The Search Warrant That Turned into a Siege

**Meshel Laurie** (0:03)
This is Australian True Crime with Meshel Laurie, and we know that you love hearing from a retired copper as much as we do, so we've got one for you today. His name is Anthony Macklin, a former Detective Inspector with the NSW Police Force. Anthony's career saw him undertake roles in the Child Protection and Sex Crime Squad investigating complex, protracted, serious sexual offences across the state. For all that, he's still got a very cheerful outlook on life, and he joins us on Australian True Crime to talk about his career.
This is Australian True Crime. We acknowledge the traditional owners of the land on which this podcast is created, the Wurundjeri Woi Wurrung people of the Kulin Nation. And a warning, this episode of the podcast contains graphic descriptions of violence.

**Anthony Macklin** (0:52)
Look, I spent 18 years in NSW Police. I have to say I started, I left school thinking I was going to become an accountant. Many people tell me I've got the look of an accountant, so that would have fit.
And I got, I don't know, I was putting myself through university doing security, as of all things, couldn't, didn't want to do the kind of Oz study thing, and it was 24 hours and it was just something to get me through. A friend of mine got me into it. And I kind of enjoyed it.
Like for example, I was working in King's Cross back in the late 90s and doing patrols and things. And then I went and worked in a hospital in Sydney. I'm like, this will be so cruisy. It was a bloodbath. It was, I was like, the things I saw there. However, I got to work with people with mental health issues. I got to deal with grieving families. There was a methadone clinic attached to the location where I was working. So you dealt with people that had addiction problems. And then there was just this raft of constant thefts and assaults and things. And you kind of start doing a little bit of the basics of investigation and then obviously the police come and take it over. And it just sparked something in me. I really wanted to do something more. And so much to my parents' chagrin, I decided I was going to go join the police. No one could really understand this concept of accounting and world domination through corporate takeovers through to now I'm going to go become a police officer. Sometimes I question my own decision on that.

**Meshel Laurie** (2:28)
You must have seen a lot of policing when you were knocking around King's Cross as well.

**Anthony Macklin** (2:31)
Yeah. Look, I know this is going to shock some of your viewers, but I was a very nerdy kid, right? Look at me now, you wouldn't think I was a nerdy kid, but I was.
So I had this kind of sheltered lifestyle. I remember working in King's Cross and just like King's Cross today is very different to what it was mid late, late nineties, you know.

**Meshel Laurie** (2:52)
Oh God, I know. I was knocking around there in the late nineties and it was a lot of fun and it was very exciting. I mean, that's where you went just for a bit of excitement and it always provided it. I was in Sydney a couple of months ago with my kids and I said, after dinner, let's go down, I'll take you to the cross.
Thinking I'd give them a bit of excitement. There were 16 and oh my God, it was so boring. It was just, it was dead. What's happened?

**Anthony Macklin** (3:16)
I know. And look, it's a great thing, but it's also that point of, when you talk to people about what it was like then versus now, they are chalk and cheese. Totally different things. Like three o'clock was like a witching hour. You'd have people just kind of came out of all the cracks and crevices, and there was people on the nod in the street. And for those who don't really know, on the nod means after you've had a shot of heroin, particularly, you start to go into almost like this comatose state. So you see people just bent over in the street standing on their feet, but their head nearly touching their toes, and they're about to fall over because they've just had a shot.
Brawls everywhere.

**Meshel Laurie** (4:02)
But then juxtaposed with that was the energy. So you've got that going on, you've got people on the nod, but then you've also got this incredible energy frisson around the place. You just don't know what's around the corner or who's around the corner. You've got blokes in doorways saying, hey, come up and see the girls. You've got all that kind of drunks, bucks nights, hens nights, and it's a really small space as well. So it's a lot going on in a small space.