Listeners are advised that this podcast series Broman contains coarse language and adult themes.

This podcast series is brought to you by me Headley Thomas and The Australian.

You and I have both done a lot of knocking on doors Headley, and it's one of the hardest things in journalism.

It's to go and knock on a door, cold and introduce yourself and just hope that you can get people talking to you.

Often it's in very tragic circumstances where someone has died.

My friend and colleague Claire Harvey, driving our south to a suburb called Illawong, in an area we've been calling the Shire throughout this Bromwin podcast series.

It's beautiful morning in Sydney.

It's just stopped raining and there's a very cloudy, windswept sky and the streets are drying out.

We are heading to the house John Winfield helped build in May nineteen ninety three.

It must be worth at least three million dollars.

We have decided to approach the owners for the first time, to rip off the band aid and tell them about our suspicions and the suspicions of senior lawyers and former detectives that this attractive two level property may be Bromlin's resting place.

Well, often people are really happy to tell their stories.

They want to honor the person who's passed away.

I agree.

Sometimes it is cathartic.

They like to honor their loved one.

But in this case, we're not talking to a grieving relation.

We're hoping to talk to the owners of a property who may have no idea of our growing suspicion about possibly Bromwin's remains being buried.

Beneath a patio or a garage slab is the one location that takes a lot of boxes that makes most sense.

It is possible.

I suppose that their lives are busy and that they haven't heard about it.

If they had heard about it and they've been waiting for us to get in touch, I feel for them.

I feel that there must have been a difficult situation to be in.

If they haven't, it's going to be.

A big surprise.

At the very least.

This is a house that John Winfield was working on in the days before and after the disappearance of his wife.

I'd want to know that too.

If I was the owner of the house, if I had heard that this was happening at my house and the police didn't want to dig it up.

I'd be digging it up myself.

I wouldn't be out of bear the uncertainty.

Absolutely on the idea that you might unwittingly be concealing the body of a murder victim.

That was the turn off to Illowong.

If they are home, I've got no idea whether they're going to talk to us.

In an earlier episode, you heard Karina Berger and I debating whether to make this approach.

Claire Harvey was in no doubt that we needed to at least try to talk to the owners, but not to ask them for anything.

We have resolved that even if we had their permission, we would not attempt an excavation and search.

While there's still a prospect of that occurring under the supervision of the New South Wales Police Unsolved Homicide Unit or the State Coroner, Theresa O'Sullivan.

We do not know what, if anything, they are doing in relation to this place.

But before driving to Ilawong, we decided that the owners of the home do deserve a briefing from us, even though it's possible that they have been oblivious to everything that has been speculated and reported in the podcast these past twelve months.

On the other hand, they might be across every detail.

Now.

I feel like we need to tell them that as gently as possible.

I can't decide whether I'm hoping that they know about the podcast and that they've been waiting for us to come, or that they have no idea at all.

It's a lovely area.

Classic Australian suburbia around here, isn't it your for lawns, nice gardens?

Thirty two years ago this area in Illawong was not well established.

There were not many homes now here.

We are in the street, this one here.

With the the property.

Hello.

Back in the car.

Sometime later we debriefed abjectively, we looked quite unusual.

Speak for yourself.

We look like either.

Cops or bit collectors.

I'd kind of imagined a veranda or a porch that was basically just concrete.

I hadn't expected something that's quite so established, like it's tiled.

It's very nice.

Claire stared the family wagon back onto the main road out of Illawong and in the direction of the beach and Crinulla, where we have another important commitment.

One final group.

Meeting with the three most staunch people I've come to know in this podcast investigation.

Maddie and Andy and Michelle.

Just going to get it.

Approve, they'll be fine.

I actually let Andy know this morning.

Okay, I said, this is what we're going to do.

We've waited up, gone back and forth about it, but at the end, our job is to ask questions, and we try to do that with as much thoughtfulness as possible.

But if we stop asking questions, stop knocking on doors, where do you draw the line?

Yeah, you'll hear more about our visit to the house in Ilawan later in this episode.

We came here for our last anniversion.

Our meeting place, a restaurant near the beach, is well known to Andy and Michelle.

Well, here's two you guys being married for thirty five years.

Podcast nearly over, isn't it.

Yeah, it's nearly over.

Fifteen months earlier, I spoke to Bromin's brother Andy and his wife Michelle on the phone about the probable scale and duration of the planned Bromin podcast investigation.

Here's a snippet from that time, when we were just days away from the release of episode one called John's Castle.

We're talking about a series of maybe eight, nine or ten episodes, so it's not going to be over quickly.

Andy and Michelle were told back then about what we hope the impact of the early episodes would have on listeners, particularly those with information about bromin her disappearance and John.

When they start listening and appreciating what's being done and hearing the different accounts and seeing the momentum, that's when people who have been silent, who haven't wanted to talk to the cops or to journalists before, just start feeling naturally pretty guilty, feeling like they should have come forward and said something now.

At lunch and on the eve of episode thirty six, in a series which I never expected would cover this much ground and hear from so many people with information, Michelle pondered questions about this production coming to an end at least for now.

You hope that the podcast might still generate someone else's interest, or it might push someone who's sitting back and wanting to say something but too frightened too for some reason.

Which you know we know there are people like that.

Do you have any regrets about being involved?

None at all.

It's been great.

There have obviously been some pretty harrowing times with your family like this has been hard.

You guys are right at the center of it.

How do you feel about the family's feelings.

It's been hard to spring up and down right.

A lot of more through the whole thing.

Some people struggling with wanting a bit more relevant.

Back when we started, you obviously had a relationship with your sister Kim in Tasmania and with your cousin Megan.

Do you speak to them now?

Not currently.

No.

The messages and the scathingness of them that I received from Megan, they're just not so unacceptable.

I couldn't matter how much you hate someone.

There's no need to say the things that she comes up with.

I'm after answers for Braun.

I'm after justice for Braun, nothing else, nothing else.

It's quite complicated.

They were already problems before it even happened, because not everyone is going to remember things the same way, and not everyone is going to want to remember things the same way.

It just got put under the spotlight.

Megan takes the view that the police investigation early on failed because you and Michelle tried to control with and not allow other members of the family to be involved.

In the early piece in relation to Meagan just can ring me one day.

He just said to me, every time must be to this blot.

He has an answer prepared because he knows what the family's doing.

Well.

That's when I've said to Diskin, do not accept any phone calls, do speak with Megan anymore, because somehow John's finding out everything that the family knows and thinks.

Do you think that it's your exclusion of Megan and her knowledge that you excluded her that has caused a lot of the acrimony.

When she admits in her statement that she was in constant contract with him.

Let's that doesn't go any further any Let's just say nothing happens now, there are no charges laid.

The police come back to you in a month and say, look, sorry, we haven't done anything.

There's nowhere to go.

How would you feel if that happened.

No, I'd be mortified, devastated Obra.

Eightwo months ago, they sat there and said, at the moment, unless there's any further evidence coming forwards, there's nothing more we can do for you.

Now.

The podcast has run its course.

As far as I'm concerned, it'splaying the ship out of the water come up with that many relevant facts.

Everyone that knows me locally around here and that that follows the podcast just says, how can they d prepre and the please get it that far wrong would be quite devastating if it doesn't proceed.

I remember once another of a we said child said to me, your greatest VINCEL Thomas sine unit opened the lid on the boss one for years, said oh, there's nothing new, and then shut the room within.

Well, that's what it felt like until the podcast started.

We'd basically given up because I used to just make that constant annual phone call.

And god ring here after year, any news, what's going on?

All they do is check whether bank account's being touched and come back to you and go, no, yeah, mad car, your card hasn't been touched.

Bank account has and boon touched year after year, until finally that.

Blagrit moved on and I was never ever given another contract.

Unelful, very unellful.

Just prove how in NEPP the system can be.

Visitors to the new South Wales Police headquarters in Paramatta see a public display a tribute to many hundreds of people who are missing.

Their disappearance is unresolved an unknown number of murder victims.

It is particularly poignant now in this first week of August twenty twenty five, Australia's National Missing Person's Week.

The catalyst for this annual week of action was the disappearance of twenty year old Tony Jones in nineteen eighty two.

This year's campaign theme is Forever Loved, which is also very fitting for Bromin Winfield and her family.

And you just think to yourself, there are so many people who missing and you watch them go on the screens.

If you've got a missing person in your family, you've got to get on there and push.

You can't sit back.

You've got to be proactive.

You've got to be a thorn in their side really and just keep going, don't give up.

We know that the police don't really approve of journalists doing cold case investigations of unsolved on in this case though, they should not be disapproving because they had told you there was nowhere else they could go.

They couldn't take it any further unless there's fresh evidence.

The fresh evidence has all come from the podcast and all the work that's been done by to shelf.

Everything we've been able to find out.

How sad is it that Judy Singh went to two police stations and was not taken seriously.

That just blows me away what they think she was a crazy person or something.

She's also a filler of the community and n that's just incredible to me.

That was a pivotal point in the whole podcast, wasn't it.

I said it to you Leon the night that we spoke on the phone for a couple of hours after the Judy scene episode, and I said.

The.

Mum they adored, did you think when this started?

Oh my god, this is gon worry the family out.

There's no winning.

Everyone's lost something, everyone's losing something.

And yes, there are so many feelings involved in.

This, but there's really one objective.

That's the only objective, and it has been the only objective from the day that we found out she was gone.

Andrew is Roman's brother.

His status isn't here anymore, his Mum's not here anymore.

Andrew has always felt that he could never give up on his sister.

Always.

We've had so many ups and downs, Andrew even in himself with his own health over all.

Of this, purely with his frustration.

Of not having the case moving forward.

I've lived it with him the whole time.

His only objective is to find out the truth, that's all.

If it were the case that something happened to when other than what the facts point.

To, that would be acceptable.

And the pursuit of the truth has pointed us down this path to this one person from the day he walked on to.

Our front Verandah, I don't want to talk in front of the kids.

The kids were inside, and nothing about Ronwin has ever been spoken about to the kids, never allowed to be questioned.

We're never allowed to bring up Romman's name in front of the kids, like it was crazy.

And your mum's done this, your mum's run away, your mum's mentally ill.

That whole thing was pushed.

Down their throats.

I think they're just frightened to know the truth.

And I guess that's understandable too, if that's how this.

All ends up.

Because she was five, she's only going to believe what she's fed.

And that's a big thing for anybody.

When you've been told the one thing the whole time and it's not true.

What else is a five year old going to believe when they don't know anything better, and they're not allowed to talk to their family of their mother.

Who would be able to reinforce the fact that no.

Your mum wouldn't have gone away.

Your mum loved you.

We never ever were able to do that, And that's so sad.

And when you talking before about the possibility of roum, when her body being in the boot and those children on the back seat, and you were obviously upset, I understand why how much weight do you give that theory?

Given everything you've now heard.

It looks more probable than not.

It's a master search.

That's where she could be.

So she's there.

I think she's going to be in the back corner of the garage or along that side.

Walk which is the laundry backing onto the garage.

Would you want to know this is your property?

Look that for us, and someone said to us, we believe that there might be or somebody.

Buried on your property.

I would want that affirmed.

I would want that done.

As horrible as it sounds, I would want them to go ahead and do whatever they needed to do.

The chance has to be taken.

You can't go on going is she isn't she?

There needs to be an answer.

The podcast has been able to extract more information than we've ever known before, and vital information.

If all of that information now doesn't do the deed, we're going to be struggling, aren't we.

How many more chances are we going to have?

It wasn't until you've build into it to the depths that we have through the podcast that all these different facts and new facts came out.

It didn't got the information about when the sign off was for the slabs and the whole thing started just falling into place.

Ultimately, the police should have picked that up.

The fact that the place was trime for something like that to happen, and we know that now.

We didn't know that.

I don't think Glenn's suspected it either, But then when you sat there and you put those few facts to imy, when Wow.

I don't think there's very many other places she could possibly be and not have been found, not have washed up, not have been uncovered.

I think I'm strongly of the view.

I don't really think there's any other alternative.

Everybody was suspicious of the circumstances of the trip to Sydney, and everybody was suspicious of the dropping off of the children with the ex wife's mother in law and concerned about what the lies that John told about his movements might have meant.

Why was he distancing himself from certain things?

But it wasn't until those documents became available because of your connection to a long serving council staff who founded in archives.

Well, working with what we have and we've done as much as we can, I'm.

Stronger in the view now with everything you know.

Digging and graves actually very difficult.

He was Russian and he would not have arrived in Sydney as early as he did if he went into.

The middle of the woods or off the highway.

And Doug sadly, mate, I think that if Roman isn't there Atilawung, he'll probably never find.

Right after agree yeah.

The following morning, Maddie joined me in the nine Network studio in Sydney for a live TV interview, perhaps the last one will do together about this case.

Maddie will be joining the new South Wales Police Force in coming months.

They're lucky to have this intelligent forensic science graduate.

She's strong, independent and wise beyond her years, and she's been a great help to me and this podcast investigation.

It's been thirty two years see bronwyin Winfield's disappearance from her home in Lennox Head, with police yet to locate her remains.

The Today Shows co anchor Sarah Arbo went straight to the point.

After all this time, are we any closer to finding out what happens?

We believe that we are, and that the evidence that's come out through multiple witnesses who hadn't talked to the police before or who hadn't been taken seriously before, as well as some powerfully compelling circumstantial evidence pointing to where Bromlin's remains may have been concealed, show that there is a lot there that can be developed further by police and possibly by people with specialized search and excavation equipment.

That's incredible, and I do want to come to that, and I know you two have been working closely with these past eight ten months on this podcast.

What's it been like from the family's perspective to have all this brought back up.

In a way it has restored a lot of hope for us.

I mean, we went thirty one years with nothing happening, and it was a constant thing that Andy Bronwin's brother had brought up with the police to try and get them to look back into it and put it out to the public and the media that something actually eventually started happening and people started coming out of the woodwork, and we now know so much more than we did before.

And you mentioned the potential site where Bronwin's remains may be.

You've identified a concrete slab.

Do you think that's likely to ever be excavated?

I believe that senior police serving and former regarded as a priority site that needs to be looked at, if only to be ruled out if there is going to be any further action taken in so far as a possible prosecution, which was recommended by the coroner back in two thousand and two, then they wouldn't want to go forward with that not knowing what might be beneath that slab.

And it's just the timing around the concrete pause that were occurring there when John was working there as a brick layer, these other factors, his omissions about what he was doing that day, they're quite troubling when you put it all together.

And that's why Glenn Taylor said if he had known this information back then, he would have got a search order there himself.

They all point to something very troubling and then something concerning happening in the Shy in relation to the possible disposal of a body, but he's always denied wrongdoing.

It's incredible, isn't it.

A podcast like this can con cover and the people who come forward as well with what they remember.

Even at this very late stage of the investigation, we are still finding out important information.

I was the owner of Intercutz and I employed Jody Winfield as apprentice, so she started with me when she was maybe sixteen.

I actually solved the salon and so she was probably there till she was twenty two.

An amazing hairdresser and just lovely, gentle, beautiful girl.

Actually we had been out socially a couple of times.

Was Bromwyn and John.

We know that John says he turned up at the salon in the Shire on the morning of Monday, May seventeenth, nineteen ninety three, and he spoke to his daughter Jodi, who was working there.

She has said in evidence that she was excited and happy to see her father and the two young girls.

They had driven through the night from Lennox Head to Sydney, you'll also recall a purported telephone call made by bromwn Winfield the next day to the salon.

Andy Reid and police have long suspected that Bromwin had been murdered on the evening of Sunday.

Somebody falsely pretending to be Bromwin must have made that call.

Earlier in this podcast investigation, I sat with Maddie Walsh and Andy Reid in his car outside the Intercut's hair salon.

Andy recalled having been told by John about this purported call in May nineteen ninety three, and Andy went directly to the salon.

Back then he waited to talk to a woman whom he believed was Tanya Robertson, one of the hairdressers.

I watched and waited for the last client to walk out of that shop, and then I walked over there, knocked on the door, introduced myself, told Tanya Robinson who I was, and asked her about the phone call.

I spoke to her and I said, John and Jad have told me that there was a phone call to the salon.

And she says to me, yes, that's correct.

There was a phone call around lunch time, just after lunch, and it was a free male voice.

I can't and tell you whether it was wronging, but it was.

It's a female voice sighing and stating that I'm in Conchland and tell Jody I'm not coming back.

The identity of the caller has never been confirmed.

In a nineteen ninety eight statement to police, Tania Robertson did not remember ever receiving a phone call from a woman purporting to be Bromwin on that day.

We know that.

Bromwin did telephone the salon from time to time to try to talk to Jody there, and Michelle O Flanagan told my colleague Karina Berger that these calls were very troubling.

We were surprised at what Michelle disclosed next.

Can you remember anything about Bronwyn and John's circumstances at that time.

I can remember there was a couple of phone calls which were quite upsetting for Jody's I think brom would have rung maybe a couple of times, and then they'd had a conversation and Jody had got a little bit upset regarding the phone calls.

And I do kind of remember on one occasion there was a phone call and I just said to her, look Bronwin, you can't be ringing Jody.

This is her workplace, she's at work.

She kind of went off a little bit and can't remember the exact words she said, but it was something along the lines he's trying to kill me or something.

She was obviously quite scared.

I felt that come across.

Just to clarify the timing, these calls were happening in the lead up to Bronwin's disappearance, not after her disappearance.

No, No, it was definitely before the disappearance.

From what I can remember, she was obviously petrified, sounds scared.

Well, you can't be ringing here, like it's really got nothing to do with Jody, and she was at work.

We were trying to work, and it was quite upsetting for Jody.

That's when I'd said, look, you've just got to stop calling here.

You can't be calling here, calling Jody.

If it's that bad, called the police.

I don't think I actually said that, but I just said, stop calling here, You've just got to stop.

It was frustrating because we're trying to run a business.

Can you remember any trigger for the call when Bronwyn told you that John was trying to kill her?

Can you remember why she was particularly fearful on that occasion.

I think that was actually maybe when I just hung up on her and told her to stop calling because it had nothing to do with us, really, and don't ring the workout was because we're kind of getting a little bit sick of the calls and work interruptions.

Did you ever get any appreciation of what Bronwin was actually hoping to achieve through the phone calls?

Well, I suppose she was probably trying to get Jody to talk to a father.

Jody had a lot of respect for him.

Michelle o flanagan believes that she told police about her discussion with Bromwyn, the one in which Bronwyn had said words like he's trying to kill me.

I spoke to Michelle o flanagan too while I was sitting with Andy and his wife, Michelle Reid in the Shire shortly before this episode was released, and the former owner of Intercuts told me that she clearly remembered Broman expressing her fear of John and of being concerned that he would kill her.

I asked her if she put this in her statement, which was briefly mentioned at the inquest.

Michelle said yes, that she would have done this, but we do not have access to that statement, and there is no mention in the transcript from the two thousand and two inquest of Michelle possibly being able to give evidence about Bromin telling her sometime in the weeks before her disappearance words to the effect that John was trying to kill her.

Michelle was not called to give evidence at the inquest.

Michelle o flanigan's statement was not generated in the usual way by the then detective Sergeant Glen Tae.

He got most of the statements that were relied upon in nineteen ninety eight and nineteen ninety nine.

The police prosecutor who was assisting the Deputy State coroner in the inquest in two thousand and two, Matt Fordham, told the inquest that Michelle's statement was quote supplied through my friend end quote, and this means the statement was obtained through John Winfield's lawyer, Craig Leggett.

Michelle o' flanagan has been upfront with Corena and me.

She said that she remains in telephone contact with Jody from time to time and she has valued their friendly connection over the years.

She hasn't seen John for quite some time.

She was apprehensive about talking on the record with careenring me.

However, she resolved that it was the right thing to do.

She did recall being contacted to make her statement, but she doesn't have a copy herself.

I can remember when it was interviewed here on the Sunshine Coast.

They asked questions about the phone call and where Jodi lived in a couple of other things.

I just remember saying to them, lot my brain was like meshed potato and peas because I just had a baby, and it's so long ago.

Obviously my brain was a bit fried around that time, so it's all a little bit of a blur.

The phone calls I do remember, because obviously they interrupted the workflow, and the fact that she was quite upset because obviously she thought he was trying to kill her.

Jodi Winfield also mentioned Bromwin telephoning the salon in her police statement, but Jodi Winfield did not say anything in her statement or in her oral evidence at the inquest about Bromwin expressing fears in her calls to the salon about John purportedly wanting to kill her.

I'm also aware that she telephoned my boss, Michelle O'Flanagan at the hair salon and she wanted to speak to me.

Michelle told her that she could not speak to me during work hours and to telephone me at home.

Michelle was aware of the problems between Dad and Bronwyn, and when she told her this, Bronwin apparently abused her over the phone, and Michelle hung up on her because she was ranting and raving.

Karina asked Michelle o flanagan about some of the other alleged events at the salon.

If we moved to about that time of Bronwin's disappearance, so she was last seen on the Sunday evening, the sixteenth of May, and then on the Monday the following day.

Would you have any recollection of John visiting the salon at all and speaking to Jody?

Not really, I would be taking a bit of a stab in the dark.

Maybe he did, I couldn't be sure.

The reason I ask is that Jody's recollection is that her dad arrived unexpectedly out of the blue at the hairdressing salon on the Monday morning and had her too siblings with him in the car.

Oh, actually, yes, I think he did too.

Yeah, Candy girls in the back of the car.

Yeah, carrying about for you.

Yeah, it does.

Many hair salons are closed on Mondays.

Michelle said that she was confident in her recollection that intercuts traded from Monday through to Saturday.

We were definitely open up.

We always opened on a Monday.

Karina asked Michelle about the alleged phone call, the one in which a woman purporting to be Bromin called the salon on Tuesday, May eighteen, nineteen ninety three, but Michelle did not have a clear memory of the circumstances surrounding that one.

During the inquest, John's lawyer, Craig Leggett read onto the record some of Michelle o'flannagan's statement about the call.

Michelle flanagan says, on Tuesday eighteen May ninety ninety three, I was on my roster day off.

Tanya Robertson, an employee at the salon, was working that day.

On my days off, i'd go into the salon and check how things were going each day and take the takings for the day.

I went into the salon this day at about four pm.

I recall that on this day Tanya told me that bronin Winfield had called and had left a message for Jody that she was leaving the kids and going away, and that Jody would have to help her father to look after the children.

Jackie, you're one of many listeners who have been on this journey with the podcast, and you sent me a very thoughtful note about why Bromin's story means so much to you.

Why did you do that?

I guess some empathy for the situation, for the family, for all the characters that had been introduced through the podcast Bromin's story and we become kind of part of it in some way.

There's something about becoming involved in Bromin's story that really touched me and made me want to reach out and perhaps try and offer something.

And I think that comes from a sense of wanting justice, wanting resolution.

It almost seems to just be there.

We could almost touch it.

It affected me very much.

Here's some of what Jackie wrote.

There's a massive ground swell of support and compassion for Brommin now and for those that truly loved her.

This can only enable a degree of healing for those to whom Bromlein mattered and loved.

The public are on their side, standing with them in the longing for revelation and justice.

Their voices are finally being heard.

They have a podcast community listening with very big ears.

The podcast impacts people like me at the deepest level because we see the injustice.

It's now a fact that the truth of what really happened to Bromwin may actually be revealed.

Bromwin is no longer forgotten.

She's not left in the past anymore.

Her life and story have stopped being a secret in the dark.

Warmly, Jackie Spanos, do you.

Have a particular interest in helping women or understanding domestic violence?

I'm a counselor what kind of counseling are you involved in?

Supporting women and couples?

Counseling, supporting relationships.

We want to be preventative of abuse.

Because of a podcast, it might be helpful in their own circumstances or relationships and they might begin to see red flags.

They can have a very powerful impact.

There's no doubt about it.

It actually helps people who might be living in similar type of circumstances.

I hear from many women who tell me this, do you retouching?

It's just so important because it's not just entertainment.

It's of immense value righting wrongs in a sense, or it's attempting to have value that benefits others.

And that's something that is so important.

The repeated podcasts, the public begin to see these repeated passions of behavior, and that's educative for people who might be in a similar situation as well, because there are patterns to these behaviors certain personality types.

Many listeners, including Jackie, were affected by the revelations about Bev Brooker.

She died of brain cancer a short time after changing her will to the almost sole benefit of her neighbor and friend John Winfield.

Bev's brothers, other family members, and friends have important but unanswered questions about Bev's state of mind at the time that she was making big decisions about her will.

The changes that Bev made ultimately enriched John to the tune of several million dollars.

John replaced Bev's good friend her cousin Kathy Hardy, as the almost one hundred percent beneficiary of Bev's estate.

I've recently caught up again with Bev's brother, Jeff Outerbridge.

You heard Jeff in previous episodes.

Jeff, have you seen John around?

Yes?

I have Hedley, Yes, I saw him at the Coles Supermarket.

What happened?

Oh, he was getting out of his vehicle and walking towards Cole's and I was getting in my vehicle, and I'm pretty sure.

I'm not one hundred percent certain, but I think he gave me the finger.

What did you say?

Why do you think he gave you the finger?

I was either he was waving to me or he gave me the finger.

It's unlikely he was waving to you.

Yeah, I know, I know you were close enough to identify him.

Positive it was him.

He's driving a new vehicle.

Well that's probably been funded by Bev's estate.

So yeah, Jeff and his younger brother Paul get a lot of questions and attention from people in Ballina, Lennox Head and surrounding areas who now know Bev's story.

People will pull me up in the chemist, in the supermarket, at garage styles.

It leaves a bit of taste in your mouth.

Kathy Hardy was interested in pursuing legal action.

I'll need to check in with her how that's going.

I just wish something could be done about it.

Really, Kathy, we last spoke some months ago, and at that time you and Les were considering your options, including potential legal action involving John Winfield.

Where did things get to Well?

I engaged as solicitor who wrote a letter on behalf of myself to John Winfield's solicitor requesting interest.

John had presented himself as Bev's career while she was dying from me, so theliomer.

He had produced a notebook to Jeff Outerbridge to explain to Jeff what was happening on certain days.

John would have been entitled to Carara payments in this role.

Kathy's lawyer also requested the handover.

Of some items that could be useful, such as his notebook or diary.

Eventually, and it took a long time, we got a reply back saying we don't owed you any interest and we don't want to comply with providing you with anything.

So it's sort of come to a standstill at that really, and.

The interest that you were requesting that relates to the fact that John held onto Bev's cash for a very long time before he notified you that you were a beneficiary.

That is correct, Yes, it was calculated to be around the twelve thousand dollar mark, but he denies that he needs to pay me that and that there was any requirement.

Twelve thousand dollars is a relative pittance compared with what you would have received if Beverly's will hadn't changed when she was very sick with brain cancer.

To go to the next level requires a lot more money and a lot more stress, and I'm not sure that I want to go there.

How do you feel about having been virtually written out of Bev's will at that late stage of her life and John receiving almost everything.

My big thing is the fact that this person's a Johnny come lately.

She hasn't known him for very long, quite mysterious.

I don't know how much impact he had on her life at the time, and I wish I had known more about her thinking at the time, because I could have actually talked to her about it.

Do you believe that John is a beneficiary deserving of what he's received.

I really don't know.

I don't know enough about the man.

I don't know enough about their relationship and what they went through.

But I don't think so.

You don't need the stress of litigation at the stage of your life.

I guess that's where you get to, right.

That's exactly right, and It would be very stressful because it means going to mediation first and then going to court.

It's expensive with no guarantee that you're going to win.

It's a bit of a gamble, and.

John would be able to fund his court costs and legal costs with Beav's money.

Correct, it puts a burden on me that I don't really want or need.

Kathy asked about the current status of investigations by the police unsolved homicide you unit.

The truth is that we do not know.

They're just still looking into it, aren't they.

Yes.

Police have been a bit in antiquity in that area, haven't they.

Yes.

Unfortunately, Well, at least you'd shone a light there and opened up probably conversations for a lot of women.

Yeah, thanks, Kathy, Good luck with the next one.

Our visit to the house at Illawong, just before we met Andy, Michelle and Maddie at Cronella presented further unanswered questions.

The owners of the home were not there.

Claire picked me up again the following day and we drove back to Eliwong.

It was mid afternoon and this time the owners were home.

Our conversation must have left them with so many questions and of course legitimate concerns.

We are not identifying the owners or their property.

After leaving them, we sat in Claire's car.

That was heavy.

They had no idea.

They haven't heard of Bromman, they haven't heard of John, They've not heard from police.

They are completely oblivious.

We really thought that they would know, It was likely that they would know, But they quickly, I think, revealed themselves to be really nice people who were very open to hearing what we said.

We gave them business cards and gave them our numbers and said please call us.

I hope they do, but I also don't want them to feel any pressure.

We've built a bridge.

If they have any questions that they want us to answer, then our undertaking is to do that.

This property that we are sitting outside of in your car now clear may not be what we think.

I really feel for them.

It's a horrible situation for them to be in.

I feel like they were very understanding that we didn't create that situation.

We didn't put them there.

If she's there, they're intelligent, perceptive, lessening, reasonable people clearly busy in their own working lives.

Has come as a complete shock to them.

You don't fake that kind of surprise.

Who knows how different people could react under those circumstances.

Some people could become very hostile to two strangers turning up with this story that must seem incredibly far fetched when you first hear it.

But they didn't.

They heard it.

They listened, They asked good questions, and I think they'll probably do some of their own research and if they have any questions, we can answer those two.

I'm glad we went, I've got to say, and this makes me sad to say it.

I think this tells us that the unsolved homicide unit of any Southwest police are not taking this seriously.

Why would they have not been.

Here or are they working in the background and deliberately not telling the family because they're going through all of the kinds of approval and legal processes that you would need to go through to justify coming here with a warrant.

I could understand that taking a month.

I can't understand it taking a year.

Thinking back to the teacher's peed investigation, police moved very quickly on that.

When police want to move quickly, they can.

Maybe they've been hoping we will drop it and lose interest, but obviously.

We have not It's a slab of patio at the front of the house.

And alternatively, and this is Andy's view, more likely a slab of garage concrete.

And again that's off to the side of the house.

We're not talking about concrete that is beneath the foundations of their home.

What would you do now, if you're this.

Family, I'd want to know.

I'd rip it up me too.

I feel sick for them.

It's so visceral, isn't it.

We talk about murder, and we talk about bodies and stuff.

Yesterday when we had lunch with Andy, he got very emotional thinking about brom and body being in the back of John's current.

That is where this becomes so serious and so macab Really, it's horrifying to think of innocent, lovely Bromwin being left in a cold, horrible place.

Maybe this sounds kind of trite, but if she is there, she's a long way from John, She's a long way from where it happened.

She's been left undisturbed, and there's a beautiful family living above her, with children laughing and lots of laugh in that home.

Well, Karina, you and I have been talking a lot about why we are suspicious of the Illoong property.

And what I want to talk to you about now is this list that you've compiled, which are all the factors that we rely on to say why the Ilowong property really needs to be ruled out because of the circumstances that make us concerned about it.

Sure, yeah, happy to go through those, Headley.

I'm just going to read your first point.

On Thursday May thirteen, nineteen ninety three, three days before Brohmin's disappearance, approval for a concrete paur at the Ilowong property was given by Shaia Council Inspectors.

Police didn't know this until very recently.

We've given the internal documents from the Shire Council to a detective inspector from the Unsolved Homicide Unit.

The second point you've raised, your Karina John had been working as a bricklayer on the Ilawong site during April and May nineteen ninety three, and we do believe he knew about the concrete poor approval.

He was probably at the site when the inspection and approval occurred, and we believe he would have known about the timing of the upcoming concrete pause.

Yeah, that's right.

Headley, and if we move away from Illawong for just a moment and think about the chronology.

On the evening of Sunday, May sixteenth, nineteen ninety three, after learning Bronman had moved back into the family home, John flew back to lennox Head from Sydney with his belongings, including his surfboard, and this suggests he planned to stay in lenox Head for a period of time and didn't intend to go back almost straight away.

Of course, the police case is that Bronwin was killed by John that evening, something that John emphatically denies.

We know that John bought petrol and balina at eleven h six pm and sometime after that he left for Sydney.

Yes, there's a verified receipt for this fuel purchase by John.

There is also the evidence of John's neighbor, Murray Nolan, who saw and heard John's Ford Falcon leaving the house and rolling down Sandstone Crescent at ten forty pm.

Murray says the car's engine and lights were off until it got to the bottom of the crescent.

Then the car started, the lights were turned on and it drove away.

We believe that sadly Bromwin was dead by this time, and that her body was in the house, possibly moved via the internal stairs and through a lockable internal door down to the garage.

But John's options were limited because the Ford Falcon was almost out of fuel and he had to get to the Ampole in Ballino to fill up before he could do anything else.

So Murray Nolan's ten forty pm sighting of the Ford Falcon leaving the house does fit neatly with the timing of John's purchase of petrol at eleven oh six pm at the ampole in Ballana, a fifteen to twenty minute drive from Sandstone Crescent.

Yeah, there's also new evidence that's come out during the podcast from Judy scene of John transporting in the backseat of the family car something that appeared to Judy to look like a body wrapped in sheets.

Judy told you Hadley that she was sitting on her deck and that she had a bird's eye view into the Ford Falcon because its interior light was on.

Judy also told you that it was late.

She put this sighting at around midnight or a little after midnight, and Judy told me.

That John looked up and that he possibly saw her looking down at him driving slowly past her house in Granite Street off Sandstone Crescent, near John and Bromin's house.

I believe that Judy's eyewitness account is solid.

Headley, You've also verified from others that Judy was deeply troubled by what she saw.

She had shared her concerns with several people, including her family, a close friend, and a New Zealand doctor over those past three decades.

She had also tried to report it to police several times.

Yeah, Judy Singh is very credible in my view, and we believe that Judy's sighting also fits the chronology because with the Ford Falcon having been refueled in Barna at eleven oh six pm, John would have then driven back to the house in Sandstone Crescent.

We believe that's when he would have put Broman's body in the back seat and driven out again, this time along Granite Street, where Judy was sitting on her deck when she saw John, and she says saw what looked like a body in that distinctive Ford face.

Can we believe that John intended to dispose of Bronwin's body somewhere near Lennox had but that because of Judy's sighting, John put Bronwin's body in the boot of the car, packed up with the two girls and the dog, and left very quickly for Sydney.

If Judy sings right, John would have left some time after midnight.

This would have been just four to five hours after John had arrived back in Lennox Head from Sydney.

Yes, and importantly, the citing evidence of both Murray, Nolan and Judy seing fit with what we suspect is unfolded.

Well, let's recap on all of it.

Zero point one.

We believe that after Bronwin had died, John drove to Baliner to get fuel.

That was the ten forty pm event which Murray witnessed, and Murray said the car bottomed out when it went down the driveway with its lights and engine off.

But as the inquest heard in two thousand and two, that was not as rare or as suspense as it perhaps seemed.

In fact, it had happened before because on other occasions John apparently didn't want to disturb he's near neighbors when he would leave early in the morning.

We do not believe her body was in the boot when John went to Barner for his fuel fill up, timed at eleven oh six pm.

Point two, We believe that John has returned from the ampole in Barner to his house in Sandstone Crescent, arriving back around eleven thirty pm, and Murray would have been asleep by then.

Point three.

We believe John has then moved Bronwin's body from the garage to the back seat of the family car.

But John hadn't closed the back door properly, and in that model of car, it meant the interior light stayed.

Ono point four.

We believe that he then drove slowly along Granite Street around midnight, and that was the Judy seeing sighting.

Remember, Judy disclosed to me that John actually looked up to where she was sitting on her upstairs deck.

There was a light on her deck.

Judy believed that John was quite possibly concerned that she had seen him.

Zero point five.

We believe that John has then hastily driven back to the house and moved Bronwin's body from the back feet to the car's boots.

Then John has made a new plan because if.

He suspected that Judy had seen him, he would have been concerned that she might call police.

And say I think I saw my neighbor driving with what looks like a body in his car.

We believe that's why John needed to leave the house and the area with the two girls in a final departure some time before one am in what was a very sudden and suspicious getaway.

Murray's sighting of John at ten point forty pm and Judy's sighting of John around midnight actually build and corroborate the timeline.

In our view.

We believe John got his two girls and the dog in to the car after midnight and then embarked on the long drive to Sydney.

We believe that the building side at Illowong became his new plan B, and that he wanted to get to Illowong, just south of Sydney sometime on Monday before the concrete pause occurred point six.

We also believe that his unusual efforts to share with people the timing of his receipt for his fuel purchase at eleven oh six PM are explained too.

It's because the receipt supported a claim by John that that was the real time John left Barner for the drive to Sydney, and of course that receipt would undermine any claim Judy sin might make that she saw him with what looked like a body around midnight or a little after midnight.

He would be able to say, that's ridiculous, she's making stuff up.

Look, I've even got a receipt for a fuel purchase at eleven oh six pm.

But in our view, John in fact left sometime before one am.

It's exactly what the famed former detective Mick Drury describes as a classic example of alibi construction.

We believe that Judy's version is reliable and that John's drive to Sydney began some time between midnight and one am.

He must have been exhausted, and it begs the question why would you drive away so urgently after such a long day.

Already I agree Hadley, and quite frankly the circumstances of John's departure for Sydney on Sunday May sixteen, which is really bizarre in a number of ways.

There was very little time between John flying from Sydney to the Ballina Airport and then driving from there to Lenox Heads, and after this leaving lenox Head to drive to Sydney.

He left late at night.

We think sometime after midnight.

He was traveling with two young girls who were aged five and ten, and Mopsy the dog, and it's quite unusual to travelsaneously at this time of night with young children.

Witnesses have said that the family home was left in a complete mess, washing in the washing machine, food on plates, the girl's beds were stripped.

This was very out of character for John.

So many people that you've spoken to Hadley have mentioned his insistence upon organization and tidiness and cleanliness, particularly in the home.

It's a long drive.

It's some eight hundred odd kilometers from Lenox Head to Sydney.

Yeah, it's a huge distance.

We know that John took hardly any luggage to Sydney, just very limited clothing for the girls, and that appeared to have been thrown into pillowcases.

They ended up staying in Sydney for ten days.

It was winter again.

It just underlies this was an abrupt and unplanned departure.

In our view, if Broman's body went to Sydney in the Ford Falcon, she had to be in the boot.

The car had an LPG tank in its boot.

We know there would have been room for a body with the tank in the boot, but probably not room for suitcases too.

The other thing we know is that it wasn't school holidays in mid May.

The girls were supposed to be at school the very next morning.

It's really unusual to take two children at late notice out of school during term time without good reason and without letting the school know about it.

First.

Your list Karna then has John arriving in Sydney on the morning of May seventeen, that's a Monday, and after visiting the hair salon, he leaves the two girls with someone who was a complete stranger to them and to John.

This person was his ex wife's new mother in law.

So Jenny Mason, who was John's first wife, has remarried and her new husband's mother is at Jenny's home.

While Jenny's out shopping, John leaves the girls with this woman, Joan Mason.

Lauren and Crystal were in their pajamas.

John went to this stranger instead of Roman's brother and sister in law.

Andy and Michelle read they were in the same suburb, and since they learned about this years after the event, they found it absolutely extraordinary that John would have left the girls with a stranger in those circumstances.

If John had taken the girls to a relative that would have undoubtedly raised questions about Rombin's whereabouts and the reasons for John's hasty travel to Sydney.

There may have even been a risk that relatives would have wanted to go to the car boot, perhaps to help with luggage that they would have thought would have been there.

Like Andy and Michelle Hadley, I've just found this event in particular really extraordinary.

And in his only formal interview with police, John was asked about his movements on May seventeen.

He didn't tell police about leaving the girls at his ex wife's house with a stranger.

This could be a deliberate decision by John not to disclose information to avoid arousing the suspicion of police about his actions and his whereabouts on that Monday.

Another thing that John didn't tell police was how he spent a number of hours on the Monday from about the late morning to the early afternoon.

John's movements between him dropping the girls at the ex wife's house and him registering the car at three oh seven pm and then going to Andy and Michelle's around four PM are still a mystery.

John had the time and the opportunity to go to the building site at ill Along in this time and dispose of Bronwin's body or other evidence such as her handbag.

He wasn't expected in Sydney by anyone on Monday, not his daughter Jody, not Andy and Michelle, not his ex wife, and not the builder Glenn Webster.

He didn't have any accommodation or childcare arranged, even though he was traveling with two young children and a dog.

Just such a weird series of movements for someone who likes to always be in control and have a plan.

It just seems very out of character to act so spontaneously.

John's explanations for the reasons for this travel to Sydney they're just not consistent and they are all over the shop.

One thing police didn't know is something a confidential source has told me, and that is that John told this person on the afternoon of Monday May seventeen that he had to be back in Sydney for an upcoming concrete poor in the Southern Shire.

That source said John did appear agitated and he appeared to regret having disclosed that there was going to be a concrete poor.

Now, the builder Glenn Webster, who employed John has said John wasn't needed for the concrete poor.

We also know that John went back to work at the Illawong building site during this ten days stay in Sydney, but he did not disclose this to police.

He did not tell police he had returned to Sydney for urgent work or a big job, which are the reasons he gave to others for the trip.

And he was asked about what he was doing in Sydney.

He had an opportunity to say I was working.

I was doing some bricklaying at Illawong, a building site.

You can talk to Glenn Webster.

That doesn't fall from his lips.

No, that's right.

He was very squarely asked what he was doing in Sydney and what he was doing on Monday, May seventeen, nineteen ninety three, and John only gave a really vague explanation to police about what he and the girls had done during their time in Sydney.

He told police, probably just hang about, just sort of sight seeing and everything.

You know.

The evidence is actually that the girls and the dogs stayed with Andy and Michelle and John stayed elsewhere but visited most days.

We believe John deliberately withheld the information about him working at the Illawong building site from police to distance himself from that site, and also from concrete pause that we believe might have occurred on the Tuesday or Wednesday of that week.

When you go to Illawong, Now, it's hard to imagine what it would have looked like on Monday, May seventeen, nineteen ninety three.

I mean, that was thirty two years ago.

Now it's very established.

But back then, the building site on which John was working was a vacant block of land in a mostly vacant housing estate.

It was isolated.

The vast majority of the properties, including all of those in the actual street, were not under construction, so there weren't people around.

The bricklayer turning up on a Monday in his vehicle is not going to arouse suspicion.

John usually worked alone at the site, with the builder, Glenn Webster, acting from time to time as his laborer.

If John wasn't there, Glenn wasn't there.

Glenn's told us that, and we don't believe Glenn was at the site that Monday because he thought John was still Atlantic's head.

The other thing we know is that one of Crystal's friends has said that Crystal told her that Cristel and Lauren were not allowed by John to look in the boot of the on the morning of May seventeen.

If this is true, it begs the question of what the girls were not meant to see.

It's a lengthy list, Carena, there's more than twenty points, and I reckon we've missed a few.

How important With your experience of running coeronnial investigations in the past, do you believe that Illawongs site potentially.

Could be Headley.

I think there's a real prospect that Bromwin's remains or other evidence, possibly her handbag, might be concealed at Illowong.

When you pull all of these factors together that we've just been discussing, it's just such a compelling list of factors.

I really feel that the Illawong site should be searched out of fairness to Bronwin and her family and to try and give them some answers.

I've been thinking a lot this week about the ambiguous loss that they're living with not knowing where Bronwin is or what happened to her.

Searching Illowong would at least answer that question for them.

It almost goes without saying that it's very difficult to hand dig a grave, a grave that will not be disturbed by animals, say along the Pacific Highway or somewhere in Lennox Head, when it's dark, it's cold, you've got children either sleeping at home or in the car.

However, at a building site where the ground has been prepared for a concrete pore, where there is phil that is readily moved to put the remains of someone or other evidence into it is a relatively straightforward, but macarb task.

I agree, a much easier option, and there seems much less chance of the body ever being found.

I'm even suspicious carena of the fact that when John turned up at Andy and Michelle's house in the afternoon for thirty PM, the boot lining, which back then was vinyl, was not visible.

There was no vinyl lining in the boot of that vehicle.

That's what Andy noted.

Would that vinyl lining have been a useful wrap for a body already concealed perhaps in.

Sheets it could have been, or perhaps it needed to be removed from the car because it might have had forensic evidence on it.

From transporting the body.

In a telecom television commercial in the year that Romwin disappeared, Australian country music singer John Williamson told Australians that they had one of the best phone services you could get.

Now we set to take our country into the next century and now shut the world outside this.

But could that phone service capture local call data at that time?

For months, we have been trying to confirm once and for all whether police could have retrospectively obtained local telephone call data from Telstra for any local calls made from Sandstone Crescent on the evening of May sixteenth, nineteen ninety three, and Carina Berger has been doing a lot of work on this.

The local call data is critically important in this case, and that's because John Winfield alleges Bromwin made some telephone calls shortly before she was purportedly picked up by an unknown person.

Strong inference is that Bromwyn telephone the person who John says picked bromwn up.

It follows then that if no telephone call was made, then John has been lying and nobody picked bromwn up and only the provision of local telephone call data would be able to verify this.

But was that data available we have received contradictory information about that point.

Back then, Telstra was known as Telecom.

We know that police asked the telecommunications provider for some details about long distance calls and other non local calls made around the time Bromwyn disappeared.

You have heard a bit about that in earlier episodes.

We know that at the inquest into Bromin's disappearance, evidence was given that a Telstra employee had said that local call details would not have been available in ninety ninety three.

We asked Telstra to confirm whether that position was correct.

After some delay, we were told by a Telstra spokeswoman.

This was not available for local calls respectively in nineteen ninety three and only became widely available in nineteen ninety seven.

In nineteen ninety three, there was a process in place to manually activate tracing for select reasons, one charge check where someone was disputing their charges, and two malicious call trace for police matters.

Both of these needed to be proactively switched on prior to the call.

In episode thirty four, the former detective Michael Drury spoke about podcasts having an investigational team of ten thousand or more.

We've received a lot of information from listeners, all of whom have shown their goodwill and keenness to help by giving us some personal and often sensitive details from their own lives that led to their dealings with local call data.

Listeners experiences with local call data vary greatly, but the timing of the events and the locations of the exchanges are critical.

We've been told by some listeners, including other Telstra workers, that local call data was available in the early nineteen nineties.

One former employee said.

I started working for Telecom in January nineteen ninety two as a customer service officer in a call center in Townsville.

At that time, local call data could be obtained, even though it was not printed on customers bills.

Another listener recalled her mother obtaining local call record from Telstra in nineteen ninety three for an address in western Sydney.

But we haven't heard from anyone who has specific and particular knowledge about local call data and it's ability from the lenox Head area in nineteen ninety three.

Lenox Head is a regional area, and that probably meant that local called data was not available in nineteen ninety three, even though it may have been available elsewhere in metropolitan areas, technological advancements were rolled out across the cities before they got to the regions.

Former Telstra employee Odette Nettleton has described her work experience for Telstra in regional New South Wales, and her recollection is that telephone exchange equipment in metropolitan areas was upgraded much earlier than the equipment in regional areas.

Odette says that in Gosford at this time that's mid nineteen ninety seven, there were no records of which numbers.

Were dialed slowly each exchange was upgraded.

These upgrades took place from late nineteen ninety seven and into nineteen ninety eight.

From my memory, Odette checked with some other former Telecom and Telstra workers and their feedback was that the lenox Head telephone exchange may not have been upgraded until around August nineteen ninety seven.

It seems to us that it's more likely than not that local call telephone data in lenox Head was not available to police in nineteen ninety three.

Really nice person soft personality, softly spoken, very pretty girl.

You'd always look at her and go, oh, she's just so nice.

In this the last episode in the Bromwin series.

For the time being and until there are new developments, it does seem fitting to talk about the woman at the heart of all of this.

My mum even put her in the Mister Luru contest down in Cronulla when she was younger.

Fiona Houstoner grew up a stone's throw from where Bromwin and Andy lived as teenagers with their father, Philip, his second wife, and their daughter Melissa in the Shire.

There are friendships forged four decades ago.

Their ties were strong and meaningful back in the day.

Fiona regularly drops into her own family home where Bromwyn would babysit her and her brother Sean.

Mom and dad still live there, Andrew's mom still lives two doors down.

Andy's stepmother, the woman he still calls mom, stayed there after Philip's death.

Their house in Krela in the Shire has scarcely changed since the mid nineteen seventies when teenage Bromwin and little brother Andy were there.

We used to go to their house all the time.

Fiona tells me she was a little in awe of the older very pretty.

Bromwin, always looking up to her, and we used to go over and see her after she had Crystal.

Why did you ask me to look at Broman's case six years ago?

God, someone was missing and we've never heard anything about it, and it's someone you know.

No one knew what had happened.

It sort of just got swept under the carpet for a long time.

Only Andrew was fighting for it.

It seems much clearer now.

It's just not swept under the carpet anymore.

My friend Matt Condon is a remarkable writer.

He thinks deeply about people, about his own work and the writing of others.

Broman left behind some of her writing, and you heard little snippets of this in very early episodes.

Matt has studied Bromman's written words and then he wrote something deeply moving about this mother of two's summary of her life.

We published it in the pages of The Australian right back near the start of this series.

At that time I asked Matt to narrate it for audio to be used in a future episode.

Now is the right time to hear Matt's and Broman's words and our videoographer friend Bianca's voice.

It was one of the few artifacts she left behind after disappearing from her family home at Sandstone Crescent, Lennox Head.

On May sixteenth, nineteen ninety three, Bronwin joy Winfield, thirty one supposedly abandoned two daughters, clothes, jewelry, a femur, and a fragment of autobiography.

In the vacuum of her absence was a nine page handwritten testimony on simple A four sheets.

Perhaps not a testimony, but this is my life style of declaration.

It begins with sometimes tortured remembrances of childhood moments.

Andrew always wedding bed, my recurring nightmare of the man coming to my room often snuck into Andrew's bed and on the end of it.

When to Perth with stepmother, went to King's Park and Rottnest Island, went to Canns and met Sonia and Billy McMahon while staying there.

When to Fiji with family, a wonderful place and stayed Castaway Island, very primitive but picturesque god stranded in a lagoon was rescued by man and underwear, only to discover the water was only waist deep.

Bronwin races through fractured teenage years, becomes mired in her contemporaneous marriage to John Winfield, and then leaps into the future with an unconvincing declaration of hope.

The physical handwriting is tight knit, unfurling in long, unbroken paragraphs.

It is riddled with exclamation marks, The lower case eyes are topped with small circles as a child might punctuate.

Mistakes are heavily scratched out with biro, and the text is flecked with spelling and grammatical errors.

But all that aside, the biggest and most curious question is this, why does this little personal manuscript in Bronman's hand even exist?

Did she write it over a period of time?

If so, when and where?

When she was living virtually hand to mouth in that small flat down in Byron Street after her marriage to John Winfield had collapsed and she'd left him.

Or was she sitting at the kitchen table in Sandstone Crescent, in that suburban estate on the ridge above the Coast Road and the sliver of Boulder Beach when she moved back into the house while John was working in Sydney the marriage over, but she not willing to cut free without assets she was legally entitled to.

Did she write it on the fire all weekend of her life before she disappeared.

It's an opportunity to reflect a tableau, to unleash pent up emotions.

You sense reading it that it was a difficult task for her, this excavating of her own life and times.

She writes in sometimes abbreviated halting snatches, as if under pressure to produce the document.

Started school four years nine months mount Owsley Primary.

Moved to Sydney age seven.

We had Auntie Phillis looking after Melissa and Andrew and I before and after school.

She used to bring us hot doughnuts in the mornings.

Caught recurrent ear infections and had chronic stomach upset after doctor's examination.

Moved after fire in Roseland's just escaped before place was almost destroyed.

Moved to Murray Place, Sylvania.

Traumatic time, to say the least.

The story she commits to paper is no fairy tale.

Hers is a fractured childhood.

She is shunted between different schools and carers, endures a short stint in boarding school and wonders if she just left or was thrown out.

There is animosity between her and her stepmother, she couldn't stand me and short stays with her nana.

During this chaos.

She writes of meeting her real mother, Barbara, who had fled husband Philip and the kids Bronwin and Andy with postnatal depression, only to turn up in Tasmania years later.

She records the continued animosity with her stepmother.

She recounts her first kiss.

Year ten dance Robert Austen.

Wasn't supposed to go, but pleaded, but didn't have anything to wear but Daggie Fletcher Jones g and DJ shirt just one in Denham Jean's like the.

Others and a nickname given to her.

Nickname Twiggy, Tall and Slim.

Left school year ten, wanted to leave home, hated it.

There is a creeping sense in the manuscript that Bronwan's life was touched from childhood with bad luck.

She walks out on her first job at the Bank of New South Wales.

Was harassed by accountant when a bank manager who just laughed, couldn't stand the accountant, couldn't get transfer, walked out one afternoon, never went back.

And is picked up by the police for smoking pot.

Her rendition of how her first child was conceived was hardly lifted from a romance novel.

Meanwhile, I fell pregnant to Mark Davis because I was drinking at my birthday party after an argument with Mark Guthrie, who wanted to marry me.

She gives birth to Crystal and lives on her own until she is briefly married to a crook.

Then moved to Nana Reed's unit for a while, then the place was sold.

And is staying with friends.

When she meets Jonathan got.

To know John.

We talked and I felt I had made a friend.

John has a daughter, Jody, to a previous relationship.

By page five of the diary, things move quickly.

Bronwan starts living with John in a flat behind a milk bar in South Cronulla.

Then the grievances immediately kick in.

When we moved to Lennox Head, I was even more lonely.

The house that was Bill became John's castle and my prison.

On some pages there is random children scrawling, perhaps in the hand of Lauren, then a toddler.

It's a heartbreaking document, a small record of a short and relatively uneventful life.

Despite the glory of her children.

I was surrounded by hate and abuse in various ways as a child, and am determined not to allow this to happen to my girls or myself ever again.

No one will ever intimidate me again, nor will I allow anyone to force their opinions onto me, as this can cause damage to myself as well as my children.

Here I am, it says, near the end, exposed.

This is me warts and all.

My marriage has fallen apart, and this is how I'm feeling about my life.

Eventually I switched off and became cold inside.

He had a heart of ice and always criticized me no matter what I did.

The man was cold and heartless and gave nothing but expected everything.

So why did she do it?

Was she asked to commit to paper a summary of herself and her life?

Was this the raw material for a future court battle with estranged husband John over custody of their children and the division of assets?

Or was she setting down her history in the shadow of uncertainty about her future, wanting to leave a record behind for her children.

Then she disappeared without a trace.

Now those nine pages, for so many different reasons, have become remarkable and priceless.

Before we go, please listen again to one of Broman's best friends in Lennox Head, a special woman called Denise Barnard.

I interviewed her for the first time on February fourteen, twenty twenty four, at the home her husband Les built for them.

You first heard Denise's voice in episode two.

How do you feel about Bromin's case becoming part of this podcast investigation?

Fantastic.

You're not worried about bringing up painful memories and difficult situations that I.

Think we need to We need to do it.

It's been too long.

Anybody that had anything to impart any more information to try and get this resolved one way or the other wouldn't be interested in.

Talking to you.

I still recollect when she told me that he had had her by the throat up against the wall and that she was frightened.

I think she was committed to leaving him and taking the girls and starting a new life for herself.

They were her wife, and knowing that Chrystal wasn't John's, she wouldn't have gone anywhere without them.

She just wouldn't have done it.

Whatever happened on that Sunday night, that was the last of Bromin.

Next tonight, those girls lost their mum.

Denise cared deeply about Bromin.

She hoped that there would be justice.

And do you know Broman's third person of my friends that's gone missing without a trace, you would have heard of Debbie Walkin and George Jamison.

Yeah, that was to all my friends in Sydney that disappear, never a trace of them ever, both nurses and rumored i'd heard either la they were eighteen.

Whatever happened to them?

How do people just disappear and you will never see them again.

The day before this episode thirty six, I went back and listened to my recordings with Denise to some of the things that she said which were not published in the podcast.

Denise had refused to talk to John Winfield for a long time.

I hope it'd be a bit frightened that something might be.

Uncovered when I met her.

The Bromwin podcast investigation was three months away from the release of its first episode.

Throughout its life, Denise has hoped that it would make a difference.

Let's see if we can do something and get something happening with this good a great outcome.

Denise and her husband Lez were in touch with deb Hall and Murray Nolan, familiar friends in a relatively small community touched by the unresolved disappearance of a much love woman in nineteen ninety three.

Looking forward to catching up with them.

Are they coming out for a glass having that wine?

Yeah, we're going to Yeah, that's good after you talk to Headley.

Yeah together.

I promised to leave you a few times now.

To get home to your family.

Yeah.

It was lovely to meet you.

Good to chat to you again, mister numbers for you.

Denise was true to her word.

She called other people who knew Bromwin.

She asked them to talk to me and they did.

Safe journey home, Good luck with it.

You've been grave.

We end now with a special thanks to everyone who has helped get this far.

You have all been remarkable and a heartfelt thank you to Denise Barnard, Bromlin's dear friend.

Sadly, Denise died two days before this episode was released.

Our deepest sympathies are extended to Denise's husband, Les and their family.

Bronwm is written and investigated by me Headley Thomas as a podcast production for The Australian.

If anyone has information which may help solve this cold case, please contact me confidentially by emailing Bronwyn at the Australian dot com dot Au.

You can read more about this case and see a range of photographs and other artwork at the website Bromwyn Podcast dot com.

Our subscribers and registered users here episodes first.

The production and editorial team for bromwin includes Claire Harvey, Kristin Amiot, Joshua Burton, Bridget, Ryan Bianca, far Marcus, Katie Burns, Liam Mendez, Sean Callen, Matthew Condon, Karina Verger and David Murray, with assistance from Isaac Iron's.

Audio production for this podcast series is by Wasabi Audio and original theme music by Slade Gibson.

We have been assisted by Madison Walsh, a relation of Bromwyn Winfield.

We can only do this kind of journalism with the support of our subscribers and our major sponsors like Harvey Norman.

For all of our exclusive stories, videos, maps, timelines and documents about this podcast and other podcasts including The Teacher's Pet, The Teachers Trial, The Teacher's Accuser, Shandy Story, Shandy's Legacy and The Night Driver, go to the Australian dot com dot au and subscribe