Joel Murchie: Bali bombings hero cleared of assault charges
A retired police commander who survived the Bali bombings in 2002 has learned his fate after being accused of physically and indecently assaulting a female colleague.
Central Sydney
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The lawyer of a former high-ranking cop and Bali bombings hero has slammed an “incompetent” investigation after his client was cleared of physically and indecently assaulting a female colleague over the course of two years.
Retired commander Joel Murchie reached for a tissue as Magistrate Margaret Quinn dismissed two charges of common assault and one of indecent assault at Central Local Court on Friday.
It was alleged Mr Murchie flicked and kicked the bottom of the woman in 2015 and 2017 respectively, and kissed her with an open mouth in October 2016, while he was the Commander of NSW Police’s Mental Health Intervention Team.
Several witnesses gave evidence in hearing dates throughout 2019 of a “jovial” office where prank YouTube videos were played and the kicking and flicking of colleagues was “part of the banter”.
Magistrate Quinn found the team’s at times “unprofessional” behaviour gave doubt to whether the woman, who said she had also kicked and flicked Mr Murchie, consented to the assaults.
“You can’t assault someone if they’re consenting to it,” she said.
“I find that the office was a jovial place to work … It was a place where people behaved in a manner that you might not find in other places.”
Magistrate Quinn also accepted the defence argument that the complainant had initiated the kiss with Mr Murchie while they were at an overnight training course in 2016.
She found Mr Murchie had gone to the woman’s room about 9.20pm to speak to her about his struggle to perform duties as the anniversary of the Bali bombings approached.
The 49-year-old was at nightclub Sari Bar on October 12, 2002 when a van parked outside exploded, killing many inside and “melting” his arms. He received a bravery award for helping survivors to escape the inferno.
Mr Murchie told the court in November he went to the woman’s room to talk when she leaned in and kissed him. “I said, ‘I’m not here for that’,” he told the court.
The complainant had testified Mr Murchie knocked on her door before approaching her, “grabbed me around the waist” with two hands and “passionately” kissed her.
Magistrate Quinn said that a text the woman sent to a friend and other messages to Mr Murchie, including love heart emojis, following the incident told a different story.
“It’s implausible and I don’t accept it,” she said.
Outside court Mr Murchie’s lawyer Paul McGirr said that “justice was done”, with the allegations “taken out of context” due to his client being a male.
“Fortunately the magistrate has got the result spot on, in relation to not really accepting what the alleged victim actually said happened,” Mr McGirr said.
“This matter should never ever have got this far and the investigation was frankly incompetent.”
Mr Murchie will make a costs application.
