Hiding behind a tree trunk, Melissa Sharman’s hands trembled as she telephoned her friend, fearful the attacker was closing in.
Moments before, the 15-year-old had escaped from a terrifying encounter with the man she’d been paired with by her church group to volunteer at a local soup kitchen.
When Melissa’s school friend arrived they fled to safety, but the teen was too afraid to report what had happened.
“I was so embarrassed and I kept thinking, ‘What did I do to cause this?’” Melissa tells Woman’s Day.
At the time, Melissa was unaware this man had been imprisoned for sexually assaulting two children and had only recently been released on parole.
Sixteen years later, the whole of Australia would know Brett Peter Cowan as Daniel Morcombe’s killer.
Back in 1998, Cowan and Melissa had been on their way to volunteer at the soup kitchen when he insisted on driving to his Sunshine Coast home to shower and change his clothes.
“I felt anxious but I didn’t know why,” Melissa says of the time she spent waiting for him.
“He finally came out of the shower in just a towel and walked towards me with a cold look in his eyes.”
Unable to express how uncomfortable she was feeling, Melissa was frozen in place, but as Cowan moved closer she began to panic.
DENIED THE ALLEGATION
“He pulled at my clothes and I tried getting him off me,” says Melissa. “Then I was able to knee him back.”
This knocked Cowan off balance, giving Melissa time to escape.
Later, Melissa would confide what happened that day to some school friends, and as a result the church pastor found out too. He questioned Melissa without her parents present and, incredibly, didn’t alert the police.
“It never crossed my mind that they wouldn’t believe me,” says Melissa, 43, remembering how the church told her Cowan had denied the allegation.
“I didn’t realise it then but the church knew he was in a sexual offenders treatment program.”
Despite this, Cowan was allowed to spend time with a child unsupervised.
Melissa felt she couldn’t tell her parents about the assault and began to struggle with her mental health. She was later diagnosed with severe depression.
“I was a good student, but I dropped out of school – and by the time I was17 I’d taken off to the other side of the world. I couldn’t cope and I ran away from everything.”
Five years after attacking Melissa, Cowan kidnapped and murdered 13-year-old Daniel Morcombe.
Just two weeks before Christmas in 2003, Cowan abducted Daniel from an informal bus stop near the Big Pineapple – sparking Queensland police’s largest ever criminal investigation.
In August 2011, Cowan confessed to killing Daniel, whose remains were found a week later about 40km from where he disappeared.
When Daniel first went missing, Melissa would see his mum Denise at the supermarket where she worked.
“I remember packing bags at the grocery store and Denise would come in. I remember her eyes… They looked like big lagoons, she looked so sad.
“I used to think that someone must know who did this, never thinking that could’ve been me.”
But it wasn’t until a police sketch of Daniel’s suspected killer was released that Melissa realised Cowan was the prime suspect, and she immediately contacted Crime Stoppers.
“I didn’t know he’d only served three years of his seven-year sentence and that if he re-offended, he’d be sent back to jail,” she tells.
GUILT & BLAME
Cowan was sentenced to life in prison with a 20-year non-parole period in March 2014. Since then, Melissa’s struggled with guilt over Daniel’s death.
“For a long time, I felt like I was to blame,” she admits.
She used her experiences to build a career as a family violence support counsellor and has now written a memoir, The Beauty Of Broken Things.
“I’ve done a lot of healing,” says Melissa. “My work gives me a sense of purpose.”
