The family of an Aboriginal woman missing for 11 years has reacted with grief and frustration at news that a man first interviewed by police more than a decade ago has now been charged with her murder.
Thomas Byrnes told an inquest in 2022 that the 23-year-old woman, who was last seen in his company in Cape York, had gone “walkabout”.
On Tuesday Byrnes was charged with the murder of the Kowanyama mother-of-two, who her family has requested be referred to as Ms Bernard.
Ms Bernard was reported missing by her family in February 2013, after she failed to arrive as expected from the seven-hour drive from Coen to Kowanyama, on the other side of the Cape.
It was there, at the Exchange Hotel in Coen, that Ms Bernard was seen in the company of Byrnes, who previously told a coronial inquest he had taken her from the pub to a remote quarry at which he was caretaker.
Ms Bernard was never seen again.
Byrnes, now 62, has repeatedly denied having anything to do with her disappearance, telling the inquest she left the property later in the night to go “walkabout”.
The murder charges came after the coronial inquest into Ms Bernard’s death was critical of initial investigative efforts, ordering police in April 2022 to undertake fresh searches at Byrnes’s property, known as the Bend.
A year later, police offered a $500,000 reward for information into Ms Bernard’s disappearance.
Ms Bernard’s family said it was pressure from their lawyer, human rights activist Debbie Kilroy and the coroner that “ensured the police did their job” and followed up “their failed investigation” from 2013.
“This has been a long sad journey for us as a family,” the statement read.
“Our women do not go missing and they don’t run off into the dark for no reason.”
On Wednesday, Queensland police service Detective Acting Superintendent Mick Searle acknowledged the family’s frustration and the “challenges and shortcomings” of the initial investigation that had been “well documented” by the coronial inquest.
“That’s subsequently been reviewed and now every bit of information and every investigative strategy that we use is very carefully analysed and assessed, so that our very thorough lens is applied over everything,” he told press in Cairns.
“I’m not going to apologise for the time that it has taken – obviously since those challenges have been recognised – for us to come to this point and won’t apologise for making sure that we are very thorough and detailed [going] forward.”
Searle said that helicopters, police dive squads and army personnel had been involved in the initial search for Ms Bernard, and that since then new drone and camera technology had been systematically deployed.
“Since 2013, police have not given up looking for Ms Bernard,” he said.
‘There is a long road to go’
The family hopes the arrest leads to the discovery of Ms Bernard’s body and they can “bring her home to her traditional homeland so she can be buried alongside her loved ones”.
But the man who led Queensland police’s search and rescue for 17 years and coordinated the initial search for Ms Bernard says he fears her remains may never be found unless police receive a tip-off or confession.
Former senior sergeant Jim Whitehead, who retired in 2022 after 34 years in the state’s Search and Rescue unit, said the timeframe in which Ms Bernard’s remains could be found in the rugged and inhospitable terrain had “probably long past” unless someone were to come forward with information.
Whitehead said he was haunted by the 327 people his teams never found and that Ms Bernard’s case was particularly upsetting.
“Losing someone is horrendous,” Whitehead said.
“But losing someone and not knowing why or where they are lost is probably the worst thing that could ever happen to a parent or a family member.
“I would hate for that to happen forever.”
Searle declined to say what new evidence had led to police laying charges after 11 years.
Asked by press if he believed people other than the accused still harboured information relating to Ms Bernard’s alleged murder, Searle replied: “I certainly think so.”
The reward for information leading to a conviction or the discovery of Ms Bernard’s remains is still in place.
“This isn’t the end of this matter, there is a long road to go through the prosecution process,” Searle said.
Ms Bernard’s family described the mother-of-two as “a cheeky little girl who grew into a quiet, proud and loving mother”.
“She loved to dance and to swim in the freshwater on her country.”
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