THIRD PARTY TO MURDER: THE SEQUEL is a two-part book that includes Reid's initial examination of the crime and continues to probe the circumstances and aftermath of the bizarre tragedy. Reid's chilling narrative grips the reader from page one and proves once again the old adage that "truth is stranger than fiction".
The bodies of Arnold, 27, and Leahy, 26, were found near Atherton, north Queensland, by trail bike riders after the women had been missing for 15 days. Julie-Anne was behind the wheel of her four-wheel drive vehicle, held upright by a seatbelt wrapped tightly around her neck. She had been shot twice in the head, slashed across the throat, and savagely battered by a large rock. She was staring straight ahead. Vicki Arnold was slumped between the front passenger seat and the dashboard, her feet protruding from the open doorway. Her upper body was sprawled across the seat, almost touching her friend, her hand resting on a sawn-off rifle. She had been shot three times - in the left thigh, upwards through the jaw, and behind the right ear.
Despite a highly complex death scene, police concluded that Arnold had murdered Leahy and then killed herself. Just hours later the bodies were removed and the vehicle towed away and left in the open for three days before scientific officers arrived. No fingerprints were found. One year later a coroner agreed with the police that the case was a clear-cut murder-suicide. But the case refused to go away. Over the next seven years public pressure and Reid's first book led to four separate investigations and a Criminal Justice Commission inquiry. In 1999 a second inquest was held, but despite fresh evidence uncovered by independent investigators a year earlier, a murder-suicide finding was again handed down.
But in September 2005 a former police officer revealed to the author the REAL reason why a double murder investigation did not go ahead. This sensational new information led to front page news and a feature in The Weekend Australian (17-18/9/05), and the same in The Cairns Post. The next evening Channel Nine's 60 Minutes program headlined a special report on the case which attracted the largest viewing audience for the year.
On Thursday 29 September, 2005, Member for Tableland Rosa Lee Long requested in State Parliament that the Minister for Justice and Attorney-General, Linda Lavarch, "appoint a new investigation team from outside the state of Queensland to fully investigate all the known facts surrounding the deaths, including the new evidence that has recently been released, so as to allay the continuing community concerns in relation to this case."
