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QC says Azaria's
father mistreated
ALICE SPRINGS: A lawyer at
the Azaria Chamberlain inquest ob-
jected yesterday to the child's
father, Pastor Michael Cham-
berlain, being subjected to what he
called a "very strong, very dextrous,
inquisitorial" examination.
Mr Phil Rice, QC, appearing for the
Chamberlains, also asked why no
charge had been laid if it was being
suggested that Mr Chamberlain had
committed a crime.
Mr Rice was objecting after Mr Des
Sturgess, the Brisbane QC assisting the
Coroner, Mr Gerry Galvin, had put a
series of questions to Mr Chamberlain
on the second day of the new inquest
into the disappearance of the baby.
Mr Sturgess had asked Mr Cham-
berlain why he took photographs for an
Adelaide newspaper while people were
still searching for the baby the day after
she had disappeared from the Ayers
Rock campsite in August last year.
In his objection, Mr Rice said the
hearing was "taking on the semblance
of a very strong, very dextrous, in-
quisitorial examination as to why this
man did not go out to join the search
as expected by the examiner.
"It more or less seeks to impute some
impure motive, or to impute some sort
of guilt on the part of Mr Cham-
berlain", he said.
"We know nothing. [Mr Cham-
berlain] has gone into the witness stand
without any notice.
"I do object that if my friend [Mr
Sturgess] suggests he has committed
some offence — why has he not been
charged and normal processes of the law
[been] allowed to proceed, instead of
putting him into the witness box?"
Mr Rice said Mr Chamberlain had
been put into the witness box and cross-
examined by Mr Sturgess "under the
guise of an inquisitorial inquest, with a
view of building up a case against him
when this other, undisclosed evidence
doesn't have the fibre".
Earlier in the day Mr Rice, his junior
counsel and a Victorian solicitor, Mr
Andrew Kirkham, had tried to block Mr
Sturgess calling Mr and Mrs Cham-
berlain to the witness box before any
fresh evidence had been presented to
the inquest.
In answer to the objections to his line
of questioning, Mr Sturgess said he was
seeking to examine the conduct of Mr
Chamberlain in the hours immediately
after the incident, when Azaria had
disappeared from the family tent.
He said the evidence would "strongly
suggest that some person or persons,
subsequent to the alarm being raised,
did certain things with clothing" that
was allegedly worn by the baby.
"In those circumstance I think we
have to be very much concerned of the
conduct of the people who were
closest".
Mr Sturgess said he wanted to ex-
amine why Mr Chamberlain went back
to the campsite after his child's disap-
pearance.
Mr Galvin said he considered the line
of questioning to be relevant at that
time and allowed it to proceed.
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