opportunity to initiate conversation.
“One more thing, did the voices ever want you to kill your sister, Savannah?”
He clenched his teeth. “She died in an accident.”
Anya kept eye-contact. “I was hoping you might like to talk about how she died. It could help.”
Gary quickly stood and pulled down the picture of Cradle Mountain, smashing it against the wall and screaming incoherently.
Doctor Temple stood up and pressed a red buzzer above the desk. Swiftly, Anya moved closer to the door. A nurse arrived with a trolley and two wardsmen. The psychiatrist drew up an intramuscular sedative and injected it into his arm with his staff’s help.
After watching Gary Harbourn’s sedation take effect, Anya excused herself and left the room.
Doctor Temple followed, like a nervous parent.
“No one could deny that Gary is very disturbed.”
“I agree. He is extremely troubled about a number of things, as you mentioned; his sister’s death is one of them. However, he should still be able to be interviewed by the police about the night Rachel Goodwin and her sister were attacked-with your approval and presence, of course.”
26
Natasha Ryder downed a grape from the plate on the table and rocked in her chair.
“The insane defense? You’ve got to be joking.”
Anya handed the prosecutor her report of Gary Harbourn’s assessment.
Natasha pulled on rimless glasses and read while Hayden Richards and Kate Farrer sat quietly.
“Hearing voices, that’s original. Is there an ‘Idiot’s Guide to Faking Insanity’ that we don’t know about?” Natasha mumbled as she turned the page. “Let’s get to the crux. Is he faking?”
Anya had to be honest. “From that short interview, I can’t be sure. His psychiatrist is convinced but Harbourn was reasonably lucid when I saw him, until I mentioned Savannah’s death. That’s when he went berserk.”
Kate slapped the arms of her chair. “How can he be insane and lucid? He’s making fools of us.”
“It’s not that simple,” Anya explained. “He claims to have been in a psychotic state when the Goodwins were attacked. One induced by depression, cannabis and alcohol. It’s irrelevant about whether or not he’s thinking clearly now. My purpose was to assess any physical injuries he had and whether he was fit for police interview. That’s it. The rest is my non-expert opinion.”
“I appreciate that,” Natasha said, “but what’s your gut telling you?”
Anya had to be careful what she said. This was outside her field of expertise. “Sorry, but I’m not qualified to judge.”
Hayden Richards stroked his mustache with one finger. “How about we show you his behavior at the house search and you can compare that to the impression he gave you?”
“I want to review that tape anyway.” The prosecutor stood and turned on the portable television. “Maybe you missed something. These guys aren’t that smart.”
Anya could see Kate grip the chair. “We even had a stud gun looking for metal hidden behind the walls, which is how we located the knife, which is consistent with the girl’s stab wounds. We’ve established that the underpants in the bag belonged to Rachel. We believe we were thorough.”
“Let’s see.” Natasha hit the play button and returned to her seat with the remote.
The DVD began with Noelene Harbourn in view wearing her gown. It quickly fast-forwarded to the room searches. A few minutes later, Gary Harbourn came into view, wearing nothing but underpants.
Bare-chested, it was possible to see a torso, biceps and triceps that had only developed from weight-lifting, with or without steroids. He may have had strength, but the shortened hamstrings and bulked quadriceps meant he was unlikely to be fast or flexible.
He didn’t appear to be in any distress from his feet, which were bare and bandage-free. From his comments and wisecracks, this was a man who didn’t fear the police. He had cut the soles of his feet some time between the search and being admitted to Saint Stephen’s.
Natasha paused the footage of the smirking Gary, who seemed to be daring Kate to arrest him.
The behavior was arrogant and taunting, not what she would expect from someone in psychosis, with no memory of an event. Experience and instinct told her Gary Harbourn was faking to avoid prison.
“He’s pretty smug, the bastard.” Kate scratched at the arm of her chair. “As if he’s sure we wouldn’t find anything on him in the house that day.”
Natasha agreed. “Not exactly Einstein, this guy.”
“What about the baseball bat? Any prints or blood on it?”
The conversation she had with Savannah and mention of the baseball bat had been confidential, but then she remembered Sophie mentioning the man with the bat going into Rachel’s room. Gary’s overreaction to the brothers borrowing it the night Savannah was beaten meant it was probably incriminating.
Natasha played, then paused the recording again. When Milo sprayed the luminol in the living area, there was no bat. A few minutes later, a baseball bat and tattered mitt were by the sofa.
“For occupational health and safety reasons the CSO wouldn’t spray with members of the public present.” Kate sank in her chair. “She got them to leave the room, then re-enter it.”
Natasha forwarded through more images. The cameraman moved to the next room and followed Liz Gould and the CSOs.
The lounge room, where the family had waited, was only searched with the naked eye once the bat appeared. If an object had been in contact with blood, then washed, it wouldn’t have been obvious to anyone doing the search.
“Where did the bat come from?” Anya wanted to know if it had been there or brought out by one of the family when they moved back into the room.”
The prosecutor moved closer to the screen and paused the image. She forwarded slowly. The cameraman had recorded each of the children filing back from the corridor.
One of the elder boys entered the room with something at his side, then the children huddled together. A few frames later, the youngest sister was standing near the bat, the handle now covered with a mitt.
They watched Liz Gould checking the walls with the stud finder, to knee level. Kate explained, “Anything metallic, like the knife, would register. We got lucky in Gary’s room.”
“Smart,” Natasha commented. “It should become part of the routine. So we think this could have been used to threaten Rachel?” Anya could not admit knowing that the bat had been used for other assaults.
“We need to check it for traces of blood,” Hayden shook his head at the mistake.
“That leaves us with a few problems.” Natasha tapped the desk with her pen. “Were Rick and Patrick the other Harbourns at the Goodwin home, and do we have anything to link them to that house, or even to Rachel and Sophie? And what about this Simon Vine character? If we can only prove Gary was there and he claims insanity, we could lose. If there’s nothing to suggest he deliberately planned the attack on the Goodwins, he might get away with insanity as a defense. Without motive or a logical reason for him attacking the girls, it’s hard to challenge a drug-induced psychosis. If a jury sees his act, they’ll acquit.” A good defense lawyer could tear Sophie to shreds on the stand given her severe blood loss that night and inability to ID the others.
Kate flicked through her notebook. “The singlet and shirt that showed positive for luminol were Gary’s, and they’d both been washed. Lab’s trying to get DNA from the blood in the seams, but hasn’t had any luck yet.”
“We’re still canvassing friends and acquaintances about who left the street party, but so far no one’s talking. It seems everyone we approach thinks of the Harbourn brothers as folk heroes beating the system by getting out of jail, or else they’re too scared of being bashed, or worse.” Hayden sounded more frustrated than the prosecutor.
“What about the knife? Do we know where it came from?”
Kate answered, “Patrick claims Gary took the knife from him that night. Wait for it, to carve up roast chickens for the street party. Funny how he could hand Gary a knife and not leave his own print on it.”
Hayden added, “There’s no obvious link between the Harbourns and the Goodwins, so we don’t have a motive.
