This podcast contains information and details relating to suicide. We urge anyone struggling with their emotions to contact Lifeline on thirteen eleven fourteen thirteen eleven fourteen or visit them at lifeline dot org dot AU. A twenty four year old devoted mother of two fleeing a violent relationship. As bags pack car running, her daughters strapped into the backseat.
Mom told me that she needed to go back inside to grab something.
Panic.
Amy is dead, Sir aim his dead?
Eight confusion about five minutes, say sit not to suicide.
One hundred percent.
This is emergency.
What do you think is really the honest truth about Amy?
The Truth About Amy?
Episode one O.
Amy Wensley and her daughters, six year old Maya and Tay who's almost four, lived in Serpentine, Western Australia. It's a small town about fifty five kilometers southeast of Perth. They were in a small fibro house with Amy's partner, David Simmons, situated on acreage owned by his father Robert. In the late afternoon of Thursday, June twenty six, Amy's girls were seated in the back of a running car
on that rural property where they lived. Their bags were packed with clothes and toys, waiting for their mum to return. After she'd headed back inside the house for a few of her own belongings, including makeup and her passport. Tay starts singing Twinkle Twinkle, Little Star, Naya Watchers Simmons go back into the house. Neither girls will ever see their mum again.
Who picked up from school?
My mother?
And what did she do when she used to pick you up? When she saw you?
She would.
Hug me and I would run up to her. My arms would be wide open so I could cuddle her, and her arms would be wide open so she could cuddle me.
All right, So I'm just wondering if there's anything specially you want to tell me about your mum.
Yes, what she promised, and she said she'll never break a promise, that she'd take us to the movies like she never did when just before she passed away.
What was Mum's favorite color?
Pink?
My favorite color too? Was mum up in heaven?
This is Tay a couple of years after Amy's death.
Yes, I loved her more than anybody.
Tay didn't grow up with either parent, having been estranged from her father, David Simmons, for most of her life. As the years were by, she gets upset at how the memories of her mum fade. It's now been ten years since Amy died. The twenty four year old's crumpled body found slumped in a tiny corner of the bedroom she shared with Simmons, her skull shattered after the firing of a double barrel shotgun at close range. Strangely, the
doorknob is missing on the inside. I'm Allison Sandy. Some of you will know me from other podcasts such as The Lady Vanishes and Shot in the Dark, which is how I came to learn about the story of Amy Wensley. For those of you who have heard that one, you'll notice some striking similarities between Gwen Grover and Amy. Both were of low socioeconomic working class backgrounds and victims of domestic violence. Those tasked to investigate their deaths made quick
judgments of suicide and failed to follow proper procedure. But probably worst of all, the agencies they work for seem more interested in supporting and justifying bad behavior than owning up and learning from their failures. By this, I mean they cherry picked evidence supporting their original decision and ignored that which didn't. This alone is incredible to me because the purpose of police is to protect and serve, uphold
the law, and administer it fairly. I knew to tell this story I needed someone on the ground in wa A seasoned, no nonsense, tough talking investigative journalist, an expert in interviews who only ask the hard questions, but isn't afraid to push for answers, the truthful answers. Someone who has a lot of experience, isn't daunted by obstacles, and doesn't care if he ruffles some feathers, particularly of people
in power. Many of you who know Liam Bartlett will know he embodies all of these well qualities.
Yes, thanks, Al, I think it's true. I've been in this journalism game for a long time now, coming up to almost four decades. Let's call it thirty odd years for the sake of not sounding too much like a dinosaur.
But in all that time, and really, one of the reasons I chose to be a journalist in the first place is that I am a believer in holding people to account when they've done the wrong thing to other people, whether it be politicians, or police, or shire counselors or health workers, or bosses or bureaucrats or con menal criminals.
I think justice is always a concept worth fighting for, and to find justice, real justice, you must get to the truth without the truth, Separating fact from fiction obviously is impossible. And even though journalism has changed in many ways over those thirty odd years, one thing that remains constant to me is that the truth still matters, and that's why we want to find the truth about Amy. It's crucial for her family and loved ones left behind.
They deserve the truth. That's the least they deserve, and it's crucial for justicerely come across a case like this where authorities have been so determined to stick to their narrative, to stick to their version of the story, despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary. Even a decade ago, it was widely known, if not reported, that domestic violence was the
scourge of our nation. And while this issue is finally starting to garner political attention as the media reporting ramps up, our research has revealed that in just one family protection unit in Wa alone, an average of one hundred referrals come in each and every week. That's in one family Protection unit. Now there are seventeen of those units seventeen districts in WA, and statistics show that only about ten percent of domestic violence cases are actually reported. Amy's was
one of those unreported until after she died. After Family Protection Unit workers interviewed Amy's mother, Nancy, the alarm was raised to detectives on her case that further investigation was required. David Simmons was arrested twice, having denied any involvement in her death. He was let go both times and never charged.
Throughout the course of this podcast, we will reveal the pattern of behavior of the key people involved, will interview witnesses, dissect known evidence, present new evidence, and provide an in depth analysis of the inquest. We will then provide details on how this case can and hopefully move forward and justice finally be found for Amy.
While researching Shop in the Dark, I learned the rate of gun use by women taking their own lives between nineteen oh seven and twenty twenty two was at most zero points six percent per one hundred thousand of population at any given time, according to the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare. Some may argue the reason it's so low is because women typically don't have access to firearms.
Others say it's simply a vanity issue. For people who knew Amy, and even those of us who were drawing on everything available to us to try to get to know her, It's clear Amy cares about her appearance. Amy was a pretty girl who loved dressing up and taking a selfie. There were hundreds of these stored on her pink iPhone, which authorities is found hidden in one of the boots she was wearing at the time of her death.
Similarly with her daughters, so many photos of her pulling faces with them, wearing detox masks, and just goofing about.
Her.
Friends describe Amy as a girly girl, always well groomed, often made up. She was also petite and quite thin, just one hundred and sixty five centimeters tall and fifty kilos. On the night she died, it takes less than an hour for police detectives to decide she somehow propped up a double barrel shotgun on a bed while crunched into a tiny space behind the bedroom door, and shot herself through the temple. To do this, evidence shows the gun would have had to have been horizontal and hurled and
triggered with her left hand. By eight point thirty pm, forensics was called off and Amy's death deemed non suspicious. Amy died just over three hours prior. Her case was destined to become yet another unexplained sudden death, to fly under the radar until the intervention.
Just one moment, because already I feel like this thing into two of this woman. It's ten years of of all the cost of emotion, and it's encompassed so much of my life. It has come my life, and Amy is the first thing that in my life all the time, every day she's been there, and everything is about her and anything to do with her. I drop everything immediately for her. For this ten years of my life I'd been spent trying to prove Amy's innocence because she's not
here to do that for herself. And when she has members of a police force pointing the finger at her and blaming her for her own death and she's not here to prove them wrong and to prove that she didn't do this, it's a really tough fight. So ten years of my life has been trying to do that for Amy and to get her justice. So that her girls can live in peace, so that her mother can have some sort of a peace. You know, she's my sister.
Nancy is not the same person. She's so so different, and she hasn't been the same since that night, you know, ten years on. Just recently, Amy's eldest daughter turned sixteen years old and got an ell. And I know that, you know, the children are going to grow up and everything, But when I hear that, when I hear that she's just got Earl's and she's just turned sixteen, It's like, it's like it shakes me out of where I am,
to remind me I'm no longer in twenty fourteen. I'm still stuck in twenty fourteen, still stuck there, trying to prove Amy is innocent and did not do this. While the world still moves on. Her children are growing and everything's changing that my life hasn't, and everything that I've done for her hasn't changed. I'm still there and I'm still fighting.
Anna Davy is Amy's auntie. But why are you? Why has it fallen to you to be the family champion? Sorry, you're right, because it is a big burden, isn't it.
It is a heavy burden. It's a really heavy one to carry. But I've got the shoulders for it. Liam, I've got the shoulders for it. As Amy's mother, Nancy is a very devastated person, and she is a very broken person. She's not capable of doing this. It is too much for her to try and fight a system that is just trying to sweep this under the carpet and not do anything. So how could I expect her to do any of this when just talking about Amy. She couldn't do that. For months and months after Amy died,
it was too painful. I had to do it. I had to. It's not a matter of really of falling on me. It was me wanting to do it. It had to be me. I wanted to.
But month after month, year after year, ten years of it.
I'm not a quitter. My love for Amy runs deep and I'm not quitting. This is not over. You know, somebody knows the truth, and I'm not quitting.
When did you first realize that this story of suicide just does not add up?
The moment Nancy told me The moment she told me over the phone that police went to her house and said that Amy took a life right then. As soon as she told me that, I didn't believe it because I was so confused. And my question to her was did they find a suicide note? Because it happened in less than twenty four hours, the suicide finding, so for it to happen so quickly, they must have found a suicide note evidence pointing towards that. And she told me
she didn't know. That's where it all began for me, the moment they said suicide and in less than twenty four hours, How could anyone believe it?
What obvious sign did they see that they could have come to that conclusion so quickly?
When I started asking those questions, they weren't giving me answers. They don't want to share anything with you and whatever. Eventually, after some time, you get told things and you think, well, that doesn't really convince me. You haven't provided me evidence to show that. You're just giving me words. And what you think, Well, you know she was on antidepressants, so there are a lot of people on antidepressants. They don't go and kill themselves. What does that prove? It proves nothing.
Was it also about your perceptions of the sort of person?
Amy was, oh, yes, yes, I knew Amy as a mother, as a young mother, and those children were so important to her that I knew straight away she would not do this. I know she would not do this. It is not her. She's a fantastic mother. Everything was about her children. Everything. It was about their education, it was about their safety. She used to follow the school bus
when her eldest daughter started school. She'd put her on the bus and then she'd drive behind the bus and in fact, lamb in her mobile phone, the bus driver's phone numbers in there. Why is that?
You know what I mean?
Like, she wanted to make sure her daughter was okay.
That's detail.
It is detail, and it is making sure that your child is safe. She also sought advice from a friend who worked in childhood education about her youngest daughter, who she thought was probably not progressing where she should be. So she went and discuss that. So everything was about them.
I want you to think very carefully about this. Was she the sort of num in any world that you can imagine, who would leave her two little girls in the car with the engine running and then go back inside the house and shoot herself dead.
Absolutely not. There is no way she would have done that. Now, Let's pretend for a moment that she did this, but she didn't. Let's pretend the mother I know Amy to be, she would have put those children in the car. She would have driven to her mother's house, and she would have dropped those children off and possibly said mom will be back soon, love you bye, gone back to the house and killed herself if that's what she was going
to do. Because she knew her eldest daughter could unclip the seat belt from her child's seat, she wouldn't want her daughter to run in and find her like that, do you know what I mean?
And she wouldn't.
She just wouldn't. She would not want her children to find her like that.
That's the part I don't understand in all this, because everything points to planning on her behalf. Her mom phones her, she plans to come to her mom's place. Your sister, yep, she plans for the kids, because she packs their bags, she puts the kids in the car. Everything is planned. She tells one of the girls they're going to watch a movie that night, so in the immediate horizon, her
world is planned. And then somehow we're to accept that she simply goes back into the bedroom and shoots herself with a double barrel shotgun.
Yeah, it's utterly ridiculous. What she was doing with everything that you just said is called escaping. That's what it is. She is escaping a situation. I believe she's getting her children away from a violent situation. She has just been physically assaulted, verbally abused, and she is getting away and she's taking her children with her.
According to people closest to Amy, the relationship between Amy and her partner David, was almost always volatile.
Sami was a single mom, and I think she was working part time at a tavern or a pub, and she met one of the regulars that go there, and I guess, you know, he flooded her. Perhaps he was probably really nice to her, and she started dating him. And it wasn't long after that that she felt pregnant with her second child, and she had a child for him, and they moved in together, and I just things progress from there, you know, after a while. I guess I like to call it a mask. You know, it's like
a prince charming mask. They come in the long full of compliments and flattery and flowers and all that sort of things, and then they get into a relationship, and I believe the mask starts to fall off, and I think Aily saw that, and I think that things that started to become violent. He became controlling of any jealous,
accusing her of being unfaithful. You know, I only know these things because it all came to light after she died, because it's not something that you're going to tell your family, you know. Whether whether a person is ashamed or embarrassed, or they don't want to put friends or family in danger, I don't know, but I think things became quite violent and quite ugly not long after she or maybe before
she had the child to him. And on the twenty sixth of June twenty fourteen, she had a daughter up from school and was turning home and a fight had occurred between her and her partner.
Nancy rings her daughter Amy at about five pm to find her hysterical. This is a reenactment of that call.
I fucking hate him.
He'd better not have hit you. Did he fucking hit you?
We use voice actors to reenact key moments throughout the entirety of this podcast.
He grabbed me by the throat and he threw me to the ground.
What pack your shit? Pack some of the girl's stuff and come here. I don't care if you stay here a week, a month, a year, I don't care. Get here now. In fact, I'll come up and I'll get you. No, mom, hey, mom, oh, I will I'll see you soon. I will come.
When she hangs up, Amy has less than fifteen minutes left to live.
Amy was shot in the head with a double girl shot and then and then the person who was on the proper of her partner and his friends, the baby's two children in the car, drove to the roadhouse to make a triple zero call ambulance.
What's theaters the emergency two.
Seven A three Southwestern Highway serventine.
Okay, tell me exactly what happened. Somebody shot themselves in the head. Okay, are you with that person at the moment? No, I'm not. I had to drive down the service station because my phone's broken. I have two kids, and my wife has shot itself. Okay, how old is she? How old is she?
Twenty three?
Okay? I just she's dead, all right, So she's not conscious or breathing. Yes, I've got kids in the car. I'm going to have to take him to Okay, yeah, all right, and I have a mate standing on the highway. Okay, can you please just come and take her or do something. Yes, we're going to get that organized. So that was R. J. Simmons, R and B. Simmons, R and B. Simmons. Okay, what was your name, sir, David Simmons. David Simmons. W What did you fucking do that? Okay, I'm going to get
that organized for you straight away. All right, thank you very much, all right, all right, see bye.
According to ambulance records, this call happened at five eighteen pm. They proceeded to immediately alert police. Simmons, who was with his best mate Gareth Price at the time, says he also calls his father, Robert, but his dad doesn't answer. Robert, who is at home in a much bigger house nearby on the same property, does, however, receive a call at five twenty three pm from the Saint John ambulance operator who advises they just received a call for that address
from David Simmons requesting an ambulance. Robert says he doesn't have a clue what's happened, but there are two houses on the property and he will head to the other one to find out, so he drives down to the house where Amy and her daughters are living with his son. He smells gunpowder, spies the shotgun from outside the room, pushes the door open, and walks straight into the bedroom. He cracks the four to ten boito open and proceeds to unload a spent and live cartridge, placing both of
them on the bedside table. He closes the gun and puts it back on the floor. When Robert Simmons turns around, he sees blood spatter on the wall behind the door and takes a look. He says it was a gray or khaki jacket over the head and upper body, so he pulls it off and it's Amy. He immediately calls wa police. He is an excerpt of what was said. The time is five twenty eight pm.
I live in Serpentine two seven eighty three. Saint John's ambulance just rang me and there'd been a call mate from here. I've come down the hill to where my son and partner lives and she's dead. Someone shot her. I think it must have been my son.
He's not here.
My son made the mistake, but she's been shot in the head and she's dead.
Okay, see your daughter and Laura's dead? Is that right?
I think so, yes, pretty much. I didn't see her behind the door. I didn't see until I just walked in. She's behind the She's behind the door, and I just saw the feed and they had a jacket over her head and I just took the jacket off. I can't believe this has happened. I don't know where my son is. The ambulance people wrung me and they said you'd better ring him. So I just I didn't know what was
happening because they lived down the bottom hill. So I just drove down there fast, and I just walked straight inside and I had to look around. And I walked in his room and there was a gun laying on the floor and I could smell the powder. I picked up the gun and pulled the There was one light bullet, one dead bullet, and I pulled them out, and then I want.
To get.
It's worth noting at this point that there are many discrepancies in the evidence provided by David Simmons, Gareth Price, and Robert Simmons in relation to the night Amy died. One of those is what was over Amy's head Price says a red or my own towel, but it's a blue towel police found on her, contradicting Robert Simmons claim it was a gray or khky jacket. There doesn't appear to be any reference to such a jacket existing again, or any attempt to clarify the discrepancies, but Robert Simmons
always maintains it was a jacket, not a towel. So after Amy was shot and David drives to the roadhouse to make the triple zero call, he drove back.
He dropped his friend Gareth's Price off at the bottom gate so that he could wave down the ambulance because it's a long stretch of road with no streetlights. He drove and dropped Amy's children off at Amy's mother's place and told her that Amy had taken her own life. Nancy immediately hopped in her car and drove to the Prophecy and he followed. When she got there, police were there, and they stopped her at the gate, and she aw
she wanted was a daughter, Where's my baby? And I told him that she was gone, And then Nancy started yelling and saying that it was his fault that he did this, and you know, not one detective spoke to Nancy on that night. So there's the mother of a victims yelling and saying that he's done this, that he's stile for them, and they don't even speak to us.
There's a dispute between the uniformed officers and detectives.
There were three uniform police officers, and those police officers were very concerned by what they were in fronted with and they found it highly suspicious. They are the ones that falled in the detective and they also called in forensics. And when the two detectives turned up at the scene, my understanding after speaking to one of those uniform police officers was that they weren't even going to go into
the room. They were happy enough to look at the photographs that the uniform police officers had taken and they were just going to look at those photos and not go into the room. And the uniform police officers said, no, you have to go in there and have a look. So they did, and they were in there for about fifteen minutes and they came out and the detective said
the naming had killed herself that he could discussion. It took place because they didn't agree with what the detectives were saying, but they felt they were renked by the detective and had to do what they were told. So forensics was called off, the secured area was called off, and the business card for a trauma cleaning company was given to David's father. No one spoke to anyone in my family. Nobody called Nancy and his mother to ask
any questions. Nobody did anything. So these two detectives just took it upon themselves to decide that Amy did this and not speak to the two people present. They did not even speak to David or his friend Gareth Price and speaks to them. Just sat in a car and read two statements. That's all it was. Wasn't even a form interview, just two statements taken by uniform police officers on the night.
During this time, Simmons tries to access Amy's phone.
I do know that he tried to go back up into the house and the uniform police officers stopped him, and he said he wanted to get his phone, and they asked what his phone looked like, and he said it was a pink phone. And they both found that really suspicious that someone like him would have a pink phone. Let me tell you who had a pink phone. Amy had a pink phone, and that pink phone would sound shoved inside her boot like she's hiding it. Why did he want that phone so badly to light at the
police and say it was he? Why did Amy have it hidden in her foot? So in twenty fourteen, Amy had a brand new iPhone and on the night she died, after those detective declared that this did not need to be a secure scene. No one was being arrested, no one was being interviewed. Amy's family were not going to be spoken to. Nothing was going to happen. Police turned up at Nancy's house that night. The uniform police her hand over Amy's belongings, and part of that was Amy's phone.
They gave Amy's mother her phone, the bloody jewelry that was on Amy a necklace, and she had some rings. It was in a bag. It had Amy's blood and god knows what else on it, and it was handed to Nancy. The following day, Major Crime became involved, and when they found out Amy's mother had that phone, they said it should never have been given to us, and they wanted it back. So Major Crime detectives came around
to get Amy's stone and they asked Amie's children. They the same mum put in the pin number and they remember the pin number well. They tried too many times and the phone looked so we couldn't get into it. So the phone became useless. So after the major crime investigation, which took two weeks, and they came to that same conclusion that Amy took her life, they gave the phone base.
It isn't until cold case becomes involved much later that they finally get into Amy's phone and discover the selfie. The photo, taken less than an hour before her death, showed Amy reflected in the mirror, sitting on the end of the bed, holding her pink mobile phone with her left hand and a double barreled shotgun with her right.
It's the same gun used to kill her. She's wearing black clothes, Her hair is pulled tightly up off her face, which is virtually unreadable in that it's hard to say whether she's scared, sad, or defiant, but one thing is clear, she looks anxious. The gun is not pointed toward Amy, but rather upwards. In court, wa police use the selfie to support their case for suicide, but Anna says, in her mind, Amy is preparing to defend herself, not to end her life.
She was in a recess behind the door, so her back was leaning against a wardrobe, the side of a wardrobe, and to her left was the wall. In front of her was a wall, and just slightly to the right was the door to the bedroom. So she was found seated in this corner of the room behind the door. I think her legs were slightly bent because the area would have been too small for her to be able
to with her legs stretched straight out. So she's sitting there with her knees slightly bent, and she's sitting on her right hand. Now, Amy is right handed, and she was shot on the right side of her head with her right hand under her, which means that she would have only had her left hand to hold up a double barrel shotgun to shoot herself on the right side of the head.
Complicating matters are the injuries sustained by Amy following a car accident a year.
Prior where she fractured two vertebrates when David Simmons was driving and she had halo drilled into her head for about three months and she was still having trouble moving to her neck, and David said at the inquest when he gave evidence, he said something along the lines of right up until the day she died, she still had trouble moving her neck without turning the top part of the body, in other words, her shoulders to turn. So Amy seated behind a door, apparently still suffering from this
neck injury and having trouble turning the head. She's right handed. She's sitting on her right hand, but she's going to use her left hand to hold up a double barrel shotgun straight along to the side of the head to tet her self. Now there was no blood spatter on her right hand.
Angry and frustrated, Anna finds herself obsessing over everything that's happened or hasn't happened.
Because the people who should be helping her, I feel as though they are not helping her. I think there are people who just want this to go away, and so the easiest way to make it go away is to continue the narrative that was placed on this the night she died, which was it was suicide done without a proper investigation, done without forensics, done without questioning or interviewing the two people who were present.
So from her home in Sydney, Anna writes to the West Australian Corruption and Crime.
Commission outlining all of my concerns, all the concerns that were just calling on deafis, and they actually sat up and listened. I sent that same letter to the Coroner's office because I wanted them to know. I also sent it to the envious and I think what happened was after sending it to the Coroner's office, I think kind of very concerned about the things that I had said in that letter, that they quested the Police Commissioner to conduct an investigation, and I think from memory that that's
how Cold Case may have become involved. Cold Case was the first thing to come along and say, look, we don't know, so instead of falling back to the good old easy way out blame the victim. They did not say suicide, but they said they couldn't determine whether it was suicide, homicide or accidental deaths. They couldn't determine. And as hard as what that was to take, I think looking back that it's better than them following what all the others had said, which is the easy way out it's a suicide.
An inquest is being held into the shooting of a devoted mother of two at her Serpentine home. Amy Wensley was just twenty four years old when she died from a gunshot wound to the head on a semi rural property in Serpentine in twenty fourteen. Detectives took just an hour to reach the conclusion of suicide, which her family has never accepted.
The coronial inquest into the death of Amy Wensley starts on the ninth of February twenty twenty one and lasts two weeks.
So I did have one detective comment, so I don't understand why they've given it so many days. You know, she's been like two or three days. And I said, well, maybe they need to hear about all the fuck ups that were made. You know, there wasn't so many. Maybe it wouldn't go for so long anyway. Thing what's happened, and it's one of the hardest thing I think I've
ever had to do, and it was just awful. My understanding was that an inquest is for a coroner to hear all the available information from everybody, from experts to witnesses from everybody, so that the coroner had all the information to come to a conclusion about how someone died and why someone died. But when we were there, we sat there and we listened to some of the evidence that we were given, I felt like that's not what the case was at all. It felt like there was
a character assassination taking place on Amy. It felt like some of the police officers who were there weren't there to help the coroner at all get to the truth. It was more like they were there trying to talk to coroner into a finding of a suicide. And I couldn't believe some of the things that were happening in that courtroom. And you know, as a family and as you know, Laura, abiding citizens, we have to sit there
and just suck it up and not say anything. We have to hold it together and sit there and listen to it. It's one of the hardest things that I think I've ever had to do, because there are so many times I would have loved to have jumped up and said what I wanted to say, but I didn't. I had to sit there and remain composed and just listen to some of the rubbish that was coming out of their mouths. Like I said before, I don't know Amy. I know Amy. Don't sit there and tell me that
she was depressed and all these other things. Yeah she was. She was depressed because she was in a relationship with a piece of shit who wouldn't be depressed. But to say that Amy took her life because she was depressed about the breakdown of a relationship, I don't think so. If a woman depressed about the breakup of her relationship, why would she pack her bags and leave. You're saying I'm not going anywhere. I love you, let's work this out.
That's not what Amy did. So the twisted in that coroner's courtroom and try and make out Amy was depressed about the breakdown of a relationship, so she shot herself on the right side of the head using a left hand like that. But I just am so grateful to the decent and honest people who were in that courtroom telling the truth. Thank you to the uniform police officers who had the guts to stand up there and tell
the truth about what they saw that night. So grateful for the experts as well, who gave an unbiased view that their job as experts is to look at everything, and they are experts in their field for a reason, and they gave their opinion it is highly unlikely she did it, and it is more consistent with her being shot by another person. Why had nobody listen to this? Ron Idles done, Australia's greatest homicide detective. He gave his
view as well, why is no one listening? You know, we have we have, you know, honest, good people standing up in that courtroom giving evidence, and then we have other people who just want to cover up with all the shit that happened on the night with two detectives who couldn't even do their job properly.
Simmons never turns up to the coroner's court, but he does testify.
On the last day the increase, he was due to give evidence and the court kept a journey and they somehow reached someone who said that David was on his way, and then we adjourned again and he actually didn't turn up, and I commented to one of the detectives that perhaps they need to go to some of the pubs that he likes to frequent and find him and bring him.
He never turned up on the last day. He didn't turn up, so Amy's legal teams saying issue would bench warrant, and the police representatives were against the Why why would you be against that? Do you know what I mean? Your job there is to present the coroner with available information, not to be one sided. This is supposed to be open and unbiased. But it didn't feel that way to me.
So the coroner said that a bench warrant had only ever been issued once in wa and I remember thinking to myself, well, how hard is it this person's not turning up the one person that everyone should be hearing from. He was there on the night. As it turns out, she gave it another day and he actually turned up. But he didn't turn up to the coroner's court. He turned up to a court somewhere else and appeared via a video link. And all I can say to that
is what a coward? What a coward? He knew there was media at court room, he knew Amy's family and Amy's friends were in that court room. What evidence did he give? I had to make out that Amy was physically abusive. Amy was tiny and he was way bigger than her. So what a joke? Tried to make out Amy was physically abusive, that Amy was the one that liked drugs. He said that because it was put to him the comments she made to her mother that he had grabbed her by the throat and slammed her to
the floor. Now that was really upsetting for Amy's mother to here, because we know about her injuries to her neck, and for him to do that, you're risking injury to her neck and making it worse, and she could have ended up in a bloody wheelchair. So that's what really upset Amy's mother when she heard that from Amy. So I guess, in course, maybe he's trying to make or
he did that. Amy lost the temper and was throwing things around and did bit And you know she's a violent one, and she had buttered me, and I strained her gently and put her to the floor. Amy was always is really skinny, even when she was pregnant. The only weight she put on was like a belly. It looked like she had a basketball shoved off a top or something. She was so skinny and she was tiny, and he is way bigger than her.
Simmons best mate, Gareth Price also gives evidence.
Oh my god, okay, careth Price So I've never met this person. I don't know this person, and I only saw him for the first time at the inquest, and I remember sitting there and I was next sitting next to one of Amy's friends, and I had to comment, and I said, is there something wrong with him mentally? Because I watched him on the stand and he was it was like he was itching, rubbing his face, scratching his head and he couldn't sit still in that seat.
It was just really jittery and moving around a lot, and it was really I found it really odd. It was just bizarre. So he said something like this is from memory. It said something like he's never seen the argue. You know, they got along really well. He loved Amy, just you know, obviously painting the picture perfect relationship, which is just a lie. Clearly it's not. He said that when the gun went off, that both he and David were both standing beside Amy's car where the children were seated.
They were seated in Amy's car when it happened. He said, they were both there. But the information that they gave when statements were taken from them by the uniform police at night, there were inconsistencies in some of their statements, Gareth said that when the gun went off, that David ran in first, and he said he was right behind David, and David went into the room first, and as Gareth in there, he passed David in the hallway. David ran
out and Gareth went in. But in David's statements, he said the gun went off and Gareth stayed at the car. He went in and found Amy, went back out to the car where Gareth was and told Gareth what he saw. Gareth said when he went in there that the gun was laying on Amy, so the butt of the gun was along her legs, if you could imagine, kind of between her legs, and the barrel was along her chest pointing outwards. When David went in that room, he said the gun was about a meter away from Amy.
At the inquest, the position Amy was found in was discussed at length. Like Anna describes, Amy was seated in a cramped space behind the bedroom door, with her back against the wall of the built in wardrobe. The area was so tight Amy couldn't stretch out her legs. The unusual placement of her body, given she apparently chose this location to take her own life, was noted several times
during the inquest. Her head, which was facing the bedroom door, was tilted to the left, resting against the wall, and Amy was sitting on her right hand, leaving only her left hand to potentially hold up the gun to fire horizontally through her right temple. The shot then exits through her forehead. Gunshot residue was found only on Amy's left hand. The gun, a Buoyito four to ten side by side. The double barrel shotgun was located on the floor in
the bedroom between the bed and the wall. Toxicology analysis detects a normal dosage of the antidepressant drug catelepran, also known as cipromil, but no alcohol or any other drug. Deputy State Coroner Sarah Linton delivers her findings on the ninth of September twenty twenty one.
Amy Lee Wensley died on the twenty sixth of June twenty fourteen at her home as a result of a shotgun injury to her head. She was twenty four years old. A discretionary inquest was ordered following consideration of a request from Miss Wensley's family, and a date for the hearing was set down for August twenty eighteen. However, prior to
the inquest commencing, an expert biomechanical report was received. Based on the expert opinion contained in this report, the inquest hearing was adjourned and the matter was referred to the WA Director of Public Prosecution. This referral resulted in the WA Police Cold Case Homicide Squad conducting a review of the earlier police investigations into Miss Wensley's death. The review concluded that there was insufficient evidence to establish the involvement
of another person in Miss Wensley's death. The WA Director of Public Prosecutions agreed with these findings and referred the matter back to the Coroner's Court to continue the coronial proceedings. After further delays due to COVID nineteen, an inquest finally
proceeded in February twenty twenty one. The Deputy State Coroner conducted the inquest with the focus to ascertain whether there was any additional evidence that could be obtained through calling witnesses to speak to the materials already available in the coronial brief that might assist the coroner to determine how Miss Wensley came to suffer the shotgun injury that caused
her death, or whether that question must remain unanswered. The quality and conduct of the police investigations was also explored. At the time of her death, Miss Wensley was in a relationship with David Simons. They had been together since two thousand and nine and had one daughter together. Miss Wensley also had another daughter from a previous relationship. Miss Wensley and her two daughters lived with mister Symonds in a small house on mister symons father's property in Serpentine.
The court heard evidence that the relationship at times was tumultuous and characterized by arguments, often prompted by mister symons drinking and drug use. In March twenty thirteen, Miss Wensley and mister Symonds were involved in a traffic accident where mister Symonds was the driver. Miss Wensley was seriously injured as a result of the crash. The injuries affected her ongoing health and were a further source of tension between the couple. Mister Symonds was a gun enthusiast and owned
a number of firearms. Miss Wensley also became involved in shooting during the relationship and owned her own firearm. On Wednesday, twenty fifth of June twenty fourteen, mister Simmons and a friend went pig shooting and Miss Wensley spent the day with the friend's wife. The friends stayed overnight at the Serpentine property. The next day, mister Simmons went out the back of the Serpentine property to cut firewood with another friend. Miss Wensley and her friend had gone shopping and then
to collect the children from school. Mister Simmons was supposed to have returned home with the firewood as someone was coming to purchase the firewood. Miss Wensley had difficulty contacting him as mister Simmons had damaged his phone, and it appears she became angry as she thought he was deliberately avoiding her. In the afternoon, mister Simmons collected another friend and purchased a carton of beer before returning to the Serpentine property. When the three men arrived back home, Miss
Wensley was not at home. However, she returned soon afterwards with her two daughters. At a time estimated betwre between four p m and four fifteen p m. Miss Wensley appeared to be upset about the events that afternoon, and an argument quickly started between Miss Wensley and mister Symonds. There was evidence that Miss Wensley tried to strike mister Symons with a mirror and head butted him, and that
he wrestled her to the ground. Miss Wensley then went outside the house to a shed and smashed a lizard tank. Miss Wensley had a short telephone conversation with her mother at five p m. In which she advised her mother about the argument with mister Symons. She was described as extremely upset and hysterical. During the phone call, Miss Wensley arranged with her mother that she would take the two
children and go and stay with her mother. After ending the phone call, Miss Wensley told mister Symonds that she would be taking the children to stay with her mother. She began packing some belongings while mister Simons took the two children and placed them in Miss Wensley's car. Mister Symonds told the court that he waited with the children at the car. While he was there, he shot a bird with a twenty two firearm, and this was supported
by one of the children and mister symons friend. Mister Simmons and his friend gave evidence they were standing outside the house near the car when they heard a sound like a thud. They went inside the house to investigate the noise. Mister Simons entered the main bedroom, where he found Miss Wensley sitting on the bedroom floor with a shotgun next to her and a gunshot wound to her head. Mister Simmons ran outside the room and his friend then entered the room and moved the shotgun and placed a
piece of fabric on her head. Neither men had working mobile phones, so they left the house and drove to the nearby Serpentine Road house to use the phone to call an ambulance. The call was made at around five twenty p m, only twenty minutes after Miss Wensley had spoken to her mother. The initial attending police officers had concerns that another person may have been involved in Miss
Wensley's death, so they requested the attender of detectives. The attending detectives spoke to the uniformed police and viewed Miss
Wensley in situ in the bedroom. After a short period, the detectives formed the view that the evidence supported the conclusion that Miss Wensley had committed suicide, they informed the uniformed police, who disagreed with this conclusion, but followed instructions to release the protected forensic area that had been declared and allow Miss Wensley's body to be taken to the mortuary.
The next morning, mister Simmons' father, who was the owner of the house, arranged for the bedroom to be forensically cleaned using a cleaner who had been suggested by the police the night before. That afternoon, after Miss Wensley's mother raised concerns about her daughter's death and some further evidence was discovered, the initial decision of the detectives that there was no evidence of criminality was reviewed and a new
investigation was commenced into the death by different detectives. The second investigation was hampered by the fact that the scene had been contaminated, but ultimately the investigators reached the same conclusion that there was no evidence of the involvement of another person in Miss Wensley's death. The matter was then given to coronial investigators before being provided to the coroner
as noted above. Following further coronial investigation, a third investigation was conducted by police into the possibility that another person was involved in Miss Wensley's death. That investigation left open the possibility that her death occurred by suicide or homicide or accident.
After hearing from all potential witnesses, the Deputy State Coroner concluded there is not enough evidence to make a formal finding as to how Miss Wensley died. Accordingly, her honor makes an open finding, which means she cannot determine whether it was suicide, homicide, or accidental due to the lack of relevant evidence as a result of the limited initial police investigation.
Oh my god, can I tell you When we were waiting and waiting sort of the coroner's finding, Like I would say, it was mainly Nancy, Amy's mother, Kelly, Amy's sister, myself, and Amy's closest friends. We were all hanging for that finding, and we were all hoping and praying that it was going to be a finding that was not suicide. As long as it wasn't suicide, that's what we were hoping for. But when it eventually came out, Nancy actually got a copy of it before it was made public on the
coroner's website. So Nancy ringed me and she said, I've got this letter from the corner's thought, and I said, oh my god, Nancy's open up. What is it? What is it? Quickly, quick, quick? She goes ages and pages and she started reading. Us aid, Nancy, you go to the end. Just go to the last two three pages. It's going to be there. The finding is going to
be there. And when she read it out to me and said it was an open finding that she couldn't determine who called that trigger, we just burst into cheers. We were so upset right because what we were hoping for was that the coroner could see it was not a suicide. So we were extremely upset. We cried, all of.
These people have something in common, a burning desire to know who killed their loved ones or had a hand in their disappearance. Now, sixty other cases of missing and murdered people from across the state will also attract a million dollar reward.
After fighting so hard for a suicide finding, WA police was forced to concede for the state government's decision to introduce a one million dollar reward for information into Amy Wensley's homicide two years after the inquest finding.
Also on the list is Amy Lee Wensley, whose death in twenty fourteen was declared a suicide after a botched investigation. Police now accept she was murdered.
A few senior officers were disappointed with this decision, but we'll come to that a bit later in the podcast.
It is a huge step forward.
The WA government is offering million dollar rewards for a number of families, including the homicide of Amy. As soon as I read those few lines, and I'm at work, remember, I had to leave my desk, go find a conference room, shut the door, read it, and burst into deers. I couldn't believe that for the first time since twenty fourteen, I'm reading something from the police that actually says homicide. And then I think to myself, how amazing that they're
going to offer them a million dollar reward. This is fantastic. But then on the flip side of that, I become really annoyed and very cranky as well, because I think, to myself, hang on a minute, how dare you say this? So you're saying homicide for whatever reason you're saying it, but you haven't come to speak to us, to me to tell me what's going on, and you have made me for eight years or more fight you on this and tell you it wasn't a suicide, and all of
a sudden, you're doing a turnaround. But hey, I'm happy with the turnaround, but what's upsetting me is that I had to fight for so long to say that it was not a suicide. So no explanation has been given to me about this turnaround. But I'm asking questions of this poor woman who's emailed me from the police, and she says, hey, I'm just here to tell the family. I'm really not sure what's going on, so okay. Then all of a sudden they give me a new liaison officer.
By the way, I've lost out how many I've had. And I'm told that the reason why they're giving a one million dollar reward is because it's a cold case. I said, I your grew information as an information come to light. No, no new nation has come to Life's just because it's a coroll cat, you know, and this was a good one. You know, there are other families who didn't get this. There's only selected number of families
that's not this one million dollar reward. And of some who didn't, and I remember thinking to myself, and I supposed to be grateful.
However, they don't say sorry for the way they handled Amy's death.
Never have never apologized. I will say this to the credit of the uniform police officers, the decent people. I've had apologies from uniform police officers who were there on the night. The uniformed police officers came up to me at the inquest after they gave evidence. One of them actually helped me and said how sorry he was for
what happened. Another police officer, she gave evidence, and she waited outside the courtroom, and when there was a break, I came out and she came over to him and introduced herself and told me how sorry she was for what happened, you know, And I appreciated that. I really appreciated it. I just felt I felt for them too, because I always thought it was just my family and I and Amy's friends who were suffering from what happened.
But I never got to give thought to the people who turned up, such as the decent costs, the uniform one and even the paramedics that turned up. I never stopped to think about how they felt, and obviously it
affected them. It affected them to the point where they came up and spoke to me, to apologize and I appreciated it, but those detectives, no, the police commissioner, no, it was us in the currenter's court of the superintendent who was there, you know, they were going to apologize and from memory his comment was something like, I'm not
authorized to do that. So after the inquest finished, submissions were supposed to be done by our legal team and the police legal team, and one of the things that came up was about the police apologizing to my sister and our family, and our legal team received an email from the police legal team saying that she had been authorized to offer the family a letter of regret.
Dear Ms Kirk, please accept my deepest sympathy and sincere condolences on the loss of your daughter in February twenty twenty one. Further to the inquest held in relation to Amy's death, I wish to formally express regret for the fact that the Western Australian Police officers who investigated her death on the evening of the twenty sixth of June twenty fourteen did not request the attendance of specialist services
or specialist units. I also wish to express regret for the manner in which our internal processes addressed issues in relation to the initial investigation. As you will be aware from evidence led at the inquest, the Western Australian Police Force has recently undergone significant improvements in relation to police supervision and accountability, particularly with respect to requesting the attendance
of the homicide Squad and forensics at unexplained deaths. I hope this letter will be of some comfort to you and your family. Your sincerely, Cole Blanche, APM, Deputy Commissioner.
It's dated twelve October twenty twenty one. Cole Blanche is now Commissioner of the Western Australian Police Force. We asked him for a formal interview to ask questions about this case.
He said no, Now the legal team ring me and I spoke to my sister. I don't make all the decisions. I always speak to my sister when it comes to the big stuff and this was one of those moments, and I told her that the police would like to offer a lot of regrets. Would she like it? And she asked me what I thought, and I said, I already know what I think, that this is your decision and can I tell you It was utter relief when she said no, that's not the fucking apology, and I
thank god, I said, that's exactly what I think. So we went back to the legal scene and we said to them, no, we don't want this, we don't want a letter of regret because that's not an apology. So we said no. But the deputy police commissioner at the time still sense that it was something like, dear missus Kirk, that's my sister, Amy's mother, Dear missus Kirk, condolences on the loss of your daughter in February twenty twenty one.
Amy died in June twenty fourteen. When I read that, I just thought to myself, this is just more of the same shit, the same attention to detail, just lack of lack of care, just more of the same, because it's everything that happens now, even if it's small, just adds on. It adds on to that mountain of anger and that mountain of grief and resentment and all those feelings of sadness. All of it not good enough, that's not good enough, ownly a mistake, own.
It, despite everything, and acknowledges a lot has been achieved thanks to support from a small group of people.
I was blessed enough to meet amazing, bloody people, good decent human beings with hearts of gold. So I'll tell you how this started. After Amy died, and everyone's saying. When I say everyone, I'm talking about the people in authority. When you have all of them saying Amy did it and you know she didn't, I've got to come home. So I'm home three weeks after Amy dide, feeling lost, feeling so alone, like I had the whole world against me. You know who is going to believe me?
Who?
They're just going to think I'm a greeting arts that won't accept this or hang on a stet. The detectives who turned up on the night and major crime squad are all sayings, she committed suicide. Who's going to listen to me?
Contact details of a domestic violence legal expert by the name of Charon dev Singh are passed on to Anna and they arranged to meet at a cafe. In preparation, Ana lists everything she knows about Amy's death.
And I sat across the table from him and I gave him this thing and he's reading it, and as he's reading it, he's shaking his head. And when I saw that him shaking his head. My heart just stunk and I thought, oh my god, he can see it too. You know, when you feel like everyone's going to be against you and everyone's just going to think you're silly, and you know you're not accepting this. To have people do that was just so up listing. And he said to me, you know, what you're about to take on
is really big. He said, if you do this, it's going to take up at least five years of your life. And I'll never forget him saying that to him. And I said to him, do you know what, Charon dev I said, I have five years. Amy has nothing. She doesn't have any more years. What's five years in my life? Let's do this? And he said, I'm going to try to get a legal team pro bono. I've got a list and I'm going to start at the top of
the list and work my way down. And we waited for a little while, and I'm very anxious waiting, and he reached out to Peter Ward at ours Hirst Law Firm and they said yes. And I couldn't believe how lucky we were that the first he wanted to approach actually said yes. But again, I dispersed into two because each time something amazing happens amongst all this shit, it's
just uplifting and it's hopeful. And to have people that don't even know you, who are total strangers to you, willing to help, willing to give up their time and believe amy, it's truly amazing. I cannot thank these people enough for seeing the truth.
There's still a long way to go, and the world today is very different than it was in twenty fourteen.
For a third day, Australians take to the streets.
Domestic violence is now recognized as one of the nation's biggest issues.
This is just one of many rallies across the country today and over the weekend, with thousands of people turning out to take.
A stand against domestic violence.
Of control laws have been rolled out in New South Wales and most recently Queensland, with other states set to follow. The legislation outlaws an adult engaging in a course of conduct of abusive behavior that is intended to coerce or control the other person.
We're God, We're we are, and we are fed up.
Pressure to do more is mounting because while there's more recognition, there isn't resolution. If you talk to people who work with domestic violence victims, it's actually getting worse.
Why is it that so many of us have to endure abuse?
And attention has now turned to the highest office in the land.
In Canberra, the march was to Parliament House, where the Prime Minister told the crowd.
And this is a national crisis.
We're here today to demand that governments of all levels must do bettering my own. We need to change the culture, we need to change. But for Anna, the fight for her niece continues.
I always think people who were mums understand.
This, and she's as determined as ever to do whatever it takes to ensure the truth about Amy comes out.
Because I loved her like a daughter. She was mine. Did I tell you about when she was born? Nancy was eighteen and I was twenty, and Nancy and I are really close growing up, right, we were very very close. And when she got pregnant, I was so excited and we were together all the time. Right. I'd go and see her after work, I think, you know, on weekends I'd go and see we'd hang out and we'd always say this baby, we're going to have two mums. That's
what We used to say, this baby's so lucky. It's going to have two moms, you and I. Right when Nancy went into later, she rang me in the days before mobile phone. But I write up to the hospital and she was in labor and the doctor's saying she didn't be like long hours an hour. I went home and had Sis. I went back up in the outernoon and she's still in labor. And I was there because she always said she wanted me with her, and Amy's father was there, and I just stayed with Nsy. I
didn't go down the other ende. But when the doctor said, oh, the baby's got a head full of hair, I thought, how to look at this? Isn't it funny when like, I don't think of anything like down there except me Amy's head, right, I just had all his black hair. And then this baby came out. And I remember getting really too because although you know where a baby comes from, its really weird. It was the most beautiful thing I'd ever seen, do you know what I mean? Like it
was beautiful. They wrapped Amy up and they put Amy or needs his chest, and she was so tired. So I took the baby off needs his chest, and I held the baby before Amy's father could hold her. I looked at that baby and I cried because even before she was born, I loved her because her mother and I were together all the time, and we said this baby was so lucky because she was going to have two mums. And after she was born, I went brought a baby castic for my car, and I come and
take her because she was mine too. Amy and I are really close. When she was growing up, she gave me a nickname. She used to call me Goog right, and her kids, Amy's little one called me Annie Goog. And when she was very little, she said to me, good, Can I call you mom? I said, only if it's okay with your mom. She goes, mom, can I call good mom? And there she said, yeah, I don't care. And so from that day it was mum. And then sometimes she'd say mum and we'll both go.
What In the next episode, will head back to the scene of the crime.
I made a pledge to Aimy on that fatal night.
And speak to the police officer first, just on the scene.
When Amy died, I said the words out loud to her, I'm sorry for what's happened to you, Sis. We will get to the bottom of it.
Er your say so, Desm.
We both know the nasty untill me.
Until If you knew Amy and have information, any information about her death, we'd love to hear from you. Just email us at the Truth about Amy at seven dot com dot A you that's s e v E N The Truth about Amy at seven dot com dot au, or visit our website sevenews dot com dot au forward slash the Truth about Amy. You can also send us an anonymous tip at www dot the Truth about Amy
dot com. If you're on Facebook or Instagram, you can follow us to see photos and updates relevant to the case, but for legal reasons, unfortunately you won't be able to make any comments. And remember, if you like what you're hearing, don't forget to subscribe. Please rate and review our series because it really helps new listeners to find us. Presenter and executive producer Alison Sandy Center and investigative journalist Liam Bartlett.
Sound design Mark Wright, Assistant producer Cassie Woodward, Graphics Jason Blandford, and special thanks to Tim Clark and Brian Seymour. This is a seven News production