The Claremont killings Inside the trial
THE SHOCKING TWISTS AND GRUESOME DETAILS OF A MURDER TRIAL THAT HAS GRIPPED PERTH AND BEYOND
Since the Claremont murders trial got underway in November last year, 23 years since the first victim vanished, the public gallery in Perth’s Supreme Court has been packed daily – and it comes as no surprise to veteran local reporter Alison Fan. “These crimes changed the face of Perth,” says the former Seven News reporter, who came out of semi-retirement to cover what the local media is calling “the trial of the century”. “Because a serial killer could affect anybody. And it was in Claremont – a wealthy, quiet area where nothing bad ever happened. These were girls who were plucked off the street. It affected everybody’s lives.”
Those women were secretary Sarah Spiers, 18, childcare worker Jane Rimmer, 23, and lawyer Ciara Glennon, 27, all of whom disappeared between 1996 and 1997 after a night out in well-heeled Claremont.
Rimmer’s naked body was found
55 days after she vanished, in bushland in southern Perth. Glennon’s body was found in bushland in Eglinton, in Perth’s north, 19 days after she disappeared. Spiers, who was the first person to vanish, has never been found.
In a stunning development in
2016, telco worker Bradley Robert Edwards, then 48, was arrested and charged over the murders and other attacks, following an often controversial 20-year investigation that involved the resources of the FBI and British forensic laboratories.
Edwards, who has pleaded guilty to two attacks that took place before the murders, has pleaded not guilty to the killings. Here, Fan, who also reports for The West Australian’s popular podcast Claremont: The Trial, updates WHO on what the judge-only trial has heard so far.
Who is Bradley Edwards?
Edwards, who grew up in Huntingdale, in Perth’s south-east, has been married twice, and was living with his adult stepdaughter at the time of his arrest. “He was a Telstra technician,” says Fan. “The prosecution has been linking emotional events of his life – marriage breakdowns, relationship break-ups – to him going out and randomly attacking a girl.”
What has Edwards pleaded guilty to? In a dramatic development last year, Edwards pleaded guilty to two attacks in Perth that took place before the murders. In 1988 he says he broke into the bedroom of an 18-year-old woman in Huntingdale, while wearing a kimono ‘nightie’ he had stolen from a clothesline. He lay on top of the girl, who first believed it was her boyfriend. When the girl realised it was an intruder, she screamed for her dad and Edwards fled. And in 1995, Edwards admitted to brutally raping a 17-year-old girl in Perth’s Karrakatta Cemetery. He had abducted her from a Claremont park. DNA evidence tied Edwards to both attacks. By pleading guilty, “he’s saying yes, I’m a sexual deviant, but I’m not a serial killer”, says Fan.
What led to Edwards’ arrest?
His previous attacks. The DNA found at those crime scenes was also allegedly found on Ciara Glennon. And fingerprints found at a ‘prowler’ crime scene near the home of the Huntingdale attack were matched to Edwards (having been convicted of a common assault against a woman in 1990, his fingerprints were on file). Police then obtained DNA in an undercover operation and through that evidence he was charged with the murders. According to many commentators, the case hinges on the DNA. The defence argues “that the DNA evidence was contaminated”, says Fan.
Were the murder victims sexually assaulted? “The latest evidence we heard was that the two victims found were not raped,” explains Fan. “But because the bodies were so badly decomposed, they can’t rule it out altogether.” Were the women violently abducted? According to witness statements, the women willingly got into Edwards’ vehicle. “Back then, he was a good-looking guy – a guy you’d trust,” says Fan. It is not clear at what point the killer first attacked his victims, but, “There were blood-curdling screams heard by neighbours in the vicinity where they vanished,” says Fan. Are the victims’ loved ones attending the trial?
“Dennis Glennon [Ciara’s father] has been there almost every day,” says Fan. “The woman from the Huntingdale attack has been coming to eyeball [Edwards]. Sarah’s father has also been there. Sarah’s family is still going through the terrible anguish of not knowing where she is.”
The trial continues.
“These crimes changed the face of Perth” — ALISON FAN