Bradley Trial

Press, Volume C, Issue 29474, 28 March 1961, Page 16

Bradley Trial

(Continued from Page 15) Mr Knight: You realised, when you were writing that, that it was serious?—lf I had realised that I would not have written it.

Were you conscious?—l would not be sure in a real sense.

Mr Knight asked Bradley whether any of the police told him to put in the statement that he hit the boy with a spanner from the car or something similar. Bradley: No.

There was no discussion about what you should put in it about the injury to the boy’s head?—l don’t think so. Did they ask you to put in that you put your hands around the boy’s throat and throttled him?—l don’t remember that.

If they had asked you to put in, ‘I put the scarf around his throat,’ you would have written it?—Yes. BONDI STREETS

Mr Knight asked him if he knew enough about the streets in Bondi Junction not to get lost. —It depends what part of Bondi Junction. Mr Knight: You didn’t know Centennial Park well? —No.

Bradley told Mr Knight he remembered hearing him in his opening address to the jury refer to things in the statement which were silly. Mr Knight: Would it appear to you to be silly for a man kidnapping a boy to drive up to the toll gates on the bridge, pull up and pay the toll with the boy sitting alongside him? Bradley: Yes, definitely. And then to pull up at a 'phone box and leave the boy in the car and go and make the demand for ransom? — Yes.

It couldn’t happen?—l don’t know that.

I suggest you took the boy into Centennial Park and that he was in the boot of the car from the time 1 it came out of the park and went over the bridge?—Certainly not, I never saw that boy. Mr Knight asked Bradley was there any coincidence in the fact that the day after he was interviewed by Doyle and Fergusson on Augjst 24 his wife had booked her passage for England. Bradley: The main reason was for the boy.

Mr Knight: Why didn’t she book a passage for the boy at the same time? —The main reason was to sell her music and songs. Mr Knight: It was not until you made the booking three days later that the boy was included in the booking?— That is right. It was intended that he (Peter) and the girl (Helen) should stay with me. Bradley agreed with Mr Knight that he had lost £2OO on the purchase and sale of the Ford.

Bradley said he did not advertise the car for sale in the paper, but tried to sell it through dealers, at motor auctions and to Constable Bob Shaw at the Manly police station.

Mr Knight: You have friends in Australia? —A few, not many. And you didn’t tell any of them you were going to England?—l told a few of them.

Name any of them? —One was a Mr Mason, who used to act for me as a solicitor many years ago. Bradley said he thought he also told a Hungarian couple named Imria. who had a haberdashery, he believed in Oxford street, Woollahra, or Bondi Junction. He said there was no goingaway party because he was not anxious to let Wittman know they were going away. After Mr Knight concluded his cross-examination. Mr Vizzard began re-examina-tion.

Bradley told Mr Vizzard it was his original intention, before the argument with his wife, that he and his family should go to Surfers Paradise in the Ford car. Examination of Bradley then ended and be was allowed to leave the witness box and go back and sit in the dock. Later Peter Wittman, Bradley's stepson, gave evidence.

Mr Vizzard asked him: Do you remember the day you left Moor street, Clontarf, and went to Surfers Paradise?—Yes. Peter Wittman said that the day they left (July 7) he got up at 7.3 a.m. He knew the time as he had locked at the clock in the

kitchen. On that morning. Bradley was in the loungeroom putting labels on the furniture and some packing cases.

Bradley had left the house at 8.30 a.m. saying he was going to get some cigarettes and wire. Mrs Bradley was asleep in bed. He (Peter) woke her up about 8 30 and told her Bradley had gone out. He did not see Bradley drive away.

A taxi had arrived at the house for them about 10 a.m. His mother had taken him and the other children to the air terminal about 10 30 a m. He had seen Mrs Bradley use the telephone at the terminal about 1045 a m. RUG NOT TORN

Peter told Mr Vizzard the family had had a similar rug to the one produced in court, but it was not torn. The family’s rug was lost round Christmas time.

Cross-examined by Mr Knight. Peter said it was on the morning of July 9 that he had first seen Bradley at Surfers Paradise.

Mr Knight: Could that have been July 10, the Sunday?— I couldn’t be sure. I thought it was the Saturday, about 9. Peter would not agree he had any conversation on what happened on the morning of July 7, before arriving in London. Mr Knight: You stopped in Aden for a few days and you never told your mother what happened on the morning you left for Surfers Paradise?—No.

Peter said he was not present on the night of July 6 when the decision was made that Mrs Bradley would not go by car to Surfers Paradise, he said. He was told later about it.

Mr Knight: Can you tell when your mother gets very annoyed?—Yes, I think so. Can you tell whether your father is angry?—Yes. Were they angry on that night?—No. WIFE’S EVIDENCE There was an excited murmur in the Courtroom when Mr Vizzard called Mrs Magda Bradley. Mrs Bradley said she remembered the day they went to Surfers Paradise. They had been packing all the week. She said Wittman was present on July 5 and stayed there overnight On July 6 she was packing. Mr Vizzard: What was your husband's reaction to Wittman being there?—He wasn’t very happy. What was your attitude?— I tried to avoid a fight between us because of my son, Peter.

Mr Vizzard: Something occurred on July 6?—l have been very tired—well. I get so tired of packing and I tell him I blame him for no place to go ... I, we exchange a few words ... I decided finally to go to Surfers Paradise with the children and left him to packing. Mrs Bradley said she went to bed at 1 a.m. on July 7 and got up between 8.30 and 8.45 that morning. Peter woke her as her husband was not there. He told her to hurry up or they would miss the plane. They left for the air terminal at Phillip street, Sydney, by taxi at 10 a.m., arriving there about 10.20. From there, she rang up her husband and spoke to him. She said he told her he was sorry he could not get back in time to see her before she left but he had some shopping to do and had to get some wire for the packing. Asked by Mr Vizzard whether she had expected her husband to drive her to the air terminal. Mrs Bradley replied: “No.” She said they were expecting furniture removers at 11 a.m. that day and that was why she caught a taxi.

She told Mr Vizzard that when she was married to Wittman. Mr Fogel had given her a present of a rug. ru fl is very similar, only I remember our rug was much more worn, more faded,” Mrs Bradley said. They had the rug when the family moved to Clontarf in December. 1959. and at that time it was not torn. She took the rug with the children on picnics and on a trip to Tuggerah. She had not seen it after that trip. “We lost that rug,” she said. ‘We used to have it in the car. I asked the children about it and my husband and they couldn't remember seeing it.”