Pain lingers over detective’s bombing death

For Jane Bowen-Sutton, only one thing was worse than hearing of her husband’s murder. It was telling her sons, then seven and five, their dad would never come home. She remembers it as a “shocking experience”, and has always carried it with her.

“You read about child grief, and I thought I’d done this terrible thing to my sons: told them that their dad had been killed,” she said recently. “I’ll never recover (from that).”

The boys’ father, WA detective sergeant, Geoffrey Bowen, died in the National Crime Authority bombing of March 1994. He had worked in the NCA’s Adelaide office on a secondment for two years.

Lawyer Peter Wallis survived the blast but suffered extensive burns, and lost his sight in one eye.

Last month, on the 10th anniversary of the bombing, Mrs Bowen-Sutton and her sons, Matthew and Simon, now 17 and 15, returned to Adelaide. There, they paid tribute to their murdered husband and father in an emotional memorial service on Waymouth St, outside the former NCA offices.

That March 2 day was the 19th anniversary of Mrs Bowen-Sutton’s marriage to Det Sgt Bowen.

Senior SA Police chaplain, Rev David Marr, conducted the service with his WA counterpart, Rev Barry May.

Officials from the Western Australia Police Union and the Police Association of South Australia joined the Bowen family, and scores of serving police, at the morning ceremony.

Mourners laid wreaths and flowers over a brass plate in the footpath, in honour of Det Sgt Bowen.

Among the congregation were Police Federation of Australia president, Peter Alexander, Australian Crime Commission chairman, Mick Keelty, and SA Police Commissioner Mal Hyde.

Mr Alexander described the “terrorist nature” of Det Sgt Bowen’s murder as unprecedented in Australia.

“The word cowardly comes to mind,” he said. “To send a bomb is, in itself, extraordinary. Then, to consider there could have been other people who could have lost their lives, by being in the wrong place at the wrong time.

“It just goes to show the extent of the criminality of it.”

Police charged Domenic Perre with Det Sgt Bowen’s murder soon after the bombing, but lacked sufficient evidence to go to trial. A coronial inquest in 1999, however, found that Mr Perre was indeed behind the bombing.

Mrs Bowen-Sutton, now remarried, said she gained some peace from the Coroner’s finding, but would continue to comment publicly – at the expense of her privacy – until a court convicted Mr Perre.

“Major Crime said that nothing more will happen unless new evidence comes to light,” she said.

“I have trouble with the nature of Geoff’s death, because he was a terrific man, appalled by violence. I don’t know if I’ll ever get over that.”