The man who wandered the streets was not always without apparent purpose. His parents emigrated from Ayrshire, Scotland, and moved to Melbourne shortly after the 1956 Olympics when he was three. He adapted quickly and soon excelled at school, winning academic awards and becoming school captain. He was always determined, and it was during these years he settled on his future career path. ''He always wanted to be a policeman,'' his mother, May, would later say. ''And he did very well at it.'' This was not a mother blinded by pride for her only child. Kenneth McNeil graduated dux of his course when he walked out of the academy on January 28, 1974. The commandant of the day reported he was a ''quiet but extremely competent member''. Other assessments included, ''Will prove an asset to the service and could go far'', ''Should develop into a highly efficient member'', ''Brainy'' and ''Should show out in the future''. Yet less than four months later his career was finished after he received severe injuries on duty that would leave him disabled for life.

Back then the first stop for a young police officer was the Russell Street Reserve, where the inexperienced were given their first taste of street policing. On Wednesday, May 22, he was moved to the Traffic and Patrol Division for a stint on point duty. On his second day he was sent to control the evening peak rush at the intersection of Swanston and Little Collins streets under the supervision of an experienced sergeant. It was cold and rainy so McNeil wore his cumbersome police issue waterproof cape. Nearby at the Town Hall a crowd had gathered to farewell Governor Sir Rohan and Lady Delacombe, who were retiring after 11 years in office. Just on 4.30pm two trams passed in opposite directions and McNeil turned himself side on - exactly as he had been trained. It was a move made hundreds of times a day by police on point duty throughout Melbourne. But McNeil's whole life would turn on a piece of fabric. His police cape apparently caught on one of the trams and he hit the running board before lurching into the second tram. Neither driver was aware of the accident as they trundled away. He was left with severe head injuries and a fractured left wrist. Following emergency surgery, doctors at Prince Henry's Hospital knew they could save him but he would never be the same. It was four days after his 20th birthday.

His mother said hours after the accident, ''He has always been a very clever boy. He was the dux of his squad when he graduated in January, but he has always shunned publicity.'' A few weeks earlier a policeman directing traffic at the Camberwell Junction was nearly involved in a similar incident. Rowland Legg turned sideways as two trams passed when his cape blew up and hooked on the side of a metal advertising sign. ''Fortunately it was near the running board and I was able to jump on and hang on with one hand while I unhooked the cape with the other.'' He travelled more than 100 metres up Burke Road before he could free himself, then ran back to the junction, which had become hopelessly clogged with traffic. He remembers that a short time later trams were banned from passing traffic police while moving in opposite directions, ''because of an accident involving a member in the city''.

Legg went on to become one of Australia's best known and respected homicide detectives while McNeil was robbed of the chance to fulfil the potential that had been identified during his training days. A year after the accident a senior policeman visited McNeil at the Caulfield Convalescent Hospital. It was his 21st birthday. ''He can now speak in a stunted manner and is able to walk with the aid of supports,'' the inspector reported. ''It appears that he will never return to active duty.'' On January 6, 1976, he was boarded out as medically unfit due to the acquired brain injury he sustained on duty. Because he had been in the police force for such a short time he hadn't developed a network of mates to check on his welfare and the truth is he fell through the cracks.

Eventually he returned to the family home in Claremont Avenue, Malvern, where he was supported by his stoic parents. But with no extended family and following the death of his parents he was left to fend for himself - a task that in many ways was beyond him. In his short time in the police force his passion for the uniform and care in his appearance led superiors to note on his file, ''always well turned out''. But in those last dark years he became a bedraggled local identity often seen wandering the streets. In February, 2002, police conducting a welfare check found McNeil's body in his family home. He was 47 years old. There were only 18 mourners at the funeral, made up largely of friends of the celebrant and two serving police, the lone police piper one of the few reminders of his past and what his life should have been. It was left to O'Connor to deliver the eulogy.

''I have no doubt that Kenneth McNeil died as a result of injuries suffered on May 23, 1974, and as such I believe he deserves to be remembered as a young man who died whilst serving the community of Victoria. In 1974 he was a young, fresh-faced constable who had the world at his feet. He may have had aspirations of being chief commissioner or the harder job as a policeman at a one-man police station. He was never able to achieve those dreams.'' The former policeman who died alone was doomed to be forgotten until a small article in the Police Journal touched a detective stationed at Caulfield. Marilyn Ross carried the article for years and eventually had it laminated. She wondered if something could be done in his name and believed his story should be taught to all young police in training to reinforce two important career points. First, that even what appears to be routine can be dangerous and second, don't be too quick to judge the needy. Eventually she contacted O'Connor, whose eulogy appeared in the Police Journal story. Over a cup of coffee they decided to push for McNeil to finally receive official police recognition. Ross then made a detailed submission to the honours and awards unit, persuasively arguing that McNeil's sacrifice while on duty should be officially acknowledged.

On May 23 this year, 27 years to the day after he received his life-altering injuries, the unit manager wrote to Ross to inform her the nomination had been successful. Last month at the Police Academy, where he graduated first of his class, Kenneth McNeil was posthumously awarded the Police Star - a medal for those killed or seriously wounded on duty. It has been donated to the Police Museum. O'Connor graduated a year before McNeil and while he never met him says he learnt a valuable lesson from the man he saw wander by his parents' home. ''We shouldn't judge people on the way they look. There is always a story on how they ended there. It was a good lesson for me and one all police members should remember.''