Episode 4: Go Higher

Summary

---

Julie's Gone – Episode 4: Go Higher

Host: Helen Thomas / Casefile Presents
Release Date: July 30, 2025

---

Overview

Episode 4 of “Julie’s Gone” dives into the turbulent Melbourne of the 1970s, unveiling the political, policing, and social chaos surrounding the disappearance of Julie Ann Garciacelay. Investigative journalist Helen Thomas situates Julie’s case amid rampant police corruption, failed investigations, and the heartbreak experienced by Julie’s family—particularly her mother, Ruth, who took unprecedented risks in a desperate search for answers.

---

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Melbourne 1975: A City in Crisis

• The episode opens with context: Australia in the mid-1970s, especially Victoria, was undergoing upheaval, both politically and institutionally ([01:02]).
• Widespread corruption plagued the Victoria Police. High-profile inquiries into police misconduct were underway, making public trust scarce.

“Culturally too, long-revered institutions like the police force in Victoria were suddenly under serious scrutiny. … An inquiry into allegations of police accepting bribes from abortion practitioners...”
— Helen Thomas ([01:02])

2. Police Corruption & the Beach Inquiry

• Criminologist Jude McCulloch and journalist Russell Skelton recount the Justice Beach Inquiry, focusing on the police's “brotherhood” mentality and cover-ups ([01:55], [03:44]).
• Despite damning findings—including collusion, fabrication of evidence, and specific officers imprisoned for corruption—little changed initially ([03:44], [04:11]).

"Justice Beach had serious problems with the way police went about their business. He said the practices were terrible. There was evidence of collusion. There was a brotherhood mentality."
— Russell Skelton ([03:44])

3. Homicide Squad’s Distraction & Consequences

• Journalist Andrew Rule details how anti-abortion laws brought criminal money into homicide investigations, directly implicating senior detectives ([06:34]).
• Corruption and distraction led to ineffective murder investigations—the very issue that stalled Julie’s case from the outset.

"The homicide squad was under enormous pressure and totally distracted from their actual job of catching murderers...if they were distracted, they were hopeless."
— Andrew Rule ([07:30])

4. Mishandling of Julie’s Case

• John Joseph Power, one of the last to see Julie alive and later tied to the notorious Easey Street murders, was never properly interviewed—even while under police surveillance ([08:06]).
• The episode suggests possible complicity or utility-driven neglect (“maybe they need him for something else”) ([08:41]).

“…justice wasn’t being properly served in this state during that time because of the compromised relationships between police and criminals.”
— Russell Skelton ([08:41])

5. Family’s Desperate Search for Truth

• In 1977, Julie’s mother Ruth and sister Gail returned to Melbourne following a tip Julie might still be alive ([09:06]).
• Their reception at the police station was hostile. Ruth describes the lead detective as "livid" at her appearance ([10:25]).

“I got the reception that it’s like maybe I was the devil. I walked in. They did not know we were coming back…”
— Ruth, Julie’s mother ([10:25])

6. Ruth Confronts John Power in Prison

• Taking matters into her own hands, Ruth independently visits Power in Pentridge Prison, hoping mother-to-father empathy might prompt answers ([12:08]).
• Ruth recalls Power making a chilling throat-slitting gesture and repeating, “Go higher,” suggesting—without clarity—what befell Julie ([14:52]).

“I asked him, what did you do?...he took his finger and went across his neck...and he said, ‘Go higher. Go higher.’”
— Ruth ([14:52])

• Power presented Ruth with a pile of his own convictions, apparently angling for her help or sympathy ([15:41]).

7. Consequences for Julie’s Family

• The aftermath of Julie’s disappearance devastated her family:
  • Gail became consumed by alcoholism and eventually drank herself to death ([21:34]).
  • Laurie, the youngest sister, also descended into instability and later Alzheimer's ([22:28]).

“…She was trying to push the hurt down, or what she might have cost because she asked her sister to join her. That’s why she drank herself to death.”
— Ruth on Gail ([21:34])

• Ruth received sporadic, false leads from police—for decades ([19:56]).

---

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

Corruption and the Frustration of Injustice

• “I think the overall culture was one of resistance. That’s why they brought in Mick Miller… he quietly, internally went about changing things.”
  — Russell Skelton ([05:43])
• “If he’s going to do you harm, he’s going to do it. But I wasn’t there. I was there as a mother and he’s a father.”
  — Ruth ([16:52])

Family Tragedy

• “There is no family left anymore. The family's gone.”
  — Ruth ([23:10])

---

Timestamps for Key Segments

• 01:02–01:55 — Setting the stage: Melbourne’s political and police turmoil
• 01:55–04:07 — The Beach Inquiry and deep police corruption
• 06:28–08:06 — How vice rackets compromised even ‘untouchable’ squads
• 08:06–09:37 — Julie’s investigation and mishandling by authorities
• 09:37–10:25 — Ruth and Gail’s emotional return to Melbourne
• 12:08–17:27 — Ruth’s prison confrontation with John Power
• 19:41–23:10 — Aftermath for the Garcia Soleil family

---

Closing Notes

Episode 4 paints a painful, systemic portrait of Melbourne’s mid-70s dysfunction—where policing failures and corruption tragically intersected with a family’s loss and unending grief. Ruth’s determined, dangerous efforts highlight both maternal love and the hopelessness inflicted by institutional rot, leaving listeners with lasting questions and empathy for the family’s ordeal.

---

Coming Next: A deeper look into the roots of violence against women and the continuing investigation into who harms—and fails—women like Julie ([23:27–23:53]).

Transcript

[A]

ACAST powers the world's best podcasts. Here's a show that we recommend.

[B]

Hi, I'm Cara Berry, host of Everyone's Business But Mine. Think of me as your new friend and fellow busybody as I talk about everything under the pop culture sun, from the best way to detect a celebrity breakup or pregnancy to recapping your favorite reality TV shows from the housewives cinematic universe. Welcome to Plathville, Kardashians and so much more. So check out Everyone's Business But Mine, airing multiple times a week everywhere you listen to podcasts.

[A]

ACAST helps creators launch, grow and monetize their podcasts everywhere. Acast.com.

[C]

They probably didn't realise it as they went about their time in Melbourne, but Julie and her sister Gail Garcia Soleil were living in a city undergoing tumultuous change. And as a nation, Australia was actually heading towards a major political crisis. With Gough Whittlem's labor government ousted by the head of state in November 1975, culturally too long revered institutions like the police force in Victoria were suddenly under serious scrutiny. An inquiry into allegations of police accepting bribes from abortion practitioners preceded Justice Barry beach looking into corruption and misconduct more generally within the force. And as we'll hear that one man board of inquiry had much material to work with. Thanks for joining us. I'm Helen Thomas and this is Julie's Gone, episode four, go higher.

[D]

Starting from the late 60s, I suppose going into the early 70s, there are a lot of allegations about police corruption in relation to perjury, abortion, but also criminal conspiracy, fabrication of evidence. So there was an inquiry done by justice Kaye in 1970 and there were at least two senior members of the homicide squad who were found guilty of criminal offences and sentenced to five years jail each. So I think that that's part of the background to the investigations done by the homicide squad.

[C]

Criminologist Jude McCulloch says this was the backdrop for the beach inquiry.

[D]

The beach inquiry mainly focused on the armed robbery squad and the homicide squad and that started in March 1975. And the whole police force was extremely exercised by that.

[E]

They were inundated with complaints, so they had to really cull back what they were going to investigate and what they were going to look at. And those complaints actually fell into two categories. There was the general public that had been pushed around by police and denied their rights. And then there were a bunch of serious criminals who had complaints about the Armed robbery squad and a whole lot of very senior branches of the police force, which there was a lot of suspicion about. I Think the government and everybody knew this was a big problem area.

[C]

Journalist and author Russell Skelton covered the beach inquiry for the Age. And while beach was critical of the way John Power had been treated in terms of police trying to convict him of murder, Skelton says he saw much bigger problems across the force.

[E]

Well, justice beach had serious problems with the way police went about their business. He said the practices were terrible. There was evidence of collusion. There was a brotherhood mentality that existed within the police force, where no matter what an officer had done, right or wrong, force would come in behind him and defend them. And he recommended a whole lot of changes to police procedures and practices.

[C]

So how important were the beach recommendations?

[E]

Well, the report was an absolute hot potato, because beach completed the report and then the government sat on it and did nothing about it. I think they were so shocked, they didn't know which way to go, so they sat on it. And of course, it got leaked to the National Times. And the National Times ran great slabs of this week after week, until the Government was shamed into actually releasing it.

[C]

What changed anything?

[E]

A number of police were charged. I think the recommendations, about 50, I think 30 plus were charged, and none of them were convicted. They all got off. But I think if you remember, soon after this report, the government appointed Mick Miller as the chief of police, an outsider, to come in and clean the police force up. And new procedures were recommended for handling police complaints. I think beach himself strongly criticised the fact that police complaints were handled by the police and not by an outside authority at that stage. And so the government went about trying to quietly reform the police force without getting into a confrontation. And you've got to remember that brotherhood mentality was really extensive. It was huge. Even before the beach report was landed, once National Times started writing about it, they had a big protest meeting. Almost the entire police force turned up at Festival Hall. They passed motions condemning beach, condemning the report and all the rest of it. The Police association defended everybody, even the people who were obviously quite corrupt.

[C]

And culturally, do you think it had an impact within the police force?

[E]

I think there were individual officers who were really absolutely concerned and bothered by what was going on. But I think the overall culture was one of resistance. That's why they brought in Mick Miller. Cause they thought they're gonna have to do this in a gentle way, but a persistent way. And he had that sort of reputation as sort of standalone figure of integrity. And I think he quietly, internally went about changing things. And when, years later, I think it was the Caine government appointed a DPP because they wanted to remove from the police the decision to charge people that they thought there's too much politics going on. And when you had chunky practices and you had police stitching up witnesses and all the rest of it, they needed another body to actually recommend who should be charged and who shouldn't be charged.

[C]

In other words, these were chaotic times for this police force. Journalist Andrew Rule.

[F]

All side squads are regarded as fairly corruption proof because they're dealing with murder, they're not patrolling the brothels and the gambling dens and all those things where there's easy money that, you know, people want to slip. The vice squad, et cetera. The homicide squad, in the normal circumstances would be mostly beyond corruption, but in that era we had the anti abortion laws, which meant there was a flourishing trade in illegal abortions. And where you have a flourishing trade in illegal abortions, you have big money being paid for this service. And where you've got big money being paid, you've got the potential for large bribes to be paid to those who are supposed to police it. That is in this case, the homicide squad. And so the big time abortionists of that era, they were paying large bribes to the homicide squad. And we know that because I think the head of the homicide squad and one of the leading detectives, so this is Jack Matthews and Jack Ford were both charged, found guilty and drummed out of the regiment, drummed out of the job for taking bribes from abortionists. And that tells you that the homicide squad was under enormous pressure and totally distracted from their actual job of catching murderers and they weren't that good at it anyway. And if they were distracted, they were hopeless.

[C]

With all this in mind, it's important to note again that in the days after Julie went missing in 1975, John Joseph Powell wasn't interviewed about her disappearance, even though he was under police surveillance at the time. As the Victorian coroner's inquest brief reveals, he eluded them on the 1st of July and stayed off their radar for three days. Even then, back in the mix, he wasn't officially interviewed about what happened the night he visited Julie's apartment. For 28 years, political analyst Russell Skelton.

[E]

I don't know the facts around this, but it depends on what his relationship was with the police. Doesn't how far they're going to push it or how he's got dirt on them. They're hands off, maybe they need him for something else so they're not going to push him too hard. I mean, the key thing about these reports is that justice wasn't being properly served in this state during that time because of the compromised relationships between police and criminals.

[C]

Perhaps unsurprisingly, given this political theatre as backdrop, detectives had made little headway in Julie's case when Ruth Garcia Soleil and her oldest daughter Gail returned to Australia in 1977, a visit that was prompted by Gayle convincing herself that her sister was still alive and working at a hotel in Melbourne where she'd been employed before taking the job at Southdown Press. At that stage, Gail was willing to make the long trip back to the city in which her sister's fate was still unknown.

[G]

Gail called that hotel and said, hey, this is Julie's sister Gail from America. I want to talk to Julie. And the person who answered the phone said, hey, just a minute. Yeah, she's here. But nothing came of it. And so Gail came to me and said, mom, she's there. They've got her there. And that lit me up with my daughters alive.

[C]

But Ruth says they weren't welcome when they went to see the detective in charge of Julie's case.

[G]

No, Helen. I got the reception that it's like maybe I was the devil. I walked in. They did not know we were coming back, Gail and I. I didn't want anyone to know. In fact, I remember at the door, they were stopping people who's coming into the police station. And for some reason, Gail and I were not stopped. I walked right through it. It's like God had his hand there and said, hey, go ahead. So I walked right through it with my daughter, walked upstairs, and finally got in to see the main detective, the boss. His face turned red with anger when he found out who I was. And I said, well, you know us pushy Americans. That's how I stated it to him. He was livid that I was there.

[C]

Ruth Garcia Soleil thinks this reaction was prompted by the authorities overall lack of progress and the fact they'd failed to keep in touch with her, either by letter or over the phone. This is one of the reasons she made up her mind to take an extraordinary next step independent of police, one that was as daunting and as it was daring. Ruth went to see John Power, the man she believed was the most serious person of interest in her daughter's case in Melbourne's Pentridge Prison on her own.

[G]

They told me about Power, my first visit. That's when one of the detectives said to me, even as a policeman, we do not, would not ever want to meet him in a dark alley because he was that fierce. And that's why when I went back, I made up my mind I needed to talk to Powers in prison. He was in maximum security. I said to myself, he's got three daughters. I may be able to get to him by speaking to him as a father of three daughters, and I'm the mother of three daughters. So I did.

[C]

Now, John Van Groningen, Pentridge, prison warden at the time, doesn't recall this meeting taking place more than 40 years ago. But according to the police brief prepared for the Victorian coroner in 2016, that Casefile presents has been allowed to access, Power told his then wife about it. And Peter Norden, who was chaplain at Pentridge then, thinks he remembers it too.

[H]

It does kind of ring a bell that that's the sort of thing that prisoners would come to me and say, look, this woman wants to come and see me. She's the mother of a woman who was murdered and why does she want to see me? What should I do? Should I see her or shouldn't I see her? And I have a general recollection rather than a specific recollection. I'd say that JJ may well have sought my advice on this because it rings bells about how he was confused as to whether he should meet with her or not. And it was a discussion not just between him and I, but with a couple of other prisoners. And it's the sort of thing in the prison, you know, they don't know who to talk to, they often don't trust each other. And the role of the chaplain, at least as it was played in those days, was that's the sort of thing where you'd often sort of say, what do you think, Father Peter? I would say, look, if you think it's going to help the mother of the girl who's disappeared, then that's something good. But if you're not going to be able to help her, why waste her time?

[C]

Do you remember after the meeting, did he come to you about having seen Mrs. Garcia Sille?

[H]

I don't recall. I just recall in a general way rather than a specific way that there was this meeting.

[C]

Thank you for listening. We'll be back after a short break. There certainly was. And what John Power told Ruth was cruel.

[G]

And I asked him, what did you do? Please tell me what you did with my daughter. And that's when he took his finger and he went across his neck like you would cut into somebody's throat. And he said, go higher. Go higher. Go higher for what, John? What am I looking for? Give me a clue. And he again went across his throat. Go higher. So was my daughter still alive or did they murder her? If they murdered her, why? What did she know?

[C]

Ruth says when John Power came into the room to talk with her, he was carrying a large pile of documents that he placed on the table between them, almost with a flourish. He told her it was proof of his many convictions and he wanted her to read through them and consider intervening on his behalf. She took them back to her hotel, but couldn't bring herself to look at them, and returned them to Pentridge the next day.

[G]

Well, when he walked in and he put on the table a huge volume of convictions, then he sat there. He was sure of himself, Helen. There was no glimmer of him being wrong. That's why he brought those convictions in, the volumes that sat in front of him.

[C]

But it must have been very chilling to talk with him, Ruth, when he. When he put his hand, you know, his finger under his neck and made that motion across his neck, that must have been frightening.

[G]

It was. I could see what the detective meant. You'd never, ever want to meet this man alone. If he's going to do you harm, he's going to do it. But I wasn't there. I was there as a mother and he's a father.

[C]

And police. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I understand that police had told you that they knew he'd been stalking Julie for two or three days before she disappeared. Did you raise that with him?

[G]

Yes. Denied.

[C]

He denied.

[G]

Denied. The police knew. But do you know, Helen, how did the police know? Where did they get that information?

[C]

Now, Ruth and I did this interview a couple of months before I gained access to documents from the Victorian Coroner's Court that made clear that Power was under surveillance by officers of the Armed Robbery Squad when Julie disappeared. She now understands the reason. They were aware of Powell's movements. They were tracking him and so knew he'd been following Julie. She doesn't comment about police failing to intervene on her daughter's behalf in the days before she vanished. Nor does she dwell on how distressing it must have been confronting Power in jail. It's clear she believes it was what she had to do to try to find Julie, or at least be able to recover her body. But her oldest daughter found it harder than expected, being back in the town where she'd lost her sister. Like her mother, Gail tried to continue her own detective work, visiting the hotel Julie had worked at briefly, in the mistaken belief or desperate hope she was still there. It was an extremely Stressful pursuit.

[G]

Gail went to that hotel by herself. I couldn't talk her out of it, so she went there extremely intoxicated. She always had to be extremely intoxicated. And then that's what I heard from a detective. Get her out of this town right away. They knew she was stirring up people in the criminal world. They knew that. So she wasn't ready to go when I confronted her with this. But I had to do something to make her afraid. You've got to get out of here, Gail, or I'm going to lose another daughter. So I stayed a very short time. That's, of course, that was the end of me coming. Even thinking of coming back to Australia.

[C]

Once back home in California, Ruth had little contact with the Melbourne detectives overseeing Julie's case. She says she had infrequent updates from them for a couple of years about bodies in strange places, but no leads held up.

[G]

I got notification from the police. A convict from the penitentiary said, hey, I know where the American girl is. One of your abandoned gold or silver mines that are in Australia. Her body's there. Well, they'd go there and they'd find animal bugs or, I know. Another convict said, I know where she is. And that they put her in some water. They went there and they found nothing. Another one said, I know what they did with her. I saw her body. She was wrapped up and she was in the back of this van where they went to investigate that. And it was nothing or didn't get anywhere. Those are the three things in all the years, Helen, that. That I ever. I ever got.

[C]

Then, nearly three decades later, a homicide detective rang Gail and told her Julie's case had been reopened and she might have to return for a trial. It was jarring news. She didn't want to go back to Melbourne again, and who can blame her? But did she blame herself for Julie's disappearance?

[G]

She never talked about it. Even when we came back to the States for years. Never said, mom, I'm to blame. I shouldn't have asked Julie to come. No.

[C]

Do you think, as her mother, that she did blame herself?

[G]

Yes. Her drinking got so out of hand, I don't think she'd be dead today. Gail liked to have her nightly drinks, but after this happened, it became so bad. She was trying to push the hurt down, or what she might have cost because she asked her sister to join her. That's why she drank herself to death.

[C]

It's so sad, Ruth. But what about Laurie? How did it affect your family overall? And Laurie, the little sister, Laurie she.

[G]

Became out of control. She disappeared at the age of 18. Then she started taking off. And I would never know there would be a year, over a year or more that any of us knew where she was. Laurie is not doing well now. She has dementia and Alzheimer's. So it has been a traumatized family just from taking a trip. There is no family left anymore. The family's gone.

[C]

Gail Garci Soleil, Julie's big sister and best friend, died in 2010. She was 57. Next time on Casefile Presents. Julie's gone.

[E]

Where does the violence come from?

[F]

I mean, who are the woman killers?

[D]

When you think about the attitude to violence against women, when you think about what was happening in the Victoria police force, then I'm a little less surprised.

[C]

That's the old phrase, isn't it? They were asking for it.

[F]

Authors of their own misfortune, if that makes sense.

[A]

Finding great candidates to hire can be like, well, trying to find a needle in a haystack. Sure, you can post your job to some job board, but then all you can do is hope the right person comes along. Which is why you should try ZipRecruiter for free at ZipRecruiter.com Zip ZipRecruiter doesn't depend on candidates finding you. It finds them for you. Its powerful technology identifies people with the right experience and actively invites them to apply to your job. You get qualified candidates fast. So while other companies might deliver a lot of hay, ZipRecruiter finds you what you're looking for. The needle in the Haystack. See why 4 out of 5 employers who post a job on ZipRecruiter get a quality candidate within the first day. The smartest way to hire. And right now, you can try ZipRecruiter for free.

[H]

That's right, free.

[A]

And at ZipRecruiter.com Zip that's ZipRecruiter.com Zip ZipRecruiter.com Zip Acast powers the world's best podcasts. Here's a show that we recommend.

[B]

Hi, I'm Kara Berry, host of Everyone's Business But Mine. Think of me as your new friend and fellow busybody as I talk about everything under the pop culture sun, from the best way to detect a celebrity breakup or pregnancy to recapping your favorite reality TV shows from the Housewives cinematic universe. Welcome to Plathville, Kardashians, and so much more. So check out Everyone's Business but Mine. Airing multiple times a week everywhere you listen to podcasts.

[A]

Acast helps creators launch, grow and monetize their podcasts everywhere. Acast.com.