June 2024 will mark the 20th anniversary of the disappearance of east Auckland man Jim Donnelly. The Times is looking back, through a series of stories, at one of the most baffling unsolved cases in recent New Zealand history. Part one of this series (Times, Nov 30) detailed Jim’s behaviour and movements in the days preceding his disappearance.
Jim Donnelly went missing on Monday, June 21, 2004.
He hasn’t been seen since and his whereabouts are a mystery to his loved ones and the police.
Jim was 43 years old and living with his wife Tracey and their two young children in Dannemora when he disappeared.
An inquest hearing was held on the matter by coroner Sam Herdson in Auckland in 2007.
Herdson’s subsequent report states when Jim vanished, he’d been working at Glenbrook Steel Mill in Waiuku in a supervisory engineering role for 19 years.
The coroner found what happened to him remains unexplained but “the presumption is Jim has died”.
The evidence in the inquest report was collated and presented by the officer then in charge of the case, detective senior sergeant Neil Grimstone, who’s since retired from the police.
June 21, 2004
This is the last day Jim was seen alive.
He got up at about 4.30am-5am and woke Tracey to tell her about a computer game he’d bought for their son’s birthday.
Herdson’s report states Jim said he would sort it out later that night and left for work as normal.
He arrived at the steel mill and was seen at about 6am standing in the locker room for several minutes.
About 15-20 minutes later he was seen heading up some stairs.
The shift supervisor said good morning to Jim, who didn’t reply and was described as “looking as if he was frozen on the spot”.
He was then seen in a nearby area and described as looking like he couldn’t make up his mind where he was going.
At about 8am Tracey tried calling Jim on his work phone number but couldn’t reach him.
He didn’t have a mobile phone.
Jim was seen at about 8.30am by another worker from a distance of 10-15 metres wearing an orange fleece jacket, yellow hard hat, and glasses.
Tracey and others kept trying to reach him on the phone throughout the morning without success.
“It became clear there was some concern about Jim and people at the Glenbrook Steel Mill had also begun looking for him,” the report says.
“At about 6pm on June 21 Jim was officially reported to the police as a missing person.”
The days after
Following Jim’s disappearance, extensive searches were made within the steel mill and surrounding areas.
They involved police, search and rescue teams, Air Force personnel, St John Ambulance, and steel mill staff.
June 26, 2004
A steel mill worker found a yellow protective helmet with Jim’s surname on it behind a protective cage and next to an acid tank.
“The tank was drained and other items belonging to Jim were found, including things such as his personal electronic diary, glasses, money, credit cards and a library card,” the report says.
“Two other acid tanks were also drained and searched but nothing further was found.”
Jim had no known significant health problems but had been noted as being depressed following deaths in his family several years before his disappearance.
There was no evidence to suggest he had any serious financial stress or debts or had the “obvious means to support himself to live, or re-establish himself, independently”.
Police inquiries and alerts show no financial transactions or legitimate travel outside New Zealand by him.
The report states Grimstone confirmed in late 2005 he reviewed the investigation into Jim’s disappearance and concluded there were four possible scenarios.
They were an accident, suicide, staged disappearance or foul play.
Grimstone believed despite the steel mill being a workplace with potential risks and hazards, it was unlikely Jim had suffered some sort of accident.
According to Grimstone, if Jim had suffered an accident at work, the searches would have found his body.
The police officer considered suicide was a strong possibility, “based on Jim’s mental state and unusual behaviour prior to his disappearance”.
Grimstone considered the evidence did not indicate Donnelly had any kind of secret life or engaged in forward planning.
Nor was there a reason why he would take such a course of action, Herdson’s report states.
“He [Grimstone] noted Jim was considered a devoted father to his two children and, irrespective of any relationship difficulties, if Jim were alive it would be expected he would make contact with his children.”
The police file was reviewed with the consideration Jim had been the victim of foul play and Grimstone found nothing to indicate that was the case.
Herdson’s report concludes by saying the weight of the evidence favours the possibilities Jim died as a result of suicide or accident.
- This series continues in the New Year with stories based on interviews with Tracey Donnelly and Inspector Dave Glossop, who used to hold the file on Jim’s disappearance.
