Friday, March 17, 2006

Death on the South Pacific

Police 'danced with witness' - The Nation - Breaking News 24/7 - NEWS.com.au

This inquest into the shipboard death of a mother on a South Pacific fun cruise is an intriguing story. The death occurred in 2002 on the Pacific Sky, which does the sort of cruises David Williamson had so much fun on recently.

Anyway, it appears that the mother died of an overdose of the "date drug" GBH, after some (allegedly) consensual sex with some bloke she just met (an activity apparently out of character for the mother). Some details are here, here and here. It seems that the police have not come up with a clear suspect to charge, but note there are 8 "persons of interest". Their photo was published recently, which is somewhat unfair if only one of them was the one who administered the drug. (Don't follow the link if you share my reservation.) Their names keep getting splashed around too, which again strikes me as perhaps a little unfair.

Today's story notes how the police investigating on the ship danced with witnesses before the interview. I am not sure that this technique is recommended in police operations manuals.

The case would all make for a good movie, but maybe it would need to be fictionalised a bit to make it not quite so sordid.

Update: would photoshopping David Williamson into the photo of the 8 persons of interest be funny? Maybe, but probably not worth the defamation action...

(I also had some bad spelling in the post originally, but could not edit it for hours due to a Blogger fault. I must learn to spell check before posting, not after...)

2 comments:

Caz said...

Steve - I know I can't decide if this is "unfair" or not. It's all so unsavoury.

Those eight men were very likely collectively involved in the gang rape and murder of a woman. It's highly improbable all eight of them will ever go to trial. Perhaps none of them will.

Two of the men who took photo's of the unconscious woman and not only showed the pics around, but told other young woman about having sex with the now dead woman (inviting them to go to the room to join in the terrific fun), would, surely, eventually, be charged with something. But who knows. Despite that revolting evidence, even they haven't been charged at this stage.

This wasn't some minor accidental death from an overdose. That is a vile group of men. Should other women be wary of them? Yes. Very possibly the worst that will happen to most / all of them is having their pic in the paper & their name published, details of which will be forgotten by most people in half a nanosecond. That's it, that's all they'll get for raping and killing a woman, and they will go on with the nasty, smug little lives.

Something is definitely unfair!

Steve said...

Caz, you make some good points. Incidentally, I have been trying to edit the post to correct spelling errors, but it won't work. I have to remember to spell check before posting.