This is a revised analysis of statements made by Bradley Murdoch.
After I analysed Lees’ transcript and statement, because I did not have access to court transcripts, I initially worked on the Murdoch analysis from an extract in the book by Robin Bowles, Dead Centre Bowles. She reproduced in quoted text what was meant to be Murdoch’s verbatim evidence in his trial, along with some paraphrased segments of his evidence. I initially trusted that the quoted text was verbatim language Murdoch used in evidence.
I later applied for Murdoch’s transcript of evidence under FOI and realised Bowles had paraphrased virtually all his evidence set out in her book, even though she had put much of it in parenthesis. Hence this revision.
Nevertheless, some of his interesting quotes are reported by Bowles. She was one of the few people, if not the only person, outside his legal team who managed to interview Murdoch. Her interviews were all prison visits, either when he was in remand or awaiting trial. Prison rules prevented her from recording the conversations, so I’m relying on her professionalism as a writer for her to have recounted Murdoch’s words accurately.
The first item I’ll cover is an excerpt from a letter Murdoch wrote to Bowles after she first visited him. She published it in her book.
I use this excerpt in the training courses as a good starting point because participants only have to ‘read between the lines’ to get the gist of his letter:
‘I know I have been a bit of a rat-bag at times and I know I have smacked a few people under the ear, only people that have deserved it though. I am a bit rough around the edges at times, but my principles are in the right place. I knew when you came to visit me in Yatala that you were not sure. You came to see a person of average size and shoulder length hair and were confronted by a 6’4”, crew cut, fully tattooed arms, which to most people is intimidating. It is something that I have had to live with for many years and people that look past that find a gentle, kind person with some hard principles that won’t stand for any bull.’
I suggest Murdoch is endeavouring to convince Bowles that, despite some indiscretions, he is a kind and gentle person – ostensibly not the kind of person to commit murder. He is ‘virtue signalling’.
He concedes to have ‘smacked a few people under the ear …’ that he is ‘ … a bit rough around the edges at times …’ and he ‘ … won’t stand for any bull.’
Way back in the 1600s, well before the advent of SCAN as a discipline, French author Duc de La Rochefoucauld observed, ‘We only confess our little faults to persuade people that we have no big ones.’ Generalisations such as those offered by Murdoch should immediately put an analyst on notice. Admitting small indiscretions should have minimal bearing if assessing a person for serious misgivings.
The terms he uses are clearly euphemisms.
What are some of his indiscretions? In 1980, aged 21, he received a three-month suspended sentence after he was convicted for causing death by dangerous driving.
He served time in 1995 after he fired shots into a group of indigenous Australians celebrating a football grand final win at a barbecue at Fitzroy Crossing, missing the head of one woman by millimetres.
He is openly racist and has a tattoo on his arm of an Aboriginal hanging from gallows, along with ‘KKK’.
In 2003 he was charged with the abduction and rape of a twelve-year-old girl and her mother. While holding down the girl, he said, ‘If you move, I’ll give you brain damage.’ Although he was acquitted of these charges, many circumstances and his modus operandi paralleled the Falconio incident.
According to James Hepi (Murdoch’s former partner in their cannabis-running enterprise from Sedan to Broome) Murdoch viciously assaulted and kicked a 62-year-old man named Nelson who was a drunk and a local Broome identity. According to author Paul Toohey, Hepi described Murdoch as a ‘nutcase’.
At the time of the Falconio murder, he was an active drug runner, regularly ferrying large quantities of marijuana from South Australia to Broome.
Returning to the letter, he said, ‘You came to see a person of average size and shoulder length hair and were confronted by a 6’4”, crew cut …’ He is referencing the description given by Joanne Lees of the suspect in the Falconio murder, whereas his height and hair-length are in contrast. A subtle way of saying they’ve got the wrong man.
Murdoch said, ‘ … people that look past that and find a gentle, kind person …’ There are three points to this statement. First, by saying ‘look past’ he is hinting to Bowles to be insightful, disregard his appearance and indiscretions, and look beyond them to find the gentle soul he claims to be.
Second, saying ‘people … find’ or ‘they say’ are easy ways to be deceptive without giving a personally committed statement using ‘I’, such as saying, ‘I am a gentle, kind person.’
Third, it begs the question, who are these insightful ‘people’ who find him to be kind and gentle? Narrators frequently use terminology like, ‘they say …’, ‘I have heard …’, to promote their own agenda or beliefs.
He uses the term ‘at times’ twice. He only considers himself a rat-bag and rough around the edges ‘at times’.
He sensed that Robin Bowles was intimidated and confronted by him when she visited. He acknowledges he has had this affect on others ‘for many years’. He was obviously not prepared to change his appearance to alter this perception he sensed people gained.
He considers he has justification to ‘smack people under the ear’ if they deserve it, or if they offer him bull.
The question is, how should we let such comments influence us? We are frequently ‘sold’ stories in our everyday lives – by salespeople, politicians, activists, social commentators, religious leaders, family members, etc. Often times, we are suspicious but, for any number of reasons, we want to believe them and do not question what they have to say.
Before moving on to examine other excerpts attributed to Murdoch, it is useful to briefly canvass the nature of denials. If a person stands accused of a wrongdoing, if one of their first utterances in open discussion is to the affect, ‘I did not do it’ then there is a high probability the person is telling the truth and did not do it.
If a suspected or accused person does not take the opportunity to deny involvement in an open discussion, then this must raise suspicion of their guilt.
Bowles interviewed Murdoch twice on consecutive days for around forty minutes each visit when he was on remand in Yatala prison for offences in South Australia.
If a person is wrongly accused of a crime, unreservedly, their early and prime utterances will be to the effect, ‘I did not do it’ or ‘It wasn’t me.’ Picture oneself in a situation like Murdoch if wrongly accused of any crime. A journalist or writer takes an interest and interviews you. How long would it be before you said you did not do it? Would you need to be asked?
In these interviews, Murdoch had every opportunity to deny his involvement in the Falconio murder. He obviously did not offer a denial because, in describing the second interview, Bowles wrote,
‘I drew a deep breath. ‘Bradley, did you kill Peter Falconio?’ ‘No, I did not kill Peter Falconio. And how do you even know he’s dead?’’
When Murdoch was on remand in South Australia he knew he was a suspect for the Falconio murder. This is an unreliable denial. Both an innocent or guilty person will deny involvement when pressed into a corner by a direct question. This ‘parroted’ denial was preceded by around an hour of open conversation during which Murdoch did not deny he killed Falconio.
It is not unusual for a person to be able to kill another yet be psychologically unable to deny doing it in an open statement. (You will see several examples of this in the training course).
So Bowles had to ask him. She did well. Many experienced investigators fail to ask such a vital question. It is often mentally hard to do so. As she said, she had to ‘draw a deep breath’.
Continuing with Murdoch’s response to Bowles, he added what is termed in language analysis a ‘tangent’ to a ’yes/no’ question: ‘And how do you know he’s dead?’ This rhetorical question is outside the bounds of the interviewer’s question. Tangential information is thrown in to convince the listener that they are being truthful. A truthful subject will rarely feel a need to add persuasive comment. A truthful person simply tells it as it is.
The usual case with a rhetorical question is that the person already knows the answer and wants the reader to respond for them. Stated differently, they can use a rhetorical question to avoid telling a lie.
Further, various studies have shown that truth-tellers have the confidence to simply ‘convey’ their message, whereas liars feel they must ‘convince’. There is a subtle difference, a difference which can affect the choice of language. In Murdoch’s response, he said an emphatic, ‘No, I did not.’ Truthtellers would be more inclined to give a contracted response of, ‘No, I didn’t.’
Taken further, his response of, ‘And how do you know he’s dead?’ is in the same context: a statement used to convince rather than convey.
All Murdoch had to say was, ‘No’ or ‘No, I didn’t.’ In Language Analysis, you tally every word after the initial response to a ‘yes/no’ question and, in many cases, each word thereafter serves to further reduce the reliability of a ‘yes/no’ answer.
Bowles also asked Murdoch about the NT Police coming to visit him at Yatala. Murdoch said,
‘Yeah, I told them to get stuffed. Wouldn’t talk to them.’
Here was a great and obvious opportunity for Murdoch to say to the police, ‘It wasn’t me.’ If he wasn’t prepared to at least say it wasn’t him, he was either the right man, or he was incredibly stupid, or both.
It is interesting that there is a missing ‘I’ before ‘Wouldn’t talk to them.’ The missing ‘I’ indicates lack of commitment. This persuasively indicates he did speak to the NT Police who visited him beyond telling them to ‘get stuffed’.
During his various conversations with Bowles, Murdoch offered statements of misdirection to create the impression he was not involved. He said,
‘I had a bloody arsenal in the back – you realise if I’d shot Falconio there would have been stuff all over the road.’
This is not a denial. It is misdirection.
When Bowles interviewed him later in Berrimah gaol in the NT, he showed Bowles his large fist and said,
‘See this? She [Lees] reckons in her first statement that she was punched in the face with a closed fist while lying face down on the ground … If I’d punched her, she would’ve had a broken jaw. And gravel pushed into her face.’
Assuming Bowles accurately recorded Murdoch’s words, the clause, ‘If I’d punched her …’ can be interpreted two ways. The first way is, ‘If it was me who had punched her ….’
The second way is, ‘I was there and did other things but if I had punched her …’ This alternative and valid interpretation puts him there, at the scene.
If he was not there, it begs the question why he did not say words to the effect, ‘If it was me who had punched her …’
There was one other quote of Murdoch that stood out. When analysing a narrative, the first step is to red-circle pronouns.
Possessive pronouns are particularly important and telling. These include:
- My, mine, your, yours, his, her hers
We are possessive creatures and what is ours is important to us. Our proprietorial values start at an early age. If you are a parent and you hear one of your kids say, ‘Give it back. That’s mine,’ you will be on the alert for trouble. Getting kids to share is also a parental challenge.
We’ll even use possessive pronouns to lay claim to aversions, such as, ‘my mistake’, ‘my downfall’, ‘my back goes out more than I do’, etc.
Our use of pronouns is common practice when compared to our use of language in general. We all use pronouns and articles in the same way whereas our use of other language – nouns, verbs, adjectives, adverbs etc., may vary.
I’ll give some quick examples of the revelations given by the possessive pronoun, ‘my’ and which lead into a similar revelation unwittingly offered by Murdoch.
Most would be familiar with the case of O J Simpson. After the police charged O J with murdering his wife, he wrote a book, I Want to Tell You, to raise money for his defence. The book included letters people had written to him.
Below is a Thank You Simpson included to those people who wrote:
’I am grateful that even those who believe in my guilt also believe that I should have my day in court and have agreed to let their words be published in this book’
He said, ‘my guilt’. In his mind he knew he killed his wife and used the possessive pronoun, ‘my’ and exposed his self-held feeling of guilt. By using the possessive pronoun ‘my’, he tied himself to the crime.
One simple test to assess the use of language is to consider how you would express this statement. If it was you, and you had not committed the murder, would you have used ‘my’ guilt? Indeed, you couldn’t possibly say ‘my guilt’ because you would have had no cause to feel guilty.
Following is a not-so-familiar case. It relates to a 1959 crime in Canada. A jury convicted Stephen Truscott, then fourteen-years-old, of the rape and murder of his twelve-year-old schoolmate, Lynne Harper.
Truscott insisted on his innocence and a groundswell of public opinion garnered support. In 2007 an appeal court determined there had been a miscarriage of justice. He was awarded $6.5m in compensation.
Truscott then wrote a book in which he explained how he took exception to a journalist’s comment that he was ‘clever and devious’.
This is the excerpt of interest:
‘As to ‘clever and devious’ had I intended to rape and murder Lynne Harper would I not rather have been stupid beyond belief to drive my victim minutes prior to killing her past innumerable witnesses? This fact occurred to no one not even my counsel.’
(There are other language cues and inconsistencies in his book that substantiate Truscott killed Harper).
The clue is like the one for O J Simpson. Imagine yourself as Truscott, and not responsible for the murder. Would you have used the term, ‘my victim’? Truscott has also included ‘killing her’. Surely if he had not killed her he would have used terminology like, ‘ … would I not rather have been stupid beyond belief to drive the victim minutes prior to when she was killed …’
What does OJ and Truscott have to do with Murdoch? During his trial, Bowles paid Murdoch a weekend visit at Berrimah gaol. At that stage of the trial, the evidence against Murdoch, particularly the DNA evidence, was mounting. The conversation at one point focused on Bowles suggesting Murdoch get a new gaol T-shirt. Murdoch said,
‘No, the new ones are too hot – too thick. I like this one. But I think I’ll be changing it for a red one and moving to B Block [the high security prison area] soon. I’m resigned to doing my 17 years.’
He said, ‘my 17 years’ – the possessive pronoun ‘my’. Just like O J Simpson inadvertently disclosed his culpability by saying ‘my guilt’, and Stephen Truscott saying, ‘my victim’, Murdoch accepted ‘my 17 years’.
If he was to be wrongly convicted, he would be doing someone else’s time. If he did not murder Falconio, any reasonable person would have been protesting like hell if he was doing time for the real killer. Murdoch did not perceive himself as doing someone else’s time.
Moving to the evidence Murdoch gave in his trial, his testimony was led by questions from his barrister, Mr Grant Algie QC. Once his evidence was completed, he was cross-examined by Mr Rex Wild QC, the prosecutor and the NT Director of Public Prosecutions.
From Murdoch’s perspective, a crucial part of his evidence was that he went to the Red Rooster fast-food chicken outlet. This was because the most compelling piece of evidence against Murdoch was his DNA found in a small patch of blood on Joanne Lees’ T-shirt. Murdoch would have known, either from evidence Lees gave in the committal proceeding, or from details in the police PROMIS case management data he had direct access to, that she and Falconio went to the Red Rooster before departing Alice Springs.
Murdoch implied there must have been an innocent and passive transfer after he inadvertently smeared his blood in the Red Rooster and Joanne Lees picked it up later. In evidence, Murdoch said,
‘ … first thing in Alice, pulled into the Red Rooster, that’s a bit of a spot we always used to sort of go to. Not necessarily in Alice Springs. Went to – went into there. Chicken roll, box of nuggets for Jack. Jack was a bit of a liker on nuggets. Full chicken for the trip’.
There is no ‘I’ in this excerpt of his evidence, indicating Murdoch has shown no commitment to the claim. Deceptive people often unwittingly drop the pronoun ‘I’, indicating they do not have commitment to the statement.
He had to self-correct himself from saying ‘went to’ to ‘went into there.’ Going to a place is not the same as going into a place.
The statement also begs the question of who is ‘we’? Is he referring to himself and his dog, Jack? Alternatively, subjects can avoid commitment by not using ‘I’ and also substituting ‘we’.
He was not able to say that he ‘bought’ the chicken. By comparison, he said he went to Repco where ‘… I just basically bought what they had.’
In referring to fuel drums, he said, ‘I bought two, one yellow, one red one … I bought a dash mat …’ Later, he went to a small shopping centre where he said, ‘I bought iced coffee, yogurt, Yucalt, some little bottles of Yucalt…’ At Repco and the shopping centre, he had the commitment of saying ‘I’ and using ‘bought’ – something he could not bring himself to say about his claimed visit to Red Rooster.
He also included, ‘Jack was a bit of a liker on nuggets.’ This is extraneous language used to convince. Deceptive narrators are more inclined to add in language to convince the reader or listener: truthful people invariable tell it as it is without a need to add convincing language.
He went on to say in evidence, after leaving the Red Rooster,
‘ … from there I went around to – to Kittle’s which is – they’re a Toyota agent, but they’ve also got four big wash bays out the back. So while I was waiting there to get into the wash bay the chook went into the back, into the fridge.’
He has changed his language from ‘chicken’ to ‘chook’. Changing language without a contextual change in reality can indicate the language is fabricated. He also used passive voice by saying, ‘ … the chook went into the back, into the fridge…’ He did not say what would be a committed statement, ‘I put the chook into the back, into the fridge …’ Once again, the missing ‘I’ indicates a lack of commitment to his statement.
Nor did he volunteer what injury he had that was the source of any blood smear.
Murdoch did not go to the Red Rooster. The only plausible explanation for the blood on Joanne Lees’ T-shirt was his assault on her during the incident.
It is also useful to look at his language regarding his claimed visit to the BP service station. His barrister asked him, ‘What did you do there [at the BP]?’ Murdoch said,
‘Fuelled the vehicle up. Filled the main tank which has got its filler on the driver’s side near where the driver’s door opens. Unzip me sides or pull downs, down with me tailgate, lift me side up, and filled my big main tank up which is the long range tank in the back. And put those couple of items away and then fill those two plastic jerry cans up with water and put them in their site.’
There is not one ‘I’ in this answer, indicating a lack of commitment. If Murdoch does not have commitment to the statements, the listener should not commit to believing the statement either.
He went on to say, ‘Unzip me side or pull downs, down with me tailgate, lift me side up … and put those couple of items away and then fill those two plastic jerry cans up with water and put them in their site’. This is couched in present tense, indicating he was not recalling from memory.
The answer also contains unimportant information, such as describing where the filler tanks were and how accessed. It is language used to convince.
There are three strong indicators he was deceptive when describing his visit to the BP service station.
Murdoch explained that he was living in Broome, had a 1983 47 Landcruiser and was obsessed with motor vehicles. He also bought a camper-trailer, which he said he took with him on this trip.
When people refer to their vehicle and possessions, they invariably use the possessive pronoun ‘my’. Murdoch referred many times to his vehicle and the camper-trailer in his evidence. He did not use ‘my’ once in relation to the camper-trailer.
Apart from denying it was ‘my vehicle’ in the CCTV footage of the Shell truck stop, he did not use ‘my’ in relation to his vehicle except to respond to a question in cross-examination and say, ‘I never had Mr Falconio in my vehicle and I did not commit this so …‘
(‘Never’ is regarded as a weak denial. It is not as strong a denial as, ‘I didn’t have Mr Falconio in my vehicle …’)
When the use of the pronoun ‘my’ is continually avoided, it is a strong indication there is deception relating to the vehicle and camper-trailer. It is avoidance and distancing language, and demonstrates lack of commitment.
Regarding the camper-trailer, I am satisfied he did have it on the journey because he said he had problems with a loose axle when going along the Tanami Track. He said:
‘Just passed Yuendumu. It might have been just before or just after Yuendumu that I had the first trouble with the axle moving back against the tyre against the mudguard, rubbing on the mudguard.’
Saying he had trouble with the camper-trailer is a ‘complication’. He was able to give specific details. ‘Complications’ rarely enter a deceptive part of a narrative.
The defence also had a task to enamour Murdoch to the jury. Murdoch’s testimony is replete with embellishments which have little to do with the facts in issue. He also frequently resorts to the universal ‘you’, or ‘we’ to describe his actions, such as:
‘The usual stuff when we left Sedan was – out there they’re 80 acre blocks, they’re old shacks and what have you. We would generally leave after dark so that, you know, people would hear you leaving, they’d just hear a rumble across the limestone tracks, cause it’s all limestone country out there, rather than seeing your vehicle leaving. If they were seeing a vehicle leaving well, then people would know that your shack’s unattended, so you’d always go out in the dark. That particular trip, same as usual, around about the 7 o’clock mark set off.
While the universal ‘you’ is acceptable and justified in some circumstances, it does not have the commitment of using ‘I’ or ‘my’ as per the reconstructed sentence below:
‘The usual stuff when I left Sedan was – out there they’re 80 acre blocks, they’re old shacks and what have you. I would generally leave after dark so that, you know, people would hear me leaving, they’d just hear a rumble across the limestone tracks, cause it’s all limestone country out there, rather than seeing my vehicle leaving. If they were seeing my vehicle leaving well, then people would know that my shack’s unattended, so I’d always go out in the dark. That particular trip, same as usual, around about the 7 o’clock mark [missing ‘I’] set off.
The universal ‘you’ is a recourse to distance the speaker from an assertion and avoid commitment. Frequent use of ‘you’ can also be used by a narrator to help convince, as a recourse to engage the listener. If a person is telling the truth, they do not have to engage the listener and simply tell it as it is.
The missing ‘I’ is a further indication of lack of commitment. Who is the ‘we’ he refers to? Him and his dog Jack? Substituting ‘we’ for ‘I’ is another way to avoid the commitment of ‘I’.
Murdoch frequently resorted to giving explanations as to why he did things, or included unimportant information irrelevant to the facts in issue of the trial. As one example picked at random, Algie asked him where he went after leaving Marla. Notice also the regular use of ‘you’:
I think it’s Erldunda and you – where you go out to go out to Ayers Rock. Pulled in there, steak sandwich a bit of a run around with Jack, best getting Friday night, I didn’t want to go through Alice Springs you know loaded up and doing a run, I’m not in such a great hurry. So north of there, there’s a couple of Finke River crossings that you can park down on and there’s a couple of parking areas so I camped up there around half 10 or 11 o’clock at night I think I sort of finally sort of got to there.
Notice also the omission of ‘I’ before ‘(I) pulled in there …’,’ (I got a) steak sandwich, (I had) a bit of a run around with Jack…’ Note also he said, ‘I’m not in such a great hurry’: this is present tense. Present tense indicates he is not recalling from memory.
It is a general rule of language analysis that a person delivering a truthful account will rarely include embellishments in their language to persuade or convince. It is interesting to compare the conciseness of the language in Joanne Lees’ interview with the police to the transcript showing Murdoch’s language.
Author and journalist, Paul Toohey, who wrote The Killer Within – Inside the World of Bradley John Murdoch, summed up Murdoch’s evidence quite well:
‘He had taken the trailer in order to look like ‘Tommy Tourist’ and ‘You know, we were doing something illegal’. Tommy Tourist? Pulling spanners? It didn’t sound like good honest bush talk. It was forced and too chummy.’ (Toohey p200)
And
‘Murdoch said he nursed his combat-ready vehicle towards Western Australia at a docile ‘50, 60 kilometres an hour. I’m a big one for letting my tyres down,’ he said easily, explaining how it gave a softer ride and things in the back didn’t get broken. Jurors stirred. Lunch break was called. The court doors flew open and people made for the foyer, brushing the heavy settling bullshit from their shoulders.’ (Toohey, p202)
I sided with Toohey when he picked up on ‘Tommy Tourist’. Murdoch explained this was one reason why he towed the camper-trailer – to look like ‘Tommy tourist’. Arguably, towing a trailer would have the reverse effect and make him stand out from the crowd. The outback is replete with Toyota Landcruisers. Towing a trailer would make it easier for police patrols to notice.
That said, towing a trailer across the Tanami Track, when police were looking for a Landcruiser after the incident, would be to his advantage. I suggest his Tanami run is where the ‘Tommy Tourist’ seed grew in his mind and entered his language.
Another interesting point is that he used the word ‘unattended’ when he said, ‘ … then people would know that my shack’s unattended…’
‘Unattended’ is a cue-word picked up from the teachings of Statement Analyst by former US Marshall and author Mark McClish. He has made Statement Analysis, as he calls it, his life’s work. ‘Unattended’ is not a cue word I had encountered until this transcript.
McClish explained it is a word used primarily by women, particularly in relation to children or personal accessories. From his experience, it is rarely used by men unless they are engaged in law enforcement, security, the fire brigade, or healthcare.
Otherwise, its use by a man can indicate he is homosexual or bisexual. According to McClish, it is an ‘indicator’ and not an ‘absolute’. It would be necessary to identify other ‘indicators’ before concluding a male subject was bisexual or homosexual. I confess that I had reservations about referencing this word in my analysis – perhaps it was an American thing.
I knew Murdoch was not homosexual. While outside the realms of Language Analysis, I understand he was in a relationship with a woman. He had been married and had a son. And he had been charged – albeit acquitted – of the rape of two females a little over a year after the Falconio matter.
Nevertheless, putting faith in McClish’s experience, I had to consider Murdoch may be bisexual. I therefore noted in my initial analysis that this was something worth keeping in the back of one’s mind regarding friendships Murdoch had with men relevant to the investigation.
But, to my surprise, as I often am with the outcomes of Language Analysis, I came across what I would describe as information (not evidence) that Murdoch was bisexual.
Paul Toohey, mentioned above, wrote about observations made by a woman named Laura. (She was one of the two females who Murdoch allegedly raped, resulting in the South Australia trial. The other female was her twelve-year-old daughter. While the jury acquitted Murdoch, Laura’s surname was suppressed to conceal the identity of her daughter).
Laura was a former prostitute and the de facto of a former brothel-keeper, Fred Everitt. They lived in Sedan in an adjoining property to James Hepi. Prior to the Falconio matter, Everitt and Murdoch became close friends. Laura suspected there was a sexual relationship between them after they both spent four days holed up together at Murdoch’s Sedan residence.
Laura described how shortly after this time the two men spent together, Everitt cried when Murdoch left on the drug-run that led to the Falconio incident.
Laura also noticed how Murdoch shaved his arms and legs – something she thought unusual for a tough persona. Everitt got defensive when she raised it with him. Laura had worked in the sex industry so her experience and judgment would be better than most.
In August 2002, when a doctor examined Murdoch while he was in police custody in South Australia for the alleged rape, the doctor noted Murdoch had shaved his crotch and around the back of his legs. Murdoch said, ‘It stops chafing, yeah.’ (An otherwise unnecessary end tag of ‘yeah’ is used to convince. Perhaps to convince himself?)
While still on this question of sexual orientation, if the subject labels themselves as a ‘person’ rather than a ‘man’ or ‘woman’, it could indicate they have a problem with their sexual identity. In his letter to Bowles, Murdoch referred to himself twice as a ‘person’:
You came to see a person of average size and shoulder length hair and were confronted by a 6’4”, crew cut, fully tattooed arms, which to most people is intimidating. It is something that I have had to live with for many years and people that look past that find a gentle, kind person with some hard principles that won’t stand for any bull.
Once again, this usage of ‘person’ is an indicator and not an absolute. Nonetheless, the clues are stacking up.
In summary on this point, there is no smoking gun to conclude Murdoch is bisexual but there is cause for suspicion both from his language and the doubt raised by Laura. This single word of ‘unattended’ is an example of how certain words and phrases can offer subliminal clues which could prove important to an enquiry or analysis.
To further explain my thinking on whether Murdoch had a camper-trailer, I do need to go outside the bounds of a strict analysis of the language. While Language Analysis focuses on an examination of the language, ideally without influence from extrinsic issues, once the analysis is completed, it is essential the outcomes are compared to, and tested against, known facts and circumstances.
I do not have access to the case material or all the evidence, and only have a basic understanding of the wider information and facts. But by way of example of comparing language use to know facts, Joanne Lees described what she experienced when she was put in the cabin of the offender’s vehicle. She said in her first statement,
‘ … While I was in the front, I noticed that the front cab was quite ‘cluttered’ and that there wasn’t a lot of leg space …’
Murdoch, in his evidence said,
‘In the front, I had a milk crate bit of a set up, a mattress that he [Jack, his dog] could have on the back of the seat to the front of the dash …’
In this case, extrinsic information relating to this incidental description adds to the reliability and credibility of Lees’ description. Stated differently, it would be very unusual for a contrived account by Lees to go to imagine and fabricate this description.
Returning to the camper-trailer, Murdoch gave evidence that he was towing a camper-trailer but there was no camper-trailer attached in the CCTV footage from the Shell Alice Springs truck stop. Yet Murdoch and his vehicle were identified by various witnesses from this CCTV footage. This was at 12:38am, more than a reasonable time to allow him to drive there after the incident north of Barrow Creek, which is around three hours’ drive.
(He would have had around 1 ½ hours of unaccounted time beyond his driving time. Ti Tree to Barrow Creek 108 ks + 13 ks = 121. Sunset 14 July 6:04pm. Depart Ti Tree 6:20pm. 121ks @ 80 kph = 1hr 30m. Incident therefore around 8pm, and incident last, say, 30min. Following the incident, Murdoch had to travel 315ks to Alice Springs, say, at 120 kph, it would take 2h 40min (2h 24m @ 130 kph), to arrive around 11:10pm. He was recorded at the Alice Springs Truck Stop at 12:38am, giving him 1hr 30 min approx. to dispose of Falconio’s body).
Joanne Lees did not notice a trailer attached and encountered no tow-frame hindrance when she escaped from the back of the ute.
Nevertheless, his language (as explained above) and other circumstances suggest he did tow a camper-trailer on that trip.
Murdoch’s friend from the Fitzroy Crossing Roadhouse, Peter Jamieson, also said in evidence, when asked, ‘Did you notice anything about his vehicle, when you first saw it?’ He said, ‘It had a canopy on the back and he was towing a camper-trailer.’ That said, it is difficult to judge how much reliance can be placed on this claim by Jamieson because he was a friend of Murdoch. His evidence was not strong on many points but that is understandable because of the passage of time. But he was unequivocal about seeing the camper-trailer.
In the earlier part of his trip, Murdoch chose to camp overnight at Marla and at Finke River, and drive by day. It would be reasonable to assume he would camp overnight and drive by day on the rough Tanami Track.
He purchased two water tanks at Repco in Alice Springs. He said in evidence that before leaving Alice Springs, he fuelled up at the BP service station and ‘fill (sic) those two plastic jerry cans up with water and put them in their site.’ Two jerry cans of water would be an unnecessary burden for a quick trip across the Tanami – he never needed this much water on prior trips. But a good supply of water would be a consideration if he were to set up camp.
Joanne Lees claimed the back of the ute she was thrown into was uncluttered. According to Brian Johnson, who did several cross-country drug delivery trips with Murdoch, Murdoch had a fridge, plus other camping gear, in the back of his ute. Murdoch also said he had a fridge in the back, as discussed above. It is highly probable this gear was at a campsite when Lees was put in the back of his ute.
Murdoch had bought perishables at Alice Springs – milk, bread and smallgoods. If he did not have an intention to camp overnight, he would have put the perishables into his fridge at the first opportunity – that would have been when he was in the parking lot of the shopping centre. Note, as mentioned earlier, he claimed he put the ‘chook’ in the fridge when at Kittle’s car wash.
He said in evidence he stopped to put this food into the back of his ute at the start of the Tanami Track:
‘Headed out of Alice Springs around about – well, 20 Ks north of Alice Springs you’ve got the Tanami turnoff. Down there – I don’t know, what is it. 25-10 Ks there’s a little sort of tourist-bay type of thing, truck bay, where I pulled up and had a bit of a break for a while, let Jack out, and stacked those goods away that I’d bought, and then I was sort of ready to take off on my trip across the Tanami.’
It is reasonable to question why someone who is used to driving long stretches would pull over for a break after a 20k journey. He also used equivocal language: ‘you’ve got’, ‘I don’t know what it is’, ‘sort of tourist bay type of thing’, ‘bit of a break for a while’, and ‘sort of ready’. It would be most unlikely he would set up camp in a public location such as this turn-off truck bay, but one may consider he stopped here to check passing traffic to select a victim.
(Witness Julie-Anne McPhail, who met and travelled with Murdoch across the Nullabor on Murdoch’s preceding trip from Broome to Sedan, described how Murdoch commenced following her after she passed him, stopped on the side of the road. Of interest, McPhail, who looks a lot like Joanne Lees, later thought Murdoch may have been waiting for her, as she had told him she was planning to go to Barrow Creek with a friend and in a Kombi. In the absence of any definite motive, this is as good as any – arguably better than the suggested motive that Murdoch thought Falconio and Lees were law enforcement and tailing him – see https://www.smh.com.au/national/falconio-killer-may-killed-wrong-person-20061007-gdojre.html).
In evidence, he said he also stopped near Tilmouth Well to let air out of his tyres before commencing on the gravel. (The gravel now starts about 250k into the Track near Yuendumu. In 2001, I gather from one source the gravel started about 100k from the turnoff – see https://www.exploroz.com/Members/82.875/7/2001/Tanami_Track_Day_11_-_Alice_Springs_to_Papunya_Turnoff__Tanami_Track_.aspx ) However, Tilmouth Well is around 170ks along the Tanami Track.
When he manacled and abducted Laura and her daughter, he took them to a site where he set up camp. Admittedly, this was after the Falconio matter, but it demonstrated his way of thinking – his modus operandi. If his intention on the night of the Falconio matter was to abduct a victim, it is probable he planned to take his victim to some sort of a base.
It is also reasonable to presume he set up camp, possibly in the vicinity of the Tanami Track turnoff, which is around 30ks north of Alice Springs.
Having set up a camp site would explain why the camper-trailer was not attached when he attempted to abduct Lees, and when he got fuel at the Shell truck stop.
And having set up camp into the Tamami Track would also fit in with his need to go to the Alice Spring truck stop late at night to get fuel because he was initially considering camping until complications forced him to start the Tanami journey early than anticipated. His need to flee and refuel resulted in the otherwise inexplicable excursion to the Shell truck stop.
In this respect, I mentioned above there were language indicators that Murdoch was deceptive when describing his visit to the BP service station. Stepping outside language analysis, the best I can get from Google now is that diesel was around 70c a litre in 2001. For the $115 that I understand he spent at the Shell truck stop, that’s around 164 litres. Estimating using crude figures, a Toyota HZJ75, towing a trailer, should average around 11 litres per 100k. That is a rough indication Murdoch travelled an impossible 1800ks if he took on 164 litres at the Shell truck stop if he had in fact filled up at the BP as he claimed.
Sedan in South Australia to Barrow Creek, and back to Alice Springs, is 2054ks. It is possible, and achievable with his long-range fuel tanks, that he did not ‘fuel up’ at BP Alice Springs as he claimed. He certainly could not have travelled around 1800ks in the time since leaving Alice springs and returning to the Shell truck stop later that night.
Departing Alice Springs without fueling up is an indicator he planned to stay in the vicinity for some time and would fuel up when he was ready to depart.
If this is the case, it weakens the consideration that he filled the two water tanks if he did not go to the BP. But there would have been other opportunities to fill those tanks – at Kittle’s car wash, for example.
If he had the fridge in its travelling spot in the back of the ute, it begs the question why he travelled out of Alice Springs without refrigerating the perishables. It is probable he intended to put them in the fridge when he set up in a camp site. That said, it is unlikely the camp site would have been 100ks into the Track otherwise he would have stowed his perishables earlier. His chosen campsite would more likely be closer to the Stuart Highway.
Further, if he intended to go looking for a victim on the Stuart Highway, and if he was going to set up a camp, a good site would be somewhere adjacent to the bitumen section of the Tanami Track to avoid dust, not too far from Alice Springs, and away from sidetracks, bores, and homesteads.
As I understand it, the NT Police had no reason to be aware from initial enquiries that Murdoch had a camper-trailer on that trip. Indeed, it was the belief by the prosecution much later in the trial that Murdoch was not towing the camper-trailer.
If this was the investigation team’s and the prosecution belief back at that time, it is possible that prospective campsites, as well as a possible burial sites, along the Tanami Track were not searched in the early days of the investigation – if at all.
While it would be more likely that Murdoch, being mindful of Lees raising the alarm and the possibility of police roadblocks, would want to dispose of Falconio’s body as soon as possible. The counterargument is that he would have wanted to get out of the area as quickly as possible and may not have dallied to dispose of the body.
James Hepi claimed Murdoch raised the subject of the best place to bury a body in the outback. When a matter is pressing on a person’s mind, there is often a propensity to talk about it. People have an underlying urge to talk. Murdock nominated the soft earth of a spoon drain. This was allegedly said in an open statement to Hepi. People rarely lie in open statements. There is a high probability Murdoch buried Falconio in a spoon drain – bearing in mind there are around 1 ½ hours of unaccounted time from the end of the incident till Murdoch’s arrival at the Shell truck stop.
I understand the Police made an extensive search along the perimeters of the Stuart Highway, all the way to Alice Springs. I would also presume they made a thorough search of Neutral Junction Station which is close to Barrow Creek and where a vehicle like Murdoch’s was observed that night. The Police would have surely noticed disturbed earth in a spoon drain on their extensive search around the highway perimeter and Neutral Junction Station.
However, I do not know whether the Police searched along the Tanami Track, which Google Earth shows is replete with spoon drains.
At the extreme end of thinking into criminal behaviour and offender profiling, Murdoch by his own admission was an ‘organised’ type. (He was asked in cross-examination by the prosecution, ‘You’re a fastidious man, aren’t you, Mr Murdoch?’ He replied, ‘I am a bit meticulous.) One must therefore consider, at this extreme end of the spectrum, that he may have pre-prepared a burial plot before embarking on his venture. That plot may have been in the vicinity of his chosen campsite, quite probably in a spoon drain.
A search of spoon drains along the early part of the Tanami track, using a powerful metal detector, may be a consideration. According to Lees, Falconio was wearing a gold St Christopher medallion on a necklace. He may have also been wearing a watch and had a belt with a metal buckle as well as coins in his pockets. (ground-penetration radar may also be a consideration although this process would arguably be way too slow and finicky)
Apart from the above-mentioned items of extrinsic information, this analysis has not stepped outside an analysis of the language. In that respect, I do not have the full facts and circumstances of the police investigation and court proceedings at my disposal. However, the full facts and circumstances are not necessary for language analysis. Indeed, they can introduce bias or doubt and thus adversely affect an analysis – as demonstrated by the flawed initial SCAN analysis by the Police Analyst.
Bill Beale
May 2020