Inside Their Minds: Australian Criminals

by Rochelle Jackson

Overview

On the couch with some of Australia's most notorious criminals, this book explores the secrets, motivations, and inner workings of the criminal mind

He is 29 years old and commits his horrendous crime alone. He is an underachiever, unskilled, doesn't have a regular job and he is now a mass murderer. What made Martin Bryant go on a brutal killing spree at Port Arthur taking the lives of 35 people? Working with a leading Australian forensic psychologist, investigative journalist Rochelle Jackson takes readers deep into the minds of eight of Australia's most notorious criminals: serial killer Ivan Milat, female sex offender Karen Ellis, serial arsonist Peter Burgess, armed robber and escapee Brenden Abbott, child killer Kathleen Folbigg, murderer Matthew Wales, and gangland warlord Carl Williams. She probes their motivations, delves deep into their pasts, and unlocks the dark side of their humanity, making for a penetrating, forensic, and revealing investigation of the criminal mind.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781742693811
Publisher:	Allen & Unwin
Publication date:	09/01/2011
Sold by:	INDEPENDENT PUB GROUP - EPUB - EBKS
Format:	eBook
Pages:	252
File size:	2 MB

About the Author

Rochelle Jackson is an investigative journalist and author who specializes in crime and police stories. She has worked for the police.

Read an Excerpt

Inside Their Minds

Australian Criminals

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By Rochelle Jackson

Allen & Unwin

Copyright © 2011 Rochelle Jackson
All rights reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-74269-381-1

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CHAPTER 1

MARTIN BRYANT

MASS MURDERER

'FROM LITTLE THINGS, BIG THINGS GROW'

I was working for a TV current affairs program in April 1996 when I heard about the massacre at Port Arthur in Tasmania. The footage that came down the line will stay with me forever.

It was late Sunday afternoon. Twenty-nine-year-old Martin Bryant was holed up in a cottage named 'Seascape', against 20 police officers from the elite Special Operations Group (SOG) drawn from the Victorian and Tasmanian police force. The SOG are a highly trained, specialist crack unit designed to protect, rescue and resolve high-risk events such as kidnappings, bombings and counter-terrorism incidents. Earlier that day, Bryant had established himself as Australia's first mass murderer by killing 35 people at Port Arthur.

At the siege in the fading light, there was a lot of confusion among police ranks. Mobile phones didn't work in the south-east corner of the state, so communication between the command post at Port Arthur and the SOG commander at Seascape was almost impossible. No-one knew what was happening. Bryant was shooting at the police with two semi-automatic assault rifles — one with a 30-round capacity and another with a 20-round potential. He'd also hidden nine guns in the cottage's roof-gutters. Bryant was firing rounds repeatedly and bullets were whizzing past, just missing police on the ground. Throughout the night, he would fire 250 rounds out of the windows. All that night, two young uniformed policemen who'd been shot at would lay huddled in a ditch covered in leeches, in fear of their lives.

Tasmania Police had never experienced a situation like this. They had no idea how many hostages the gunman had, what he wanted or even who he was. Experienced police negotiator Sergeant Terry McCarthy had to find out. A special telephone line from Hobart was set up. Bryant was calling himself 'Jamie'. He told the sergeant he'd taken three hostages: Seascape owners Sally and David Martin, and another person, Glen Pears.

McCarthy: Okay, you say that all three persons are in the same room?

Bryant: Yes.

McCarthy: Okay, and there's nobody hurt at this stage?

Bryant: Um none at all, no.

McCarthy: What about yourself, are you alright?

Bryant: Yeah I'm fine.

During these conversations, Crown forensic psychiatrist Dr Ian Sale helped the police negotiating team. He expected to hear the usual — a very angry, intoxicated and depressed male making all sorts of threats — but was astonished when he heard Bryant's voice. 'There was a lack of affect; it was casual, there was no anger, no paranoid feeling, no signs of intoxication. The voice was effeminate and playful. I must say this utterly bewildered me and threw me into an absolute spin as to what we were dealing with.'

McCarthy: Right, you're gonna let the two go for the helicopter are you?

Bryant: [Inaudible]

McCarthy: Why are you going to take Sally?

Bryant: Oh she easy isn't she; she's a female isn't she?

McCarthy: Right, well okay.

Bryant: I mean she's going lash out at, she won't lash out at anything or me?

McCarthy: Well, I don't think anybody's going to lash out with you if you've got all those guns you've got.

Bryant: They're not all mine, a lot of them I found them upstairs here so.

LATER

McCarthy: How's things going in there mate?

Bryant: Fine, couldn't be better, just like on a Hawaiian holiday.

McCarthy: Hawaiian holiday?

Bryant: Yes, that's correct sir.

McCarthy: Oh, I'm sorry I don't understand what you mean by that.

Bryant: Well I'm looking forward to my helicopter ride, man. When are you gonna tee up this helicopter ride?

* * *

The memories of dealing with mass murderer Martin Bryant still haunt retired Tasmanian policeman John Warren. I interviewed the tall, barrel-chested former detective who headed up the Port Arthur Task Force and found the case had a profound effect on him. He's been unable to revisit the historic site since the tragedy and doubts he ever will.

On 28 April 1996, Detective Inspector John Warren was doing some fencing on his block at Collinsvale, out of Hobart. 'The phone rang and they said I would have to come in, there had been a report of 12 people being shot at Port Arthur.' He called his second-in-charge, Detective Sergeant Tony Bennett. Twenty police from the Eastern Criminal Investigation Bureau (CIB) and uniform sections met at police headquarters. They were told there was 'a gunman at large', which was all that was known at the time. The SOG was placed on standby. Detective Warren and his team headed down to Port Arthur, unaware of what they were heading into.

It was dusk as John Warren and his crew drove past the Port Arthur tollbooth. They were almost run over by a speeding ambulance, several cars and an SES truck full of emergency service workers desperate to get out. 'I asked them "What's going on?" They said, "We've just got word the gunman is coming back towards the cafe!" It was chaos. No-one knew what was happening.'

What those officers saw that evening would remain etched in their psyche. 'It was like we were driving into a war zone. Everyone was dead. So many people had been killed. Bryant had used a high-calibre weapon so the bodies weren't a pretty sight. Inside the cafe, at one exit point, there were five bodies stacked on top of one another.'

As they drove further inside Port Arthur, stopping to cover the bodies and take notes, the senior detective wondered what sort of a person was capable of doing this?

It wasn't a typical day for Martin Bryant. He rose earlier than usual — at 6 am, having set his alarm clock the night before. He and his girlfriend, Petra, didn't eat breakfast or go for a walk like they normally did. Bryant seemed keen on getting her out of the house. He placed three high-powered semi-automatic guns in the boot of his yellow Volvo sedan with the surfboard on top and kissed Petra goodbye, promising her he'd see her tomorrow morning and 'they'd do something'. It was 9.47 am when Martin Bryant left his New Town house — he was a man with a mission. But as he headed to Seascape cottage, he had time to stop and buy a cup of coffee and $15 worth of petrol, and to gaze at the natural wonders of the nearby Roaring Beach. At 12.30 pm, he reached Seascape. He left ten minutes later, having killed owners David and Sally Martin in cold blood.

Bryant was heading towards Port Arthur. At 1.10 pm he reached the tollgate, telling the security guard he wanted to 'park by the water'. He parked in the lower car park and around 1.20 pm was seen waiting in a line for food at the Broad Arrow Cafe, holding a large bag and a video camera.

At 1.30 pm, after eating his meal outside and trying to talk to a female tourist, Martin Bryant re-entered the cafe and took out his AR-15 rifle. The first two people he killed were tourists from Malaysia. He fired 17 shots, killing 12 people. In the next 75 seconds, moving through the cafe and gift shop, he killed eight more and wounded many others. Time froze in the sudden horror taking place. A man having his lunch was shot dead, still holding his cutlery — food suspended on the end of his fork. Bryant fired 29 rounds in all. He shot methodically and at times was less than two metres from his victims.

Maree Broome was one of many people having lunch with friends at the cafe that day. 'He was quite a tall boy and very slim. And he was so pale. And pretty. But nothing in his face. No face. Just blank. There was nothing at all, no expression, no hate, no joy. The thing that really got me was the way he moved — he was prancing, sort of loping.'

Bryant exited the cafe, firing shots towards the penitentiary ruins and the bus parking area, before getting another rifle from the boot of his Volvo. He walked to the bus parking area, killed another four people and wounded several others. He then returned to his vehicle and drove to the tollbooth where he killed seven people: three members of the Mikac family and the four occupants of a BMW, which he commandeered.

Bryant then drove to the Port Arthur shop. He walked over to a car and forced Glen Pears out of that vehicle and into the BMW's boot. He returned to the car and shot the woman in the driver's seat — Pears's friend, Zoe Hall — before driving off, returning to Seascape cottage. The stand-off between him and the SOG began.

* * *

The siege finished the next day at 8.35 am with Bryant setting fire to the cottage. As he ran out, partially naked and on fire, the SOG marksmen lowered their weapons. It was hard to tell if the man fleeing the cottage was the offender, but what they saw in their telescopic sights determined their next move — he was unarmed. Bryant was grabbed and pushed to the ground by several SOG officers. A blanket was thrown over him. He was handcuffed and immediately transported to Royal Hobart Hospital.

After so much horror and bloodshed, it would make sense if the world paused that day. It did for Detective Inspector John Warren. He was walking back to the office they'd set up some distance away from the cafe, when he stopped. 'It was like I was standing in a painting, because it was such a beautiful day. Not a cloud in the sky, but it was quite eerie; the trees were absolutely still and there were no birds singing. Here was this lovely morning with all this carnage behind me — but no sounds at all. I wouldn't even try to explain why that was.'

That afternoon, detectives Warren and Bennett paid Martin Bryant a visit at the hospital. They walked into the ICU area. He was lying in bed with his left arm bandaged. Warren's reaction would be similar to Ian Joblin's when the psychologist met Bryant: 'Bryant didn't look like a mad gunman. I thought, this person doesn't match what I know he's done. But I quickly worked out he wasn't going to be cooperative with us because he wouldn't acknowledge us or even open his eyes. We'd taken a video unit and set it up — but he pretended he was asleep!'

The detectives turned off the video and left the room. Detective Warren told Bryant's doctor they'd be back the next day. To their surprise the doctor remarked, 'We'll see about that!' and marched into the room, pulling on Bryant and making him sit upright. But Bryant refused to open his eyes. As they turned to walk out of the room again, Warren leaned over and tersely whispered: 'How does it feel you f — king little son of a bitch ... to kill 35 people?!'

Bryant's heart monitor registered an unusually high jump, which the doctor couldn't explain.

The next day when the detectives returned to the hospital, Bryant opened his eyes. He seemed a little taken aback when they told him he was under arrest for murder. Martin Bryant wasn't like the offenders they usually dealt with. He had a very calm voice, was quietly spoken and reasonably articulate in his own way. But to Detective John Warren, he still appeared very cunning. 'The next morning when I looked into his eyes and he looked at me I thought — yes, this guy is capable of doing what he's done.' As they left the hospital, Warren had one strong impression: he'd met a person who was pure evil.

Meanwhile, the Port Arthur Task Force was set up. Detective Inspectors John Warren and Ross Paine were the chief investigators and Inspector John Maxwell was in charge of administration. Thirty-five detectives and support staff were stationed at Hobart's CIB offices. It was going to be a huge task, especially with so many of the deceased coming from overseas.

Four weeks after their first visit, detectives Warren and Paine visited Bryant again, this time at Risdon Prison. He was handcuffed and accompanied by two guards. Once again, Bryant surprised Detective Warren with his response. 'Bryant said to me; "Oh, you seem to be a bit happier today than when I last saw you!"' It was as if he was getting a social visit from the two detectives.

Detectives Warren and Paine interviewed Bryant at Hobart's Police headquarters twice during the following month. Their first interview took six hours and the second took four. It was a long, tedious and frustrating process. Warren was surprised by the young man's memory for detail; however, Bryant didn't play ball like the typical crim. 'When I asked him about his yellow-coloured Volvo I said, "That's an unusual vehicle for a young person to have." He looked straight at me and said, "Yeah it is, that's more the sort of vehicle you would drive!"'

John Warren realised Martin Bryant knew he'd done something wrong, but didn't seem to know what it was or understand the consequences. They asked him about the firearms he used and his background, but what they really wanted to work out was his motive.

They'd have had more luck re-floating the Titanic.

As Bryant was unresponsive, Detective Warren decided to show him photographs of the victims to get him to talk. Warren stood beside Bryant with a folder of victim's photos.

'I want you to have a look at these photos, Martin,' he said, opening the folder.

Bryant looked at them with an evil grin on his face. 'That's pretty sad, isn't it?!'

Detective Warren saw red. He clenched his fists and had to take a step away. He fought an enormous urge to knock Bryant's head clean off his shoulders.

Martin Bryant maintained his innocence throughout the interviews and — despite hours of persistent questioning — never gave the detectives any reason for what he had done. For Warren, not being able to discover Bryant's motive remains the most frustrating aspect of the case. As an investigator, he had certain objectives he liked to achieve, but he felt he was never successful with Martin Bryant.

When I interviewed John Warren a decade after the massacre, he still became emotional when talking about finding some of the victims and was not afraid to admit that he often shed tears during the testing investigation back in 1996. This, despite a 37-year career which saw him deal with some of Tasmania's biggest murder cases and most notorious criminals, including Mark 'Chopper' Read, and rapist and murderer Michael John Marlow. The Port Arthur case had, quite simply, changed his life.

Afterwards, he took stock and accepted a sea change: a posting to St Helens in 1998. He decided to take early retirement in 2002, before returning to the job and finally resigning in 2005.

* * *

I decided to interview forensic psychologist Ian Joblin about mass murderer Martin Bryant to gain my own insight into what made him tick. But often I emerged from his office with more questions than when I entered. It had all the hallmarks of an unusual day. For once, it was raining as I made my way to the low-rent part of Queen Street, which is part of Melbourne's legal precinct, past smiling people in business suits, holding folders above their heads and jumping over the occasional puddle.

Ian Joblin works from a small, dishevelled office in an Art Deco building. He's one of Australia's leading forensic psychologists, respected by both Crown prosecutors and defence counsels. His office is filled with Kiwi artwork and bookshelves crammed with legal and psychology texts. A model Aston Martin sits on his desk, almost buried by files. His waiting room, on the other hand, is sparsely decorated with only a clock radio and a quirky print by Maori artist John Ford. After all, Joblin has to visit the majority of his clients — they're usually inside the 'big house', in one of Melbourne's maximum-security prisons. He's spent the past 30 years working out why the accused has done what they've done and what makes them tick.

Joblin is a tall man with unruly hair that's just starting to turn grey. His hands show he's not afraid of manual work and he has an eternal restlessness which means he's forever fidgeting. He seems to be impatient with the world and often fixes you with a stare. He has the knack of pinpointing whatever mood you're in and moves seamlessly between sussing you out and good-naturedly yakking about cricket scores.

A former probation officer with a penchant for alpacas and Aston Martins, Joblin started his career in Palmerston North, New Zealand, before backpacking around South America in search of Che Guevara. He worked as a lecturer in psychology before emigrating to Melbourne in 1976 to teach a criminal justice course, before becoming a forensic psychologist and a 'gun for hire'. For a man who spends his time working out others' motivations, he's surprisingly evasive about why he chose his vocation. Maybe it's because he doesn't want to be defined. It's something he, himself, baulks at, whenever he assesses someone. He's reluctant to pigeon-hole or generalise anyone; he assesses every offender or 'client' individually, without judgment.

His methods and ideas can differ somewhat from those of his mental health colleagues. When mental health experts are asked to assist a police investigation, they usually turn to profiling, a not so new mental health tool used by psychiatrists. A profile gives a run-down about the type of person they believe may have committed the crime, including their job, social class, gender, even the car they drive. The media love profiling because it makes great copy and the police also find it helpful because they get a total picture of the suspect.

(Continues...)

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Excerpted from Inside Their Minds by Rochelle Jackson. Copyright © 2011 Rochelle Jackson. Excerpted by permission of Allen & Unwin.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
Excerpts are provided by Dial-A-Book Inc. solely for the personal use of visitors to this web site.

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Table of Contents

Contents

Acknowledgments,
Introduction,
Martin Bryant, mass murderer — 'From little things, big things grow',
Karen Ellis, sex offender — 'A crime of passion',
Ivan Milat, serial killer — 'Like father, like son',
Peter Burgess, arsonist — 'Burning ambition',
Brenden Abbott, armed robber and escapee — 'Catch me if you can',
Kathleen Folbigg, serial killer — 'One in a trillion',
Matthew Wales, murderer — 'Mother knows best',
Carl Williams, gangland killer — 'Keep your friends close and your enemies,
closer',
Epilogue,
References,