The Night Driver

Listen to Hedley Thomas reading Chapter 1 of his new book, The Teacher's Pet. The book is published by Pan Macmillan and is available at all good bookstores, and wherever you get audiobooks. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The Australian's global smash-hit podcast Teacher's Pet returns for Australian audiences on July 1.  You can find it wherever you got this podcast. Just search for "The Teacher's Pet". See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

From Hedley Thomas and the journalists at The Australian comes The Teacher's Trial. A new episode will be published every Friday for the duration of the trial of Chris Dawson, who is accused of the murder of his wife Lynette Dawson. Search for The Teacher's Trial wherever you listen to podcasts, or read The Australian's ongoing coverage of the trial here.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Was Janine Vaughan murdered by a Bathurst man with a propensity for shocking acts of violence? Women who have been with him describe his depravity and cruelty. Or was she killed by a different man who has been dead for years? A man who worked at The Dirty Tav, drove around in a small red car, and was similarly renowned for violence. Hedley and his friend the retired judge Peter Murphy delve deep in the final episode of the series. They also explore what really happened to the bloodied knife, subjecting the stalker notes to analysis by a handwriting expert, and hearing from a former detective who identifies ‘red flags’ for possible deception and believes one of the three persons of interest is lying. The longest episode in the series hears from women who cast doubt on the conduct of the other two key persons of interest while the closest witness to the fight between Janine and her once-close friend describes what she saw just hours before Janine disappeared.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

John Haynes is a former senior cop in Bathurst who still lives at Mount Panorama. He’s been retired for a decade and for the first time he’s speaking publicly about blood-curdling screams he and his family heard near the local university, two days after Janine’s disappearance in early December 2001. Haynes is confident he heard Janine fighting for her life. He has come forward as he says the significance of the screams was not properly understood by police who looked in the wrong place, on the opposite side of a creek separating the university grounds and bushland from the mount. Haynes fears that Janine was killed near the uni and her remains could still lie among the gnarly blackberry bushes along the creek. As Kylie goes back and searches other locations around Bathurst, another thread in this case which fell through the cracks - a  fight between Janine and one of her best friends - comes to light. Janine was in serious conflict with her former employee and housemate before they spectacularly fell out. The person became Janine’s public enemy but it went under the radar in the 2009 inquest, raising awkward and distressing questions and memories nineteen years later.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

In the search for Janine’s murderer, her sister Kylie who devotes much of her life to this case is taken to the brink of what she believes is a breakthrough, only to have her hopes dashed. Every time there’s a discovery of bones near Bathurst it hits Kylie and the rest of Janine’s family that these might be the remains of Janine. More evidence including details of a police strike force investigation of possible criminal links to taxi drivers who could have picked up Janine come to light as a retired detective who helped lead the major probe into Janine’s murder reveals he formed a view about the identity of the likely killer, a man who is still alive. The former top cop also describes some of the hurdles put in the way of police who spent years in Bathurst trying to solve the mystery. The crucial assumption of almost all investigating detectives that Janine was abducted by the same night driver who attempted to entice another blond-haired woman into his car 10 minutes earlier is challenged. The podcast investigation pauses for several weeks from the release of this ninth episode to look into fresh leads provided by confidential sources from Bathurst.  See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Janine’s private life came under close scrutiny and details were aired publicly as the Coroner Mary Jerram heard evidence about a young woman overwhelmed by sadness at times in the final days of her life. Janine was in financial and emotional distress - her bills were mounting and she was spending beyond her means on nights out with youthful friends from the local university. She wanted to settle down with a man her own age and raise children but her boyfriends were mostly a decade younger and wanted to party. Janine was taking recreational drugs including pills with her younger friends and the lows were becoming harder to bear. Janine confided to her friend Jordan on the night she disappeared that she had tried to commit suicide days earlier. She made another cryptic disclosure to a friend, Mark. The Coroner Mary Jerram assured the family that she and detectives were ‘trying like mad’ to find Janine’s killer as fresh leads came to light.  See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

A local woman’s evidence was dramatic and deeply disturbing - she was adamant that she saw Janine with her hands bound with baling twine and a look of grave distress on her face while in a small red car being driven by the town’s top cop. The woman had remained silent for four and a half years but when she saw a photo of Janine in the newspaper she came forward. At the same time investigators were having another look at the police officer because of anonymous tip-offs, and then the discovery that he had arrived back in Bathurst before Janine disappeared, contrary to his earlier evidence that he was away visiting his mother. The fallout from the revelations contributed to the crippling of the murder investigation and still affects it now despite explanations of what at first appeared sinister and a cover-up.  See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Andrew Jones is a deeply spiritual man who came to Bathurst after studying pharmacy, travelling and working in a small hospital in Nepal, and studying religion in Sydney. When Janine disappeared, Jones lived alone at The Scots School in Bathurst in an arrangement where he had boarding house accommodation in return for giving up some spare time to coach the students. He worked in a pharmacy near Janine’s menswear store and he had bought clothing there. He drove a small red car, a Renault 19 series. And he became a significant person of interest in the police investigation. He has always emphatically denied wrongdoing and says police have ruined his reputation by unfairly targeting him. He insists Janine has never been in his car which police seized years later for DNA testing. Women in this episode relate their experiences with him - but Jones states that the encounters which they describe never happened.  See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

When Janine disappeared there was no crime scene or body. One man in Bathurst stepped up to tell a chilling story of having raped her at White Rock and cut her throat. Denis Briggs called himself ‘Bad Denis’ when a reckless side of his bipolar personality came out. His friends and his longtime partner were horrified by his claims. They were also plausible - because Denis had a matching car and an inflation with Janine at her menswear store. He changed his appearance and got rid of the car soon after Janine vanished. Briggs has long denied his own confessions to murder which he made when he was off his medication. But some of those he told still think he did it.  See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.