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Chapter 1: What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
Hi, Grace Tame here. You might know me as the 2021 Australian of the Year or quote unquote difficult woman. But did you know I'm also autistic? It took me a long time to get diagnosed. And sadly, that's true for a lot of women. I want to know why that's the case. That's why I'm taking over Ladies We Need To Talk for a series called Autistic AF.
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MUSIC
For decades, the whereabouts of Sharon Fulton were unknown until an anonymous tip pointed to where she may be. A tip that would have dramatic consequences in the trial of Raymond Reddington. I'm Stephen Stockwell. This is the case of Sharon's disappearance.
Special Crime Squad detectives extradited Reddington back to Perth. They were experiencing marriage difficulties and Reddington thought he would suffer financially if she left him.
I am instructed to assert that he protests his innocence.
Today is about my mother, Sharon. A dedicated, loving mother. Mum, you are not forgotten. You are not erased. You are not just a case file.
Over the 40 years since Sharon Fulton disappeared, there were a number of stories about what had happened. She ran away. She was killed by serial killers. But one story became the focus of the trial, with its surprising link back to Raymond Reddington. We'll also find out if the jury bought any of the stories in this episode. I was surprised how long it took them to reach a verdict.
And there throughout all this was the ABC's court reporter in Perth, David Webber. Welcome, David. Yeah, g'day. The trial of Raymond Reddington ran for weeks. The court heard from his children, the friends of his wife, police who investigated at the time, and then there was a letter sent to an inquest that claimed to know where Sharon was. What was this letter?
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Chapter 2: Who is Sharon Fulton and what happened to her?
Right. And in the family way, is that a way of saying that Michael Harrison got Sharon Fulton pregnant?
Yes, so the letter went on to say he got rid of that problem and suggesting that she was under a carport slab. I'm sure it's the missing woman, is what this letter said. This letter was received by the coroner's court suggesting that Sharon Fulton was murdered by Michael Harrison, who by that time had passed away.
Okay. And I mean, if the name Harrison is sounding familiar, that's because Michael Harrison is the husband of Narelle Harrison, who we talked about in our last episode, you know, the best friend of Sharon Fulton, who saw her the day before she disappeared, who said she was frightened or seemed frightened in the home.
I mean, David, was there any evidence that there was a relationship between Sharon Fulton and Michael Harrison outside of this letter?
Yeah.
Not effectively. I mean, all we heard was that Michael Harrison was deceased by the time of the trial. He was looked at by police, the possibility that he might have been involved, but the court had heard he had an alibi or there was an alibi to suggest that he wasn't involved.
Did anyone go around and look under some carport slabs or concrete slabs or anything like that to chase this up?
There are a lot of carport slabs in Perth, and it would seem that it wasn't exactly specified where in the letter. It was this address somewhere. So there's a vagueness with the letter, but the reason this letter was really important to the prosecution was that when testing was done on the envelope, a DNA sample was found inside the envelope that matched Raymond Reddington's.
And so this letter was sent by Raymond Reddington, the man who's on trial for the murder of Sharon Fulton.
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Chapter 3: What was the significance of the anonymous letter in the case?
And David, we spoke in our first episode, the defense's line basically being that, you know, there was no body. As you mentioned, there was no evidence that a crime had been committed. This was a circumstantial case that was being put towards the jury in this instance. When the closing finishes, the judge gives his directions to the jury and the jury takes their time to consider their verdict.
I mean, when the jury retired, how long were they gone for? How long did it take?
It was only about four hours or so, because I counted in a kind of ironic kind of way that it was an hour for each 10 years. Relatively quick for a jury in a murder trial.
Yeah, four hours does seem very quick, David. What was it like in the room as the jury came back in to deliver their verdict? Who was there?
So the jury came in and the foreperson was asked what the verdict was of the jury and the foreperson said guilty. And there was no reaction from Raymond Reddington who was sitting in the dock. He was as impassive as he was for much of the trial. In the public gallery, so behind where the media sits, I could hear sort of an intake of breath from somebody, like that when the verdict was provided.
There were people in the gallery who, some of whom had given evidence, There were other people associated with the trial, not as many as had been watching the trial because waiting for a jury verdict can take some time. Not everybody can be there. There was also some applause. I wrote that it was muted applause. It's just like that.
And then after the jury was let go, the defence lawyer, Jonathan Davies, said that his client, Raymond Reddington, was in the last months of his life. He was receiving chemotherapy. Not a lot more was said about that in court, except that there was an acceptance that there needed to be a sentencing date set relatively quickly.
Yeah, we'll talk more about the sentencing in our next episode, David, and explore kind of what submissions were made prior to that and what was said about Raymond Reddington going into that process. We'll also dive into some analysis of this trial as well. But before we get to that, I mean, what do you think the moment in this trial was that maybe tipped the jury over?
Without being able to interview jurors, which we can't, it's hard to say. I think his DNA being on the envelope with a letter that was trying to send police or investigators in a completely different direction, what was described as a wild goose chase, that was really important.
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