Chapter 14 argyle - State Law Publisher

FINAL REPORT
seated in a car parked some distance away, and saw the man in question for only a very
brief time. A period of several years elapsed before Barriero was able to identify this person
to the authorities as Zanetti. In the interim, he had seen Zanetti on television and this
image may well have replaced his earlier memory. The methodology used for identification
purposes, namely the Four Corners video, was far from ideal and, even with the sound
turned down, and the names blacked out, it did not exclude the danger of implicit
suggestion. Assuming that Barriero did see someone, the best that can reasonably be said
about his evidence was that it was someone who looked to be similar to Zanetti. It is not
appropriate to place any reliance on this evidence.
LYNETTE CRIMMINS’ SIGHTING OF FRANK ZANETTI
On one occasion when Mrs Crimmins arrived at L’Alba café in Northbridge, she saw a man
standing next to the table at which Roddan was seated, as if preparing to leave. They
passed each other and the man stood aside for her. She remembered thinking that he had
good manners. As she pulled up a chair and sat down, she observed an empty wine glass
on the table, in front of where the person had been standing and she assumed that he had
been drinking with Roddan.
Mrs Crimmins told the Royal Commission that she had not seen the man before. She did,
however, see this person on another occasion later. She said that she was being escorted
by witness protection officers through the Central Law Courts building. She recognized the
person she had seen at the café. He was “standing in front of the glass panelled areas and
he had perhaps four or five other people speaking with him”. She said, that as she walked
through she looked at him and he looked at her; they both recognized each other, smiled at
each other and said, “Hi. How are you?” She asked the officers who he was and they asked
her how she knew him. She told them she had seen him at the café with Roddan, who had
said he was “the man from the races”. The officers told her that it was Frank Zanetti. About
twelve months elapsed between the first and second occasions that she had seen him. She
says that she is certain that it was the same man.
The two witness protection officers present at the time were Neville Ripp and Allen
Thompson. Ripp stated to the Royal Commission that he could recall taking Mrs Crimmins to
Court with Thompson, in probably mid to late 1993. He said that Zanetti was present at the
reception with other people. Ripp could not recall Mrs Crimmins talking about or indicating
Zanetti. He “cannot even really remember what happened after approaching the reception
desk. All I can say is that there didn’t appear to be anything unusual about this occasion”.
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