Friday, December 7, 2001

Janine Mary VAUGHAN

Personal Details
Sex: Female
Year of Birth: 1970 on 7 December 2001
At Time of Disappearance
Age: 31
Height (cm): 164.0
Build: Thin
Hair Colour: Blonde
Eye Colour: Green
Complexion: Fair
Racial Appearance: Caucasian

Circumstances Janine was last seen in Bathurst.
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PIC inquiry to hear evidence about missing woman. 5
ABC Australia Orange Monday, 5 June 2006. 10:39
PIC inquiry to hear evidence about missing woman
Witnesses will appear before a Police Integrity Commission (PIC) hearing that begins in Orange today into the investigation surrounding the disappearance of a Bathurst woman.

Janine Mary Vaughan disappeared four-and-a-half years ago, on December 7 2001, after leaving a Bathurst nightclub.

The police investigation into her disappearance has since failed to find what happened to Ms Vaughan, 31, after she was last seen getting into a red car outside the nightclub.

The PIC became involved after claims one of the investigating police officers was involved in her disappearance.

It has set aside five days at the Orange courthouse to hear from people who may have information to help the investigation.

It is only the second time a PIC hearing has been held outside Sydney.
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Romance was on missing woman's mind
SMH Stephen Gibbs June 6, 2006

COUNTRY copper smiles - perhaps even winks - at a young woman through her shop window. The woman tells her mum later he is drop-dead gorgeous.

When Janine Vaughan vanished from a Bathurst street early one morning 4½ years ago, Detective Sergeant Brad Hosemans and his colleagues simply got on with their job.

This series of events - with a few complications - has stalled the investigation into Ms Vaughan's disappearance and dragged some of the state's most respected detectives to Orange this week for a costly Police Integrity Commission inquest.

When Ms Vaughan disappeared in 2001, Mr Hosemans was simultaneously a well-known detective and the deputy mayor of Bathurst.

He managed the investigation into her possible abduction while facing unrelated charges of aggravated indecent assault over an incident at the local golf club, which he subsequently beat. He left the police force in 2003.

The commission says its inquiry will investigate the circumstances surrounding Janine Mary Vaughan's disappearance and the conduct of police involved.

Counsel assisting the commission, Mark Buscombe, said yesterday it was important to stress at the hearing's outset that this was not a coronial inquest, or a substitute for one, and by the end of the day, at least that was clear.

Mr Buscombe said the hearing would be about "aspects of the policing investigation". Since the commission announced its investigation, "considerable new information" had been forthcoming, which will presumably be revealed this week.

Mr Hosemans, who now runs a fish-and-chip shop, gave evidence, followed by seven policemen, including senior detectives from the sex crimes and homicide squads.

Ms Vaughan had just left the Metro Tavern when she was last seen getting into a red car in Keppel Street, Bathurst, about 4am on Friday, December 7, 2001. When interviewed a year later, Mr Hosemans told investigators he spent that week with his mother in the Hunter Valley, returning on December 7.

Yesterday Mr Hosemans conceded he might have been back in Bathurst a day earlier, having last week found a receipt for petrol bought at Wyong on December 6.

Strike Force Toko, under the command of Detective Inspector Paul Jacob, had investigated the disappearance, and half a dozen assaults on women in the area. All remain unsolved.

In January 2002, Ms Vaughan's mother, Jennifer Vaughan, told the strike force she did not recall her daughter talking about any men except "a guy she had seen in Bathurst and who she described as drop-dead gorgeous".

Her daughter had found out this man was Brad Hosemans.

Mr Hosemans had smiled at Ms Vaughan from outside her shop, and winked, her best friend said.

No police who gave evidence were surprised by those statements and none had known a missing persons case managed by a detective facing charges of indecent assault in the past.

The hearing continues.