The public has had a long held fascination with detectives. Detective see a side of life the average person is never exposed to. I spent thirty four years as a cop. For twenty five of those years, I was catching killers. That's what I did for a living. I was a homicide detective. I'm no longer just interviewing bad guys. Instead, I'm taking the public into the world in which I operated. The guests I talk to each week have amazing stories from all sides of the law. The interviews are raw
and honest, just like the people I talk to. Some of the content and language might be confronting. That's because no one who comes into contact with crime is left unchanged. Join me now as I take you into this world. Welcome to another episode of I Catch Killers. Policing is a robust occupation with a strong culture. In such organizations, it takes a person of characters to stand up for what they believe in, maintain their integrity, and speak up
when they need to. That's exactly what today's guest, retired Superintendent Mark Ainsworth, was known for throughout his career. I never got to work with Mark. He was a member of the Queensland Police for thirty eight years and he worked on a number of investigations, including the horrific murder of Alison baden Clay, who is killed by a husband in twenty twelve. From what I know about Mark, he's
the type of cop I respect. We'll be talking about his stellar police career, getting his thoughts on fighting crime, and will break down the investigation into the horrific murder of Allison baden Clay. Mark Ainsworth, Welcome to I Catch Killers.
Thanks very much, Gary, nice to be here.
A well, we've had quite a few chats, but we're talking just before we got on Mike about life outside the police. How are you finding that?
Absolutely fantastic. I think I wish you would have done it years ago. There's life after policing, and I think the policing career puts people in a good stead to look at life after policing.
It's interesting you say that. I think when we're in police we feel that we're pigeonholed and policing is all that we can do. But the skill set you develop throughout policing is so broad that it is readily transferable outside the outside of the organization.
One hundred percent over our careers. You know, many many years, you see a lot of things, you learn a lot of things, and you become very diverse in your thinking and capabilities and transferring that to outside of policing is very very valuable.
Yeah, just where the conversation has taken this here. I often thought with policing because across the country and I think overseas as well, there's difficulty filling police forces for applicants or people that want a career in policing. I always thought during policing it would be good to be able to step away from it, do something else, freshen up, do something for a couple of years, and then come
back to policing. But we don't I'm speaking here on New South Wales, we don't really have that career path or those options. You can take leave without pay, but it's quite difficult. What's your thoughts on that?
Look? I tend to agree with that, and Queensland Police had the same when I was in that you could take a career break for twelve months and go and try something different then come back, or if you enjoyed what you're doing in that career break, you could leave the police and I think it's a great thing these days, particularly in attracting and retaining police, where it gives them
an opportunity to freshen up. Go and see what it's like in the real world, and if you don't like it, come back to the police, and I think you come back with a different mindset and a level of commitment once you see what happens in other areas, or alternatively, you think, well, this life outside of the police is for me. And I think, as you just said, I think with the attraction retention rate of police all across
the world, it's something that needs to be considered. And you know, is twelve months long enough for a career break. You know, the people that look for the career breaks have generally got a wealth of experience under their belt, so you know, it's pretty scary seeing organizations losing people that skill set after all the money invested in for training and the experience they get. So I think, yeah, I think there needs to be some options.
As you said, I know, I took twelve months leave without pay, and in a long career, it did freshen me up. I did some things. I was doing a little bit of work during that break, By the time that twelve months was up, I was itching to get back into get back into policing. I was really looking forward to it. Another thing I'd like to see with policing. Then again we're going off track, but with your experience in policing, I'd like to see our skill set as
a police officer. I'm a new South Wales Police officer. You're Queensland Police officer nationally recognized, so we could transfer at the equivalent rank to Queensland, Like it's a qualification that you have, you're a certified police officer. Yeah, they'd neither a fresher course, but not start at the bottom
because I because of relationships. At one point in time, I was considering starting over in Perth, but I really I would have had to start at the bottom and work my way up again, even though I had twenty twenty five years experience in policing. Do you think that's another thing that could could help attract people and make it a little bit more flexible.
Look, I think so, and I think all thoughts have got to be on the table. As you said, your skill set is a police officer. You don't lose particular skills because I moved from Queensland to Victoria or New South Wales. You know you've got to be across the relative legislation in those areas, which police officers pick that
up very very quickly. But I think that's another option that if you can transfer anywhere in Australia, that's a great option for police to attract them and if they want to move a family to another area, I think that's a very very good option. I think it should be on the table to consider. And I think it's not only queen'sine on New South White Wales alone that
are struggling to attract police and retain them. And I think if they all work together to come up with a strategy similar to this, it'd be quite easily achievable.
Yeah. No, I think it's a solution or possible solution. Now I understand the type of police officer you were, and we're going to talk in detail about your police career, but you've also since you've left the police, you've offered up some strong, strong thoughts on youth crime and thirty eight years in the police force, I think you're entitled to offer opinions. One was about holding parents or guardians responsible for the behavior of their children. Legislating that again,
it's thinking outside the box. What were your thoughts behind that when you raised it. I think it was on a Current Affair interview or an article.
Gary, I've had a lot of thoughts about it and being out of the police and just looking at what was going on, particularly in our communities up here in Queens and you're looking at Keynes towns for the Gold Coast, but even my own local community where it was a common denominator in conversations, people fearing what's going to happen to themselves or the houses or the youth crime I'm
running around out of control. Years ago as a young uniform officer, this issue was discussed in the around the Children's Services Department and Juvenile Aid bureaus at the time about you know, holding parents accountable for restitution, you know, if someone breaks into a house or damage or something, holding the parents accountable and it never moved, it never
proceeded from there. Now my thoughts on the accountability of parents and guardians, it comes back to a common sense approach in my view, and maybe people might think it's out of the box, but where does a parent know where the kid is at three o'clock in the morning, should that parent know where they are? I'm talking twelve, thirteen,
fourteen year old kids. You know you've got to have licenses, you know, to look after certain animals, and you know you're responsible for their well being and you're held accountable. What's the difference between holding a parent or a guardian accountable for the behavior or whereabouts their kids at that hour of the morning or even regardless of that that morning, you know, where is their accountability in relation to their criminal activities? And look, I'm not saying this relates to
all parents and guardians. I understand that some parents and guardians are at their wits end trying to control their kids and conform with laws and what's expected in the community. But it's one suggestion I think governments need to look at.
I think there's some merit there. As radical as that might sound and sort of fly in the face of what we understand with the justice system. But as police officers,
we've seen the situations, haven't we. You pick a kid up at twelve or thirteen year old that's out on the streets at two am, and yeah, they say it for adults, no good comes after midnight if you're out on the street, well, it's pretty much guaranteed that if you're a young kid and you're wandering the streets at that time of the night, you're going to get up
to mischief. And then you take the child home and you realize that there's no supervision, and it's not blaming the child, but maybe have people take responsibility for the children that they're raising. So I'm sure there'll be a lot of pushback for it, but again, we've got to look at solutions, haven't we.
One hundred percent? And I was quite critical there about you know, the government up here is wanting to increase penalties, legislate for harsher penalties. But you know, in all reality, how often does a juvenile or for that matter, an adult receive the maximum penalty or a stiffer penalty. So if you want to increase a penalty for I don't know, for assault to fourteen sixteen years, is that a deterrent for the kid at the time, And I'd argue it's not.
And I think in my view, it's just an easy way out for the government to say we're tightening things up, we're increasing our penalties where you're not looking at the core issues that are going on. You've only got to look and you'd know first hand the receivitism rate of these offenders that are getting charged by the police. Please doing a good job. Put them before the court they get or if they get sentenced to a child facility, they're meeting with like minded kids and they come out
in most times and reoffend. A part of my suggestion there was and look, I equate this back to the baby bonus that was introduced by the Labor government back in around the time of the global financial crisis, where five thousand dollars was given to women that had kids
as a baby bonners. My wife has got friends that works in child safety and an area up here north of Brisbane had something like a thirty percent increase on children being and dropped on the doorsteps of child safety by particularly young females who got the five thousand dollars baby bonners ran out, bought TVs, put drugs up their arms and here's society trying to look after those kids. So I equate back to there, and you look at you know, the age group of kids that are offending
up here now or are offending. You've got that twelve to fourteen age group which is very predominant, and that puts a lot of them into that category. I'm not saying all, but a lot. I think that the idea there needs to be some thinking out of the box in relation to custodial sentences. Now, what I suggested previously was considering, and the media ran with it as a boot camp. It wasn't. The terminology of boot camp wasn't what I really meant. It was a diversion system. And
this system's nothing new. It's worked. I know there's a group of businessmen that set up a similar sort of setup in the Kakadou area where a lot of indigenous people of alcohol problems. So they set it up as a diversionary system to get these people to come into that area and learn farming skills, break the cycle of drinking alcohol, becoming drunk, offending. And the actual program they've got has been an outseeing success. And this is run
by individuals who have the wealth to set up a program. Now, sorry, it's in the I could do. I think it might be up in the Kimberley's there. But what they've done is they've developed a skill set for people coming into that area, they learn farming schools, they learn training skills. They've got a psychologist that comes up and talks to the people on their arrival and during their stay there.
But they've also linked up with university in New South Wales to allow some leadership and education and the whole
program is working very well now. Equating that back to a juvenile type problem, I'm talking in what I did mention was in remote or rural areas where the kids can be diverted from the court system to an area where they can get an education, learn some farming schools, learn a trade, but more importantly getting them away from social media, so no farns, no computers, and just learning life skills that we probably learn as kids growing up
without the computers. And the other part of that is is the kids that would like the opportunity to do that. And I don't think we should discriminate between the offenders, but at the kids that would love the opportunity to do that should be given the opportunity as well. And as I mentioned earlier on, you might have parents that are just at wits end about trying to deal with
their kids. They're the sort of people that you know, their child gets an opportunity to go there, they learn the proper skill set, they get an education, they learn about respect behavior, and it's something that I think we need to try because what's working now, what's not working now is the system that's been around for many, many years.
Well, Mark what you just said, and I didn't interrupt you because I'm fascinated by your take on it. And if people dissect little parts of that, they'll go, oh yeah, ex scop talking tough them, send them to a camp. But the way that you explained it and articulated it really breaks it down. And I personally, not just from my experience in police life, just life itself, what you're suggesting there is sounds like a worthwhile thing to pursue.
And I balance that's it out because people that might hear you talk or hear two X cops talking crack down on crime. I'm really glad that you talk about You don't think you just need to strengthen the legislation all the time, because I never saw that working in policing the whole time I was in police. And you know, Okay, we're going to increase stealing a car from seven years to fourteen years. That's not what the offenders, specially kids,
are thinking about when they're committing the crime. And the way you describe that is you're breaking a cycle, really, aren't you. You talk about recidivism. You're trying something different, pull them from that environment and steer them and point them in the right direction.
One hundred percent. And as I said, it's nothing new. It happens overseas the example I gave there with the First Nations people, it does work. And I think the money we're spending on building new child attention centers and that the money diverted to an area like that. Even for trial, we have a politician up in the Far Nor Queens and Robie Catter who's supportive of it, and I think even for trial, it's worthwhile going through that effort. And you know, it'd be interesting to see the success
rate of it as well. And I'm not saying it's going to be one hundred percent successful. Nothing is. But it's trying something different to try and break the cycle of a life of criminality.
Yeah, well, anything you try is not going to be one hundred percent success, but if you can help one person's life, I think the fact that someone like yourself, with your experience, is talking about that. I hope people listen and on the issue of politics, and you rose to the rank of superintendent, so you understand politics, not just within the police, but politics in itself. Quite often in state elections it becomes a they said, well we're
going to take the polar opposite. You need to bipartisan approach, don't you to find the problem that's affecting everyone.
One hundred percent? And I think from when I first started, and when you know, when you first start and the police, you know, you're not aware of all the politics and the political games that are played. But as you grow through the ranks and your service expands and you see what happens. I think there needs to be a separation of powers from the police commissioner and the policing minister or government up here. And my views on this, I'm
sure a lot of people will smack them down. But you've only got to look at the COVID situation which happened, and I'm pretty sure it happened in other jurisdictions. Police became babysitters at motels. Now cost the community a hell of a lot of money. Now, why do the police have to get dragged into doing that when you could have security guards, you could have other people there performing that role. If someone doesn't conform with requirements, you call
the police to deal with that person. I think from what I'm seeing is the police, particularly up here in Queensland, are used as a stopgap measure for other duties which are not necessarily policing duties. The police everywhere operate twenty four to seven. Government departments shut their doors at five o'clock and everything after that becomes a policing problem, which, in my view, in a lot of instances, takes police
away from doing what their core role is. You look at COVID, you look at the number of number of hours and the amount of money spent on overtime. Having police sitting outside buildings babysitting that to me was an absolutely ridiculous scenario when there's plenty of other work that the police could be doing which is relevant to their roles.
Well, if you're worried about people smacking you down, I'm not going to smack you down about that one because I agree wholeheartedly and I think there needs to be the separation of powers between the police the politicians. And the courts. I think all those areas need their own autonomy and sometimes lines get blurred and that you made a point there. I hadn't even thought along those lines that who are you going to call the police? There're twenty four to seven, you know, if there's a problem,
and then we delve into mental health issues. And I know in New Southway, Queensland, across the country, police are getting frustrated that they feel like they've been brought into these mental health situations where that's not ideally their role. That's the way police get used up.
And you're right, Look, policing has changed over the years. You know, you look at the three big factors affecting police at the moment. Domestic violence number one issue across Australia, mental health, as you said up here in Queensland, the number of police shootings we've had recently involving patients with mental health that are threatening police, threatening other people and the police are forced to act. And youth crime, you know, youth crime or crime is core business of police. Police
go there to keep the peace. Domestic violence, they go there to keep the peace, but it's a whole of community problem. Mental health is a whole of community problem. But far too often a police held accountable for what they've done dealing at a domestic violence issue, or what they haven't done dealing with mental health people. And I think you know, a lot of the police are unfairly targeted. And look, I'm first to admit a lot of police, and I'm not going to say high percentage of small
percentage of police. We'll do the probably not follow through things and do things properly, but you get that in every occupation. What I am saying is that I think there needs to be a reset of the responsibilities and requirements of police in each jurisdiction.
It all makes sense and we could talk on all those subjects for the full podcast, but let's talk about yourself for a bit. Your career. Why did you join the police? Were you were you born into the job? Was it something you always aspired to or did you trip into it?
No? I sort of tripped into it. I've got no family members at all in the police. Were never had been an uncle through marriage. He was in the fingerprint section up here in Brisbane and he started talking about the police one day and I was fortunate enough that he had approval to take me out on a weekend when I was in year eleven at school and saw what he did and got really excited and interested, and that changed my mind about wanting to join the police.
So year twelve, I was going through Kedrin High School, did the application to apply to get into the police, and then January the following year, I started at the Police Academy as a seventeen year old and that was my life.
I laughed, because you're come in, and especially as a seven eeen year old. I joined a little bit later, but as a seven eeen year old you would have no idea about the world you were about to step into.
One hundred percent Gary and back in those days here I did an eighteen month training and cadeticia. It was eighteen months, so I had all these fellows the same age. You weren't allowed to get sworn in until you're nineteen years of age, and unfortunately for me, I was not nineteen when I finished my training, so I was used as a bit of a gopher. But in saying that learned a lot of things. I helped a prosecute to carry his bags and sit in court and learned a
hell of a lot. And you know that was great, But I can still remember my very first night out and my very first arrest was for the big offense of drunk in a public place. I went home that night and I shitting myself if I'd done everything right. You know, it was that bloke really drunk, you know, questioning yourself because she said, it's a new world. But you know, you learn back then from experience police you're
working with. You got some good advice from sergeants and senior servants and workmates, and your skills just developed there. But you're right, you know, I saw a lot of things as a nineteen twenty year old, and I'm sure you did that a lot of kids my age would never ever see. And you grow up very very quickly from.
That the experiences and the importance of having a good mentor your first arrest was someone drunk. Mine was a tick of the vader. I didn't realize. I honestly didn't realize you could summons a person for that offense. And I arrested him and he just happened to be a local guy that had been creating a lot of problems. All the other police thought I has been a tough guy, arresting this blope for a Asian, I didn't know you
could subpoena people for or issue a summons. Say they thought I was just being a hard as so oh yeah, yeah, no, I knew what I was doing. But yeah, the mistakes you can make. And I feel sorry for the younger police today because society, well, we didn't have the phones, it wasn't all CCTV footage, and we just didn't seem as accountable. And if you made a mistake, you'd have someone, someone that you could trust, a mentor that would say, look,
that's not how we do things. This is how we do things, and you would learn and you'd gravitate towards people that will see you in the right direction. But today's please don't have that luxury, do they.
No, I think the level of accountability has gone through the roof. And as you said, look, I remember before I retired, there was a sieed situation down in the city mall here in the middle of the day, a feller armed with a firearm, and I was an acting chief super at that stage, and I attended the scene, and I could not believe everyone in the crowd who had been pushed right away from it, just there with their cameras up in the air, photographing every movement of
everyone there. And as you said, we never had that. These days you'll see on media, you know, the police, you know doing something, you know, assaulting someone. They show that one part. They don't tell the full story. Now there's always two sides to every story. That is a real difficult thing these days. And it's not only policing. Sports people see it. Policing now is very, very difficult and I was only thinking about it last night.
You know.
When I was first in the police as a youngster, the biggest issue then was heroin. We had the Biki Bandit's running around, you know, using firearms that the rob banks to get their money to boff up on heroin. Then they sleep it off and become mellow. These days, you've got a lot more situations that police have to deal with, as we said, mental health that's you know, that's in a horrific area, and the different forms of drugs getting out there now on the level of violence.
I wasn't even issued a firearm when I first started in the job. It took about six months before we got one. I had a handcuff and a baton. But you look at the police now what they're kitted out with. You know, you've got your tasers, you've got your capsicn spray, your firearms, but they've got a choice of different different devices to use. But back in my day, that's all we had. And can I say that I don't think the level of violence was around us what it is now.
Yeah, true, true, And with all the tactical options that they have with the level of training, I should say lack a level of training that makes it very difficult too.
I had the.
Gun and the handcuffs and you'd go in there to make the rest and then yeah, the OC spray came out, the taser comes out, and I look at the police what they got on their belts now and under pressure in a critical moment, there's so many options. I don't know. It just seemed to be easier when we had the big battons and you knew what you were going to do. If you couldn't contain this person physically, you had a baton,
and if it escalated, you had a gun. Now there's so many different options which needed to be bored in. But I think the training needs to come in that people feel comfortable using all those different devices or weapons.
And look, I think back in the day to communication which you go to an effective communication with people. But I think the young police these days, you know, trying to communicate with someone that's drug effected, someone that's got mental health issues. It's a huge challenge.
And on it too, the respect has gone for police to a degree. Just a society for a variety of reasons, is not respecting authority. And you talked about the COVID period. I don't think that helped a lot of people liking police around this area in Sydney. Helicopters hovering around, police helicopters checking if people are out of their homes. It doesn't create a good relationship between the community and the police that were there to serve the community.
Yeah, look, I agree. I think there's a lot of learnings from COVID that we can take away from it. And I think the big thing is working in well during the COVID period. I was at the Racing Integrity Commission here and racing still continued during the COVID period, but we had a group of people within the industry stakeholders. We worked together to put in things in place on how people could still earn their living, how people could still race, but conforming with all the COVID legislation. And
I think that was quite effective in doing that. There was a mutual understanding between all the parties involved as what we needed to do, how we conformed, and I think that worked pretty well from a policing point of view. Again, you know, police were thrown into the ring. There was legislation developed and police had to enforce that legislation.
Okay, tell us about your career. Just describe your career and I've got details of your career here and it's been wide and varied on different things, working with external organization, on special investigations, the Crime Commission. Tell us about your career.
Well, go from the outset. I think policing is a fantastic career for anyone. You look at my CV there and I've had so many opportunities to do different things. One thing that really attracted me to the police was going in each day. You never knew what you're going
to get up to what was coming your way. The other beauty is is the ability to transfer and move within the organization of different areas, which I think is a fantastic opportunity and getting right back to our very initial conversation here, upscilling yourself across a multitude of disciplines. I had my started off the same as everyone in uniform career, worked in traffic branch for several months. I didn't like it, went to suburban stations, absolutely loved it.
You got to know your community, you got to know who the young people that needed a bit of attention in the area were. You're out patrolling meeting other people.
And then I had thirty two years in playing close which I absolutely loved, running local cibs, working in local criminal investigation branches, and then I had the opportunity to do a number of other things, and probably one of the best opportunities I had was working at the Australian Crime Commission as the manager of the Queensland Office, but being given the head of Determination role for major and organized crime around Australia with task forces around Australia, and
that was absolutely brilliant. You got to see how police and other jurisdictions operated and engaging with those people was fantastic. The Royal Commissions here, so I was as a constable seconded to the Fitzgerald Commission of Inquiry as as surveillance operative. There was five US initially that started that and that was a real eye out and for me, particularly at
that stage in my career. And then you know, the Royal commissions on top of that, and did the Flood Raw Quincident Flood Royal Commission, which again was a very much annoye opener talking a lot of people who'd lost family members and friends through the flooding devastation right across the southeast corner. And then the Trade Union Raw Commission, which is very topical at the moment. And then since retiring, the DNA RLE Commission, the DV Commission, and a little
bit in the Britney Higgins Commission down south. But probably out of all that period of time, I thoroughly enjoyed my playing clothes career. You saw, you met good people, you met more people, you saw the best and worst of people, and you know, I think it was great working in a very close knit team environment in those areas.
You would have gone through the stage as a detective sergeant, whether you're in major crime or in local area commands at local police stations. I found that rank very rewarding. It was exciting. I don't know if it correlated with the stage of your life and career, but you finally the shackles are off, You've got the experience and you're going to start running jobs. Do you have memories or investigationations that you thought, yeah, I've found my passion.
Certainly did, and I think as getting promoted to detective sergeant, as you said, is the big step, you think I finally made it. I was fortunate enough as a detective sergeant to run a local criminal investigation branch and had a great crew working under me, and that responsibility that came with that position was good. Ensuring that people were working with you were traveling down the same path as yourself, but also forming a close knit team. And you know, policing,
in my view, it's like sport. If you haven't got a team not singing in the same direction, you're going to have problems. And I think molding that team, leading that team and to achieve results, you know, was quite enjoyable.
Very satisfying. And I know you have a sporting background and interest and the way that you've described a team those even like working up to becoming a detective sergeant when and you thought, who are these wise old men or women that know all this information and can just make decisions like that. Then all of a sudden you look and you become that You become that person, and you've got what you think are young kids coming to you going what do we do now, boss or sage.
But the teamwork aspect of it, they're my fond memories of when you had a good crew. Not all the same type of personalities. It was always a range of misfits and someone had a skill set here or there, and you had a job. You get an investigation and you follow it and you get that really satisfying moment where you've got the breakthrough all of a sudden this mystery. You know who's who the person is, and then you set your traps to catch that person.
That's right. And I think you said you'd run a major instant room, and I'd always appreciate the staff that were there, whether it was the most you know, you have your briefings in the morning in the afternoon, and whether it was the most junior uniform constable and the most senior detective in the room. I always made the point of going around the room individually and from the outset saying, look, you've all come from different backgrounds, so
you've all got different skills. Don't think your idea is stupid because we mightn't have thought about it, and encourage them to come forward and feel part of that team. And I think that's the best way to get results. You're embracing everyone's ideas, you're bringing them on board as part of the team and sort of singing from the same sheet.
Yeah, one hundred percent. And I was shown that by people I respected. That is the way to get the best out of a team and let everyone and I think it also motivates people to think that they're part of it. And as you said, you could have the most junior person that's just straight out of uniform sitting there in awe of all these detectives but makes a comment that's probably the smartest comment, potentially could be the smartest comment in the room, and points you're in the direction.
One hundred percent. And it's just giving them the confidence to speak up that they're not going to be ridiculed if you know that people think it stupid.
So I want to speak to you about the murder of Allison Baden Clay. But is there an investigation that you found particularly satisfying, as like one particular investigation that's with you other than Allison Baden Clay's murder that sticks with you, that you thought, Okay, this is what policing is all about.
Yep. The Australian Crime Commission Victoria, when I was doing the Head of determination for the High Risk Crime Groups, we were working on an operation conjointly with the Piranha Task Force in Victoria and Customs in relation to the
importation of a large quantity of extacy pills. We worked on that job for about twelve fourteen months and had a great, great team, great relationship with the other jurisdictions, and when it came to resolution, we uncovered four point two ton of ecstasy pills which were brought in to the ports in Victoria, which is still the largest single
siege of ecstasy pills anywhere in the world. It came in tomato tins on a shipping container and the first couple of rows when the shipping container was unpacked were genuine tomato in the tins, and then as you got further back there was the ecstasy pills and that I just could not believe that the quantity of the sheer quantity. But the way that the three groups worked in together.
Tell me, what does four point two tons worth of pills look like?
A shiploads? Well, I think there was about fourteen can openers that they went through electric can openers, and it was amazing. A skip if you imagine a skip in half full of little pills. It was incredible.
Right, So what's the street value of something like.
That back then? They talked about seven hundred and fifty million, because I'm talking, you know, back two thousand and nine, twenty ten. The value that's very, very high. But the offender is what they did. The tomato tins. They were packed in boxes of six each of those tins to get the weight of the container consistent, so to get through any X ray or you know, checking by customs, they had to get the weight of the container ideal.
So what they did is a number of tomato tins they filled up with rocks to make sure they had the weight correct and the rest were all pills. So it was a massive load. Never seen anything like it.
You guys and girls really wrecked someone's party for that. Someone would have been disappointed with that type of seizure.
I think so, and I think the ring leaders back in Italy were the ones that we become a little bit hot under the collar. They'd lost to that money and drugs. So yeah, I.
Can imagine the reaction, the risk you take.
When you want to get into those enterprises.
Exactly how long was the investigation going on and what was the magnitude of the investigation.
The investigation was a lot of electronic surveillance, physical surveillance, identification of suspects and what happened with this one. It was we had suspects in South Australia, Victoria, New South Wales from the Griffith area and Queensland, so there was a joint effort right across all those jurisdictions in relation to the targets we had. An investigation went on for many, many months. Even after the shipping container came in, it
continued on there. I think it's a better least of the twelve months after that to round up all the offenders.
Massive, massive investigation.
To me, that was just a great example of working with other jurisdictions to get an outstanding result.
There is a satisfaction there. Like I say to people, and I put my hand up that as a detective, you feel like you're a hunter. You're hunting the person, and people might say, oh, that's a bit extreme, but that's what you feel like. And if you're involved in investigation like that, and it comes through to fruition where the point where you recover four point two tons of ecstasy pills, it's you're on a bit of a high, aren't you after something like that?
Oh, I look one hundred percent and I think you know it's again. I'll go back to the sport thing. You have a win, you celebrate, and I think that was one of the good things I liked about the team environment and the police. You had a good win. You know, you achieved a good result, and a very important part is celebrating as a team. And I think these days, you know, I'm not sure where that still occurs to the same extent as what had happened when you and I are in it, and I hope it does.
I think that's a very important part of it.
Yeah, because there's a lot that can be said negative side of the culture of police, but there was a lot of positive sides of the culture, that uniformity, that the brotherhood that there was good aspects of the culture. And we'll talk about the Fitzgerald inquiry. We had the Wood inquiry down here in New South Wales. I wonder if that misses with policing now because I don't know about you, but when I joined I joined policing as a lifetime career. It was a vacation. That's what I
was going to do. I think people, from what I hear and you and I have both been out around about the same time, people are using as a stepping saying I'll have a look at policing, do that for a bit and then move onto something else, and so they don't invest as much as I think you need to when you're committed and you're a career police officer.
Look, I agree with you as I said, I left from school straight into policing. That's all I knew from the age of seventeen to the age I got out, and I knew that I had a career path in front of me. I knew if I didn't want to be a uniform off so I could go into forensics, I could go and become a detective, and all those options were there. That's a big thing that you know, people need to look at. And I think a lot
of it comes back to recruitment. I can remember the hoops had to jump through to get recruited to join the police and everything. But I put in the works one hundred percent committed that I want to be a police officer. I'm not sure what recruiting standards are like now. I know up here in Queens And we went down the stage of fifty to fifty male and female, and you know, hearing reports that you know, males who would have been a good police officer missing out because they
weren't of the right sex. Now that's that's changed. Now we've gone down the stage of you know, you've got to have a university degree behind you to get into the police. Well, I don't think that worked that well either, you know, I think it's a recruitment has a big part of it, you know, getting the right people, getting the people that look, you don't have to be the sharpest tool and the shed to be a police officer. As long as your street wise and you've got a
level of common sense and you can communicate. They are three critical things that I believe, you know, that can make you a good police officer. And then you learn as you go along.
And there's there's obviously benefits to having the intelligence, but you put a team together and you could have the person that just had the communications skills in the street smart so you can have the IT expert that's fascinated by the computer system that the rest of us are going, Yeah, which button do we push type situation. You need that
that cross section of people. I want to talk about the Fitzgerald and I raise that not sitting in judgment because we had the same thing down here and yeah, you look at any police organization, i'd suggest across the globe, and there's been pockets of pockets of corruption. I know with the Wood Royal Commission. I was a major crime
detective at the time and it hit me hard. There was shame associated with what came out in the inquiry and the level of corruption I say, isolated pockets of corruption and it was exposed and removed needed to be done. No one's arguing against that, but I know at the time when it was happening, there was a lot of resentment from detectives in major crime because we're all being tired with the one brush you worked surveillance. As I
understand in the Fitzgerald inquiry. That would have been a tough, tough gig for you, I would imagine, because it's working in your own organization and the type of things that you would have seen.
And it was Garius I mentioned before. I think I had about four years five years service at that stage, and corruption and inappropriate relationships I'd never come across anywhere in my career. So it was a huge eye opener. That was back in the days where everyone had pages, you know, mobile phones with the size of a house
and you had one of them. Batteries last about ten minutes, and you know those days there, we weren't allowed into the office where the investigators were, so we'd meet in the park and our sergeant and come and give us some a job what it was, and you look at it and you think, Holy Dearly, you know, it's just really happening. And it was a real big eye opener for me and I think some of the other people
who had been around a little bit longer. For me, it was a little bit of a shock, But for me personally, it was an eye opener, not mainly I think looking at the way some of the organized criminal networks worked, how they infiltrated policing ranks and just the way they operated in their own environment was quite interesting.
Yeah, I think it flourished to a degree of society had changed, but there wasn't the accountability. I can't see that level of corruption occurring in this day and age. I think, you know, everyone's more accountable. But yeah, it must have been a tough gig. And after you work there, I know people that worked in those type of roles when they came back into the organization there was some I think wrong resentment of the people because of the
role that they had done. But you know, any fair minded police officer has to say, well, you know, we don't stand for corruption. Did you find any of that coming back into coming back into the organization after working on the Fitzgerald Inquiry? And I just clarify just in case we're talking, we know what it was. Fitzgerald Inquiry was the inquiry into corruption within the Queensland Police.
You know, Gary, I was very lucky I went from the Fitzgerald Inquiry to relieving officer in charge of the Valley Cob. The Valley c be here is a very much smaller scale of what you've got. The King's cross. You know he had the distreet.
Yeah, done. I've done some work up there in the valley.
I get the sense of it, and look, a lot of the main players in the Fitzgerald and Quarry, the organized criminals had businesses and enterprises set up around the valley. So I must admit I was a little bit nervous about coming back, But the team I had around me, I think I was accepted very well. I'm probably be naive to think they thought, oh, here's this dog coming from working on coppers and working on them, and now he's our boss. But I just treat every day as
it comes. What you see is what you get with me. And I never had any issues, never had any threats, never had anything directly to my face. Probably a lot, you know what the police are like, behind your back, there'd be a lot going on. But no, I never had too many issues at all.
In the work that you've done in policing, what was the area that was your favorite part. What did you enjoy most about being a detective and why you chose detective because there's some very worthwhile career paths in uniform. What was it about being a detective that was the thing that rocking.
My big interest was it was taking a complaint further and actually looking into it, you know, trying to identify the offender, trying to get victims of crime their property back for breaking. But just just investigating is what really
drew my passion. Like Uniform, you did a little bit of that, but largely, and I think even more near you're going from job to job the job so your time to do investigations was a little bit restricted, and I just love the investigation field once I got into it, you know, getting a getting a report from a break and having a look at it, you know, doing door knocks, doing the grunt work that sometimes uniform staff don't have
time to do, and working out a pattern. Then getting a crook and talking to the crook and you know, getting their trust and getting them to off up to multiple breakdowns and going for driving the car to point out where they did them and getting property back. I think that was rewarding. But one big thing I learned from it is communication. Is you know, talking to people initially how you'd like to be spoken to, treating them as human as well, and then you know you're up
the anti you're down the ante from there. But it's a good starting point. And I think you know a lot of the crooks.
You know.
My wife and he said, the other day, we're talking to someone that we're out somewhere up the coast, and a fellow come up and spoke to me. She said, who's that? And I said, I arrested him back in nineteen ninety three. You know, so not every crook's going to do that to you, But I think if you treat them properly, you know, you can earn a level of respect. But the investigation side was I thought was fantastic.
We used to do the early morning drug raids. He'd get information on place and that was a great team building exercise and it had the adrenaline going, you know, nothing like you know, kicking in a door of someone's house at seven in the morning and finding gear and you know, it's you know, that sort of thing. Was just it was just great. You know, I just thoroughly enjoyed it.
The way you just describe that market. It's almost like, I know, on jobs like that, and I'm thinking, and we're getting paid for this, the level of excitement you'd pay money to actually have the experience of doing an early morning raid or investigating a particular type.
Of crime, and you know a lot of it there is was like that, you know, and it was all legitimate, and you know, we had to conform with legislation and policies and procedures. But conforming and that didn't take the fun away from doing that sort of work exciting.
How do you find court? Because that's I think court scares a lot of people away from potentially being detectives, because if you're going to put your hand up as a detective, you're going to spend a lot of time in the witness box under cross examination. Whether you've done everything right, it doesn't matter because these barrisss, defense barrisses or solicitors get paid a hell of a lot of money to make you look stupid in front of the
magistrate or the jury. How did you find court experience and how did it develop over the years?
I guess I was fortunate that giving court evidence pre Fitzgerald, when you're relying on record of interview type record of interviews or interviews in your notebook and getting attacked by illegal off barristers and that well, you know, you just wrote these notes. You just made this up. And even though their client had signed and adopted that this is a true record. And then going on there too after Fitzgerald,
where interviews and everything were tape recorded. I think that took a lot of the angst away, but it still didn't take away why did you do this? Why did you do that? Why didn't you do this? You said this to my client, and I think you know, going in there is straight up front. You know, it either happened or it didn't, and that see what I tried
to adopt. It's it can be harrowing. But on one thing I noticed now is you know, you look at people are getting detective appointments that haven't given evidence too much in a district or supreme court, and I think that's one thing that we're seeing is a bit of a deskilling that in that ability, which is quite important. It's yeah, I think you know, the tape recording of interviews has reduced a lot of the angst going to court, but not all.
We had that down in New South Wales. I forget the years that came in euspinterviews and I was well entrenched in detectives at that stage and we all thought the world was going to going to end what you've got to get them on tape and it's not sit down interviews, and it was confronting, and I remember I put my hand up to go down there to learn it, to become a trainer in training it because I thought, that's the interview room is a skill that you need
as a detective, and if that's the way that we're doing it, you've got to get your head around it. Yes, I do think it reduced a lot of time in court, and I think it's beneficial. No one would argue against it. It's a much better system to have in place. But you made the point there that people haven't got court experience. I was working in homicide and people would getting to the rank of pretty close to the detective sergeant, and you could count on one hand the time they've been
in the witness box. And I almost felt sorry for them, because when it comes to the crunch on a big one, you're putting yourself in the homicide situation. You could find yourself in the witness box for a couple of days on complex matters, and I don't think they get the experience. I had a detective. I didn't like him at the time for what he did to me, but he set me up at the local court. He knew the defense solicitor and told me not to worry about preparing for
this case. It was just to break an ender because it'll go easy. He'll probably end up pleading guilty. So I naively took his advice and didn't get my head round the brief. He normally would get it the witness box before I'd get in the witness box, but on this occasion he didn't get in the in the witness box, he said, no, you're going first. I got in there and just totally carved up. It came out. I think the tie was around the back of a suit and
it was just a complete mess. And I'm thinking, my god. And he said how'd you go? Because he wasn't allowed in court and I said, I got ripped a part I should have prepared. And he said, have you learned anything? And I said, yeah, I've got to prepare for court. And then he introduced me to his mate, who was
a defense solicitor. So that was but I never forget that lesson Mark, And it's something that you've got to prepare and you've got to be professional, and that's the sharp end of the work that you do as a detective, because it's all right having the fun investigating locking people up, but when it's all said and done, you want that conviction beside the beside the rest.
And it's equated to it's like one of the toilet. If you don't use the paper, you're in the shit and you've got a place. A lot of emptis some paperwork and preparation. As you said, your paperwork going to court, your brief of evidence, your statements have to be spot on to close the gap for any cross examination for getting ripped apart. But preparation is critical and I think in major cases where getting your team together to make sure you're all all seeing from the same page, that
everyone is on track with what did occur. And I think that's a critical part of it, particularly these days we have the high profile matters where you've got a team and you know, the big media locally, in a state, overseas. That's where it becomes absolutely critical that the team is on the game.
And yeah, well and the further up and well, I think we can talk about this in Part two and Allison baden Clay matter. But the further up you get in the rank structure and running an investigation, you're very much reliant on the people below you to brief you because you might have thands of pieces of information. It was a detective inspector. If I was running the job, I can't get my head around all that information, so I have to rely on the people underneath me to
pass that information on and make the decisions accordingly. So it very much is about attention to detail in investigations and managing the sheer volume of information that's correct.
And I think as a detective inspector or detective superintendent, one of the roles is you know those Bade and Clay when I was a figure ahead in that role, media figurehead, largely to take the pressure away from the detective senior sergeant running it. But it was a great team underneath us. You know, we briefed in the morning, we briefed in the afternoon, and I think that is
where it's absolutely critical. And I similar role as that as getting the information but also providing the team with the resources and everything they needed to allow them to do the job properly. And we'll talk about it later on.
It's very much say it because I'd like to get your views as a superintendent involved in the bigger investigations and what that role is. But look, we might take a break here. We're also going to dive into domestic violence, which is something that nationally is very topical at the moment. But thanks for part one. Then when we get back into part two and we're going to carry the conversation further and delve deeper into your career and some of
the investigations and your thoughts on policing. But having said that, you've left me with some thoughts about your management of youth crime, and I think, yeah, there needs to at least be discussion about some of the things that you're raising.
Yeah, look, Arry, I think I think it's great. I think it's a topic in itself. And you know what, I think what I'd really love to see is policymakers. You know, you look at a lot of the policy makers in government departments, so young kids that have come straight out of YUNI, they've never seen an angry man. How many of them gone out in the road to see what's going on, to see what occurs, you know,
to go on control. I think youth crime and the way it's going, I think that is an area where it needs to be a solid panel discussion with some of the policymakers, the politicians, and the police and judiciary that are dealing with it.
All the people involved in it that understand because it's a complex problem and that's not one simple solution is going to fix it. That needs a multi layer approach. Really does on like DV exactly the same. Okay, well, we'll be back shortly for part to Thanks Garry.