Lauren Hickson at the Nepean River Caravan Park from where she was abducted and murdered by neighbour Neville Towner. Photo / News Corp Australia
WARNING: Distressing content
It was an interview conducted with a man who didn't seem capable of much, an unemployed layabout who still lived with his ageing mother.
Neville Towner was 23 years old, on the dole, a skinny little bloke with a wispy beard, sitting in the police station dressed in a pair of tiny shorts and a T-shirt.
But the detectives interviewing him had every reason to believe the little man in their Penrith police station interview room harboured the most dreadful of secrets, reports news.com.au.
Homicide detectives Warwick Laney and Steve Ticehurst had been up half the night since the alarm was raised the afternoon before that a little girl, Lauren Hickson, was missing.
The last confirmed sighting of the four-year-old was when she had been playing about 2.30pm outside her parents Derek and Jurina Hickson's motorhome at the Nepean River Caravan Park at Emu Plains in far-western Sydney.
By 5pm, 100 police, emergency services workers, army and local volunteers had launched a search for her.
An anxious Jurina Hickson told reporters that her daughter was a "wonderful little girl" who three days earlier had given her a beautiful Mother's Day present.
Sometime afterwards, a woman from the caravan park told police she had seen Lauren with a man shortly after 4pm.
The man was Neville Towner, who used to live at the park, and the witness had seen him holding hands with Lauren and leading the girl away.
But when Detective Sergeant Warwick Laney interviewed Towner about the sighting the same evening, he flatly denied it.
The police search resumed in the morning and about 10am a female soldier found Lauren Hickson's almost naked body floating in a rain-swollen creek that joined the Nepean River.
Scientific Squad officers found the toddler's pink jumper and blue jeans hanging in a tree on a river bank, 30m from her body.
After the discovery, Jurina Hickson had to be sedated and was rushed to Nepean Hospital.
Detective Laney and his partner, homicide detective Steve Ticehurst, were no longer investigating a missing child but a murder.
Police believed Lauren had died from a single head wound inflicted by a blunt object, possibly a rock.
Neville Towner was again brought in for questioning. It was four hours since the discovery of Lauren's body and almost a day since the last confirmed sighting of her.
It was now 2pm on Thursday, May 18, 1989.
The chilling interview in which Towner almost casually answered the questions put to him on that afternoon was remembered this week.
What he did tell them, he would later lie about after getting advice from a lawyer.
But even 29 years later, the former homicide detectives who investigated the murder say about Towner, "what he did to her ... what he did was unspeakable".
"He showed no mercy on her. He showed no feeling, He just tortured Lauren," former homicide detective Snr Con Steve Ticehurst told A Current Affair.
"That innocent young child, with this gash to her forehead, to see her lying there and the clothes taken off and thrown around.
"She ... trusted him, that little girl of the family because he was a friend.
"She put her trust in him ... it was horrible. This guy is an absolute scumbag."
Laney, who had a four-year-old daughter of his own at the time, said: "I don't think there's anything worse. I don't think that you ever forget; it's with you everyday.
"I think I'll live with this for the rest of my life."
While Laney interviewed Towner, Ticehurst typed.
It soon emerged, in the lengthy record of interview, that Towner had known Lauren for most of her short life.
He had lived at the caravan park for three years with his mother, but still visited once or twice a week.
Mrs Towner regularly babysat Lauren, who was the daughter of Mrs Towner's friends.
Derek and Jurina Hickson had been the Towners' neighbours at the caravan park before the mother and son had moved to nearby Kareela Ave, Kingswood.
It was at that house that Mrs Towner babysat Lauren.
Towner said he had gone over to the caravan park on the Wednesday afternoon to return a bicycle to Lauren's father, Derek, who he knew because "mum and Derek are friends".
While returning the bike, he spoke with Jurina, although he told the detectives "I couldn't tell ya" what they had talked about.
"As I was walking out I seen Loren (sic) playing by herself ... at the amenities block on the corner.
"And I walked up to her and she give me a cuddle, then we went for a walk down the bank."
Towner claimed Lauren "follows me, mate, she always does" because "she just knows me from coming over to our place".
Detective Laney: I have been told that when you walked off with Loren towards the river bank you were holding her hand. Is that correct?
Neville Towner: No, she was walking beside me but she wasn't holding my hand.
Laney: Can you tell me what Loren was wearing when you met her yesterday?
Towner: Just a little pair of pink galoshes and a pair of red pants, I think.
Laney: What happened after you walked down to the river bank with Loren?
Towner: She wouldn't stop screaming, so I put her head under the water.
Laney: Why was she screaming?
Towner: She just doesn't like, she's been told not to go down the back heaps of times, she just started screaming.
Laney: Did you do anything to Loren to cause her to scream?
Towner: No.
(News.com.au has removed Laney's next twelve questions and Towner's answer due to its distressing nature.)
Towner described how he was with Lauren at "just a little creek ... that runs through the back of the caravan park".
Laney: Will you tell me what happened next?
Towner: I put her head under the water.
Laney: How long did you hold her under the water?
Towner: A couple of minutes ... to shut her up I shoved her head in the water. And when she came back up she looked to me as if she had gone already and I hit her in the head with a rock.
Laney: Did she bleed?
Towner: I didn't stay around.
Laney: Did you put her in the creek yourself?
Towner: Yes.
Laney: Would you care for a cup of coffee or a drink?
Towner: No I'll be right, I just want to get this out of the road.
Laney: Are you married? Do you have a girlfriend.
Towner said "no" to both questions.
Laney: What was your intention when you took Loren to the river bank?
Towner: Me and Loren used to go down there before and her sister Tracey and muck around together.
Laney: How old is Tracey?
Towner: Fourteen.
Laney: Did you take any type of medication yesterday?
Towner: They're called Crufin, they're a pain killer. I took two.
Laney: Did you take anything else yesterday?
Towner: I drank some Tequila.
Laney: How much did you drink?
Towner: Almost the whole bottle.
Police charged Towner with maliciously murdering Lauren and assault with intent to sexually assault a child under 10.
Two days later, Towner attempted to take his own life in custody.
Shortly after his appearance in Penrith Court, among the angry crowd gathered outside was a man dangling a doll from a hangman's noose.
In 2002, Towner successfully had his life sentence redetermined with a minimum non-parole period.
Now aged 52, Towner has applied for parole several times.
Victims of crime advocate, Howard Brown has represented Lauren Hickson's distraught family in their submissions to keep Towner behind bars.
Towner has not undergone any transition programs in prison, but has participated in one escorted day release.
In a change.org petition to oppose his release, Jurina Hickson said, "I'll never forgive him while I've still got breath in my body.
"The murder was so horrific. He sexually assaulted and tortured her.
"I just can't understand why a prisoner of his calibre is going to get a get-out-of-jail-free card."
Neville Towner's next bid for freedom will go before the NSW State Parole Authority on June 5.
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