An inquest into the 1997 abduction of Jessica Small is likely to focus on the original investigation by Bathurst police, some of whom thought the teenager had simply run away.
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Jessica was last seen in October 1997 after she and her friend Vanessa Conlan accepted a lift with a stranger. The pair had been out at a local amusement centre and, although they had enough money for a taxi, they instead got into a white Holden Commodore after its driver offered them a lift.
Minutes later the girls faced the struggle of their lives when, in Hereford Street, the man attacked them.
Vanessa made it out of the car and ran for help, believing Jessica was behind her.
But by the time she got to a nearby house to raise the alarm, the car was gone. And so was Jessica.
What police did in the ensuing hours, days, months and years is expected to form part of an inquest into Jessica’s presumed murder which begins in Bathurst today.
A 2006 statement by Detective Sergeant Laura Thurtell referred to the initial investigation and noted that at the time of Jessica’s abduction, investigators “did not fully believe the version of events given by Vanessa Conlan”.
In the document, Detective Sergeant Thurtell said a common theory of police during the initial investigation was that Jessica “had falsified her disappearance.”
This is despite the fact there was a witness to the abduction, a description of the offender and a description of the car.
It took police nine years to complete an initial brief of evidence in the Jessica Small case, but that brief was subsequently returned to them and rejected as inadequate by deputy state coroner Carl Milovanovich.
In October 2007, Detective Sergeant Peter Smith picked up the case, but it would take his team another six years before the matter was ready for inquest.
One key difference, though, was that Detective Sergeant Smith has never doubted Vanessa Conlan’s version of events that Jessica Small was abducted and later murdered.
Detective Sergeant Smith spent two years reviewing the case, re-reading statements and interviewing key witnesses before he came across a piece of information that proved pivotal to the investigation and had been overlooked by the original investigators.
The evidence showed that a man who worked at the Oberon Timber Mill was at the Amuse Me amusement centre in Bathurst on the night Jessica disappeared and had made specific inquiries about the teenager in the hours leading up to her abduction.
As a result, Detective Sergeant Smith and his team spent months tracking down every male employee aged between 18 and 30 who was working at the Oberon Timber Mill in 1997 and they were subsequently interviewed by police.
Detective Sergeant Smith’s “fresh eyes” also brought a few more critical points to light.
On the night Jessica was abducted, a woman had phoned Bathurst police to report that a car similar to the one Jessica was abducted in had been seen driving to a secluded area of Beaconsfield Road, along the Fish River.
The car remained parked there for a considerable amount of time. It has since been confirmed that no connection was made to the abduction case but investigators attached to the second strike force now believe Jessica was in that car.
Other witnesses expected to give evidence this week will include two men who heard a girl screaming for help at Eglinton the night Jessica Small was abducted.
The inquest gets underway at Bathurst Court House this morning.
