Chapter 22

A Difference of Opinion

During her recovery from the emotional impact of her battles with Guider, Denise Hofman became acutely aware of just how much more difficult the process was than she’d expected. Having John Merrick around was a godsend. During the weeks following the final Lithgow trip in late 1998, she regularly drove to his office in Glebe after work and they talked into the early evening. Each time, she came away admiring his strength of character and capacity to care.

Merrick explained that despite all Guider’s ugliness, aggression and stubbornness, he believed he’d been trying to tell her in his own way where Sam’s body was buried. He said he felt she, in fact, held the key to unlocking the secret.

Denise was grateful for the vote of confidence but confided in Merrick during one of their chats that she couldn’t help feeling disappointed in Leach and Tuckerman not showing more interest in the poetry and paintings Guider had sent her. He sympathised but thought the detectives probably just felt obliged to get on with the business of driving the investigation forward via the other work they had to do. It didn’t mean what she had to offer wasn’t of value.

Denise had accepted the rationale, albeit with some reluctance.

By way of assuring her things were still headed in the right direction, Tuckerman had told her at the end of October that they’d just been to New Zealand interviewing more witnesses to the Raglan Street connection. She was pleased things seemed to be coming together for them regarding what was now the core area of the case but found herself continuing to dwell on her conviction that Guider wanted her to know Sam’s whereabouts. In particular, she was convinced the sketches and poems he’d given her held some kind of significance.

Location by location, she made a mental list of the most likely places Guider might have considered when choosing what to do with Sam’s remains. The one she kept coming back to, however, was Bradleys Head, on Sydney’s North Shore.1

Denise knew Guider had recorded Aboriginal sites in and around the area over a number of years and that the adjacent suburb of Mosman was one of his favourite spots. In fact, she was certain Bradleys Head had fallen within his patrol reach when he’d worked as a volunteer ranger for the National Parks and Wildlife Service. It was surely worth having a look at.

Parking at the bottom of Taronga Zoo several days later, off Bradleys Head Road, Denise walked the rest of the way down to the harbour. Along the track, she noticed a rather steep stairway leading to the water’s edge. At its base was a pelican perched on an old pier looking straight back at her. As she got nearer, she could see there was an outlet below him in the rock pools. Right where the water gushed out it contained an assortment of small fish pieces. It occurred to her that the discharge was coming from the feeding pens in the zoo and that the pelican was enjoying an easy meal of leftovers.

On her way back up, Denise passed a small historic recep­tion house known as Athol Hall. The enclosed bushland park surrounding the building gave her a feeling of déjà vu. It resembled the landscape in the oil painting Guider had sent her.

She reasoned that at one time Guider probably had a set of ranger’s keys with which to visit the site after hours. There was also a maze of tunnels linking a series of gun emplacements in the area, which were built when the harbour was under threat from Japanese attack during World War Two. It struck her that Guider’s access to the network might have been totally unchecked. He probably knew it like the back of his hand.

The place was as remote as you like, yet just a short drive from the Eastern Suburbs. It was also somewhere Samantha might have been attracted to, especially if it offered an opportunity to peer through the fences at some of the zoo animals she’d recently delighted in visiting with her father.

Denise knew she was leaving herself open to accusations of heightened imagination but was so convinced of her theory she contacted Tuckerman and talked him and Darren Sly into checking it out.

The two investigators were by then on the verge of identifying the little girl with Sam in Guider’s row boat photo. The process of eliminating her school mates by comparing the image with row after row of class photos would soon take them off to Queensland to meet Annisa Morel.

They hadn’t really been able to afford the time but agreed to drop by for an hour or two. John Merrick went along for the duration and Denise also invited Rob Allen.

They spent an entire day, 6 November 1998, cutting a swathe through the undergrowth. It was high snake season and sufficiently hot and humid to make things fairly unpleasant. Later in the day, they copped a good soaking as the result of an extended cloudburst. Merrick, however, felt the effort worthwhile. He reasoned that Guider was the type of personality who would want Sam to be found but naturally enough refuse to tell them exactly where she was, as this would constitute an admission. With the clues that he’d left them, Merrick reckoned that if and when they did locate her it would be a place that, for Guider at least, would hold some kind of special significance.

At one stage during the expedition, Denise discovered what seemed to be a hip bone partially buried in an overhang. The group had endured an anxious wait while a forensics specialist, Professor Johan Duflou, came out from Glebe to inspect the find but they were bitterly disappointed when he arrived and almost instantly proclaimed, ‘No, not human.’

***

It was difficult but Denise now resigned herself to the fact that she simply might have to step aside and let the strike force get on with what it had to do.

Within a few short days, however, she found herself re-evaluating everything she thought she knew about the murder and what was being done to solve it.

Sitting in Merrick’s waiting room again, she picked up a yellowing copy of the Sydney Morning Herald from the stack of reading material on his coffee table. Page three of the broadsheet stopped her cold. The article in question, by Philip Cornford and Les Kennedy, was called ‘Samantha Knight saga: now police look at botched sightings theory’. It alleged that the Police Integrity Commission was investigating a former detective’s claims that two reported sightings of Samantha immediately after she’d disappeared in 1986 had been ignored. On both occasions, she’d been seen in Kings Cross, the second time supposedly in the company of a lesbian paedophile. The piece went on to say that the retired officer who’d proffered the disquieting information had also accused his colleagues of repeatedly ignoring him.

All the lingering doubts Denise had about the case came surging back to the surface. A lesbian paedophile! What was that about? Was it possible Guider had actually been working in tandem with someone? Or was there an unknown presence at work trying to derail the investigation by throwing out an obscure red herring?

Leach and Tuckerman hadn’t mentioned anything about the PIC, not a word. Was there a reason they would keep something like that from her? She wondered what else she hadn’t been told. Bob Waites being sent to tell her Guider had been cleared of suspicion; Wayne Mathes and David Donohue giving him her name; the royal commission suicides; drugs and corruption at Bondi; where did it all start and end?

Denise also began revisiting her frustration over the lack of enthusiasm regarding the paintings and where Sam’s body might be. Why, she kept asking herself, had Leach and Tuckerman been so disinterested in the wooden alphabet scattered on her front lawn and how it had gotten there? The lack of explanation worried her. In fact, if she was being honest with herself, it frightened her. She started to believe someone might be trying to shut her up – or worse.

Denise wanted answers, of course. But more so, she desperately felt that the integrity of everything she’d worked so hard to put forward was being challenged.

‘In retrospect, I guess it worried me that the truth as I knew it was under threat,’ she says. ‘I was convinced I needed to do something to protect it.’

She took a leap and decided to contact the Herald and speak to one of the journalists who’d written the article. Telling them what she knew would mean divulging a lot of sensitive information but her hope was that it would at least place her own story beyond the reach of the naysayers.

When she rang through via the Fairfax switch she was connected to Philip Cornford. The 58-year-old veteran had been one of Sydney’s leading newspaper men since the early 1970s and was widely respected for his writing and newsgathering ability. A bearish character with a kind of superficial gruffness about him, Cornford bore a vague resemblance to Sean Connery. More importantly, however, Denise would soon discover that he was also as staunch as they came.

When she explained why she was calling, she got the same response she’d received months earlier from Leach and Tuckerman. Without hesitating, Cornford jumped on the first train from Town Hall to meet Denise at Parramatta Leagues Club that afternoon on her way home from school.

To her surprise, Phil almost immediately agreed that publishing a story about Guider would be quite unhelpful, in the short term at least. He said he wasn’t really sure where the PIC’s interest in the case was headed but instinct told him that, everything else aside, Harrisville still had a way to go and needed to be allowed to get on with its work without interference.

What he instead proposed was to sit down and transcribe Denise’s version of the saga from start to finish and have her sign it before a Justice of the Peace. By agreement, the Herald would then be allowed to go to print with the yarn only after seeking her approval. In effect, the arrangement would act as her insurance policy.

As things unfolded, the PIC’s concern with Harrisville was short-lived. The sightings, like others along the way, turned out to be cases of mistaken identity. Phil, however, quickly pointed to the fact that there was something else that had long troubled him about the case and that Denise needed to know about.

He presented her with a series of Herald news clippings from 1991. They detailed a controversial court case involving Gary Patrick Manson, one of Tess’s lecturers at the City Art Institute back in 1986. The 37-year-old had been accused of photographing a naked 11-year-old girl.2

The articles explained that Manson had allegedly arranged the shoot as part of an exhibition depicting the degradation of rape victims. He’d been working on the project for some time with the help of his 32-year-old de facto wife, Dobrila Stamekovic.

Although arguing that they’d also had the consent of the girl’s mother and that she’d been present at the time, the pair were convicted, each fined $1000, and placed on three-year good behaviour bonds.

Tess Knight had been called to give evidence in the case as she’d been standing watch outside the studio during one of the illegal photo sessions.

Shocked and confused by what she’d learned, Denise rang John Merrick and asked him to set up a meeting with Steve Leach and Neil Tuckerman. It was time to get up close and personal. They agreed more or less straight away to get together at Merrick’s office on Parramatta Road at Glebe.

***

From the top, Steve Leach was angry that Denise had gone outside their circle and told Phil Cornford about the investigation. When she explained why, he downplayed her concerns about everything including her own safety and put it to her that she didn’t trust them.

‘It’s not a matter of whether or not I trust you,’ she retorted. ‘There are simply way too many unexplained questions here that worry me.’ Invited to elaborate, she rattled them off almost without drawing breath.

‘For starters, the police should have found Michael way back in 1986 but they didn’t. Why is that? He’d practically been minding Samantha every weekend for two years before she disappeared but he wasn’t even located or questioned. How can that have happened?

‘How about this one,’ she continued. ‘Why didn’t anyone who knew that the three girls were regularly in Michael’s company at the time ever come forward when Samantha disappeared, for God’s sake? I mean, what on earth was going on?

‘What about Rob’s and my name being given to Michael in Junee jail? Despite the explanations, I’ve still got no idea why it really happened. He knew straight away that we’d informed on him and it basically ruined everything.

‘At the same time, I told anybody who’d listen that if anything happened to Michael while he was locked up, he’d take the secret of Samantha’s disappearance with him to the grave. So far, though, he’s been bashed twice and is lucky to have survived. Why hasn’t anything been done to make sure he isn’t murdered in jail?

‘Why was Bob Waites – a superintendent – told that Michael was no longer a suspect? Was he misled or just given poor information?

‘And while we’re at it, why didn’t you guys tell me about the PIC investigation or this court case with Tess’s lecturer?’

In reply, Leach was dismissive of the publicity generated by the Manson trial. He said he’d never really paid the matter notice because he’d never had any doubts regarding Tess’s character. If she’d somehow found herself involved in something that was questionable, it was little wonder considering what she’d been through. He said every time the police had gone knocking on her door Tess had picked up the phone to her psychiatrist.

At least on this point, Denise could sympathise. She knew she would never be able to truly relate to the utter devastation Tess had endured or how it had affected her.

As for the question of where Samantha was buried, Leach said he appreciated the fact Denise and Merrick both believed Guider was trying to hint to them where she was, yet he had some difficulty in seeing this himself. Furthermore, there’d been no fingerprints on the letters that had been left on her lawn and, in fact, he had no evidence that anyone at all had given Guider any assistance either in 1986 or at any time since. He’d said he’d formed the view that Guider had acted alone and had most likely killed Sam by giving her too much Normison by mistake.

Denise quickly resigned herself to the fact that there were some things she and Leach would have to agree to disagree on. Almost fifteen years later, she says the things they had to say to each other at the meeting effectively meant that she would no longer be included in the loop in terms of where and when the investigation was headed.

‘All considered, though, there wasn’t a lot I could do about it, she adds. ‘At least I guess everyone knew where they stood.’

Meanwhile, her deal with the Herald meant the story of her involvement with Harrisville would remain off limits until such time that she said differently. Were it the case that Harrisville’s ongoing efforts to convict Guider of murder were ever jeopardised in some way, Denise had decided that she would simply instruct Phil Cornford to let rip.

***

As coppers went, Steve Leach was old school yet a little soft around the edges at the same time. A second-generation officer, he’d signed on as a 16-year-old cadet in 1969. By the time Harrisville rolled around in mid-1998, he’d earned himself a pretty solid reputation as an investigator, having come to the public’s attention five years earlier as one of two detectives to arrest backpacker killer Ivan Milat. A few days after the arrest, he was on hand in court when Milat’s sister, Shirley, collapsed upon hearing the news that Ivan had been charged with seven murders. The poor woman began sobbing on Steve’s shoulder, not realising who he was. When she broke down completely, he carried her outside.

Over the months preceding Milat’s arrest, Leach had headed up the investigation’s gruelling search for the main murder weapon – a Ruger 10/22 rifle – of which there were about 10 000 registered across the country.

One thing he’d learned about the media during the high-profile case was that loose lips could sink ships. The other Task Force Air detective chosen with Leach to slap the cuffs around Milat’s wrists at his southern Sydney home on 22 May 1994 had been Paul Gordon. The energetic senior constable had also been credited by some of their colleagues with making the investigative breakthrough that led to the arrest. Indeed, a few of them thought Gordon hadn’t really received the recognition for his work that he deserved. The following Sunday, however, Sydney’s Sun-Herald got wind of the inside story and splashed with it. Unfortunately, with Milat yet to properly face court, the article contained details that senior police felt had the potential to place the entire case at risk. As a result, Gordon was blamed for the leak, called in and sacked from the task force.3

It wasn’t as though Leach didn’t know a few journos from around the traps himself; some he even classed as mates. But from then on, when it came to protecting the integrity of his investigation, he would only see things in black and white. As a result, her decision to speak to Phil Cornford meant he and Denise would no longer exactly find themselves on the same page.

Neil Tuckerman, however, was a different story. Of the three detectives, Denise had always had closest contact with him. He was more or less unaffected by the whole affair and they remained on good terms.

After their search over at Bradleys Head, she had been sure to stress to him that her hunch included the probability that Guider had intimate knowledge of its terrain. It was something she felt worthy of looking into in detail. Now she also offered to pass on to Tuckerman Guider’s catalogue of letters, poems, manuscripts, reports and sketches so he could get a better feel for his general affinity with the harbour and the bush. She explained that he’d conducted archaeological surveys of many, many parcels of parkland and registered them with the NPWS, including those scattered across the entire Lower North Shore.

Ever receptive, Tuckerman agreed to collect everything from her and have a look despite the fact it was a pretty hectic time. The Raglan Street phase of their work had roared to prominence following the discovery that Michael and Wendy Watt were alive and well in Darwin. However, a couple of quick phone calls in late April 1999 led to him locating Neil Martin, a senior parks officer based in Gosford who’d previously worked around Bradleys Head and was considered the organisation’s resident expert on the area.

He had an interesting yarn to tell.

Martin recalled that during the 1980s there had been a psychiatric patient named Leon who’d hung around Athol Hall creating a nuisance. His favourite pastime had been exposing himself to unsuspecting visitors to the park.

The hall had actually been derelict, reduced to little more than an old shed. However, upon inspection, it was obvious someone was living inside. There had been a row of saucepans along one of the walls, a fold-up bunk and a range of other personal effects in place. Martin’s first instinct had been to suspect Leon; however, he quickly realised that the place was too clean and well organised for Leon to have maintained. After making some inquiries, he’d discovered that the setup was Guider’s.

In itself, the information provided another compelling insight into Guider’s highly irregular personality. A couple of months later, though, the story would take on some extra significance.

In early October, Darren Sly got a call from Berrima jail. They had an inmate who’d come forward wanting to get something off his chest. He’d spent a year or so sharing close quarters with Guider in Lithgow and they’d become friendly.

The inmate said Guider, in fact, had also had a tale to tell, a rather disturbing one about a little girl, a fatal dose of sleeping pills and a couch in a shed near where he’d once worked.4