Australia Coroner Verifies The Dingo Ate My Baby Defense...

[Selene]

This case has always interested me and finally, there is some closure for the mother and father.

From the Coroner's current findings report:

On the night of 17 August dog tracks were observed on the southern

side of and very close to the Chamberlains’ tent. The same night Mr

Roff and Mr Minyintiri, both experienced trackers and familiar with

dingo behaviour, saw tracks of a dog carrying a load which they

believed to be Azaria. It was within the bounds of reasonable

possibility that a dingo might have attacked a baby and carried it

away for consumption as food. A dingo would have been capable of

carrying Azaria’s body to the place where the clothing was found. If

a dingo had taken Azaria it is likely that, on occasions, it would have

put the load down and dragged it.

2 Re Conviction of Chamberlain (1988) 93 FLR 239 at 242

3 S34, Coroner’s Act NT (1993)

Hairs, which were either dog or dingo hairs, were found in the tent

and on Azaria’s jumpsuit. The Chamberlains had not owned a dog

for some years prior to August 1980.

The quantity and distribution of the sand found on Azaria’s clothing

might have been the result of it being dragged through sand. The

sand would have come from many places in the Ayers Rock region.

The sand and plant fragments on the clothing are consistent with

Azaria’s body being carried and dragged by a dingo from the tent to

the place where it was found. It is unlikely that, if the clothing had

been taken from the Chamberlains’ car, buried, disinterred, and later

placed where it was found it would have collected the quantity and

variety of plant material found upon it.

It would have been very difficult for a dingo to have removed Azaria

from her clothing without causing more damage than was observed

on it. However, it would have been possible for it to have done so.

Mr Roff, the chief ranger at Ayers Rock and a man of great

experience, thought that the arrangement of the clothing when

discovered was consistent with dingo activity. Other dingo experts

disagreed. I think it is likely that a dingo would have left the

clothing more scattered, but it might not have done so.

The blood found in the tent was at least as consistent with dingo

involvement in Azaria’s disappearance as it was with her murder in

the car. The pattern of blood staining on the clothing does not

establish that the child’s throat was cut with a blade.

The absence of saliva on Azaria’s jumpsuit which was conclusively

proved at the trial is made more explicable by the finding of the

matinee jacket which would have partially covered it. The fact that

no debris from the baby’s body was found on the jumpsuit is also

made more explicable by the finding of the jacket.

There is great conflict of expert opinion was to whether the damage

to the clothing could have been caused by a dingo. It has not been

shown beyond reasonable doubt that it could not have been. There

were marks on plastic fragments of the nappy similar to marks made

by a dingo on another nappy used for testing purposes. However,

there was no blood on the nappy.

There was a dingo’s den about thirty metres from the place where the

clothing was found. There is no evidence that the existence of the

den was known to the Chamberlains, or for that matter, to anybody

else and in fact it was unknown to the chief ranger and his deputy.

Here is the link to the complete newspaper story from News.com.au:

http://www.news.com.au/national/dingo-took-azaria-coroner-finds/story-e6frfkvr-1226392715293