Latest / Real Crime with Adam Shand / Confessions and Consequences: The Grimmer Case Update | Ricki Nash

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Confessions and Consequences: The Grimmer Case Update | Ricki Nash · Real Crime with Adam Shand

0:05
Speaker 1: Appoche Production.
0:14
Speaker 2: Welcome to Real Crime with Adam Shand I'm your host,
0:16
Speaker 2: Adam Shand some good news about the Cheryl Grimmer case.
0:21
Speaker 2: We've covered with her brother Ricky Nash on a couple
0:24
Speaker 2: of occasions.
0:24
Speaker 3: Now.
0:26
Speaker 2: Three year old Cheryl Grimmer disappeared from a Wollongong beach
0:29
Speaker 2: more than five decades ago.
0:31
Speaker 1: In nineteen seventy one, confessions emerged detailing the abduction and
0:35
Speaker 1: murder of three year old Cheryl Grimmer.
0:39
Speaker 2: The New South Wales DPP has agreed to review the
0:43
Speaker 2: decision not to admit the critical admissions by Mercury, who
0:49
Speaker 2: is known. We can't spell out the confessions that he
0:52
Speaker 2: gave back in nineteen seventy one that he had abducted
0:55
Speaker 2: three year old Cheryl Grimmer and murdered her. The confession
1:00
Speaker 2: was recorded when the suspect was a minor, leading the
1:03
Speaker 2: Supreme Court to rule it inadmissible.
1:07
Speaker 3: The DPP's agreed to look at that now again.
1:10
Speaker 2: And this is an important breakthrough, one that her brother
1:13
Speaker 2: Ricky Nash, has been fighting for for a very long time.
1:16
Speaker 2: So I got Ricky and recently to talk about that
1:20
Speaker 2: and also the interview his daughter did that.
1:23
Speaker 1: Was the first time in my life that I've ever
1:26
Speaker 1: seen my dad ever emotional.
1:28
Speaker 3: I saw a very broken man.
1:31
Speaker 1: I've always felt that he's had that mask on, and
1:34
Speaker 1: that day, yeah, he was just a different person.
1:39
Speaker 4: Melanie Grimmer has been at different times been a strange
1:43
Speaker 4: from her father, and he suggested that she did an
1:47
Speaker 4: interview about what it's been like living with Ricky on
1:50
Speaker 4: his crusade for justice on behalf of his sister Cheryl.
1:55
Speaker 2: So have a listen to this. This is Ricky Nash
1:57
Speaker 2: recorded recently, Ricky Nash Welcome back to Real Crime with
2:03
Speaker 2: Adam Shanna. I feel like this has coming in the
2:05
Speaker 2: Grimmer Family podcast. I speak to you guys so much
2:08
Speaker 2: about your campaign for Cheryl, and I have to bring
2:12
Speaker 2: this up before we get too far in. You suggest
2:15
Speaker 2: that I speak to your daughter Melanie, and that's just
2:17
Speaker 2: obviously on the site, and I.
2:20
Speaker 3: Said, are you sure you want to do that?
2:22
Speaker 2: And she's spoken very frankly about your relationship and the
2:26
Speaker 2: impact on your whole family, by the way, typified by
2:28
Speaker 2: her experience, what this has been like for you with
2:32
Speaker 2: a single, focused, monomaniacal pursuit of the killer of your sister.
2:39
Speaker 1: Look until November of twenty sixteen. I always lived with
2:43
Speaker 1: the hope and it was a thing that kept me
2:45
Speaker 1: going because carrying blame, hearing your stepfather blame you and
2:50
Speaker 1: stuff like that for a lot of years, it took
2:53
Speaker 1: it top. So what kept me going, getting up each day,
2:57
Speaker 1: making mistakes every day, just trying to stumble through life
3:01
Speaker 1: was the hope that Cheryl one day would just knock
3:04
Speaker 1: on the door and say home, big brother, I'm home.
3:08
Speaker 1: Then in twenty sixteen, unfortunately, well, I get a call
3:13
Speaker 1: and it was from Damien Luhn, who was a detective
3:17
Speaker 1: from Wollongong, and he says, are you Ricky Nash And
3:21
Speaker 1: I say, yes, I am. He goes, he introduced himself
3:24
Speaker 1: and he says, Ricky, I've got something to tell you
3:27
Speaker 1: and it's in relation to the murder of your sister.
3:30
Speaker 1: And I you could have knocked me down with a
3:33
Speaker 1: feather duster. I mean, that was the first time I'd
3:35
Speaker 1: ever heard murder associated, the word murder associated with my sister,
3:41
Speaker 1: and it was like, you're just ripping her away from
3:44
Speaker 1: me again, right now, You're taking her away, And believe
3:48
Speaker 1: it or not, for the first part the months thereafter,
3:52
Speaker 1: I was hoping that both Damien and Frank got it wrong.
3:56
Speaker 1: I was praying that they got it wrong. And then
4:00
Speaker 1: we find out I think it's around May of seventeen
4:04
Speaker 1: that there's a confession, and that confession was made back
4:08
Speaker 1: in nineteen seventy one. It was graphic, very detailed, and
4:14
Speaker 1: I remember the Crown prosecutor at the time saying to us,
4:17
Speaker 1: they finally got their man. They've got him fifty years
4:20
Speaker 1: too late for your family. It is him to get
4:24
Speaker 1: a guilty verdict. Unfortunately for you as a family, you're
4:27
Speaker 1: going to have to hear about all of the mistakes
4:29
Speaker 1: that were made along the way. We don't care about mistakes.
4:33
Speaker 1: We just want a person to answer for taking our
4:37
Speaker 1: beautiful sister share All away from us.
4:39
Speaker 3: Yeah, that's right.
4:39
Speaker 2: So you've been captured the story very well there, which
4:42
Speaker 2: leads us to this point. But you've changed the subject somewhat.
4:45
Speaker 2: I wanted to get your impression of what your daughter
4:49
Speaker 2: Melanie said as she's telling your story through her eyes.
4:53
Speaker 3: How was that experience.
4:55
Speaker 1: I think she had the bravery to open the front
4:57
Speaker 1: door for us to sort of start talking. Which when
5:00
Speaker 1: I'm back in Australia, I'm currently residing in the Philippines
5:05
Speaker 1: when I'm back in Australia. You know, we'll sit down
5:07
Speaker 1: and have that chat. That's probably you know, forty odd
5:10
Speaker 1: years probably not probably thirty five years you're probably too
5:13
Speaker 1: younger early years, but probably around thirty five years overdue.
5:18
Speaker 1: So as much as I thought I was insane when
5:21
Speaker 1: I started listening to it, it was a very hard listen.
5:24
Speaker 1: Let me tell you some of the questions and some
5:26
Speaker 1: of the answers she gave. I mean, I wanted to
5:29
Speaker 1: murder you both. I think, yeah, I would have thought.
5:32
Speaker 2: I was thinking, Ricky's not going to thank me for this,
5:34
Speaker 2: but it was I kept saying to myself, he asked
5:36
Speaker 2: for this. He specifically asked me to do this. So
5:39
Speaker 2: part of you needed to have that door opened.
5:42
Speaker 1: Yeah. Part of the reason too, I wanted your audience
5:46
Speaker 1: to hear the impact that it has not just on
5:51
Speaker 1: it has generations, like as Mel mentioned, will this have
5:55
Speaker 1: an impact on her kids? She's very protective of her kids,
6:00
Speaker 1: so hopefully not. Hopefully life can go on as normal
6:05
Speaker 1: for my grandkids, but it may not because they're around
6:09
Speaker 1: it now. There's a lot of media at the moment
6:12
Speaker 1: they're hearing it. I mean, two of my grandkids are
6:15
Speaker 1: teenagers obviously social media. There's lots of stuff going on,
6:19
Speaker 1: and they've got lots of questions for their parents and
6:22
Speaker 1: they have to deal with that, they have to deal
6:24
Speaker 1: with something that happened fifty six years ago for their grandkids.
6:29
Speaker 2: And I should add that Melanie feels that because she
6:34
Speaker 2: looks like Cheryl, that she represents Cheryl to you as well,
6:41
Speaker 2: and there's a kind of ambivalence created.
6:44
Speaker 1: Yeah, my mother when she was alive, she was sort
6:47
Speaker 1: of you know, when Cheryl went missing, she struggled, She
6:51
Speaker 1: really really struggled. Then when mel was born, she was
6:56
Speaker 1: so protective of her in the early years, you know,
6:59
Speaker 1: super protective. And did she look at mel as you know,
7:04
Speaker 1: is this Cheryl Rebord one type thing? I don't know.
7:06
Speaker 1: I mean, I don't know what went through my mother's
7:09
Speaker 1: head every day. I know Cheryl bubbled at the top
7:12
Speaker 1: of the surface every day. And the reason I know
7:15
Speaker 1: that is I may have mentioned it before. One day,
7:17
Speaker 1: we're walking across the crossing in near where I lived,
7:21
Speaker 1: and as we were crossing the road, a woman was
7:23
Speaker 1: approaching from the other side, and my mother says to me,
7:26
Speaker 1: that could be Cheryl. So it was just bubbling there
7:31
Speaker 1: all day, every day, as it does with myself, and
7:35
Speaker 1: I'm sure my brother's to a certain degree as well.
7:39
Speaker 1: Fortunately for them, they were a bit younger, and a
7:41
Speaker 1: lot of it they can't remember, so a little bit
7:44
Speaker 1: of a blessing there, right.
7:45
Speaker 2: And you and the family have lived the ups and
7:48
Speaker 2: downs of this tragedy for years, and I think for
7:54
Speaker 2: others close to you, including Mel, they ride the ups
7:58
Speaker 2: and downs as well. And when in twenty sixteen there
8:03
Speaker 2: was a press conference to anounced the new findings of
8:06
Speaker 2: the investigation and existence of Mercury and Co. She went
8:11
Speaker 2: there and reunited with you. Then tell that story from
8:15
Speaker 2: your perspective.
8:17
Speaker 1: In the lead up to that press conference in sixteen,
8:21
Speaker 1: we weren't talking. We were sort of a strange and
8:24
Speaker 1: I was in a crazy place, and we weren't talking.
8:27
Speaker 1: And I always kept her informed when something was happening
8:30
Speaker 1: in Wollongong, because obviously she carried the name Grimmar, so
8:34
Speaker 1: I always kept her informed, regardless of how distant we
8:37
Speaker 1: were with what was going on with Cheryl's case. And
8:40
Speaker 1: I let her know that there was going to be
8:42
Speaker 1: a media conference and if she wished, she could have
8:45
Speaker 1: come down and watch. I didn't think she'd show up,
8:49
Speaker 1: to be quite honest, but she did. She showed up,
8:52
Speaker 1: and I think for the first time she realized, you know,
8:56
Speaker 1: the impact that Cheryl's disappearance had had on me. There
9:02
Speaker 1: was a picture and we didn't know it was taken,
9:05
Speaker 1: was taken by Sydney Morning Herald. That was our first
9:09
Speaker 1: little cuddle together in many many years. Really, how long
9:14
Speaker 1: been years since we'd spoken. I couldn't tell you many years.
9:18
Speaker 2: Yeah, because people listening will be thinking. It's one thing
9:23
Speaker 2: to miss all those years, was Eryl. She was so
9:27
Speaker 2: wrongly taken away from you. But to have a situation
9:30
Speaker 2: where you don't see your own daughter, that's kind of
9:33
Speaker 2: cutting off your nose despite your face.
9:34
Speaker 3: Some people might say.
9:37
Speaker 1: Look, I wasn't a good father. You know, my mind
9:41
Speaker 1: wasn't in the right place, and I had Mel very young,
9:46
Speaker 1: both me and her mother. I mean we're both really young,
9:51
Speaker 1: we're teenagers. I certainly wasn't ready for it, and I'm
9:55
Speaker 1: sure her mother wasn't ready for it. I mean, you know,
9:59
Speaker 1: just I'm grateful I've got her, but you know, you
10:03
Speaker 1: know I would have been quite happy to get through
10:05
Speaker 1: without her as well. I mean, it was eighteen nineteen, you.
10:09
Speaker 2: Know, fortunately for you, Ricky, love is forgiving. Love endlessly
10:15
Speaker 2: forgets the wrongs, and you know that her basic empathy
10:20
Speaker 2: and love for you, even when you didn't love yourself
10:23
Speaker 2: that much, I think is the bones of what you've
10:27
Speaker 2: got to start from now. And I'm really looking forward
10:30
Speaker 2: to seeing that. And I think the great thing is
10:32
Speaker 2: you've got to demonstrate all this work and effort and
10:35
Speaker 2: sacrifice and time away from your family is going to
10:38
Speaker 2: be worth it. And that's the perfect segue to the
10:40
Speaker 2: news we should be talking about in this episode that
10:45
Speaker 2: the top prosecutor in New South Wales has agreed to
10:48
Speaker 2: review the case and look at the ruling that Mercury's
10:54
Speaker 2: evidence was not admissible because there was allegedly not an
10:57
Speaker 2: adult around at the time. I'm going to tell you personally,
11:01
Speaker 2: I didn't think you're going to get this. So it
11:05
Speaker 2: is a tremendous achievement in itself, because these people don't
11:10
Speaker 2: like to admit their mistakes, even when it's generations before
11:15
Speaker 2: they've been made. So let's try to put the context
11:18
Speaker 2: around this decision for you.
11:21
Speaker 1: Yeah, look very grateful to Sally Dowling and the odp
11:26
Speaker 1: P for coming to this decision. I mean, it's something
11:32
Speaker 1: that our family are fought for. My cousin, doctor Michael Grimmer,
11:36
Speaker 1: very very smart individual, put together for amazing submissions through
11:42
Speaker 1: to the ODPP for them to consider. And it was
11:46
Speaker 1: years of research, around about seven years of research around
11:49
Speaker 1: the retrospective law around the suppression of his name, and
11:55
Speaker 1: we've given lots of things for the ODPP to reference to.
12:00
Speaker 1: Hopefully Sally's considered all of that, and I'm sure she
12:03
Speaker 1: has before making monumental decision from the ODPP. It's that
12:08
Speaker 1: little crack we've been waiting for. I think I've told
12:11
Speaker 1: you many many times, and I've told detectives and I've
12:14
Speaker 1: told the media. This person that confess Mercury, he confessed
12:19
Speaker 1: in such graphic detail, you know, not just to murdering Cheryl,
12:25
Speaker 1: abducting and murdering her. He wanted to physically abuse her,
12:29
Speaker 1: a three year old, That's what he wanted to do.
12:31
Speaker 1: That's why he took her. One thing's confessing to abducting
12:37
Speaker 1: and murdering a little three year old. Another thing is confessing.
12:40
Speaker 2: Can I interject there, put yourself in his shoes just
12:44
Speaker 2: for a moment, As loathsome as that sounds, would you
12:47
Speaker 2: be talking to the media. Would you be you know,
12:49
Speaker 2: when you're going to spend the rest of your life
12:51
Speaker 2: in jail if you do that. Play devil's advocate here.
12:54
Speaker 2: So I'm just going to question your expectation around that.
12:58
Speaker 1: If he didn't do it, he wouldn't be spending the
13:00
Speaker 1: rest of his life in jail. So if you didn't
13:02
Speaker 1: do it, tell us you didn't do it. But his
13:05
Speaker 1: silence is adding more to his guilt. The police have
13:09
Speaker 1: told us they know he'd done it. The first ground
13:11
Speaker 1: prosecutor told us he knows he's done it, like the
13:16
Speaker 1: police and the ODPP back in twenty seventeen. It was
13:20
Speaker 1: a massive decision. We're talking about a near fifty year
13:23
Speaker 1: old cold case at that time. That they've issued an
13:27
Speaker 1: arrest warrant, they've issued an extradition warrant from Victoria to
13:32
Speaker 1: New South Wales. That's a big decision to make. And
13:36
Speaker 1: the two police officers name in lun and Frank Samfittali
13:40
Speaker 1: you know as Franken Damon, have both told me they've
13:43
Speaker 1: got to be one hundred percent sure before they pushed
13:47
Speaker 1: the green light on this, because they're going to rip
13:49
Speaker 1: somebody's life apart. Now they don't take that easily. That's
13:54
Speaker 1: a big decision. They'd crossed their t's, dotted their eyes
13:58
Speaker 1: and now it was time. And everybody thought at the time,
14:01
Speaker 1: the lawyers, everybody, Yes, we're going to issue and yes.
14:04
Speaker 1: It all happened in the twenty seventeen where Mercury showed
14:10
Speaker 1: up at Frankston Police station the week before. He rang
14:15
Speaker 1: Frank sam Vitali on the Sunday and said, I believe
14:18
Speaker 1: you're looking for me, and Frank goes, yes, what are
14:21
Speaker 1: you looking for me for? Frank said, will you tell me?
14:25
Speaker 1: And he said to Frank, he said, I asked about
14:27
Speaker 1: something I've done many years ago at Faerry Beach. Frank
14:31
Speaker 1: as it could be. So what we advise you to
14:34
Speaker 1: do is a lawyer and come down to the Frankston
14:36
Speaker 1: Police station where we'll be questioning you.
14:40
Speaker 3: Yeah.
14:41
Speaker 2: Interesting you raised that conversation for Frank was at a
14:43
Speaker 2: barbecue at the time, and yes he was. He's talking
14:47
Speaker 2: to him and he's quickly mindful that he shouldn't let
14:49
Speaker 2: him continue confessing. Normally someone would say, oh, tell me more,
14:54
Speaker 2: even though you're on the phone, you know, And I
14:56
Speaker 2: wonder what else he would have said had Frank not
14:59
Speaker 2: been constrained by the police method and gathering evidence and stuff. Well,
15:03
Speaker 2: I wonder what he might have been able to say.
15:06
Speaker 1: Then, once again, police doing the right thing. Back in
15:10
Speaker 1: nine pine seventy one when he gave this detailed confession,
15:13
Speaker 1: police done the right thing. Frank again, the right thing.
15:17
Speaker 1: Police have done the right thing. We shouldn't be held
15:21
Speaker 1: back by a technicality. If the front line are doing
15:26
Speaker 1: the right thing, the police are fighting to get justice
15:30
Speaker 1: for families, and then they're tied up by a technicality,
15:34
Speaker 1: that's not right.
15:36
Speaker 3: I've got to be honest with you, Ricky.
15:37
Speaker 2: I think the principle that miners should have an adult
15:41
Speaker 2: in the room when they're being questioned, I think is sound.
15:44
Speaker 2: We've seen in American in particular, lots of false confessions
15:47
Speaker 2: by police after putting pressure on minus. So I think
15:51
Speaker 2: that principle is okay. It's using it in retrospect when
15:56
Speaker 2: the law of the land at the time allowed for
15:58
Speaker 2: that to be done, and he made the statement, there's
16:02
Speaker 2: a contemporaneous note of the statement that time, and that
16:07
Speaker 2: should stand as evidence you really have willed this opportunity
16:12
Speaker 2: to being I didn't want to give it to you.
16:16
Speaker 2: As we've said many times in conversation that I felt
16:20
Speaker 2: the only way to move things along was to find
16:22
Speaker 2: somebody to say no, there was an adult in the
16:25
Speaker 2: room at the boys home when Mercury gave the confession
16:28
Speaker 2: to the detectives, and I felt that to find some
16:31
Speaker 2: new evidence was really the best way to get it
16:35
Speaker 2: back in court. But what you'll being confronted with now,
16:37
Speaker 2: is there the DPP saying we're going to review the
16:41
Speaker 2: application of the law.
16:43
Speaker 3: Is that correct?
16:45
Speaker 1: You use the word minor. He was seventeen years in
16:49
Speaker 1: so many months, nearly what we would classify as an adult.
16:53
Speaker 1: Back in the seventies, people were married at sixteen and seventeen,
16:56
Speaker 1: people had full time jobs. I look at a minor
17:00
Speaker 1: as anyone from sort of zero up to twelve years
17:04
Speaker 1: of a then you're starting to become an adult. You know,
17:07
Speaker 1: at seventeen, god knows how many months he was. You're
17:10
Speaker 1: an adult, You're not a minor. You've got to understand
17:14
Speaker 1: he was. And I've made reference to it this week
17:17
Speaker 1: and it's come out in the press. Police were invited
17:20
Speaker 1: to the shelter because one of his minders contacted police
17:25
Speaker 1: and said, we have information. He's told me certain stuff
17:29
Speaker 1: about a missing girl, Eryl Grimmer. I feel that you
17:32
Speaker 1: should come down and at least speak to him. So
17:35
Speaker 1: police went there casually to speak to him, not to
17:39
Speaker 1: sort of hear about a confession. He's surrounded by his terrors.
17:45
Speaker 1: That's where he resided. I say, he's surrounded by his carerors,
17:50
Speaker 1: by acting parents. Carers are your acting parents. Okay. He
17:55
Speaker 1: obviously was not an easy individual, even as as a teenager,
18:00
Speaker 1: you know, running away from home. I don't know what
18:02
Speaker 1: his background was as a youth. But when he started
18:07
Speaker 1: to confess and police cautioned him, done everything right, that's
18:10
Speaker 1: all been proven. He's surrounded by his terrors. It goes
18:14
Speaker 1: to show that were there other people in that room.
18:18
Speaker 1: That's what I've sort of asked homicide to look into.
18:22
Speaker 1: Who else was in that room, who else was around
18:25
Speaker 1: on that particular time that he confessed. But again in
18:30
Speaker 1: twenty seventeen, when he rocks up to Frankston police station,
18:35
Speaker 1: he knew that he was going to be questioned about
18:37
Speaker 1: the murder and abduction of Sheryl Grimmer. He knew that
18:40
Speaker 1: now any smart guy is going to go down with
18:43
Speaker 1: at least some type of legal representation. You know, you're
18:46
Speaker 1: going to be questioned about that, he shows up again
18:50
Speaker 1: on his own, shows up very cocky and adopts that
18:55
Speaker 1: statement again, signs every single page. Now at the end
18:59
Speaker 1: of that, at the end of going through it all
19:01
Speaker 1: the actual interview, at the end of it, he said
19:05
Speaker 1: I've never been to Ferry Meadow Beach. It didn't say
19:08
Speaker 1: I didn't do it.
19:10
Speaker 2: So you go around in circles on the same points
19:13
Speaker 2: with respect because you have to, because you've been driving
19:16
Speaker 2: this back at the prosecutors, the government, the police, and
19:19
Speaker 2: you had success now and getting to reassess whether that
19:23
Speaker 2: confession should indeed have been admissible, and I believe it
19:27
Speaker 2: should have been. They should have let the trial run
19:29
Speaker 2: the conclusion, let it be weighed up. But to rule
19:31
Speaker 2: it out I think was extreme. So what are you
19:34
Speaker 2: hoping for in this review given we don't have any
19:37
Speaker 2: new evidence? We just have there the prosecutor is now
19:41
Speaker 2: willing to review the admissibility of this key confession.
19:46
Speaker 1: Well, you're saying we don't have any new evidence. I
19:49
Speaker 1: say we do. I say there's an eyewitness, we have informants. Now,
19:53
Speaker 1: there's lots of avenues that police can go down now,
19:57
Speaker 1: and really we've given them eleven lines of Investigation. We
20:01
Speaker 1: would like them to follow through after all of the
20:05
Speaker 1: information we've put together since twenty nineteen. We sent them
20:09
Speaker 1: detailed information through to the New South Wales Homicide. We
20:13
Speaker 1: have received a reply from David Laidlaw saying he will
20:17
Speaker 1: look into it. He will confer with his colleagues. We
20:20
Speaker 1: want the ODPP and Homicide and Victorian Homicide to work together,
20:28
Speaker 1: these three divisions to work together because if they do,
20:32
Speaker 1: and they work with truth, transparency and follow through on
20:37
Speaker 1: everything that's become available since twenty nineteen, he will be
20:43
Speaker 1: arrested and he will be convicted.
20:47
Speaker 2: But the point is, if you can find a witness
20:49
Speaker 2: to the original interview in nineteen seventy one where Mercury confesses,
20:56
Speaker 2: that's all corroborating stuff, because getting that confession back in
20:59
Speaker 2: is the main game.
21:00
Speaker 3: You know that, Ricky.
21:01
Speaker 2: So what I'm saying to you is how much hope
21:04
Speaker 2: do you have that they will come to a different
21:07
Speaker 2: conclusion from what the court held.
21:10
Speaker 1: Our whole family hold out a lot of hope. I mean,
21:14
Speaker 1: we can't stop until we hear the truth. We just
21:17
Speaker 1: can't stop knowing what we know. If it were your sister,
21:22
Speaker 1: what would you do? What lengths would you go to.
21:25
Speaker 1: You know, you just can't stop knowing what we know.
21:28
Speaker 1: We know everything that's in the confession. We see every
21:31
Speaker 1: day we wake up. His demeanor hasn't changed. He just hides,
21:35
Speaker 1: you know, he says nothing. Recently, a media outlet contacted
21:39
Speaker 1: him and he had his chance to say something, and
21:42
Speaker 1: he just said, I don't want to talk nothing.
21:45
Speaker 3: And I get that.
21:46
Speaker 2: I get that he's hoping to die before he goes
21:49
Speaker 2: back to jail, Which kind of brings me to a
21:52
Speaker 2: point that Melanie raised, which is, do you guys differ
21:55
Speaker 2: on that you have a relentless focus on putting him
21:59
Speaker 2: in jail for the murder of Cheryl.
22:00
Speaker 3: That's perfectly just and understandable.
22:03
Speaker 2: Melanie takes the position that the fact that he's spent
22:05
Speaker 2: a couple of years in custody and was publicly outed
22:10
Speaker 2: as the killer in a pragmatic way would be enough
22:13
Speaker 2: for her. Can you see where she's coming from?
22:17
Speaker 1: Yeah, But he wasn't publicly outed, was he? I mean,
22:20
Speaker 1: he's still hidden today. He sat two years quietly. Even
22:25
Speaker 1: where he resided at Long Bay in Sydney. For those
22:28
Speaker 1: two years, officers said there he was just cold, calculated, cool,
22:33
Speaker 1: as a cucumber, I think were their words. If he's
22:37
Speaker 1: done this to Cheryl, what else has he done since
22:40
Speaker 1: that day? You know he got away after confessing in
22:44
Speaker 1: total detail. Police let him walk out and go. See
22:47
Speaker 1: you get on with your life. We don't care.
22:50
Speaker 2: I get all that. We've talked about that before, but
22:53
Speaker 2: I mean, I'm just trying to get that position of
22:55
Speaker 2: Melaniees where she's saying, if nothing else happens, we've at
22:59
Speaker 2: least got that that's not going to be enough for you.
23:02
Speaker 1: Is it nowhere near enough be enough for you?
23:06
Speaker 3: Probably not.
23:07
Speaker 1: It's nowhere near enough. What he says he took her for?
23:11
Speaker 1: Did he do that? Goes through our minds every day.
23:14
Speaker 1: Did he did he touch her? Did he know rape her?
23:18
Speaker 1: He confessed to it, He confessed you wanted to do it. No,
23:21
Speaker 1: it's nowhere near enough. Two years for a life of
23:25
Speaker 1: a three year old, nowhere near enough? Has he been
23:29
Speaker 1: publicly added?
23:30
Speaker 2: No made listen, I'm going to I'm going to. I'm
23:33
Speaker 2: going to pull you up there. Let's talk again when
23:39
Speaker 2: we know more. The Independent MP fro New South Wales
23:43
Speaker 2: Jeremy Buckingham has got.
23:46
Speaker 3: His inquiry at foot soon and Cheryl we mentioned there.
23:50
Speaker 2: I still feel that more investigation needs to happen around
23:54
Speaker 2: the circumstances in the boys home. So we aren't talking
23:58
Speaker 2: in a few months time of the government saying, well, listen,
24:00
Speaker 2: we gave Ricky what he wanted. He's a review of
24:03
Speaker 2: the legislation. He's a review of what happened. Can we
24:06
Speaker 2: come to the same conclusion. So I think there needs
24:09
Speaker 2: to be more evidence to make sure that there's another
24:12
Speaker 2: reason that they should get back into court. And I
24:14
Speaker 2: don't think it's insoluble. This was not like a solitary
24:18
Speaker 2: confinement situation. There were lots of boys, there are lots
24:20
Speaker 2: of staff, and I think to recreate and I think
24:23
Speaker 2: another great podcast episode should be to recreate what happened
24:27
Speaker 2: at that boys home to work out the full atmosphere.
24:31
Speaker 2: Is it possible to be in a place where no
24:33
Speaker 2: one can hear and that no one's walking through and
24:36
Speaker 2: no one's sitting in the next chair or one's. All
24:38
Speaker 2: we've got is the record that was typed out. That's
24:41
Speaker 2: all we have. So I think that's your best and
24:44
Speaker 2: main hope of achieving your goal to get that confession
24:49
Speaker 2: back in. I'm hoping that the DPP or the prosecutor
24:52
Speaker 2: might just say, Okay, let's just run it back in court,
24:54
Speaker 2: and I think that's a just outcome as well. But
24:57
Speaker 2: more evidence to me is critical.
24:59
Speaker 1: Yeah, absolutely, And to get that you need to sit
25:02
Speaker 1: down with all the people that have come forward, need
25:05
Speaker 1: to sit down, get their statements, talk to them. I mean,
25:08
Speaker 1: there's an eyewitness that came forward due to the BBC
25:12
Speaker 1: podcast Very Meadow, and he said he was there on
25:15
Speaker 1: the day. He was young at the time, and he
25:18
Speaker 1: actually said to Damian Luhne, I saw a team boy
25:23
Speaker 1: carry sher all away. That was the first person that's
25:26
Speaker 1: ever come forward. And he said he's carried the guilt
25:29
Speaker 1: all of his life as well for not coming forward soon.
25:31
Speaker 1: Damien Lune spoke to him in detail, believed he was
25:35
Speaker 1: very creditable and even ranging homicide himself, you know, and said, look,
25:40
Speaker 1: you guys really need to speak to this eyewitness. He
25:43
Speaker 1: is very credible. You need to get a statement. Blah
25:45
Speaker 1: blah blah. So for Damien, you know, it just wasn't
25:49
Speaker 1: a normal police officer. He was a senior detective responsible
25:53
Speaker 1: for bringing Chris Dawson to justice. You know, this wasn't
25:56
Speaker 1: a police officer that was outright in parking tickets. He's
26:01
Speaker 1: very seasoned.
26:03
Speaker 3: No, he's very good.
26:03
Speaker 2: But you've had some tremendous police officers on the case. Latterly,
26:08
Speaker 2: maybe it's not so flash managers and of those police
26:12
Speaker 2: and a lot of opportunities were lost. I think again,
26:16
Speaker 2: you willed this into being. That's my message to you
26:19
Speaker 2: and the audience. You will this into being, and the
26:23
Speaker 2: opportunity to get a result is there now, I think.
26:27
Speaker 3: And you've also been.
26:29
Speaker 2: Very successful at telling the story yourself through lots of media,
26:34
Speaker 2: and I think it's probably time you told your story
26:37
Speaker 2: without filtering, and maybe a book is the answer. But
26:42
Speaker 2: that also continues to probe areas that need reinvesting. I'm
26:48
Speaker 2: not saying that Damien and Frank didn't look hard at
26:51
Speaker 2: the boys Home. I'm sure they did, But within a
26:55
Speaker 2: storytelling context, you can pick up a lot more that
26:58
Speaker 2: might lead just to some more evidence. So I think
27:03
Speaker 2: it's time that there was a book with Ricky Nash's
27:05
Speaker 2: name on it and we can talk about how that happens.
27:08
Speaker 1: Yeah, I'd be more than happy to do that. You know,
27:10
Speaker 1: you've sort of got to be careful what you say
27:13
Speaker 1: and what you do when you're doing an interview as well.
27:16
Speaker 1: I mean, you just want everybody to work with you,
27:18
Speaker 1: not against you. You know, I need authorities working with
27:21
Speaker 1: our family. I need police working with our family. Am
27:25
Speaker 1: I happy with the way Cheryl's case has been handled?
27:28
Speaker 1: Are our family happy? Definitely not. Lots of mistakes were made,
27:33
Speaker 1: but let's push all the mistakes aside. Let's just focus
27:36
Speaker 1: on Cheryl and have somebody answer for what they've done
27:40
Speaker 1: to her.
27:41
Speaker 3: Well.
27:41
Speaker 2: Yeah, are you know something else that I think Melanie
27:44
Speaker 2: alluded to as well that you have to allow yourself
27:48
Speaker 2: some credit for the successes you've had, as you know,
27:52
Speaker 2: nothing is going to.
27:52
Speaker 3: Bring Cheryl back, okay, but.
27:55
Speaker 2: Just having the breaks that you've had in recent years
27:59
Speaker 2: is phenomenal. Because I could name you a dozen young
28:02
Speaker 2: girls who've never been found, no suspect ever identified. Ever,
28:06
Speaker 2: it's inevitable to compare your situation with other families, and
28:10
Speaker 2: I think you're having success, but you're also an inspiration
28:13
Speaker 2: for those to keep fighting without getting through ra Rah.
28:17
Speaker 1: So yeah, I've had a lot of good help. My cousin,
28:20
Speaker 1: doctor Michael Grimmer and the UK. He's relentless as well
28:23
Speaker 1: since and he's in a similar situation to me in life.
28:28
Speaker 1: He didn't realize he was part of the Grimmer family
28:30
Speaker 1: until late in his life when he submitted his DNA
28:34
Speaker 1: and found out he was part of the Grimmer family. Really,
28:37
Speaker 1: I didn't know who his father was until late in life,
28:41
Speaker 1: very late in life as an adult.
28:43
Speaker 3: I don't know that side story.
28:45
Speaker 1: Oh there you're go. There's lots you don't know that
28:47
Speaker 1: can go into a book, Adam, lots.
28:49
Speaker 2: Yeah, right, I think we've covered all the news and
28:53
Speaker 2: views that all fit to print. Again, I want to
28:55
Speaker 2: thank you for putting forward the idea of speaking to
28:57
Speaker 2: Melanie and giving a broader dimension to your family. And
29:00
Speaker 2: I'm sure you'll come up with more ideas because you're
29:02
Speaker 2: an ideas man. You've kept this story in the light
29:06
Speaker 2: and got the due reward. And I don't want to
29:08
Speaker 2: say that's the end of itself. It's not, but well done,
29:12
Speaker 2: and look forward to the next steps.
29:15
Speaker 1: Just keep punching on that, keep fighting.
29:20
Speaker 2: That's Ricky Nash, father of Melanie Grimmer, brother of Cheryl Grimmer.
29:25
Speaker 3: He'll never give up.
29:25
Speaker 2: And I think this is a tremendous encouragement to others
29:29
Speaker 2: to follow the same track. He's been relentless willed this
29:31
Speaker 2: into being. I think it's a great story and he's
29:35
Speaker 2: doing the utmost for his family, overcoming the inevitable self
29:39
Speaker 2: blame of how this story began. One day he'll get
29:42
Speaker 2: over that, but I think justice must be done for
29:44
Speaker 2: that to happen. It's been selfless. Hopefully the best is
29:47
Speaker 2: yet to come. If you have information about this or
29:49
Speaker 2: any other crime, please call crime Stoppers one one hundred,
29:52
Speaker 2: triple three, triples zero. If you trust the cops, and
29:55
Speaker 2: maybe elements of this story will make you not trust
29:57
Speaker 2: the cops, you can always email me Adam Shanner, writer
30:00
Speaker 2: at gmail dot com. This has been Adam Shanner for
30:04
Speaker 2: Real Crime. Thanksfully listen.
30:12
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