Latest / Real Crime with Adam Shand / The Dark Legend of Mervin Henry Stevenson | Elliot Hannay

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The Dark Legend of Mervin Henry Stevenson | Elliot Hannay · Real Crime with Adam Shand

0:05
Speaker 1: Appoche Production.
0:14
Speaker 2: Welcome to Real Crime at Adam Shand. I'm your host,
0:17
Speaker 2: Adam Shand. If you ask the average person who is
0:20
Speaker 2: Australia's most corrupt and dangerous cop, most people will probably
0:24
Speaker 2: say Roger Rogerson Brandon one of the country's most corrupt cops.
0:28
Speaker 2: Convicted murderer Roger Rogerson. His meteoric rise during the seventies
0:32
Speaker 2: and eighties came during the height of police corruption in
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Speaker 2: our state. But I think there might be another contender
0:39
Speaker 2: for the title. In twenty twenty three, I was in Pentland,
0:43
Speaker 2: near Charter's Towers in far North Queensland, researching the nineteen
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Speaker 2: seventy two disappearance of hitchhikers Anita Cunningham and Robin Hoyneville Bartram.
0:53
Speaker 2: It's one of Australia's most baffling unsolved murders. Robin's body
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Speaker 2: was found under a bridge at Sensible Creek near Pentland.
1:01
Speaker 2: She'd been executed with a twenty two rifle. Anita has
1:05
Speaker 2: never been found. As I went around Pentland talking to
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Speaker 2: old timers about the case, the name of a new
1:11
Speaker 2: suspect cropped up and he was a police officer, Superintendent
1:16
Speaker 2: Mervyn Henry Stevenson, former police Superintendent MERV.
1:21
Speaker 3: Stevenson was named as a person of interest.
1:25
Speaker 2: The townsfolk couldn't give me clear evidence of why Stevenson
1:28
Speaker 2: would have been involved in this crime, but the attitude
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Speaker 2: was that anything shady, mysterious, or brutal in that era
1:34
Speaker 2: could have connections to Stevenson. He was a figure who
1:38
Speaker 2: inspired genuine terror and fear, not respect. Like Rogerson, Stevenson
1:44
Speaker 2: was a decorated officer and a larger than life figure.
1:48
Speaker 2: He made his name as boss of the police stock
1:50
Speaker 2: Squad and was an expert horseman and bushman, the last
1:54
Speaker 2: of the corn beef and damper coppers, as he was known.
1:57
Speaker 2: He was inducted into the Stockman's Hall of Fame, and
2:00
Speaker 2: when he died of cancer in two thousand and one,
2:03
Speaker 2: he was farewelled by a police guard of honor at
2:05
Speaker 2: his funeral in Townsville. He was never convicted of any crime,
2:10
Speaker 2: but his retirement news had been marred by allegations of corruption,
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Speaker 2: of cattle duffing and even murder.
2:16
Speaker 3: MP Bob Catatt stood up in Federal Parliament in two
2:19
Speaker 3: thousand and six and told of the corruption that hung
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Speaker 3: over the policeman as a ringleader of the so called
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Speaker 3: Crooked Creek Cattle Company.
2:28
Speaker 2: I've kept Stevenson's name in the back of my mind
2:30
Speaker 2: ever since until I met the former editor of the
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Speaker 2: Townsville Bulletin newspaper, Elliot Hannay. Elliott had several chilling run
2:38
Speaker 2: ins with Stevenson and believes he may have gotten away
2:41
Speaker 2: with several murders. He's written about Stevenson in his biography
2:46
Speaker 2: The Cult with No Regrets, and then followed up with
2:49
Speaker 2: some thinly veiled references to Stevenson in another book called
2:52
Speaker 2: Embedded the Gulf Country Murders. It's my pleasure to welcome
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Speaker 2: Elliot on the show to share this dark side of
2:59
Speaker 2: a once celebrated police herod. How are you going well something, sir? Yes,
3:06
Speaker 2: outback hero or killer cop? What do you think, merg
3:10
Speaker 2: Stevenson was well.
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Speaker 4: I was among the large crowd that accepted that he
3:16
Speaker 4: was a hero copper until I had a rather unnerving
3:22
Speaker 4: experience with him when I was the editor of the paper.
3:25
Speaker 4: And it was a little bit complicated, but I'd exposed
3:30
Speaker 4: Sydney underworld figure Abe Saffron as a silent partner in
3:35
Speaker 4: a big for a big lucrative casino license up here,
3:40
Speaker 4: and in amongst the mix of it all was other
3:44
Speaker 4: Gold Coast business people and the then Police Minister Russ Hins,
3:50
Speaker 4: and unbeknown to me, it looked like I'd really upset
3:55
Speaker 4: not only the Sydney underweld figures but also some high
4:01
Speaker 4: ranking police officers that they were dealing with up here.
4:05
Speaker 4: And the resultant kickback from the police at that stage
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Speaker 4: came through the special Branch unit that the corrupt Minister
4:17
Speaker 4: and the corrupt Police commissioner used in the pre Fitzgerald
4:22
Speaker 4: period to do their dirty works, and they actually harassed
4:30
Speaker 4: Bulletin staff members. They arrested my police roundsman and charged
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Speaker 4: him with trount up charges of assault, arrest and urinating
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Speaker 4: in a police vehicle, all totally fabricated. Was quite worrying
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Speaker 4: at the time, and at that stage Stevenson, in a gesture,
4:51
Speaker 4: threatened to pop me between the eyes with his service
4:55
Speaker 4: pistol if I didn't back off. So that was my
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Speaker 4: first example that there was a darker side to this man.
5:02
Speaker 4: And about the same time another colleague, Max Tomlinson, who
5:07
Speaker 4: was the editor of The Northern Minor at Charterstowers, he'd
5:11
Speaker 4: exposed Stevenson in a court story where the person that
5:17
Speaker 4: Stevenson was charging alleged that Stevenson was motivated by intimidation
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Speaker 4: because this person had discovered some of Stevenson's corrupt activities
5:30
Speaker 4: in the bush towns, and in his defense he brought
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Speaker 4: not Stevenson, but the grazier being charged by Stephenson brought
5:39
Speaker 4: up a barrister up from Brisbane unannounced at the magistrate's
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Speaker 4: court and made these astounding allegations, although they didn't astound
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Speaker 4: too many people in Charteristows or in the bush that
5:53
Speaker 4: this very senior police officer was actually corrupt and he
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Speaker 4: was involved in cattle duffing. Not only that, he was
6:01
Speaker 4: also turning a blind eye to drug farming, imports and
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Speaker 4: calm smuggling. And he was actually part of that corrupt network.
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Speaker 2: That's a lot of corrupt activities. It's amazing to me
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Speaker 2: that people outside of Queensland have actually never heard of
6:18
Speaker 2: this bloke. And if you do hear of him, he
6:21
Speaker 2: divides opinion. A lot of people think that he was
6:24
Speaker 2: a hero cop. He was one of those old school
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Speaker 2: bush coppers. He'd been involved in numerous heroic investigations and arrests.
6:34
Speaker 2: And I note that people to this day will defend him.
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Speaker 2: But on the ground there there seemed to be numerous
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Speaker 2: mysterious circumstances where people were dying, cattle were being stolen,
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Speaker 2: police stations were being burnt down where Stevenson seemed to
6:51
Speaker 2: be somewhere there or thereabouts. And you talk about that
6:55
Speaker 2: confrontation you had with him where he threatened to shoot you,
6:59
Speaker 2: you should set the scene a bit more vividly, because
7:02
Speaker 2: it was quite a moment. You were in a Chinese restaurant.
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Speaker 4: I believe we were trying to make peace with the police,
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Speaker 4: and I assumed that we just published some negative stories
7:12
Speaker 4: which upset them. But he mainly seemed to be concerned
7:16
Speaker 4: about the exposures we were giving the gangsters behind the casino.
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Speaker 1: Bit up here.
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Speaker 4: Bearing in mind he was the most senior police He
7:25
Speaker 4: was the acting regional police superintendent for the whole of
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Speaker 4: North Queens. Couldn't get any higher than him, so complaining
7:33
Speaker 4: about the man, you know, was a bit difficult. But
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Speaker 4: what really came to mind was back in two thousand
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Speaker 4: and seventeen, I was invited to assis Bob Catter for
7:45
Speaker 4: a publication for New Holland, and Bob really amazed me
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Speaker 4: with the detail that he had on Stevenson, and what
7:55
Speaker 4: really shook me up a bit was that a young
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Speaker 4: police constable came to Bob when he was a state
8:01
Speaker 4: member at Charterstouse and was worried. Said, look, I've discovered
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Speaker 4: that Stevenson's corrupt. He's covering his tracks. I think there's
8:11
Speaker 4: been a couple of mysterious murders or suicides that relate
8:15
Speaker 4: to him. And he's threatened to shoot me between the
8:19
Speaker 4: eyes with his service pistol. So that was intriguing. But
8:23
Speaker 4: according to Bob Cattera, this heroic young police officer said, well,
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Speaker 4: merv you better get me with your first shot, because
8:32
Speaker 4: if you miss, I've got a loaded pistol and I'm
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Speaker 4: a better shot than you are. So this was going
8:37
Speaker 4: on behind the scenes, and actually I've got Bob on
8:42
Speaker 4: tape where he admitted that the only reason he backed
8:47
Speaker 4: Deputy Premier Bill Gunn in the move to have the
8:51
Speaker 4: Fitzgerald inquiry it was a cabinet revolt. While Joe was away.
8:57
Speaker 4: He was into state on the JOPHO BM so they
9:00
Speaker 4: sprang this on and the only reason that Bob cater
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Speaker 4: supported gun was his belief that any inquiry into police
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Speaker 4: corruption would surely get rid of Stevenson. He'd be the
9:14
Speaker 4: first cab off the rank. And of course it didn't happen.
9:18
Speaker 4: He only got a vague mention about the lack of
9:21
Speaker 4: a proper investigation into the suicide of the young policeman
9:24
Speaker 4: up on the table leaves.
9:27
Speaker 2: We'll get to that. But I mean again, he's either
9:30
Speaker 2: a bit like Roger Rogerson before he murdered Jamie gow.
9:33
Speaker 2: He's either the most misunderstood police officer or the most corrupt.
9:37
Speaker 2: And I think Stevenson's story is quite similar. Like I say,
9:40
Speaker 2: people to this day will defend him, but when I
9:44
Speaker 2: was in Pentland, the old folks, they were sure that
9:47
Speaker 2: he was up to no good. And I think you
9:49
Speaker 2: saw that malevolent streak in him. You've called him a
9:52
Speaker 2: psychopath actually, And when you had that meeting in the
9:54
Speaker 2: Chinese restaurant, I think it was a pretty chilling one.
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Speaker 2: Just recap what happened in that meeting.
10:00
Speaker 4: Well, he took the upper hand and was just demanding
10:03
Speaker 4: the media virtually stay out and stop asking questions. And
10:08
Speaker 4: he had a thirty eight little snubnosed pistol in an
10:12
Speaker 4: ankle holster, and he made sure that I could see that.
10:16
Speaker 4: He pulled the trouser leg up and he patted it
10:19
Speaker 4: and he said, look, I'm sick and tired of what
10:22
Speaker 4: you've been doing in the townsil bullet and he said,
10:24
Speaker 4: if you don't back off, and he patted the pistol
10:27
Speaker 4: and then he said, you know, you're going to get
10:29
Speaker 4: popped between the eyes. So that resonated with me when
10:34
Speaker 4: Kada told a story about the other police officer who'd
10:37
Speaker 4: had a similar experience.
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Speaker 1: Now you talk.
10:40
Speaker 4: About people supporting Stevenson, Well, there's been never in any
10:45
Speaker 4: hard evidence for this stuff. But to this day, I've
10:49
Speaker 4: never run across anyone in all my inquiries when as
10:53
Speaker 4: soon as I mentioned the word Stevenson, it's the worst
10:56
Speaker 4: possible response. See, there was an inquiry before the Fitzgerald
11:03
Speaker 4: inquiry led by a pretty tough, honest copper named Huey.
11:10
Speaker 4: Inspector Huey.
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Speaker 2: I think he was known as a mad dog, wasn't he.
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Speaker 1: Yeah, And he really went for Stevenson.
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Speaker 4: When Stevenson retired and he was successfully running a pretty
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Speaker 4: large cattle property that developed most people said they were
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Speaker 4: stolen cattle on it, and mad Dog Huey headed the
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Speaker 4: inquiry into the fact that Stephenson was in corrupt league
11:36
Speaker 4: with the then senior officer at Charters Towse, and a
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Speaker 4: young constable had stumbled on what was going on. He'd
11:44
Speaker 4: made a complaint through the higher ranks and he was
11:48
Speaker 4: immediately transferred to traffic in Brisbane. So the police union
11:53
Speaker 4: backed him and Canter backed him to try and get
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Speaker 4: an inquiry into what was going on. Now Stevenson managed
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Speaker 4: to turn the tables.
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Speaker 1: He was very.
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Speaker 4: Close to Terry Lewis, but he was also close to
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Speaker 4: Judge Pratt. He used to do any of the inquiries
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Speaker 4: into police corruption.
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Speaker 2: Now, Terry Lewis being the former Police commission who went
12:17
Speaker 2: to jail up there in Queensland after the Prinstrill inquiry. Yeah.
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Speaker 4: Yeah, So I got a quote from Bob. If you
12:23
Speaker 4: just let me read this, I think it's pretty startling.
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Speaker 4: He said. Of the sixteen people that had given evidence
12:31
Speaker 4: or made complaints, there was a deputy mayor and president
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Speaker 4: of a Midwestern National Party division, a member of one
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Speaker 4: of the oldest grazing families in Charterstows, the deputy mayor
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Speaker 4: of Charterstowershire, the chairman of one of the biggest schools
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Speaker 4: in North Queensland and several other prominent people. All of
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Speaker 4: them were on trumped up chargers or suicide or were murdered,
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Speaker 4: take your pick. Confronting merv Stevenson was very dangerous territory.
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Speaker 4: I think that sort of sums it up. There's still
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Speaker 4: a lot of belief that that was the real story
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Speaker 4: behind the.
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Speaker 2: Man, right because obviously the Fifth should Inquiry was put
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Speaker 2: together to go after corrupt police and connections to government
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Speaker 2: and so forth. And what you're alleging really is he
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Speaker 2: is Stevenson. He has some connection to corrupt figures in government,
13:29
Speaker 2: gangsters in New South Wales, Saffron in particular Eddie Kornhauser
13:34
Speaker 2: on the Gold Coast. They're running interference or he's running
13:38
Speaker 2: interference for them, so a casino can be established in
13:42
Speaker 2: Townsville rather than Cans. In your meeting with him, he
13:45
Speaker 2: pretty much says to you, you're going to stuff up
13:48
Speaker 2: our chance to get this casino in Townsville. It's going
13:52
Speaker 2: to go to Cans. What possible interest does he have
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Speaker 2: in the economy of Townsville that this is so important.
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Speaker 4: Yeah, that's what goes through my mind at the time.
14:02
Speaker 4: Why is this coup so worried about that, and why
14:04
Speaker 4: is he so upset about the coverage and the investigative
14:08
Speaker 4: reporting we'd be doing. So it sort of came to
14:11
Speaker 4: a head in the After Martha for the Fitzgerald inquiry.
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Speaker 4: People just don't understand how corrupt the system was back
14:18
Speaker 4: then and who would just turn to. We mentioned Terry Lewis,
14:22
Speaker 4: the corrupt police commissioner that ended up being jile.
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Speaker 1: I have vivid memories of ringing him up.
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Speaker 4: And saying, look, Commissioner Lewis were having all sorts of
14:31
Speaker 4: trouble with what appears to be rague police officers up here.
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Speaker 4: Can you do anything about it? Oh, mister Hani, leave
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Speaker 4: it with me. And then in one of the other inquiries,
14:41
Speaker 4: which was brought on by the then Labor opposition, there
14:45
Speaker 4: was evidence to show that the commissioner stopped a full
14:50
Speaker 4: drug investigation up at Mariba just in its tracks, said
14:55
Speaker 4: discontinue any further investigation relating to drugs in this particular manner.
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Speaker 4: And that's where that suspicious. There was a young police constable,
15:05
Speaker 4: he was a detective. He was bragging to his close
15:09
Speaker 4: confidence that he was about to make the biggest drug
15:14
Speaker 4: bust in North Queensland's history. Links between the Griffith's drug
15:20
Speaker 4: farmers and new developments and drug farming on the tablelands,
15:25
Speaker 4: and that it would shake that several senior police officers
15:28
Speaker 4: were involved, including politicians, and then out of the blue,
15:33
Speaker 4: he'd been at the RSL club and then he went
15:35
Speaker 4: and shot himself with his police pistol suicided. So they
15:40
Speaker 4: said we better investigate this, So Mervyn Henry Stevenson goes.
15:45
Speaker 2: Up to investigate it. That was Senior Constable John Connor. Yeah,
15:50
Speaker 2: and it is a remarkable set of circums. As you say,
15:53
Speaker 2: he's going for drinks, he's got no history of depression,
15:56
Speaker 2: there's no inkling of this. He walks out of the
15:59
Speaker 2: pub the club there, gets in his vehicle and shoots
16:02
Speaker 2: himself with his own service pistol. That's sus as hell.
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Speaker 4: You'd have to think there was something suspicious about it.
16:11
Speaker 4: The timing, for instance, bragging about or not publicly, but
16:15
Speaker 4: letting people know he was about to make this huge pass. Now.
16:19
Speaker 4: What's also interesting is that Stevenson investigated, but the results
16:23
Speaker 4: of that investigation didn't come out in a later inquiry
16:27
Speaker 4: into drugs because Stevenson demanded that it was strictly confidential
16:32
Speaker 4: it was operational, and he refused to release any details
16:36
Speaker 4: and they accepted that.
16:39
Speaker 2: I mean in Stephenson at the time was not internal affairs,
16:42
Speaker 2: he wasn't homicide. He was in no way in a
16:45
Speaker 2: position to be the one who should have been investigating
16:49
Speaker 2: the death of Connor.
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Speaker 1: No, that's the weird part about it all.
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Speaker 4: And there was only a few paragraphs that hughe he
16:57
Speaker 4: managed to get about Stevenson, and it was a comment
17:01
Speaker 4: that Stevenson had grossly mismanaged that inquiry. Well, unfortunately, some
17:08
Speaker 4: of the confidence that I've had no longer with us,
17:11
Speaker 4: that they've passed on. But I did interview an old
17:15
Speaker 4: stock squad officer from up in the table lands who
17:20
Speaker 4: told me about how on a many weeks out in
17:23
Speaker 4: the scrub and back in those days, they had I
17:26
Speaker 4: think almost a pedal wireless to communicate with headquarters and
17:32
Speaker 4: they'd found a big drug farm and they were about
17:34
Speaker 4: to come down and make the raid. And he was
17:37
Speaker 4: just confirming that with head office and suddenly the next
17:41
Speaker 4: message was I bought the whole show. So he was
17:45
Speaker 4: pulled off it. And he claims because the grazier that
17:49
Speaker 4: was letting this farm operate, there was a major donor
17:53
Speaker 4: to the Country Party back in those days. But I
17:56
Speaker 4: asked him, I said, did you ever encounter Mervyn Henry Stevenson?
18:00
Speaker 4: And he said, I never met the man, and I'm
18:03
Speaker 4: glad I didn't because the rule shot my best mate,
18:07
Speaker 4: the constable at Riba. So there's an old time that
18:13
Speaker 4: you know, you tend to find that ex policemen don't
18:16
Speaker 4: make statements like that unless they've got pretty firm indication,
18:21
Speaker 4: either with evidence or with their own police nouse that
18:26
Speaker 4: even was.
18:27
Speaker 1: Quite capable of doing something like that.
18:29
Speaker 4: So either doing it or covering it up, or being
18:33
Speaker 4: part of the system that organized the fake suicide.
18:38
Speaker 2: You mentioned evidence, and that's always been what's been lacking
18:41
Speaker 2: in Stevenson's case. And I know that Tony fitzgeral QC
18:46
Speaker 2: was hell bent on getting evidence from police stations and
18:49
Speaker 2: other sources to stand up these allegations, to corroborate them
18:53
Speaker 2: because there was so many fixes going in and Charter's
18:57
Speaker 2: Towers police stations should have been a rich source of
19:00
Speaker 2: evidence for that inquiry. But what happened to Charters Towers
19:03
Speaker 2: Police station is our hearing to search it for evidence.
19:09
Speaker 4: Well, it either got burnt down or was severely damaged
19:12
Speaker 4: by fire. That was at a stage too when I
19:16
Speaker 4: believe Stevenson had retired, but he's still there were allegations
19:20
Speaker 4: that he was still in the corrupt association with the
19:23
Speaker 4: senior police officer there with cattle theft. So the word
19:28
Speaker 4: was out. Everyone knew the Special Branch shreded all their evidence.
19:32
Speaker 4: There was no evidence of Fitzgerald to look at the
19:34
Speaker 4: Special Branch, and that MERV got in and burnt the
19:37
Speaker 4: Pleae stationed down. Now I tended to sort of dismiss
19:41
Speaker 4: that a bit, but I was on a friends His
19:44
Speaker 4: name was Paul burt from Bertiken Downs. I was at
19:47
Speaker 4: Paul Burke's place and there was a young policeman boarding
19:51
Speaker 4: there because he was from the barracks at at Charlestowns
19:55
Speaker 4: that got burnt down. And I got introduced to him,
19:58
Speaker 4: and Paul said, and whatever the young constable's name was,
20:02
Speaker 4: he said, he meet him, and he's pretty upset because
20:05
Speaker 4: MERV Stevenson didn't warn him he was going to burn
20:07
Speaker 4: the police station down. And I thought it was a joke,
20:11
Speaker 4: but then my host said, oh, Eliot Hannes, retired editor
20:16
Speaker 4: of The bullet he could do a good story on it,
20:20
Speaker 4: and the poor police constable went white as a sheet
20:23
Speaker 4: and he said, please please keep me out.
20:25
Speaker 1: Of this, keep me out of this.
20:26
Speaker 4: And Paul said that he feared for his life from Stevenson,
20:30
Speaker 4: that he even when he was staying on the.
20:33
Speaker 1: Cattle station he had a loaded pistol under his pillar.
20:37
Speaker 1: He feared for his life.
20:39
Speaker 2: And you've looked into the eyes of Stephenson, what did
20:43
Speaker 2: you see in terms of a ruthless, calculating character.
20:46
Speaker 4: Well, it's interesting that you pick up on the eyes
20:49
Speaker 4: because Max Tomlinson had the same experience after he published
20:54
Speaker 4: the story, and it's this intimidation with this venomous stare
20:59
Speaker 4: of his eyes, and they saw a shake in his
21:02
Speaker 4: head at the same time. The other one Steve Austin,
21:06
Speaker 4: who's still a working broadcaster for ABC in Brisbane. As
21:10
Speaker 4: a young fellow up here, he was heroic in pursuing
21:15
Speaker 4: and challenging Stevenson. I even warned him one day that
21:20
Speaker 4: he better be careful and that if Stevenson never decides
21:23
Speaker 4: that he's he'll give me a personal interview in some
21:26
Speaker 4: remote location.
21:27
Speaker 1: Make sure.
21:27
Speaker 4: He took a witness with him and he spoke about
21:31
Speaker 4: a weird thing that had happened that Stevens had came
21:34
Speaker 4: into the ABC office and said I want to sit
21:38
Speaker 4: down and talk to you, and gave Steve the stare
21:41
Speaker 4: and he just sat on the other side of the
21:44
Speaker 4: table and stared and stared. So finally as Steve said, well,
21:49
Speaker 4: I'll make us a cup of tea. So he walked
21:51
Speaker 4: out brought a cup of team. When he came back,
21:53
Speaker 4: Stevenson had left. I think he was probably going to
21:56
Speaker 4: try the same idea of threats that he'd used on
22:01
Speaker 4: me and others at the time.
22:03
Speaker 2: Maybe it was enough just to sit there and stare
22:05
Speaker 2: at him, give him the death there. Because he's obviously
22:07
Speaker 2: a building where things are being recorded, he might have
22:11
Speaker 2: been concerned.
22:12
Speaker 1: Yes, So there's that, and then there's more as well.
22:14
Speaker 4: The last discussion I had with Bob Catter was a
22:17
Speaker 4: couple of months ago, and Kada was very keen for
22:21
Speaker 4: someone to do the definitive investigation and come up with it.
22:25
Speaker 4: He said, otherwise, this FOG's going to get away with murder.
22:28
Speaker 4: You know it's wrong. But I did ask him because
22:32
Speaker 4: there was also from the indigenous community up here, and
22:35
Speaker 4: I had contact with some of the long standing elders
22:39
Speaker 4: up here who believed that Stevenson. Of course, the traditional
22:44
Speaker 4: owners out in that country, they don't miss much what's
22:46
Speaker 4: going on, and that they picked up on what was
22:50
Speaker 4: going on, and they were also at risk. And Bob
22:53
Speaker 4: Catter was approached by a grazier who said, look, well,
22:58
Speaker 4: I've got a head stockman who's a traditional owner man,
23:02
Speaker 4: and he's got a brother who a tracker for Stevenson,
23:07
Speaker 4: and he's terrified. He wants to get out, he wants
23:10
Speaker 4: a transfer, but Stevenson weren't transferring because he reckons there's
23:14
Speaker 4: all sorts of dodgy things going on out in the bush.
23:17
Speaker 4: Do you think you can do anything for him? So
23:20
Speaker 4: Bob I think was going to have a talk to
23:21
Speaker 4: the commissioner. That wouldn't have been much use. But soon
23:25
Speaker 4: after that the grazier contacted Bob and said, my head
23:31
Speaker 4: stockman's brother has died mysteriously on a patrol, fell off
23:36
Speaker 4: a horse, hit his head on a rock and drowned
23:38
Speaker 4: in a shallow pool. And as Bob Cat said, not
23:42
Speaker 4: too many Aboriginal stockmen fall off their horses too easily.
23:46
Speaker 4: And what happened after that was this crazier friend of Katter,
23:52
Speaker 4: his head stockman who'd made the complaint. He disappeared too,
23:56
Speaker 4: He took off, and Bob doesn't know whether he disappeared
24:00
Speaker 4: as in ended up in a shallow grave, or whether
24:04
Speaker 4: he was just so far of what was happening. So
24:07
Speaker 4: there was that other side to it. It's quite understandable
24:10
Speaker 4: that First Nations deaths out in the bush wouldn't have
24:13
Speaker 4: bothered the judicial system and the police investigations too much
24:17
Speaker 4: in those days.
24:20
Speaker 2: That's right. The other one that's intriguing is the case
24:24
Speaker 2: of Tony Jones, who disappeared and only need to well
24:26
Speaker 2: hitchhiking from Townsville to Mount iSER and he's in the
24:30
Speaker 2: Rising Sun Hotel in Townsville, I believe, and he's seen
24:35
Speaker 2: with somebody who looks a lot like Mervin Henry Stephenson.
24:41
Speaker 4: That was a bit after my time, but I did
24:43
Speaker 4: follow it, particularly the Townshill Bulletin was giving it a
24:47
Speaker 4: pretty detailed coverage. But what struck me about that I
24:50
Speaker 4: think there was a coronial inquest. I think there might
24:52
Speaker 4: have been a follow up one, and my understanding was
24:56
Speaker 4: that the witness definitely identified Stevenson. It was Stevenson that
25:00
Speaker 4: this young fellow drove away with. Wonder my view was
25:06
Speaker 4: that he's an unlikely culprit for the missing backpack of girls.
25:12
Speaker 4: I think he was capable of dastardly deed to cover
25:18
Speaker 4: his tracks and to protect himself and his reputations and
25:21
Speaker 4: want to end up in jail. So, if this young
25:25
Speaker 4: fellow that was alleged that Stevenson not only had a
25:29
Speaker 4: stolen cattle, that he also had a legal outlet for
25:34
Speaker 4: his own sort of small abatuile meatworks to get it
25:37
Speaker 4: out away from the other controls that there are, and
25:42
Speaker 4: that there was something on the go out near Pentland. Now,
25:45
Speaker 4: if so, the credence that you could possibly give to
25:50
Speaker 4: the Tony Jones story is that he he offered this
25:52
Speaker 4: young fellow some work out there quite and that somehow
25:56
Speaker 4: or other, Tony Jones became a liability or a risk,
26:01
Speaker 4: and that's why he never got to Mount iSER.
26:03
Speaker 1: It must be horrible for.
26:05
Speaker 4: The families involved, you know, not knowing what went on
26:08
Speaker 4: and all this innuendo. But I'd be really worried about
26:11
Speaker 4: that outcome.
26:13
Speaker 2: Yeah, I know, Stephenson's family is still very keen to
26:17
Speaker 2: protect his legacy, and barrisses for the family have got
26:21
Speaker 2: up there and in in quests and things and tried
26:23
Speaker 2: to plead the fact that Stevens had nothing to do
26:26
Speaker 2: with it. But the fact is, you're pretty sure that
26:28
Speaker 2: that identification was Stevenson at the Rising Sun Hotel, and
26:32
Speaker 2: therefore it does raise questions.
26:35
Speaker 4: Yes, I'm not one hundred percent sure, but I can
26:37
Speaker 4: remember reading it at the time where it seemed to
26:40
Speaker 4: be accepted by the coroner that the last person probably
26:45
Speaker 4: had anything to do with this young fellow was in
26:48
Speaker 4: fact with Stevenson.
26:51
Speaker 2: Amazing figure to have gotten away with all this. I mean,
26:54
Speaker 2: I guess it was the tone of the times, and
26:55
Speaker 2: I guess for you, as an editor of the Townsville
26:58
Speaker 2: Bulletin in those years there was some occupational hazards you
27:02
Speaker 2: had to toe the line.
27:04
Speaker 4: Well, it was hard because I copped to three million
27:07
Speaker 4: dollars writed from Abe Saffron, Whi's terrified the board of
27:10
Speaker 4: directors because we weren't at Murdoch Newspaper. We were an
27:14
Speaker 4: independent Northcuff the newspaper back then. Plus the fact that
27:18
Speaker 4: there was one of Saffron's associates big noting himself around
27:23
Speaker 4: the local pubs, called himself Eddy the Torch or something
27:27
Speaker 4: and said we send our victims ears home to their
27:31
Speaker 4: families as a keepsake.
27:33
Speaker 1: You know.
27:33
Speaker 4: I went through Australia posts, so that was on the GOHO.
27:37
Speaker 4: So it was pretty hard at the time when even
27:40
Speaker 4: if I had I didn't have as much knowledge about
27:43
Speaker 4: Stevenson back then as I've got now. But it was
27:46
Speaker 4: pretty hard to put stuff in print when you had so.
27:50
Speaker 1: Much litigation hanging over it.
27:52
Speaker 4: And the other thing is not enough evidence to really
27:56
Speaker 4: nail someone in the newspaper columns.
27:59
Speaker 2: Well, and more than that you've got there's the most
28:01
Speaker 2: senior police officer in the district of the region sitting
28:05
Speaker 2: in front of you, showing his ankle holster with a
28:08
Speaker 2: thirty eight and saying to you you should stop writing
28:11
Speaker 2: these stories. I mean, did it prevent you from going
28:14
Speaker 2: as hard as you might have?
28:16
Speaker 4: Ah? I was a bit naive, you know. I was
28:20
Speaker 4: a brash young newspaper the back then. I was pretty
28:24
Speaker 4: naive and I didn't know at that stage where it
28:27
Speaker 4: was just theater had these two other cronies with him
28:30
Speaker 4: who he claim were members of the police union, but
28:32
Speaker 4: they were special branch guys, and of course they had
28:36
Speaker 4: treated it as a joke. And I had my manager
28:40
Speaker 4: with me and all he saw was was Stevenson's sort
28:44
Speaker 4: of point. You know, he didn't see the pistol in
28:47
Speaker 4: his holster, which just added a little bit more malice
28:51
Speaker 4: to the whole thing. So yeah, but I mean, those
28:54
Speaker 4: sorts of things were on the go.
28:57
Speaker 2: It's kind of remarkable because at this time Stevenson is
29:01
Speaker 2: a superintendent, he's not a frontline officer, He's not in
29:05
Speaker 2: in gunplay. If he comes to a meeting with the
29:09
Speaker 2: local editor of the paper armed with a concealed weapon,
29:13
Speaker 2: I mean, how intimidating is that.
29:16
Speaker 4: I wrote about that in my member going through my mind,
29:20
Speaker 4: Why does he have to carry a weapon it's designed
29:24
Speaker 4: for shooting people in a class range, either in defense
29:27
Speaker 4: or offense to the local Chinese restaurant to sit an
29:31
Speaker 4: ava talk with the newspaper editor about some general conflict
29:36
Speaker 4: of interest between journalists and coppers. And it wasn't It
29:39
Speaker 4: was genuine intimidation. Again, you'd have to have experienced the
29:44
Speaker 4: extent of corruption at very senior levels of the police
29:48
Speaker 4: force to know what you're up against. And you know,
29:51
Speaker 4: my hat goes off to the honest coppers of that
29:55
Speaker 4: period that tried to conduct themselves professionally and stay alive.
29:59
Speaker 1: At the same time.
30:00
Speaker 2: Well that's right. I note in your memoir the cult
30:03
Speaker 2: with no regrets. After threatens you at the Chinese restaurant,
30:06
Speaker 2: you get left with a bill as well.
30:09
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, yeah, that was classic.
30:13
Speaker 4: Stevenson sat there and made the chili mud crabs and
30:16
Speaker 4: slept them all, never contributed anything, totally ignored me except
30:21
Speaker 4: for the threat. Tried to charm the North Queensland newspaper
30:25
Speaker 4: manager Guy my good friend, and then made sure he
30:30
Speaker 4: was hal well, met with the owner of the restaurant,
30:34
Speaker 4: and I could hear him chatting to the kitchen staff
30:37
Speaker 4: as he went through the back.
30:38
Speaker 1: And you had left us with the bill.
30:41
Speaker 2: What a character. And you wonder, after all these years
30:44
Speaker 2: whether there's still evidence out there, because if there were murders,
30:47
Speaker 2: there were involvements in disappearances, there were still loved ones,
30:52
Speaker 2: family the community that haven't had answers. Do you think
30:56
Speaker 2: in your heart of hearts there are still people out
30:58
Speaker 2: there with information.
30:59
Speaker 4: Well, I'm hoping it's programs like this, particularly yours, that
31:04
Speaker 4: might prompt someone, because I agree with you the stories
31:06
Speaker 4: out there there's i'd reckon people with living memory or
31:10
Speaker 4: stories told from their father or grandfather with a fair
31:14
Speaker 4: bit of passion in the Charterstowers area, light up through
31:19
Speaker 4: to the tablelands and out to the Gold Country. As
31:21
Speaker 4: I write about I couldn't get evidence to stack it up.
31:25
Speaker 4: So after a long career in journalism, I became a
31:29
Speaker 4: novelist and I started to make things up for this story.
31:33
Speaker 4: But they're not. Most of the murders and the disappearances
31:37
Speaker 4: are all true from my experiences up here, and the
31:42
Speaker 4: nemesis in the whole story is the head of the
31:45
Speaker 4: Stock Squad. I nominated the Stock I had a talk
31:48
Speaker 4: to the current Stock Squad guys, who are tremendous. They
31:51
Speaker 4: do a wonderful job out there, and I said, look,
31:54
Speaker 4: I'm writing this book and it's a work of fiction.
31:57
Speaker 4: It's kind story, but it's based on true experiences with
32:00
Speaker 4: the Stock Squad. And I said, Oh, as long as
32:03
Speaker 4: you got a young hero copper in it, it'll be
32:06
Speaker 4: all right, which there is because there were young hero
32:09
Speaker 4: cop is making the day.
32:10
Speaker 2: Yeah, fantastic. Well, so hopefully someone out there can provide
32:13
Speaker 2: some information that can clear some of these questions up,
32:15
Speaker 2: because you know, if it wasn't as bad as you
32:17
Speaker 2: said that, there should be evidence to support that. But Equally,
32:21
Speaker 2: if there's evidence that he was involved in murders, then
32:24
Speaker 2: it should come forward. So Elliott, thank you so much
32:26
Speaker 2: for your time today. I really appreciate it.
32:29
Speaker 1: Thank you.
32:34
Speaker 2: That's Elliot Hannah, the former editor of the Townsville Bulletin.
32:38
Speaker 2: You can find his memoir The Cult with No Regrets
32:41
Speaker 2: and also his work of fiction Embedded the Golf Country Murders,
32:44
Speaker 2: both published by Wilkinson Publishing Fine Publishing House. And like
32:48
Speaker 2: I say, I think there's probably instill of it. It's
32:50
Speaker 2: still out there. Of what Stevenson did you think about
32:54
Speaker 2: the so called suicide of John Conner? Is there something
32:57
Speaker 2: still in the files, in the exhibits that can be
33:00
Speaker 2: tested again? Is there evidence out there? I know back
33:02
Speaker 2: in those days, if you're a newspaper at it and
33:05
Speaker 2: the media, you're up against it in Queensland because you
33:08
Speaker 2: had a conspiracy of government, of capital, of police to
33:12
Speaker 2: keep things just nice and quiet, because everyone was making
33:16
Speaker 2: their money when you had the Commissioner of Police of
33:18
Speaker 2: those days. So Terrence lewis going to jail. The rot
33:20
Speaker 2: started at the top. So I'd love to hear from
33:22
Speaker 2: anybody who's got information about those days that can help
33:26
Speaker 2: clear the picture. Like I say, I'm not in the
33:28
Speaker 2: business of smearing people if there's no evidence but or
33:32
Speaker 2: there's a lot of smoke in the case of Mervin
33:34
Speaker 2: Henry Stevenson, so get in touch. You always call crime
33:38
Speaker 2: stoppers as well if you if you feel coy about
33:39
Speaker 2: sharing information one eight hundred, triple three, triple zero, or
33:43
Speaker 2: you can send me in the email if you don't
33:44
Speaker 2: trust the coppers. That's Adam Shander, writer at gmail dot com.
33:49
Speaker 2: Thank you for listening today. This has been Real Crime
33:51
Speaker 2: with Adam shand.
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