NSW:Madeleine's school offers counselling

AAP General News (Australia)
08-04-2011
NSW:Madeleine's school offers counselling

SYDNEY, Aug 4 AAP - Specialist police have begun a minute search of streets surrounding
the home of Madeleine Pulver where the Sydney student endured a ten hour strapped to
what was believed to a bomb.

The 18-year-old, who is in the midst of final school year, is back with her family
after spending several hours in hospital after her ordeal ended around midnight on Wednesday.

Senior year trial exams at her school, Wenona High School, have been postponed and
counselling has been offered to other students.

The young woman was confronted by a masked man at her family's home in Mosman, on Sydney's
lower north, about 2pm on Wednesday, and spent the next ten hours petrified as police
worked to remove a device from around her neck.

Police on Thursday said the bomb had been found to be a hoax.

Six officers from the Public Order and Riot Squad (PORS) were conducting a line-search
of the lower end of Burrawong Avenue in Mosman on Thursday, closely examining undergrowth
and bushes.

Nearby streets remained cordoned off although well-wishers dropped flowers outside
the home or handed them to police to pass on to the family, one of Sydney's wealthiest.

Dr Briony Scott, the principal of the young woman's school, has advised students not
to speak to media and to stay clear of social networking sites.

"The Year 12 Trial HSC exams scheduled for today and tomorrow have been postponed,"

she said in a statement posted on the school's website.

"All students have been offered counselling at a school assembly this morning.

"Our staff will be able to provide additional support to Year 12 and extra counsellors
will be at the school today."

Dr Scott also advised students not to speak publicly about the incident or discuss
it over the internet.

"As police continue their investigations we ask that the school community respects
the integrity of their inquiries as well as the privacy of the family, by not indulging
in public commentary through the media or social networking sites," she said.

A parent of one student told AAP staff have "put the fear of god into them about talking
to the media".

The mood at the school appeared calm, orderly and collected, with teachers keeping
vigil outside and ushering students through the gates.

Prime Minister Julia Gillard said she was in disbelief when she first heard the story.

"The first thing I said was `it's like a Hollywood script, the kind of thing you would
see at the cinema or on TV'," she told Fairfax Radio in Perth.

"You would never expect it to happen in real life in Australia."

NSW Premier Barry O'Farrell said he was relieved Madeline's ordeal had come to a safe
end, and he praised the efforts of the police involved as "extraordinary".

"I'm happy to wait for all the facts to come out but no-one would want any member of
their family to go through the ordeal this woman did," he told reporters.

NSW Police Assistant Commissioner Mark Murdoch said the lengthy operation was justified
until bomb disposal experts determined the nature of the device.

"It was affixed to her by a chain or something similar, which eventually took us a
fair while to remove ... and that added to the trauma that Madelaine experienced and prolonged,"

he said outside the Pulver home, where Madeleine lives with her parents William and Belinda.

"There were some instructions left by the offender at the scene last afternoon and
those instructions will provide us with further lines for inquiry.

"Those instructions also limited us somewhat last night in how quickly we could proceed.

"Certainly the instructions were precise, they were such that led us to believe that
we were dealing with a very serious and legitimate threat."

Madeleine's parents had no idea why their daughter had been targeted, he said.

After Madeleine's family contacted police, saying their daughter needed help, a general
duties police car with two officers went to the scene.

"What they saw was a very distressed young lady with what we believed to be at the
time an improvised explosive device attached to her body," Mr Murdoch told Fairfax radio.

Nearby residents were immediately evacuated and bomb technicians, negotiators and detectives
were summoned to the scene.

The man had been disguised when he put the device around Madeleine's neck, he said,
but he declined to give any details of the disguise.

The young woman's father is chief executive of Appen Butler Hill, which provides linguistic
and voice-recognition services for many organisations including governments.

Detectives are still waiting to formally interview the teenager, police confirmed shortly
after midday on Thursday.

Mr Pulver is expected to speak to the media later in the day.

AAP vpm/tr/bwl

KEYWORD: BOMB 4TH UPDATE

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