All language subtitles for The.Night.Caller.S01E02.WEBRip.x264-ION10

[Insects chirping]

♪♪

♪♪

♪♪

[Gunshot fires, thud]

♪♪

?My husband was reading
the paper.

He said,
"There's been a killing."

I said, "Has there?"

He said, "Yeah."

He said, "I hope they catch
the bugger that did it."

John: On the 9th of February
1963, after an argument,

my girlfriend
started walking home.

I tried looking for her...

but suddenly she was gone.

I was concerned because
there was a killer out there,

shooting people.

♪♪

This is where I found
her bleeding to death.

It was a downright bloody lie.

Button was a voice around town
in the criminal element.

That bloke is bloody guilty.

♪♪

♪ So you run, run, run

♪ From everything you are

♪♪

♪ And you're lost

♪ With every scar

♪♪

♪ And you say my name
like it's a game ♪

♪ But you can't hide

♪♪

♪ I see you there

♪ Behind the lies

♪ You never know the pain

♪ It comes and goes

♪ In ways
that cannot be erased ♪

♪ It only fades away

♪ Long enough to remember

♪ The price we paid

♪♪

♪♪

Man:
Pass you that one.

Remand for youth, John Button.

It was a hit and run.

Rosemary was his fiancée.

Terrible.
John Button was responsible.

He was seen to be
the guilty one.

Knowing you've got John Button,
you know, we can relax.

Hugh:
When this charge came out,

the group with whom I associated
said they didn't believe it.

No one is that hot-headed.

Rod: The hit and run of
Rosemary Anderson was awful.

But Button is an awful
piece of work.

Had a shocking temper.

Frank: John was head over heels
in love.

He did not do it.

Rod:
No, I reckon he's still guilty.

A lot of people think
he's still guilty.

Lots.

I've heard people say
that he had a temper.

Oh...

No.

Not with me.

♪♪

♪♪

Over here at the back,
I've got the hit run.

In the front row is Button.

I became involved
in John Button's case

about 30 years
after he was arrested.

Madril confession...

He certainly didn't look
like somebody

who would be capable
of a crime like this,

but I covered police courts
as a cadet journalist.

Hit runs, hit runs.

And I could see that they could
look very nice

and sound very nice.

I used my contacts from my days
in government

and was able to get access
to every case file.

The deeper I dug,
the more clear it became

that this was far more complex
than anyone had ever realized.

There was still a lot
of division in the community

as to whether John
was guilty or not,

and none of us
had been told the full truth.

Thank you for coming,
everyone,

and it's nice to see
a few friends there.

For those who don't know me,
I grew up in Perth

and on Australia Day, 1963,

there were five shootings
in Perth in one night.

[Gunshots fire]

It set Perth into utter panic.

Everyone was terrified.

[Gunshot fires]

And so was I.

He's got a gun!

[Gunshot fires]

It completely changed the city.

Then, while the entire
police force

was searching for this killer,

just two weeks later
Rosemary Anderson

gets run down by a car
as she walks home at night.

And all the evidence points
to her 19-year-old boyfriend,

John Button.

Police took John to the main
police station in Perth

and detectives took a statement.

♪♪

John:
I told them as much as I could.

I started off about telling them
that we'd had an argument.

She'd walked home,
and I'd followed her down

and found her lying
by the side of the road

and rushed her off
to the doctor's surgery.

Blackburn: But the detectives
didn't buy it.

They were the best
in the business.

They knew a liar
when they saw it.

Stuttering.
Stumbling.

He had liar written
all over his face.

But the police, they don't
just go on hunches.

They needed evidence.

Condren: Button's car was
in the Roe Street police yard.

I was called to examine
the vehicle

for its mechanical condition.

You judged the vehicle
on its damage, how it occurred,

where it occurs, points
of impact, stresses and so on.

When I investigated the Simca,

I saw that there was damage

to the front over-rider
on the bumper.

John's car had been involved
in a collision.

These policemen, they noticed
the front of the car

had been damaged

and they noticed a few drops of
blood on the bonnet of the car.

Also, I had a large amount
of blood on my hands.

I'd actually run into the back
of a car a fortnight earlier,

and damaged the left-hand
grille and headlight.

But I didn't know
how the blood got there.

But then even more evidence
of Button's guilt.

They found some stockings
and a girdle in the backseat.

Aha!
Sex was involved.

They worked it out.

He'd got a bit fresh with her,
maybe a bit of playing around,

but then she said no,
and she went off.

He got angry, stormed after her
and wild at her,

he ran her down.

For police, this was proof
that Button was lying.

John: But they didn't
believe my story.

I've never been as upset in all
my life as I was over this.

But I tried not to think
about that.

I was more...

I was more concerned
about Rosemary.

All I could think of was her
being hurt.

I didn't want to believe it.

I just wanted to live
in a fantasy world

where it's been a big mistake.

The police were determined
to get the truth out of him,

so they kept interrogating him.

John: These policemen
turned around and said,

"Look at the damage
to the front of the car.

We know it's you.

We want a confession."

But then things started
getting a lot worse.

♪♪

Blackburn:
John Button had been caught,

but there was still a shooter
out there.

[radio tuning]Announcer: A mystery gunman

shot two people dead
in Vincent

and Louise Streets,
Nedlands.

A third man
was critically wounded,

and the gunman fired upon
two other people

sitting in a parked car.

The gunman vanished
into the night

as mysteriously
as he had arrived.

He left few clues.

We were certainly reporting
every car backfiring.

Every time somebody
knocked at the door

you'd call out, "Who is it?"

Doors stayed locked.

Windows stayed locked.

We didn't
sleep outside anymore.

We're a big, suspicious,
scared city.

Geoff:
We've got to find this person.

Everybody was looking
at each other.

Everybody knew everybody.

And so everybody suspected
everybody.

Life changed completely.

Every police officer
was onto it.

Hugh: But everything that they
had been doing to date seemed

to have been wasted.

Graham: I think we were losing
empathy with the police,

because they couldn't solve
what should have been

a simple solution.

Probably about 500,000 people
lived in Perth at that time,

and 500,000 of them
were frightened for their lives.

So they wanted the police
to fix it, and they couldn't.

Oh, huge pressure.

Baker: What's happening?

Murders committed and no one's
being charged with anything.

And this is true.

To the point where it got
to Parliament

that we weren't doing our job.

Nielson: Questions were being
asked in Parliament

as to why
the FBI wasn't called in.

Scotland Yard should
have been called in

to give the local CIB
the assistance it required,

because of...
there was still no result

from our investigations.

Baker: They then brought over
a New South Wales Detective

and put him on the team.

And we were very unhappy
about that.

That must have been
frustrating for you guys.

Well, it was.

Everybody was feeling it.

Blackburn:
And then nothing more happened.

The shooter had gone quiet,

and we'd started
to relax slightly.

He hasn't done anything
for a while,

so we thought we were okay.

But we weren't.

♪♪

That was me, hanging out clothes
at the university.

On Australia Day 1963.

Well, I was in Papua New Guinea
for the holidays,

with my university friend,
Shirley.

While we were driving
in the car,

over the radio came
the shocking announcement

that people in Perth
had been killed.

And one of them
was John Sturkey, whom we knew.

That was even more horrifying.

♪♪

We had no idea
six months later...

Shirley would be shot
as well.

♪♪

♪♪

Shirley and I, we became friends
in the last year of school

and then went
to university together.

She was quite charismatic...

...and she was quite ambitious.

I think she wanted to try
and rise

above the more
working-class family.

We spent a lot of time together
and became really close friends.

After Papua New Guinea,

Shirley and I made our debut
at the Graduation Ball.

That was me, doing the curtsey.

You had to curtsey
to the Chancellor.

The university
was very up-market.

We spent a lot of time
going to the coffee shop.

Sometimes going to lectures,
but more often than not,

sleeping in and missing lectures
and so on.

But by August holidays,
the place was fairly deserted.

♪♪

And several of the students
would babysit

for people who lived
in these posher areas

near the university,
in Dalkeith.

[Thunder rumbling]

So this particular night,

Shirley took the place
of another student

who was sick to babysit
for these people named Dowd.

♪♪

[Clattering in distance]

♪♪

Blackburn:
We were all locking our doors.

One had been left unlocked.

♪♪

This shooter found it.

♪♪

♪♪

[Gunshot fires]

[Record static]

Perth erupts again.
The shooter is still around.

He's still out there,
hunching around houses,

looking for unlocked doors.

Shirley McLeod was babysitting
for Karl and Wendy Dowd.

So I rang Karl Dowd
and I took shorthand notes

of what he told me
over the phone.

"I went up the stairs first
and saw her.

Having seen her,
I raced into the nursery

and put my back
against the door.

Immediate assumption was
that this guy was still around.

I just stood there with my back
against the wall going,

'No, no, no.'"

Fay:
It was a Sunday morning

and there was a loud bang
on my door,

and it was
our University warden.

She said, "Oh, Shirley's
been shot."

I said, "But she's alright,
isn't she?"

She said, "I'm sorry,
but I'm afraid she died."

I -- I just was sort of
completely

horrified and shocked.

And detectives, they had taken
apart everything in her room.

They had taken all of the books
out of the bookshelves.

Pieces of paper out of pockets
of her clothing.

That was pretty dreadful.

"Perth girl, 18, shot.
Police hunt for maniac." Ohh.

Fay: "And the police believe
that the killer

could be the same person

who committed the Nedlands
and Cottesloe shootings

six months ago."

Oh, no.
Not another one.

Especially near us again,
close to home.
Mm.

It just seemed endless.

It was a shock that you could be
sitting your lounge room.

And the police
were absolutely right.

We were dealing with a maniac.

And everybody was totally
at the end of their tether

when it comes to this.

Jim:
Police officers, they weren't
seemingly making any headway

whatsoever, and the nature
of the murders were so brazen,

so outrageous
and so different.

Blackburn: And then, suddenly
there was a major breakthrough

with Shirley McLeod's murder.

For the first time at a murder
scene, they found a fingerprint.

There'd been no fingerprints on
any of the other murder scenes.

They found one that testing,
checking,

showed didn't belong
to the baby's parents,

didn't belong to any visitors,
didn't belong to any tradesmen.

They had a stranger's
fingerprint in this house.

They started fingerprinting
en masse.

Nielson: The police were house
to house, door to door,

on residents in the area,
particularly in the areas

where the multiple murders
were committed.

Many, many residents
in the Nedlands, Cottesloe area,

Dalkeith area,
were fingerprinted.

Blackburn:
It was the biggest door to door

fingerprinting operation
ever in Australia.

The plan was to fingerprint
every male over 12 years old.

It was unprecedented.

Geoff:
I can still see them the day
they came and fingerprinted me.

Dad set this thing up for them,

then we had two policemen
come in.

And Mum made them a cup of tea.

It was still like that.

So they had a cup of tea
while they fingerprinted us.

I thought it was a bit of
an invasion of privacy,

but that had to be set aside
in the better good of everybody.

Blackburn:
They fingerprinted every male
student in the university,

including her brother,

which is shocking really
when you think about it.

She was so close to her brother.

The atmosphere of the western
suburbs suddenly changed.

There was some hope
they might catch this guy

before the next one.

A glimmer of hope.

We had a little tiff.
She ran out of the house.

I went to follow her.

I couldn't find her for ages.

At the police station,
John Button continued

to tell them
his version of events.

John told them he drove
under the subway,

and found Rosemary
lying in the sand.

But they had real evidence
against him.

The grille was buckled.

The headlight rim was dented.

And there was blood on the car.

And then, examining Button's
car again,

they found a dent on the bonnet,

a broad, shallow dent
about the size of a head.

Clear evidence that Rosemary's
head had hit the bonnet

before she was flung off
to the side in the sand.

So they kept asking over
and over and over.

Man: Tell us again.

John: And this was this sort
of questioning

that went on
and on and on then.

-Again!
-Yeah, what happened?

"Why did you do it?
It must have been you.

Look at the blood on the car.
Just tell us why."

The police, they said
it could have been

that you just got
too close to her.

You could have just meant
to scare her

and made a slip
and ran her down.

And I've seen her on the side
of the road, in the sand.

John: I kept telling them
the same story.

And I think she was bleeding.

"I found her lying
by the side of the road,

and I took her off
to the doctor's surgery."

And I said, no,
that I hadn't done it.

Blackburn: But the detectives,
they weren't buying it.

They thought he was lying.

So they kept on at him.

They were going to get the truth
out of him.

And that's exactly
what they did.

Naomi: So this document...

is a confession

that my father signed.

In his words,
"Rosemary was walking on

the left-hand side of the road.

Before I realized
what had happened,

I had hit her
with the left-hand side

of the front of my car.

I stopped my car and got out.

I saw Rosemary lying on
the left-hand side of the road,

level with the front door.

She had a cut over her
right eye and was bleeding.

She was unconscious
and not moving."

You know, my questions
as I grew up and asked my Dad,

"What'd you do?"

How could that possibly be?

How do you end up
with a signed confession?"

♪♪

John: And then they started
getting physical.

And I remember being punched
a few times.

And it was then that I thought,

well, I wanted to know
how Rosemary was.

I said to them, I said,
"How's Rosemary?"

And they said,
"Oh, she's dead.

She died a couple
of hours ago."

♪♪

At that point, I didn't care
what happened to me.

♪♪

[Typewriter clacking]Said, "You had an argument?"

I said, "Yes."
-You got fresh with her.

I said, "Yes."

"You followed her in the car?"
"Yes."

-You tried to scare her.
-Yes.

And you're there
and ran her down.

I said, "Yes."

At that point,
I -- I signed a confession.

[Typewriter dings]

Blackburn:
That's a bullshit story.

Anybody likely to believe that?

This is the police
he's talking about.

The police. The people
we trust to protect us.

John, he felt guilty.

He had been lying.

Now he was telling the truth.

He'd signed a confession.

They had their man.

Naomi:
I know my Dad signed that.

But it's jarring to me.

It doesn't fit,

because I grew up
knowing that my Dad...

is the softest,

most-gentlest man
you could come across.

Rod: He confessed to the murder
of Rosemary Anderson.

He had the argument
with the girl

and then there was
a hit and run.

Man: If someone was to say,
"Oh, Button had a real temper."

I never saw that.

Ever.

John: I was charged
with willful murder.

I was sent down
to Fremantle Prison.

It was my 19th birthday.

♪♪

Blackburn: For the next week
after Shirley McLeod's murder,

the police were still
in the middle

of a huge
fingerprinting operation.

In the end, they collected
8,000 fingerprints,

but they did not get a match.

But then there was another
major breakthrough

on the other side of the river.

♪♪

Right over in Mount Pleasant
in the south of Perth.

Hidden away,
under a Geraldton wax bush.

♪♪

They had found a rifle

under this sprig
of Geraldton wax.

[Insects chirping]

It's pretty well right here.

Four or five yards
from my bedroom window.

The couple were walking by.

The lady decided she wanted
to pick a piece of Geraldton wax

which had these nice
little flowers on the end.

As she went to pick them,

she's noticed the rifle
on the ground.

When I found out that rifle was
right outside my bedroom window,

I was petrified.

I've got a shivery feeling
just thinking about it.

They called the police.

Nielson: We took the rifle in
to the ballistics people...

...and it was then ascertained
that this was the rifle

used to shoot the latest victim,
the girl Shirley McLeod.

♪♪

What we did, we took
another rifle back

and wired it into this bush.

So they put up
a lookout for us.

Nielson: And then we kept
a 24-hour vigil

in a camouflaged tent,

wearing camouflaged clothing,
changing staff at midnight

so that nobody knew
of the presence

of the detectives in that area.

[Thunder rumbles]

They were there for 17 days
and 17 nights

in one of the worst winters
we ever had.

Graham: But nobody went back
to retrieve it.

♪♪

Blackburn: They waited two
weeks, but nothing happened.

So the police came up with
a plan to draw out the killer.

Nielson: How could we get the
perpetrator back to the bush?

So we decided on a ruse
whereby it was decided

that insertion
in the local Daily News.

Coulter: The truth is,
the CIB called in myself,

as the
Daily Newscrime reporter,

and told us
they'd found the rifle.

So we were more or less given
a carte blanche

to write anything we liked,

with the hope of attracting
the killer back for the weapon.

And we fed out such stories to
the effect that fingerprinting

was being conducted
in the Mount Pleasant area.

Just try and entice whoever
it was to come back for it.

Blackburn: It must have been
a very hard job for the police,

because it was a cold winter.

It was cold and wet and rainy
and still not knowing,

will this killer come back
for his rifle?

♪♪

Two weeks later,
half past one in the morning,

just as
the streetlights went out,

Bill Hawker, who was on guard,

saw a car pull up
opposite the bush.

Because it was so steep,

they could
only see the top of the car.

Baker:
But they had to wait and see
if he'd come to get the gun.

♪♪

Blackburn:
Perth is waiting for this.

The police reputation
is hanging on this.

It must have been
a very difficult time

for those police officers.

If we miss, and he's got a rifle
and sees us up here...

♪♪

♪♪

Baker: The lookout,
two 15-stone blokes ran down.

And we got the bastard.

♪♪

The perpetrator
is taken in for questioning.

They've got him.

-They'd got him.
-They got him.

-Oh, at last. Yes.
-Got him.

[Chuckles]
-Bastard!

♪♪

Geoff:
The police were extraordinary.

When anybody mentions
a Geraldton wax bush today,

you think of that rifle.

♪♪

Blackburn:
Finally, the police had
the shooter of Shirley McLeod.

He was small and he was
mumbling something.

They actually thought they had
a wild animal,

because his hands
didn't feel human.

But he was wearing
kid gloves.

He always did that
to avoid fingerprints.

The detectives in
the CIB Headquarters in Perth

take a statement.

But this man
kept denying anything.

They had him going
for the rifle,

but he said he had just been
going to urinate

there one day previously
and had seen it

and was coming back
to get it for the fun of it.

He denied everything.

But then they found a
.22 rifle cartridge in his car.

That cartridge was tested
and proved to be a cartridge

from the rifle that had been
used to kill Shirley McLeod.

They had their man.

♪♪

John: After they charged me,

because I was charged
with willful murder,

I was put in solitary
confinement on death row

before my trial.

Death row down
at Fremantle Prison

consisted of about seven
or eight cells

that were wired off
from the rest of the prison.

There'd be a mattress
on the floor,

there'd be a plastic bucket
in the corner.

I did hear in prison the killer
came to retrieve his rifle,

but I didn't believe it.

I thought they'd been out
looking for this killer.

They were after a crime
to solve.

They just had to find someone
to pin this crime on.

Blackburn: Button was on death
row, pleading his innocence.

Wow.

Guilty people in prison are
always pleading their innocence.

But Button's parents
believed him.

Now, they needed
the best lawyer in Perth.

♪♪

Murdoch: We're looking at
a portrait of my father,

Ken Hatfield.

My father was a top
criminal lawyer and a QC.

He was one of the best.

A man with great morals
and great integrity.

The phone would ring at 3:00 AM

He would get up.

A taxi would pick him up
at 4:00,

and he would go straight
to the office

so that he could work
without telephones

and people interrupting him
before he had to go to court.

If you had him for a lawyer,
you would be a very lucky man.

The Button family
contacted my father.

So he went to visit
Button in prison.

My father said, "You tell me
the truth and I can help you."

John: He said, "John, why did
you sign that confession?"

And he said,
"John, did you do it?"

And I said,
"No, but it was my fault."

Murdoch:
My father didn't really know,
you know, what he believed.

I think you always think you can
trust the police, don't you?

My father thought that John
would lose

because he signed a confession.

But my father loved a challenge.

Ken Hatfield had a real record

for getting
his clients acquitted.

Button's family, they mortgaged
their house to pay for him,

but that gave them some hope.

♪♪

At the trial, the biggest thing
that his defense had to deal

with, of course,
was the confession.

That was going
to be the problem,

because people didn't believe

that the police
would do anything wrong.

[Gavel banging]

So Ken Hatfield
tried desperately to have

John's confession
excluded from the trial.

He ran a voir dire, a whole day
of argument before the judge,

with the jury absent,
to explain they'd hounded him,

they'd gone on and on,

and that confession
wasn't given voluntarily.

It certainly didn't mention
any violence,

but it was the detectives going
on and on and on at John.

Not letting him off.

"Come on, come on,
tell us the truth.

You did it, didn't you?
You killed her, didn't you?"

And he was trying to get
the judge to believe

that it wasn't
given voluntarily,

therefore it should be excluded
from the trial.

Despite him presenting this,
the judge said he was convinced

that there was no impropriety
on behalf of the police

in getting this confession
from Button.

John: My lawyer said,
"The confession,

That's the best evidence
they've got against you."

He said, "I won't ask you
the question in court,

have the police beaten
you up or not,

but if it does come up,

think very carefully about
what answer you give."

They don't believe the police
were beating me up,

"They mightn't believe
you on anything,

and they could hang you."

Consequently in court,
the question did come up.

The prosecutor asked me
if I'd...

that there'd been
physical abuse.

Now I didn't want to call
the police liars

by saying
they had been beating me up.

And after thinking for a few
seconds, I had to say no.

Blackburn:
And then in the trial,

the prosecutor asked Button,

"How did that dent in the bonnet
get there?"

You can just see it there,
or a ripple, buckled slightly.

John: I told them I didn't know
what had happened

to the bonnet of the car.

Blackburn: And he just said,
"I wouldn't like to say."

And that was it.

You know, that was it.

"I wouldn't like to say."

Now that doesn't go down well,
does it?

"I wouldn't like to say,"
to me, means you're guilty.

It got there
and I'm not going to tell you.

[Indistinct conversations]

[Gavel bangs]Murdoch: After that,

my father thought
he was going to lose the case.

He was very concerned.

Blackburn: The trial lasted
all week into Saturday,

and at the end,
the jury deliberated

for three and a half hours.

I didn't know what to think,
whether I'd be found guilty

or not guilty.

To get convicted,
I could be hanged.

Blackburn: For the jury,
it ultimately came down to,

"Do you believe the police,

or do you believe
a stuttering teenager?"

They came to a decision.

John: I was up in the dock.

I was trying very hard
to hold myself together...

[Indistinct conversations]

...when the jury came back
with the verdict.

[Indistinct conversations]

[Gavel bangs]

Man: Would you ask the witness
to come into the box,

Mr. Hatfield?

Man #2: Members of the jury,

have you agreed
to come to a verdict?

-We have, Your Honor.
-How say you?

John Button,
guilty or not guilty?

Man #3:
Not guilty, Your Honor.

Bart Kakulis, who was sitting
with my father said,

"Thank Christ."

"Not guilty, Your Honor."

My emotions shot right up.

I -- I just felt this great
big load

had suddenly been lifted off
and I was free.

I felt a bit like a bird.

I was able just to fly
out of there.

I was free.
It was all over.

I just couldn't believe it.

I looked out the back of me,
to the door, and thought,

"Could they stop me
if I hopped out of the dock

and just ran outside?"

Man #3: I'm sorry, sir, I said
the wrong thing there.

John: But then suddenly,

the foreman
turned around and said,

"Sorry, Your Honor,
I made a mistake there."

Man #3:
I must apologize, Your Honor.

Man: Read that again to me,
please.

Man #2:
How say you, John Button,

guilty or not guilty?
-Guilty, Your Honor.

[Recording stops]

Mm.

I looked at my lawyer,
and he's just sat there

and I couldn't believe it.

My mind was just screaming out,
"Don't sit there.

Do something.
Say something.

Surely this can't be allowed
to happen."

But he did nothing.

Blackburn: And the Justice
had to say, "Guilty to what?"

because it could have been
willful murder,

murder or manslaughter.

"Manslaughter, Your Honor."

Manslaughter.

It was terrible.

It was devastating
for all of them.

What a lot of crap, you know.

And a mob of bastards,
you know.

And saying it's
a lot of bullshit.

[Paper rustling]

Blackburn: Sunday Times,
the next day, in the morning,

"Jury Returns Manslaughter
Verdict In Car Case"

and they run a photo
there of John's father

thanking his lawyers.

And he must have been
heartbroken.

Murdoch:
I went out to get the paper.

I threw the paper
onto my father's bed and said,

"Well, that's case
you didn't win."

And he said, "It's one bastard
I should have.

That boy is innocent."

I think everyone
was quite happy.

He was found guilty.

Geoff:
The relief was amazing.

Knowing they've got their man,
John Button.

Intense relief.

Sally: We were watching it,
and my husband says,

"This boy says
he's not guilty."

And I said, "Well, do you reckon
he is guilty, Eric?

What do you think?"

And he said,
"Well, if he's not guilty,

he's no need to worry,

'cause they're bound to catch
the killer sooner or later.

He'll confess
and they'll release him."

♪♪

John: I was sentenced
10 years hard labor.

♪♪

Naomi: Hey, Dad,
so this is your old workshop.

John: We all had
a toolbox like that.

We used to make cupboards
for the government.

I didn't know that.

The worst part of prison
is the nights.

During the day,
you can keep yourself busy.

But at night, the lights are
turned out at 8:00

and you've got
nothing left to do.

Naomi:
This is my Dad's prison cell.

F52, Fremantle Prison.

This is where he spent...

his sentence.

I never realized what it might
be like for him

to be on this side of it,

with no capacity or freedom
to let himself out.

I just wanted to live
in a fantasy world

where it's been a big mistake.

You get more and more emotional
until finally hours later,

you'd throw yourself on the bed,
crying your eyes out.

This was basically every night.
It would...

would get to you.

One of the memories I know

so well as a child
is my father's pacing.

Even when he's...

...distressed, or stressed

or distracted as an adult,
he paces.

And he paces exactly four paces
the size of his cell,

and he still does that now.

And I grew up watching my Dad
with his fists

clenched by his side, pacing.

I realized they're demons
that keep him awake at night.

John: I never got over it.

Man: You know, why does he still
feel he can't get over it?

Why is he tormented?

Because he's guilty.

I've never thought
he was innocent, ever.

♪♪

Blackburn: The police had
the shooter of Shirley McLeod.

It was a man the police knew
as a petty thief.

A small man with a disability,
cleft palate, cleft lip.

A family man, seven children,
from South Perth.

Eric Edgar Cooke.

My husband.

Oh, dear.

[Police radio chatter]

[Clattering]

It was Father's Day.

The kids were all babies.

They all ran to the door
with presents for Dad

because they thought it was
Dad coming home.

He'd been out all night,
which wasn't...

unusual.

But there's Mr. Nielson.

I said, "Oh, hello.

What have you got him
for this time?"

'cause he was always
getting arrested.

"Loitering or stealing?"

He said, "Far worse than that,
Mrs. Cooke."

-Bill Nielson came in
with Mrs. Cooke

and she called out,
"What are they doing to you?"

And he said, "Oh, they're saying
they're trying to tell you

that I'm the bloke
they're looking for."

I didn't believe it was him.

I said, "You might have got him
for loitering,

but you're telling me
you got him for murder?"

And they said, "Yes,
and he's confessed to it."

And I said, "Oh,
you're telling lies.

You're just trying to make
a big fella of yourself."

But I said, "Cookie,
you tell your wife the truth."

Well, I said, "It's not true,
is it, Eric?"

And she said,
"Eric, what is the truth?

What -- What have you
been doing?"

I said to Eric,
"I don't believe the police."

He said, "They don't lie."

He said, "The police
never lie, Sally."

He said, "It's true."

And he said,
"Oh, yes, darling,

I'm the man
they're looking for."

Well, I knew he was a thief
and a womanizer,

but that's far different
to being a murderer.

And he said, "It's a good job
you caught me

without me knowing
I was being caught,

'cause I had enough bullets
and a rifle up in my ceiling

to do away with my family
and then myself."

And that's
what he had in mind.

And the police said, "You'd kill
your little children?"

"Well, I wasn't going to leave
them behind for anybody else."

And they got the gun
out of the ceiling.

He wasn't telling lies.

Man:
And then what'd you do?

Well, I had seven kids.

No money.

Just a pension.

Rented house.

So...

I had sisters,
wouldn't come near me

because of the scandal

and my sister said,
"Well, you move away from here.

Go to another state.
Change your name."

She said, "Well, you won't be
seeing me with my daughter.

This name's not going
to rub off on here."

And I...

Well,
I didn't know what to do.

Blackburn: The police had
John Button for the murder

of Rosemary Anderson.

They had Eric Edgar Cooke for
the murder of Shirley McLeod.

But although we in the community
were relieved,

we weren't really relaxed.

Police suspected Cooke
might also be responsible

for the Australia Day murders.

[Gunshot fires]There were similarities

between all the shootings.

The same type of rifle was used

and all the victims
had been shot in the head.

So they took Cooke
to the locations

of all the Australia Day
shootings,

to see if he might confess.

He took them around.

He went from house to house
to house,

but he only told them
about minor crimes.

He would take them to a house

and say where
he'd stolen money from,

what sort of dogs they had,
the decor of the house.

Even what whiskey decanters
he'd taken a swig from.

But he couldn't
or wouldn't talk to them.

Nope.

You can't do much about it.

Blackburn:
Then, there was another
completely unexpected turn.

Cooke confessed to running
down Rosemary Anderson.

♪♪

John:
I got the news in prison.

I was sitting there,
stuck to the wireless.

[Radio tuning]Announcer: The cruel killer,

he confessed to being a hit
and run maniac in a stolen car.

John: Eric Edgar Cooke confessed
to running down Rosemary.

I couldn't believe it.

He did the right thing
and came out with the truth.

I thought straight away,
"I'm out of here,

if somebody's
come and confessed."

I was just basically waiting for
someone to come and release me.

But they didn't.

Life just got worse
instead of better.

♪ You never know the pain

Blackburn:
He was driving around,

looking for someone
to kill that night.

I got to about here when I heard
the car rev up.

I kept screaming
that he was coming for me.

Until he is hung,
the book can't be closed.

This is the time
to clear my Dad's name.

Man: Belief is not proof.

They were going to show whether
John was a liar and a killer,

or whether he was
totally innocent.

Prisons are full of people
who never did it.

I opened the door and down
on the grass was a body.

I just thought,
"She's dead."

And now we've got a strangler.

♪♪

♪♪

♪♪

♪♪

♪♪