NT:Brother seeks justice in outback killing

AAP General News (Australia)
12-22-2011
NT:Brother seeks justice in outback killing

By Xavier La Canna

DARWIN, Dec 21 AAP - Learning his brother had been stabbed to death was heart wrenching
for Ray Condrick, but hearing him called a pedophile and suggestions he might have deserved
his fate have been sickening.

Michael Condrick, who was found dead in his home in June last year, has been demonised
by some as a man who groomed former students for sex.

There is no denying the 50-year-old former teacher, who lived in Katherine in the Northern
Territory, had a curious relationship with former students.

Evidence has come to light that he'd had homosexual relationships with some of those
he once taught at the impoverished Aboriginal community of Barunga and regularly invited
past students to his home to drink alcohol or smoke marijuana.

But none of the men he had sex with are known to have been under age at the time.

At all times the sex appears to have been consensual, although there has been a claim
he paid one man $20 to sleep with him.

Ray says his 86-year-old mother Mona has just about been killed by the innuendo about
her youngest son, and by the failure of police to bring anyone to justice for the crime.

"We spoke to quite a few Aboriginal people about it, and they knew Michael and they
really liked Michael," Mr Condrick says.

"Michael might have done a few things wrong, but he did help a lot of outback Aboriginal
people up here to learn to read," he says.

Ray's wife Julie says it was the pedophile claims, splashed across the front page of
the NT News, that devastated the family.

"It was hard enough to lose Michael, but then to have all of these allegations made
against him..." she says.

Michael was a victim, she says, but is being talked about like he was a criminal.

"The family accepted the fact that they have said that he was homosexual, and that
isn't an issue.

"The family have huge issue with the allegations of him being a pedophile," she says.

The killing was gruesome.

Police found Mr Condrick naked and dead from blood loss on the floor of his lounge room.

Large amounts of blood were found in his bedroom, hallway, bathroom and lounge room,
and there were minor injuries on his head, hip and arm.

Ray and Julie Condrick spoke to AAP outside the Katherine Court House, where they had
travelled from their NSW home for the inquest into Michael's death.

The three-day proceedings were told two men at Michael's home on the night of the killing
have blamed each other for his death.

Although both were originally charged with murder, one, Samuel Wesan, cut a deal with
prosecutors to give evidence against the other man at trial, and nothing he told the court
could be used against him.

The other man, who was 17 at the time of the killing and whom AAP has chosen not to
name, went to trial earlier this year but walked free in June when the trial was aborted
just weeks into the proceedings.

With no case against the teenager and no charges against Wesan, the chances of a conviction
seem low.

The teenager's murder trial was abandoned after evidence came to light that had apparently
been misplaced by police and was never given to the defence or prosecutors.

The evidence was a forensic report that showed blood from Mr Condrick was on Wesan's
shorts, and the revelation was enough to see the trial aborted.

"How the trial was aborted just on one little bit of evidence like that is totally
beyond us," Julie says.

It also emerged prior to the trial that police had kept the 17-year-old in a cell without
a mattress and at one stage cut off his water supply and didn't turn it back on.

The teenager told police he didn't want to participate in interviews but seems to have
been recorded talking with police anyway.

AAP has seen a transcript of those interviews, in which the teenager does not admit
to the crime but does appear to lie to police about his movements in the hours after the
killing.

Both the teenager and Wesan were later found to have Condrick's blood on their clothing,
but both deny any suggestion they were responsible for the fatal wound.

Some items were stolen from Mr Condrick's home on the night of the killing, and they
have been linked to both the teenager and Wesan.

Wesan has pleaded guilty to stealing a shirt from Condrick and one litre of wine.

An Xbox game console, mobile phone and an iPad taken from the home have been linked
to the teenager.

Neither suspect gave evidence at the inquest on the grounds that they may incriminate themselves.

The inquest into Michael Condrick's death has put the NT Police under the spotlight,
with the investigation apparently conducted with scant resources.

As well as the missing evidence, a forensic expert in blood pattern analysis was on
holidays during the initial investigation, and there was no follow-up to ensure the analysis
ever got done.

But Ray blames legal loopholes for nobody being brought to justice over the crime,
not the police, whom he says did quite a good job.

He hopes someone will pay one day for the death of his brother.

"It is not just a break-in. It is a murder, and somebody should be accountable for it," he says.

AAP xlc/jl/goc/

KEYWORD: CONDRICK (NEWSFEATURE) (PIX AVAILABLE)

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