At 10.10 am on Tuesday 8 August 1995 the drama opened for a second season to a packed court gallery. Family and friends from each side were present along with a phalanx of reporters, curious lawyers and members of the public to witness justice being done. As the Sunday Mail described it:
The public conscience was there again in the form of mainly mature age, middle-class women who each day sat listening intently to evidence, familiar with the details from the [first] trial, so much so a hard-core band of them had decided he was guilty.99
The dramatis personae were much the same. The prosecution’s strategy was to make the ‘grip theory’ more tangible and elevate the greed factor while presenting Anna-Jane as entirely innocent to the subterfuge behind the million dollars’ worth of fraudulent insurance policies. They also bolstered the number of witnesses who might be able to expose more about the couple’s finances.
Though Henry did not immediately tell the police that the insurance policies he’d handed over were ‘bogus’ and that he had forged Anna-Jane’s signature, his lawyers soon did. It was crucial to dispel any impression that he had something to hide. The policies were effectively worthless; if Henry had tried to claim on them he’d have been caught out by the required disclosure on each one that it was the sole policy of the owner. Creating ‘bogus’ policies in someone else’s name was a well-established practice in the insurance industry. The practice is referred to as ‘tombstoning’ because these sham policies are sometimes taken out over the lives of people already dead. There’s plenty of anecdotal evidence from the industry to say writing such policies can be an effective low-cost way of keeping agencies open. The commission paid on the initial sale would roughly cover premiums for a few years until either the agency was abandoned or the level of legitimate business written meant the dummy policies could be cancelled. The signing of cheques for payment of the early premiums was part of the appearance of authenticity.
In Henry’s case, a joint account shared with Anna-Jane was the source of the funds paying the fees. Eight cheques were written: three covered the policies taken out over Keogh’s life, and the other five paid the premiums on the policies taken out over Anna-Jane’s, and on which he forged her signature. The prosecution alleged this was all part of his plan to keep the existence of the policies secret. Keogh explained that for his strategy to be effective the servicing of the policies needed to look as legitimate as possible. He could hardly, as the agent, sign the cheques himself. They had to be paid, or at least appear to be paid, by the ‘owner’ of the policy.
Keogh denied there was anything secretive about his actions. That appears to be supported by discussions Anna-Jane had with her father, brother and her friend Lucinda. They all confirmed she’d talked about having insurance. More persuasive were the entries contained in two bank loan applications she’d prepared in November 1993 and March 1994. On both documents, in her schedule of weekly expenses, Anna-Jane had allowed for life insurance. Against that heading was written a figure of $36.00. It was exactly the amount of her share of the weekly premiums payable on the five policies, if she split the bill equally with Henry. As the Acting Professional Conduct Director at the Law Society she was unlikely to risk being accused of non-disclosure when applying for a bank loan.
The DPP claimed the $36 was actually a combination of Anna-Jane’s health insurance premiums and her income protection insurance. However, both those policies had been cancelled prior to the loan applications being created. A letter exhibited to the court, written by Anna-Jane to health insurance provider Mutual Community, showed she had cancelled her cover as of 19 October 1993. Income protection insurance was part of her salary package when she joined the Law Society so she allowed her existing policy with Friends Provident to lapse. A document recording the end date as 15 September 1993 was also displayed in the court.
The existence of five policies valued collectively at over one million dollars was grounds for suspicion. The sum assured on each policy, according to the prosecution, was cunningly set below the threshold that required Anna-Jane to submit to a medical examination. It was presented as yet more evidence of Keogh’s devious design to keep the policies secret. The defence argued there was nothing underhanded going on. All this was consistent with Anna-Jane’s instructions to keep her at arm’s length from the scheme. She didn’t want to be complicit, nor did she want to be inconvenienced by medical appointments which involved being tested for HIV.
The prosecution’s argument of a secret plot to cash in on Anna-Jane’s murder achieved considerable traction with the media and was to remain the enduring belief held by the public.
When it came to the pathology evidence the DPP elevated their expert witnesses up the order. The handprint of murder was a powerful image to be planted in the minds of the jury as early as possible. When introducing his star forensic witness, Paul Rofe opened by registering this fact: ‘Dr Manock, I think you retired last Friday as the Senior Director of Forensic Pathology at the State Forensic Science Centre.’100 To the jury, retiring on the eve of the trial would have been immaterial; people retire all the time. And while 58 is unusually young to withdraw from such a senior position, no explanation was provided or called for.
In the first trial and then in the second Dr Manock delivered his diagnosis of death as drowning. Manock had referred to his pathologists’ handbook, Lecture Notes on Forensic Medicine, prepared by Professor D. J. Gee of the University of Leeds in 1968, to underpin his reasoning. Its earliest editions referred to the presence of ‘haemolytic staining’ of the aorta and ‘differential staining’ as symptoms of freshwater drowning. The theory was that as water entered the bloodstream via the lungs the red blood cells would be forced by osmosis to absorb the liquid. This would cause the blood cells to burst, randomly staining the interior wall of the aorta and producing the phenomenon known as differential staining: the pulmonary trunk leading back to the lungs, where there would be no ingestion of water, would be unaffected and there would be an observable difference between the two major blood vessels.
The reference was removed from later editions of Gee’s notes as it was deemed to be misleading. Many other processes can cause the same effect, including natural decomposition. Dr Manock, however, stuck to this theory, in fact highlighting it in the second trial as ‘a classical sign of freshwater drowning’.101 Dr Manock had ordered no photographs to document this phenomenon, nor taken histology from the site for other pathologists to examine and check.
The prosecution understood how critical the bruising pattern on the left leg was to proving the act of murder. It was the only piece of physical evidence that directly implicated another party in the death of Anna-Jane. There was nothing else: no defensive injuries to either party, nothing to suggest a struggle, and of course no witnesses.
The linchpin for the grip theory was the ‘thumb mark’. Paul Rofe introduced a new piece of evidence, Exhibit P53: a photograph of the medial, or inner, side of the deceased’s lower left leg. Like the other four photos of the legs, it was in black and white. As explained to the jury in the first trial, the use of the Polilight device was the justification for using only monochrome film, although Dr Manock confirmed the photographs exhibited in court were actually all taken with ‘ordinary flash’.102
Exhibit P53 was something of an enigma. To the naked eye there appeared to be no sign of a mark on the inside calf as photographed. Dr Manock, who already testified to its existence, having microscopically examined the tissue sample, was certain he could see it with the naked eye:
PR: Is the bruise visible in the photograph?
CM: Yes.
PR: Could you circle the bruise on the inner aspect of the lower left leg.103
The transcript notes ‘witness marks exhibit’ as Dr Manock drew a circle with a red marker on the photograph. This direction to the witness ensured the jury also ‘saw’ exactly what Dr Manock insisted he’d seen in the mortuary and through his microscope.
The next performance involved a bath. In the well of the court sat a white bathtub the same size and type as the one in which Anna-Jane had been found dead. The jury were given a demonstration of how the grip theory worked in practice. Dr Manock knelt beside the bath, in full view of the jury, the bar table and the bench, and prepared to go through his routine. Justice Duggan at this point took over the inquisition himself:
His Honour: Your hand is outstretched, the left arm outstretched and indicating with the right arm forward and I think you had your palm up in the position in which you suggest …
CM: Yes.
HH: The left leg could be held – is that right?
CM: Yes.
HH: And that assumes you would be putting your right hand across or under the right leg?
CM: Under the right leg.
HH: Under the right leg and grasping the left leg from behind, is that correct?
CM: Yes.
HH: And then raising the legs and folding them over?
CM: Yes.
HH: Leaving aside any push with the left hand, on the head, would the simple action in terms of bodily mechanics of gripping the left leg and pulling it up and over achieve the same result of the head going down?
CM: Yes.104
There it was in unambiguous clarity, with the judge himself leading the interrogation. With the existence of a grip mark and the seven bruises on the legs, it all appeared quite straightforward. The jury now had the motive and method of the murder.
Dr Ross James again followed his boss into the box, and again he gave licence to most of the propositions Dr Manock had asserted. Yes, a grip was the most obvious cause of the bruise pattern to the leg. He, too, had seen the bruises in the photographs. The two men differed on the presence of an injury to the brain, but met again on the diagnosis of drowning applying the tell-tale signs of ‘haemolytic staining’. James told the jury, ‘the described fluid in the outflow tract of the heart compared with the inflow tract … all support freshwater drowning’.105 The two good men from the Crown, acting in the interests of the people of the state, were largely in accord.
On the other side of the ledger, the defence had been trawling for weaknesses in the forensic evidence. They introduced a second expert, Professor Anthony Ansford, a forensic pathologist from Brisbane who had been practising since 1974 and was by 1983 the head forensic pathologist in Queensland. He had conducted over 4000 autopsies and supervised twice that number. Ansford hadn’t examined the tissue slides taken from the body, but he’d read all the documentary evidence and the transcript of testimony given by the other pathologists and examined the photographs. Ansford said he had some difficulty accepting the bruises were from a handgrip at the time of death, as the ageing of bruises is imprecise, and he agreed with the majority view that there need be no sign of brain injury for a person to be rendered unconscious. In his evidence-in-chief regarding the mechanism of drowning proposed by Dr Manock, Ansford offered the following opinion:
AA: I find it hard to accept the suggested mechanism. As I understand it, the leg is so far over the head that it is beating against the end of the bath or the edge of the bath and hitting itself in seven different places.
Michael David: Medically speaking and forensically speaking, can you exclude accident as a cause of death in this case?
AA: No.
MD: Can you exclude a slip in the bath causing unconsciousness, causing drowning, as a possibility?
AA: No.106
The final piece of the puzzle for the prosecution was the nature of the relationship between Henry and Anna-Jane. To that end the ‘love interests’ A. and B. made their reappearances, much to the delight of the media. After going through the details of her relationship with the accused, B. was quizzed about her lover’s attitude towards the concept of ‘fidelity’. She responded:
I asked him if he was sleeping with anybody else and he said, ‘No, that is a given.’ I said, ‘I don’t know what that term means.’ He said no, he was not sleeping with anybody else and no, he didn’t expect me to either.107
The prosecution was well aware that the evidence adduced in the first trial on the state of Henry Keogh’s penis had the potential to undermine the credibility of the second ‘female consort’. A. had said her lover was circumcised but it was established upon inspection in the first trial that his foreskin was still intact. The point of contention was whether circumcision was obvious when the penis was erect. The gallery in court craned forward as one when this topic was scrutinised for a second time:
Paul Rofe: Did you see his penis on occasions?
A.: Yes.
PR: What state was it in on the occasions you saw it?
A.: Erect.108
Later, in cross-examination, Michael David challenged the honesty of A.’s answers, putting to A. that she had never had occasion to cause his client to become erect, describing what she’d told the court as ‘nonsense’.109 She fought back, saying, ‘It’s not nonsense. No one stares at a penis continuously for an hour or half an hour. I don’t think anyone in here would stare at a penis for that long, just look at it.’110
Regardless, A.’s concluding remarks in her evidence-in-chief were potentially the most damaging. She said on 17 March 1994, the day before Anna-Jane died, she had phoned Henry from Flinders University, where she was studying. Keogh didn’t deny the call was made, but told the court that he couldn’t recall the details of the conversation, or how things were left. A. said she had a clear recollection. She said Henry had stood her up for a pre-arranged coffee and by then she was over his excuses. In exasperation she informed him, ‘Fine, I’m not going to bother anymore. I’m not going to waste your time anymore.’111 With that she hung up. The next day, Anna-Jane’s life ended.
Beyond that, there was nothing new to add.
Following just over two weeks of evidence and the judge’s summary, the second jury of five women and seven men retired at 12.03 pm on 23 August. They didn’t disturb the court until they returned at 5.29 pm with their verdict: guilty.
He was now ‘Keogh the killer’. That’s the headline the Advertiser ran across its front page the next morning. This time they could print whatever they wanted. It didn’t take much to reignite community outrage over the callous crime that extinguished the life of a much-loved and loving young woman. Henry Keogh, already a blighted figure, was now officially one of the most detested men in Adelaide. It’s not a stigma ever likely to be erased.
The media had a feeding frenzy for at least the next six months. Article after article poured out venom against the heartless murderer who gave in to vile greed. The Sunday Mail even remonstrated over Keogh having been granted bail for his second trial:
The major difference this time was that Henry Keogh was on bail and free to wander from Court No. 3 in the Samuel Way complex each time there was a break. He was free to go home to his family at night, free to walk with his brother Michael to the local coffee shops at the lunch adjournments and sit at the sidewalk tables and watch the world go by.112
The implication was that Keogh had been permitted to enjoy the simple pleasures of the living while the cold ashes of Anna-Jane were lying in their final resting place. The Cheney family were the subject of enormous sympathy for the loss they must endure. They requested space from the media to be able to continue their private grieving. That wish was respected.
Eileen Keogh was also in shock. Under the banner of ‘The pain of a killer’s mother’, the Advertiser quoted her as saying, ‘I am so numb I can’t even cry.’113 A shattered Eileen told the media she had not slept for weeks: ‘I’m so tired. I’m not sure even where Henry is.’ According to the report, Correctional Services officers, who had held formal talks with Keogh about his immediate needs, described him as ‘distraught’. The authorities gave assurances that prisoners in such circumstances were closely monitored.
The conviction made national news. The Bulletin magazine ran a seven-page feature entitled ‘Love, greed and cold-blooded murder’, labelling Keogh ‘the sinister suitor’.114 Kevin Cheney described Henry as a ‘smart-arse’ and Anna’s brother, Marc, told the author of the article, Robert Mayne, Keogh was a ‘con man’.
Notice of Henry Keogh’s intentions to appeal was accompanied by further outcries of dismay and disgust. He remained for months in the city’s remand centre as sentencing was postponed after his conviction and further delayed by his initial appeal bid.
In February 1996 Justice Duggan delivered the punishment for what he described as an ‘elaborate and coldly planned scheme to kill’.115 He committed Keogh to serve one of the heaviest penalties imposed in South Australia, with a 25-year non-parole period. Keogh was stripped and his clothing stuffed into a green plastic bag; his new uniform would be the generic orange garb of another one of the invisibles. He was then prepared for transportation to the remorseless horrors of Yatala Labour Prison.