“We never thought for a minute it was someone from town,” says Judy Wilson.
Like William’s grandmother, she has since moved out of Benaroon Drive, but in September 2014 Wilson lived in the house that adjoins William’s grandmother’s back yard. In the days after he vanished, she couldn’t shake the thought that William’s potential abductor had waited for her to go into town to run errands before activating a plan too dark for Wilson to dwell on.
“We think about William every day,” she says. “And when we think of him we think of him alive.”
From his house directly opposite William’s grandmother’s former home, an elderly man named Paul (surname withheld for privacy reasons) and his son, Sean, have watched long-time friends and neighbours slowly drift away from Benaroon Drive.
“A lot of them have moved,” he says. “One bloke left because he felt intimidated by the police. He had a few problems. He wasn’t a crook or a bad bloke, just a bit of a loner. He wanted out.”
“A recluse,” says Sean. “I think all of the attention sort of frightened him
They were coming around checking everything and he got scared,” Paul says. “Just the fear of that.” He shrugs his shoulders. “You got to let them do their job and they’re still following up on everything. They’re doing a good job.”
There’s a grandmother of 10 who lives towards the bottom of the street who slowly drags her black bin filled with fallen leaves out to the kerbside. She speaks of how, every single day, she pads up her long driveway to her letterbox. When she reaches the letterbox, she looks left, then right, up and down her street, not knowing what exactly she is hoping to see. “But it’s always just like this,” she says, raising her palms to the sky. Total stillness. Total silence but for a bird or two singing.
She remembers when William’s grandmother knocked frantically on her door on September 12, 2014. She ran straight to her husband and said in disbelief, “She’s lost her f..king grandson.”
“We were one of the few — I’ll say unfortunate people now — that were here when it happened,” she says. “We were just witnesses but the police are on our case a lot now and it’s frustrating.
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/new...d/news-story/2d8aa4bde6c83ded451c26090fb55643