I want to meet Derek Percy, face to face. Almost all his police investigators have been men; would he, I wonder, respond differently to a female writer, knowing he is the subject of his own biography? I want to gauge his personality myself; assess whether that implacable mask hides a host of secrets; whether this softly-spoken man is as clever as they say. I want to see the face of this sexual sadist whose writings delight in pain and suffering, who is outwardly normal and does not behave floridly or badly.
I want to meet the man whose life I have been tracing for a year. How does he look? Is he sketching, drawing? If he is, what is he sketching? Is he writing? If so, what is he writing? But I am only too aware of the torment that can follow these sorts of interviews, the exclusives where you have to sift the interviewees' truths from their lies, weighing their stories in the balance. The murder of Yvonne Tuohy was so disturbing, so graphic, that it was months before I could even begin to start turning the research into writing, so terribly dark and real that it beggared belief. Now I want to try and interview this man, the subject of that research. I write him a letter, polite though informal, outlining my request.
In early July 2008 I receive a letter from Len Norman, Assistant Director of the Prison Services, thanking me for my correspondence and informing me that, regardless of the willingness of prisoners to be involved with interviews with journalists, it is not in the best interest of Percy, the community, or Corrections Victoria for the interview to take place.
'The unnecessary attention this process will attract towards Mr Percy,' the letter continued, 'and the potential for such interviews to jeopardise other possible legal proceedings, means that I am unable to approve your request to interview Mr Percy.'
It is not in the best interest of Mr Percy, the Community or Corrections Victoria. Why is it not in the best interests of Mr Percy, I wonder? Granted, as I was once gruffly reminded by a correctional services officer when I made an application to interview Snowtown killer Robert Wagner, prisons are 'not the bloody Hilton'. But who is to say what an interview with Percy could reveal, an interview not staged by a police officer, psychiatrist or correctional services? Does he even know that I have tried to make contact with him? Did he receive the letter I wrote him or was it intercepted by prison authorities, opened, read and a decision made on his behalf, without his knowledge? Are authorities frightened that Percy might embarrass them by saying something he has not said earlier? With so many unsolved murders and abductions linked to him, isn't it worth a shot? Why is it not in the best interest of the community to allow an outsider in to talk to him, if he had agreed? It is the community that wants to know what he knows, that demands answers about what has happened to its children.
The letter strikes me as perfunctory, a foregone conclusion.
In May 2009 I contact Corrections Victoria to enquire whether Percy ever received my correspondence. The Acting Manager of Prisons Directorate, Emma Law, returns my call. 'I can confirm,' she tells me, 'that we have received advice from Port Phillip Prison, where Mr Percy is incarcerated, that he was not provided with your letter.'
'Oh? Why is that?'
'The reasons are outlined in the letter from Mr Norman.'
'That tells me why I couldn't interview Percy. It doesn't explain that he was not even given my letter. What is the reason for that?'
'I can only tell you what is in Mr Norman's letter to you.'
'So Percy has no knowledge of the fact that I tried to contact him?'
'No. The letter was intercepted by prison staff. I'm afraid that is the only information we can give you.' We finish the call.
Who is to say what an interview with Percy could have revealed? Who is to say?
We will now never know.
Percy is not just a prisoner; he is a hot political potato, prime media fodder. He is the caged beast whose silence makes a mockery of everyone around him. He is, as a prison officer once noted, 'Australia's Hannibal Lecter'.