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WARNING: Graphic

Grisly footage of the crime scenes where two of the bodies of the women who became known as the Claremont serial killer victims shown in court last week was judged too distressing for the public to see.

Police called to the scenes gave graphic accounts of the bush gravesites of Ciara Glennon, 27, and Jane Rimmer, 23, which were so affecting they still vividly recall them today.

The trial of the man accused of the three murders, Bradley Robert Edwards, resumed in Perth’s Supreme Court this week to hear graphic accounts of bush gravesites of two of the victims.

Mr Edwards, a 51-year-old former Telstra technician, has pleaded not guilty to the murders of Sarah Spiers, 18, Jane Rimmer, 23, and Ciara Glennon, 27 in 1996 and 1997.

Ms Spiers’ body has never been found.

A detective told the trial this week he will never forget the smell of Ciara Glennon’s dumped body, which he initially thought was a kangaroo.

Detective Edward Besson described how he was called to the site at Eglinton, north of Perth, in April 1997 after a man looking for cannabis plants stumbled upon the site where Ms Glennon’s remains lay in scrub.

The solicitor had been missing for three weeks, last seen on the highway in the wealthy nightclub precinct of Claremont in Perth after drinking with friends.

Mr Besson said he and Detective Detectives Charles Carver, walked on saltbush to avoid disturbing the scene, and remained around five metres from the body.

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“The smell didn’t smell like a dead kangaroo,” he said, giving evidence last Wednesday.

“We were aware that we had to keep the scene pristine and that’s exactly what we did.

“We didn’t get too close … I could see that the person had what appeared to be long, blondish hair.”

“I noticed that particular site and the smell. I’ll never forget it, I can still visualise it now.

“It affected me in the way that I saw it and was shocked by it and haven’t forgotten it in 20-odd years.”

Video taken at the Eglinton crime scene and at Wellard, where childcare worker Jane Rimmer’s remains had been found nine months earlier, were played in court.

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But the footage was only visible to the accused, Mr Edwards, senior legal counsel and Justice Stephen Hall after he ordered screens be erected to protect the dignity of the slain women and their families.

However, audio of police at the scenes could be heard, including former forensic supervisor Robert Hemelaar’s description of Ms Glennon’s gravesite.

Mr Hemelaar said bark on a tree and twigs appeared to have been torn off and placed on Ciara’s body.

“We’ve now removed a portion of the vegetation, we are seeing the deceased person … now panned to the shirt, head area, and we are now panning down (to the) waist, bottom, left thigh,” Mr Hemelaar said.

He described the deceased as lying on her stomach with her left arm out, her left thigh slightly higher up and her right arm underneath her.

He said she was clothed and wore a bracelet and a watch.

In evidence, which is part of the prosecution case which alleges Mr Edwards’ DNA was later identified as having been under Ms Glennon’s fingernails, a forensic pathologist can be heard describing Ms Glennon’s nails.

“The nail on the ring finger is short, I don’t know if it has been broken … it’s shorter than the others,” Karin Margolius says in the video.

Ms Glennon’s body was later lifted by a plastic sheet into a body bag, then placed in the shade.

Mr Edwards’ defence case is that contamination of crime scene evidence which allegedly had his DNA has taken place.

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Ms Rimmer’s body was found in Wellard, which in 1996 was on the southern fringes of Perth, by a mother picking lilies after her children got out of the car to chase a stray chicken.

It was 55 days after Ms Rimmer had vanished from a Claremont hotel in June 1996.

Retired senior detective Jonathan Adams told the court his memory of seeing Ms Rimmer’s naked and decomposing body dumped in bushes is seared into his mind.

“What is burned in my brain is the vision of a rump and the upper part of the body, and that is quite vivid,” he said.

He was the senior of all the police officers at the crime scene before detectives arrived.

Mr Adams was cross-examined by Mr Edwards’ defence counsel who suggested he was embarrassed he may have contaminated the crime scene by stepping into the bushes without wearing protective clothing.

Mr Adams said he went no closer than four metres, saying: “I’ve had years of experience … you do not go anywhere near … because of contamination.”

Former police officer Bleddyn Davies told the court that after arriving at the scene, he saw a “white, waxy lump”.

Standing about 1.5m from the body, though never touching it, he said “you wouldn’t identify (it) necessarily as a human body”.

His former colleague, Michelle Beaman, was also at the scene and described seeing a naked body lying face down in scrub, and an upper thigh, shoulder and foot.

“The deceased person was in a decomposed state … maybe wildlife had interfered with the body,” she said.

Detective Sergeant James Crozier said he was about five metres from the body, but denied getting into the bushes to see it, saying he did not want to risk contaminating the site.

Former funeral worker Peta Page described the site as “a very busy crime scene” but said funeral staff all wore protective gear, including masks and bootees.

“We were being mindful and respectful of who we thought it was,”: she said.

“I just assumed that I would have done the transfer like I would have done other coronial transfers.”

Michael Teraci, who filmed the areas where the bodies of Ms Rimmer and Ms Glennon were discovered and their post-mortem examinations, said he never ventured near or touched the bodies.

Under cross-examination, Mr Teraci said he did not wear any protective gear at the Glennon crime scene, and wore blue overalls but nothing protecting his feet, hands or head at the Rimmer site.

He said he was not trained as a forensic technician but had attended “hundreds” of crime scenes and knew the importance of avoiding contamination.

Retired detective Jonathan Adams was also cross-examined about another role he had in in a case connected to Bradley Edwards.

Mr Edwards has previously pleaded guilty to five unrelated charges stemming from a 1988 attack on an 18-year-old woman in Huntingdale, Perth and the abduction and rape of a 17-year-old girl at Karrakatta cemetery in 1995.

Prosecutor Carmel Barbagallo alleges that fibres found on an exhibit in the Karrakatta case came from Mr Edwards’ blue Telstra uniform and were also on Ms Rimmer and Ms Glennon’s bodies.

The Karrakatta exhibit, a pair of shorts worn by the rape victim, were wrongly labelled as being a “skirt” and there was an eight month long hiatus in their storage history.

Defence counsel Genevieve Cleary suggested to Mr Adams the shorts had been contaminated.

Mr Adams said the eight month discrepancy in their storage record was a “human data entry lag”, but said the exhibits were kept in folded paper bags that were not sealed off.

The judge only trial began last November and is expected to continue for months.

candace.sutton@news.com.au

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