Three years ago I sat down with renowned journalist Claire Harvey, who interviewed me following public criticism by the then New South Wales Police Commissioner Mick Fuller of the way I handled the investigations. The things that I said in that interview are still relevant as they were three years ago. I invite you to have a listen to that interview.
I stand by everything I said in that interview. Unfortunately, it has now been over five and a half years since I was removed from the investigation, and I think I'm as confused as a public as to what is going on. I sincerely hope we find out what's happened to weir. Leading an investigation in the disappearance of a three year old child comes with responsibilities and accountabilities. If mistakes were made, those responsible need to be held to account.
That comes with the job. Here now is the interview I did with Claire Harvey.
We're recording this on Thursday, the eighteenth of November. I'm Claire Harvey, a journalist, and I am speaking with Gary Jublin. This is a special episode in the Eyecatch Killers podcast feed because there's been some news this week about the William Tyrel matter. Gary William Tyrell was a three year old boy who disappeared seven years ago from a property on the New South Wales Mid North coast. Tell me how you got involved in this case.
At the time of his disappearance, I was working at homicide with the New South Wales Police. I was a detective Chief inspector. I took the investigation over five months after he disappeared. It was in September twenty fourteen. It was run for five months and then the person that was running that was retiring and I took over the investigation five months after he disappeared. I worked on it
for four years, led the investigation for four years. My role was a supervisor, which as an inspector you sit over a team of investigators and in that role you're responsible for the direction of the investigation and operational decisions, strategies and whatnot. After around four years or just sure the four years, I was removed from the investigator And there's no hiding the fact that it was in somewhat
controversial circumstances. Allegations were made against me and that resulted in me being charged with recording conversations with a suspect in the William tyrrel matter on my telephone. It was a local court matter, relatively minor matter, but powers it be removed me from the investigation. I since retired from the police. I decided that the organization was not the
right fit for me anymore. I've been in the police for thirty four years, so it wasn't an easy decision, but I left the police at the time of running the investigation. At the time of leaving the investigation, I should say I wasn't afforded the opportunity to speak to anyone still on the investigation or provide a handover, which I always thought that was not the best way of transition one investigation to someone else taking it over. At your trial.
In that local court matter, one of the people who gave evidence was the foster mother of William, who told the court that she had she had greatly respected you as a detective and that she was really afraid that with a dogged detective like you off the case, that it would ultimately be sent on unsolved homicide and that would be the end of the investigation into William. She made it clear that she wanted this murder investigation to keep going. Is that right?
Yeah, that's that's pretty much right in summary, and I feel and really the facus should always be on the victim, victim's families and trying to resolve it. Unfortunately, it got caught up in the internal conflict that was happening in with the new South Isles Police, with the issues that were happening with me, and she had concerns that the
matter would be referred to unsolved unsolved homicide. So that's she chose to actually give evidence at my hearing was something that she decided that there was some information she provided that would support my position on what happened in the allegations against me. It was her choosing and I appreciate it obviously, and after that that was my involvement in the investigation.
She has now been publicly named this week as the only person of interest in the investigation as it's been run by the new team, and the Police Commissioner Mick Fuller and the Police Minister David Elliott have been out in public making some pretty strong comments about the history of this investigation. How does it all make you feel now about the way it all unfolded?
Quite frankly, when I heard what the Commissioner was saying and breaking it down. He was announcing what was considered to be a breakthrough in the investigation, which I see as a positive, positive line if I'm just looking at it from the outside, and I should say that that's what I'm doing. I've been off the investigation for two
years ten months. Once I left the investigation, I didn't say anything negative about the investigation, and I honestly believe the police that are heading up the investigation or working on the investigation want to solve it as much as I did in the team I was working with at the time. But strangely, and yeah, there was to me,
it seemed very unnecessary. Commissioner Fuller, in this public interview on two GB decided to talk about the new developments in the case and also made the comment that the current team running the investigation inherited a brief that was described as shambles, and also made a comment later on that the detectives were following suspects that were clearly not involved, wasting time, I think was the wording of it. Wasn't aware of this, Like I've been keeping my eye on
anything that develops in the wiim tyrial matter. But then I got inundated with text messages saying the U Okay, how do you feel about this? And I didn't know where that was coming from. And then a source back to the comments of the commission that were clearly directed as an investigation that I was running, running it for four years, I thought it was unnecessary. I don't think
it's a very smart play. I think airing something like that in an investigation is dangerous because it makes it harder to convict people because it will give the defense a foot in the door to question the integrity of the evidence or the manner in which the investigation was run. But probably more importantly, and I'm making the life outside the outside the police. But you know, basically, I've been a career detective and have a commissioner of police say
that about an investigation that you ran. I found that highly offensive. I must admit I was in two minds where I wanted to even respond to it, and my initial thought I was angry, and then Carma Garry stops and thinks, okay, maybe just just let it slide through.
But the amount of people that said I should be aggreeved by the comments that were made made me feel that I couldn't just sit on my hands, and I had to address it and a couple of points because it's simply well I say it's incorrect, and people might dismiss that and say, well, yeah, that's your view. The commissioner's view is something different. I like dealing with facts, and I think that comes from being a detective as long as I have been that you need to back
up opinions. Leading an investigation like William Tyrrel's and I would call it the state's highest profile investigation, if not one of the highest profile investigations in the country. Obviously and quite appropriately, if you're running the investigation, you need to report up what you're doing to your senior officers. As an inspector, my senior officer is the Commander of Homicide,
who sits at the level of superintendent. We then now also have a director, which is a chief superintendent, and assistant commissioner sits above that in the State Crime Command. Leading the investigation, I was responsible for submitting what's called the progress report. Progress reports are as a name would suggest. It's outlining the progress of an investigation and to be submitted every four weeks. In that you have to outline what you've achieved in that period of time, so that
four weeks identify what suspects that you've got. What are you doing, what are your strategies, what are your future directions? How many staff have you got? Basically the nitty gritty, in minute detail of what's happening on the investigation. I complete that. It then gets forwarded to up the chain of command to the Commander of Homicide, then the director, and then the Commander of State Crime, all of which have to sign off on the document to acknowledge that
they're satisfied with the direction of the investigation. Now, what I find quite strange is a commissioner has come out and said that it was in a shambles. I submitted, I believe it was forty four progress reports, not once where I criticized about the direction or the strategies of the investigation. The only different opinion we had in regards to the way I was running the investigation. I wanted more staff, which I couldn't get, which I understand because
I was at management level. I understand that it's limited resources, but I'll always ask for it, even with the expectation that I might receive the staff. The other thing was whether the investigation should be shut down. They're the only and I won't even say disagreement, so just discussions. But for the four years I ran the investigation, there was no criticism in the direction that I was running the investigation, who I was targeting, how I was targeting the investigations,
targeting the suspects. I should say also with this particular investigation, because it was such a high profile, I also had to participate in regular reviews and reviews. You have a panel of senior police sit down and listen to what's happening and let's agree or disagree or point it in a different direction. So there were a number of reviews, and because of the William Tyrrell the nature of it, I also had to report up to a Deputy commission
at one stage fortnightly. So to now, almost three years after I've left the police, here the commissioners say the investigation was in the shambles and the detectives were wasting time following suspects that clearly weren't involved. I may not have got to say something. And those the records I talk about, this is not just an opinion based thing. Those records I talk about are retained with the new South Files Police. I also did an investigation plan that
was updated regularly. All these things outline the strategies and directions. So to sit back and just accept that sort of criticism, I'm not prepared had to do it.
So why if it appears the way it is, are they trying to throw you under the bus?
I can't. I can't answer that answer that question. I can speculate is that what's happening. I think throwing under the bus is a good description that certainly people that I have worked with in the past that are now out of the police have termed it exactly that. Why are they throwing you under the bus? It worries me. It worries me that a false narrative could be created, that the investigation is not solved because the person that got charge with a criminal offense relating to the investigation
has stuffed up the investigation. We also had the police minister suggests that maybe an inquiry is necessary on that, I say, bring that on. I have no problems with an inquiry in the manner in which I ran the investigation. LEADERSHI is about accepting responsibility. I accept my responsibility at my level of a inspector running a homicide investigation. Let the people that sit above me accept the same responsibility the decisions they made.
What do you think that the police minister and the police commissioner would expect you to do in response to this kind of criticism.
I honestly think, because I've left the police, and I've said it, and I've said it publicly, and I genuinely mean this, I have no animosity towards it, towards the police, and I've got on with my life. I'm trying to forge your career in the media, doing the best I can, and I've sort of moved past the police. Each day a little bit more of the police evolves from me, and I become more I'm looking at things not through
a policeman set of eyes. But I've made a conscious decision not to criticize criticize the police because I respect the work that they do, and I haven't criticized the wim terial investigation. So I don't know if they think I was just a week boy that oh, he'll take it. But yeah, most people that know me, there's a limit to how far I can be pushed. And I suppose, and this is deeply personal but to actually bring me out and talk about this, it's because it's hurt me.
I don't mind if people say they don't like me. They might have opinions on me, and you know, I don't like some people. Other people I do like. That's fine, but they've taken it to another level, questioning my professionalism as a career detective. I'd also like to make the point that the commissioners was his whole tenure as a commissioner. This investigation was running as well, so he was the boss. He was the boss. So I don't know why, Claire.
I don't know why it's come out this way. The fact that it's come out this way when there's supposedly possibly I don't know because I'm watching from the sideline as everyone else, is a breakthrough in the investigation. But you know, I've got to be honest. Everything is running through my mind because I've never seen that done before. I've never seen a commissioner, or any senior office for that matter, criticize an investigation whilst an active investigation is
being run. So I'm had a loss why it occurred. And getting back to your question, what did they expect me to do? I don't know, like, do they really think I'm just going to sit back and take that because I'm not.
I imagine when you walk into any homicide investigation, you know you're encountering hundreds of people who are potentially persons of interest, You're potentially suspects. You've said to me before that your best witness is dead, and that's a very natural work.
That is the nature.
So take me back to the start of the William Tyrrell investigation. When you took it over five months after William had disappeared. What was the first thing, What was your first priority and what did you do, particularly in relation to William's family.
Well, the first priority, even prior to me starting on it five months into the invesstigation, there was no investigation plan. Now, for all homicide investigations have an investigation plan. How for five months that managed to slip through with an investigation plan, I'm gobsmack by. So the first thing I did was sit down and do an investigation plan. An investigation plan
outlines all the steps and directions. It's like a it's like a framework of the way that you can freeform it, but it's like a framework of the way that you're going to conduct this investigation. Okay, we're going to look at people close to at the time William disappeared, and you outline strategies for a complex investigation like William Tyrell. I think it's a no brainer and it's something that should have been done and it hadn't been done. So that's the first thing I did when I took over
the investigation. I was introduced to the Foster family in a briefing by hands Rup and sorry, he was detective chief inspector that was running prior to myself, and it was quite right that there was a handover done and that he introduced me to the foster parents, so they had a point of contact when we were what we're doing. At that time, they were eliminated as suspects, So they.
Had already been eliminated as suspects by the previous investigation.
Yeah, and so yeah, I inherited the investigation and they had been eliminated. So I still going there. I think this is a detective detective in you. I accept and I respect what hands does his work. So you know, if he's telling me they've been eliminated, that carry some weight. But you look at it as anyone would if you took over an investigation that that classic saying that fresh set of eyes. I was keeping an eye on the family to see, Okay, is there something that I'm missing,
something hands missing, or something that's just developed. I didn't see any of that. There was another suspect at the time that I took it over, and that was the without naming names, that it was a high profile one. Search warrants had already been executed on his place before I even took over the investigation, so I had to concentrate on that to start with and get things I won't say sorted, but get things in order in the
way that I thought the investigation had to progress. Because it's a live animal homicide investigation, priorities change on a daily basis, so you've got to be fluent in your thinking. But with the investigation plan concentrated on looking at the person that was being targeted, that he was a priority suspect, and then the family. So the meeting with the family was not It sounds to the layman you're meeting with someone whose child has been abducted. That's a fairly common
thing for a homicide detective. You're meeting with the family of the victim. So they were very emotional. I remember that, and there was a lot of tears during the first meet, and I think they were concerned that Hands was leaving. They had got accustomed to Hands dealing with them. So Hands and I thought it's important that we show them that there's continuity in Hands. Vouches for me and I vouch for Hands, and we take it from there.
And so you sat down for a cup of tea.
I'm not sure if we got to a cup of tea situation, but I remember sitting sitting in their home. They are firing more questions at Hands because Hands had the answers, and I just got a sense of who they were and they got a sense of what I was about, and so that's how that's when I first met them.
Yeah, I understand that there were members of the Strike Force who were keen for there to be another look at the Foster family. So what did you do then?
It just putting it in time frame, so we're talking twenty fifteen, this is probably mid twenty sixteen. Always something to do, like we always had suspects, too many suspects, so we're prioritizing that. But we would have regular briefings as a team. And when I talk, I'm talking a strikeforce. So a strikeforce. Yeah, it's a combination of things. I'm listening to other people's opinions. We'd have a weekly briefing in difficult times, it might be daily briefings. It might
be briefing in the morning, briefing in the afternoon. One of the briefings, a detective that I respect mentioned that there was a couple of things that had been troubling her about the foster parents, and bearing in mind we hadn't solved it, so we're open minded to everything. She outlined what the concerns were. I respected her. I'd work with her, I think, very early in her career, and so I listened to what she proposed. And so I'm not sure if it was just her or other members.
It was a sort of people were coming in and going out of the strikeforce all the time. But I decided, Okay, we're going to target them. It's not something I wanted to do. I admit I didn't want to do it. I saw them as the victim's family, the foster family, and the biological family, and it's never going to be pretty. But I took it upon myself to do the interview with the officer that identified areas that she believed needed
to be addressed. And this is when I talk this and I think I need to clarify that it's things that may need to be clarified. It's not necessarily evident. It's not like we saw you with blood on your hands. It's little things that a version of events. While you said this, what did you mean? They're that type of thing?
She prepared the interview plans and then we sat down and she brought me up to speed on it and the way I decided to do the do this, and I think it's important with the narrative that's going now. And this is not something I would normally talk about in an active investigation, but I think it needs to be said that I invited them into police headquarters as I would probably a couple of a couple of times
a year. They would come in and meet the strike force, because that's another thing I do, the keep people motivated, let them meet the victim's family so they understand what we're working towards, especially on the difficult homicides. That's very important, and I would have briefings where the family would come in and there'd be members of the Strikeforce crime and the family. But after the family left, I had a highly motivated group of people that wanted to solve what
was going on. So on this particular day, I invited them to come and see me. There's something i'd need to speak to you about. And this is not verbatim, but that went along these lines. They came to police headquarters and they shook hands when we met, and I said, you're not going to like me today, and my demeanor changed, became very professional and I became very homicide detective ish. I suppose as the way of saying it. I said, you're not going to like me. I don't want your
talking to each other. We're going to Paramatta Police station. I'm going to interview you first, and then I'm going to interview you second. You're not going to get an opportunity to talk between the interviews, and at the end of the day we'll see where the cards lie. But I'm sure you're not going to like me with that. We take them over to Paramatta Police station.
So you ambushed them.
It was I think the ambush is a fair way of describing it, and yeah, it's smart policing. Also, there's nothing wrong there. You don't put you don't give suspects questions on notice, you drop it on them. So they would have had no idea that's how their day was going to play out. But they came over to the police station. I interviewed I think the foster mother first. I can't be sure, but it doesn't really matter. With the detective that had area that want them to be concerned.
We did an electronic interview with them, sit down Q and as answer the questions, finish with the first parent, and then without letting the other one see or speak to the person, we bought the other one in and did the second second interview straight away. After that, we stayed with the We stayed with them both so they
had no opportunity to talk. And then I don't want to go into a lot of details, but we had a COVET operation in place, and so we'll be able to monitor conversations after their first available opportunity.
So what they said to each other when they got back together.
What they said to each other in what they considered a safe environment, and it was as to be expected, they said disparaging things about me and part and parcel. A lot of people might say they're right, that only went on for a short time and then they talked about just doing their job and that hopefully they'll find it.
Based on the information that their answers to the questions that were on the interview and the way they responded in the Covit investigation, I formed the opinion and when I say, I am talking for the strike Force, although the butt stops with me, but based on the information, everyone was comfortable with the fact that they've been eliminated. It was important time too, because it was in the lead up to the million dollar reward.
So you came up with the strategy or the strike force came up with a strategy to announce a million dollar award, which at the time in New South Wales was very unusual.
It was the first first reward and it was approved at ministerial level, and that was on the back of a phone call that I received from a minister and said what would you like and said a million dollar reward. We might be able to use that strategically.
Because it not just might motivate someone, but it might also get people talking.
Get people talking, and it tell a lot too if there's at that particular point in time, I think there was a focus on the pedophile ring, A me and dollar reward would separate that. If there's a group of people that might potentially be involved in it, A me and dollar reward is a life changing type of situation. There was a strategy, a very clear strategy that I spent a lot of time with doctor Sarahuel, who was a senior forensic psychologist with the New South Wales Police.
She was a leader in a field in the country. She was pretty well embedded in the investigation that I relied on her heavily because it was a difficult investigation because to solve this investigation without any physical evidence, which we didn't have, you needed either a confession or you needed forensic evidence link physical evidence linking a person to the crime, or eyewitness accounts of which we didn't have any.
So the me and dollar reward was a strategy. We announced that I think it was on the second anniversary to give it the power that needed. And this was all in consult consultation with Sarah. There was very key messages I was putting out that with a million dollar reward, the person you might be watching at home. We're interested in someone that reacts strange when it comes on, gets nervous when it comes on, or turns the TV off, that type of thing. If someone's reacting strange when this
type of announcement is made. We also had the Premier mister bed there and Andrew Scipioni, the then commissioner there that supported.
It at the press court as a press conference.
Yeah, so it was a big deal and this was something that we were really going to go hard on and see what came from this announcement of the million dollar reward. And as I said, the first first in the state, the very clear message would put out that and normally the rewards and I think when this was announced last week that was slightly wrong. They were saying me and dollar reward for the conviction of William Tyrell for the conviction of person responsible for the deduction and
murder of William Tyrell. That's not the case. It was me and dollar reward for anyone that provided information to find out what happened to So even in the wording of the reward, it was very specific the way that we did it. So then we're we received the type of information you expect at.
That press conference as well. You said something about your feeling, your thoughts about the foster and biology will, didn't.
You part of the reason I wanted to do make sure that satisfy myself with that operation. I told of where we interviewed them and had the COVID operation was. I knew at the press conference I would be asked
have the families been eliminated? The foster family and the biological family, And I had to make sure that I was comfortable and everyone else that was supporting the press conference were comfortable that we could say, yes, the family have been eliminated, both biological and foster family eliminated.
Whenever a child disappears, I think it's not surprising that most outsider's response is to immediately suspect the people closest to that child. I've done it myself. You know, you see a family on TV and you think, have you done it? And I know that in any high profile Murtter investigation, rumors are swirling. You know, we go back to Lindy Chamberlain, to Joanne Lee's. As recently as last month, a little girl disappeared in w A Cleo Smith and
that had a very different result. What is that about, and how is that playing into the situation that we're seeing right here in South Wales.
Now, okay, we'll make the observation because it's fairly recent in all our minds Cleo smith disappearance. When you first saw the family doing the press conference. I think, if we're all honest with ourselves, we all formed an opinion and we don't even have to break down the opinion.
I think we all know what I'm talking about. When we were watching that press conference play out and watching the way people were reacting, that wasn't the way that we thought they should be reacting, and we came to a conclusion. We all became arm chaired detectives. I was an arm chaired detective and we're all thinking maybe that, but take away the armchair. The real professional detectives understand that means nothing. That's that rumor, that's white noise. That's
the things that gets you distracted. And with the Cleo Smith thing, I think we're all honest with ourselves. The majority of us were wrong with the assumptions that we made. I think with children, it is likely that you start at ground zero. Of course, you start at ground zero. I mean you'd have to be a numb school not to look at where did the child disappear from. They're
rare in the types of time it happens. And I think even the way that the police responded with the Cleo Smith one and Q doos to good police work. It looked like they hit the ground running, not just for the search for the child lost, but from an investigative point of view, and I think that was pretty impressive.
But yeah, with children, I think there is a natural assumption we don't want to find the bad the monster under the Yeah I was going to say boogie man, but yeah, monster on the bed's probably a better term.
So you know, as parents, we don't want it to be a reality that someone might snatch a child, that a stranger might snatch a child. So it's potentially more reassuring or less frightening to think, oh, it's got to be the parents, or it's got to be the cousin, or it's got to be someone who's in the household.
I agree to a certain extent, but there is also I saw this with the William Tyrell matter. There was a narrative everyone wanted the pedophile. Yeah, when you've been around as long as I do. You know how pedophiles look, and they don't always stand because they prey on people feeling comfortable in their environment. But people wanted this pedophile monster with horns coming out of their head to be the offender, and that's not always the case. So I
agree with what you're saying. Yes, it's easier to process if it's someone that's known to the child.
Part of the way that the William Tyrole case unfolded is that William disappeared, his mother called Tripolo and then immediately it was a search for a lost kid and so the site was absolutely inundated with well meaning people looking for him as it lost in the bush. So the pony club, the sees, everyone from the street was out trampling all over the site, so any evidence that might have been there was gone. Yeah, And in the Cleosmith case, we saw that police came in very quickly.
It was immediately a homicide. It was a potential abduction case that they were looking at, and so you know, they were DNA testing rubbish from all the rubbish bins and they were going through everything very forensically from the very beginning, and no doubt that helped them in that matter in relation to William Tyrrel. How did that And you've touched on this a little bit before, What does
that mean in terms of finding a suspect. So you don't have any DNA, you don't have any footprints, you don't have fingerprints, there's no blood.
What are you looking for? Yeah, well that's what makes this type of investigation difficult. You're looking for confessional material so you get someone to confess. You're looking for forensic evidence that will link that person to the offense, or witness testimony, all of which were not available with the
William Tyrell one. So what you've got to do, And this is why on this particular matter, I thought it was necessary to have doctor Sarah Yule heavily involved in the investigation from the outset, and I know hands was relying on her before I became involved to help look at the suspects. Now, with the William Tyrell matter, people talk about the publicly identified suspects, and there's been a few of them, and some have been right in everyone's face.
But there's a lot of other suspects that we're targeting, and a lot of other suspects that were working on that. No one knows about, and it was a process of elimination. When I'm doing a homicide investigation, I was taught this by people before me. I had some very good people training in the art of a homicide investigator. Motive, opportunity, and capability, now that was what I think. I put
that in the investigation plan. When I've created the investigation plan, we look at motive, we look at the opportunity, we look at capability. Let's move motive aside, but opportunity, you've got to have someone there. And that's where the William Tyrrell matter is fairly unique because at the end of Bend and Ruin Drive, it's a dead end street. You're not going to drive there and get lost. It's almost you get a sense that it's going to come to a dead end. So you've got to put someone there
in ben and Ruin Drive capability. This is a difficult one too, because who's capable of abducting a three year old three year old child? Clearly, an evil pedophile type might be. But Sarah, you'll caution me that the person that's done this mightn't even know why they've done that. I've done this, so that sort of opens it up as well. Then the motive. What is the motive? Well, people I think can only kid It must be a pedophile,
that's the motive. But you also have the childless couples or that might try to take a child, So we look at those things. Obviously, opportunity is the easiest to rule out. If someone's in prison when we're looking at them at the time of William's abduction, they're gone, They're off the list. The other thing that we did with this investigation, and this is where when there's criticism of
the investigation, I invite people to scrutinize it. As a minister said, let there'd be an inquiry because I was presented with a situation. We're inundated with evidence and we had to prioritize how we work our way through through the suspects. I think there was over a thousand sightings of William Terial we were dealing with that we had at one stage, and I'm talking when I say that's the time period that I was responsible for the investigation.
That for year period, six hundred suspects, six hundred persons of interest. Now people go, Jesus, you must have no idea what's going on? But we would prioritize those persons of interest. We'd high priority, low priority, medium priority, and we'd categorize them and that way we could work through it. So we'd eliminate a suspect depending on the resources what we did. And some and these are suspects that you
don't even know about. They're very complex operations. We've got to test the water, push a little bit, find out how that person reacts, and cover that and then come to a conclusion where that person can go off the suspect list or not. So that's how we dealt with it.
State Crime they saw that we just did not have the resources to manage what we were doing at the time, so they created an additional strike force with other police coming in and we created packages for the suspects and those packages had everything that the people, the full time people worked on and we'd hand those packages out to other teams and detectives and that have all the information contained in the folder, and then they would follow that up and then they'd have to report back. So that
was a way that we addressed with the numbers. So there was some you know, I think, and I don't take credit for it, because it was a team effort, but there were some very innovative ways that we dealt with the sheer volume of information that came in about William Tyrrell. And I think I personally think and this is this is other people might have different views and it's only that police just didn't realize what we're sitting
on with William Tyrell. Like people the William Tyrell or William Tyrel, someone would sneeze and it's on the front page as we see now. Why. I think partly because of the iconic fate of William and people could relate to it. I also think the fact that William disappeared from his grandparents or grandmother's home, which everyone you take your child to grandparents' home, everyone feels safe for whatever reason, that captured the imagination of the public, the media, and
that added to the pressure of running the investigation. But certainly not out of our depth running the investigation, but there just needed to be an appreciation of what this investigation was about. I mentioned earlier that the only disagreements, and that's probably putting too strong a word on it, was when we're talking about whether the investigation should be shut down or referred to unsolved homicide. You know, benefits a great thing, or hindsight's a great thing. I should say.
I'm sitting here now, three years after I've left, and I know this, they're still running very heavily on the investigation. So I think I was probably right when I was saying the investigation shouldn't have been downsized all those years ago.
Was there significant pressure to send it to unsolved tom site?
There was pressure, But I also want to say that policing is a robust business. There's always competing interests. So I'm not saying I'll argue my point and that might be overruled, and I'll accept that because sometimes you've got to move on. So I don't want to be critical in terms of the way resources are managed because people are sitting above me deciding, well, we've got to prioritize that I operate at my level, and my level was on my retirement was out of chief inspector, so I'm
a commissioned officer. So you're in that management level. So you can allocate your resources that you've given the way you want to allocate those resources, but people above me allocate the resources to me. So yeah, there's a chain of command and That's where I bring back to and the comments that it was in the shambles. Well, I'll accept responsibility for what I've done on the investigation, but my expectation these people above me also accept responsibility. They're
going to call that the shambles. And what I find quite ironic is that it were so heavily reported on and there was no criticism whatsoever in the way that I was running the investigation, and the commanders were well in their right to take me off the investigation if they thought I was out of my depth running the investigation.
What is this case all about? Who is this case about?
The case should always be about William Tyrrell and that is the real tragedy of what's taken place in that And I think that was the foster mother's concern, or the foster family, and I'm sure and the biological family that the only priority should be that of finding Whim, finding out what happened to Wim. And I think an organization like the New South Wales Police should be judged on how we respond to a job like this.
If the person who's currently a person of interest, the foster mother, is ultimately charged and convicted, what would your responsibit of that.
My priority response is I want to find out what's happened to wim wherever the cards fall, and that's the lot of a homicide detective. So if, and I say if, because I saying at the time that I left the investigation there was no evidence, I don't know what's taken past there, well and good. I'm all for bringing to justice people that have committed crimes, especially serious crimes such as this, So I have no qualms with that. And yeah, I'm think now that the door's been open and I've
I've been sitting on this for ages. Yeah, like I don't want to talk about it because and it's an open investigation or it's a current investigation, so it's not good form to talk about the investigation. But I think people think I go down one path and then won't change my view if you've got to base your opinions on evidence. And I can't stress this enough, and I wish we could all when I say, well, because I'm a member of the public, now take a step back,
take a breath. With everything that's coming out in the news at the moment, like the Leads story was William Tyrell all week every time turned on the TV or listen to the radio, or open the paper. It was William Tyrell. William Tyrell. Everyone needs to take a step back and let's see how it plays out. William Yrell, for whatever reason, has played out very publicly, so many many times, and I think we'd all be best served in just taking a deep breath, take a step back
and see what's happened. Very easy to paint someone in a light without knowing the full details, and so from my point of view as a former homicide detective now member of the public, but with the experience of a homicide detective, let's just see what happens before people come to conclusions.
If that doesn't happen, if the person of interest is not charged, not convicted, and this does end up going to unsolved homicide, what are the events of this week mean? What's happened this week?
This week? This week, My observation has been someone has been publicly hung out, and there's no other way of describing it. There's strategies we're in policing. I'm not talking stuff that people don't know, but pressure is applied. That's obvious. From the time I was locking people up for breaking enters or shoplifting your apply pressure. The way it's played out now, I hope the people are orchestrating this know what they're doing because it's playing high stakes and playing hardball,
playing high stakes, but with high stakes there's consequences. And yeah, if let's just say hypothetical, nothing comes of it, no one's charged. Well, yeah, look at how many lives have been impacted upon. And that's what worries me about this. And people think I wouldn't want it solved because I've said that publicly. You know they're being eliminated or whatever. I want to see this solved as much as anyone.
And I think that's I really want to get that, get that point across, because I don't know what's been said about me, But the fact that the commissioner comes out and says the things he did, he doesn't know me and has no understanding of who I am to make those comments.
It's I think the the implication is jubilant got too close and a cloud at his man.
I'd lock up my mother if I thought she had murdered someone. So I laugh at that because that's what it needs. It needs to be laughed at. And I just find it. And when I say I find the defensive, I know you're just free laying it. So I'm not angry at you, but I'm so angry at people that suggest that because what I'm prepared to cover up a murder. I've got close to every victims family throughout my whole career,
and I make no bones about it. And I'm going to make a strong point here because I'm sick of hearing this narrative that he gets too close to victims. Lazy people say that because managing victims is hard, but to manage a victim, give them a little bit of humanity is not a big ask when they've lost a loved one. And it's lazy police that say you get too close to victims. From a good to take this point of view, if I'm going after someone, I want to be as close as possible as well, So think
of it that way. You want to know what's going on with the victim, get close to someone that knows the victim well, and you'll get information that if you keep yourself at a distance distance you won't. So yeah, it's it's a narrative that plays out, and I think it's lazy people hide behind it, Oh, get too close, too passionate or whatever. You're talking about the murder of someone or a disappearance of a three year old child, and I think the other thing. And it's just made
me think about it now. What we're dealing with William's disappearance and the likelihood is it's unlikely that he's going to be found alive, but we don't know. And yeah, no one thought Cleo was going to be found alive and she was. We're working with that as well on the on the William tyrole matter, so we're dealing with that. So all those factors sort of have played in. And one thing I think it's very important I should say that I've taken offense to what was said by the commissioner.
There were so many hard working detectives on that strikeforce. That reflects on them as well. I'll take the Knox because I was the figurehead of it, but I know people that that would upset them greatly because I saw how hard people worked on that investigation when I was running it for four years. Not everyone. Some people didn't want to be on it, but the majority of the detectives gave it their all and it impacted on their lives. They spent a lot of time away from home. The
job wasn't based in Sydney. There was a lot of time away. And I saw, I don't think I've had an investigation where I've seen so many detectives crying and like, yeah, that's emotion that was attached to that investigation. So when these people are given their all and some of them have been broken by the investigation, it has broken people. And then the commissioner is saying, well, you know you're wasting time. That is just so offensive and that's what's
brought me out from behind the behind the covers. Basically, Like as I said, I sat for a day or to thinking what do I do? How do I respond? I don't want to pick a fight. I don't want to have an argument. I didn't pick a fight. The fight was picked with me and criticizing my professionalism and this is my response to it. And I say, the documents are there, the records are there. I'm a homicide detective. I keep documents. It's all there, retained by the New South Wales Police.
Gary. Thanks very much for joining us.
Thanks claim