Joanne hypnotised in bid to find Falconio killer
The girlfriend of a British backpacker believed murdered in the Australian Outback underwent hypnotherapy to try to dredge up more evidence for police hunting the killer, a policewoman told a court today.
Australian mechanic Bradley John Murdoch is accused of murdering Peter Falconio, from Huddersfield, on July 14, 2001, and abducting and assaulting Falconio’s girlfriend Joanne Lees.
He is facing a hearing in the northern city of Darwin to establish if evidence against him is strong enough to send to a jury trial.
Lees, from Brighton, was hypnotised in the weeks after Falconio’s alleged murder, Superintendent Jeanette Kerr told Darwin Magistrates Court.
“It was an attempt to try and (get) more information from Ms. Lees in relation to the offender of the matter,” Kerr said.
It was unclear if investigators gained any new information from Lees under hypnosis.
Kerr said police missed important evidence in initial searches of the crime scene – duct tape believed to have been used as handcuffs to restrain Lees, until she stumbled upon it three months later.
Kerr said she was visiting the crime scene near the isolated Outback community of Barrow Creek in central Australia in October 2001 and looked at the tree Lees claimed she hid behind after escaping her attacker.
“I approached the tree and bent down to walk under the tree and as I bent down ... I saw two pieces of black tape on the ground,” Kerr said.
“I immediately believed that they were the two pieces of black tape Ms. Lees had described as biting off the manacles that she was restrained with.”
Asked if she considered the tape to be relevant, Kerr replied: “Absolutely“.
Crime Scene Examiner Ian Spilsbury then searched the area under the tree and found a lip balm stick that Ms Lees said she used to try to lubricate her wrists to remove her restraints while under the tree, she said.
“Senior Constable Spilsbury moved the leaf debris aside and searched the area and located the lip balm,” she said.
The tape and lip balm were discovered three months after police searched the area and found the white lid of the lip balm, the court has been told.
During today’s proceeding, Murdoch asked to inspect the lip balm.
Kerr said a chaperone was appointed to be with Lees at all times when she was in Alice Springs soon after the attack.
“Ms Lees was alone in Australia,” she said.
“We felt (she was) extremely vulnerable.
“She was frightened and traumatised and she needed a support person with her.”
The committal hearing heard from four police witnesses involved in the investigation of the alleged murder.
South Australian police Detective Sergeant Dennis Connor earlier told the court he was involved in examining four vehicles linked with the case.
The court was told parts of the four-wheel-drive vehicles had been interchanged with each other, and one had a different bull bar which Murdoch purchased from a shop in Adelaide in March 2002.
The pretrial hearing is scheduled to last six weeks.
