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- [00:01]
Commercial Narrator
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super real.
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Todd McGuire
But when I answer the phone, he was crying and he goes, mate, just tell my wife and my kids that I love them. And I said, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, you're not doing that, man. I said, where are you? He said, I'm down on the cliffs at the Brisbane river and I'm going to jump. I said, wait for me. So I've raced over there and there he's standing right over looking over the edge, and I grabbed his hand and I said, oh, if you're going to do it, I'll do it with you. Let's go. One, two, three. And he sort of went, what the fuck are you doing. I said, come on, let's do it. And he's yanked me back and we've hit the ground and, you know, he was crying. I started crying then. And we sat on a park bench for the next couple hours and we just thrashed everything out. And I think that was the first time I really broke down and went, I can't do this anymore. I've got to fucking stop this, you know, stop this reckless behaviour.
- [02:59]
Julian Morgans
Hey, I'm Julian Morgans and you're listening to what It Was like, the show that asks people who have lived through big dramatic events what it was like. Hello again. Welcome back. So many of our stories are true crime, which have been solved via the work of undercover cops. And the more I learn about undercover police work, the more it just sounds like a job for people with a death wish. As far as I'm concerned, undercover cops seem to have the same psychological makeup as big wave surfers or free solo climbers. You know, they're just like, it's just a fearless approach to mortality that I. That I find pretty fascinating. So I've always wanted to interview an undercover cop on this show, which is how I found a book called Donnie An Undercover Cop With a Death Wish. It's a title that's pretty similar to the title of this episode for good reason. It's a memoir by an ex undercover cop named Todd McGuire who grew up in Brisbane through the 80s and 90s and became a policeman. And things were going well for him until on the 1st of January, 2000, his girlfriend died by suicide. And for Todd, this was this sliding doors moment that pushed him from being a regular policeman into undercover work, where he began chasing life and death situations as a way to sort of distract himself from his trauma. Today on the show, I'm talking to Todd about his arc from PTSD through to self reflection and redemption. And we're going to hear a few stories along the way, like the time that he took down a speedcork in regional Queensland and how he recovered a haul of stolen guns. These are very heavy duty, gritty, very Australian stories. It all feels very Animal kingdom or chopper. And I think if you're in Australia, you're going to love it. Yeah, you're going to love it wherever you are. But just before we get started, a little plug a bit little on the theme of adrenaline junkies. This week's subscriber episode features a man who hiked a South American volcano, only to wake up in his tent to find the volcano erupting around him. So just imagine A pitch black sky with this blizzard of ash falling down around you. How do you get to safety when you're miles up a mountain and the mountain is exploding? That's our subscriber episode this week. But for now, Here is Todd McGuire. Hey, Todd, welcome to the show.
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Todd McGuire
Hello. How are you mate?
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Julian Morgans
I'm doing well, yeah, I'm good. So I want to go back to the very end of the last millennium, back to 1999.
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Todd McGuire
Last century?
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Julian Morgans
Yeah, last century, that's right. Like basically the inciting incident of this story occurred on the 1st of January. So give me a snapshot of your life at that time.
- [06:01]
Todd McGuire
Yeah, absolutely. My life was great, you know, I was two and a half years into the, into the Queensland Police. I was pretty excited about this new job. I was a pretty lucky, lucky, happy sort of fella. Played a bit of rugby league and sort of moved in with a girl and things were getting pretty serious. I'd been there with her for about 18 months. We were looking at a future. We're looking at, you know, making things fairly serious. I was still young, I was still naive. I hadn't been through any adversity whatsoever. I didn't know what adversity was.
- [06:30]
Julian Morgans
But then everything changed on the 1st of January 2000.
- [06:34]
Todd McGuire
It did, unfortunately. And as I was saying, I was living with a girl by the name of Karen. I was only 25 years of age and she was 31. She'd already had a wedding, a marriage that had failed and a four year old son from the previous marriage. And she seemed to be going okay about it. But there must have been other stuff that was bothering her because still to this day I don't know why she did what she did. But I worked the night shift being a fairly junior police officer and 1999 was, was very much the millennial bug, you know, the Y2K where they thought every, everything was going to stop the next day and the excitement was. I haven't seen since. It was, it was just a buzz. Everyone was excited, everyone was having fun. It was almost like this was their last night of party, it really was. And my girlfriend Karen, she goes out to a nightclub and you know, I keep in contact with her. What I'd found out is that she'd. She'd had a half an ecstasy tablet and I wasn't aware of that and I wasn't really happy about that being a copper and so forth. But I kept in contact with her and she seemed to be having a great time and she was really enjoying a night and so the plan was to pick her up at 6 o' clock in the morning. When I finished work and picked her up she was in a great mood. I dropped her friend off her house on the way, on the way home and we got home and you know, we had a little bit of breakfast and had a bit of a chat and it was like, yep, let's go to bed. But I got to work at 4 o' clock the afternoon. It was a bit of a quick shift so I didn't have much time to sort of recover and I woke up maybe an hour or two later and Karen wasn't there and I could hear the front door open and I sort of got up and had a look and Karen's ex husband had brought the four year old over and I said oh, I didn't know we're having Clark today. And she goes oh I totally forgot, I can't believe it. I was supposed to picking you up this morning and I just totally forgot and I feel so bad. You know she was upset, she was saying she was a bad mum and all that sort of stuff and I was reassuring her saying you're not a bad mum, you forgot one thing that's you know, you're the best mum I've ever seen. It's unbelievable. Yeah, all of these things. And I said, you know, it's getting it on nine, ten o' clock in the morning, we really need to get some sleep. You probably need some sleep, you're just tired, emotional. And she goes, yeah, yeah, true, true. So we put a movie on for Clark and by this time my eyes are hanging out and I said come on, we really need some sleep. I've sort of fallen asleep almost pretty much straight away and I woke up just after 1:30 and young Clark was sort of walking around the bed sort of going mummy, where are you? Where are you Mummy? And it sort of made me wake up and it took me a while to sort of get my bearings and find out where I was and everything. And I rolled over and you know, Karen wasn't there. You know her side of the bed was, was cold and it was like okay, well let's go and find where mummy is. And we did that and we were sort of walking around the room and like I remember seeing the, the front door ajar and I'm going well that's a bit odd. But then I've seen her car keys and her, her, her purse in the kitchen. I'm going well she hasn't gone anywhere. Okay. So I wasn't thinking Anything bad? I was just thinking, yeah, maybe she's downstairs doing the laundry. I said, let's go and find. Let's go and find Mummy downstairs. As we're sort of going down, we're having a bit of a joke and having a laugh. And then I. I opened the sliding door and. And then. And then, unfortunately, I seen her and she'd used a electrical cord to hang herself. And, you know, there she was, just staring straight at me. And, you know, my initial thoughts were just not to let Clark see her. So I threw him back out of the room. Out to the sort of out to the backyard type thing. Yeah. And that's when I just started trying to process it. I closed the door. And I remember the physical hit that it sort of gave me was like, bigger than any footy hit I'd ever received. It just took my breath away. It felt like it opened my chest up, my legs. I couldn't move. I sort of half fell to the floor and like, I was just crying, sobbing, yelling, you know, what's. Is this a joke? You know, what's going on, Karen? Why? Why? Why? I finally sort of got over to her and sort of tried to take the weight off her and I was trying to get the cord from around her neck, but with those electrical cords, you know, when they get stuck together and it was just impossible to move. So I ended up finding a knife and cut her down and. And commence CPR and all those sort of things and a lot of other sort of ugly things. But at the end of the day, I decided this is not working and I'm gonna have to grab Clark. I wanna. I was worried about where he was. He could have wandered off or whatever. And I went outside and grabbed him and we went out to the front and I called Triple O and waited for my. My workmates to come up and come over and deal with what I had to do. Yeah, it was. It was a bit weird. It was a bit weird having my work colleagues come over and have her to do that. But, yeah, that certainly started my year off and my century off on a pretty bad note, to say the least. My world got tipped upside down. Nothing that I ever believed in or knew made sense anymore. My anger went through the roof. I couldn't understand why this had happened. She didn't leave a note. She didn't leave anything. There was nothing. So I was pretty lost.
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Julian Morgans
Had there been any stepping stones up to this moment?
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Todd McGuire
There was only one stepping stone in November. She did have a. Termination for a birth, for a baby. We decided that we weren't ready for that yet again. I don't know if that came into play a couple of weeks later when we came back down from Brisbane to clean out the house. We did find a lot of Zoloft medication individually wrapped and secreted around the house. And I don't know how long that had been there or even if she'd used it, but they're the only indications that, to me that she had anything going on in her head.
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Julian Morgans
Yeah, it's the. Just the chaotic nature of this event. You know, it doesn't sound like you. It was something that you expected. It was just a bolt out of the blue. And then you've got to live in that. Just like life doesn't make sense sometimes.
- [12:36]
Todd McGuire
Yeah. I don't recall ever talking about suicide. I don't remember her ever saying, you know, I want to kill myself, or I wish I wasn't here, or anything like that. I hadn't experienced anything really traumatic in my life. And all I can say is that what I did was. In hindsight, what I looked at is the. Very much the wrong way of dealing with things is I tried to bury it. I tried to drink myself to death, I tried to forget about it and push everything down and. And, you know, and try and numb absolutely everything. I. I turned to drugs, I turned to alcohol and. And very risky behavior.
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Julian Morgans
And would you say that becoming an undercover police officer was part of that burying technique that you were going for?
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Todd McGuire
Yeah, when I look back now, you know, in hindsight, I do. I sort of. I had three months off work straight after that and then moved back up to Brisbane. And that three months was good to a certain extent, but it just means that I had 24 hours a day to drink, and that's pretty much what I did. And then it was a bit of a struggle to get back to work and trying not to drink, but I sort of managed to do it. I sort of packed it into whatever was left in the day. And then I sort of had this chance meeting with a fellow who was in undercover, and it was in a pub, obviously. And, you know, it was about nine months later, I was sort of talking to him and a few of his mates who were undercover, and they're telling me all about stories and it sounded really good. And, you know, I was numb, I was drunk, not liking the world, hating everything that happened to me. And I said, well, that's what I'm going to do. I said, I've got nothing to live for. I got nothing to go Home to why not be an undercover cop? And it was probably the first thing that had happened in nine months which had sort of raised any sort of interest in my body, you know, in my mind, because I just, when you're going through those grief stages, you just don't, you don't see anything positive. You really think that, you know, nothing's going to get better. So, yeah, pretty much 12 months to the day, I, I got accepted into the course. Did a four week course for somehow back in 2000, having your partner suicide 12 months earlier. I don't know how the psychologist ticked me off, but apparently, apparently I was fine. I don't know how that works, but it was a different era back then, wasn't it? Yeah.
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Julian Morgans
So becoming an undercover cop to me sounds like some sort of black magic. I mean, what, what does that involve? Like what, what does that course teach you?
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Todd McGuire
Yeah, like, like most courses for any job, you, you learn so much more on the job. But the problem with undercover is that it's pretty much you're like an actor but you don't get a retake of, of a scene. You've really, it's really, you've really got to think on your feet really, really quickly. And I, I've sort of pretty much taught myself to do that. But I thought that the true training for that four weeks was, you know, at the end of each day that they'd take us down to a pub and, and then basically just drink until you fell over. They would basically just see who could handle it. They'd get current CPA or undercover agents or ex undercover agents, get them into the bar with them as well and just start talking to them and, and try and get information out of them and, and if these people would, don't tell anyone, but I'm actually doing an undercover course right now, you know, that sort of shit back. You're out. So it was always, you're always getting tested on certain things.
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Julian Morgans
And that is so interesting that they've woven heavy drinking into the itinerary, like the training manual because obviously you're going to be just socializing with thugs the whole time. So heavy drinking is going to be part of that.
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Todd McGuire
So they, yeah, and they wanted to make sure that you weren't a dickhead on the piss and, or you could handle yourself and you weren't, you didn't have loose lips and you didn't want to see a bloke starting to fight either or doing something stupid. So they kept a close eye on us and, and the fact that for the past 12 months, I had been. That was my number one game. I passed with flying colors. Everyone else has fallen over and I'm still, still holding the bar up going, we're still going, who's going to drink with me? Because that's what I've been doing for 12 months. So it was about the only thing.
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Julian Morgans
The piss fit you were really.
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Todd McGuire
Yeah, I was, I was very pissed fit. Yeah. So it's probably the only time, you know, drinking the amount of alcohol that I'd drunk actually served me a good purpose.
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Julian Morgans
Okay, all right. So you go through the training process, you come out with flying colors. What's the next step?
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Todd McGuire
Yeah, so they said you passed. And basically they said, yeah, okay, here's your first job. And end up being, you know, Operation Ice Pick.
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Julian Morgans
What was the brief?
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Todd McGuire
So Operation Ice Pick was a pretty big job up in Caboolture, which is about 50, 60 k's north of Brisbane. And it's a, it's a low socioeconomic sort of place. A lot of housing commission and, and at the time drugs were really rife in town with high unemployment. And it's a pretty rough area, really rough area. But. So there's. There was a fella who was living out the back of Caboolture and his name was Eddie Madden and he was, you know, Southeast Queensland or maybe even Queensland's biggest speed cooks at the time. You know, his operation was huge. Organized crime had tried to get him probably three times over the last 10 years and he was just way too good for it. And they basically said, okay, here's your new name, it's Donnie Wilson. Here's a printout of your address, your date of birth, all your new identity. You're going to move up there, find a unit, you're going to have this person looking after you, a controller. And basically you've got a, you've got a police registered informant who's going to start introducing you around the town and you're just going to embed yourself in there and work yourself up to as. As far as we can until we get big. Eddie.
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Julian Morgans
So where do you start with a thing like that? What, like, what is your plan?
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Todd McGuire
Just start on the ground and just for the first month or two, just be seen. You know, hang out the pubs, hang out, shopping centers, just hang out at all these different places. So I'll become a familiar face as well, instead of just being new. Also being aware that your name was Donnie and not Todd and you had to answer to Donnie and not answer to Todd. You had to Train yourself with that one as well. But, you know, even if it was on my night off, I'd be at the, at any particular pub because I would be every night and I'd just start talking to someone and I'd make a story up and they go, what do you do, mate? And I go, I'm a nail salesman. And I'd just pick it out of the blue and then I'd try and book as much bullshit as I could to try and make that person believe that I knew everything about nails and I was a nail salesman, thank Christ. I never spoke to a laborer or, you know, a tradie. He would have seen straight through me. Like all the times I was always putting myself in situations that I'd have to talk my way out of it and, and try and make a person believe that you knew what you're talking about and.
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Julian Morgans
And I guess you were just practicing on the job.
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Todd McGuire
Yeah, yeah, I did more practice. I did more of those conversations off the job than what I did in. But most of the time, yeah, most of the time what I worked out was when you're in the job, you basically, you know, you, you set up a buy to buy some drugs and you basically just did it and, and then you didn't sort of hang around, you didn't talk too much.
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Julian Morgans
Okay, so most of the time you are posing. I guess it's like a low level drug dealer or drug enthusiast.
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Todd McGuire
Yes. Yeah, at first, at first it was. And then, you know, I was probably doing, initially, you know, it was 500 buys or maybe a gram or two. And then it sort of moved up to buying ounces and a couple ounces and so forth.
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Julian Morgans
So always speed?
- [20:08]
Todd McGuire
Yeah, always speed. Back then, yeah, back then, you know, at the turn of the century, it was mainly all, all speed. And then that's when pill sort of came into it as well.
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Julian Morgans
Did you develop a bit of a taste for speed, you know, doing it regularly?
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Todd McGuire
No, no, I didn't really, I didn't use it speed that often. You know, the few times that I sort of made to. And it certainly affected my sleep. I know that I didn't sleep for two days, but it wasn't something that I was, was too interested in. There was a job that I did down in Sydney where I was made to take two MDMA pills. And because I was still very, you know, I still wanted to try and get rid of every ecstasy pill on the, on the planet because of what, what I thought it had done to Karen. But when I did take Those MDMA pills, I, I did, I did end up liking them, yes. They were quite fun.
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Julian Morgans
Yeah. I mean, these days MDMA is used in sort of psychedelic post traumatic stress therapy. You know, it's seen as this remedial thing. That's interesting that you might have got some, some sort of use out of it as well.
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Todd McGuire
Yeah. And I, and I could talk about it now, but, yeah, I did use MDMA for quite some time after that.
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Julian Morgans
Yeah, right, yeah. That appealed to you more than speed.
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Todd McGuire
Yeah, it did, yeah. I like the, the happy feeling, the loving feeling. Felt nice.
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Julian Morgans
Yeah, yeah, yeah. You string someone's shirt and you're like, oh my God, it's the best feeling in the world.
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Todd McGuire
Maybe.
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Julian Morgans
Yeah.
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Todd McGuire
I suppose I could have knit it now. Yeah.
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Julian Morgans
Okay. So the other thing I'm hearing, just on this job as an undercover cop, it sounds like most of the time you're just kind of socializing. You're at the pub, you're just hanging out with people and drinking, you're just
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Todd McGuire
infiltrating, you're just being part of the community. Buying drugs was just a really small part of it because the buyers themselves were just a formality because you'd done all the, all the groundwork. They knew who you were. You weren't someone who's just rocked up to a pub and gone, I'm looking to buy some drugs. And they go, who the are you, mate? Like, you've got to do all the groundwork to get involved and be being known and being seen and do it that way. And that's why, you know, the buyers themselves were quite simple, quite easy.
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Julian Morgans
I mean, to most of these people, you know, sort of low level drug dealers in regional Australia, do they spend most of their time just socializing at the pub? Do they have jobs? What do their lives look like?
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Todd McGuire
No, a lot of. Well, back then, a lot of them spent most of their time just trying to get on, trying to put the money together to, you know, get their next fix the next day. And most of them wouldn't waste too much money on alcohol because they, you know, I know a lot of them used to say, you know, they wanted the, the feel for steel. They loved it, the, the needle going in. And it was one of my very first things at Caboolture was sort of met up with the, with this couple, male and female, and the female had some, some loose ties with, with, with the big fella, Mad Madden. And so we thought, well, that could be a strategy. We'll see, see how that plays out, you know, so you sort of spend a bit of time with them. And I went over to his place and I said, oh, I'm looking to get on. He goes, oh, you got a car? I said, yeah, yeah, it's at the front. Let's go for a drive. Yep. Boom. He goes, oh, we got a stop at, at the bank. Got to get some money at first because I wanted to get on as well. And back then you had to fill out the slip and give it to the teller type thing. So he's going to the bank and, and, and you could see him arguing with the teller and sort of. He got pretty angry and he's come back to his Mrs. Crystal and said, where the. Is the money out of our account. Did you take it? And as she's trying to say, I had to buy groceries. We had no food in the house. He's knocked her up right in the door and put her on her ass. And like, I'm still two, two or three months out of the. Out of that training course and I'm still half a copper, like, going, holy, what do I do? My police reaction and my normal reaction as a person wanted to help her. But then I went, no, I've got to be. I've got to be like one of them. And I said, you know, I leaned over and I said, yeah, don't do it again. You have a mole or something like that. And I was like. And he's like, come on, Donnie, come on, let's fucking go. Leave her down there. So, like, it actually made me look good, you know, in his eyes because I was like him, you know, she can't run into the car, you know, sobbing and crying and apologizing with a blood nose and oh, I won't do it again. I'm sorry, I'm sorry. That's. That's the sort of life that these people live. And, you know, so we've gone and, you know, bought some speed and they couldn't wait to buffet up their arms straight away. So they sort of told me to pull over and I had this awesome yellow vacationer and had black and white sort of moocow car seats. And I was really proud of them. And I had my. You know, it had a cassette tape as well that I'd have all these mixed tapes that I'd put in. Everyone knew the, the Donnymobile. It was really bright yellow. And as she sort of. They're both sort of buffing up. He's sort of going, oh, the feel for steel. How good's that? You get it right in the right, right, get it right. The Adam's apple. How good, how good? And I could hear her dry reaching and he's going, oh, yeah, it's good for her too, man. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I'm going, not on my car seats. How dare you. Don't you dare spew on my car seats. And I've jumped out of the car and I said, get the out of the back. And I'm throwing it down in the gutter. I said, spewing there, not on my car seats. And then I look over and we're right, right in front of a school and like there's all these kids just like going, what's going on now? I said, oh, I've got to get out of here. Yeah. By this time, you know, the boyfriend's jumped in, in the driver's seat and he's, he's put the seatbelt on. He's going, come on. And like he's, he's off his head by this time, putting it in a driving. I'm like, oh, he's going to take off without me. I said, I can't let this happen. In the meantime, she's ran around and jumped in the passenger seat. And just as he took off, I've dove into the, the back seat just so they, you know, wouldn't leave me behind. And I, they are off their dials and he is driving down one road streets the wrong way and you know, hitting letter boxes, hitting cars and they're just screaming at each other and like he's going. Driving it like I stole it. Yeah, all that sort of. And I, in the meantime, I'm getting flown around in the back of the back of the car and I'm worried about the, you know, the needle that she left somewhere. And I was more worried about that going, I hope that doesn't get me somewhere. And. And it was almost like they loved each other and then they hated each other. Loved each other and hated each other. And like she was going, go faster. No, go slower. And like he's trying to drive and she's just yelling at him and he's going, shut the fuck up. Shut the fuck up. And it was just. And I'm looking at him going, what the hell is going on here? And anyway, it's like, I love you, honeyb. No, you off. Off. And anyway, he, she's just, he's just going, shut the up, shut up, shut up, shut up. And. And then she said one more thing, the stupid thing. I would have taken the hint of her. So he's pulled out a knife and he stabbed her right in the leg. And I've gone, oh, no. Well, that'll shut up now, won't it? And anyway, something must have hit him where he's just gone. He slammed on the brakes and he starts sobbing. I'm so sorry, darling. I love you. I didn't mean to do that. Well, this time I've jumped out of the car and I've ripped both of them out and I've taken off and I've got onto my. My boss and I said, can you get the cops and ambos to this corner of the street? Someone you need to fucking get this ordered. And that was. That was one of the very first sort of times I bought drugs and I was like, holy, I hope that it's not gonna be like that every time.
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Julian Morgans
My God, I. I pity the paramedics that had to show up and deal with those guys.
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Todd McGuire
He went to jail for it, which was good. Which. Yeah, for unlawful wounding. And. And then it then gave an opening when she wasn't hooked up with anyone that, you know, I sort of befriended her and it sort of went that way where she then sort of set me on the right course to get me towards the. The big fella. So end up being a blessing in disguise. Yeah.
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Julian Morgans
Hey, we're going to take a quick ad break, but stick around because we'll be back with more what it was like.
- [28:27]
Commercial Narrator
If you felt stuck trying to lose weight, you're not alone. Enter weight loss by hers. It's designed to support you in reaching your goals. And hers now offers access to an affordable range of FDA approved GLP1 medications, including the Wegovy pill and the Wegovy pen. Even better, with a range of affordable GLP1 options, hers makes it simple to find an approach that fits your needs and your budget. If eligible, you'll get a treatment plan personalized to you and unlimited dosage changes as needed. It's weight loss design to work with your life. Ready to reach your goals? Visit fourhers.com eligible to get personalized affordable care that gets you. That's F o r h E-R-S.com eligible forhers.com eligible weight loss by hers is not available in all 50 states. WeGovy is the registered trademark of Novo Nordisk as to get started and learn more, including important safety information, Wegovy clinical study information and restrictions, visit forhers.com Insurance
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- [31:25]
Julian Morgans
Let's follow that thread. So how did this incident get you closer?
- [31:31]
Todd McGuire
Oh, well, it sort of then sort of introduced me to another fellow who was involved in a bikie club and bought some drugs off him. Bought a car, stolen car and stuff, you know, it sort of got to the stage where I got her to take me out to this fellow's joint and it was out in the bush, you know, it was one of those properties with a fenced sort of front. It said, private property, don't come in here, you will get shot. All that sort of shit. You can see cameras in the. In the trees and everything. And.
- [32:01]
Julian Morgans
And to be clear, this is the target. This is Eddie the speed cook.
- [32:05]
Todd McGuire
Yeah, because I finally convinced her to. To take me out to his place. And she reluctantly did it. And anyway, so we. We get there and I open it up, said, come on, off you go. Walk down there and let them know that I'm up here and I'll come down. She goes, no, no, no, no, no. I'm not walking down there. It's about a kilometer. I want to take your car. Because she's saying, you can't come down here, not yet. And I go, you can't take my car. And it was a. Like, it was an undercover car that had recording devices in it and, you know, a particular way that you turn the car on and turned it off. We'd just stand there for ages. She's going, I'm not walking. I said, well, you're not taking my car. She goes, well, let's just wait here. I'm going. I finally just made that decision. I said, okay, take my car. Whatever you do, do not turn the thing off, okay? She was like, two hours, still nothing. And like, there was no phone reception. There was nothing. And I can go, fuck. Have they ripped my car apart and found everything in there? You know, all of these things are going through my head. And I went, it, okay, So I jumped the fence and I started walking down. And next thing you know, this ute comes flying straight after me. You know, leave blokes with guns. What the do you want, cunt? You know, all that sort of shit. I said, that's my car down there. I'm just coming to get it. They sort of bundled me in the back of the ute and said, come down here. Come down here and end up meeting Eddie. And, you know, I'm sort of saying, no disrespect, mate. I really, you know, But I want my car. She's taken it. And I made out that she stole it. And, you know, I've just come back to get it. And, like, she was sobbing and crying. She's going, I turned it off. I know you told me not to. And I'm going, yeah, it's. Yeah, it's got a bad clutch. Got a bad whatever. I said, oh, I could start it. So I went in and did what I had to do to turn it back on. I said, see, See, it's not that bad. And anyway, like, he's sort of going, don't ever fucking turn up to my house again. You know, all that sort of shit. And I'm going, mate, yep, no disrespect, I'm so sorry, but I just needed my car. I didn't want to walk all the way back into town. And anyways, you know, he's giving me a fucking fair bit of mouthful and shit, like. And, you know, I've just taken off and burnt some rubber and got out of there and. And then a couple of days later I just made the, the phone call and, and rang his number and he answered and, And I said, mate, this Donnie, I, I was a bloke with a car the other day and, you know, I knew you were pissed off and I wanted to apologize again, that's not how I meant. We're just trying to get on. And he goes, yeah, I'm Denard and everything. And he goes, okay, we'll come to my place this time tomorrow at 2 o'. Clock. Don't ever turn up unannounced. You tell me when you're coming. Bang, Got him and it was over.
- [34:41]
Julian Morgans
Well, wait, wait, what do you mean you got him? Like, like, take me through it.
- [34:44]
Todd McGuire
Well, I went and did a couple of buys and they were very simple, they're very easy, rocked up. It was actually really nice. And so there you go, here's a couple ounces. It was always outside. He'd always get someone else to go and get it for him. And then he never handled the drugs or the money, but I'm still talking to him and, and everything's recorded. So we did three more buys exactly like that. And then the bosses sort of went, that's it, we've got enough. So what they did was they, they got the cert people, you know, the ones that wear the monkey suits and the, the boogie, the boogeyman with all the black and everything. And. And then at 4 o' clock in the morning, they smashed the windows and put some, you know, smoke bombs in there and, and went in and got him and, you know, there was a, like a big oil bin dug in the ground and had hundreds of thousands of dollars in it. And there was stolen cars, stolen motorbikes, stolen jet skis. It was like the biggest, massive, big ride. Yeah, and then you got something like 12 years or something like that. And, and most of them sort of got put away. But, yeah, everyone was, everyone was patting me on the back and everyone was happy and. But I wasn't. I didn't give a. It didn't. That's not what I was doing it for. That's not. Yeah, I was still alive and I was still, still unhappy and I was still grieving. So, like, I sort of got a couple of the awards and I threw them in the Bin. I said, I'm going somewhere else. This. There was a, like an awards night type thing. I said, this doesn't interest me.
- [36:14]
Julian Morgans
What was it that you wanted at that time?
- [36:16]
Todd McGuire
I was so confused. I was so stuck in the depths of grief that I. I didn't know what I wanted, but I just knew that I was so sad and I was sad, I was angry, I was not liking the world, I was not liking anything. You know, I couldn't find any interest in anything. I don't know what I was looking for, but nothing made me happy.
- [36:37]
Julian Morgans
I mean, I know that being a policeman, there's psychologists available. Had you been seeing anyone or were you recommended to see anyone?
- [36:45]
Todd McGuire
Yeah, I sort of did some of my own ones. I found that it didn't help me. Anyone that hadn't been through significant trauma, I felt they didn't know what I was talking about and if they just went to a uni degree or read some books, what the hell would they know? That's what I had in my head. And I found that over the years that I could tell straight away if someone had gone through significant trauma. Their empathy and their wording and just the way that they talk about things, I could tell straight away. Similarly, I could tell people who hadn't been through anything, they totally, totally missed everything. That was what I was trying to say and they just didn't understand me.
- [37:28]
Julian Morgans
Let's dig into a few other cases. So I understand that you went to Bundaberg to investigate the case of a woman who'd been thrown off a bridge. Do you want to just set that up for me?
- [37:40]
Todd McGuire
Yeah. Paul. Caroline struttle, she's a 19 year old backpacker from England and she was walking home late at night. They found her underneath the bridge and she was dead. And they don't know. People didn't know if she'd jumped or pushed or thrown or whatever. But the local detectives had sort of been doing a bit of work and they'd found out that words getting out around town, that these two blokes had something to do with it. Something to do with it, don't know why. And they were drug dealers. So my job was to go and infiltrate them, become their mates and. And find out as much as possible. It just didn't go that way. They were really sus. Initially, the main bloke, when I first met him, he lost his nana and put a machete up against my neck and said I was a cop and all that sort of. I sort of talked him around from that and a Couple of cones sort of settled him down. And then he became a mate. And then we found out that they broke into a gun store and stole about 20 guns. So they said, oh, this is another chance of go back, see if you can buy some guns off him. And this is another sort of opportunity to, you know, find out more information. And I went over to their place. One of his mates, who I'd never met before, opened the door, he's got a handgun. What the do you want, mate? I was like, here we go again, me. Jesus. It was only a small little prick too, which annoyed the crap out of me. So when his mate sort of came out from the back room and said, oh, that's, that's me mate, leave him alone. He goes, oh, okay, okay. He puts the gun down on the, on the table and I immediately launch at him and I get him around the neck and I put him up against the wall and said, don't you ever do that again. You know, I had to live that life as well, you know, and I didn't appreciate a gun on my face. So my way of trying to. How do you say, oh, here, you broke into a gun shop last night. I want to buy some. It's not that simple. So I always carried a knife with me. And I said, I pulled out the knife and I just threw it against the wall right next to the fella's head that pulled the gun on me just to scare the shit out of him. But it just ended up working for me. And, you know, I pulled it out of the wall and it was like a Japanese throwing knife. And I said, have a look at this. This is sharp as fuck. It'll almost take your thumb off because you threw it by the blade. And I said, you know, I'm fucking sick of it. You know, I really hate this thing. And it kept on sort of slicing the top of me and there was a little bit of blood. And I said, see that? I fucking hate that. I fucking hate it. I said, I need something a little bit better. And the main sort of bloke says, oh, what do you mean? I said, I need something that's a bit more permanent. I said, what do you mean? I said, like a bang bang. And I sort of did the. The gun sort of moment. And he goes, he looked. They looked at each other. I went, you got a car? Said, yeah, let's go for a drive. So we've gone for a drive down towards Maryborough, there's a pine forest. And they sort of told me to go into There, and we're driving in there and it was getting darker and darker and darker and darker and like, what have I done? I think this is a setup, I really do. We pulled up, a bloke jumps out from behind a tree just out of the blue. I was like, yep. Oh, God, yeah. Because they had a police scanner as well with them, which meant that they were pretty sus. And honestly thought that was it. And I thought, oh, well, not a bad way to go. And the main one was walking around looking for where these guns were. And he's behind a tree going, not this one, not this one. And like, I'm going out, just get out of the way. I sort of had a bit of a thought and I went, hang on, I may never be found out here. I don't want to die here. They'll never find me. But I had a recording device going on as well. So I was sort of thinking to myself, if they ever dug me up, at least they'll be able to find out who did it. Because I was sort of saying, it's this person, it's this person, it's this person that's doing it, all that sort of stuff. And Anyway, after about 30, 40 minutes of this fellow not around this one, not this one, not this one. Then he goes, yeah, here it is, found it. And we started walking over to behind the tree. And I thought, there's going to be a hole there or something. I don't know what the around it. But anyway, I sort of closed my eyes going, here we go, here we go. Open my eyes. Yep. He dug up a. A duffel bag full of guns. So, whoa. I said, they look good. I said. They said, which one do you want? I said, all of them. I'll take all of them. I said, no, you can't take all of them, you can only have two. So I said, that one and that one, that one and that one. And then by that. And I said, how much are they? They said, 1500 each. I went, oh, okay, yep, too easy. So we're driving back and I said, don't forget, don't forget to remind me I've got to go to the atm. Anyway. They said, yeah, yeah, yeah, but they're all laughing because they think they've made 3,000 for the night and got back to their house. And I stopped and I went, oh, I forgot to go to the atm. You're supposed to remind me. He goes, ah, yeah, sorry, man. How much you got in your wallet? I said, oh, 300. He goes, that lou Bang. So I went back to me boss and I said, mate, I just saved you 78 of 2,700. I'm pro organization. I'm saving the. The. The cops money.
- [42:40]
Julian Morgans
I hope they gave you some sort of really deluxe meat tray for. For Christmas.
- [42:45]
Todd McGuire
No, never got that, Mike. Never got that. Well, we didn't end up. We didn't end up finishing that job. The problem was, is that there was a corrupt cop from the drug squad that come up and, and compromised everything. And he came in and told almost everyone in town that I was an undercover cop, so.
- [42:59]
Julian Morgans
Oh, really? So what happened for you?
- [43:01]
Todd McGuire
So my boss sort of rings me and he goes, mate, we're out. Pack your bags. We're leaving at midnight tonight. Okay? And as that was happening, he goes, do you reckon you'd remember where the guns are? I went, oh, yeah, I only went there a couple of days ago. I reckon so. So yeah, we went there with our torches and it took us about an hour or two, but we found them and so we recovered all the other guns and. And we took off in the middle of the night and never to be seen again. Wow.
- [43:29]
Julian Morgans
So the through line between all of this is you're doing incredibly dangerous work with just a total disregard for your own well being. What was the catalyst for you doing a bit of self reflection and being like, I've got a bit of a death wish here. What's happening?
- [43:45]
Todd McGuire
There was a couple. There was one particular one where I was doing a job in the Valley, Fortitude Valley, and I was buying MDMA pearls off a bloke. And he had sort of gone down a similar track to me. You know, he'd fallen on hard times and he'd broken up with his wife and was missing his kids and he started selling pills. And it shows how much of a bad dealer he was because one of the first sales he did was to an undercover cop. So I think he recognizes that it wasn't his forte in life. So I ended up getting on really well with him. He was a good fella. He wasn't a crook by any other means. But, you know, that was his way of sort of dealing with his trauma that he'd sort of been through. You know, it got a stage where we'd finished that job. He got arrested and he got told that that Donnie was the undercover cop that. That basically set you up. And I got told by the detectives that he was pretty upset about it and he didn't. He couldn't understand it. He didn't know and didn't See it happening. And I thought we were mates. And so it was about two weeks later and I saw my phone ring and it was his name, and I went, oh, he's going to give me a spray. Like, what I'm going to get is, I can't believe you dogged me. I can't believe you did this. Fucking, you're a prick. I'm going to kill you. All that sort of shit. And I thought, you know what? I'm going to let him get it out of his system because if I don't answer now, he's. He's going to keep doing it. I only had probably, you know, three or four months left in the undercover unit to go. And what I did notice over the next couple of months is, you know, my drinking and all that sort of stuff was exactly the same. But if there was a red flag on a. On a door saying, don't go in where Donnie used to run straight in without, even without a care factor, I'd ask a few questions now and go, okay, I need to know more about this person behind that door. You know, I became a bit more cautious, and I noticed that was the start of me going, okay, I'm not as reckless as what I was. And I started getting better and better and better.
- [45:38]
Julian Morgans
That's so interesting that just through observing your own behavior that you became a bit more cautious.
- [45:45]
Todd McGuire
Yeah, yeah, because I. Because I think I worked out that if he didn't pull me back, we were gone. And I think that just really made me think about it. And at the end of the day, I was in the same boat as him. I didn't really want to die. I didn't want to. He didn't want to go to jail. I didn't want to deal with the pain. I didn't want this and that, but never really wanted to die. I was exactly like that. And it made me really think about it.
- [46:07]
Julian Morgans
I mean, it's a really beautiful moment with this guy. You know, you're dealing with real scumbags throughout this story, and yet you end up having your first kind of really open, really vulnerable conversation with this guy who I. I assume he wasn't like, you know, tertiary educated, doesn't have a psychological degree, whatever, but you end up. You. You finally sort of get this catharsis that you needed through him.
- [46:32]
Todd McGuire
Yeah, yeah, that was the first time that I. I stopped that reckless behavior. And it's just started little by little. Just got less and less and less. But that still hadn't changed the way that I was dealing with my ptsd. I was still numbing it. I was still running from it. I was still, you know, suppressing it.
- [46:56]
Julian Morgans
Hey, we're going to take a quick ad break, but stick around because we'll be back with more what it was like.
- [47:06]
Commercial Narrator
This episode is brought to you by Progressive Insurance. Do you ever think about switching insurance companies to see if you could save some cash? Progressive makes it easy to see if you could save when you bundle your home and auto policies. Try it@progressive.com Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and affiliates. Potential savings will vary. Not available in all states.
- [47:25]
If you've felt stuck trying to lose weight, you're not alone. Enter weight loss by hers. It's designed to support you in reaching your goals, and hers now offers access to an affordable range of FDA approved GLP1 medications, including the Wegovy pill and the Wegovy pen. Even better, with a range of affordable GLP1 options, hers makes it simple to find an approach that fits your needs and your budget. If eligible, you'll get a treatment plan personalized to you and unlimited dosage changes as needed. It's weight loss designed to work with your life. Ready to reach your goals? Visit fourhers.com eligible to get personalized affordable care that gets you. That's F O R h e r rs.com Eligible for hers.com Eligible weight loss by hers is not available in all 50 states. WeGovy is the registered trademark of Novo Nordisk as To get started and learn more, including important safety information, WeGovy clinical study information, and restrictions, visit forhers.com.
- [48:28]
Julian Morgans
What was the real turning point where you made some big changes in your life?
- [48:33]
Todd McGuire
Well, there was numerous ones, but the next big one was I end up meeting a girl and we got married and had a son. And that was when I sort of made the decision, you know, it's not about me anymore. I've got to stop being selfish and say, poor me, why'd this happen to me? This young kid's not going to give a shit about what happened to me five, 10 years ago, five, six years ago. You know, I've got to be a bit selfless and go, hang on, this kid needs me now. He's relying on me. I've got a. I've got to step up. I was doing everything in my power to be a good dad, a good husband, but because my PTSD wasn't addressed, I'd still behave in a poor manner. I'd go on three day benders and I'd fight people and I'd get angry And I had a really bad attitude type thing. Yeah. And then I'd feel sorry for myself. And I go, no, okay, I can't do that anymore. I got to do. I've got to stop that. I've got to stop that. And it was a recurring thing over and over. I did it for years and years until I. Until I really worked out. I don't want to live like this anymore. I think that was what it was. I just. I'm sick of living like this, you know, Feels like I'm stuck in mud. And I think a big one just recently was, you know, turning 50. Where I went. I might have only 25 years left to go. I don't want to live my last 25, you know, I don't want to live my next 25 like I had my last 25. I want this next 25 to be the best 25 years of my life. And I think it got to the stage where I just went, it's just so tiring. It's just so. This is so shit. And I don't want to feel like it anymore. And the first start of my healing was of true healing, was writing the book. And I found that it has done so much better than any anytime I've been, you know, sitting in with a psychologist. It's really made it, as they say, you know, you write things down and you feel so cathartic over it, and it just feels like it's just got a weight off my shoulders. And, you know, I wrote it for myself to get it all out of my system. But what's made it even better is that I'm getting all these comments from people saying, you have no idea how much this has helped me. The fact that it's now helping people has just made everything better and everything worthwhile that I feel that what I went through was now, instead of a negative thing, to me, it was a positive thing. And, you know, I've got a story to tell which is actually helping people.
- [50:54]
Julian Morgans
Does that feel like it's given you a mission? Like a sort of secondary reason to go on as well?
- [50:58]
Todd McGuire
Yeah, because I always used to say that Karen's death was for nothing. Everyone forgot her. It was just a waste of time. I wanted to honour in some sort of way and keep her memory alive. And I wanted something good to come out of it. And I could never see anything good. I said, everything's bad come out of it. Everything is shit, everything's awful. This is the first time in many years where I've gone. She didn't die for nothing. I know it sounds awful, but I can now make something positive out of something so negative.
- [51:27]
Julian Morgans
This was a little tale that we left off on your very first story, But Karen's son, you said he was 4 years old, and you put him in the backyard when you found his mother. How's he doing now?
- [51:40]
Todd McGuire
He's actually really good. He just got married last year, and he's 31, and he's. He's actually a very, very good kid. Yeah. I'm still really good friends with. With his dad as well, and. And we both joke and say that he's more mature than both of us together. So he's done a really good job, and he's going well. Going really well.
- [52:02]
Julian Morgans
I'm so glad to hear that. I felt like your answer to my question was going to really dictate the mood that we were going to end on. But the fact that he's come out okay makes me feel like, you know, there's hope, there's this sort of purpose, and this sort of. The universe rhymes. It's not all just meaningless chaos.
- [52:20]
Todd McGuire
Yeah. He's still got a lot of confusion over it and, you know, sadness over it, but he's really worked hard to become something of himself, and he's quite successful in what he does, and he's really good. Yeah.
- [52:33]
Julian Morgans
Well, I just really have one last question, and that is that what do you want listeners to take away from your experience and from your story?
- [52:40]
Todd McGuire
I suppose the lesson that. That I've learned and I'd like to sort of put on to other people is, is, you know, when you go through a traumatic event, and most people will, in their life, understand it and recognize it and. And deal with it straight away, don't do what I did and hide it. Drink as much alcohol as possible. Go undercover and run from it, and then try and forget about it for the next 20 years, because it will come back and bite you in the ass, and it comes back even harder. So what I try to say to people is, take it on head first. And it's going to be ugly at first, but it's going to be a lot less harder than if you do it 20 years later. I thought I was stronger. I thought I was bigger enough and I could run away from it. It just sits and waits. It really does. Yeah.
- [53:29]
Julian Morgans
Todd, thank you so much for talking with me. It's been fascinating.
- [53:32]
Todd McGuire
Yeah, thank you. Thank you. I love talking about it now because so many years I didn't talk about it, and, you know, it's it's almost like a, it's a therapy session for me each time I do a podcast. So I love it.
- [53:44]
Julian Morgans
That's great. I'm pleased. I'm pleased to hear that.
- [53:47]
Todd McGuire
Yeah. Thank you.
- [53:49]
Julian Morgans
Hey, thanks for listening. Just a reminder that you can check out Todd's book. It's called Donnie An Undercover Cop with a Death Wish. It's packed full of stories that we didn't get time for today. It's really interesting. It's well written. He wrote it himself. He didn't even have a ghostwriter. It's like real gritty, sort of hard boiled cop literature. And I actually genuinely loved reading it. So check it out. It's on Amazon. You know all the usual places online. Also, this week's subscriber episode features a man who hiked a South American volcano. Volcano. So he woke up in his tent one morning, he unzipped it and he found that the sky had turned completely black. How do you get to safety when you're miles up a mountain and it's exploding? That's our subscriber episode this week and I will see you next week. What It Was like is produced by Rachel Tuffery. This episode was edited by Ellie Dickey, who also does our research. Our cover art is by Rich Akers. Our theme music was produced by Jimmy Saunders and this whole thing has been a super real production.
- [55:14]
Commercial Narrator
This episode is brought to you by Progressive Insurance. Do you ever think about switching insurance companies to see if you could save some cash? Progressive makes it easy to see if you could save when you bundle your home and auto policies. Try it@progressive.com Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and affiliates. Potential savings will vary. Not available in all states.
- [55:33]
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