A sordid tale of lives in collision
Andrea Petrie
September 4, 2010
http://www.theage.com.au/victoria/a-sordid-tale-of-lives-in-collision-20100903-14uhs.html
MARIO Schembri, short, plump and unsophisticated, and Bernadette Denny once shared a relatively prosaic life in working-class Hadfield in Melbourne's north.
Schembri is a bald, semi-literate handyman, a father of seven and grandfather of six. Denny, his girlfriend, is a depressed, alcoholic pensioner with a dependent personality disorder. She is also the mother of two teenage daughters with whom she has a fractured relationship.
In stark contrast, Herman Rockefeller was a handsome multimillionaire, a fitness fanatic and married father of two living in a comfortable, ivy-clad home on the outskirts of the leafy suburb of Malvern East.
Yet the trio's lives collided earlier this year in circumstances that have since attracted international attention. And what happened next is almost incomprehensible.
It began when Denny responded to an advertisement in a sex-swingers' magazine. Its author introduced himself as Andrew Kingston. He was really Herman Rockefeller.
''Andy'' explained that his wife ''Jenny'' would also be involved. But his real wife, Vicky, knew nothing of his adulterous ways. Mr Rockefeller visited his new acquaintances in early January where he had sex with Denny on a mattress on the living room floor at their South Street home. Schembri watched. They agreed to meet again.
He returned just before 10pm on January 21 after flying in to Melbourne Airport from an interstate business trip.
To coincide with his secret, double life, he sent his wife a text message explaining his plane had been delayed. When he failed to arrive home, he was reported missing. Schembri, 58, and Denny, 42, pleaded guilty in Victoria's Supreme Court this week to his manslaughter, as Mr Rockefeller's devastated family - also in court - listened to the gruesome details of his death.
An argument had broken out when he arrived at their house alone. Schembri likened himself to Muhammad Ali, telling police he punched Mr Rockefeller harder than he had ever struck anyone before. Mr Rockefeller fell, hit his head and died, the court heard.
In the following days the couple dumped his car and bought a chainsaw from a local hardware store. Schembri dismembered his body while Denny listened from inside the house, vomiting. Schembri then burnt his remains in a 44-gallon drum in a friend's backyard.
Police got their strongest lead into the 51-year-old's disappearance when Mr Rockefeller's car was located 80 kilometres west of Melbourne. The car's GPS co-ordinates led them to Denny and Schembri's house. Their address was also written alongside a Sudoku puzzle in the car.
While the prosecution acknowledged the death was unplanned, the couple's post-offence conduct was described as ''monstrously wrong''.
Schembri's lawyer, Geoffrey Steward, described his client as ''a simple man who has been devoted to his children and his family''. Born in Malta, he immigrated, at age three, to Australia with his parents. He married his wife in the 1970s and they had seven children. A daughter died at 16 months of meningitis in 1991, which he claims changed his life.
His marriage broke up in late 2008 and he met Denny in the street the following April when they discussed a lost dog. Love blossomed.
Denny was the only daughter of Egyptian-born parents. She met her husband through her older brother and they had two daughters. In 1996, her husband was diagnosed with bone cancer and she nursed him until his death. She began drinking, was in and out of treatment and suffered depression. She described the next years as a ''blur''. Then Schembri came along.
Since her arrest, Denny has been diagnosed with dependent personality disorder, which her lawyer, Phil Dunn, QC, said meant she was unable to think independently and rationally.
Separated by a sole prison guard in the dock, they stole fleeting glances at each other as the prosecution called for Schembri to be jailed for six to 10 years and Denny between five and eight.
While the final chapter of this sordid love tale could be written with sentencing as early as next week, the shattered families of those involved are likely to take much longer to come to terms with it all - regardless of the gulf in their social class.
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