Acts to ensure justice

When the sounds of a violent, hateful crime broke a country town’s night silence last year, off-duty city policeman Bob Stewart swung into action.

Bob Stewart never expected to witness a killing when he settled in at a riverside caravan park for some leisure time with his wife and daughters. But, soon after night fell on his first day in the idyllic River Murray setting, he heard yelling voices and deathly thuds.

From the commotion, just off the southern riverbank only 50 metres from his caravan site, Stewart knew someone was at least “being seriously assaulted”.

Later, he would discover that he had actually heard the last cries of man savagely beaten with an oar before drowning. But, now, the burley, seasoned street cop and PASA delegate felt he had to investigate.

So, Stewart, then 41, picked up a torch and, in the pitch black of a humid January evening at Renmark’s Riverfront Caravan Park, headed toward the river.

“It sounded as if someone was really getting cracked with something,” he says, “a cricket bat or a baseball bat. It sounded pretty severe.

“Mr Furniss (the victim) was calling out for Ben, his son. Ben was staying at a campsite a bit further east of us. He must have got over there (to his father) earlier.”

Stewart, on his way to the river, saw a woman heading in the same direction. She, too, had heard the commotion and decided to investigate. Stewart asked her if she knew what was happening. She said it sounded as if “someone’s getting a flogging”.

Just when Stewart had almost reached the river’s edge, he noticed a solidly-built man of about 30 walking toward him. Steven Alan Angus, heavily tattooed and dressed in only shorts and sports shoes, had a bleeding gash above his left eye.

Stewart then looked to the river and saw Ben Furniss with only his head above the water. The young man, a few metres out from the bank near his family’s aluminium dinghy, was desperately calling out: “Dad, Dad!”

Angus, it would emerge, had tried to steal the dinghy, and beaten 59-year-old Nicholas Furniss with the oar when he tried to stop him. Ben Furniss, 15, took a blow from the oar-wielding Angus as well.

But with the ever-vigilant Stewart on the scene, Angus would never disappear quietly into the night and, ultimately, escape justice.

“I thought it was strange,” says the Parks-based senior constable. “He was agitated, shaken and wringing wet. And he was the only bloke walking away, when everyone else was walking to it (the river). A lot of other people had made their way from close-by campsites.”

So, suspecting that Angus had “cracked someone”, Stewart asked him what had happened. The attacker blurted out an ill-conceived lie about an argument over crab pots. But his bid to fool the clear-thinking Stewart – who knew of no such pots – proved fruitless.

“He kept walking away,” says Stewart, “so, I said: ‘Hang on, mate, I want to have a word’. Then, he started to run. I thought: ‘Here we go!’

“I called out to him a couple of times to stop but, the more I was calling out, the faster he was going.”

Angus headed toward scrub at the eastern end of the caravan park, as Stewart – with only thongs for footwear – gave chase, but eventually lost sight of him.

Undeterred, Stewart, too, ventured into the scrub. And, as he searched, with only the aid of torchlight under an overcast sky, he could hear the sound of cracking twigs. It seemed that, with his footsteps, Angus had given his pursuer an advantage.

Stewart continued his search, but in the direction of the sound. For around a minute, he saw nothing. But, then, in the light of his torch, he spotted Angus peering out from behind a log.

Stewart approached him, and again asked: “What’s going on, mate?” Angus, lying on his back, uttered the same line about crab pots. So, now, Stewart asked him to go back to the scene and “sort it out”.

When Angus refused, Stewart helped him to his feet and identified himself as a police officer. Then, in a highly dangerous move without back-up or communication, he warned him that, if he did not return willingly, he would arrest him.

In an instant, Angus hurled a barrage of expletives at Stewart and shaped up ready to box. “He threw one at me,” says Stewart, “and I dodged under that. Then, I just pushed him backwards, and he fell onto his back.

“I landed on top of him, sat astride his torso and tried to restrain his arms. He punched me twice to my left temple with his clenched fist. It (the force) knocked my head to the side. I punched him once to his face with my fist, and he stopped hitting me.”

Stewart again helped Angus to his feet, and started to escort him on a walk of 300-odd metres back to the scene. Angus, not handcuffed and capable of a sudden move against Stewart, stayed compliant.

But his mood changed when the pair finally reached a waiting police patrol back at the scene, 15 minutes after the chase began.

“He started to struggle and was spitting and bleeding,” says Stewart. “Bill Gardner (one of the patrol officers) got the cuffs out and went to put them on, and he (Angus) really started to arc up.”

Just then, Shadow Police Minister Robert Brokenshire – who happened to be vacationing at the caravan park – stepped in to give Stewart some help. In an unlikely partnership, the pair managed to get Angus handcuffed.

“Once he was handcuffed, I just held him against the police car,” says Brokenshire. “I found him very threatening, aggressive, and not caring at all about what had occurred.

“He also called us dogs, and said: ‘I’m going to vomit in your police car’. The window was down, so I dragged him to the back of the car so he couldn’t do that.”

Meanwhile, with Angus finally in police custody amid a growing crowd of holidaymakers, Stewart went to search for the now missing Furniss. But his body remained undiscovered, until Water Operations officers attended early the next morning.

Stewart went on to prepare notes of the incident, and take photographs of the scene of the chase.

Today, he concedes he was never prepared to wait for back-up before he undertook the chase and search, but rightly reflects on his actions with no regret.

“Because,” he says, “if something had happened, and we didn’t find him, well... we were never going to find him. I think, all too often, people aren’t prepared to take any initiative these days.”

And the views of others confirm that Stewart is right to feel comfortable with his actions. Shadow Minister Brokenshire speaks of the veteran officer as taking his skills and commitment to duty “right to the fullest extent”.

“It was one of the finest examples of police work that I’ve witnessed in the years that I’ve had the privilege of being either minister or shadow minister,” he says.

To Police Association president, Peter Alexander, Stewart’s actions came as no surprise. “The way Bob reacted in those circumstances was typical,” he says. “He really is a role model, and a bloke like him makes you feel good about being in the police force.”

But Stewart’s beyond-the-call-of-duty effort was not a first for him. In April 2001, he saved a 15-month-old boy from a Croydon Park house fire. For his courage, he received a Police Bravery Medal.

And, for his equally courageous off-duty arrest of Angus, Brokenshire and former Riverland LSA boss, Superintendent Bronwyn Killmier, recommended Stewart for another award.

At a Fort Largs graduation ceremony on April 21, Commissioner Mal Hyde presented him with a certificate of merit.

Stewart’s involvement in two such mettle-testing incidents in just 22 months might surprise some. “Things happen to some people, and not to others,” he says. “But, I’m sure that, if they did happen to others, they’d do the same thing I did.”

• Angus pleaded guilty in the Supreme Court last February to the manslaughter of Nicholas Furniss, and the assault occasioning actual bodily harm of Ben Furniss.