Kidnapping ‘best thing for neighbourhood group’

Press, 17 March 1987, Page 45

Kidnapping ‘best thing for neighbourhood group’

PA Hamilton Jenny Gallagher’s kidnapping was the best thing that could have happened to the neighbourhood support group in her area.

The group was set up at Christmas — and the kidnap was originally a bitter blow.

Mrs Gallagher, whose husband is managing director of the Hamiltonbased Gallagher Group, was taken from her home on the morning of February 2. She was rescued by the police on the Wednesday, and two men have since been jailed for nine years for their bid to gain a $1 million — later $500,000 — ransom.

In an interview with the “Waikato Times,” Mrs Gallagher said it would have been easy for the support group to give up in disgust. Instead, the drama has given impetus to its activities — and has left no doubt that householders everywhere could suddenly face very real dangers. “Everyone in the group knows now it’s for real,” she said. “While we may rely on the police for our protection, the onus is really on every individual to be aware.” On the afternoon of the abduction a neighbour was working in his garden next door — but had gone inside for an early lunch when the incident occurred.

“Five minutes earlier it may not have gone as far as it did,” she said. What had happened was an embarrassment to the group, but now there was a lot more casual observation than before, a greater awareness of one another’s activities.

Mrs Gallagher was kept in an area of bush near Te Pahu, 20km south-west of Hamilton, from the Monday until late on the Wednesday. Tactics used by her brother-in-law, John Gallagher, during negotiations with the abductors enabled the police to track them, and Gallagher emerged from the bush exhausted, hungry insect-bitten, shocked, but otherwise unharmed. More than a month after her abduction, she suffers from a permanent

head-ache. She has memory gaps, and still recoils when the doorbell or telephone rings — both bring back the nightmare memory of a man at the door dressed like a courier, holding a parcel that turned out to be concealing a gun, being bustled into her own car to drive to a point where cars were switched for her final trip, bound and blindfolded, into the bush.

She has always been a Nature lover, and has reflected this in her art. Since the abduction, she has made one attempt at a bush walk: “I walked away thinking ‘l’ll look at you tomorrow’. Grateful to everyone who sent flowers or messages, and those who try to coerce her into taking control of her life again, Mrs Gallagher asks only that she be left to recover in her own time.

At first she thought it was a joke. Fake kidnaps are a not-uncommon method of fund-raising, she says. Now she would like to see them stopped. For it soon became apparent, as the man in courier garb walked in, hung up on the person she had been chatting with on the telephone, and placed a ransom note on the table, that this was no harmless hoax.

If it was a joke it was a cruel one — but at first that explanation was the only thing that made sense.

There was no mistaking the gun at her back, however, or the knife at her ribs as they drove southwest to Te Pahu — a knife that was removed a few centimetres when she said she might have an accident.

Did they really believe they would end up with $1 million? “On the Monday night they were virtually counting the money. I heard them talking outside the tent about Bill being in Australia, and one said: 'I wunder if it’ll be in Australian currency?* ” A pup tent became her home for nearly two days and two long, dark nights. Her two abductors left her alone, and there she was allowed to raise the blindfold. They said she could take if off while

hidden, but that would have meant replacing it totally and losing the tiny gap of light she was able to maintain throughout. The pup tent gave her some respite from the “amazing” number of flies she encountered outside, and some relief from the mosquitoes. While she spent her time alternating from the tent to the outdoors, the abductors were negotiating with her brother-in-law, John Gallagher. These negotiations invariably resulted in threats to her safety or her life. But “it was uncanny” — she and John used the same stalling tactics, gave the same excuses; while he was “pretending to be an idiot” she was giving the same impression, both warned the kidnappers that she had left without medication, both claimed that with Bill Gallagher overseas nothing could be settled. That helped exercise her mind. So did her attempts to work out whether the two men were telling the truth.

But there were moments of despair, and long periods when she thought of absolutely nothing. There were moments of fear, conviction that she would never return home.

“The threats were very real — violence, the use of weapons, the prospect of sending proof that I had really been abducted: and I didn’t think they meant a lock of my hair.”

A big factor in her salvation, however, was the way John Gallagher frustrated the kidnappers with his stalling. He became the object of their anger, and they spent a lot of time assassinating his character — "how could he not come to the rescue?”

Creepiest of all was the long silences when she thought they had left — only to be reminded by a touch on the arm, or the sudden glimpse of a shoe through the gap in her blindfold, that one of the men was beside her. She believes they became bored. At one stage they seemed insistent that she see their faces. She thinks it was an excuse for violence.

Throughout the ordeal she refused all offers of food.

There was no privacy, little sleep. All dignity was stripped. Whatever she did, whatever needs had to be met, there was no way of knowing whether one of the men was there.

Nor was there any place for “television-type fairy stories” — acts of heroism, escape attempts, outright resistance.

“I didn’t believe I would get out of it; One doesn’t read about hostages getting away scotfree. I was in a constant state of waiting for it to happen.” On the afternoon of the rescue she was talking to one of the men, she in the tent, the man outside. They were discussing travel, when he mentioned that there was a track nearby and told her that if a tramper appeared she had better “hit the floor.” If she signalled, the tramper would be killed. She felt the two becoming nervous. This was pick-up day, when final plans for the ransom, they hoped, would be settled. At one stage they said they might move to another site, and the trek began.

Masked, one in front of their victim and one behind, they began walking upwards into the bush. There were noises in the valley, and several times “I was pushed under a bush,” still blindfolded. Often she strayed out of line but was quickly handled back. In jandals, and still suffering after surgery on an ankle, she found walking difficult, but she plodded onward and upward.

Then she was told to rest against a tree, and was to be covered with a green sleeping bag. But the captors changed their minds, spread the sleeping bag on the ground, and told her to lie on it face down. She felt like a perfect target. One of the men, the younger one, left. Hands in front of her face, she could see her watch; Half an hour passed without a sound or a movement. Then someone touched her arm and offered her • a drink.

There was the sound of a helicopter. But the men knew this was a marijuana area, and aircraft were not uncommon. There was no panic. Then the younger man disappeared again — and never came back. The other man asked if she knew how to get out of the area.

The last thing he said to her referred to earlier assertions by the men that they were not married. “I was on a steep bank, with my feet against tree roots. I decided to turn over and let go, hoping it would look as if I’d fallen.

“I went crashing through the undergrowth, then hit a big tree that wasn’t going to move. I felt my way up the trunk of the tree. There, was no gunshot, no knife in the back, so I lifted the blindfold. It was getting dark. “There was no way I would stay in the bush. I could hear vehicles, and started down. I decided there was a road nearby and decided I would get to it.

“A dog started barking — I have a childhood fear of certain types of dogs. There was a sound of moreporks and I started shouting, yelling for help, a second dog I started barking.

“Nothing came through the undergrowth at me—- — the next thing I knew there were footsteps and the police were there. Just as well — I was above the road and couldn’t see it, and could have fallen.”

Mrs Gallagher was taken back to Hamilton, saw a doctor, and then joined her family at John Gallagher’s house.

Her first real treat? A shower and clean clothing, and a binge on perfume.

Her aim now is to draw a design for a thank-you card she will send to wellwishers and those who have given their support. She had chosen to depict stylised flax. She was very impressed with the performance of the police — as much for their humanity as for the efficiency in tracing and catching the abductors. Her greatest need now? Reassurance “that I did the right thing.” - .