In Eight Minutes Of Footage Jessica Zrinski Doesn’t Get Out Of The Car Once

At 8:49am on a Tuesday morning in November 2022, 30-year-old Jessica Zrinski was captured on CCTV in the passenger seat of a blue Holden Commodore pulling into a service station in Mount Victoria. Trailing from her passenger door was a massive tree branch, and driving the car was Paul Jones, a man she had met outside a Western Sydney pub just hours earlier. Those eight minutes and 40 seconds of footage would be the last time Jessica was ever seen alive. Soon after, Jones vanished off the grid for nearly three years, eventually located by police living in a camouflaged cave in dense bushland before being subpoenaed to give evidence at her coronial inquest. In this episode of True Crime Conversations, NewsCorp investigative journalist Ashlea Hansen joins Gemma Bath to unpack the bizarre timeline, the extensive searches through the Blue Mountains bushland, and what Jessica’s family hopes to finally learn as the inquest resumes. LINKS If any of the contents in this episode have caused distress, know that there is help available via Lifeline on 13 11 14 or Beyond Blue on 1300 22 4636. Contact Full Stop Australia https://fullstop.org.au/ on 1800 385 578, 7 days, 24 hours. GET IN TOUCH Follow us on Instagram and TikTok @truecrimeconversations https://www.instagram.com/truecrimeconversations/?hl=en Want us to cover a case on the podcast? Email us at [email protected] mailto:[email protected] or send us a voice note. https://help.mamamia.com.au/en-US/send-a-podcast-voice-note-467960 MAMAMIA OFFERS: Right now, every Mamamia subscriber is automatically entered to win a $5,000 Dreamworld holiday for four; flights, accommodation, express passes and more included.https://www.mamamia.com.au/subscribeSubscribe here to enter. https://www.mamamia.com.au/subscribe/?utm_source=shownotes&utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=tcc&utm_content=dreamworld-giveawayy T&Cs apply https://help.mamamia.com.au/en-US/subcriber-giveaway-x-dreamworld-7904221. Get access to Very Peri, Mamamia's exclusive perimenopause series, for just $59. 25 world-leading experts, over 20 on-demand sessions, available now. We’ve sorted through the noise so you don't have to. Go toveryperi.com.au http://veryperi.com.au/ today. You hot? Same. Make sure to leave us a rating and review on Apple & Spotify to let us know how you're liking the episodes. CREDITS Guest: Ashlea Hansen Host & Executive Producer: Gemma Bath Senior Producer: Tahli Blackman Producer: Ella Maitland Group Executive Producer: Ilaria Brophy Video Editor: Julian Rosario Audio Designer: Tegan Salder Mamamia acknowledges the traditional owners of the land on which we have recorded this podcast. Become a Mamamia subscriber: https://www.mamamia.com.au/subscribe https://www.mamamia.com.au/subscribe See omnystudio.com/listener https://omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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• 0:01Gemma Bath?

  It's 8:49 AM on a Tuesday morning in November 2022. And Jessica Zrinski is in the passenger seat of a blue Holden Commodore as it pulls into an Ampol service station in Mount Victoria in the New South Wales Blue Mountains. The 30-year-old's hair and orange top can clearly be seen on CCTV footage from the servo, but her face is obscured by the angle. Next to her driving is a man named Paul Jones. She met him the night before in a pub car park more than an hour's drive from where they are right now. A giant branch can be seen sticking out of Jessica's door. It's trailing along the ground as they pull in.

• 0:45Gemma Bath?

  There's also damage on the front bumper. They're at the service station for just under nine minutes. In that time, Paul fills up the car, buys some strawberry milk and a donut, heads back inside a second time for some cigarettes, checks out something in the boot and removes the branch from Jessica's door. She doesn't step foot out of the vehicle. It's the last time Jessica Zrinski has been seen and it's footage her devastated family is still trying to understand.

• 1:28Gemma Bath?

  I'm Gemma Bath and you're listening to True Crime Conversations, a podcast exploring the world's most notorious crimes by speaking to the people who know the most about them. It's all they have, eight minutes, 40 seconds of footage. After that, there's no trace of Jessica. They've analysed every second of that servo CCTV, trying to work out what's going on. Who is this man? What are they doing in the Blue Mountains? Why is there half a tree branch hanging off the car? It's all just bizarre and Jones has never come forward to explain it. Three years later, the family might finally get some answers.

• 2:13Gemma Bath?

  An inquest into Jessica's suspected death that started in March will continue in August 2026. Jones, the last person to see her alive, has been served a subpoena to appear and answer questions. To be clear, he has not been charged with anything in relation to this case, but he is a key person of interest. He's the last person who saw Jessica alive. Our guest today is News Corp investigative journalist Ashley Hanson. She's been following this case closely and has been talking to Jessica's family in the lead up to the inquest. She joins us now.

• 2:57Gemma Bath?

  Ashley, tell me about Jessica. How would her family describe her?

• 3:03Speaker 01

  Her family would describe her as outgoing, loving, caring, very kind, an element of naivety, I guess. But certainly vulnerable and troubled would be a way that they would probably describe her as well. She struggled with some mental health issues and drug addiction issues as well, but she was very much loved by her family and her friends.

• 3:30Gemma Bath?

  What was happening in her life in 2022? You mentioned that she was having some issues there, but where was she living? What was she doing?

• 3:37Speaker 01

  Well, I think she was living with her grandmother and she lived in Sydney's West. She was also known to go and stay with friends a lot and I think she was just trying to figure out her life and she wasn't working at the time. Her family was trying to help her, but anyone with a loved one that is going through difficulties knows that it's challenging. It's challenging to help someone that are going through their own battles. She was still very much going about her own business. I mean, in the days leading up to her disappearance, she was going to get her hair done. So she took pride in the way that she was, she appeared

• 4:21Speaker 01

  and was doing things like that and hanging out with friends and whatnot. So, yeah, she was, she was, she was still living life.

• 4:32Gemma Bath?

  A word that the family used quite a bit in your interviews was vulnerable. Can you expand on that? How, how did they see her as vulnerable?

• 4:41Speaker 01

  Anyone with addiction issues and mental health issues are vulnerable because they're, they're struggling in their life and their, their challenges in terms of, yeah, their problems that they're dealing with. And I think that because of her, her problems that she was facing, she was very much vulnerable in the sense that she was easy to take advantage of. I think that's how they view it and that's why they would definitely describe her as vulnerable. She did need help.

• 5:14Gemma Bath?

  Can you take us through her movements on the evening of Monday, November 28th, 2022? We have a lot of CCTV that can show us where she was, what time, where she kind of ended up. Can you talk us through that?

• 5:28Speaker 01

  Yeah, it's really incredible how police have pieced together her hours and even the days leading up to her disappearance. Because she didn't have a phone, that was, made it very difficult for police to track her movements. So they really had to go back to gathering all the CCTV that they could and interviewing people and piecing together her movements. And they pretty much pieced it together minute by minute. And the, the night that she was, met this mystery man, who we can talk about later, but the night that she, she, she, of this interaction with this man, she had been walking around the streets and we're not entirely sure of what she was doing,

• 6:11Speaker 01

  but there was this two minutes, this chance encounter with a driver and she met him in the car park outside of a pub in Sydney's West. And we don't know the nature of the conversation, but we do know that she willingly got into his car, this blue Commodore station wagon. And the driver we now know is Paul Jones and he was the last known man to see her alive. And about 10 minutes after they left the pub, they went to a service station in Horsley Park, not far away. Jessica can be seen, happy. It doesn't look like there's, there's a problem at all in the front seat. Mr. Jones filled up his car. He went in and bought Jessica a drink. He bought himself a drink as well.

• 6:56Speaker 01

  And they left into the night. And what, what transpired over the next 12 hours is now at the centre of homicide investigation.

• 7:10Gemma Bath?

  When her family realised that she hopped into this car of a seemingly stranger, she doesn't know this person, was that unusual for her? Would they have seen that as weird for her to just hop in a car with a random man?

• 7:23Speaker 01

  No, she was extremely friendly. And as I said, that, that was part of her personality. She would talk to anyone. She would ask people for a cigarette. She was very trusting. She would ask people for a lift. She'd ask people if she could borrow their mobile phone because she didn't have one at the time. And so that was an unusual and I think that also made it difficult for the police investigation.

• 7:48Gemma Bath?

  There was a witness that you got to meet that then placed the car kind of around 3, 4 AM in the morning. What did he see during that interaction?

• 8:01Speaker 01

  It's incredible what he saw because during my investigation, I identified him and reached out to him and he said, yeah, no, I have a vivid memory of, of a car, the same description of this blue Commodore station wagon on that particular night. And I said, well, can you prove it? It was a couple of years ago now. How, how do I know that? And he said, well, I, I text my friend that night who has that car because of the way that it was being driven very erratically. And he said, and I actually text my friend who had a car like that, a blue Commodore station wagon and said, hey, was that you running from the cops this morning? And the reason he said that was because at this particular intersection

• 8:44Speaker 01

  where he spotted that car, he was on his way. He's a truck driver, delivery driver of some sorts. And he was on his way to a job. And he said he had a very early pickup of some type of machinery. So it was early in, in the early hours of the morning. And he said he approached these, this busy intersection. It wasn't busy at that time in the morning, of course. He was one of the only cars on the road. But he said that when he approached the intersection, he saw this car just come out of nowhere. And when it crossed the intersection, it went onto the wrong side of the road and started travelling on the wrong side of the road. And he was just stunned.

• 9:25Speaker 01

  And then just momentarily after, a police car came through. And so he just put the two and two together thinking, well, were the police following that car? When, we don't know if that was the case. What we know is that perhaps that driver and one of the questions that we're trying to answer is, is that driver of the blue Commodore station wagon, were they in some way concerned about the police being in that area? And they were trying to, yeah, drive away for some particular reason. But it's obviously of note to identify the fact that this, this, this car was seen on the wrong side of the road. Shaun Edwards, who was that truck driver that morning,

• 10:10Speaker 01

  he has since done a formal statement with homicide detectives about what he saw that night. So that, that, that statement is now part of Jessica's brief of evidence and that is now being examined by the coroner. So I'm not exactly sure how it all fits in.

• 10:26Gemma Bath?

  Yeah.

• 10:27Speaker 01

  But certainly when, when I heard about that, it was, yeah, something that definitely stood out in, in that evening of events.

• 10:37Gemma Bath?

  Because the next kind of major time or only other time we see Jessica is the following morning where CCTV from a servo kind of picks up the car and it's eight minutes, 40 seconds of footage. So we, we get a lot of insight. What was your reaction when you saw? That video, the, the morning after she jumped into this car.

• 11:03Speaker 01

  Bizarre.

• 11:04Gemma Bath?

  It is bizarre, isn't it?

• 11:06Speaker 01

  I just, it's perplexing, it's distressing now knowing that that is the final glimpse that we saw Jessica. And there's just a flash of her i- in the front seat of this car. We don't know what state she was in, in terms of her physical wellbeing. We don't know what her mental state was. We don't know if she was in fear. We don't know if she was happy in that car. We just don't know. And because of the length of time of that CCTV segment, as you say, almost nine minutes.

• 11:43Gemma Bath?

  It's a long time. Like, if you think about how long you go to a servo for, you fill up the car, you grab something from the shop, you head back. Like, it's a long period of time.

• 11:53Speaker 01

  It's also a long time for a passenger, someone like Jessica, to have not got out of the car. And that, that comes from her family. And that's what they find the most bizarre part of that CCTV is they said that Jessica was just a person, she was quite fidgety, she was, she used to smoke, so she.

• 12:13Gemma Bath?

  I was just thinking cigarettes.

• 12:14Speaker 01

  Exactly.

• 12:14Gemma Bath?

  Wouldn't she duck out and have one?

• 12:16Speaker 01

  And, and that's what, they're the questions that they're asking. Why didn't she get out of the car? There's so many, um, points in that CCTV that you are just left, uh, asking more questions about why did he do that? One of the other things was when you can see this foliage in the, stuck in between the passenger door underneath, and this is clearly from the bush somewhere in the Blue Mountains. And you have to remember that Jessica was picked up from outside of, um, a Western Sydney pub. And then the following morning, she's seen on CCTV with this driver, Paul Jones, in the Blue Mountains. So what was the purpose of being in the Blue Mountains?

• 13:01Speaker 01

  That, that's a question that everyone i- is asking and wants to know. But the thing about that CCTV and, and getting back to the foliage is that when Paul Jones, after he filled up and then he went inside and he bought, um, a strawberry milk, a- and he came back outside and he spotted the foliage in the door. And he walked around to, to Jessica's side, the passenger's side, and he just opened the door very briefly for a second or so to pull out the foliage. But I was kind of left wondering, if I was opening someone's door who was a passenger in my car, I would mention what I was doing as in.

• 13:42Gemma Bath?

  Isn't this a bit funny? There's a tr- like, it's not just a bit of foliage. It's, like, I'm trying, it's huge.

• 13:47Speaker 01

  It's, it's, it's a branch.

• 13:48Gemma Bath?

  It's a huge branch.

• 13:50Speaker 01

  Exactly.

• 13:50Gemma Bath?

  You'd make a comment.

• 13:51Speaker 01

  And how did it get into the car? I mean, that's another question, right? But, but in terms of him going in and opening the door, I just thought, that's a little bit strange. Why did he not converse with her and just say, I'm just, oh, there's just something in the door? And, um, yeah, just one of the, one of the many, many things, um, we, we may never know. But it was strange. And then at one point during this CCTV, before he fills up the car, he goes to the boot. And when he opens the boot, there's a blanket in the car. Now, a blanket ordinarily in someone's car is probably unusual, but that blanket, as far as I'm aware, has never been found.

• 14:35Speaker 01

  And Jessica has never been found. Paul Jones, who has not been charged, nor has anyone else, he'll have an opportunity to explain and answer some of these questions when the next phase of the inquest gets underway.

• 14:50Gemma Bath?

  You mentioned that the bush came from the Blue Mountains. We know that, don't we? We know the car during that 24 hour period went to the bush.

• 15:00Speaker 01

  Look, I'm not aware of what sort of, um, determinations the police have done in terms of matching that particular branch with the area that Paul Jones was spotted in that morning. But we do know that mobile phone data had placed him in the Hampton State Forest at around six twenty in the morning for almost a two hour period before he got back to that Mount Victoria service station. So that, I guess, looking at the timeline, it's unusual because he went to this area of the state forest with Jessica, presumably at around six twenty in the morning. Then he is some, for some reason, he's left the forest and then he's, he's gone to get

• 15:45Speaker 01

  petrol and then we see Jessica in the front seat, that, that glimpse. And then when he turns back out onto the Great Western Highway, he doesn't head back down the mountain towards Sydney. He heads back in the direction that he came from, which is the Hampton State Forest, back into the forest. And clearly, uh, the, the matching of the, the foliage stacks up the evidence that he had been in that forest and possibly taken the car off-road to a certain degree, along one of those tracks. Interestingly, what came out of the inquest was that a driver who was working in that area at the time, something to do with logging, had identified and had reported to police

• 16:30Speaker 01

  that they saw, uh, a lowered Commodore station wagon, a blue colour, and, and a man was driving it. Uh, when, when that evidence came out at the inquest as well, that was, um, yeah, shocking to, to, to hear what he had to, to say to police after they put out a public appeal in terms of the car and had anyone seen this car. And this worker came forward and said, well, I do have a memory of that morning. And he said, because his truck had broken down and he saw this, this blue Commodore station wagon drive into one of the trails. And he said it, it just, it caught his eye because he thought, what is a car like this doing in this area?

• 17:12Speaker 01

  Because it was that lowered sort of Commodore and these are dirt roads, they're not, um, they're not sealed roads. An unusual place to be taking a, a lowered car like that. And it, it stood out in his mind and he reported it to police, that sighting. And the other thing he said was that when, when the car passed him, he tried to, uh, wave to the driver. And the driver had his head down and he noticed that this driver wa- was bearded. And he said he just had his head down and he looked like he was up to no good. And he said, and that, that was his, um, perception of that, that sighting.

• 17:53Gemma Bath?

  And is, his evidence to the inquest the first time we've heard from that?

• 17:58Speaker 01

  Yes. We didn't hear from him personally, but we heard about his evidence when it was presented by the officer in charge, when she was running through some of the key pieces of evidence in connection with Jessica's disappearance. And she, um, revealed this information, which was of course interesting, the first that anyone else in the courtroom, in terms of Jessica's family and, and myself as a journalist sitting there, had heard before.

• 18:28Speaker 02

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• 19:05Gemma Bath?

  Ashley, what do we know about Paul Jones' movements after that? Because we've just had kind of minute by minute through CCTV, through pinging of the phone, we see Jessica at the service station. Then what?

• 19:19Speaker 01

  After we see Jessica in the passenger seat and the car leaves the service station, and Paul Jones is believed to have headed back into the Hampton State Forest area. Interestingly, his phone, um, goes flat or is turned off deliberately. We don't know. But his, his mobile is undetected for almost five hours. And so when he returns to Sydney later that afternoon, he's spotted on a traffic camera coming down the mountain, back in towards Sydney, and there is no sign of Jessica in the front seat, in the passenger seat. And she was never seen alive again.

• 20:05Speaker 01

  Paul Jones didn't report her missing. He didn't, um, tell anyone, as far as we're aware, of where Jessica was going, what happened to her. And this is now what her family is, is desperate to know.

• 20:20Gemma Bath?

  So how quickly did her family realise she was missing?

• 20:24Speaker 01

  Pretty soon, I'm sure. Her grandmother was very concerned within the next day and the ringing around. But a- as, as I mentioned before, she, it wasn't uncommon for her to stay, stay on a couch at a friend's place and not come home for a couple of days. But they usually had contact with her. So it, it wasn't, it was out of character for her to go a long period of time and not be in contact with her family. And so her grandmother and, or her, another family member reported her missing to police. And initially, it was, it was being treated by the local detectives and they were investigating her disappearance.

• 21:08Speaker 01

  And when, um, the detectives started to piece together the CCTV, and then they realised that there was this chance encounter with a stranger that she didn't know, and they identified the blue Commodore station wagon, that's when they ramped up this investigation and it was handed over to the homicide squad.

• 21:28Gemma Bath?

  So that's when they decided that there was potentially foul play?

• 21:33Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 21:35Gemma Bath?

  At first, there was some hope because often, well, always when there's a missing person, you check whether their bank accounts are being used, you check mobile phones, stuff like that. And her bank account was being used.

• 21:47Speaker 01

  Look, this is a really cruel twist in her story because her bank account was being used and it turns out that it was a so-called friend that was using her bank account and accessing her Centrelink payments to the tune of around $10,000. So I think that that really didn't help the situation. And her Facebook and social media was also being accessed. So it left the police with this impression that potentially she was alive and accessing her money and also using her social media. But of course, we now know that that so-called

• 22:27Speaker 01

  friend was charged with fraud offences. He pled guilty in the court and he was sentenced over that. He had no connection to Jessica's disappearance.

• 22:38Gemma Bath?

  Right. So that was investigated.

• 22:40Speaker 01

  It was investigated and he was ruled out and cleared of, he didn't have any involvement in her disappearance. But when you think about it, it does show Jess's vulnerability.

• 22:51Gemma Bath?

  Yeah, it goes back to that, doesn't it?

• 22:53Speaker 01

  Exactly. And even the text messages that I found through the court papers about that particular case. And she was texting, just in the days leading up to her disappearance, texting this, you know, friend and telling him, don't spend my money. You know, I wanted to go to the hairdresser today. Don't spend it. You know, never spend my money. And it just showed that someone was already taking advantage of her in the lead up to her disappearance. And then, of course, we now know that she's been missing for years now and we don't know what happened to her.

• 23:29Gemma Bath?

  And did that interference, well, I can't see how it wouldn't have hampered those early investigations.

• 23:35Speaker 01

  It must have. It had to have had something to do with it. But I think that once police were on to the fact that she had met this, this mystery man, then they started looking into, well, who is this driver? They had his car registration and they quickly identified who he was. And when they started investigating and they did a public appeal, they put out the car, details of the car as well. But they, they did a search warrant and they executed a search warrant on Paul Jones's workplace and his caravan where he was living at the

• 24:16Speaker 01

  time. Nothing was, was found connecting, which was connected to Jessica's disappearance. But interestingly, he left town on the day that police turned up with a search warrant and told them that they were investigating the disappearance of Jessica Zrinski. As you could imagine, homicide detectives, this was a serious investigation. And Paul Jones reached out to his daughter and basically said that he's, he's going to WA. And he couldn't be found for three years.

• 24:55Gemma Bath?

  And we'll get to when he was found because that is a story. But so back in 2022, he wasn't interviewed. He couldn't be found to be interviewed.

• 25:07Speaker 01

  Police executed a search warrant on Paul Jones's workplace and his caravan in January in 2023. So this is two months after Jessica's disappearance. He spoke to police

• 25:20Speaker 01

  at the location of his workplace. He would have been cautioned because the homicide detectives would have identified themselves as homicide squad investigators and they would have said why they're there. And that would have been on the search warrant that we are investigating the disappearance of Jessica Zrinski. So he was very aware that, that he was being looked at in connection with the disappearance of a young woman. And on that day, he went, they seized his car, this blue Commodore station wagon. So they took it from his work in front of his colleagues. They took it away for forensic testing. We don't know exactly

• 25:58Speaker 01

  what they found in that forensic testing, but certainly nothing, not enough to, to explain what may have happened to Jessica. I'm not sure of what, what he explained to police as to what happened that night. That's, that's yet to come out in the coroner's court. But what we do know is that he, I guess, went missing himself for close to three years and was known to be in WA, Queensland. And yeah, it was a, a long journey to, to get to this point where he finally was served a subpoena to appear at Jessica's inquest.

• 26:43Gemma Bath?

  Well, in the meantime, there are a few searches done of the Blue Mountains to try and see if they could find Jessica. On what scale were those searches? I know you went into the Blue Mountains to see the kind of areas that they were looking at. How big were those searches?

• 26:59Speaker 01

  They were huge searches and a big, a large amount of resources were put into those searches. There were two major land searches that focused on these particular areas in the Genolan State Forest and the Hampton State Forest. And they had intelligence, which we now know were probably the phone pings and the detections of Paul Jones's phone in those particular areas. Also the sighting of the blue Commodore station wagon in that forest area and on that particular track. They had dozens of volunteers, they

• 27:41Speaker 01

  had police dogs, cadaver dogs, and they didn't find any trace of Jessica. You're talking about, this area is, is pine forest. So it regularly on this particular cycle gets, you know, harvested and, and these areas do get logged. So.

• 28:04Gemma Bath?

  So it wouldn't be hard to miss a body? Because how can you search every millimetre of ground, really?

• 28:13Speaker 01

  Look, I think it's, it's so difficult. You're talking about a needle in a haystack. It's, when you go out there, it is overwhelming. And I went out there with Jessica's auntie and her uncle. And just the scale of this forest and how many tracks are out there. And unless you have a specific location, and we know that, you know, she could have been out there for hours. We don't know where exactly she was last spotted in that particular area or where she was taken to. It's, it's so difficult. And the, the amount of time that has passed, the Blue Mountain gets, Blue Mountains get snow.

• 28:57Gemma Bath?

  Lots of rain.

• 28:58Speaker 01

  Lots of rain. As I said, that area gets harvested and the areas get cleared. Jessica was a very small, petite person. And yeah, we, no, no trace of her clothing has ever been found. Very, very tragic case.

• 29:22Gemma Bath?

  How did you feel being in the parts of the forest where we believe she might have been? Was it, because it's not the kind of areas that people frequent. There might be a few bikers coming past, but what was it like in there?

• 29:35Speaker 01

  Even then, it was, it was so isolated. We were there for hours and we didn't see anyone else. And I think that that was chilling, really, when you think about it. And we were there in broad daylight as well. And you just think, yeah, where, where is she? And what was, what was the purpose of coming out here?

• 29:59Gemma Bath?

  Are there any other persons of interest in this case? Could Jessica have gone out to the forest on her own because she enjoyed the forest? Like, is there anything else that we need to kind of think of here?

• 30:13Speaker 01

  We have to remain open-minded about what happened to Jessica. While it is an open and active homicide investigation, the coroner is now examining all of the circumstances surrounding her disappearance. So a coroner will look at the basic facts and now decide and try to determine Jessica's cause of death, if in fact Jessica is deceased. And if there is any reason to make any recommendations or findings in relation to her case, the coroner also has the power to refer her matter to the DPP. We, we don't know what

• 30:54Speaker 01

  happened to Jessica. We have to remain open-minded about what happened to her. One of the tragedies of Jessica's story is that her family is not holding out hope that she's going to walk back through the door. They have come to terms with the fact that Jessica is deceased. Police believe she is deceased. And now they want her remains. And they also want justice. If somebody harmed her, they want justice.

• 31:28Gemma Bath?

  After the break, we take a closer look at the person of interest in this case and the key questions the inquest into Jessica's death will explore. Obviously, Paul Jones is the man we need to hear from because he was the last person to see Jessica, so we need to hear his side of the story. Can you explain why we didn't know his name for so long? Because it was suppressed for a long time. Now we are actually able to see his face and say his name.

• 31:56Speaker 01

  I wish I could answer that question, but I think that's one for police because the family and myself were asking it for a long time as to why this man's identity was protected for three years when we now know he couldn't be contacted and he couldn't be found. He left the state of New South Wales on the day that he was

• 32:20Speaker 01

  identified as a person of interest in Jessica's disappearance. And this search warrant was executed on his workplace. His car was seized, his caravan was raided, and then he just disappears.

• 32:33Speaker 01

  Jessica's family are extremely frustrated that for three years they didn't know his identity. Could you imagine sitting there as a family, knowing that there's this mystery man that your daughter was seen in a car with? And you see it on the news and his face is blurred and you can't know his name?

• 32:55Gemma Bath?

  It's weird.

• 32:56Speaker 01

  It's, I mean, it must be infuriating for them. And I know it has been. They also need to and have been following the process and this grueling process now of what the coroner's court is going through in this inquest. And as I said, still an active homicide investigation. So Paul Jones has been subpoenaed to give evidence and attend the next phase of Jessica's inquest in August.

• 33:28Gemma Bath?

  Tell us that story because you broke that news a few weeks ago. And it is extraordinary how they actually delivered that subpoena. It is like something from a movie.

• 33:38Speaker 01

  It was crazy. When we heard that the extents that they went to, to deliver this subpoena and where he'd been living, we don't know for how long, but living in a cave.

• 33:52Gemma Bath?

  It was a cave, an actual cave.

• 33:54Speaker 01

  It was covered, you couldn't see it by air or drone. Apparently there were trees that were covering the cave. You have to climb down into it. It's off a walking track. It's in dense bushland in New South Wales. And he's been living off the grid. We don't know for how long. And police went and they took a team in to execute this operation. It was a police operation to deliver this subpoena to him. They clearly don't have enough evidence to charge him with any offences. And he needs to be afforded the presumption of innocence.

• 34:36Speaker 01

  But they couldn't even find him to deliver the subpoena to him. So that was a big hurdle in itself, finding him. And interestingly, the coronial process is probably how they were able to find him.

• 34:52Gemma Bath?

  They basically chop it in, didn't they?

• 34:54Speaker 01

  I'm not sure, definitely there was eyes in the sky. I'm not sure to what degree, but they had to walk in and they had the rescue squad was with them. They had to use particular equipment and used a ladder to get down into the cave where he was to personally hand him this subpoena. And what was interesting as well is he honoured the subpoena.

• 35:18Gemma Bath?

  He turned up in court, didn't he?

• 35:19Speaker 01

  He turned up in court, but he was also wearing a suit, which is just a little bit strange when you realise that he's been living in this cave. And then he turns up to court just a few days later, he's wearing a suit. And he looked very presentable. He looked, he was sitting there in court and he followed all of the orders that he had to. And he will get an opportunity to tell his side of the story. And everyone is very much looking forward to hearing what Paul Jones has to say.

• 35:53Gemma Bath?

  So he didn't do any of that in the first half of the inquest? He wasn't asked any questions?

• 35:58Speaker 01

  No, he hasn't been called as a witness yet.

• 36:00Gemma Bath?

  For those that aren't aware of how a coroner's court works, what happens if you are issued a subpoena and then you don't turn up?

• 36:10Speaker 01

  Well, you can be arrested.

• 36:11Gemma Bath?

  Right.

• 36:12Speaker 01

  It's a criminal offence not to honour a subpoena. He also has rights as well, and like anyone that appears in a coroner's court. And we've seen this time and time again, that you have a right to not answer any questions if they could incriminate you.

• 36:30Gemma Bath?

  Yeah.

• 36:31Speaker 01

  So we're yet to learn whether or not he will answer any questions.

• 36:36Gemma Bath?

  Was there anything else that was new news to you in the first half of the inquest?

• 36:42Speaker 01

  Oh, there was so much that we didn't know about Jessica's case. I mean, day one, we learned Paul Jones, we learned his name. We learned that he left the state of New South Wales on the day that this search warrant and homicide detectives approached him. And we also learned about the details of the phone pings and movements throughout the night of the phone activity, which I think is just piecing together the timeline. And you just sit back and sort of go, what happened? What were they doing and why the Blue Mountains? Why this particular area? Why did he go there?

• 37:27Speaker 01

  Like we said before, why did he stop for almost nine minutes at this petrol station? And where is Jessica?

• 37:35Gemma Bath?

  Well, I guess he will hopefully tell his side of the story at the next stage of the inquest. How is Jessica's family feeling about this process? Going to court is strange for any family. How are they coping with it?

• 37:49Speaker 01

  It's extremely difficult for them. I think they all handle it in their own individual ways. But a very, very emotional and traumatic experience to be sitting in a coroner's court when you're trying to get answers and find out where your missing loved one is. So to sit there in court and the people that have to turn up and give evidence, it's difficult for them too. It's not, it's not a usual thing to have to go to a court and sit and give evidence about someone you love or someone you know that may in some way be connected to the disappearance of a young woman.

• 38:32Speaker 01

  So I think it was very, very emotional and confronting. But Jessica's family are very united in the fact that they want this process to play out. And they do have hope that they will get the answers that they're very much hoping for.

• 38:52Gemma Bath?

  And how long can we expect the next stage of the inquest to go for? And when do we get findings?

• 39:00Speaker 01

  Look, how long's a piece of string?

• 39:02Gemma Bath?

  It could be years really, couldn't it?

• 39:03Speaker 01

  It could be, it could be a lot quicker. It may be, yeah, I just, we don't know. I think the next stage will be interesting. And whether or not there's another stage after that, we don't know. We'll have to keep following it.

• 39:20Gemma Bath?

  Crime is your world. You've interviewed and covered so many cases. How have you found working on this case? It is still so fresh, it's all ongoing. You're talking to a family who's only just kind of learnt names and learnt timelines. How have you found working on this case?

• 39:39Speaker 01

  It's been an eye-opening experience to work on this case and a lot of learnings.

• 39:48Speaker 01

  But basically, working closely with Jessica's family and trying to get to the bottom of what happened to her.

• 39:58Speaker 01

  Yeah, is, yeah, there's a lot of responsibility in that. You also have to be very cautious to remain open-minded about what did happen to her. But I think raising awareness about Jessica's case is a good thing. You know, we shouldn't forget missing women and any missing person or any type of case like this that's unresolved. These families deserve to know what happened. And it is a privilege in my space to be able to work with these families and follow it through.

• 40:33Gemma Bath?

  I'm interested to hear more broadly, you have sat with and next to so many people's grief in their homes, seeing the bedrooms of loved ones that have passed, photo albums.

• 40:47Gemma Bath?

  What stays with you about that experience? And do you see kind of similar experiences playing out across families of lost loved ones?

• 40:57Speaker 01

  Every case is different and the way people cope with deep grief is also very different. There's something that always stays with you about a particular case. And whether it's something that a family has said to you or something that you've seen that's just sad and tragic. And I guess for me, that's actually a motivator. I just think it's cruel, it's cruel what these families have to go through. And you just hope that you are never in that position. It's not a position you ever want to be in. These families want me to help them in any way, which is to raise awareness, which is to do my own investigation and to try and gather more witnesses

• 41:42Speaker 01

  or just put the spotlight on a particular loved one's case. That's something that I think is meaningful and I get a lot of purpose out of that. As a journalist, I think that it's important.

• 41:55Gemma Bath?

  I think, I mean, we can pull the curtain back a little bit on this podcast because people might see you on the TV or in your videos. And, you know, we're always very polished. But when you're sitting in that courtroom, you also care about what's going to happen. You're like so connected to the family, you're so entrenched in that story. You want to see an outcome, you want to see answers.

• 42:20Speaker 01

  Of course, of course. And there's, aside from all of that, of being in the courtroom, there's also hours and hours of talking to loved ones on the phone and all the moments that they're finding out new information and you're talking all the time. So, yeah, it's, as I said, yeah, coroner's courts, courts in general are sad places. And a lot of confronting material comes out in court cases. But also some really moving moments. I think in Jessica's inquest, there was a particular police officer and he was involved in Jessica's searches.

• 43:01Speaker 01

  And he turned to the family and addressed them and said that he wouldn't give up. And I know that when the officer in charge as well addressed the family, when she was asked a question as to whether she believed Jessica was alive or not, when she answered that question, that must have been really difficult for her. I'm sure she's had those moments with the family where she's had to tell them, you know, we don't believe Jessica is alive. But to say it in a courtroom and to have to publicly face them like that and deliver that, that hard truth, I think is difficult.

• 43:36Gemma Bath?

  Well, we can't.

• 43:37Speaker 01

  And it's very real.

• 43:38Gemma Bath?

  It is very real. And it's obvious that the police are working really hard on this case. I mean, case in point, how they got a subpoena to the person who last saw her. Like they are really trying to find answers for this family.

• 43:50Speaker 01

  They are, they are. And everyone is hoping that they can get to the bottom of this.

• 43:58Gemma Bath?

  Thank you to Ashley for helping us to tell this story. If you want to see visuals from this episode, head over to our Instagram page at True Crime Conversations. And for in-depth case explainers, follow us on TikTok under the same name. Thanks so much for listening. I'll be back next week with another True Crime Conversation.