries inflicted on both women as a collect...
Jan 29, 2020•35 min•Season 2Ep. 34
We’ve already been told Jane Rimmer and Ciara Glennon fought for their lives. But what they went through in the moments before their deaths hasn't been spoken about in great detail, until today. On day 33, that was made a little clearer by the testimony of pathologist Dr Clive Cooke. He revealed there was no evidence to suggest she was raped before she was murdered. During his third day on the stand, Dr Cooke said while there was no evidence of sexual assault, Jane’s body was so badl...
Jan 28, 2020•24 min•Season 2Ep. 33
It was the Australia Day weekend 1996. Perth woke to the shocking news that an 18-year-old had been reported missing after not returning home from a night out in Claremont with friends. Little did we know that her disappearance would be just the beginning of Australia's most expensive and longest running investigation. She was the first victim of the Claremont Serial Killer, but her body has never been found. In this bonus episode, we're joined by veteran journalist Alison Fan, who became close ...
Jan 26, 2020•24 min
It has been revealed for the first time that Ciara Glennon may have been struck on the back of her head in the moments before her death. The blow may have stunned, or rendered her semi-conscious. This information we can bring to you now, because late on day 32 of the Claremont Serial Killings trial, Justice Stephen Hall lifted the suppression order put in place the day before, which had banned all details about Jane Rimmer and Ciara Glennon’s autopsies being broadcast to the public. After ...
Jan 24, 2020•24 min•Season 2Ep. 32
Before Day 31’s evidence in the Claremont Serial Killings trial could be heard, Justice Stephen Hall issues a temporary suppression order on all details regarding the post mortems of Jane Rimmer and Ciara Glennon, including any injuries and the causes of death. Justice Hall said the suppression was made at the request of the victim’s families. The suppression order was put in place just before evidence from the pathologist who carried out the post mortems of Jane Rimmer and Ciara Gle...
Jan 23, 2020•37 min•Season 2Ep. 31
The forensic officer who was involved with the collection of what is now seen as key pieces of evidence for the prosecution has revealed one of those pieces of evidence mysteriously disappeared after it was stored for the weekend at police HQ after Ciara Glennon’s autopsy. Sgt Adam McCulloch, who was in his second day of evidence, told the court a white fibre labelled AJM23 - which was collected during a Polilight exam on Ciara's body - was missing. It’s unknown, and will probably ne...
Jan 22, 2020•29 min•Season 2Ep. 30
Day 29 started out unusually in court, with an officer asked to spell the words ‘maggot’ and ‘entomology’ for the court as his cross examination started. The spelling test however, wasn’t just for fun, the court was told during evidence collection, several copies of exhibit lists were made, and one officer simply couldn’t spell those two words, and could identify his writing through his spelling of ‘magat’ and ‘antomology’. Also to take...
Jan 21, 2020•27 min•Season 2Ep. 29
