Source : Perth Now news
NSW’s top prosecutor has agreed to investigate why the case against a teenager previously charged over the abduction of toddler Cheryl Grimmer 56 years ago was dropped.
The three-year-old was allegedly abducted on January 12, 1970, outside a shower block at Fairy Meadow Beach in Wollongong, south of Sydney.
The case has been the subject of multiple police investigations in the decades since, and a coronial inquest in 2011 found Cheryl was likely deceased.
In 2017, a man — known by the pseudonym Mercury — pleaded not guilty after he was charged with Cheryl’s murder.
Prosecutors later dropped the case against the man – who was a teenager when Cheryl vanished – after the NSW Supreme Court ruled his confession was inadmissable.
The teen did not have a parent, adult, or lawyer present when he was interviewed in 1971.
The Director of Public Prosecution declined to appeal the 2019 decision.
In a February 16 letter to Ms Grimmer’s family, NSW Director of Public Prosecution Sally Dowling SC agreed to conduct a review into the initial decision to discontinue proceedings.
The Office of the Director of Public Prosecution confirmed the review would be conducted under the ODPP Victim Right of Review policy, which empowers victims to seek a review in circumstances where prosecutors either do not launch or discontinue proceedings.
As the ODPP has no investigative function, a review under the policy can only occur on evidence available at the time of the original decision.
It was under those circumstances that Ms Dowling raised whether the Grimmer family wished to submit any fresh information to NSW Police prior to the review.
The ODPP said it would be a matter for the police as to whether they conducted any further investigation.
The family were now reportedly considering the letter.
They told the ABC they had written to “NSW Homicide requesting that they open a reinvestigation in light of the significant new evidence that has come to light since 2019.
“We believe this material warrants thorough reassessment and independent review,“ brother Rick Nash said.
It comes after NSW MLC Jeremy Buckingham used parliamentary privilege to name Mercury last year.
He recounted for the record passages of an April 29, 1971, interview between Mercury and a police sergeant during which he allegedly admitted to having “come around from the back of the shower block and grabbed the little girl”, according to Mr Buckingham’s speech.
NewsWire has chosen not to name the man and he was not legally identifiable during the 2018 court trial due to being underage at the time of Cheryl’s disappearance.
It is understood the family have subsequently submitted to the ODPP that there were errors in the original investigation and attempted prosecution.
