At 7.30 on Wednesday night, an electronic monitoring board at police headquarters in the NSW country town of Gloucester started flashing. Something was moving inside a farm hut and it was bigger than an animal. Police had planted sensors inside the hut situated in the remote area of Moppy Road because Malcolm Naden had broken into it before and they were hoping he would come back.
Police travelled 20 kms until the road ran out and then trekked the last 10 kilometres on foot. When they arrived at the hut, there was smoke coming from the chimney. They surrounded the hut and were going to wait until 2 am when they thought Naden would be well and truly asleep. But around midnight, he wandered outside for a cigarette and that’s when police decided to charge.
Taken completely by surprise, when he saw the armed police, he ran back into the hut and out the back door where more police were waiting. There was a scuffle and a police dog locked its jaws onto his left leg and didn’t let go until handcuffs bound his wrists.
"Who are you? Are you Malcolm Naden?”
“Yes. I'm Malcolm Naden" he said.
Today marks six years and nine months since Malcolm Nadan fled his grandparents’ home in Dubbo.
Filthy dirty and very thin, the prisoner was taken to the local hospital to have his dog bite seen to and last night he was on his way to Goulburn Supermax Prison. He has been charged with the murder of 24 year old Kristy Scholes who was found dead in the bedroom of a house in 2005 and two counts of aggravated indecent assault on a 15 year old girl at Dubbo in 2004. There is an additional charge of shooting a police officer in Nowendoc on December 7 last year. He has not yet been charged with the disappearance of mother of four Lateesha Nolan.
Specially trained officers had spent months trekking through rugged bushland and mapping the terrain Naden called home. They used GPS trackers to monitor his movements and planted devices in camping equipment left in huts which they hoped Naden would break into. Sensors were also strategically planted in trees along tracks and trails.
Police Minister Scipione said "This result could not have been achieved without the co-operation of communities in northern NSW whose assistance and vital information has helped police over a long period of time."
Naden didn’t mind being alone, he liked it that way, in fact he hated human contact. He would lock himself in his room at his grandparents house in Dubbo and sneak around in the ceiling space to spy on family members through holes in the plaster. He refused to socialise and insisted on his meals being left outside his door. There were rumours that he was a decorated soldier – not true, he was never in the Army. Another myth going around was was that he was so clever, even Aboriginal trackers and bounty hunters after the $250,000 reward couldn’t catch him but there were no Aboriginal trackers or bounty hunters involved.
Nadan was a child of one of the the more notorious housing estates on the outskirts of Dubbo, mostly occupied by Aboriginal people. But his grandparents, Florence and Jack Nolan were members of the Seventh Day Adventist church and his father was a hard working, non-drinking shearer. Something happened and he left his family home and went to live with his maternal grandparents when he was a teenager. He had a reputation of being a hard worker but was “a bit strange” said a former employer. He embraces two things - he holds a black belt in Karate and is obsessed with the Bible.
On his 2,466th night in the rugged bush, the hunt for the armed and dangerous alleged killer has come to an end. Sitting on the rain sodden ground in handcuffs yesterday morning, surrounded by police, he said “Thank God it’s over, I’ve had enough.”
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