Just Who is D.I. Sam Voss?

Name’s Sam Voss and I catch killers.

Born sometime in the winter of 1968 at five days old I was left on the steps of a South Melbourne Police Station. All they had to identify me was the beer box that served as a bassinet, a Jack Daniels bottle full of formula or breast milk, no one bothered to test it and a copy of Patrick White’s Voss. Desk Sergeant Vaughn Samson took care of me until child services arrived, when the paper work was finished I’d been tagged Samson Voss, a Christian name I’ve hated ever since. Friends can call me Sam, but not often.

A weak and ugly child I was overlooked by many, loved by none. After years, living in an endless roster of foster homes, I became convinced I was always destined to be an outsider. This, the never-ending fights with teachers and Nuns, every one of them making me believe I was born of the Devil’s spawn. For years, those bastards made me feel despised and unworthy.

That was until the day I asked an old man in a cassock to describe evil. That old German priest dismissed that any notion I had of being the work of Satan, was rubbish. I remember him saying that every child is born innocent. However, he did point out that if I didn't sharpen up soon, I was headed for death or gaol.

Neither of those options held a lot of hope, or interest for me and for the next few years he kept an eye out for me, pushing, prodding me to do better. This old man in a worn and tattered clothes cared for people, street people, working girls and the wealthy. It didn’t matter, in his eyes everyone was the same. He taught me to care, he showed me it didn’t matter where people came from, they could fall or fly, the choice was up to them.

At seventeen, he passed me into the care of the police academy. I finally found a place I fitted into, something I was good and a career that interested me. I had somewhere to learn about the use of structure. Not just how a building is put together, or what makes men and women different, but everyday structure. Rules, the framework a free society is built on.

So here I stand on the page before you, a seasoned and accomplished police officer determined to put killers behind bars.