Smith - Stalked: every womans nightmare

To the hundreds of Australian women who tonight brace themselves for another terrifying episode at the hands of their own twisted stalker.

First published in Australia in 2007 by
New Holland Publishers (Australia) Pty Ltd
Sydney Auckland London Cape Town

www.newholland.com.au

14 Aquatic Drive Frenchs Forest NSW 2086 Australia
218 Lake Road Northcote Auckland New Zealand
86 Edgware Road London W2 2EA United Kingdom
80 McKenzie Street Cape Town 8001 South Africa

Copyright 2007 in text: Chris Smith
Copyright 2007 New Holland Publishers (Australia) Pty Ltd

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the publishers and copyright holders.

National Library of Australia Cataloguing-in-Publication Data:

ISBN 9781741105278.
e-ISBN 9781921665180

Having worked in an electronic storytelling medium for 26 years, its not always the extreme manifestation of crime or behaviour that engrosses me enough to put the tale down in a book.

Sometimes its the sheer commonality of the syndrome and its unimpeded damage that attracts me, that motivates me to delve further and tell as many people about it as possible.

According to the Australian Bureau of Statistics in 2005, almost 200,000 women were stalked in Australia. Thats two or more stalking episodes from the same person. Forty per cent were stalked by a stranger and fourteen per cent by a previous partner.

This is the kind of anecdotal frequency I was fielding as an investigative journalist, but it was such a difficult crime to uncover and reveal. That was until I met Libby Masters, who in 1995 became the tragic victim of an incessant and obsessed stalker. Her predators dysfunction was well on the way to wrecking one very promising life.

When Libbys case came to me, while I was working at A Current Affair, it was at the genesis of the television genres hidden infra-red camera phase. It was only after this tale became televised, however, that I realised how essential it was to write this book. The stalkers tentacles were far-reaching. This was, without hyperbole, every womans nightmare.

There is an intentional ten-year gap between the start and finish of this story after what the victims endured, they deserved such a respite. Therefore, today those same courageous women can either choose to revisit this horror in total anonymity or introduce those who now share their new lives to this tragic chapter in their past.

If, in some of the victims recollections or my interpretation of them, some details have faded a little in that time lapse, I apologise in advance. I have done my very best to record what really happened between this serial stalker and his hapless victims.

I essentially want to highlight this frequently reported dysfunction to the widest possible readership. Stalking creates unreported and untold angst and horror for so many women across Australia. They deserve better protective legislation and sentencing, but, at a grassroots level, even greater attention from those that receive the panic call at the cop shop late at night. Never ignore the victim!

I hope that Stalked goes some way to highlighting the damaging fallout from such an insidious common obsession.

The long-suffering victims at the centre of this case deserve the ultimate thanks for their courage, firstly to fight back and secondly to be prepared to add very personal input into the telling of this story. Chief amongst them Libby Masters, who told me of her ordeal many more times than she was ever prepared to. She should be applauded for her uncanny ability to bounce back from repeated horror and still stick her neck out to seek closure and justice.

It was that missionto shut her stalker from her life foreverwhich made her reticent to throw herself back into the telling of this story a decade after her anguish began. That to me will always be an entirely understandable reaction.

My appreciation goes too to the former detectives who joined in the hunt for the stalker. They later assisted the process with vital information and recently agreed to scan through an early manuscript.

To Matthew Condonwho not only connected me to Libbys plight, but continually encouraged me to write this bookI hope that we remain eternal mates.

To Managing Director Fiona Schultz, Publisher Martin Ford, Project Editor Michael McGrath, Editor Belinda Castles and Publicists Ian Dodd and Lotta Haegg, youve made disseminating this haunting story remarkably easy.

Thank you too to my old comrades at Channel Nine, who gave me opportunity and support, even when things didnt go to plan.

My thanks also to Warren Mallard, at Lyonswood Investigations, and Steve Packer, from the Barrington Group, who helped me tie up some important loose ends.

Acting NSW Chief Coroner Jacqui Milledge has had such a mammoth and high-profile caseload of late. Her insight into this menacing syndrome is gratefully accepted.

Its not such an impossible task researching and interviewing key players in a story, when you are totally consumed by the work. It is, however, an entirely different proposition a decade later, when the responsibility of marriage and toddlers compete with the writing of that story. This book would not have materialised without the patience and encouragement of my fabulously colourful wife Ally, who spent most of every second evening in 2006 without a husband. You are beautiful.

Jacqueline Milledge

When I was a young probationary constable, in 1972, I lectured schoolchildren on the topic of stranger danger. My warnings were sincere; my stories drawn from actual cases of child abuse and abduction. In those days, crimes against children, while abhorrent, were rarely exposed in the public arena. As I spoke to my young and captive audience, I was mindful that the likelihood of any of them becoming a victim at the hands of a stranger, although possible, was highly unlikely. Nonetheless, the message was important. They need only remember one simple rule; you cant trust people you dont know.

The children who listened intently to my stories will be adults themselves now, with children of their own. Sadly, too many of them, mostly women, will have learnt the hard way that there is a different kind of monster, someone who is no stranger to his victims. Someone the police lady failed to warn them about.

As a nave police officer in the 1970s, I was never trained in the area of domestic violence. Generally police did not regard violence in the home as a serious problem. Police themselves reflected the attitudes of the wider community. I was taught that, at the slightest suggestion that you were going to apprehend the offending husband, the wife would turn and abuse you for interfering. Not all police adopted the attitude that it was simply a domestic that could be resolved if the victim made some adjustment. Many of us could see it for the awful crime that it was.

Thankfully others in the community were lobbying to have this insidious and often deadly behaviour recognised and outlawed.

Australias first womens refuge opened in 1972 in Glebe. Fully funded by the government, the Elsie Womens Refuge ensured there was a safe haven for women and children who were victims of domestic violence. The Sydney Rape Crisis Centre also opened its doors, supporting victims of sexual assault regardless of whether they reported their victimisation to police or chose to remain silent.