On February 2 businesses will come together at a special event at Blacktown Workers Club to raise money for a new homicide victims care facility called Graces Place, named after Anita’s mother.
What follows is an EXCLUSIVE reflection on the crime that shook Australia from one of the original investigating officers, Chief Inspector Gary Raymond (Ret’d). To find out more about the event on February 2 visit www.workersclub.com.au
IT was a hot summer’s night on February 4, 1986.
The attractive 26-year-old Registered Nurse Anita Lorraine Cobby stepped off the train at Blacktown. As she had done many times, she’d decided to phone her Dad and get him to meet her at the station and drive her home.
This was the normal arrangement but no public phones worked, due to vandalism. I don’t think vandals calculate the enormous inconvenience they cause people when they damage public or private property. The cost and time it takes to replace or repair things can be substantive.
Sometimes damaged property is irreplaceable. Because mobile phones were rare back then people like Anita relied on public phones. I wonder if the vandal(s) who damaged those phones at Blacktown in 1986 ever counted the cost of that senseless act of damage - a woman murdered.
Anita decided to walk home after a happy time at a Lebanese restaurant in Redfern, Sydney with two female nursing friends; she felt good. All was well. All was right with the world.
She’d walk to her parents as the weather was good. As she left the train, she had no idea monstrous things would happen to her within minutes. She would never reach home, but in fact only reach the end of her life.
For the nurse it was a routine walk, one she’d done many times being raised in Blacktown. It wasn’t too late, no danger. This night was to walk not be driven. No need to disturb her parents.
If only she’d spoken to her Dad. But life cannot be lived backwards on if only. That’s too late.
Meanwhile, five intoxicated men, all with lengthy criminal records, were on the prowl looking for a woman to abduct and abuse. One had seeded the idea and all agreed to “get a Sheila”.
It’s unclear whether they wanted money, a sexual victim or both. Probably both. They talk about terrorism today, yet every act of violent crime terrorises the victim, so every such crime is an act of terrorism not only those committed by Islamic extremists.
However, not even the most hardened people and police officers could have expected these criminals to act the way they did against this innocent female.
A steady walk on a pleasant Australian evening and in a safe Sydney suburb and enter five evil men in a stolen car. The car slowed beside the walking nurse. When the car stopped, a crime followed.
Julia Sheppard, author of Someone Else’s Daughter believes it was a crime so shocking it should never be forgotten.
As the parents, Garry and Grace Lynch, waited at home for the arrival of their daughter they had no idea of the tragic circumstances that would soon engulf them and change their lives forever.
It was not a long walk from the Blacktown Railway Station to the Lynch home. With five men, high on a cocktail of alcohol and drugs and fueled by each other’s lust, looking for trouble, anything can happen.
Anita Cobby could never in her wildest dreams have even begun to imagine the evil that was about to launch itself upon her.
Certainly shades of a Nightmare on Elm Street had to be far from her mind. The foul deeds that would be committed were worse than any horror film Anita may have seen at a cinema or read about in a book.
The gang of five was led by John Travers, a person who’d been in endless trouble with the police since the age of 13. His four followers were like willing slaves that dark night as they drove around the Blacktown streets seeking someone they might treat as the object of their wicked desires.
For Travers, a predator, rape was his favourite crime. He had done it many times before with men, women and animals. He saw Anita as she walked along Newtown Road. Suddenly she became his target. “Stop the car.”
The men needed no second command. They pounced on Anita. She shrieked with fear, writhed, struggled and kicked as she was shoved without ceremony into the back seat of the car, then onto the floor.
The car sped off with its unwilling captive. The gruesome, degrading process began immediately. From the moment she was dragged into the car, indecent acts followed.
She was told to strip. She refused. Her clothes were ripped off. Money for petrol was taken from her purse. The process of taking everything started from her money to her life itself. They obtained petrol with her money and drove off as Anita was kept quiet, under threat, on the back floor.
Since there was no phone call to pick her up at the station, Anita’s parents thought their daughter had decided to stay in the city with friends.
Next day, after a nursing sister from Sydney Hospital called to find out why Anita hadn’t reported for work without a call being sick, her father went to Blacktown Police Station. He reported his daughter missing.
Out went a description. Aged 26, thin build, 175cm tall, black wavy hair, hazel eyes and a light olive complexion. Blacktown Police had already received reports of a girl being abducted into a car that night in the area of Newton Road.
They were starting to put two and two together. One of the most extensive Australian manhunts was on. Time was of the essence.
When I heard about what happened to Anita Cobby like many others, I found it hard to believe. Not even a crime writer could have thought of something like this.
Even after five years in the Ambulance Service, 10 years in Police Rescue and Detectives, I thought I’d seen it all.
Was it possible that in Sydney in the 1980’s a woman could be restrained, bashed, raped, tortured, brutalized, have her throat slashed so badly she was almost decapitated, have her fingers broken and all this happen while she was still alive?
Defense wounds from the sharp blade of the knife on her hands and fingers proved that she fought for her life to the bitter end.
As I looked at the crime scene I found it hard to believe anything like the rape and murder of Anita Cobby could happen. It was a somewhat isolated place with dairy farming and grazing land with eucalypt trees.
It also had long grass which helped to hide the crime scene. There was blood, Anita’s blood, on the blades of grass. It was not that far from the Great Western Highway, a busy motorway.
Yet far enough away so that no one heard a cry for help as Anita fought for her life.
A herd of dairy cows first found her body. They gathered around her almost like a curious protective cordon when the dairy farmer, Mr Reen, investigated and found her. He had seen his cows in a circle facing inwards which was unusual causing him to “sus it out’.
My thoughts turned to the police who had to tell Anita’s family that a body had been found and was believed to be Anita’s.
No longer a missing person but a found person in the worst possible condition, dead. The missing person investigation had regrettably turned into a homicide investigation; a family’s worst nightmare.
How would we tell them that all that’s left of their beautiful missing daughter?
I remembered the many times when as a police officer I’d had to knock on a door to tell a family their loved one was not coming home. I used to pray, swallow hard and take deep breaths as I approached the front door.
Then I had to watch as I delivered the terrible news to a stunned family. It was often late at night or the early hours of the morning when people were awakened from their sleep and expected to comprehend what I was telling them.
I watched as the terrible news was delivered and began to sink into stunned minds. Tenderly, with God’s help I comforted the people and often prayed with them. I’d wait for the reaction which was accompanied by denial, disbelief, anger, bargaining with God and shock.
It was like the family was hit by a freight train they didn’t know was coming. Some thought it was a practical joke or a prank. Many said: “Come on Inspector you’re having a lend of me”.
Some would walk out of their door, look around for their loved one thinking they were hiding and would jump from behind the bushes as a surprise.
Although, sometimes with drug users or crazy drivers the family would say to me: “We knew one day this knock on the door would come.”
That wasn’t the case with the Lynch or Cobby family. Their knock on the door had no forewarning although Anita’s father had an inkling that something was wrong with Anita’s unusual disappearance.
She was a very responsible person and would never not come home or be absent from work without notifying someone. The shock still resonates whenever Anita’s name is mentioned.
The sheer horror of what was to be revealed to Anita’s parents is hard for us to even start to imagine.
At the time of the murder, I was out of Sydney on an investigation with Detective Tony (Muddy) Waters. We were urgently called back to Blacktown Police Station. Once there we were briefed on the murder.
I was given the job to hit the streets go gather information and get leads on possible suspects for the murder. My task was to find out as much as possible about individuals who’d recently been released from gaol, mental health units or juvenile institutions that may have the Modus Operandi (MO) and be capable of committing such a crime.
With other Detectives I was instructed to leave no stone unturned to get information. A vital lead on the case was out there on the streets just waiting to be found.
Junkies, drug dealers, gang members, the homeless, prostitutes and thieves were all to be approached. A sense of urgency hovered over us.
The killers were on the loose and they could rape or kill again, especially if they knew they’d get caught and spend a long time in gaol.
They may use their short freedom to cram in as much evil pleasure as possible. The other detectives and I were afraid the offenders might go on a frenzy feed of violence before they were captured. A last perverted fling.
Like many others close to the investigation, I saw them as monstrous criminals who attacked a woman in an uncontrolled frenzied outburst.
They’d acted like a pack of wild animals, although wild animals have a reason to attack; being food or self-defense. This pack didn’t have that reason or any other reason except their self-gratification. They must be caught, and caught soon.
Looking back, there was fear throughout Western Sydney. You could just about smell the fear in the air around Blacktown. Fear the crime might be repeated was front of people’s minds.
The crime was taken so seriously many stayed home, locked, barricaded their doors and windows, especially single women or those with children.
Some even obtained weapons, whether legally or otherwise. Men were over-protective of their wives and daughters. They met them at railway or bus stations and took them straight home.
Some employers engaged security guards to escort women from home to work and return. Staff at Blacktown Hospital were escorted by security guards to and from the carpark.
Every woman in the area was terrified and it was real fear, not perceived. I had never seen people so scared, hypersensitive and hypervigilant. Even the toughest blokes around the streets of Blacktown were anxious for two reasons.
They were disgusted by the crime and it had caused an unusual amount of police attention on their activities. The heat was on.
It also deeply affected police like me who left their families at home as we investigated the crime. Many police sent their family to relatives or friends houses until the offenders was arrested. I kept a constant check on my wife Michelle who was home alone. All this adds to the stress of the manhunt.
Your mind goes to and fro; investigation - home - investigation – home and so it goes on.
Along with other police officers, I attended a homicide briefing at the Detective’s Office. Photographs, diagrams of the crime scene and autopsy photos were displayed. As I looked at the photographs, I couldn’t believe human beings could treat another human being in such a way.
The paddock had become a torture chamber. Even though I looked at the photos forensically, I couldn’t help but contemplate what Anita went through; those last hours.
As I gazed at the photos a shiver rippled through my spine. The hairs on my neck were standing. How could they have done this, I kept repeating to myself. As a hardened ambulance officer and police veteran, I was used to seeing human remains but this one was different.
With Anita’s murder, the sheer force of the attack on this innocent nurse beggared description. Words failed me. If some ravenous beast had been responsible it might have been easier to cope with, but humans? In trying to defend herself, it was evident she had fought hard to her last breath.
John Travers had a distinct teardrop tattoo under his left eye. Maybe in the moonlight Anita saw this teardrop and by this she might identify her assailant and put him in gaol. Travers thought it far too risky.
On that fateful night, after a discussion with Travers, they all agreed she must die. This permission by the gang to kill, fuelled Traver’s lust for blood.
The way they sniggered together in court later meant they probably laughed as Traver’s cut her throat and left Anita lying dead in the muddy grass dairy paddock.
Justice Alan Maxwell was later to describe the crime as: “One of the most horrifying physical and sexual assaults. This was a calculated killing done in cold blood.”
I thought about that and realised in my mind the judge was not accurate. It wasn’t cold blood. It was Anita’s warm blood circulating giving her life until a cold blooded Travers caused her life blood to ebb away.
As the investigation proceeded, a neighbour saw clothes being burnt in a backyard the morning after the crime had been committed.
There was also a report of a stolen car. As information came in, the search was on for where the offenders might stay. Who might shelter them? There were many tips.
Some by phone others by people going to the Police Station. The TRG (Tactical Response Groups) was called in. After a tip, police sped off in convoy to a place where the suspects might be.
There’s never an excuse for rape. Nobody has the right to rape another. It’s been said: “Rape is the only crime in which the victim becomes the accused.” (Freda Adler).
Sadly: “Rape is the easiest charge to make and the most difficult to prove.” (Anon).
From a Christian viewpoint we must be reminded of the words of Eli Khamarov: “To admit there’s no God is to provide free license to pillage and rape with clear conscience.”
One thing is certain, there’s no way a Christian can rape for it takes away a person’s inalienable right.
A ring was taken from Anita’s finger. Detective Sgt Ian Kennedy had the responsibility of taking that tiny ring to the Lynch home.
The ring was identified as belonging to Anita. Garry Lynch was taken to Westmead Hospital. He identified the broken and bruised body of his daughter.
As it was a Coroner’s homicide investigation, no contamination of the body was allowed which meant Gary was unable to embrace his daughter’s body. The ache was unfathomable and hurt Garry Lynch deeply.
In tracking those who raped Anita Cobby at one stage police chased a car but lost it. Many tips came in.
The critical break came when a hidden microphone carried by an informant at the cell complex at Blacktown Police recorded Travers’ confession of his deadly deeds.
At one stage when I was back at the police station, I helped and purchased some take-away food for my fellow police officers. I made coffee after they had conducted a raid looking for the offenders.
The offenders had got away before police arrival on that raid. I heard a banging noise coming from the locker room. It was a loud metallic echoing sound like thunder.
I went to the door of the locker room. He stood for a moment amazed. There was a detective pounding his fists into a metal locker door. I paused and just watched. I didn’t know what the punching was all about.
The detective turned, looked at me and with gritted teeth and an angry look said: “We missed the bastards.”
It was frustrating and beyond belief that the people who harboured them were women. Fear of reprisal may have been a factor.
I felt sorry for the detective but even sorrier for Anita’s parents who were at the Police Station.
Garry and Grace Lynch just had blank looks on their faces. I gently said to them: “Can I get you something to eat or drink?” Garry said: “No thanks. I want information. Information no matter how bad it is that you and your colleagues find out and I want to know every bit of information. Some people left behind after a homicide don’t want to know or need to know. I want to know and I need to know everything.”
When all the offenders were subsequently caught, I was away from the police station following a lead.
As I arrived back at the station, the offenders were being brought in. Ugliness on two legs. They were interviewed, walked around the crime scene and charged. They showed no emotion, no remorse or no regret. They were only sorry they got caught, not sorry for the murder.
When the interviewing, charging and court appearance were finished an announcement came over the station public address system: “All available police to urgently assemble at the front of the police station for crowd control. I immediately put on my gun and handcuffs. The entire Kildare Road was packed with a crowd of about or so 500 people yelling obscenities and threats towards the perpetrators. I have never seen anything like it before or since.
What amazed me was the composition of the crowd. All ages, nationalities and both genders. The terror and rage on their faces was noticeable yet with some relief the offenders had been captured and charged. It was a crowd yelling threats of reprisal and wanting an eye for an eye.
The Westfield Shopping Centre is opposite the police station and word had spread through the media and by word of mouth that the Cobby killers were at Blacktown Police Station.
Hanging from the roof of the Shopping Centre carpark was a rope noose. The crowd wanted to lynch them on the spot. The area was in lockdown. The police virtually faced a modern day lynch mob.
As the police vehicles came out with the offenders, I recall the crowd lunged forward. Along with other police I yelled: “Move back, Move back.” Physical encounters started occurring between the crowd and the police. People looked straight through me and continued to push forward.
They wanted a look at the offenders and give them a mouth full of abuse. An elderly lady of about 80-years-old looked at me and said as she pointed to the nooses hanging from the building opposite: “That’s what we’re going to do with them and you’re going to let us.”
The rhythmic cries of: “Hang the bastards” became very loud. Another woman looked at me and said: “Do you have a daughter?” I said, “No”. She said with rage in his eyes: “I do, let me get the mongrels and string ‘em up.”
For John Travers, the word mercy was an unknown. Even in the last act of throat slitting. A wild cowardly act however, we couldn’t allow street justice to prevail and the lynch mob was restrained and controlled with a lot of difficulty and high emotion.
One policeman told me he wanted to leave the cops join the lynch mob and hang the bastards.
So the police cars moved away and the crowd slowly dispersed, but I have never forgotten the scene. I am convinced beyond doubt had the police lost control of the crowd, they would have released the offenders from the vans and hung them all by the neck until dead.
One of the most amazing things about the whole Cobby killing is the sheer grace shown by Anita’s parents and the fact her father served on the Parole Board for some years after the murder.
One thing he did stipulate was that if any of his daughter’s killers came before the board, he would not attend as he had a conflict of interest.
For Garry Lynch the loss of his daughter pained him to his dying day. He said: “It feels like a dagger goes through your heart.”
Grace Lynch said it was: “An experience beyond thinking.” They helped establish the Homicide Victim’s Support Group which is an amazing non-profit organisation working miracles in those left behind after a murder, especially children. For a Christian like me, to put such an act as the Anita Cobby murder into perspective has been hard.
As I turned to the scriptures I thought perhaps there’s help in the words of Romans 8:28: “And we know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are the called according to His purpose”.
After all, there’s no way in which God can be blamed for the crimes of the Travers gang. This gang of five made their decision against God’s will and the consequences of their sins were catastrophic.
Does this offer some explanation? For surely it well describes those who have no time for God and God was the last person in the mind of those five when they attacked Anita Cobby. Perhaps they did know it was grossly wrong but went ahead anyway.
At the trial, the judge said: “Wild animals are given to assault and killing for the purpose of survival. Not so these prisoners. They assaulted in a pack for satisfying their lust and killed for the purpose of identification.”
As Steve Liebmann, television presenter, put it the Cobby case is: “A scar that will never go away.” After an urgent change in legislation, justly the files on the accused were marked, never to be released.
For me there’s hope. As a Christian I believe things will not always stay as they are.
A change is on the way: “God will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away” (Revelation 21: 3-4).
The memory of Anita Cobby should and must be kept alive. Anita’s parents were never the same after her murder. Garry Lynch passed away recently followed by her mother.
The dark deeds of that night should never be shrouded in mystery but kept clearly in the light of truth. A woman was violated in a most despicable way and we should never let this act be forgotten.
