Shepparton’s dark underbelly is at the centre of the first episode of a new homicide series to be premiered on Foxtel tomorrow night.
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Episode one of Ron Iddles: The Good Cop has the former Melbourne homicide detective re-tell the story of the investigation into the murder of Shepparton teenager Michelle Buckingham, 16.
Miss Buckingham’s badly decomposed body was found on November 7, 1983, on a roadside at Kialla East, 10 days after she had been officially reported missing.
She had been stabbed 19 times.
After remaining dormant for nearly 30 years, Mr Iddles re-opened the cold case when former Shepparton News journalist Tammy Mills started asking questions, which led to a front page story on September 1, 2012, headlined ‘‘Who killed Michelle?’’
Two days before Christmas 2015, Steven James Bradley was sentenced to 27 years in jail for Miss Buckingham’s murder.
In tomorrow night’s 48-minute long episode titled ‘‘Michelle Buckingham: Failure is not an option’’, Mr Iddles is filmed walking around Shepparton’s central business district and re-visiting sites important to the case.
In one poignant scene, Mr Iddles visits the lonely location on the little-used Violet Town-Boundary Rd where Miss Buckingham’s body was found.
‘‘It looks remote, but it’s only 12km from Shepparton. I look at it and think — that’s a very lonely, lonely place to ultimately pass away,’’ Mr Iddles says.
The program also features several images of The News’ coverage of the case from the 1980s, as well as archival television footage and an interview with Shepparton criminal lawyer Brian Birrell, who represented Greg Gleadhill, who was initially charged with the murder. The charge was dropped in 1988 because of a lack of evidence.
In one striking scene, Mr Birrell recounts the moment Mr Gleadhill appeared in his Shepparton office.
‘‘About four months after the murder, Gleadhill came into my office and threw a knife on my desk and said that was the knife that killed Michelle Buckingham — which tended to focus my mind,’’ Mr Birrell says.
Through several face-to-camera pieces with Mr Iddles, the program strips away the cliche of the tough, old-school cop to reveal the emotional commitment needed to solve a crime.
The grizzled detective’s face crumples as he recounts the moment he met Miss Buckingham’s mother Elvira, who was at first reluctant to re-open the case.
‘‘She said ‘you’ll take me to the top of the mountain and I’ll crash. How do I know that I can trust you?’’’ Mr Iddles says.
‘‘Then she got up and gave me a big hug and said ‘I’ll trust you’. I said I’ll do the best I can.’’
The big cop tears up again when he remembers how Elvira died just days before Bradley’s trial was to start.
Mr Iddles’ wife Colleen says the Buckingham case was an emotional one for her husband.
‘‘Michelle’s mother touched him more emotionally I think because she was becoming elderly and it was still hard for her,’’ she says.
‘‘Elvira was robbed of a lot of memories that she should have had.’’
Ms Mills, now a crime reporter for The Age, explains why she pursued the Buckingham case with such passion.
‘‘Michelle’s case stuck with me because she was 16 years old, she was left on the side of the road like an animal and it also felt like most of the town had forgotten about it,’’ she says.
‘‘That to me felt deeply wrong — that a person’s killer is still out there.’’
There are times Mr Iddles admits he was frustrated at the young reporter’s persistent phone calls, claiming he did not have the staff to investigate.
‘‘I said ‘look, you’re breaking my balls’,’’ he says at one point.
But he admits that without her, the case would never have been solved.
‘‘Without Tammy Mills’s determination to write the story — the case of Michelle Buckingham would still be sitting in a box file covered in dust,’’ he says.
After more than 25 years in the homicide squad, Mr Iddles has an iron reputation for catching crooks.
He is reputed to have solved 99 per cent of the more than 320 murder cases he has investigated and put more murderers behind bars than any other Australian policeman.
Speaking from northern Queensland where he lives, Mr Iddles reflected on the qualities it takes to solve violent crimes.
‘‘You can have all the technology you want — but you still have to talk to people. You have to be a good communicator and show empathy to the accused — develop a relationship,’’ he said.
‘‘You have to be analytical. Don’t make the facts fit your story — let them speak for themselves.
‘‘An ounce of information is worth a ton of investigation.’’
Other episodes feature the 1997 murder of Jane Thurgood-Dove shot dead in the driveway of her suburban home in front of her three children and the sexual assault and murder of Bonnie Clarke, 6, in her bed in 1982.
The six-part series A Masterclass in Homicide Investigation Ron Iddles: The Good Cop airs on Foxtel from tomorrow from 7.30pm.
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