Vikki Petraitis - The Crime Scene Examiner

THE CRIME SCENE EXAMINER

by

Vikki Petraitis

Forensic evidence is known as the silent witness. Crime scene examiners make the silent witness speak.

Sergeant Trevor Evans has been a crime scene examiner for 17 years, and worked the notorious case of murdered baby Jaidyn Leskie in Moe. He also examined the scene of the intriguing, still-unsolved murder of Jane Thurgood-Dove, a mother gunned down in the driveway of her home in Niddrie.

Evans also used his wealth of experience when he was called to join the international team shifting through the debris after the Bali bombings, in order to identify those who lost their lives.

Sergeant Trevor Evans has been in the police force fortwenty-seven years, and a Crime Scene Examiner for the past seventeen of those.When he was nineteen-years-old, Evans decided he wanted a career that offereddifferent experiences every day. He'd tried working as a clerk, and some parttime study, but that wasn't for him. As a teenager, he'd met a couple of copsand their work sounded interesting. Evans applied to become a police officer,and was accepted to train at the Victoria Police Academy.

On 7 November 1977, Trevor Evans, with his packed suitcase and his regulationshort-back-and-sides haircut, arrived at the imposing Police Academy in GlenWaverley. In those days, many of the classes were run by senior constables whofashioned themselves after army drill sergeants. On the very first day, Evansrecalls one such chap standing in front of the raw recruits screaming so loudlythat his face glowed red and spittle flew from his mouth as he yelled. Hefinished his baptism of fire with a directive - they all had to go home and gettheir hair cut even shorter. It would be the last chance they would get to leavethe Academy during the week. Their twenty weeks was akin to being in prison withweekend leave.

That night at home, Evans's mum took one look at her son and knew that if shehad have told him he didn't have to go back to the Academy, he wouldn't have.Luckily, she had the sense to keep her own counsel and her son returned thefollowing day.

The old-style of training for police recruits was raw and regimented. Therewas a definite pecking order, and the junior ones did as they were told. TrevorEvans enjoyed his training but really didn't like the Academy, and each Sunday,after a weekend's respite, he drove up Waverley Road and saw the huge imposingPolice Academy looming on top of the hill and shuddered inwardly.

Despite not enjoying being at the Academy, graduation happened soon enoughand the recruits practised their drills and marches. When graduation day rolledaround, so did the dark thunder clouds, and it literally rained on their parade.Evans and his squad ended up graduating in the Academy's beautiful chapel.

After graduation, in the real world of policing, Trevor Evans had a slowstart at Ringwood police station. There was lots of patrolling in the van, andlots of foot patrols through the Eastland Shopping Centre. After his three-monthprobation period was over, Evans was sent to the Information Bureau of Records.In those days, information on criminals was stored on cards not unlike a librarycataloguing system. When police officers rang through for information onsomeone, IBR personnel would locate the alphabetised drawer, pluck out theappropriate card and read out the information over the phone. It was acumbersome, but necessary system. The fact that the secondment was only fortwelve months, and that next door to the Information Bureau of Records was acavernous room filled with rows of young female typists typing up the indexcards, meant that Evans lasted out his time in fairly good humour. He alsolearnt the importance of writing as much information about people as you couldfor future reference - tattoos, distinguishing features, known associates - theinformation could prove vital for future investigations.

Next posting for the young recruit was at the Richmond police station. HereTrevor Evans really started his policing education. The good Catholic boy fromthe Eastern suburbs was about to learn that inner-city Richmond, with itsclusters of monolithic housing commission towers, high unemployment andthirty-seven pubs for its hard-drinking locals to choose from, would certainlyprovide him with an interesting work environment. Nothing in Richmond wasmundane.

Evans remembers domestic violence as being particularly prevalent in theRichmond housing commission flats. Neighbours would call and report screamingmatches from nearby flats, and Evans, then aged just twenty, would find himselfmediating between warring couples old enough to be his parents. Particularlyfrustrating was the wife's mantra that he heard too often: 'I love him. He onlybashes me when he drinks...'

Trouble was, a lot of the husbands drank all the time.

Another thing, the young constable learnt early on in Richmond was that younever park a police car near the housing commission high-rises. When he'd beenthere a while, Evans was driving a fellow officer to a domestic dispute at oneof the high-rises. His colleague had recently transferred to Richmond, and Evanstold him about the parking rule. Another back-up police car from a nearbypolicing district had arrived ahead of them. Those cops had already raced intothe building leaving their car parked too close to the towers. As Evans and hispartner walked past the police car, pausing only to take in its smashedwindscreen and driver's side window and the bottles pelted from upstairs windowsstrewn around, Evans said laconically, 'That's why you never park near thebuildings.'

The high-rise flats also came with their own sets of rules. If cops werecalled to a disturbance, they would catch the lifts which always smelledpungently of urine, to a floor above or below the floor they'd been called to -just in case the call was a set up and people were waiting outside the lifts tojump the cops.

And some of the Richmond kids started their apprenticeships early - Evansremembers being called regularly to the local primary school to disarm anine-year-old boy with a penchant for coming to school armed with a knife.

As a uniformed constable, Trevor Evans didn't really come across any of thehardened criminals although he was well aware of the presence of the notoriousPettingill family in the area. Mostly, the uniformed cops were kept busy enoughpatrolling the mean streets and dealing with the local drunks and streetoffences like assaults, offensive behaviour, and thefts. Richmond had a host ofold drunks who were real characters. On a cold winter's night, they would paradeinto the Richmond police station and say, 'It's cold out tonight, sir.' Evansrecalls this with a shrug. 'We'd give them a bed for the night. They wereharmless. Mostly you'd lock them up for their own safety. If we didn't they'd bestaggering around the street.'

Evans's father had worked closely with the St Vincent de Paul Society, andhelping the helpless was a family trait.

After two years in Richmond, Evans, who was by now married with a baby,decided that a move to the country would be a refreshing change from excitementof inner-city policing. He applied for a position in Camperdown - a small townhalfway between Colac and Warrnambool. Camperdown was farming country where itwas said that it rained for nine months of the year and dripped off the treesfor the other three months.

Richmond cops had patrolled two-up so there was always someone to back youup; in Camperdown, police officers often rode solo, so as a cop, you were onyour own. Evans enjoyed this self-reliance. Country policing also meant that youwere never really off duty. Evans remembers a time when he was driving homeafter visiting his wife in hospital. She had just given birth to their secondchild. On the way home, he saw a fellow police officer parked on the side of theroad having trouble with a gang of youths. And so the new dad pulled over andhelped his colleague arrest them and take them back to the police lock-up.