We take a look at some of Australia's most notorious serial killers, some of whom will be in prison until they die, with no chance of parole.
This is a list of notable serial killers from Australia, ranked by number of proven victims (deadliest):
| # | Name: | Number of victims: |
| 30. | Bevan Spencer von Einem | 1 – 5+ |
| 29. | "Bowraville Murders" Killer | 3 |
| 28. | Matthew James Harris | 3 |
| 27. | John Coombes | 3 |
| 26. | Claremont Killer | 3 |
| 25. | Gregory Brazel | 3 |
| 24. | Eddie Leonski | 3 |
| 23. | Martha Rendell | 3 |
| 22. | Bandali Debs | 3 – 5 |
| 21. | Paul Denyer | 3 – 5 |
| 20. | Peter Dupas | 3 – 6 |
| 19. | Kathleen Folbigg | 4 |
| 18. | Arnold Sodeman | 4 |
| 17. | James Vlassakis | 4 |
| 16. | Archibald McCafferty | 4 |
| 15. | Caroline Grills | 4 – 4+ |
| 14. | Leonard Fraser | 4 – 7+ |
| 13. | Catherine Birnie | 4 – 8 |
| 12. | David Birnie | 4 – 8 |
| 11. | William MacDonald | 5 |
| 10. | Thomas Jeffries | 5 – 5+ |
| 9. | John Wayne Glover | 6 – 13 |
| 8. | James Miller | 6 – 7 |
| 7. | Christopher Worrell | 7 |
| 6. | Paul Steven Haigh | 7 |
| 5. | Ivan Milat | 7 – 12+ |
| 4. | Eric Edgar Cooke | 8 |
| 3. | Robert Joe Wagner | 10 |
| 2. | John Lynch | 10 |
| 1. | John Justin Bunting | 11 |
(See also 7 Myths About Serial Killers)
(See also The Last Words of 30 Famous Serial Killers)
(See also Top 30 Intelligent Serial Killers With Highest IQ)
(See also Top 30 Serial Killers By Number of Victims (20th century))
(See also Top 10 Australian Bank Robbers)
30. Bevan Spencer von Einem (1 – 5+)
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| (Bevan Spencer von Einem appearing in Adelaide Magistrates Court in 2008) |
Bevan Spencer von Einem (born c.1945), also known as Bevan von Einem (last name sometimes spelled "Von Einem"), is a convicted child murderer from Adelaide, South Australia and suspected serial killer. An accountant by profession, he was convicted in 1984 for the murder of 15-year-old Adelaide teenager Richard Kelvin, the son of local TV personality Rob Kelvin, and is currently serving life imprisonment in Port Augusta Prison.
Classification: Murderer (Serial Killer?)
Characteristics: Child sex offender - Rape - Torture
Number of victims: 1 - 5
Date of murders: 1979 - 1983
Date of arrest: November 3, 1983
Date of birth: 1945
Victim profile: Richard Kelvin, 15 / Boys and young men
Method of murder: Torture - Massive blood loss (captive for five weeks)
Location: Adelaide, South Australia, Australia
Status: Sentenced to life with a non-parole period of 36 years, 1984
The Good Samaritan
The name Bevan Spencer von Einem first came to attention on the night of May 10, 1972. That night, two homosexual men were thrown into the River Torrens by a group of men. The river banks (or "Number 1 beat" as it was known) were a place for homosexuals to meet in secret, as homosexuality was still illegal in South Australia at that time.
Tragically, one of the men, Dr. George Duncan drowned, however the other man, Roger James suffered a broken leg and was rescued out of the river by von Einem, who happened to be driving by at the time. Von Einem then took James to Royal Adelaide Hospital.
Over the next decade, rumours were rife that the group of men that threw the two men in the river were Vice Squad Police and on July 30, 1985 former Vice Squad officer Mick O'Shea revealed in the The Advertiser newspaper that the group involved were Vice Squad officers and that there was a cover-up to protect them. A task force was soon set up, and on February 5, 1986 three former police officers were charged with the manslaughter of Dr. Duncan, however all were eventually cleared of the charges.
Murder of Richard Kelvin
At around 6 pm. on June 5, 1983, von Einem (along with other unknown persons) abducted Kelvin in a North Adelaide street, just 60 metres from Kelvin's home. Kelvin had just seen off a friend at a nearby bus stop on the corner of O'Connell and Marian Streets, North Adelaide and was returning home for dinner.
Several witnesses living near to the Kelvin's home heard cries for help, car doors slamming and a car with a noisy exhaust speeding away. Significantly, Kelvin had a dog collar in his possession which was likely to have attracted von Einem's attention.
Von Einem then tortured, drugged, raped and held Kelvin captive for five weeks, before murdering him and dumping his body on an airstrip near One Tree Hill in the Adelaide Hills area (to the north-east of the city and close to where relatives of von Einem's lived). Kelvin's clothed body was found by a geologist on July 24, 1983.
The autopsy revealed that Kelvin had most certainly died from massive blood loss from an anal injury, likely caused by the insertion of a blunt object, such as a beer bottle, and he suffered bruising and injuries on his head and back, which were likely to have been caused by blows. Also traces of four hypnotic drugs were found in Kelvin, including Mandrax and Noctec.
With the drugs as their only firm lead at that stage, police began sifting through prescriptions for those drugs. During their search they found a prescription for Mandrax issued to a B. von Einem, a name familiar to police as he was questioned previously over the deaths of three young men and an alleged sexual assault of another.
Four days after the body was discovered, von Einem was questioned about the murder of Richard Kelvin by police. He initially claimed that he had no knowledge of what happened to Kelvin and said that on the night of abduction he was in bed with the flu. Police also searched his home in the northern Adelaide suburb of Paradise, where police seized a bottle of Mandrax.
Von Einem admitted that the drugs were his and said that he used them to help him sleep. He denied having any other drugs, but police also seized a bottle of Noctec, concealed on a ledge behind his wardrobe. Von Einem also allowed police to take hair and blood samples, as well as carpets and other materials for testing.
As von Einem went on holiday in the Soviet Union and the United Kingdom during August and September of 1983, the case against him began to mount up. Forensic investigators were able to match the many fibres found on Kelvin's clothing to those taken from von Einem's home, along with hairs found which matched those belonging to von Einem.
Forensics also determined that Kelvin was murdered between July 8 and July 10, 1983 and was dumped at the airstrip no later than the 10th. However, police raids on various locations around Adelaide linked to von Einem yielded few clues. Police also searched for a man who previously claimed to police during the investigation of the murder of Alan Barnes that von Einem was involved in his death and also that he was a former associate of von Einem. Barnes' fatal injuries mirrored those of Kelvin's closely.
The man, known as "Mr. B", was located and informed police in great detail how he and von Einem picked up young male hitchhikers, gave them alcoholic drinks laced with hypnotic drugs, and took them to von Einem's previous home in the Adelaide suburb of Campbelltown, where the young men were abused overnight and sent home the next day. "B" also provided further information about other associates of von Einem, but claimed he took no part whatsoever in any murders. Police also questioned women and transsexuals who von Einem associated with, however they volunteered little information.
With enough evidence, along with the information given by "B", to indicate that Richard Kelvin was at von Einem's home around the time of his death, police arrested and charged von Einem with murder on November 3, 1983. Von Einem still denied ever coming into contact with Kelvin.
The committal hearing to determine if there was sufficient evidence for von Einem to stand trial for murder began on February 20, 1984. Faced with evidence from prosecutors suggesting that Kelvin was in his company, von Einem changed his alibi to answer that evidence and claimed that he was in contact with Richard Kelvin on the night of June 5, 1983.
Von Einem said that he was driving along O'Connell Street in North Adelaide looking for a parking spot in order to buy some dinner. While looking for a parking spot in a side street, von Einem said that he nearly ran over Kelvin as he jogged in from his side.
Von Einem stated he thought Kelvin had bisexual tendencies and said that the two of them then had a conversation about problems Kelvin had been having at school, and Kelvin willingly got into the car and they drove to von Einem's home. Kelvin stayed for two hours before von Einem dropped him off in the Adelaide CBD near a hospital, and gave Kelvin $20 to catch a taxi home. Von Einem said that was the last time he saw Kelvin. However, there was enough evidence to suggest otherwise, and on May 25, 1984, Magistrate Nick Manos ordered von Einem to stand trial for the murder of Richard Kelvin.
The trial
The trial against Bevan Spencer von Einem for the murder of Richard Kelvin opened at the Supreme Court Building of South Australia on October 15, 1984 before Mr. Justice White. A jury of 12 people (seven women and five men) were selected and were agreed upon by the prosecution and defense.
Von Einem pleaded not guilty, and his defense was led by barrister Barry Jennings, and was assisted by Helena Jasinski, who was von Einem's solicitor from the start of the police's investigation of him in the murder during the previous year. The prosecution was led by Brian Martin QC (who is currently the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of the Northern Territory), with assistance from Paul Rofe (now the recently retired Director of the Department of Public Prosecutions).
For the prosecution, it was a matter of proving von Einem's guilt (along with unknown persons) by presenting the strong scientific evidence that was gathered during the investigation, and disproving von Einem's story of being in contact with Richard Kelvin on the night of June 5, 1983. For the defense, it was a case of trying make von Einem's story hold up in court, and raising doubts about von Einem ability to keep Richard Kelvin captive for five weeks and committing the murder.
The prosecution opened their case with the jury being taken to the various sites around Adelaide that were important in the trial, and over the first week they called various witnesses to the stand. Richard Kelvin's parents, girlfriend and best friend were called to testify that Kelvin was an average 15 year old who would not willingly get into a car with a stranger, and was heterosexual and had no homosexual or bisexual tendencies and that he was wearing the dog collar as a prank.
People living close to the Kelvin's then testified that they heard noises and commotion corresponding to the abduction taking place on the night of June 5 at around 6pm. Forensic pathologists were called to testify about the injuries to the head and anus on Kelvin's body and the likely cause of his death, and pharmacists gave evidence of the excessive amount of different hypnotic drugs von Einem had been prescribed 5172 tablets and capsules of six different brands of drugs between December 15, 1978 and August 10, 1983, and showed that von Einem often had prescriptions for drugs issued from different chemists on the same day or during the same weeks.
And various police who worked on the case testified to their investigation of von Einem since they first questioned him about the murder, as well as their visit to von Einem's home where a police officer claimed that von Einem's bedroom appeared to have been unusually cleaned quite "extensively".
Forensic scientists were called next to testify firstly when Kelvin died and when his body was dumped in the Adelaide Hills area and a leading entomologist claimed from the larvae cycle of flies that were on the body, and comparing these to the larvae cycle of flies on a dead dog that was nearby, that Kelvin's body must have been dumped on the airstrip near One Tree Hill on July 10, 1983.
Other forensic scientists were called to testify about the hair and fibre samples collected that were linked to von Einem himself and his home. Hairs from von Einem were found on and inside Kelvin's clothing and of 925 fibre samples found on Kelvin's clothing, 250 came from von Einem's home environment, with just seven from Kelvin's home.
The scientists stated that if von Einem's story was true, then there should be a very small amount or even none of the fibres and hair samples from that night still on Kelvin's clothing some 36 hours later, let alone five weeks later. Faced with such damning scientific evidence, the defense tried to counter this during cross-examination by floating a possible theory that after von Einem last contact with Kelvin, he was abducted by other people, who stored his clothing for five weeks before murdering him and re-dressing him.
While the forensic scientists conceded that this was a possible scenario, under recross-examination by the prosecution, they conceded that it would be still unlikely given the whole science of how fibres and hair are transferred from surface to surface over time. The prosecution then rested their case.
The defense opted for von Einem to give a unsworn statement from the dock, rather than given sworn evidence from the witness box. In his unsworn statement, von Einem detailed his alibi with what he claimed happened in his life between June 5 and July 11, 1983. He again claimed on June 5 he picked up Kelvin in North Adelaide, drove him to his home, and then dropped him off in the Adelaide CBD.
He also claimed that he was sick with the flu for the next week after that and did not return to work until June 14. Von Einem said he was quite sketchy on his activities after that, however he did remember what he did on July 10, the day the body was dumped on the airstrip. He said that he was at a relative's birthday party with his mother for most of that evening, and after dropping off a friend on the way home, went straight to bed and went to work the next day.
Von Einem also addressed the issue of the noisy exhaust on the car heard during the abduction of Kelvin, by stating that the exhaust on his Ford Falcon (which he sold on July 16, 1983 to raise money for his overseas trip) was less than two years old and in good condition. Von Einem closed his unsworn statement by again claiming his innocence.
The defense then called various witnesses in an attempt to corroborate von Einem's story. The witnesses included colleagues and friends of his to testify of him being unwell and at home during the first week of Richard Kelvin's captivity.
Also testifying for the defense was the geologist, who while walking his dogs through the airstrip discovered Kelvin' body on July 24, recalling that he was walking in the same area on July 10 during the early afternoon and the body wasn't there at that stage.
Others called to give testimony for the defense were the woman who purchased von Einem's Ford Falcon who detailed the condition of the car, and the relative who hosted the birthday party on July 10 who said that von Einem and his mother arrived there at 5:30pm and left at 10:30pm.
Photographs of the party that included von Einem were also tendered to the court. Finally, the defense called von Einem's mother to testify about her son's activities over the weekend when Richard Kelvin was kidnapped.
Under cross-examination, the prosecution were able to show inconsistencies in her current testimony compared to her earlier statements to police about von Einem's whereabouts on the weekend of June 4-5, which weakened von Einem's case considerably as this highlighted von Einem's change the previous February of his account of what happened on the night of June 5, 1983.
In their summation, the prosecution stated that the evidence they presented proved that von Einem's story was full of lies and inconsistencies, and that he did murder (with the help of others) Richard Kelvin. They also stated that his admittance of picking up Kelvin showed that he was in contact with him on June 5, the fibres and hairs proved that von Einem was with him at the time of just before and/or at the time of death, and the drugs proved von Einem was with Kelvin in between those times.
The prosecution also answered the doubts raised by the defense about when on July 10 the body was dumped at the airstrip, by suggesting that von Einem could have dumped the body sometime very late on July 10 or in the early morning of July 11 before von Einem went to work for the day.
The defense stated in their summary that the prosecution had failed to prove beyond reasonable doubt that von Einem was guilty of murder and also weren't able to establish the exact cause of Kelvin's death, so therefore the jury must give von Einem the benefit of the doubt.
Mr. Justice White then gave his summation of the trial, and in the early afternoon of November 5, 1984, the jury retired to consider their verdict.
Found guilty
After 7½ hours of deliberation, the jury returned to give their verdict. Bevan Spencer von Einem was found guilty of the murder of Richard Kelvin and was automatically sentenced to life at Yatala Labour Prison with Mr. Justice White imposing a non-parole period of 24 years. Under South Australian law, a third of the non-parole period could be taken off for good behaviour in prison, which meant that von Einem could be out on parole sometime in late 2000.
The Attorney-General of South Australia immediately appealed the leniency of the non-parole period, and on March 29, 1985 the Criminal Courts of Appeal in South Australia increased the non-parole period to 36 years, a record at the time in that state. The earliest von Einem could be released on parole was therefore on October 31, 2008.
Von Einem's defense team (now consisting of barrister David Peek with assistance from Helena Jasinski) appealed the conviction to the Criminal Courts of Appeal in South Australia and requested that a new trial be set. The basis for this appeal was the evidence given about Kelvin's heterosexuality, the references to von Einem's own heterosexuality through the trial and the negative impact that might have had on the jury, and also how Mr. Justice White in his summation did not include the testimony given by von Einem's relative about his attendance at the birthday party on the day Kelvin's body was dumped.
The Criminal Courts of Appeal rejected the appeal, saying that the trial was conducted fairly and just throughout, however they did concede that Mr. Justice White should have included the evidence relating to the birthday party.
More murder charges
Bevan Spencer von Einem was the leading suspect in the unsolved murders of four other young men between 1979 and 1982, and police continued to pursue leads on those cases in the years after his murder conviction. The four murdered were Alan Barnes in June 1979, Neil Muir in August 1979, Peter Stogneff in August 1981 and Mark Langley in February 1982.
In February 1988, the State Coroner at the time in South Australia, Kevin Ahern, ordered an inquest into the deaths of these four young men, and on March 24, 1988, the State Coroner in his findings stated that manner and circumstances in which the four were murdered was very similar to that in the case of Richard Kelvin, particularly the murders of Barnes and Langley. The reward for any information leading to an arrest for the murders was increased to $250,000, and this was lated increased to $500,000 in September 1989.
Following the inquest, police pushed on with their investigations and attempted to locate von Einem's former associates to question them about the murders. And during 1989 media interest in the four unsolved murders increased, with extensive news coverage in Adelaide about who was involved in the murders.
The media dubbed those involved "The Family", an alleged group of homosexual child sexual abusers possibly involving high-profile Adelaide establishment figures (doctors, lawyers, judges and politicians), a theory that still persists to this day, although police who have worked on the cases believe that the group doesn't involve any high-profile people in Adelaide. However, fuel was added to the rumours of a conspiracy, when on August 28, 1989, von Einem gave his one and only interview from prison, given to The Advertiser journalist Dick Wordley.
In the interview, von Einem again pleaded his innocence in the murder of Richard Kelvin and of the four other young men, and regretted taking his lawyer's advice to keep silent during the early stages of the Kelvin investigation. He also hinted that he could name people that could help police with their investigation, but feared for his life if he did and also claimed that his life was already threatened once by two police officers who ordered him not to give evidence in the inquest into the death of Dr. George Duncan in 1972.
Shortly after von Einem's interview, police interviewed "Mr. B" again who was now living in Sydney. "B" gave a statement about the Alan Barnes murder that convinced prosecutors to grant him immunity if von Einem was brought to trial. Police, now with "B"'s statement and the similar fact evidence from the Richard Kelvin case, then arrested von Einem at Yatala Labour Prison on September 15, 1989 for the murder of Alan Barnes.
On November 10, 1989, von Einem was also arrested for the murder of Mark Langley. Police were never able to obtain enough evidence for charges in the murders of Neil Muir and Peter Stogneff, though in the case of Muir an Adelaide doctor was tried for his murder in 1980 but was found not guilty.
The committal hearing to determine if von Einem should stand trial for the murders of Barnes and Langley began on March 5, 1990 before magistrate David Gurry. Von Einem plead not guilty to both murders, and his defense cousel (now consisting of barrister Mark Griffin with assistance from Marie Shaw) immediately claimed that it would be an abuse of justice for their client if he was ordered to stand trial given the mass coverage of the murders in the media in the past year.
The prosecution was led again by Brian Martin QC, who was assisted this time by Tom Birchall, and their case against von Einem relied on evidence of the Richard Kelvin murder, with the details of the crime being so strikingly similar to the murders of Barnes and Langley.
The prosecution's case also relied on evidence given by former associates testifying to von Einem picking up boys hitchhiking and sexually abusing them, as well as "B"'s sensational evidence being in the company of Barnes and von Einem at the time just before Barnes' murder. "B" also gave startling allegations of von Einem being involved in the unexplained Beaumont children disappearance in 1966, as well as the disappearance of two girls at the Adelaide Oval in 1973.
However, these allegations were unable to be proven. Another witness also came forward to claim he'd seen von Einem and Barnes together drinking in the weeks before Barnes' death. Also entered as evidence was samples taken from Barnes' body which showed that sedative drugs were present. Little evidence was presented for the murder of Mark Langley, as prosecutors felt if they could prove that von Einem murdered Barnes, then it would naturally follow that he murdered Langley as well.
On May 11, 1990, Magistrate Gurry ordered von Einem to stand trial for the two murders of Alan Barnes and Mark Langley. Von Einem's defense counsel appealed the decision, launching an abuse of process action in the Supreme Court of South Australia to achieve a permanent stay of proceedings, as well as stating that the huge media interest in the charges would result in their client not getting a fair trial. Proceedings began on June 19, 1990 before Justice Kevin Duggan, and six months later on December 17, 1990, Justice Duggan released his findings. He ordered von Einem to stand trial, however he expressed concerns with most of the prosecution's evidence.
The pre-trial hearing began on December 19, 1990 in the Supreme Court of South Australia, with Justice Duggan as the presiding judge. The prosecution decided after Justice Duggan's findings two days earlier to have von Einem tried separately for the murders of Alan Barnes and Mark Langley.
Justice Duggan ruled that the evidence relating to the Richard Kelvin murder and from the various associates of von Einem and hitchhikers was inadmissible, although he did rule that "B"'s evidence could be heard, but with the defense allowed to question the evidence as it was being given. This was a shattering blow for the prosecution's case, and on December 21, 1990, on advice from the Attorney-General of South Australia, prosecutors withdrew the charge for the murder of Mark Langley.
The prosecution tried to continue with the charge for the murder of Alan Barnes, however with the problems of getting enough evidence admitted into court from associates about von Einem picking up hitchhikers to convict von Einem still too great, the final charge was withdrawn on February 1, 1991. The prosecution, on the advice of the Attorney-General, then entered a nolle prosequi for the Alan Barnes murder charge.
On January 29, 2006, the Sunday Mail reported that von Einem is currently being investigated for allegedly raping an inmate several times at Yatala Labour Prison.
Recent events
2009
On 24 June 2009, von Einem was sentenced to a further 3 months for the possession of child pornography.
On 27 May 2009, von Einem pleaded guilty to possessing child pornography – the first time he has ever confessed to a crime.
2008
On 28 October 2008, it was announced police hope one of four suspects in the notorious Family sex murders will come forward to help solve the case after the State Government doubled a reward to $1 million. This announcement comes just days after Major Crime detectives interviewed von Einem from his prison cell.
On 18 September 2008, it was announced that prosecutors have dropped allegations that von Einem wrote stories of child pornography in his jail cell.
On 6 June 2008, it was announced that prosecutors have dropped one charge of producing child pornography, however von Einem is still facing charges of possession.
On 4 May 2008, it was announced that an Adelaide chiropractor who fled Australia while being investigated for involvement in the Family Murders is now being sought in Europe by Police. He was a former associate of von Einem.
On 27 April 2008, it was announced that police are set to travel overseas to interview several key witnesses as part of their new investigations into the Family murders.
On 13 April 2008, it was announced that police conducting fresh investigations into the unsolved Family murders will quiz transvestites who have information that could assist the inquiry. Some are former associates of von Einem and are likely to provide valuable information into the inquiries.
On 30 March 2008, it was announced that key suspects in Adelaide's notorious 'The Family' murders are being DNA tested as part of a new inquiry into the sex killings. Although von Einem is the only member of 'The Family' who was convicted, police are now reviewing the cold case.
On 28 March 2008, the ABC reported that the child pornography found in von Einem's cell has been determined to not have been written by von Einem and that fingerprints do not match. Defence lawyer Sam Abbott said he expects the Director of Public Prosecutions to drop the most serious charge of producing the material and, if not, he will argue there is no case to answer. It was also announced that von Einem has been excused from attending his court hearings so he can avoid an "unpleasant" three-hour drive with other inmates.
On 25 January 2008, The Advertiser reported that von Einem will not answer charges of possessing child pornography for at least another two months.
2007
On 7 December 2007, the ABC reported that von Einem has been granted a further adjournment before answering charges of possessing child pornography.
On 1 November 2007, the ABC reported that after 24 years behind bars, von Einem is now eligible to apply for parole. However, South Australian Premier Mike Rann has vowed to enforce new legislation to ensure von Einem never leaves prison alive.
On 11 August 2007, The Australian reported that detectives are calling for information to establish the identity of a young man seen in the Seven Network's news archive, showing police searching a storm water drain in the days after the Beaumont Children's disappearance. The man bears a striking resemblance to a youthful Bevan Spencer von Einem. On 13 August 2007, the Seven Network followed this with a story that the man standing next to the von Einem lookalike in their archived film matched the police sketch of the suspect seen with the Beaumonts at the beach on the day of their disappearance.
On 27 July 2007 it was announced that von Einem had been transferred from the maximum security B-Division of Yatala Labour Prison to Port Augusta Prison.
On 14 June 2007, the ABC reported that von Einem has been charged with producing and possessing child pornography, with police alleging that he handwrote three fictitious stories describing sexual acts between a child and a man. His lawyer believes a handwriting analysis will clear von Einem.
On 4 February 2007, the ABC reported that von Einem had been charged over commercial dealings during his incarceration, including selling hand-painted greeting cards.
2006
On 26 November 2006 it was revealed that von Einem had been prescribed Cialis by a prison doctor in 2003.
On 12 November 2006, the Sunday Mail reported that von Einem was receiving preferential treatment by some prison officials at Yatala Labour Prison which included home cooked meals for him and the use of a mobile telephone.
On 29 October 2006, The Australian reported that von Einem had been selling hand-painted greeting cards to prison officers for $20 each.
On 29 January 2006, the Sunday Mail reported that von Einem is currently being investigated for allegedly raping an inmate several times at Yatala Labour Prison.
29. "Bowraville Murders" Killer (3)
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| (The Bowraville murders) |
The Bowraville murders were a series of serial killings that took place over a period of five months from September 1990 to February 1991 in Bowraville, New South Wales, Australia.
Proposed serial killer responsible of the murders of three Aboriginal children in the same area, all bludgeoned to death. Thomas Jay Hart was tried for one of the murders and acquitted, and held as a suspect in another for which he did not face prosecution.
The murders
The three killings took place in the rural timber town of Bowraville on New South Wales' Mid North Coast region. There were several similarities between the disappearances that led police to believe that they were committed by the same killer:
-The murders all took place within the short time frame of five months.
-All three victims were Aboriginal.
-Autopsies of the two bodies that were found indicate both suffered blunt force trauma to the head.
-All three victims disappeared after parties in the Aboriginal community in Bowraville, in an area known as The Mission.
There were three victims in the series of killings. The first person to disappear was 16-year-old Colleen Walker, who was reported missing on 13 September 1990. The second to disappear was Walker's cousin, Evelyn Greenup, on 4 October 1990. The third victim was 16-year-old Clinton Speedy-Duroux on 1 February 1991.
Victim 1 - Colleen Walker
The first victim, Colleen Walker, was last seen alive at a party in The Mission, in the Aboriginal community, on 13 September 1990. The last positive sighting of Colleen was walking away from a group of people at the party. She was reported missing to the police the following day by her family. Despite the family being sure that something terrible had happened, the Missing Persons report was not taken seriously by police; no search parties were formed and no formal police action was taken.
Colleen Walker's body has not been found, although her weighted down clothes were later found by a fisherman in the Nambucca River. Much media commentary assumed Colleen was from Bowraville, but she was visiting family and friends and was from Sawtell.
Victim 2 - Evelyn Greenup
Two-and-a-half weeks after the disappearance of Colleen Walker, 4-year-old Evelyn Greenup disappeared after a party at The Mission, on 4 October 1990. She was last seen by her mother as she was put to bed some time during the night. The next morning she was gone from her bed.
Evelyn's skeletal remains were found six months later in bushland near the side of the road, about 5 kilometres (3.1 mi) from Bowraville. An autopsy could not conclusively determine the cause of death, but noted that a skull injury was "consistent with a forceful penetration by a sharp instrument".
Victim 3 - Clinton Speedy-Duroux
Approximately three months after the disappearance of Evelyn Greenup, 16-year-old Clinton Speedy-Duroux went missing after a party at The Mission. He was last seen leaving the party on his way to a house to sleep.
Clinton Speedy-Duroux's remains were found about two weeks later by farmers who were collecting wood.
Investigation and prosecution
In spite of two trials and a coroner's inquest, no one has been successfully prosecuted for the murders.
Arrest of Thomas Jay Hart
On 8 April 1991, a local Bowraville labourer, 25-year-old Thomas Jay Hart, was arrested for the murder of Clinton Speedy. Hart was well known in the Aboriginal community in Bowraville, and often attended the parties at The Mission.
On 16 October 1991, while on bail awaiting trial, Hart was arrested and charged with the murder of Evelyn Greenup. Despite a strong circumstantial case, Hart was acquitted of Speedy's murder by a Supreme Court jury on 18 February 1994, the third anniversary of the discovery of his body.
After the acquittal on the Speedy case, prosecutors did not proceed with the trial against Hart for the Evelyn Greenup murder.
Evelyn Greenup trial
In 1997, the New South Wales Police Commissioner Peter Ryan set up Task Force Ancud, to continue the investigation into the unsolved murders. In February 2004, an inquest was held into the murders, and as a result Thomas Jay Hart was charged again, this time for the murder of Evelyn Greenup.
The trial was conducted in February 2006. The prosecution provided strong evidence including two supposed confessions made by Hart. Despite the evidence and confessions, Hart was acquitted on 3 March 2006.
After-effects
The murders, and the fact that to date no one has been convicted of the crimes, is a source of pain and bitterness in the Aboriginal community in Bowraville.
After the acquittal of Hart in 2006, the NSW Police Minister raised the reward to $250,000 for information leading to the conviction of the persons responsible for the murders. The previous reward was $100,000 and it was only for Colleen Walker.
In November 2011 bones were found believed to be Colleen Walker-Craig but they were DNA tested and turned out to be animal remains.
In 2006, changes were made to double jeopardy legislation in NSW opening the way for retrial of any person acquitted of a life-sentence offence if "fresh and compelling evidence" was uncovered. On 8 February 2013, the Attorney-General of New South Wales, Greg Smith, chose to re-try all three cases in separate trials. The families of the three children have called for a Royal Commission to enquire into the conduct of the police investigation.
Facebook pages have been set up for victims families: Justice for Colleen Walker-Craig, and Justice for the Bowraville Children.
Submission to Attorney-General
In May 2016 The Australian newspaper released a weekly podcast examining the murders of the 3 children. Narrated by crime reporter Dan Box, the podcast resulted in significant national attention being placed on the three unsolved murders.
In May 2016, the detective-inspector leading the investigation made a submission to the Attorney-General calling for a retrial of the prime suspect based on new evidence.
28. Matthew James Harris (3)
(No Photo.)
Matthew James Harris (born 30 June 1968) is an Australian serial killer from Wagga Wagga, New South Wales, currently serving two sentences of life imprisonment plus 40 years imprisonment without the possibility of parole for the murder of three people in and around Wagga Wagga in October and November 1998.
Classification: Serial killer
Characteristics: Robberies
Number of victims: 3
Date of murders: October-November 1998
Date of arrest: December 1, 1998
Date of birth: June 30, 1968
Victims profile: Peter Wennerbom, 62 / Yvonne Ford, 33 / Ronald Galvin
Method of murder: Strangulation
Location: Wagga Wagga, New South Wales, Australia
Status: Pleaded guilty. Sentenced to 3 concurrent terms of 40 years imprisonment with non-parole periods of 25 years on December 20, 2000
The crimes
Robbery of Trang Nguyen: 20 June 1998
Harris, along with Kenneth Scott Frazier, forced their way into Trang Nguyen's house, threatening her with a knife in front of her three children. They robbed her of $58 which they used to buy alcohol.
Murder of Peter Wennerbom: 1 October 1998
Harris was friends with Elaine de Jong, who was the sister of 62 year-old Peter Wennerbom. On 1 October 1998 Harris forced his way into Wennerbom's house. He strangled Wennerbom to death. He later told police "He was an old man, there was no, no resistance at all. I had total, you know, control over the situation, he, he couldn't do anything".
Murder of Yvonne Ford: 17 October 1998
On 17 October 1998 Harris went to the house of 33 year-old Yvonne Ford, who had a mild intellectual handicap. Harris would later say he "just went there. I was probably out on one of me walks and I probably had a few drinks, in the area so I just went went to the house ended up there". Ford let him in, and after some time he made a sexual advance towards her. He later said "We struck up a bit of a friendship, as, just, just driving her around, and I obviously could tell she was lonely, she was slightly handicapped. I didn't come, I didn't come around here for sex, I didn't come around here for anything, I just came around to say Hello, I live nearby, but then these thoughts started entering my head that I wanted to kill her." As they sat in the bath together, Harris strangled her and held her under the bath for 3 or 4 minutes. "It could have been her, it could've been anybody. She was just unlucky...I just thought she would be easy, to target, she wouldn't put up a fight or ... she would be relatively easy to kill". Asked how he felt after the murder he said "powerful, angry, just anger, pure anger. Not, not that she, there was no sex or anything, I was angry at the world. This is why this whole thing has happened, has started, and it was just my total anger building up from, I don't know, from the day I was adopted, it's just all built and built and, and something has set, set me off and I, I killed her".
Murder of Ronald Galvin: 3 November 1998
On 3 November 1998 Harris strangled his neighbour, Ronald Galvin. The following evening he borrowed Elaine de Jong's car and drove Galvin's body to nearby Uranquinty. His only explanation of this murder was "... I think it was just a lot of anger I was getting rid of and it was being projected on him".
Suicide attempts
Harris overdosed twice on heroin a few days after Galvin's murder and in the early hours of 1 December 1998, the day of his arrest.
Sentencing
On 3 December 1999 Harris pleaded guilty to the murders and the robbery of Trang Nguyen. On 7 April 2000 NSW Supreme Court Justice Virginia Bell sentenced Harris to 3 concurrent terms of 40 years imprisonment with non-parole periods of 25 years in relation to the murders and 3 years imprisonment in relation to the robbery, making him eligible for parole on 30 November 2023.
On 2 May 2000 the matter was mentioned in New South Wales Parliament where it was noted that "Harris in a police record of interview said "… to murder and to keep murdering and to get away with it was an achievement …I'd still be going if I hadn't been caught."" and that the sentences were "far too lenient".
The Director of Public Prosecutions appealed against the murder sentences on the basis that they were inadequate. On 20 December 2000 the NSW Court of Criminal Appeal upheld the appeal and quashed Harris' sentences in relation to the murders of Ford and Galvin, substituting them with life sentences. Chief Justice Wood noted that "I am of the view that the criminality of the respondent, and the level of his dangerousness, are such that, notwithstanding the principles there discussed, it is necessary for the Court to intervene".
27. John Coombes (3)
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| (John Coombes) |
John Coombes (born eptember 14, 1954) is a convicted Australian serial killer. Coombes sentenced to life behind bars with no chance of parole. Justice Geoffrey Nettle said Coombes had "a frightening predilection for homicide’’, showed no remorse, and, given the opportunity, would kill again.
Classification: Serial killer
Characteristics: Dismemberment - Speirani's remains are never found
Number of victims: 3
Date of murders: February 26/November 17, 1984 / August 12, 2009
Date of arrest: November 2, 2009
Date of birth: September 14, 1954
Victims profile: Michael Peter Speirani, 20 / Henry Raymond Kells, 44 / Raechel Betts, 27
Method of murder: By driving over him in a motorboat / Stabbing with knife / Strangulation
Location: Victoria, Australia
Status: Sentenced to life with no chance of parole on August 26, 2011
Triple killer to die in jail for murder that 'ought never have happened'
It started with the tattooed leg. Normally a good start, as far as clues in a missing person's case go. Except that it was a leg without a body, water-logged and washed up on a Phillip Island beach.
In the days after that grisly find in August 2009, other body parts turned up on beaches. Police appealed for help to identify them, and so began one of Victoria's most gruesome murder investigations.
Today, it ended with monstrous triple killer John Leslie Coombes jailed for life with no chance of parole for strangling and dismembering childcare worker Raechel Betts.
After months of denials, Coombes, 56, in May pleaded guilty to strangling 27-year-old Ms Betts to death after the pair argued in bed at the Phillip Island home of friend Nicole Godfrey.
In sentencing, Justice Geoffrey Nettle said there was significant similarity between Coombes’ three murders - including the violence in which they were committed and the lies he constructed afterwards.
"It evinces a frightening predilection for homicide," Justice Nettle said.
He said he believed that Coombes was not remorseful and if given the opportunity to kill again, he would.
"It passes understanding that a sane human being could hack up and destroy the body of another as if, to use your own words, she were just a lump of meat," Justice Nettle said.
"The heinousness of that conduct is shocking. It bespeaks an utter disregard of the law and basic norms of society and depraved inhumanity towards the deceased, her family and her loved ones."
After strangling Ms Betts, Coombes cut the corpse into pieces in a bath, placed the body parts in plastic bags and threw them off a local pier. The bags later washed up on nearby beaches.
He then began a sexual relationship with Godfrey, who was in an adjoining bedroom as Coombes dismembered the body.
"I know she was chopped up in the bathroom," Godfrey told police during the investigation. "He took her into the bathroom because I was in bed and I had the TV (on) a little bit and I had my hands in my ears so I couldn't hear anything."
The court heard Ms Godfrey had given Coombes false alibis, claiming she feared for her own safety.
Godfrey pleaded guilty to perverting the course of justice and received a suspended sentence in return for assisting the prosecution.
Shaking outside court, Ms Betts' mother Sandra said Coombes was "a cruel monster", who had killed her daughter because she refused to become his mistress.
"Murder to him is better than sex," she said. "May he never be released and never have a chance to harm another human being or animal."
Coombes, a triple murderer, has a long criminal history that includes escape from jail, where he was serving a sentence for the murder of Henry Raymond Kells, 44, who was stabbed to death in his Chelsea home in 1984.
He was also later convicted and jailed for the murder of Michael Peter Speirani, 20, of Mount Martha, who went missing while on a fishing trip in February 1984.
He was paroled in October 1996 after serving time for the Kells murder, and arrested two months later over the Speirani murder. In 1998 he was sentenced to a minimum 10-year term for that killing. He was released on parole in February 2007.
Two-and-a-half years later, he strangled Ms Betts to death.
In June, Ms Betts' mother told the Supreme Court Coombes should never be released.
In her 50-minute victim impact statement, Sandra Betts urged Justice Nettle to lock Coombes up for life, given Coombes had two murder convictions before he killed her daughter.
"This murder ought not to have happened," she told the court, adding that Coombes' actions had handed her family a "life sentence of grief and loss".
"He represents a definite threat to society of murder and mutilation. Although the justice system has failed Raechel, it should never fail another person again," she said. "I don't want to find in 11 or so years John Leslie Coombes has been released and has again murdered another person."
Coombes' counsel argued Ms Betts was a drug dealer and said his client had "snapped" after she offered him a young girl for sex, having been sexually abused himself as a child.
However, the judge placed little weight on Coombes claims, saying he had a propensity to lie for his own advantage.
Coombes claimed that he had been the victim of a paedophile ring when he was younger and that he had seen service as a solider in Vietnam, but he had never seen any action.
Sandra Betts said he had learned to kill in the army and had been cruel and sadistic towards pets in the past.
Coombes told police that when he murdered Betts he cut off her breasts as she did not ‘‘deserve to die like a f---ing woman’’.
26. Claremont Killer (3)
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| (The Claremont serial murders) |
The Claremont serial murders is the name given by the media of the case of the murders of two young Australian women, aged 23 and 27 and the disappearance of a third, aged 18 in 1996 and 1997 in Claremont, a wealthy western suburb of Perth, Western Australia. All three women disappeared in similar circumstances after attending night spots in Claremont, leading police to suspect that an unidentified serial killer was the offender.
A man was arrested on 22 December 2016, in regard to the wilful murder of both Jane Rimmer and Ciara Glennon. According to a report by ABC News, the man is believed to have no previous link to the case. The man, Bradley Robert Edwards, was subsequently charged with both murders on 23 December 2016. He has also been charged over two other alleged attacks, one against a 17-year-old girl in Claremont in 1995, and the other against an 18-year-old woman in Huntingdale in 1988.
Other names: The Claremont Killer
Victims: 3+
Span of killings: January 1996–14 March 1997
Country: Australia
State(s): Western Australia
Background
The case began with the disappearance of Sarah Spiers, 18, on 26 January 1996, after she left a nightclub in the centre of Claremont. Her disappearance was described by her friends and family as out of character and attracted massive publicity. Spiers had apparently called a taxi from a phone booth but was not present when the responding vehicle arrived. Her fate remains uncertain.
Some months later, on 9 June 1996, Jane Rimmer, 23, disappeared from the same part of Claremont. Her body was found in bushland near Woolcoot Road, Wellard, in August 1996.
On 14 March 1997, Ciara Glennon, a 27-year-old lawyer, disappeared from the Claremont area. Her body was found on 3 April, near a track in scrub off Pipidinny Road in Eglinton, a northern suburb of Perth. After this murder police confirmed that they were searching for a serial killer.
Each of the women had attended either a pub called The Continental (later renamed The Red Rock and now known as The Claremont Hotel) and/or the nightclub Club Bayview.
Possible related cases
It has also been suggested by Liam Bartlett, a journalist, that Sarah Spiers was not the first victim. He wrote that police have told the father of a fourth missing woman, 22-year-old Julie Cutler, that his daughter was probably a victim of the Claremont killer.
Ms. Cutler, a university student, from Fremantle, vanished after leaving a staff function at the Parmelia Hilton Hotel in Perth at 9pm, one night in 1988. Her car was found in the surf near the groyne at Cottesloe Beach two days later. Her fate is also unknown.
Investigation and speculation
The Western Australian Police established a special task force to investigate the case. It was given the name "Macro". Several phases have elapsed in the course of the continuing work of the task force.
Initial suspicion focused on the taxi-drivers of Perth because of the women last seen in circumstances where they may have been seeking taxi service. There had also been a predisposition to this possibility because of reports from late 1995 of possible improper conduct by some drivers. A massive DNA-testing exercise was carried out to cover all of the taxi drivers licensed in Western Australia; a group of more than two thousand. A thorough review of the character/background standards for drivers was conducted and led to drivers with any significant criminal history being de-licensed. Training for drivers and examining standards for license eligibility were raised. Stricter standards were also applied to verifying that decommissioned taxi vehicles were stripped of any insignia and equipment that could be used to falsely purport that a vehicle was a taxi. While this had the beneficial side-effect of improving the quality of the taxi service and enhancing the confidence of the public in using it, the investigation itself does not appear to have progressed.
In the next major development, a junior officer of the Western Australian Public Service was targeted by police as the prime suspect, after he attracted their attention during a decoy operation. The suspect made himself known to the media and asserted his innocence. He was subjected to a high level of overt surveillance, apparently with the purpose of prompting a confession. Although this continued for several years, the suspect maintained his innocence and appears to have intact alibis. The police declared late 2008 that he was "no longer a person of interest".
It was reported that police also investigated whether Bradley John Murdoch, the convicted killer of British tourist Peter Falconio may have been involved, although Murdoch was serving a custodial sentence from November 1995 until February 1997.
One of the tactics used by the Macro Task-force was the distribution of questionnaires to "persons of interest", including various confrontational enquiries such as "Are you the killer?" The utility of this approach was disputed and the choice of persons to whom they were sent was controversial. One was a prominent civil libertarian and local government figure, Peter Weygers. He was mayor of the Town of Claremont at the time of the women's disappearance/demise and was involved in some disputes with the victims' families concerning the duty of care of the local authority in securing the district. He also was leasing a premises to a taxi-driver who attracted police attention to himself by claiming to have transported Sarah Spiers in his taxi shortly before her disappearance. Weygers' premises were raided by the police and he and his tenant were obliged to give samples for DNA testing. As with other avenues of investigation, nothing was to come of it.
In October 2006, it was announced that Mark Dixie (AKA Shane Turner), who was convicted in the United Kingdom for the 2005 murder of 18-year-old model Sally Anne Bowman, was a prime suspect in the killings, and the WA Police's Macro Taskforce requested DNA samples from Dixie to test against evidence taken during the inquiry. However, WA Police Deputy Commissioner Murray Lampard was later quoted as saying "Dixie was closely investigated at the time and eventually ruled out as a suspect."
In a memoir titled The End of Innocence, published in 2007, Estelle Blackburn, a Western Australian journalist and author, speculated that her former partner, who had assaulted and threatened many times to kill her, may be the killer; claiming that he had performed maintenance on taxi vehicles and often had overnight access to them. This was further explored in a two-part episode of the ABC's television programme, Australian Story, in November 2007.
25. Gregory Brazel (3)
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| (Gregory Brazel) |
Gregory John 'Bluey' Brazel (born 17 November 1954) is a convicted Australian serial killer, arsonist, and armed robber currently serving three consecutive life sentences for the murders of prostitutes Sharon Taylor and Roslyn Hayward in 1990, and the murder of Mordialloc hardware store owner Mildred Hanmer during an armed robbery in 1982 for which he confessed some eighteen years later.
Brazel is often described as one of the most manipulative and violent prisoners in Victoria's prison system, and was estimated to be worth more than A$500,000 in 2000. He will be eligible for parole in 2020.
A.K.A.: "Bluey"
Classification: Serial killer
Characteristics: Arsonist - Armed robber
Number of victims: 3
Date of murder: 1982 / 1990
Date of arrest: September 26, 1990
Date of birth: November 17, 1954
Victim profile: Mildred Teresa Hanmer, 51 (shopkeeper) / Sharon Taylor (prostitute) / Roslyn Hayward (prostitute)
Method of murder: Shooting
Location: Victoria, Australia
Status: Sentenced to three consecutive life sentences
Early life
Enlisted in Australian Army 1974. Trained at 1RTB (Kapooka) 14Platoon B Company. Posted September 1974 to Aust Army medical training school Healsville Victoria. In 1976, Brazel took five privates hostage during an army medical corps exercise in Healesville. Shots were fired before Brazel was persuaded to release the hostages. He was later dishonorably discharged.
Murder of Sharon Taylor
On 28 May 1990, while on early release from prison, Brazel murdered prostitute Sharon Taylor. Her body was found in a shallow grave at Barongarook,Victoria, South of Colac on 23 September 1990.
Murder of Roslyn Hayward
On 13 September 1990, Brazel murdered prostitute Roslyn Hayward at Sorrento. Her body was not discovered until 1 October 1990.
Murder of Mildred Hanmer
Mildred Teresa Hanmer was shot in the chest on 20 September 1982 during an armed robbery on her Mordialloc hardware and gift store. She later died in the Alfred Hospital from her injuries. Her murder remained unsolved until August, 2000.
On 18 August 2000, Brazel voluntarily confessed to the 1982 murder, seeking to make a deal with police officers that no life term would be imposed before agreeing to make a statement.
Prison life
Brazel has continued to regularly offend whilst imprisoned and is often described as being manipulative and violent. In November, 1991, Brazel took a staff member hostage while imprisoned at the HM Melbourne Assessment Prison when he learned of his impending transfer to HM Prison Pentridge.
In 2003, Brazel conned an elderly woman into deposting more than A$30,000 into a TAB telephone betting account for his own personal use. In 2006, Brazel was awarded A$12,000 in damages in an out of court settlement after suffering a violent attack with a broken bottle whilst imprisoned at Melbourne's privately operated Port Phillip Correctional Centre in Laverton in May, 2001. In October 2006, Brazel was caught collecting personal information relating to senior prison staff.
Summary of criminal convictions
During the period of March 1983 until August 2000 Brazel was convicted of 37 offences from fifteen court appearances. Offences since 1992 occurred while Brazel was in prison custody apart from the 2005 conviction for murder which occurred in 1982.
24. Eddie Leonski (3)
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| (Edward "Eddie" Joseph Leonski) |
Edward Joseph Leonski (December 12, 1917 – November 9, 1942) was a United States Army soldier during World War II. He was also a serial killer responsible for the strangling murders of three women in Melbourne, Australia. Leonski was known as both the "Brownout Strangler", given Melbourne's wartime status of keeping low lighting (not as stringent as a wartime blackout) and also as the "Singing Strangler" due to his self-confessed motive for the killings being a twisted fascination with female voices, especially when they were singing, and his claim that he killed the women to "get at their voices."
A.K.A.: "The Brown-out Strangler"
Classification: Spree killer
Characteristics: Rape - U.S. Army private
Number of victims: 3
Date of murders: May 3-18, 1942
Date of arrest: May 22, 1942
Date of birth: December 12, 1918
Victims profile: Ivy Violet McLeod, 40 / Pauline Thompson, 31 / Gladys Lilian Hosking, 41
Method of murder: Strangulation
Location: Melbourne, Victoria, Australia
Status: Executed by hanging at Pentridge Prison on November 9, 1942
Early life
Born in New York, Leonski grew up in an abusive, alcoholic family, and one of his brothers was committed to a mental institution. He was called up for the US Army in February 1941 and arrived in Melbourne on February 2, 1942.
Murders
On May 3, 1942, Ivy Violet McLeod, 40, was found dead in Albert Park, Melbourne. She had been beaten and strangled, and because she was found to be in possession of her purse it was evident that robbery was not the motive.
Just six days later, 31-year-old Pauline Thompson was strangled to death after a night out. She was last seen in the company of a young man who was described as having an American accent. Gladys Hosking, 40, was the next victim, murdered on May 18 while walking late at night near Melbourne University.
A witness said that, on the night of the killing, a disheveled American man had approached him asking for directions, seemingly out of breath and covered with mud. This description matched the individual Pauline Thompson was seen with on the night of her murder, as well as the descriptions given by several women who had survived recent attacks.
These survivors and other witnesses were able to pick 23-year-old Edward Leonski out of a line-up of American servicemen who were stationed in the city during World War 2. A Private in the 52nd Signal Battallion, Leonski was arrested and charged with three murders.
Trial and execution
Leonski confessed to the crimes and was convicted and sentenced to death at a United States Army general court-martial on July 17, 1942. General Douglas MacArthur confirmed the sentence on October 14, 1942 and a Board of Review upheld the findings and sentence on October 28, 1942. General Court-Martial Order 1 promulgated Leonski's death sentence on November 1, 1942.
In a departure from normal procedure, on November 4, 1942, MacArthur personally signed the order of execution (in future executions, this administrative task would be entrusted to his Chief of Staff, Richard Sutherland). Leonski was hanged at Pentridge Prison on November 9, 1942, only the second American serviceman to be executed during World War II.
Leonski's counsel, Ira C. Rothgerber, attempted to win an external review, even from the U.S. Supreme Court, but was unable to do so. Rothgerber kept the issue alive after the war, and Leonski's case contributed to the development of the Uniform Code of Military Justice (UCMJ).
Leonski was temporarily interred at several cemeteries in Australia. His remains were eventually permanently interred in Section 9, Row B, Site 8 at Schofield Barracks Post Cemetery, in a portion of the facility reserved for general prisoners who had died in military custody.
Fictional portrayals
The 1986 film Death of a Soldier is based on Leonski.
23. Martha Rendell (3)
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| (Martha Rendell) |
Martha Rendell (10 August 1871 – 6 October 1909) was the last woman to be hanged in Western Australia. She was convicted of murdering her de facto husband's son, Arthur Morris, in 1908. She was also suspected of killing his two daughters, Annie and Olive, by swabbing their throats with hydrochloric acid. Although the children died slow and agonising deaths, they had been treated by a number of doctors during their illness, only one of whom expressed any doubts about their deaths.
Classification: Murderer
Characteristics: Sadist
Number of victims: 3
Date of murders: July 28, 1907 / October 6, 1907 / October 6, 1908
Date of arrest: July 1909
Date of birth: August 10, 1871
Victims profile: Annie Morris, 7 / Olive Morris, 5 / Arthur Morris, 14 (her stepchildren)
Method of murder: By swabbing their throats with hydrochloric acid
Location: Perth, Western Australia, Australia
Status: Executed by hanging at Fremantle Prison on October 6, 1909. Rendell was the last woman hanged in Western Australia
Martha Rendell moved in with Thomas Nicholls Morris after he had separated from his wife, who had moved out and lived elsewhere. Morris had custody of his five children at the time. Rendell, who had known Morris whilst in Adelaide and had followed him west, moved into the house and posed as his wife. The children were told to call her "mother".
Rendell brutally abused Morris' children, once beating Annie so brutally that she could not walk. Arresting officer Inspector Harry Mann said "she delighted in seeing her victims writhe in agony, and from it derived sexual satisfaction".
Crimes
Rendell killed 7-year-old Annie first. Her method was to put something in the child's food that would result in a sore throat. It was alleged that she killed the children by swabbing hydrochloric acid on the backs of their throats, claiming it was medicine. This would inflame the throat until the child could no longer eat, and thus would starve to death. Annie died on 28 July 1907. Dr. Cuthbert issued a certificate stating the cause of death was diphtheria.
After killing Annie, she turned her attention on Olive, aged 5. Olive died on 6 October 1907, and again Cuthbert issued a certificate stating the cause of death was diphtheria.
In the winter of 1908 Rendell tried the same method on Arthur, the third son and youngest child still alive. Arthur, who was 14, took longer to succumb to the treatment, finally dying on 6 October 1908. Cuthbert asked permission for an autopsy. Rendell said she wanted to be present during the investigation. She stood by as the autopsy was performed, and the doctors found nothing to incriminate her.
In April 1909, she turned her attention on the second son, George. It didn't take long for the second son to complain of a sore throat after drinking a cup of tea. Rendell coated his tonsils with the syrup, frightening the boy, who ran to his mother's place some streets away. Neighbours would enquire as to the boy's whereabouts; however, his father Thomas Morris would state that he did not know.
Investigation, trial and execution
Neighbours went to the police, and inspector Harry Mann conducted inquiries. Mann heard repeated references to the children's having their throats painted, and that Rendell's apparent indifference to their pain. One neighbour claimed he often peeked in the windows to see Rendell standing in front of the screaming victim, rocking back and forth as if in ecstasy. Mann located George Morris, who had claimed to have run away because his stepmother had killed his siblings and was trying to poison him with spirits of salts (i.e. hydrochloric acid).
The inquiry was hampered by the period of time that had elapsed since the deaths, and because doctors could not say what effect swabbing with spirits of salts would have. Suspicions were further aroused when it was shown that Rendell had purchased large quantities of spirits of salts during the period of the children's illnesses, but none since the last death. Armed with this information the detectives obtained permission to exhume the bodies and this was done on 3 July 1909. Police exhumed the bodies of the three children; and diluted hydrochloric acid was found on the throat tissue.
Rendell and Thomas Morris were both charged with murder. Rendell protested her innocence, maintaining that she was treating the children for diphtheria. Although Thomas Morris was also charged with the murders, he was acquitted; it was believed that, although he had purchased spirits of salts, he had not been aware of the crimes until after the children's deaths. The jury wanted to find him guilty of being an accessory after the fact, but this was not allowed.
Rendell was sentenced to death.
Rendell's crimes aroused considerable public outrage at the time; the press portrayed her as a "scarlet woman" and "wicked stepmother". She was hanged at Fremantle Prison on 6 October 1909. She is buried at Fremantle Cemetery, in the same grave where serial killer Eric Edgar Cooke was interred more than half a century afterwards. Martha Rendell was the last woman executed in the state of Western Australia.
An illusion appears on one of the prison windows which can only be seen on the outside of the window; when inside the church looking out the glass is smooth and even, with no unusual shape or texture. An urban legend has it that this illusion is the portrait of Rendell, who watches over the prison.
In popular culture
The crimes of Martha Rendell were featured in an episode of the true crime TV series Deadly Women entitled "Pleasures For Pain".
22. Bandali Debs (3 – 5)
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| (Bandali Debs) |
Bandali Michael Debs (born 18 July 1953) is an Australian serial killer, currently serving four consecutive terms of life imprisonment for the murder of two Victoria Police officers in August, 1998, and also the 1997 murder of teenager Kristy Harty. Debs was detained at HM Prison Barwon in Victoria. On 12 December 2011 he was convicted of the April 1995 shooting murder of New South Wales prostitute Donna Ann Hicks. He is portrayed by Australian actor Greg Stone in the telemovie Underbelly Files: Tell Them Lucifer was Here.
Classification: Murderer (Serial killer ?)
Characteristics: Robberies - To avoid arrest
Number of victims: 3 – 5
Date of murders: June 17, 1997 / August 16, 1998
Date of arrest: September 24, 2001
Date of birth: July 18, 1953
Victims profile: Kristy Mary Harty, 18 / Sergeant Gary Silk, 21, and Senior Constable Rodney Miller, 28 (Victoria Police officers)
Method of murder: Shooting
Location: Victoria, Australia
Status: Sentenced to two consecutive terms of life imprisonment with no minimum term in February 2003. Sentenced to a third consecutive term of life imprisonment in May 2007
Personal life
Debs, from Narre Warren, a south eastern suburb of Melbourne was employed as a tiler. He had fathered five children. The youngest son of Debs, Joseph, was found dead due to a suspected drug overdose at a house in Greensborough in December, 2003.
Silk-Miller police murders
In February, 2003, Debs was convicted and sentenced to two consecutive terms of life imprisonment with no minimum term for the murders of two Victoria Police officers, Sergeant Gary Silk and Senior Constable Rodney Miller at Moorabbin, Victoria on 16 August 1998.
Accomplice, Jason Joseph Roberts, who was 22 at the time of sentencing, was also convicted of the police murders and sentenced to two consecutive terms of life imprisonment with a minimum term of 35 years.
Murder of Kristy Harty
On 20 June 2005, police charged Debs with the murder of troubled teenager Kristy Mary Harty, who was murdered at Upper Beaconsfield on 17 June 1997.
Harty was soliciting for sex along the Princes Highway when she met with Debs. The pair drove to a secluded bush track in Upper Beaconsfield where the pair had unprotected sex. Harty was later murdered. Her semi-naked body was later found lying face down by bushwalkers. A single gunshot wound was discovered at the rear of her head.
DNA tests revealed semen located on the body of Harty was linked to Debs.
In May, 2007, Debs was convicted of the murder of Harty and sentenced to a third consecutive term of life imprisonment.
In sentencing Debs, Justice Kaye remarked:
Your murder of Ms Harty was entirely senseless, needless and wanton. The evidence discloses beyond any doubt that this was not a case of a sexual encounter in which, in the heat of the moment, feelings or passions may have led to a spontaneous and irrational act of violence. Rather, and quite to the contrary, this was, most clearly, a callous, craven and senseless murder in cold blood of an entirely innocent, defenceless and vulnerable young woman. The evidence leads to the inevitable conclusion that you murdered Kristy Harty for no other reason than for the sheer sake of it.
Prison life
Whilst imprisoned, Debs has undertaken psychology, life skills and computer training and is employed as a prison carpet cleaner.
On 30 September 2008, Melbourne detectives interviewed Debs and raided his previous address as part of a murder investigation into the killing of 34-year-old Sydney mother Donna Anne Hicks. Hicks was shot dead in April 1995 in an unsolved murder. Debs has been linked to the case through DNA analysis.
21. Paul Denyer (3 – 5)
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| (Paul Denyer) |
Paul Charles Denyer (born 14 April 1972) is an Australian serial killer, currently serving three consecutive sentences of life imprisonment with a non-parole period 30 years at HM Prison Barwon for the murders of Elizabeth Stevens, 18, Debbie Fream, 22, and Natalie Russell, 17, in Frankston, Victoria, in 1993.
Denyer is known as the "Frankston Killer" as his crimes occurred in Frankston and neighbouring suburbs. Denyer was featured in the pilot episode of Seven Network crime series Forensic Investigators.
A.K.A.: "The Frankston Serial Killer"
Classification: Serial killer
Characteristics: Transsexual - He hated women in general
Number of victims: 3 – 5
Date of murders: June-July 1993
Date of arrest: July 31, 1993
Date of birth: April 14, 1972
Victims profile: Elizabeth Stevens, 18 / Debbie Fream, 22 / Natalie Russell, 17
Method of murder: Stabbing with knife / Strangulation
Location: Melbourne, Australia
Status: Sentenced to life in prison on December 20, 1993
Early life
Denyer was born to British immigrant parents, Anthony and Maureen Denyer in Campbelltown, New South Wales, an outer suburb of Sydney. His parents had immigrated to Australia in 1965. In 1981, the family relocated to Victoria.
Denyer reportedly had difficulty fitting in amongst his peers in his new town which led to problems with his self-confidence that was worsened by significant weight gain during his teen years. The abuse Paul suffered at the hands of his father did not help either, or the fact that he would witness many times his own mother being beaten up by his father.
Murders
Denyer stalked and murdered three women in and around the Melbourne suburb of Frankston during a seven-week period in 1993. Denyer was 21 at the time of his crimes. During a police interview Denyer said the motivation for his crimes was a hatred of women in general.
POLICE: Can you explain why we have women victims?
DENYER: I just hate them.
POLICE: I beg your pardon.
DENYER: I hate them all.
POLICE: Those particular girls or women in general?
DENYER: General.
Victims
The first victim was 18-year-old Elizabeth Stevens. She had just alighted from a bus to Langwarrin when she was dragged to nearby Lloyd Park. Her throat was slashed and a criss-cross pattern was carved into her chest.
A month later, the second victim, Deborah Fream, was abducted in the early evening. She had left her car unlocked to run into a store to buy milk. Denyer climbed into the back seat, and hijacked the car after Fream drove from the store. She was taken to Taylor's Road and, like Stevens, her throat was slashed savagely. She had left her 12-day-old baby at home with a friend when she left to buy the milk.
Rosza Toth was attacked by Denyer while walking home from Seaford railway station on the evening of Deborah Fream's abduction. Toth was dragged towards the toilet block. She managed to break free of Denyer's grasp and notified police.
The third and final victim, 17-year-old Natalie Russell, was attacked while walking home early from school. She had taken a short cut home along a bicycle track through a park. She was dragged from the path through a large hole in a wire fence, but put up a huge fight. This made Denyer angry, and he slashed at her head and neck. Russell's death was the most brutal.
Connections with the 1990 disappearance of Sarah MacDiarmid from nearby Kananook railway station were made. MacDiarmid's body has never been found. The only evidence suggesting a crime was a pool of blood next to her car, parked at the station. Denyer denied involvement in MacDiarmid's disappearance.
Similar connections to the murder of Michelle Brown have also been discussed. She was found naked, and her body was too decomposed to examine the injuries.
Sex reassignment requests
Whilst imprisoned, Denyer requested to be allowed to purchase and wear women's cosmetics, which was denied.
Denyer also filed freedom of information requests to learn of the Victorian government's policy on gender reassignment surgery for prisoners and has sought evaluation to determine his suitability for such surgery, which was also rejected by medical specialists.
20. Peter Dupas (3 – 6)
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| (Peter Dupas) |
Peter Norris Dupas (born 6 July 1953) is an Australian serial killer, currently serving three consecutive life sentences for murder. His violent criminal history spans more than three decades, and with every release from prison has been known to commit further crimes against women with increasing levels of violence. His criminal signature is to remove the breasts of his female victims.
As of 2007, Dupas has been convicted of three murders and is a prime suspect in at least three other murders committed in the vicinity of the Melbourne area during the 1980s and 1990s.
Classification: Serial killer
Characteristics: Rape - Mutilation
Number of victims: 3 – 6
Date of murders: 1997 - 1999
Date of arrest: April 22, 1999
Date of birth: July 6, 1953
Victims profile: Margaret Josephine Maher, 40 / Mersina Halvagis, 25 / Nicole Amanda Patterson, 28
Method of murder: Stabbing with knife
Location: Melbourne, Victoria, Australia
Status: Sentenced to life imprisoment with no possiblility of parole on August 22, 2000. Sentenced to a second term of life imprisonment on August 16, 2004. Sentenced to his third life sentence with no minimum term on August 17, 2007
Early life
Dupas was the youngest of three children, born into what has been described as "a fairly normal family". Born in Sydney, New South Wales, his family moved to Melbourne while he was still a toddler. With both siblings considerably older, his elderly parents treated him much like an only child. Dupas left high school upon completing Form 5, and later obtained his Higher School Certificate while in custody.
On October 3, 1968, at the age of 15, Dupas, still attending high school at Waverley High School in the eastern Melbourne suburb of Mount Waverley, visited his next door neighbour requesting to borrow a knife for the purpose of peeling vegetables. Dupas was apprehended after he stabbed the woman in the face, neck and hand as she attempted to fight off his attack. He later told police he could not help himself and did not know why he began to attack the woman. He was placed on 18 months probation and admitted to the Larundel Psychiatric Hospital for evaluation; he was released after two weeks and treated as an outpatient.
In October 1969, a mortuary located at the Austin Hospital was broken into. The bodies of two elderly women were mutilated using a pathologist's knife. One body contained a strange wound inflicted with a knife to the area of the thigh. Police now believe Dupas was involved in the break-in as the wounds inflicted matched that of a later murder victim, Nicole Patterson.
Senior Detective Ian Armstrong, who interviewed Dupas on November 30, 1973, at the Nunawading Police Station described Dupas as "weak and compliant" when confronted by authority.
“He stood out. To me the guy was just pure evil … His attacks were all carefully planned and he showed no remorse. We could see where he was going. I remember thinking, 'This guy could go all the way'.
He is an unmitigated liar … he is a very dangerous young person who will continue to offend where females are concerned and will possibly cause the death of one of his victims if he is not straightened out.”
After Dupas received a term of nine years imprisonment for rape in 1974, prison psychiatrist Dr. Allen Bartholomew noted Dupas was in constant denial of his criminal activity, noting at the time: "I am reasonably certain that this youth has a serious psychosexual problem, that he is using the technique of denial as a coping device and that he is to be seen as potentially dangerous. The denial technique makes for huge difficulty in treatment."
Sex offences
On July 25, 1974, Dupas was sentenced to nine years imprisonment with a minimum period of five years for an attack on a married woman in her own home. Dupas broke into the victim's house and threatened her with a knife before tying her up with cord and raping her. He threatened to harm her baby when she resisted his attack. The sentencing judge described the offence as "one of the worst rapes that could be imagined".
In 1979, approximately two months after his release from prison, Dupas again molested women in four separate attacks over a 10 day period. On February 28, 1980, Dupas received a five year minimum prison sentence for three charges of assault with intent to rape, malicious wounding, assault with intent to rob, and indecent assault. A 1980 report on Dupas stated "There is little that can be said in Dupas' favour. He remains an extremely disturbed, immature and dangerous man. His release on parole was a mistake."
Dupas was again released from prison in February 1985. Approximately one month later, he raped a 21-year-old woman on a beach at Blairgowrie. After alighting from his car, Dupas followed the woman and attacked her, holding her to the ground at knifepoint before raping her. He later told police: "I'm sorry for what happened. Everyone was telling me I'm OK now. I never thought it was going to happen again. I only wanted to live a normal life."
On June 28, 1985, Dupas was sentenced to 12 years imprisonment for the Blairgowrie rape, and released in 1992 after serving seven years of his sentence.
Less than two years after his release from prison, Dupas was arrested on charges of false imprisonment over an incident at Lake Eppalock in January 1994. Wearing a hood and armed with a knife, insulation tape and handcuffs, Dupas followed a woman who was picnicking and held her at knifepoint in a toilet block but was chased off by her friends. As he was leaving the scene he crashed his car and was apprehended.
On August 18, 1994, after entering a guilty plea to one count of false imprisonment in the Country Court in Bendigo, Dupas was sentenced to three years and nine months imprisonment, with a minimum period of two years and nine months. In September 1996, Dupas was again released from prison and moved into a house in the Melbourne suburb of Pascoe Vale.
Murder of Nicole Patterson
Nicole Amanda Patterson was a 28 year old psychotherapist and youth counsellor employed with the Ardoch Youth Foundation, an organisation formed to assist young drug users. Patterson had desired to operate her own private practice and was using her Northcote home as an office. She placed several classified ads in a local newspaper, the Northcote Leader in an effort to expand her client base.
Two neighbours reported hearing the screams of a young woman coming from Patterson's house between 9.00a.m. and 9.30a.m. on the day of her murder. Attempts by Patterson's boyfriend to contact her in the afternoon failed, raising suspicions.
On April 19, 1999 the body of Nicole Amanda Patterson was discovered by a friend in the front room of her Harper Street, Northcote residence. Patterson's friend had visited to attend a dinner engagement. Upon hearing music from a radio and discovering the front door unlocked, she entered the house and found the body of Patterson severely mutilated.
Patterson died from 27 stab wounds to her chest and back. Her body was discovered naked from the waist down, with her skirt found in a nearby bedroom and her underwear around her ankles. Small pieces of yellow PVC tape were attached to her body and both of her breasts had been removed using a sharp knife. Her handbag and drivers licence were stolen during the attack. The murder weapon and Patterson's breasts have never been recovered.
Arrest
Police investigations of the crime scene revealed Patterson had a 9.00a.m. appointment with a new client by the name of "Malcolm" as noted in her personal diary, alongside a mobile telephone number. The number was traced to an Indian student studying at La Trobe University named "Harry". Police learned Dupas had approached Harry with an offer of labouring work. On April 22, 1999, police arrested Dupas at midday at the Excelsior Hotel in Thomastown and charged him with the murder of Patterson later the same day.
Telephone records revealed Dupas had made three prior telephone calls to Patterson to arrange a counselling session to treat depression and a gambling addiction, the first from a public telephone booth approximately six weeks before her murder. Over the course of the next six weeks, Dupas made calls to Patterson in an attempt to establish her vulnerability. Dupas later told police he cancelled his appointment with Patterson after being told by her his problem was something he was able to work through of his own accord.
Police also noticed scratches on Dupas' face and hand, consistent with a recent struggle. Dupas claimed the scratches had occurred when he was working in his backyard shed and a piece of wood hit him while using a lathe; Dupas did not own a lathe, however. He later changed his story to the effect that the injuries were sustained while working in the shed and walking by a protruding piece of wood.
A police search of Dupas' home revealed blood stained clothing, PVC tape similar to that located at the crime scene, a ski mask, newspaper clippings detailing Patterson's murder and also a paper containing her advertisement for psychotherapy services.
Trial and appeal
After retiring for less than three hours, the jury returned to deliver a guilty verdict. On August 22, 2000, while sentencing Dupas to life imprisonment, Judge Frank Vincent remarked "...the prospects of your eventual rehabilitation must be regarded as so close to hopeless that they can be effectively discounted. There is no indication whatsoever that you have experienced any sense of remorse for what you have done, and I doubt that you are capable of any such human response. At a fundamental level, as human beings, you present for us the awful, threatening and unanswerable question: How did you come to be as you are?"
Dupas appeared in the Supreme Court of Victoria Court of Appeal in August 2001 to appeal his conviction for the murder of Patterson. His appeal was dismissed.
Murder of Margaret Maher
Margaret Josephine Maher, 40, was a prostitute working in the Melbourne area who was last seen alive at the Safeway supermarket at 12.20a.m. in Broadmeadows on October 4, 1997.
Her body was discovered under a cardboard box containing computer parts at 1.45p.m. on October 4, 1997 by Ronald Frank McDonald, who made the discovery while he was collecting aluminium cans beside Cliffords Road, Somerton with his wife, Eva and their children. A black woollen glove was found near Maher's body which police later confirmed contained DNA matching that of Dupas.
A post-mortem examination revealed Maher had suffered a stab wound to her left wrist, bruising to her neck, blunt force trauma to the area of her right eyebrow and lacerations to her right arm. Maher's left breast had been removed and placed into her mouth. At the time of Maher's murder, Dupas had been out of prison for just over a year after serving time for rape offences and was no longer under the supervision of the government corrections agency, Corrections Victoria.
Dupas was already serving a life sentence without parole for the murder of Nicole Patterson at the time of his arrest for the murder of Margaret Maher. With Dupas in custody, police were able to obtain a DNA sample, linking him to the 1997 murder of Maher.
Trial
During a trial lasting three weeks, evidence was presented to the jury that the removal of Patterson's and Maher's breasts were so "strikingly similar" as to be a signature or trademark stamp common to both crimes, thereby identifying Dupas as the killer of both women. The jury, who was not told Dupas was already serving a life term of imprisonment for the murder of Patterson, took less than a day to convict him of his second murder conviction. Upon hearing the jury deliver the guilty verdict, Dupas claimed "it's a kangaroo court" before being led away by court staff to begin his sentence.
After the guilty verdict, Kylie Nicholas, Nicole Pattersons sister, described Dupas as "...the most evil predator, a psychopath, a true evil predatory, cunning repulsive person. It's such a rare evil that comes into this world that's destroyed these women and our lives. We're just praying that this man is held accountable for everything he has done."
On August 16, 2004, Dupas was convicted of the October 4, 1997, murder of Maher and sentenced to a second term of life imprisonment.
Ian Joblin, a Melbourne-based forensic psychologist, released a report to the court attempting to explain Dupas’ sexual reoffending behaviour:
"Dupas attacked women to fulfil fantasies of conquest and control…For Dupas, the actual assault has not lived up to the fantasy which preceded the assault, and is seen at times as disappointing…He does not feel reassured by either his performance or his victim’s response and must find another victim, this time ‘the right one’. Thus, his offences become quite repetitive."
During sentencing, Kaye remarked he would have sentenced Dupas for a life term for Maher's murder even if he had not killed Patterson, saying:
"In view of your appalling criminal history, and in view of the particularly serious nature of the crime for which you have been convicted, it is only appropriate that you be sentenced to life imprisonment. Even if the murder of Nicole Patterson had never occurred, I would have no hesitation in imposing a term of life imprisonment upon you. "It is clear, both in the present case and from your previous convictions for rape and like offences, that your offending is connected with a need by you to vindicate a perverted and sadistic hatred of women and a contempt for them and their right to live. As such the present offence must be characterised as being in one of the most serious categories of murders which come before this Court. "You intentionally killed a harmless, defenceless woman who, like all your other victims, had no prospect of protecting herself against you. At the time you committed that offence, you had, over almost three decades, terrorised women in this State. You have repeatedly violated a central norm of a decent civilised society. Your conduct in the present case is without mitigation or palliation. There has been no recognition by you of your wrongdoing. Rather, you repeated the same offence, with even more brutality, 18 months after murdering Margaret Maher. "Based on your repeated violent offences, and on the gravity of this offence, there is no prospect of your rehabilitation. Nothing was advanced on your behalf to reflect that there is even the faintest glimmer of hope for you. Even if there were, any considerations of rehabilitation must, in this case, be subordinated to the gravity of your offending, the need for the imposition of a just punishment, and the principle of general deterrence. All those circumstances combine, in my view, not only to justify, but also to require that I do not fix a minimum term."
After Dupas received his second murder conviction, Victorian Attorney General Rob Hulls stated judges needed discretionary powers to tailor punishments for criminals such as Dupas and that more training may be needed to assist them in making their judgments. Hulls was quoted as saying, "There's no question that a formalised judicial education and training needs to be introduced in Victoria. I intend to investigate how that can best be done".
Felicity Hampell QC, president of civil liberties group Liberty Victoria replied in response to Hulls, "Neither imprisonment in itself nor parole in itself is going to stop everybody from committing offences. What's important to bear in mind is that a person has to be sentenced for the offence they've committed, and that might mean that somebody gets a sentence that is proportionate for the crime, but it doesn't cure them of the dangerousness or the characteristic that makes them continue to offend".
Appeal
On July 25, 2005, Dupas appeared in the Supreme Court of Victoria Court of Appeal to appeal his conviction for the murder of Maher on the grounds of:
"whether the judge erred in ruling that the facts of the mutilation of Patterson’s body should have been admitted at trial".
"whether the directions of the judge aimed at keeping the evidence of the Patterson murder discrete were sufficient".
"whether the judge incorrectly directed the jury regarding the compression applied to the deceased’s neck as one of three possible causes of death".
"if the matters relied upon in the other grounds listed above did not result in a miscarriage of justice, their "aggregate effect" did".
His appeal was dismissed.
Murder of Mersina Halvagis
Mersina Halvagis was a 25-year-old Melbourne woman murdered in an attack on November 1, 1997, while visiting her grandmother's grave in the Greek Orthodox section of Fawkner Cemetery in Fawkner, a northern suburb of Melbourne. The alarm was raised by Halvagis' fiancée when she failed to meet with him later that day as the couple had planned.
Halvagis' body was discovered at 4.35 a.m. on November 5, 1997, by Halvagis' fiancée in an empty plot, three graves from where her grandmother was buried. Police believe Halvagis was attacked from behind while kneeling to attend to a flower arrangement, and that she died from massive injuries, including 87 stab wounds about her knees, neck, with most wounds concentrated around her breasts. Her upper clothing had been pulled over her head towards her chest.
Dupas' home in Coane Street, Pascoe Vale was near the cemetery. Halvagis' murder had remained unsolved since 1997, with the Victorian state government, together with police offering a AUD$1 million reward for information leading to an arrest. The large reward was the fourth such reward of AUD$1 million in Victoria's history.
Frank Cole, an elderly resident of Pascoe Vale, claims he saw Dupas leaving the Fawkner Cemetery on the day of the murder. Cole had earlier claimed he shot a dingo he suspected had killed two-month-old Azaria Chamberlain who went missing at an Ayers Rock camping ground on August 17, 1980.
An anonymous female who was visiting her parents' grave on the day of the murder had seen Dupas wearing sunglasses jogging through out the cemetery casually.
Inquest
An inquest into Halvagis's death before coroner Graeme Johnstone heard circumstantial evidence in the case against Dupas in relation to the murder:
Nine witnesses identified Dupas as a man they saw at Fawkner Cemetery on the day Halvagis was attacked.
Dupas' grandfather's gravesite is located 128 metres from the crime scene.
Dupas frequented the 'First and Last Hotel', located opposite Fawkner Cemetery.
Dupas lied to police about a facial injury received about the time of the attack on Halvagis.
Dupas attempted to alter his appearance after Halvagis' murder.
Dupas was identified by a woman from police photographs, who said she saw him minutes before the attack 20 metres from where Halvagis' murder occurred.
Senior Detective Scarlett told the inquest a car known to be used by Dupas at the time of the murder was sold to a work associate in the month following the murder of Halvagis. The car has since been crushed for scrap metal and was never examined by detectives.
Forensic pathologist Professor David Ransom, who compared wounds suffered by Halvagis to the wounds suffered by Patterson and Maher, told the inquest there was insufficient evidence to suggest the wounds suffered by Halvagis were inflicted using the same knife or by the same person who had murdered Dupas' other victims.
Dupas' lawyer, David Drake, advised the inquest that the only evidence linking Dupas to the murder of Halvagis was the fact that Dupas had lived nearby to the Fawkner Cemetery, and his reputation based on prior convictions for similar offences. He further said police had relied upon their beliefs that Dupas had a propensity to attack women using knives, thereby linking him to the crime.
On August 1, 2006, the inquest was adjourned indefinitely following charges laid by police on Dupas for the murder of Halvagis.
Arrest
After obtaining a court order granting permission to interview Dupas in relation to Halvagis' murder, police collected Dupas from HM Prison Barwon on September 2, 2006, taking him to the St Kilda Road Police Headquarters in Melbourne for questioning. On September 11, 2006, police charged Dupas with the murder of Mersina Halvagis, after disgraced Melbourne lawyer, Andrew Fraser, revealed Dupas confessed to the killing of Halvagis while gardening weeds in Port Phillip Prison during 2002.
Fraser told police he once found a homemade knife concealed among weeds at Port Phillip Prison and he called Dupas over to inspect it, which is when the confession occurred:
"We regularly used to find stuff hidden in the garden, drugs, weapons and other stuff. I once found a homemade knife and called Dupas over to show it to him. He took it off me and started handling it, almost caressing it in a sexual way. Dupas then started saying 'Mersina, Mersina' over and over with this strange look on his face. I was certainly left in no doubt that Dupas murdered Mersina. "This wasn't some sort of jailhouse confession where somebody has gone in and sat in a cell one night and had a brew with another prisoner and somebody has allegedly said something. It's a lot stronger than that. Dupas and I spoke regularly, just the two of us. This was over months and months that he was talking to me and confiding in me. "There was one occasion when another prisoner came up to us when we were gardening and started abusing Dupas. This prisoner was yelling at Dupas saying 'You killed Mersina, you killed Mersina'. "After he had gone, Dupas turned to me and said 'How does that cunt know I did it?'
After agreeing to give evidence against Dupas, Fraser was released from Fulham Correctional Centre in Sale on September 11, 2006, two months early of his five year sentence for drug trafficking. The Victorian government has said Fraser is now eligible to apply for a share of the AUD$1 million reward offered for information leading to an arrest on Halvagis' murder.
Direct presentment to trial
The Victorian Director of Public Prosecutions withdrew the charge of murder in the Melbourne Magistrates Court and requested the case against Dupas be sent directly to trial, bypassing the committal hearing process. On September 26, 2006, Dupas appeared via video link in the Supreme Court of Victoria, charged with Halvagis' murder, entering a plea of not guilty. Dupas' barrister David Drake told the Supreme Court his client was being unfairly dealt with by skipping the usual process of a committal hearing in the Magistrates' Court.
The Supreme Court of Victoria ruled on whether Dupas would face a committal hearing in November 2006. On November 14, 2006, Dupas appeared in the Supreme Court of Victoria before Justice John Coldrey, where he requested an opportunity to be able to cross-examine witness Andrew Fraser before a criminal trial takes place.
On December 12, 2006, the Supreme Court of Victoria ordered Dupas be presented directly to trial for the murder of Mersina Halvagis, bypassing the usual committal hearing process
Trial
The trial for the murder of Mersina Halvagis ran for 22 days. On July 9, 2007, the jury selected for the trial was discharged on a "legal technicality" when prosecutor Colin Hillman, SC advised Justice Philip Cummins that a failure to comply with the Jury Act had occurred when potential jurors were not advised of the possible duration of the trial.
Prosecution witness and disgraced lawyer Andrew Fraser described to the jury how Dupas attacked Halvagis. Fraser has now submitted a claim to the $1 million reward.
Dupas was found guilty of the murder of Mersina Halvagis on August 9, 2007 and appeared for a pre-sentencing hearing eight days later. Dupas was sentenced to his third life sentence with no minimum term. The sentencing judge allowed permission for one television camera to record the sentencing of Dupas, the only televised sentencing in Australia since the 1995 sentencing of child killer Nathan John Avent. Upon sentencing Dupas, the judge said "life means life".
On September 10, 2007, lawyers for Dupas submitted an appeal on the basis the verdict of guilty for the murder of Halvagis was unsafe and unsatisfactory.
On September 17, 2009, Dupas's appeal against the conviction was upheld in Victoria's Court of Appeal by a two to one majority. The Court ruled that the directions of the judge in the original trial were inadequate.
On October 14, 2009, Lawyers for Dupas argued that the procedings against him should be stayed permenanently based on the publicity surrounding the case. Victorian Supreme Court Justice Paul Coghlan disagreed and set the trial date for April 7, 2010.
Murder of Helen McMahon
Helen McMahon was a 47-year-old woman found bashed to death on a Rye beach in February 13, 1985. Although Dupas was imprisoned at the time of McMahon's murder and was not released until two weeks later, investigators learned Dupas was on pre-release leave from prison and living in the Rye area when McMahon was killed.
McMahon was sunbathing topless on the beach when attacked. Her body was discovered naked, covered by her beach towel. The location of the murder of McMahon was nearby to the location where Dupas had earlier raped a 21-year-old woman at a beach in Blairgowrie, for which he was convicted and served a term of imprisonment. Police believe McMahon may have been Dupas' first murder victim, although her murder officially remains unsolved.
Murder of Renita Brunton
Dupas is a suspect in the murder of 31-year old Renita Brunton at Sunbury, Victoria in 1993.
Murder of Kathleen Downes
Dupas is a suspect in the murder of 95-year-old Kathleen Downes at the Brunswick Lodge nursing home in Brunswick. Downes was stabbed to death at 6:30a.m. on December 31, 1997, a month after Halvagis' murder. Police investigations revealed Dupas had telephoned the nursing home some time before the murder. No charges have been laid regarding Downes' murder. Her murder is being considered for referral to the State Coroner.
Marriage
While imprisoned at Melbourne's Pentridge Prison, Dupas formed a relationship with mental health nurse Grace McConnell, who was 16 years his senior. The pair married in 1987 inside Castlemaine Gaol.
McConnell described her marriage to Dupas during the inquest into the murder of Mersina Halvagis:
"He insisted that he was in love with me .... and that with my help he could come out of himself and become a normal person. I agreed (to marry Dupas), not out of particular love for this man but from a sense of responsibility to helping him become a useful member of the community. In my mind, our relationship was mother and son. "Our sex life was very basic, almost non-existent. I would go along with it out of a sense of responsibility … It got to the stage where I could not bear him touching me.
His new wife found him to be a self-obsessed, lazy, needy, and a snob, and they divorced during the mid 1990s.
Prison life
As of 2006, Dupas is serving his sentences between the maximum security protection unit of Port Phillip Correctional Centre, at Laverton and HM Prison Barwon in Lara, a northern suburb of Geelong. He has attempted suicide several times while imprisoned. Prison staff describe him as a model prisoner while in custody and "a monster" whenever released.
Summary of criminal convictions
Before his first conviction for murder, Dupas had 16 prior convictions involving acts of sexual violence from six court appearances between March 27, 1972 and November 11, 1994.
July 25, 1974- Rape - Sentenced to 9 years imprisonment.
February 28, 1980 - Rape - Committed two months after his release from prison. Sentenced to 5 years imprisonment.
June 28, 1985 - Rape - Committed 4 days after his release from prison. Sentenced to 12 years imprisonment.
August 18, 1994 - False imprisonment - Sentenced to 3 years imprisonment.
August 22, 2000 - Murder - Nicole Patterson. Sentenced to life imprisonment with no minimum period.
August 16, 2004 - Murder - Margaret Maher. Sentenced to life imprisonment with no minimum period.
August 9, 2007 - Murder - Mersina Halvagis. Sentenced to life imprisonment with no minimum period on August 27, 2007.
Chronology
July 6, 1953 born
October 3, 1968 at age fifteen he stabbed his female neighbour and received eighteen months probation
July 25, 1974 sentenced to 5 to 9 years imprisonment for rape aged 21
1979 approximately two months after his release from prison, Dupas again molested women in four separate attacks over a ten day period.
February 28, 1980 Dupas received a five year minimum prison sentence for three charges of assault with intent to rape, malicious wounding, assault with intent to rob, and indecent assault.
1985 February released from prison
June 28, 1985 Dupas was sentenced to twelve years imprisonment for rape that was committed four days after his release from prison. Less than two years after his release from prison, Dupas was arrested on charges of false imprisonment over an incident at Lake Eppalock during January 1994
August 18, 1994 after entering a guilty plea to one count of false imprisonment, Dupas was sentenced to three years and nine months imprisonment, with a minimum period of two years and nine months.
1996 September Dupas released from prison
October 4, 1997 The murdered body of Margaret Josephine Maher was discovered.
November 4, 1997 Mersina Halvagis murdered. Body discovered the next day.
April 19, 1999 The murdered body of Nicole Amanda Patterson was discovered.
April 22, 1999 police arrested Dupas
August 22, 2000 Sentenced to life imprisonment for the murder of Nicole Patterson with no minimum period.
August 16, 2004 Dupas was convicted of the murder of Maher and sentenced to a second term of life imprisonment.
September 11, 2006 police charged Dupas with the murder of Mersina Halvagis August 9, 2007 Dupas was convicted of the murder of Mersina Halvagis.
August 27, 2007 Dupas sentenced to serve life imprisonment for the murder of Mersina Halvagis.
September 17, 2009 Dupas' appeal upheld against conviction for the murder of Mersina Halvagis, verdict set aside.
19. Kathleen Folbigg (4)
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| (Kathleen Megan Folbigg (née Donovan)) |
Kathleen Megan Folbigg (née Donovan) (born 14 June 1967) is an Australian serial child killer. Folbigg was convicted of murdering her three infant children, Patrick Allen (at age eight months), Sarah Kathleen (at age 10-months) and Laura Elizabeth (at age 19 months). Folbigg was also convicted of the manslaughter of a fourth child, Caleb Gibson (at age 19 days). The murders took place between 1991 and 1999, coming to an end only when her husband discovered her personal diary, which detailed the killings.
Folbigg was originally sentenced to 40 years' jail, with a non-parole period of 30 years, but on appeal this was reduced to 30 years, with a non-parole period of 25 years. Folbigg maintains her innocence, claiming the four children died from natural causes.
Classification: Murderer (Serial child killer)
Characteristics: Parricide - The motive remains unknown
Number of victims: 4
Date of murder: 1989 - 1999
Date of arrest: April 19, 2001
Date of birth: June 14, 1967
Victims profile: Her four infant children, Patrick Allen, 8-month-old, Sarah Kathleen, 10-month-old, Laura Elizabeth, 19-month-old, and Caleb Gibson, aged 19 days
Method of murder: Smothering
Location: New South Wales, Australia
Status: Sentenced to 40 years' imprisonment with a non-parole period of 30 years on October 24, 2003. The court reduced her sentence to 30 years' imprisonment with a non-parole period of 25 years on appeal on February 17, 2005
Early life
On 8 January 1969, Folbigg's natural father, Thomas John Britton, murdered her mother, also named Kathleen, by stabbing her 24 times. Following her father's arrest on the day after the murder, Folbigg was made a ward of the state and placed into foster care with a couple.
On 18 July 1970, Folbigg was removed from the care of the foster couple and placed into Bidura Children's Home.
In September 1970, Folbigg moved into the home of Mr and Mrs Marlborough, a couple who also provided foster care and expressed a desire to adopt Folbigg. While living there she was treated, particularly by Diedre Marlborough as a slave and not allowed to spend time with friends often.
She was not told of her mother's murder by her father until 1984, in fact she was not told that she had always been a ward of the state, always believing she had been adopted by the Marlborough's. Kathleen completed her Trial HSC in 1985 at Kotara High School, until life at home became unbearable and she was forced to leave home and school, finding work and then met Craig Gibson Folbigg in 1985. The pair formed a relationship and bought a home in the north-western Newcastle, New South Wales suburb of Mayfield in May 1987. They married in September that same year.
Deaths
Caleb Gibson
Caleb Gibson Folbigg was born a healthy baby on 1 February 1989. Caleb was known to breathe noisily and was diagnosed by a pediatrician to be suffering from a mild case of laryngomalacia, something he would eventually outgrow. On 20 February 1989, Folbigg put Caleb to sleep in a room adjoining the room she shared with her husband.
During the night, Caleb stirred from midnight until 2 a.m. Folbigg attended to her baby's cries, subsequently smothering him. The death was attributed to sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS).
Patrick Allen
Patrick Allen Folbigg was born on 3 June 1990. Craig Folbigg remained at home to help care for his wife and baby for three months after the birth. On 18 October 1990, Folbigg put Patrick to bed. Craig Folbigg was awakened by the sounds of his wife screaming and found her standing at the baby's cot. He noticed the child wasn't breathing and attempted to revive him by cardiopulmonary resuscitation. An ambulance was called and Patrick was taken to hospital. Patrick would later be diagnosed to be suffering from epilepsy and cortical blindness.
Sarah Kathleen
The couple moved to Thornton in the City of Maitland. Sarah Kathleen Folbigg was born on 14 October 1992, and died on 29 August 1993.
Laura Elizabeth
In 1996, the couple moved to Singleton. On 7 August 1997, Laura Elizabeth Folbigg was born. On 27 February 1999, Laura died.
Trial
Folbigg's trial lasted seven weeks. During a jury replay of Folbigg's police interview, she attempted to run from the court room.
The prosecution alleged Folbigg murdered her four children by smothering them in periods of frustration. Folbigg relied on the defense that all four of her children had died from natural causes and denied that the contents of her diary related to the killing of her children.
The defence case:
The appellant did not kill her children or harm Patrick... She did not think Craig was responsible for their deaths... There were natural explanations for the events, such as Sudden Infant Death Syndrome and, in the case of Laura's death, myocarditis. The appellant in fact was a caring mother, who, for example, always kept her children clean and tidy and was attentive to their appointments with doctors. Many of her diary entries in fact showed that she was concerned as a parent and enjoyed being a parent, something that was noticed by Craig and other witnesses at various times and passed on to the police during their investigations.
There was no direct statement of responsibility for a death and it is understandable how a mother would blame herself in the appellant's situation, even though she was not responsible. There was no 'failure to thrive' by the children, apart from Patrick's difficulties with epilepsy and blindness, and they were well-nourished and cared for. The appellant appeared to be utterly distraught when the ambulance officers, the former police officer Mr. Saunders and others came to the house after the deaths of the children.
Prosecution had no evidence that was not circumstantial, and questioned at least eight expert witnessess. None of the doctors came to a consensus on the cause of death for any children.
Verdict
On 21 May 2003, Folbigg was found guilty by the Supreme Court of New South Wales jury of the following crimes: three counts of murder, one count of manslaughter and one count of maliciously inflicting grievous bodily harm. On 24 October 2003, Folbigg was sentenced to 40 years' imprisonment with a non-parole period of 30 years.
Appeal
On 17 February 2005, the court reduced her sentence to 30 years' imprisonment with a non-parole period of 25 years on appeal. Due to the nature of her crimes, Folbigg resides in protective custody to prevent possible violence by other inmates.
Further reading
Benns, Matthew (2003). When the Bough Breaks: The True Story of Child Killer Kathleen Folbigg. Sydney: Bantam Books.
18. Arnold Sodeman (4)
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| (Arnold Sodeman) |
Arnold Karl Sodeman (12 December 1899 – 1 June 1936), also known as the School-girl Strangler, was a serial killer who targeted children. He confessed to four killings before being executed at Pentridge Prison, Victoria in 1936. Sodeman was the second of eleven people to be hanged at Pentridge Prison after the closure of Melbourne Gaol in 1929.
A.K.A.: "The School-girl Strangler"
Classification: Serial killer
Characteristics: Rape - Alcoholic
Number of victims: 4
Date of murders: 1930 - 1935
Date of birth: December 12, 1899
Victims profile: Mena Griffiths, 12 / Hazel Wilson, 16 / Ethel Belshaw, 12 / June Rushmer, 6
Method of murder: Strangulation
Location: Melbourne, Victoria, Australia
Status: Executed by hanging at Pentridge Prison, Melbourne, on June 1, 1936
Early life
Arnold Karl Sodeman was born in Victoria in 1899. His mother suffered from bouts of amnesia and his father and grandfather had both died in mental institutions. At 18, Sodeman had been sent to a reformatory for 12 months for fraud.
It wasn't long after his release from the reformatory before he was in trouble with police again for armed robbery and wounding of the station master at Surrey Hills train station. Sodeman was sent to prison to serve 3 years hard-labour. Whilst in prison, Sodeman escaped and given another 12 months of hard-labour to add to his existing sentence. By the time he was released in 1922, he was a well-seasoned criminal.
Released in 1926, Sodeman settled down to various labouring jobs, at first in Melbourne and later in Gippsland. He married Bernice Pope at Collingwood and their daughter was born in 1928. The marriage was a happy one; although Sodeman seemed to suffer from occasional bouts of depression and frequent drunkenness, he was never violent to his family. To those who knew him he was a hard-working, mild and amiable man with a generous disposition. He led a normal, law-abiding existence until 1930.
The murders
On November 9, 1930, Arnold Sodeman abducted a 12 year old schoolgirl, Mena Griffiths. He came upon his victim at the local playground playing with a group of friends. He gave the other girls some money, and told them to go to the shop to get some candy; meanwhile, he told his victim that he had a different errand for her to run. By the time the little girl's friends returned to the playground, there was no sign of the man or their friend. Griffith’s body was discovered 2 days later at Ormond, in an abandoned building. She had been gagged, bound and strangled to death.
On January 10, 1931, he abducted a 16 year old Hazel Wilson and strangled her to death. Her body was also found in the suburb of Ormond. He had gagged both girls and tied their hands behind their backs with portions of their clothing.
Sodeman struck for the third time on January 1, 1935. His victim, Ethel Belshaw, was a 12 year old girl whom he strangled at the sea-side town of Inverloch. Belshaw was intending to buying an ice cream when she disappeared.
On December 1, 1935, Sodeman killed his fourth victim, a 6 year old girl named June Rushmer. He met her while she was walking home from a local park. Her body was found the following day less than 2 kilometres (1.2 mi) from her Leongatha home. She had also been bound, gagged and strangled. Witnesses stated that they had seen the child with a man on a bicycle shortly before her disappearance.
Sodeman at the time was working with a crew fixing the shires roads. During morning smoko, a fellow co-worker had jokingly stated that he had seen Sodeman on his bike near the crime scene. Sodeman replied angrily that he wasn't there. He had answered with such anger and rage, it was very out of character for him to react that way the workers told police.
Police rushed to Sodeman's worksite and took him away for questioning. As soon as police had him in their custody, Sodeman confessed to the crimes. Police were skeptical of him at first, but when he gave details of the crimes that only the killer could have known, they knew they had the right person. Whilst confessing to the crimes, Sodeman told police how he would link his thumbs together to simplify the choking of his victims.
June Rushmer inquest
The little court house at Leongatha was crowded to-day, when the inquest on June Rushmer, aged 6, whose bound and gagged body was found in the scrub on December 2, was resumed. Arnold Sodeman, 36, of Leongatha who has been charged with murder, was present in court. The Government Pathologist, Dr. Mollison, said that the dead girl's hands were tied behind her back with a piece of cloth, and a bloodstained garment was pushed into her mouth. A piece of torn sock was tied around her neck. The body bore bruises. Death, he thought was due to suffocation.
Nancy Viola Smith, aged 12, said that she played with June Rushmer on the Leongatha reserve on December 1. June Rushmer left the park at 7.15 p.m.
William Henry Money, of Leongatha said that at 7.15 p.m. on December 1 he saw Sodeman riding his bicycle in the direction of the reserve. Sodeman had a strange look on his face and the witness thought it peculiar. Sodeman did not speak to him.
Vincent Desmond Ryan of Leongatha, said that between 7.15 and 7.30 p.m. on December 1 he saw a man with a little girl on the front of his cycle. The child was similar in build to June Rushmer, but witness was 90 yards away and could not see him properly.
Senior Detective O'Keefe said that Detective Delminico said to Sodeman : "If you care to tell us what you had to do with the death of the girl, I will leave the room. " Sodeman replied, "No you can stay." He continued, "there is not only this one." He then made a statement.
The statement set out "I saw June Rushmer on the footpath walking towards her home near the tennis court and she said, 'Give us a ride.' I knew her and she knew me. I agreed, and rode down the stock route and turned down the road leading to the sanitary depot. About 100 yards from the corner, she said, 'This is far enough.' I got off the bike and said 'You can walk home.' I made a run towards her and she ran into the bush. I ran after her, and caught her round the neck, and she started to scream. I held her by the neck and she went limp all of a sudden. I then took off her bloomers and jammed them into her mouth. I got a belt from her frock and tied it over her mouth and round the back of her neck." Sodeman was committed for trial by the Coroner.
Trial and sentencing
At the conclusion of the two-day trial, in February 1936 the jury found him guilty of murder. The judge sentenced him to death for the murder of Rushmer.
Judge Charles Gavan Duffy advised the jury to distinguish between opinions given by expert medical witnesses on matters relating to the physical body, which could be proved by surgery, and those concerning the mind. Rejecting Sodeman's defence of insanity.
The defence
The government medical officer Dr A. J. W. Philpott, his assistant Dr R. T. Allan and a psychiatrist Dr Reginald Ellery all gave evidence that Sodeman was suffering from a disorder of the mind which created an 'obsessional impulse' of such power that—under the influence of alcohol—he was no longer responsible for his behaviour. Since Sodeman was intoxicated on all four occasions, the doctors concluded that he was insane at the times of the murders. Their conclusion was reinforced not only by Sodeman's repetitive behaviour, but also by his family's medical history: both his father and grandfather had died insane.
Appeals
An extract from the Argus, Friday 24 April 1936, read, "An English King's Counsel has now been engaged to plead the case before the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council of Arnold Sodeman, who has been condemned to death for the murder of June Rushmer at Leongatha. Sodeman's solicitor (Mr. C H. Auty) said yesterday that he had arranged by cable message for Mr D. N Pritt, K C, a leading Kings Counsel, and a member of the House of Commons, to appear for Sodeman in the proposed application by him for special leave to appeal against the refusal of the High Court of Australia to grant him special leave to appeal against his conviction. Mr Auty said that his agents in London would instruct Mr. Pritt and another barrister, who would act as Mr Pritt's Junior, regarding the details of the application Meanwhile, Mr. Auty has addressed a written request to the Premier Mr. Dunstan) that the Government should grant a further reprieve to Sodeman until such time as the condemned man's application to the Privy Council has been determined Mr Auty said yesterday that he was now 'preparing the petition for special leave to appeal and other necessary documents. He expected that those documents would be ready in time to be despatched to England next week'. One of the documents which must shortly go forward to London is an affidavit in support of the application. This must be signed by Sodeman, whose present reprieve expires on May 4, for which day the execution has been fixed. It is expected that the Executive Council will grant the reprieve now asked for by Mr. Auty It is expected that a report will be received from the Crown Law Department next week, and if the Cabinet decides that the request should be granted the necessary action will be taken immediately by the Executive Council. Sodeman's appeal against his conviction was unsuccessful. The grounds of the appeal were:-(1) That the learned trial Judge wrongly admitted evidence, namely, the evidence of the deaths of Mena Griffiths, Hazel Wilson, and Ethel Belshaw; (2) that the learned trial judge misdirected the jury (a) as to the onus of proof in a case of insanity, (b) as to the requirements of the law in relation to insanity, and (c) as to the law relating to drink, insanity, and manslaughter; and (3) that the prosecution and the learned trial Judge made comments on the failure of the accused to give evidence.
Execution eve
He had not wanted a reprieve because of the fear that if he lived he may have committed more murders. Sodeman spent a good deal of yesterday playing draughts with Edward Cornelius, who is under sentence of death for the murder of the Rev. Cecil in Fitzroy in November of last year. His last words to the Governor of the Gaol last night were: "I am glad it is nearly over."
Execution
Arnold Karl Sodeman was hanged and buried Pentridge Prison, Coburg, on 1 June 1936. Asked by the Sheriff whether he had anything to say, Sodeman replied: "Nothing, sir." He walked to the scaffold, apparently unmoved.
An autopsy disclosed that he was suffering from leptomeningitis, a degenerative disease which could cause serious congestion of the brain when aggravated by alcohol.
75 years later
On the seventh-fifth anniversary of the murder of Ethel Belshaw, Leongatha newspaper ‘’’The Great Southern Star’’’ published an interview with Maureen Lewis (nee Keighery) who was Sodermans neighbour in 1935. Maureen was with the Sodeman family on the same day Arnold brutally murdered 12-year-old Ethel Belshaw in Inverloch. She counts herself lucky Sodeman’s wife, Bernice, did not allow him to buy her an ice cream on New Year’s Day 1935. Ethel was last seen buying an ice cream from a Beach Road milk bar in the town. Maureen had travelled with the Sodemans from Leongatha, for a fun day in the sun. She was friends with the Sodemans’ child, Joan, a girl of similar age. “On the day Ethel was murdered he wanted to take me for an ice cream. It could have been me that day,” she said. “I went down there with them to Inverloch on that day with the Sodemans. They lived next door. He wanted to take me for an ice cream and Mrs Sodeman wouldn’t let him take me unless he took Joan, his daughter.”
But Maureen, like many others in Leongatha, always suspected there was something not quite right about the man. “We were always frightened of him. In those days you didn’t call anyone ‘Old Sodeman,’ because your dad would pull you up and insist you call him Mr Sodeman. But to us kids he was always Old Sodeman,” she said. “He wore sandshoes and he was sort of creepy."
17. James Vlassakis (4)
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| (James Vlassakis) |
James Spyridon Vlassakis (born 24 December 1979) is an Australian serial killer currently serving four consecutive terms of life imprisonment with a non-parole period of 26 years for his role in the Snowtown murders. Vlassakis confessed to four murders, including the murder of his stepbrother, David Johnson and half-brother Troy Youde as well as the murders of Gary O'Dwyer and Frederick Brooks.
Vlassakis met John Bunting when aged fourteen and looked up to Bunting as a father figure. It was alleged Bunting groomed Vlassakis into committing serial murders.
Vlassakis was tried separately from the other accused and was the first to be sentenced for his role in the murders. He pleaded guilty to the four murders he was charged with.
A.K.A.: "The Snowtown murders" - "The Bodies in Barrels murders"
Classification: Serial killer
Characteristics: "Degenerate sub-culture" of murderers - Cannibalism - Torture
Number of victims: 4
Date of murders: 1997 - 1999
Date of birth: December 24, 1979
Victims profile: David Johnson (his stepbrother) / Troy Youde (his half-brother) / Gary O'Dwyer / Frederick Brooks
Method of murder: Shooting - Strangulation
Location: Snowtown, South Australia, Australia
Status: Sentenced to four consecutive terms of life imprisonment with a non-parole period of 26 years
Murders
Troy Youde
Troy Youde was the half-brother of Vlassakis. Vlassakis had earlier confided in Bunting that Youde had sexually abused him when he was aged thirteen. Bunting, Wagner, Vlassakis and Haydon hatched a plan to murder Youde and the group drove to Youde's house and dragged from his bed while sleeping. Youde was strangled by Wagner in his bathroom. Vlassakis admitted to being a witness to the murder.
Frederick Brooks
Frederick Brooks was the intellectually disabled son of Jodie Elliot and nephew of Elizabeth Haydon. He was murdered by Bunting, Wagner, and Vlassakis on 17 September 1998.
Brooks' body was moved to a car which was later collected by Mark Haydon. The body was later located by police in the disused bank vault in Snowtown. Mark Haydon continued to access the welfare payments of Brooks.
Gary O'Dwyer
Gary O'Dwyer, 29, was an intellectually disabled man who lived alone in Frances Street, Murray Bridge. His disabilities arose from a car accident earlier in life. Bunting had Vlassakis learn personal information about O'Dwyer and whether he had any family. O'Dwyer was seen by Bunting as an easy target and murdered so Bunting could gain from O'Dwyer's welfare payments.
O'Dwyer's body was found by police in the bank vault in Snowtown. His body contained burn marks which were inflicted by using a variac machine to apply electric shocks.
David Johnson
Johnson was lured to the disused bank in Snowtown by his stepbrother, James Vlassakis, on 9 May 1999. Johnson was not homosexual, but Bunting would often refer to him as a "faggot" and say he needed to die.
Vlassakis had earlier told Johnson about a computer for sale near Clare, South Australia. Vlassakis drove him to Snowton to ostensibly look at this computer.
Shortly after Johnson entered the bank building, he was grabbed by Wagner around the throat and strangled. Wagner then applied handcuffs to Johnson and he was forced by Bunting to read a script Bunting had earlier prepared, as well as provide his bank account PIN. Johnson's voice was recorded on a computer equipped with a microphone.
Wagner and Vlassakis drove to Port Wakefield and attempted to access Johnson's bank account, leaving Bunting and Haydon with Johnson in the disused bank. Wagner and Vlassakis were unsuccessful in withdrawing funds from Johnson's account. When they returned to Snowtown, Johnson was dead.
Bunting and Wagner dismembered Johnson's body, then fried and ate parts of his flesh.
Johnson was the final murder victim before the group was apprehended.
Suppression order
A suppression order was granted restricting any image from publication which could identify Vlassakis. The order was granted to provide protection to Vlassakis within the prison system as he had agreed to provide evidence against his co-accused at their upcoming trials.
The terms of the order were as follows:
Order suppressing publication of the image of Vlassakis in any form, including photographs, sketches and illustrations.
Further order suppressing publication of any description of Vlassakis, that is, of his appearance, which would have the capacity to lead to identification of him by a reader of the description.
The orders will remain in force until further order, but His Honour indicated that it his intention to review orders on the next appearance of Vlassakis in this court.
REASONS:
To prevent prejudice to the proper administration of justice.
In July, 2004, publishers of Australian newspapers The Australian and Herald Sun were convicted on contempt of court charges for the publication of a photograph of Vlassakis on 11 July 2002.
16. Archibald McCafferty (4)
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| (Archibald Beattie "Mad Dog" McCafferty) |
Archibald Beattie "Mad Dog" McCafferty (born 1948) is a convicted Australian serial killer. A multiple killer who has been in jail in Australia for the past 23 years was to be deported to his native Scotland within the next two weeks. "Mad Dog", who was given three life sentences in 1974 for leading a gang which killed three men in five days, was granted parole on April 20, 1997.
The murderous rampage took place five days after his six-week-old son died when his wife fell asleep while breast-feeding and rolled on top of him.
McCafferty claimed at his trial in 1974 that he had heard the voice of his dead son telling him he would be born again if seven people were killed. He remained obsessed with the number seven in prison, writing an autobiography titled "Seven Shall Die."
A.K.A.: "Mad Dog"
Classification: Serial killer
Characteristics: McCafferty claimed at his trial that he had heard the voice of his dead son telling him he would be born again if seven people were killed
Number of victims: 4
Date of murders: 1973 / 1982
Date of birth: 1948
Victims profile: George Anson, 50 / Ronald Neil Cox, 42 / Evangelos Kollias, 24 / Edward James Lloyd (fellow prison inmate)
Method of murder: Shooting - Stabbing with knife
Location: Australia
Status: Sentenced to three life sentences in 1974. Released and deported to Scotland on May 1, 1997
Eight years after his trial he killed a fellow-prisoner, leaving three killings pending.
However, a parole board judge said that by 1988 "Mad Dog" became a model prisoner. His freedom was granted after his fifth request for parole. Philip Morrice, the British Consul-General, said Britain had no choice but to accept the decision to deport McCafferty, although the prisoner has appealed against the move.
At the hearing McCafferty apologised to relatives of his victims and said he was "out of touch with reality" at the time of the killings. "I realise the chaos and trauma I have created," he said. "I killed three fathers and for that I am truly sorry. If I could give my life to bring your fathers back I would do that gladly." Outside the courtroom, Lesley Cox, the daughter of one of his victims, wept and said she was "frightened and terrified" by the parole decision.
On April 23, 1997 "Mad Dog" lost his last appeal to the Administrative Appeals Tribunal against a deportation order by the Australian government. May 1, McCafferty was escorted onto a plane by two police officers and sent on his way to Scotland, a place he has no desire to live in. Scottish authorities stated that they will have to house him if he returns to Glasgow, but there are fears of a lynch-mob if the public discovers his where-abouts. The victims families believe that he is not a changed-man, and that there is every possibility that he will kill again. 4 down, three to go...
15. Caroline Grills (4 – 4+)
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| (Caroline Grills, born Caroline Mickelson) |
Caroline Grills, born Caroline Mickelson ((1888 - 1890?) – October 1960), was an Australian serial killer.
Grills became a suspect in 1947 after the deaths of four family members: her 87-year-old stepmother Christine Mickelson; relatives by marriage Angelina Thomas and John Lundberg; and sister in law Mary Anne Mickelson. Authorities tested tea she had given to two additional family members (Christine Downey and John Downey) on 13 April 1953, and detected the poison thallium.
Grills appeared in court charged with four murders and three attempted murders (the third being Eveline Lundberg, Christine Downey's mother) in October 1953. She was convicted on 15 October 1953 and sentenced to death, but her sentence was later changed to life in prison. She became affectionately known as "Aunt Thally" to other inmates of Sydney's Long Bay prison. In October 1960, she was rushed to the hospital where she died from peritonitis from a ruptured gastric ulcer.
A.K.A: "Aunt Thally"
Classification: Serial killer
Characteristics: Poisoner
Number of victims: 4 – 4 +
Date of murders: 1947 - 1953
Date of arrest: May 11, 1953
Date of birth: (1888 - 1890?)
Victims profile: Christine Mickelson, 87 (her stepmother) / Angelina Thomas, 84, and John Lundberg (relatives by marriage) / Mary Anne Mickelson, 60 (sister in law)
Method of murder: Poisoning (thallium)
Location: New South Wales, Australia
Status: Sentenced to death on October 15, 1953. Commuted to life imprisonment. Died in prison on October 6, 1960
Grills, Caroline ((1888-1890?)–1960)
Caroline Grills (1888?-1960), poisoner, was born probably in 1888 at Balmain, Sydney, daughter of George Mickelson, labourer, and his wife Mary, née Preiers. On 22 April 1908 at the district registrar's office, Balmain South, she married, with her father's consent, Richard William Grills, a labourer; they were to have five sons and a daughter. Two of the boys died tragically, one as a result of typhoid contracted while working as a lifesaver at Maroubra beach. The Grills moved into a succession of rented houses in the city and the Randwick area, during which years Richard was employed as a real-estate agent. After the death of her father in 1948, Caroline inherited and moved into his home at Gladesville. Known as Aunty Carrie by her extensive family, she was a short, 'dumpy' woman who wore thick-rimmed glasses. She frequently visited her in-laws and friends, making tea, cakes and biscuits for them.
On 11 May 1953 Grills was arrested and charged with the attempted murder of her sister-in-law Mrs Eveline Lundberg and Lundberg's daughter Mrs Christine Downey, both of Redfern; the attempt had been made with thallium, a poison commonly found in rat bait. The symptoms of thallium poisoning included loss of hair, nervous disorders, progressive blindness, loss of speech and eventual death. Both Downey and Lundberg suffered these symptoms for some time, recovering only when Mrs Grills did not visit. They were not alone. In 1953 Sydney was in the grip of thallium panic. From March 1952 until the arrest of Grills there had been forty-six cases of reported thallium poisoning, involving ten deaths. In the few months after her arrest there were further reported cases of thallium poisoning, among them one of a prominent footballer.
Further investigation led police to charge Grills with four murders and one attempted murder. All of the victims, with the exception of a friend of her mother, were in-laws. Police speculated that her poisoning spree had begun in 1947 with the murder of her stepmother. Exhumation of the bodies of two victims revealed traces of thallium. While the police believed that a strong circumstantial case existed to substantiate murder, they only proceeded with the original charge of attempting to murder Mrs Lundberg.
At her trial in the Central Criminal Court, Grills professed her innocence, claiming that police had pressured her relations to convict her and that she 'helped to live, not kill'. Her behaviour in court, marked by outbursts of laughter, reinforced ideas that she was a malevolent killer. On 15 October 1953 she was found guilty of attempted murder and sentenced to death. Although her appeal was dismissed by the Court of Criminal Appeal in April 1954, her sentence was commuted to life imprisonment. She was admitted to the State Reformatory for Women where she spent the next six and a half years.
Rushed to Prince Henry Hospital, Grills died of peritonitis on 6 October 1960 and was cremated with Anglican rites; her husband, daughter and three of her sons survived her. 'Aunt Thally', as she was popularly known, remains an enigma. The undercurrents of envy, anger or revenge that pushed her to kill so many of her family can only be guessed at. She was a disquieting case, a matronly figure who did what all favourite aunts were meant to do—serve tea and cakes.
14. Leonard Fraser (4 – 7+)
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| (Leonard Fraser) |
Leonard John Fraser (27 June 1951 – 1 January 2007), also known as "The Rockhampton Rapist", was an Australian convicted serial killer.
A.K.A.: "The Rockhampton Rapist"
Classification: Serial killer
Characteristics: Rape
Number of victims: 4 – 7+
Date of murders: 1998 - 1999
Date of arrest: April 22, 1999
Date of birth: June 27, 1951
Victims profile: Sylvia Benedetti, 19 / Beverly Leggo, 36 / Julie Turner, 39 / Keyra Steinhardt, 9
Method of murder: Strangulation
Location: Rockhampton, Queensland, Australia
Status: Sentenced to life imprisonment on June 13, 2003. Died in prison on January 1, 2007
Biography
Fraser was born in Ingham, Queensland. He had a daughter in the 1970's with a woman named Pearl. He was also noted for having below average intelligence, to the point where he had trouble writing his own name.
Crimes
Before a life sentence on 7 September 2000 for the abduction, rape and murder of a 9-year-old girl, Rockhampton, Queensland, Leonard Fraser had spent almost 20 of the preceding 22 years behind bars for the rape of other women. He even raped a terminally ill cancer patient, with whom he was living with in early 1997. He was subsequently charged with four murders. Police found many trophies of his victims in his flat and ponytails from three different women, which could not be traced to any of his known victims.
Fraser originally confessed to five murders in an apparent deal with police to avoid general population in prison, but one of those victims was a 14-year-old, Natasha Ryan, who was found to be alive and living secretly with her boyfriend in a nearby town after having been listed as a missing person for five years. Although there was an obvious problem in his confessions to crimes where no corroborating evidence existed and there was therefore reason for a mistrial, his defence did not file for one. Nor did his defence object to the prosecution using the same confession made in custody, which included the Ryan confession, for three other victims whose remains were found. The Ryan 'murder' was also based on testimony from a fellow prisoner who alleged that Fraser drew detailed maps showing where Ms. Ryan's remains could be located. Even so, the judge in the case, Justice Brian Ambrose, heavily criticised the media for commenting on the value of confessions to crimes made to police under duress or to other prisoners while in custody, where no or little corroborating evidence exists.
In 2003 Fraser was sentenced to three indefinite prison terms for the murders of Beverley Leggo and Sylvia Benedetti, and the manslaughter of Julie Turner in the Rockhampton area in 1998 and 1999. At his trial, the judge described him as a sexual predator who was a danger to the community and his fellow inmates.
Death
Fraser was being held at the Wolston Correctional Centre and, after complaining of chest pains, he was taken to a secure section of the Princess Alexandra Hospital in Woolloongabba, on 26 December 2006, where he subsequently died of a heart attack on 1 January 2007.
Media
Fraser's murders are the focus of the Crime Investigation Australia series 2 episode "The Predator: Leonard John Fraser" and Crime Stories episode "Leonard Fraser: the Rockhampton Rapist".
13. Catherine Birnie (4 – 8)
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| (Catherine Birnie) |
David John Birnie (16 February 1951 – 7 October 2005) and Catherine Margaret Birnie (born 23 May 1951) were an Australian couple from Perth, Australia. They murdered four women ranging in age from 15 to 31 in their home in the 1980s, and attempted to murder a fifth. These crimes were referred to in the press as the Moorhouse murders, after the Birnies' address at 3 Moorhouse Street in Willagee, a suburb of Perth, Western Australia.
Under WA law, Birnie's case for parole must be reviewed every three years, meaning her next statutory review date will be in 2019.
The Moorhouse murders
Catherine Birnie
Born: Catherine Margaret Harrison, 23 May 1951 (age 65)
Criminal penalty: Four terms of life imprisonment
Spouse(s): Donald McLaughlin (1971–?), David Birnie
Children: 7 (1 deceased)
Victims: 4+
Span of killings: 6 October 1986–5 November 1986
Victims profile: Mary Francis Neilson, 22 / Susannah Candy, 15 / Noelene Patterson, 31 / Denise Karen Brown, 21
Method of murder: Strangulation / Stabbing with knife
Country: Australia
State(s): Western Australia
Date apprehended: November 1986
Biography
Catherine Birnie
Catherine Birnie (nee Harrison) was also born in 1951. She was 2 years old when her mother, Doreen, died giving birth to her brother, who died two days later. Unable to cope with her, her father Harold had sent her away to live with her maternal grandparents. At the age of ten, there was a custody dispute which ended in Catherine's father gaining sole custody of Catherine.
At the age of 12, she met David Birnie, and by the age of 14 she was in a relationship with him. Harold had begged Catherine on several occasions to leave David due to the fact that she was often getting in trouble with the local police. But the disapproval of their relationship only strengthened their union.
Her time in prison throughout her adolescent years offered Catherine the chance to break away from David Birnie. Encouraged by a parole officer, Catherine began working for the McLaughlin family as a house keeper. She married Donald McLaughlin on her 21st birthday.
She and McLaughlin had seven children; their firstborn, a son, was struck and killed by a car in infancy.
Four weeks after the birth of her seventh child, she abandoned McLaughlin and began cohabiting with Birnie, who had tracked her down in hospital after she had had a hysterectomy. She had her surname legally changed by deed poll to match his, and reportedly was emotionally dependent on him.
Crimes
David and Catherine Birnie murdered the following women:
Mary Neilson, aged 22
Susannah Candy, aged 15
Noelene Patterson, aged 31
Denise Brown, aged 21
Their final abductee survived.
Mary Neilson
On 11 October 1986, 22-year-old student Mary Neilson turned up at the Birnie house to buy some car tires. On arrival, she was gagged, chained to the bed and raped by David while Catherine observed. She was taken to Gleneagles National Park near Albany Highway in Bedfordale and as she begged for her life, she was raped again and strangled with a nylon cord, dropping dead at David's feet. He then stabbed her through the body, knowing that would speed up the decomposition, as he had "read that in a book somewhere". They buried her in a shallow grave. The year after, she would have received her degree for psychology from the University of Western Australia. This murder was apparently unplanned.
Susannah Candy
The second killing took place two weeks later when they abducted 15-year-old Susannah Candy as she hitchhiked along Stirling Highway in Claremont. An outstanding student at the Hollywood High School, Candy lived at home in Nedlands with her parents, two brothers and a sister.
Her father is one of the top ophthalmic surgeons in Western Australia. After she went missing the Birnies forced her to send letters to her family to assure them that she was all right. But the family feared for her life.
The Birnies had been cruising for hours looking for a victim when they spotted Candy. Within seconds of being in the car she had a knife at her throat and her hands were bound. She was taken back to the Willagee house where she was gagged, chained to the bed and raped.
After Birnie had finished raping the girl, Catherine Birnie got into the bed with them. She now knew that this turned her lover on. When they had satiated their lust, Birnie tried to strangle the girl with the nylon cord, but she became hysterical and went berserk. The Birnies forced sleeping pills down her throat to calm her down. Once Candy was asleep, David put the cord around her neck and told Catherine to prove her undying love for him by murdering the girl.
Catherine obliged willingly. She tightened the cord slowly around the young girl's neck until she stopped breathing. David Birnie stood beside the bed watching. Asked later why she had done it, Catherine Birnie said: "Because I wanted to see how strong I was within my inner self. I didn't feel a thing. It was like I expected. I was prepared to follow him to the end of the earth and do anything to see that his desires were satisfied. She was a female. Females hurt and destroy males."
They buried Candy near the grave of Mary Neilson in the State Forest.
Noelene Patterson
On 1 November, they saw 31-year-old Noelene Patterson standing beside her car on the Canning Highway; she had run out of petrol while on her way home from her job as bar manager at the Nedlands Golf Club. Once inside the car, she had a knife held to her throat, was tied up and told not to move. She was taken back to Moorhouse Street where David Birnie repeatedly raped her after she was gagged and chained to the bed. They had originally decided to murder her that same night but David Birnie kept her prisoner in the house for three days and there were signs that he had developed emotional feelings for Patterson. Quick to notice, a jealous Catherine made an ultimatum: David would have to kill Patterson or she would kill her herself. He immediately forced an overdose of sleeping pills down her throat and strangled her while she slept. They took her body to the forest but buried it away from the others. Catherine Birnie reportedly got great pleasure in throwing sand in Patterson's face.
Denise Brown
On 5 November, they abducted 21-year-old Denise Brown as she was waiting for a bus on Stirling Highway. She accepted a lift from the Birnies; at knife point, Brown was taken to the house in Willagee, chained to the bed and raped. The following afternoon she was taken to the Wanneroo pine plantation. Safely in the seclusion of the forest, David Birnie raped Brown in the car while the couple waited for darkness. As they dragged the woman from the car, David Birnie assaulted her again and plunged a knife into Brown's neck while he was raping her. Convinced that the girl was dead, they dug a shallow grave and lay her body in it, but Brown sat up in the grave; David Birnie then grabbed an axe and struck her twice at full force on the skull with it before burying her body in the grave.
Investigation
Their final abductee and the only girl to survive their attacks was then seventeen-year-old Kate Moir. She ran semi-clothed into a vacuum cleaner shop on 10 November 1986 and insisted on seeing the police. When the police arrived, she stated that she had been abducted at knifepoint by a couple who had taken her back to their house and raped her. According to author Paul B. Kidd, who described the case for the now defunct CrimeLibrary.com, this girl showed incredible presence of mind and resourcefulness even after her ordeal. She escaped out the window when Catherine Birnie momentarily left her alone. Birnie had forced the girl to telephone her parents and pretend she was safe – the girl memorized the phone number of the house, and also managed to get the address, both of which she later gave to the police, along with "a full description of her attackers." She also concealed some of her effects in the house, so she could prove she had been there. A police officer at the time described her as a "very alert, intelligent and brave female."
Apprehension, trial and sentencing
The Birnies were detained by police, who tried to trick them into confessing to the crimes by intense interrogation. Around dusk, Detective Sergeant Vince Katich said in a joking manner to David Birnie, "It's getting dark. Best we take the shovel and dig them up." Birnie replied, "Okay. There are four of them."
When sent to trial, David Birnie pleaded guilty to four counts of murder and one count each of abduction and rape. When asked why he pleaded guilty, he gestured toward the victims' families and said, "It's the least I could do." He was sentenced to four sentences of life imprisonment. After being found sane enough to stand trial, Catherine Birnie was also sentenced to four sentences of life imprisonment by the Supreme Court of Western Australia; under law at the time, both were required to serve 20 years before being eligible for parole.
Initially David Birnie was held at the maximum security Fremantle Prison, but he was soon moved to solitary confinement to keep him from coming to harm from other prisoners. The original death row cells were converted for him and he stayed there until the prison was closed in 1990. The cell can now be viewed on the Great Escape Tour held daily at Fremantle Prison. While incarcerated, the Birnies exchanged more than 2,600 letters but were not allowed any other form of contact.
David Birnie was found dead in his cell at Casuarina Prison on 7 October 2005 at 1.33am. He had committed suicide by hanging; he was due to appear in court for the rape of a fellow prisoner the next day.
Catherine Birnie is imprisoned in Bandyup Women's Prison, where she was formerly the head librarian. She was barred from attending David's funeral; an application for parole in 2007 was rejected, and the then Attorney-General of Western Australia, Jim McGinty, said that her release was unlikely while he remained in office.
Her case was to be reviewed again in January 2010; however, on 14 March 2009, new Western Australian Attorney-General Christian Porter, following requests from the victims' families, determined she would stay in jail for life. This decision makes her the third Australian woman (after Katherine Knight and Patricia Byers) to have her papers marked "never to be released" . Her appeal of this decision was turned down in March 2010 by Porter. However, her case may be up for review again in 2019. In 2016 the Birnies' final victim – who survived – began a campaign to end Western Australian laws that automatically put convicts up for parole every three years.
12. David Birnie (4 – 8)
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| (David John Birnie (L) and Catherine Margaret Birnie (R)) |
David John Birnie (16 February 1951 – 7 October 2005) and Catherine Margaret Birnie (born 23 May 1951) were an Australian couple from Perth, Australia. They murdered four women ranging in age from 15 to 31 in their home in the 1980s, and attempted to murder a fifth. These crimes were referred to in the press as the Moorhouse murders, after the Birnies' address at 3 Moorhouse Street in Willagee, a suburb of Perth, Western Australia.
The Moorhouse murders
David Birnie
Born: David John Birnie, 16 February 1951
Died: 7 October 2005 (aged 54), Casuarina Prison in Casuarina, Western Australia
Cause of death: Suicide
Criminal penalty: Four terms of life imprisonment
Spouse(s): Catherine Birnie (?–2005; his death)
Children: 1
Victims: 4+
Span of killings: 6 October 1986–5 November 1986
Victims profile: Mary Francis Neilson, 22 / Susannah Candy, 15 / Noelene Patterson, 31 / Denise Karen Brown, 21
Method of murder: Strangulation / Stabbing with knife
Country: Australia
State(s): Western Australia
Date apprehended: November 1986
Biography
David Birnie
David Birnie was the eldest of five children. In his formative years, he lived in the semi-rural suburb of Wattle Grove, east of Perth.
School friends and parishioners from the Wattle Grove Baptist Church of the period remember the family as particularly dysfunctional. Rumours abounded about the family's promiscuity, alcoholism and that they engaged in incest.
When Birnie's parents had asked the local priest to conduct their wedding ceremony, he expressed concerns about them as individuals and as a potential couple, broadly stating that he felt theirs was a union that could never lead to any good; an unusual and seemingly unsuited pairing, the father was a man of very small stature and unattractive appearance, while the mother was known for her coarse manner, language and behaviour, often exchanging sexual favours with taxi drivers as payment for fares.
David Birnie's school friends also commented on the family home, stating that it was unkempt and filthy, with the family never having regular meals together. Nor were meals prepared for the children by their parents.
One school friend stated that the door of the Birnie fridge was always left wide open, so the children and the family dog could eat at will whenever hungry.
In the early 1960s, Birnie's parents decided to move the family to another Perth suburb, where he had met Catherine through mutual friends. At 15, David left school to become an apprentice jockey for Eric Parnham at a nearby Ascot racecourse. During his time there he often physically harmed the horses and developed the tendencies of an exhibitionist. On one particular night, David broke into the room of an elderly lady where he was boarding, naked with stockings over his head and attempted to commit his first rape.
By the time he was an adolescent, he had been convicted of several crimes and had spent time in and out of jail for misdemeanors and felonies. As an adult, he was a known sex and pornography addict, and paraphiliac. He was married to his first wife during his early 20s and had a baby daughter.
In late 1986, David Birnie was employed at a local car wreckers. For more than a year David and Catherine had practiced how to make their sexual fantasies of rape and murder come true; he was weeks away from committing his first horrific crime.
Crimes
David and Catherine Birnie murdered the following women:
Mary Neilson, aged 22
Susannah Candy, aged 15
Noelene Patterson, aged 31
Denise Brown, aged 21
Their final abductee survived.
Mary Neilson
On 11 October 1986, 22-year-old student Mary Neilson turned up at the Birnie house to buy some car tires. On arrival, she was gagged, chained to the bed and raped by David while Catherine observed. She was taken to Gleneagles National Park near Albany Highway in Bedfordale and as she begged for her life, she was raped again and strangled with a nylon cord, dropping dead at David's feet. He then stabbed her through the body, knowing that would speed up the decomposition, as he had "read that in a book somewhere". They buried her in a shallow grave. The year after, she would have received her degree for psychology from the University of Western Australia. This murder was apparently unplanned.
Susannah Candy
The second killing took place two weeks later when they abducted 15-year-old Susannah Candy as she hitchhiked along Stirling Highway in Claremont. An outstanding student at the Hollywood High School, Candy lived at home in Nedlands with her parents, two brothers and a sister.
Her father is one of the top ophthalmic surgeons in Western Australia. After she went missing the Birnies forced her to send letters to her family to assure them that she was all right. But the family feared for her life.
The Birnies had been cruising for hours looking for a victim when they spotted Candy. Within seconds of being in the car she had a knife at her throat and her hands were bound. She was taken back to the Willagee house where she was gagged, chained to the bed and raped.
After Birnie had finished raping the girl, Catherine Birnie got into the bed with them. She now knew that this turned her lover on. When they had satiated their lust, Birnie tried to strangle the girl with the nylon cord, but she became hysterical and went berserk. The Birnies forced sleeping pills down her throat to calm her down. Once Candy was asleep, David put the cord around her neck and told Catherine to prove her undying love for him by murdering the girl.
Catherine obliged willingly. She tightened the cord slowly around the young girl's neck until she stopped breathing. David Birnie stood beside the bed watching. Asked later why she had done it, Catherine Birnie said: "Because I wanted to see how strong I was within my inner self. I didn't feel a thing. It was like I expected. I was prepared to follow him to the end of the earth and do anything to see that his desires were satisfied. She was a female. Females hurt and destroy males."
They buried Candy near the grave of Mary Neilson in the State Forest.
Noelene Patterson
On 1 November, they saw 31-year-old Noelene Patterson standing beside her car on the Canning Highway; she had run out of petrol while on her way home from her job as bar manager at the Nedlands Golf Club. Once inside the car, she had a knife held to her throat, was tied up and told not to move. She was taken back to Moorhouse Street where David Birnie repeatedly raped her after she was gagged and chained to the bed. They had originally decided to murder her that same night but David Birnie kept her prisoner in the house for three days and there were signs that he had developed emotional feelings for Patterson. Quick to notice, a jealous Catherine made an ultimatum: David would have to kill Patterson or she would kill her herself. He immediately forced an overdose of sleeping pills down her throat and strangled her while she slept. They took her body to the forest but buried it away from the others. Catherine Birnie reportedly got great pleasure in throwing sand in Patterson's face.
Denise Brown
On 5 November, they abducted 21-year-old Denise Brown as she was waiting for a bus on Stirling Highway. She accepted a lift from the Birnies; at knife point, Brown was taken to the house in Willagee, chained to the bed and raped. The following afternoon she was taken to the Wanneroo pine plantation. Safely in the seclusion of the forest, David Birnie raped Brown in the car while the couple waited for darkness. As they dragged the woman from the car, David Birnie assaulted her again and plunged a knife into Brown's neck while he was raping her. Convinced that the girl was dead, they dug a shallow grave and lay her body in it, but Brown sat up in the grave; David Birnie then grabbed an axe and struck her twice at full force on the skull with it before burying her body in the grave.
Investigation
Their final abductee and the only girl to survive their attacks was then seventeen-year-old Kate Moir. She ran semi-clothed into a vacuum cleaner shop on 10 November 1986 and insisted on seeing the police. When the police arrived, she stated that she had been abducted at knifepoint by a couple who had taken her back to their house and raped her. According to author Paul B. Kidd, who described the case for the now defunct CrimeLibrary.com, this girl showed incredible presence of mind and resourcefulness even after her ordeal. She escaped out the window when Catherine Birnie momentarily left her alone. Birnie had forced the girl to telephone her parents and pretend she was safe – the girl memorized the phone number of the house, and also managed to get the address, both of which she later gave to the police, along with "a full description of her attackers." She also concealed some of her effects in the house, so she could prove she had been there. A police officer at the time described her as a "very alert, intelligent and brave female."
Apprehension, trial and sentencing
The Birnies were detained by police, who tried to trick them into confessing to the crimes by intense interrogation. Around dusk, Detective Sergeant Vince Katich said in a joking manner to David Birnie, "It's getting dark. Best we take the shovel and dig them up." Birnie replied, "Okay. There are four of them."
When sent to trial, David Birnie pleaded guilty to four counts of murder and one count each of abduction and rape. When asked why he pleaded guilty, he gestured toward the victims' families and said, "It's the least I could do." He was sentenced to four sentences of life imprisonment. After being found sane enough to stand trial, Catherine Birnie was also sentenced to four sentences of life imprisonment by the Supreme Court of Western Australia; under law at the time, both were required to serve 20 years before being eligible for parole.
Initially David Birnie was held at the maximum security Fremantle Prison, but he was soon moved to solitary confinement to keep him from coming to harm from other prisoners. The original death row cells were converted for him and he stayed there until the prison was closed in 1990. The cell can now be viewed on the Great Escape Tour held daily at Fremantle Prison. While incarcerated, the Birnies exchanged more than 2,600 letters but were not allowed any other form of contact.
David Birnie was found dead in his cell at Casuarina Prison on 7 October 2005 at 1.33am. He had committed suicide by hanging; he was due to appear in court for the rape of a fellow prisoner the next day.
Catherine Birnie is imprisoned in Bandyup Women's Prison, where she was formerly the head librarian. She was barred from attending David's funeral; an application for parole in 2007 was rejected, and the then Attorney-General of Western Australia, Jim McGinty, said that her release was unlikely while he remained in office.
Her case was to be reviewed again in January 2010; however, on 14 March 2009, new Western Australian Attorney-General Christian Porter, following requests from the victims' families, determined she would stay in jail for life. This decision makes her the third Australian woman (after Katherine Knight and Patricia Byers) to have her papers marked "never to be released" . Her appeal of this decision was turned down in March 2010 by Porter. However, her case may be up for review again in 2019. In 2016 the Birnies' final victim – who survived – began a campaign to end Western Australian laws that automatically put convicts up for parole every three years.
11. William MacDonald (5)
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| (William MacDonald) |
William MacDonald, (17 June 1924 – 12 May 2015), known as "the (Sydney) Mutilator", was classed as Australia's first true serial killer. MacDonald was born in Liverpool, England in 1924. Between 1961 and 1962 MacDonald terrorised Sydney with a string of gruesome murders before being apprehended while working as a porter at Melbourne's Spencer Street railway station on 13 May 1963. His modus operandi was to select his male victims at random (mostly derelicts), lure them into a dark place, violently stab them dozens of times about the head and neck with a long bladed knife, and finally sever their penis and testicles.
A.K.A.: "The Sydney Mutilator"
Classification: Serial killer
Characteristics: "Ripper" of gay males - Genital mutilation - Allegedly sought revenge for homosexual rape in his teens
Number of victims: 5
Date of murders: 1961 - 1962
Date of arrest: May 1963
Date of birth: 1926
Victims profile: Amos Hurst, 55 / Alfred Reginald Greenfield, 41 / Ernest William Cobbin, 41 / Frank Gladstone McLean / Patrick James Hackett, 42
Method of murder: Stabbing with knife
Location: Sydney, New South Wales, Australia
Status: Sentenced to prison for life with the strong recommendation that he never be released in 1963
Early life
In 1943 at the age of 19, MacDonald was enlisted in the army and transferred to the Lancashire Fusiliers. One night, MacDonald was raped in an air-raid shelter by one of his corporals. At first he felt traumatised, but later came to the conclusion that he enjoyed the experience which, however, preyed on his mind for the rest of his life. Discharged from the army in 1947, he was diagnosed as having schizophrenia and committed for several months to a mental asylum where daily he was treated with electroconvulsive therapy.
MacDonald emigrated from England to Canada in 1949 and then to Australia in 1955. Shortly after his arrival, he was arrested and charged for touching a detective's penis in a public toilet. For this he was placed on a two-year good behaviour bond. In 1961, MacDonald moved to Sydney. He found accommodation in East Sydney, where he became well known in the parks and public toilets that were, due to the oppression of "mainstream" society, surreptitious meeting places for homosexual men.
Crimes
Amos Hurst (Victim 1)
The murders began in Brisbane in 1961. MacDonald befriended a 55-year-old man named Amos Hurst outside the Roma Street Railway Station. After a long drinking session at one of the local pubs, they went back to Hurst's apartment where they consumed more alcohol. When Hurst became intoxicated MacDonald began to strangle him. Hurst was so intoxicated that he did not realise what was happening and eventually began to haemorrhage. Blood poured from his mouth and on to MacDonald's hands. MacDonald then punched Hurst in the face, killing him.
Five days later he found Hurst's name in a newspaper obituary column. It said Amos Hurst had died accidentally. MacDonald had been in terror of the police arresting him for murder, even though he was certain that no one had seen him leave Hurst's room.
Alfred Reginald Greenfield (Victim 2)
On 4 June 1961, police were summoned to the Sydney Domain Baths. A man's nude corpse had been found, savagely stabbed over 30 times, and with the genitalia completely severed from his body. Alfred Greenfield became the second victim claimed by the killer soon to be dubbed "the Mutilator".
Alfred Reginald Greenfield had been sitting on a park bench in Green Park, just across the road from St Vincent's Hospital in Darlinghurst. MacDonald offered Greenfield a drink and lured him to the nearby Domain Baths on the pretext of providing more alcohol. Once at the Domain the need to kill had become overwhelming. MacDonald waited until Greenfield fell asleep, then removed his knife from its sheath and stabbed Greenfield approximately thirty times. The ferocity of the first blow severed the arteries in Greenfield's neck. MacDonald then pulled down Greenfield's trousers and underwear, severed his genitals and threw them into Sydney Harbour.
William Cobbin (Victim 3)
Similarly to the second victim, William Cobbin was stabbed repeatedly and mutilated. His body was found in a public toilet at Moore Park.
On this night MacDonald was walking down South Dowling Street where he met 55-year-old William Cobbin. MacDonald lured his victim to Moore Park and drank beer with him in a public toilet. Just before the attack, MacDonald put on his plastic raincoat. Cobbin was sitting on the toilet seat when MacDonald, using an uppercut motion, struck Cobbin in the neck with a knife, severing his jugular vein. Blood splattered all over MacDonald's arms, face and his plastic raincoat. Cobbin tried to defend himself by raising his arms. MacDonald continued to stab his victim multiple times, covering the toilet cubicle with blood. MacDonald then severed the victim's genitals, placed them into a plastic bag along with his knife, and departed the scene. On the way home MacDonald washed the blood off his hands and face.
Frank Gladstone McLean (Victim 4)
On 31 March 1962, in suburban Darlinghurst, New South Wales, the mortally wounded Frank McLean was found by a man walking with his wife and child. He was the victim of an unfinished assault committed by MacDonald. The man found McLean still breathing, but bleeding heavily, and went to get police.
On this day MacDonald bought a knife from a sports store in Sydney. That night MacDonald left the Oxford Hotel in Darlinghurst and followed McLean down Bourke Street past the local police station. MacDonald initiated conversation with McLean and suggested they have a drinking session around the corner in Bourke Lane. As they entered Bourke Lane, MacDonald plunged his knife into McLean's throat. McLean tried to fight off the attack but he was too intoxicated to do so. He was then stabbed again in the face and punched—forcing him off balance. The assault was interrupted by a young family approaching. MacDonald hid himself on hearing the voices and the sound of a baby's cry. Once the man and his family had left to summon police, MacDonald returned to the barely-alive McLean, pulled him further into the lane and stabbed him again. A total of six stab wounds were inflicted. He then pulled down McLean's trousers, sliced off his genitals and put them into a plastic bag which he took home and disposed of the next day.
The police at one stage thought that the killer could have been a deranged surgeon. The manner in which McLean's genitals were removed seemed to be done by someone with years of surgical experience. Doctors at one stage found themselves under investigation.
Residence in Burwood Road, Concord
After being dismissed from his job at the local post office, where he had been hired as a letter sorter under the assumed name of Alan Edward Brennan, MacDonald went into business for himself. He purchased a mixed business store in Concord, again under the assumed name of Alan Edward Brennan. Here, he intended to sell sandwiches and smallgoods, living in rooms above the store. He actually lived there for only about a week after paying the purchase deposit.
Patrick James Hackett (Victim 5)
On the night of Saturday 6 June 1962, MacDonald went to a wine saloon in Pitt Street, Sydney, where he met 42-year-old James Hackett, a thief and derelict who had just recently been released from prison. They went back to MacDonald's new residence where they continued to drink alcohol. After a short period, Hackett fell asleep on the floor. MacDonald then got out a boning knife that he used in his delicatessen. He stabbed Hackett in the neck, the blow passing straight through. After the first blow, Hackett woke up and tried to shield himself, pushing the knife back into MacDonald's other hand and cutting it severely. MacDonald then unleashed a renewed attack, eventually striking the knife into Hackett's heart, killing him instantly. He continued to stab his victim until he had to stop for breath. Hackett's blood was splattered all over the walls and floor.
The knife having become blunted, MacDonald was unable to sever his victim's genitals and fell asleep. when he awoke the following morning he found himself lying next to the victim's body covered in sticky, drying blood. The pools of blood had soaked through the floorboards and almost on to the counter in his shop downstairs. He cleaned himself and went to a hospital to have the wound in his hand stitched. He told the doctor that he had cut himself in his shop. After cleaning up the blood, MacDonald dragged Hackett's corpse underneath his shop. Believing the police would soon come looking for his victim, he fled to Brisbane.
Three weeks later, neighbours noticed a putrid smell coming from the shop and called the health department, which in turn called the police. On 20 November 1962 police discovered the rotting corpse, which was too badly decomposed to be identified. An autopsy determined that the body was of someone in their forties, which tallied with records of the missing shop owner, Alan Edward Brennan (MacDonald's alias). In late July, the police had still made no connection between the case and the three previous Mutilator killings, and had profiled the killer as operating in Sydney's inner eastern suburbs, which were many miles distant from Concord.
The case of the walking corpse
After investigations, the victim was incorrectly identified as Alan Edward Brennan and a notice published in a newspaper obituary column. This was read by his former workmates at the local post office, who attended a small memorial service conducted by a local funeral director. At this time, MacDonald was living in Brisbane and then moved to New Zealand, believing that the police would still be looking for him. He felt the need to kill again, but for some reason he had to return to Sydney to do it. Returning to Sydney, he met former workmate John McCarthy, who said, "I believed you had died," at which MacDonald replied, "Leave me alone," and ran away, travelling to Melbourne soon after.
McCarthy went straight to the police. At first they did not believe him. They accused him of having had too much to drink and he was told to go home and sleep it off. They even said that he was crazy. He went back again the next day and tried to explain what had happened, but they still didn't believe him. This persuaded McCarthy to go to the Daily Mirror newspaper where he spoke to crime reporter Joe Morris. McCarthy explained how he bumped into the "supposed to be dead" MacDonald, a.k.a. Alan Brennan. The reporter saw the account as credible and filed a story under the headline "Case of the walking corpse". Publication forced the police to exhume the corpse. The fingerprints identified the body as belonging to James Hackett and not William MacDonald. Closer examination found that the body had several stab wounds and mutilation of the penis and testicles, potentially linking the crime to the notorious Mutilator.
Capture, trial and sentencing
The Sydney police obtained an identikit picture of MacDonald, which was circulated to every newspaper in the nation. MacDonald had taken a job on the Melbourne railways, being hired as "David Allan". Even though he tried to disguise himself by dyeing his hair and growing a moustache, he was instantly recognised by his workmates. Melbourne police arrested him as he collected his pay for that week.
Under questioning, MacDonald readily admitted to the killings, blaming them on an irresistible urge to kill. He claimed he was the victim of rape as a teenager, and was inflicting his revenge on victims chosen at random. A man with schizophrenia, MacDonald said that he heard voices in his head telling him that his victims were the corporal who raped him as a teenager. He was charged with four counts of murder and committed for trial on 15 August 1963. The trial began in September 1963 and was one of the nation's most sensational. MacDonald pleaded not guilty on the grounds of insanity and testified in great detail to the gruesome murders. He told the court of how blood had sprayed over his raincoat as he castrated his victims, put their private parts into plastic bags and took them home. He even told the court what he did with the genitals once he got home. Some jurors fainted and had to be taken from the court. The jury chose to ignore overwhelming evidence for insanity in handing down a 'guilty' verdict, which amazed expert psychiatrists. Before passing sentence, Mr Justice McLennan said that this was the most barbaric case of murder and total disregard for human life that had come before him in his many years on the bench. MacDonald showed no signs of remorse and made it quite clear that, if he were free, he would go on killing. He was sentenced to five consecutive life sentences with the strong recommendation that he never be released.
Imprisonment
MacDonald was imprisoned at Long Bay Hospital, a division of Long Bay Correctional Centre, but was soon certified as insane and transferred to a secure mental hospital. In the prison system, MacDonald was known simply as Bill; he had been in prison for so long that he became institutionalised, the longest continuous serving inmate in the New South Wales prison system. He stated in 2003 "I have no desire to go and live on the outside. I wouldn't last five minutes."
Death
MacDonald died May 12, 2015, aged 90, while still imprisoned, at the time of his death McDonald had been the oldest and longest served prisoner in custody in NSW.
10. Thomas Jeffries (5 – 5+)
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| (Thomas Jeffries (Jefferies), aka Mark Jeffries) |
Thomas Jeffries (Jefferies) (??? – May 4, 1826), also known as Mark Jeffries, was a bushranger, serial killer and cannibal in the early 19th century in Van Diemen's Land (now Tasmania, Australia). Jeffries was transported for life from Scotland on the Albion, arriving in Van Diemen's Land on 21 October 1823. He was sentenced to 12 months in Macquarie Harbour, the penal settlement on the colony's west coast in June 1824 for threatening to stab Constable Lawson. By August 1825 he had been appointed a watch house keeper and flagellator (flogger) at Launceston Gaol.
Executed by hanging at the Hobart Town Gaol on May 4, 1826
A.K.A.: "Jeffries the Monster"
Classification: Murderer
Characteristics: Escaped convict, rapist, and cannibal
Number of victims: 5 – 5+
Date of murders: 1820's
Date of arrest: 1825
Date of birth: ???
Victims profile: Four male adults and a five-month-old baby
Method of murder: ???
Location: Tasmania, Australia
Status: Executed by hanging at the Hobart Town Gaol on May 4, 1826
Crimes
Jeffries was a violent sexual offender, and on 25 August 1825 was fined half of his salary for falsely imprisoning and assaulting Mrs Jessop. In October he was fined 20 shillings for taking a female prisoner out of the watch house. On 31 December 1825, Jeffries and three convicts, Perry, Russell and Hopkins, escaped from the Launceston Watch House. They robbed the hut of a Mr Barnard, then broke into the house of a settler called Tibbs, about five miles from Launceston. Tibbs's wife and five-month-old child and a neighbour called Basham were at the house. When they tried to tie the men up, they resisted. Basham was shot and killed, and Tibbs wounded. The bushrangers left, taking Mrs Tibbs and the baby. When Mrs Tibbs could not keep up, Jeffries grabbed the baby and bashed its head against a tree, killing it. The baby's remains, which had been partly eaten by animals, were discovered about a week afterwards in the bush. Mrs Tibbs returned home on Sunday afternoon. The newspapers were coy about her state, but it is likely she had been raped. According to Mrs Tibbs, Jeffries was calling himself "Captain", and was dressed in a long black coat, a red waistcoat, and a kangaroo skin cap.
During their escape from Launceston, the four convicts ran out of food, whereupon they turned on Russell, killed him and ate part of his body. According to the Hobart Town Gazette of 27 January 1826, when asked what he then did with the remainder of Russell's corpse, Jeffries said it was cut into steaks and fried up with the mutton from a sheep they stole.
On 11 January 1826, Jeffries shot Magnus Bakie or Baker, a constable from George Town, through the head. For a brief period Jeffries ran with Matthew Brady's gang, but Brady, who was unfailingly chivalrous to women, could not tolerate Jeffries' sexual crimes, and expelled him, calling him "a de-humanised monster".
Capture and death
Jeffries was captured on 23 January 1826 at South Esk without a fight. When he was brought to Launceston the population turned out to lynch him. Safely in jail, he willingly told the authorities all he knew of the locations, movements and habits of other bushrangers. When Matthew Brady heard about this he had to be argued out of leading his gang in a frontal assault on the Launceston lockup, freeing all the prisoners, dragging Jeffries out and flogging him to death. Jeffries was hanged on 4 May 1826 at the old Hobart Jail alongside Brady on the infamous six-man scaffold. Brady complained about being executed in such poor company.
He ranks alongside Alexander Pearce and Mad Dog Morgan as one of the most infamous criminals in Australia's colonial history.
9. John Wayne Glover (6 – 13)
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| (John Wayne Glover) |
John Wayne Glover (26 November 1932 – 9 September 2005) was an English-born Australian serial killer convicted of the murders of six elderly women, including Lady Winifreda Ashton, widow of famous artist Will Ashton (MBE), on Sydney's North Shore. Over a fourteen-month period in 1989/90, Glover killed six elderly women, for which he was dubbed in the press as the "Granny Killer". Following arrest in 1990, he admitted to the murders and was sentenced to consecutive terms of life imprisonment without the possibility of parole. He committed suicide by hanging himself in prison on 9 September 2005.
A.K.A.: "Granny Killer"
Classification: Serial killer
Characteristics: Gerontophilia
Number of victims: 6 – 13
Date of murders: 1989 - 1990
Date of arrest: March 19, 1990 (suicide attempt)
Date of birth: November 26, 1932
Victims profile: Gwendolin Louise Mitchelhill, 82; Winifred Isabelle Ashton, 82; Margaret Frances Pahud, 85; Olive Cleveland, 81; Muriel Beryl Falconer, 92; and Joan Violet Sinclair, 60
Method of murder: Bashing with a claw hammer and ritual strangulation with the victim's pantyhose
Location: Sydney, Australia
Status: Sentenced to six terms of life imprisonment, never to be released, 1991. Committed suicide by hanging himself in his cell on September 9, 2005
Background
Originally from a working class family in Wolverhampton, England, Glover was convicted of many petty crimes dating back to 1947 for stealing clothing and handbags. He was later thrown out of the British army when these were discovered. Later, he emigrated to Australia in 1956. where he first lived in Melbourne. He had a troubled relationship with older women in his life, especially his mother Freda (who had had several husbands and many boyfriends), and after 1968 his mother-in law, when he married and moved into his parent-in-law's house in Mosman, Sydney.
Before John Glover began his killings in the late 1980s, he was a volunteer at the Senior Citizens Society, and was considered among his friends a friendly, trustworthy man. He was married with two children, and lived a contented lifestyle in Mosman. Glover worked as a sales representative for Four 'n' Twenty Pies.
Prior offences (1960s)
Shortly after immigrating from England to Australia, Glover was convicted on two counts of larceny in Victoria, and a stealing charge in New South Wales. In 1962 he was convicted on two counts of assaulting women in Melbourne, two counts of indecent assault, one of assault occasioning actual bodily harm, and another four counts of larceny. For this he received a three year good behaviour bond.
These attacks were reported to be extremely severe and on each occasion certain articles of clothing had been removed. The victims were forced to the ground while he violently tore their clothing. A 25-year-old woman was on her way home from a meeting at about 10:30 pm when she was followed and chased down a dark suburban street. The attacker knocked her to the ground unconscious. Later she awoke in a garden bleeding profusely and her undergarments in a state of disarray. The attacker made a run for it when her screams alerted residents. At the time of these offences, Glover was employed as a television rigger for the ABC and lived in the Melbourne suburb of Camberwell.
Murders
There is no proof of Glover killing before 1989, when he was 56. At this stage, he had been married for 20 years and had children, and his wife had no knowledge of his previous offences. Glover admitted to the killings when confronted with the police evidence. He denied responsibility for other crimes in which he was a prime suspect, including the bashing murder of Florence Broadhurst in her Paddington home in 1977. A number of years after his conviction, Glover admitted that he never worried about who his victims were, or why he killed them. He said he wanted to stop killing, but couldn't. After each murder he apparently went about his normal life.
Pre-murder offence
On 11 January 1989, 84-year-old Margaret Todhunter was walking down Hale Road, Mosman, where she was seen by Glover. After parking his car, he walked to the victim. He punched Todhunter in the face, and stole the contents of her purse including $209. Glover then went to the Mosman RSL club where he spent Mrs Todhunter's money. Investigating police concluded the crime was a mugging and held little hope of finding the perpetrator.
Gwendoline Mitchelhill
On 1 March 1989, as he left the Mosman RSL in Military Rd, Glover saw 82 year-old Gwendoline Mitchelhill walking down the street. Glover returned to his car and put a hammer under his belt. He followed Mitchelhill to the entry foyer of her Military Road apartment building. As she went to open the front door, he hit her with the hammer on the back of her head. He then continued to strike her about the head and body; several of her ribs were broken. Glover fled the scene taking her purse containing $100. Mitchelhill was still alive when she was found by two schoolboys, but died shortly after the police and ambulance arrived. The police had no eyewitnesses or leads and there was nothing concrete to link this attack with the previous attack on Margaret Todhunter. There was no forensic evidence either, as good-intentioned neighbours, believing she had merely fallen, had washed the crime scene. The police assumed that it was another mugging gone wrong.
Lady (Winfreda) Ashton
On 9 May 1989, Glover was walking along Military Road when he saw 84 year-old Lady Ashton (the widow of the artist Sir William Ashton) walking towards him. She was on her way home to nearby Raglan Street. Glover put on a pair of gloves and followed her into the foyer of her apartment, where he attacked her with his hammer. He then threw her to the ground and dragged her into a rubbish bin alcove where he repeatedly hit her head on the pavement. Glover recalled that she had almost overpowered him, until he fell on top of her and started to hit her head on the pavement. After she was knocked unconscious, John Glover removed her pantyhose and strangled her. He placed Lady Ashton's walking stick and shoes at her feet. He then left with her purse containing $100. Glover headed for the Mosman RSL, where he commented to staff that he hoped the sirens outside weren't for another mugging.
The police found Lady Ashton lying face down diagonally across the concrete floor of the small bin alcove. There was a pool of blood around her head. The pantyhose were strung so tight around her neck that it cut through the skin. Her bare legs were crossed and her arms were placed by her sides. She had a thin trickle of blood running out of her mouth. At this point, the police concluded they were facing a serial killer. To date all three victims were wealthy elderly women, from the same suburb, and were all assaulted or killed in the same manner before being robbed of their handbags.
A post mortem was carried out and no sign of semen was found. The ligature mark around her neck measured nine centimetres. She had bruises on her nose and temple, on her neck, and both her eyelids. At some stage during the struggle she bit her lips causing damage to the inner lining of her mouth. There was a wound on her cheek, which was an open cut that had a small, semi-circular abrasion which was a few centimetres away from it. The examiner noted the victim's diamond ring was still present suggesting that she had not been killed for money.
Further offences
On 6 June 1989, Glover molested 77 year-old Marjorie Moseley at the Wesley Gardens Retirement Home in Belrose. The victim reported to hospital staff and police that a man had put his hand under her night gown, but that she could not remember what the man looked like.
On 24 June 1989, Glover visited the Caroline Chisholm Nursing Home in Lane Cove where he lifted the dress of an elderly patient and fondled her buttocks. In a neighbouring room, he slid his hand down the front of another patient's nightdress and stroked her breasts. The woman cried out for help and Glover was briefly questioned by staff at the hospital before leaving.
On 8 August 1989, Glover assaulted the elderly Effie Carnie in a back street of Lindfield, on Sydney's upper North Shore.
On 6 October, he pretended to be a doctor and ran his hand up the dress of Phyllis McNeil, a patient at the Wybenia Nursing Home in the lower North Shore suburb of Neutral Bay. Glover left when the blind McNeil called for help. At the time, Glover was apparently never suspected of, or identified as being responsible for the molestations.
On 18 October 1989, Glover followed 86-year-old widow Doris Cox along Spit Road, Mosman to her retirement village. In the secluded stairwell at the front of the house he attacked her, ramming her face into a brick wall where she fell. Amazingly she survived the assault, but she was not able to provide a clear description or recollection of events probably due to her dementia; according to her, the attacker was a young man, possibly a teenager or skateboarder. She provided police with an identikit drawing, but again the scene was washed down by neighbours before investigators arrived.
Margaret Pahud
On 2 November 1989, Glover approached 78-year-old Lane Cove resident Dorothy Benke while she was walking home in a quiet backstreet, just off Longueville Road, Lane Cove (about 10 kilometres from Mosman). Glover then engaged her in conversation, and offered to carry her groceries home for her. Benke invited him inside her house for a cup of tea. Glover declined the tea, but on the return down the laneway to the main street, he passed another old woman and then assaulted her from behind.
The victim this time was 85-year-old widow Margaret Pahud (also on her way home from grocery shopping), and the police were certain this was the work of the "granny killer". She was hit on the back of the head with a blunt instrument, and when she collapsed he struck her again on the side of the head. Glover rearranged her clothing, shoes, and walking stick, took her handbag and left. Again, nobody saw the attack but within a few minutes her body was found by a young schoolgirl who at first thought the body was a pile of clothing dumped in the laneway. Neighbours yet again washed down the crime scene. As the police and ambulance were on their way, Glover rummaged through the contents of Pahud's purse on the grounds of a nearby golf club. He then headed off to the Mosman RSL Club to again spend $300 he had stolen from Pahud.
Olive Cleveland
Within 24 hours of the Pahud murder, on 3 November, 81 year-old Olive Cleveland became the fourth woman killed by the now so-called "granny killer". Glover struck up a conversation with Cleveland while she was sitting on a bench just outside the Wesley Gardens Retirement Village where she lived in the suburb of Belrose. When Olive became uncomfortable she got up and proceeded to walk to the main building, Glover seized her from behind and forced her down a ramp into a secluded side lane. Here he hit her and repeatedly pushed her head into the concrete before he removed her pantyhose and tied them tightly around her neck. Once again Glover rearranged her clothing, shoes, and walking stick, then left taking money ($60) from her handbag. Once again, the old woman's injuries were initially attributed to a heavy fall and the crime scene was yet again washed down. There were no eyewitnesses.Shortly afterwards the state government doubled the reward to $200,000.
Muriel Falconer
On 23 November 1989, Glover was sitting in the Buena Vista Hotel in Middle Head Road, Mosman when he saw 93 year-old widow Muriel Falconer walking opposite the hotel (returning home with her shopping). Glover returned to his car (parked opposite the police station), to retrieve his hammer and gloves. He followed Falconer to the exterior of her home in Muston Street. He quietly moved up behind her while the partially deaf and blind Falconer opened her front door. He put his hand around her mouth to silence her, before repeatedly hitting her around the head and neck with his hammer. When she fell to the floor Glover began to remove Falconer's pantyhose. As he did this she began to regain consciousness and cried for help. This prompted Glover to hit her multiple times with the hammer until she finally passed out. He removed her undergarments and used them to strangle her. He searched her purse and the rest of her house for valuables before leaving with $100, again after rearranging her shoes. The following afternoon, the body was discovered by a neighbour who entered using a spare key. Fortunately for investigators, the crime scene this time was intact, and forensic evidence, such as a bloody shoeprints, was collected. Police were now starting to home in on a suspect identified by the neighbour as both middle-aged, portly, and grey-haired (i.e. someone who would fit in easily in the Mosman area). The reward is increased to $250,000 by Christmas.
Police investigation
On 11 January 1990, Glover visited the Greenwich Hospital in River Road, Greenwich, on his pie sales round. He was in his work uniform and carried a clipboard, and entered the hospital's palliative care ward where there were four elderly and ill women, including 82 year old advanced cancer patient Daisy Roberts. Glover asked if she was losing any body heat, he then pulled up her night gown and touched her in an indecent manner. Roberts panicked and called for help, upon which a hospital sister found Glover in the ward. When confronted, Glover ran from the ward and the sister was able to record his car's registration number, and notified police.
The hospital staff were able to identify and name Glover, as he was known from doing his pie rounds. A week later, the police returned with a photograph of Glover which Sister Davis and Mrs Roberts positively identified. Although this was a significant break through, the hospital assaults were not linked to the murders, nor reported to the murder task force for three weeks. Detectives from Chatswood police station contacted and confirmed Glover's name via his employers. Detectives contacted Glover and requested he attend an interview at the station the following day. When Glover failed to appear, the police rang his home and were informed by his wife that he had attempted suicide by overdose and was recovering at the Royal North Shore Hospital. Police went to the hospital to see Glover but he declined to be interviewed - although he did permit them to take a photograph. Staff at the hospital handed police a note that was written by Glover, in the middle of the page on Four 'n' Twenty Pies business paper, that contained the words "no more grannies ... grannies" and "Essie [Glover's mother-in-law] started it".
It was two weeks before the suicide note and photo were passed on to the task force (now numbering some 70 members), whereupon detectives believed immediately that Glover was the killer, although they had no evidence. The head of the detective task force said,
"If he had said to us, "I don't want to talk," we couldn't have proved a thing. Still, the photo matched the descriptions of the gray-haired suspect and in his job as a pie salesman, Glover could have been at any of the murder scenes."
Glover was interviewed over the nursing home assaults and denied all accusations. Police had limited evidence and decided not to question him over the murders, which would have let Glover know of the police suspicions. Glover was put under constant police surveillance including, at one stage, with an automatic tracking device. To make sure that he wasn't being followed, Glover would drive around the block more than once, or drive the wrong way up one way streets.
Joan Sinclair
On 19 March 1990, John Glover killed his sixth and final victim, 60-year-old divorcee Joan Sinclair, with whom he had a platonic relationship, in Beauty Point, Mosman. By this stage, police had Glover under constant surveillance and watched as Sinclair let Glover into her home at approximately 10 a.m. By 1 p.m. there was no sign of Glover or movement within the house. Police and the surveillance team, became concerned at about 5 p.m. and got permission to enter the house at 6pm. Two uniformed police knocked on the front door (ostensibly to check on barking dogs) to no answer, and saw through rear glass door a hammer lying in a pool of dry blood on a mat. Four detectives searched the house and found Sinclair’s battered head wrapped in a bundle of blood-soaked towels. She was naked from the waist down and her pantyhose were tied around her neck. Her genitals were damaged but Glover would later deny raping her. After finding Sinclair's body, they then searched the house for Glover who was found unconscious in the filled bathtub.
Glover later told police he murdered Joan Sinclair and explained they had been having a relationship for some time. He said that he beat her about the head with his hammer, removed her pantyhose, and strangled her with them. Glover rolled the body onto a mat; wrapped four towels around her extensive head wounds to stem the flow of blood, then dragged her body across the room, leaving a trail of blood. He then ran the bath, swallowed a handful of Valium with a bottle of Vat 69, slashed his left wrist and lay in the tub to die. The police were relieved he had survived, as otherwise they feared ongoing speculation as to whether Glover was the murderer.
Trial
At the trial, commencing 28 March 1990, John Wayne Glover pleaded not guilty to his crimes on the grounds of diminished responsibility. A psychiatrist said Glover had built up hostility and aggression since his childhood against his mother and then against his mother-in-law, who was said to "trigger" him. When she died, he had to take out his aggression on someone else. The psychiatrist who studied the case also added that this was a very unusual case because there are very few mass murders, and most of the perpetrators are mentally ill, and/or have an organic disease of the brain. According to this psychiatrist Glover was sane at the time of the murders.
The Crown prosecutor maintained that Glover was well aware of his actions. When he killed, he was also planning what to do with the victim’s money, and also took time to clean the hammer with acid. Glover was impotent and had no interest in sex. So tying the pantyhose so tightly around his victim’s neck was to make sure they were dead, at the same time trying to trick the police into thinking that this was the work of a sexually-motivated killer.
Glover was addicted to poker machines, and the easiest way for him to get more money was to steal. After the guilty verdict was delivered, the presiding judge stated that he was dealing with an extremely dangerous prisoner:
"He is able to choose when to attack and when to stay his hand. He is cunning and able to cover his tracks. It is plain that he has chosen his moments carefully. Although the crimes have been opportunistic, he has not gone in where the risks were overwhelming.
The period since January 1989 has been one of intense and serious crime involving extreme violence inflicted on elderly women, accompanied by theft or robbery of their property. On any view, the prisoner has shown himself to be an exceedingly dangerous person and that view was mirrored by the opinions of the psychiatrists who gave evidence at his trial.
I have no alternative other than to impose the maximum available sentence, which means that the prisoner will be required to spend the remainder of his natural life in Jail.
It is inappropriate to express any date as to release on parole. Having regard to those life sentences, this is not a case where the prisoner may ever be released pursuant to order of this court. He is never to be released"
"Confession" sketch
Days before Glover finally committed suicide (on his third known attempt), he handed his last outside visitor a sketch. The sketch was of a park with significant changes in the sketch, pointed out by Glover was two palm trees. In the middle of the right palm tree, the number "nine" can be seen between leaves and branches. The number nine is said to represent the number of murders that Glover committed, or the number of unsolved murders still out there that he committed.
The nine additional victims (and unsolved cases) may include:
1 - Elsie Boyes, 63, Prahran (3 June 1967)
2 - Emmie May Anderson, 78, East Melbourne (19 October 1961)
3 - Irene Kiddle, 61, St Kilda (22 March 1963)
4 - Christina Yankos, 63, Albert Park (9 April 1968)
5 - Florence Broadhurst, 78, Paddington (16 October 1977)
6 - Josephine McDonald, 72, Ettalong (29 August 1984)
7 - Wanda Amundsen, 83, Umina (21 November 1986)
Media
Glover's serial murders was the focus of the Crime Investigation Australia series 1 episode "No More Grannies / The Granny Killer, and of the series 2 episode of Forensic Investigators entitled "Granny Killer".
Glover's serial murders were dramatised in the final vignette of the 2000 film Terror Tract.
8. James Miller (6 – 7)
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| (James Miller) |
James William Miller (1940 – October 22, 2008) and Christopher Robin Worrell (1954 – February 19, 1977) were among Australia's first "tandem" killers — two men who sought out and killed seven women. The Truro murders of the late 1970s ended when Worrell was killed in a car smash.
Miller was found guilty of six of the seven crimes. It appears that all had been strangled, often using a nylon cord, though there was a suspicion that the last of the victims had been buried alive.
A.K.A.: "Truro murderer"
Classification: Serial killer
Characteristics: Homosexual - His accomplice Christopher Worrell Worrell raped and killed the women while Miller - who said at trial his job was to be "chauffeur and mug" - waited nearby
Number of victims: 6 - 7
Date of murders: December 1976 - February 1977
Date of arrest: May 23, 1979
Date of birth: 1940
Victims profile: Veronica Knight, 18 / Tania Kenny, 15 / Juliet Mykyta, 16 / Sylvia Pittman, 16 / Vickie Howell, 26 / Connie Iordanides, 16 / Deborah Lamb, 20
Method of murder: Strangulation
Location: Truro, South Australia, Australia
Status: Sentenced to life in prison with a non-parole period of 35 years on March 12, 1980. Died in prison on October 22, 2008
Discovery
On 25 April 1978, William 'Bill' Thomas and Valda Thomas found what they thought was the bone from the leg of a cow whilst mushrooming in bushland near the South Australian town of Truro. Upon closer inspection, they noted the bone had a shoe attached and inside the shoe was human skin and painted toenails. Clothes, blood stains, and more bones were found nearby. The dead woman was later identified to be Veronica Knight, an 18 year old girl who had vanished from an Adelaide street around Christmas of 1976.
A year later, on April 15 1979, four bushwalkers discovered the skeletal remains of 16 year old Sylvia Pittman, about 1 km from where Veronica's remains had been located. Pittman had disappeared around the same time as Knight.
Serial killing was a new phenomenon in Australia at the time, and police faced a difficult task of piecing together evidence. There was the strong suggestion of a link between the two dead women found in the Truro bushland, and five other young women reported missing in Adelaide at the time.
Eleven days later a huge search party discovered two more skeletons in a paddock on the opposite side of the road. They were the remains of Connie Iordanides and Vicki Howell, two of the five missing girls.
Arrest
Christopher Worrell, described as young, charismatic and psychosociopathic, and James Miller, a 40 year old labourer, described as a drifter and homosexual partner of Worrell, are believed to have committed the murders.
Miller first met Worrell when both were in prison together, Miller for Breaking and entering, Worrell for Rape and breaching a two year suspended sentence for Armed Robbery. After release they formed a dominant/submissive relationship and both lived and worked together. Though Worrell was not himself homosexual, Miller was infatuated with him and Worrell would allow Miller to perform sexual acts on him while he read pornographic, and predominantly BDSM, magazines. As Worrell preferred women this later ceased and they became more like brothers.
Worrell and a female friend were killed in a car accident on February 19 1977, thus ending the murders. Miller survived the car accident.
Miller suffered depression and became homeless after Worrell's death. Miller's state of mind and a chance comment were to eventually give police a breakthrough when at Worrell's funeral, his former girlfriend, Amelia, told Miller that Worrell had had a suspected blood clot on the brain. This prompted Miller to tell her about Worrell's fascination with thrill killing and he suggested the clot was possibly responsible for the moods that led Worrell to kill.
In May 1979 she collected a AUD$30,000 reward after providing the information to police leading to Miller's arrest and capture. Amelia said that she had not come forward earlier because she had no proof the admission was true and that there wasn't much point in going to the police as Worrell was dead. It was only after reading of the murders in the newspaper that she came forward. It is highly likely that the murders would have gone unsolved if Amelia hadn't come forward.
Miller was brought in for questioning on May 23 1979. He initially denied knowing anything but eventually stated Amelia had "done what I should have" and told detectives there were three more. Miller was driven under guard to Truro, Port Gawler and the Wingfield dump where he pointed out their locations.
Victims
December 23, 1976 Veronica Knight 18
Veronica had become separated from her friend while shopping and accepted a ride home. Miller claims they talked her into going for a drive in the Adelaide foothills. Worrell parked while Miller went for a walk. Returning to the car he found Veronica dead and allegedly angrily confronted Worrell who pulled a knife and threatened him. Worrell was in a "black" mood and wouldn't talk, Miller helped him dump the body at Truro. The next morning they both returned to work.
January 2, 1977 Tania Kenny 15
Miller and Worrell picked up Tania who had just arrived in the city after hichhiking from Victor Harbour. They drove to Miller's sister's home and Miller sat in the car while Worrell and Tania went inside. Worrell later returned and asked for help. Allegedly an argument occurred and Worrell threatened to kill Miller if he did not help. That night they buried Tania at Wingfield.
January 21, 1977 Juliet Mykyta 16
Julie was waiting at a bus stop after finishing a part time job in the city when Worrell offered her a lift home. Instead he drove her to Port Wakefield. This time Miller sat in the car while Worrell tied her up. This was not unusual behaviour as "it was Worrell's kink" so miller though nothing of it. Miller alleges he then went to take a walk but turned around after hearing a disturbance. Julie was out of the car and falling to the ground. Worrell turned her over and began strangling her. Miller claims he tried to pull him off but was not strong enough and again Worrell threatened to kill him. Later Julie joined the others at Truro.
February 6, 1977 Sylvia Pittman 16
Picked up as she waited for a train at the Adelaide Railway Station. They drove to the Wingfield area where Miller went for a walk and later helped dispose of the body at Truro.
February 7, 1977 Vickie Howell 26
Worrell rang Miller to pick him up from the Adelaide Post Office. When he arrived Vickie was already with him. Vikie had recently separated from her husband and was happy to go with them to Nuriootpa. Stopping the car Miller went for a walk but soon returned to find everything ok so he then took a longer walk. When he returned Vickie was dead and Worrell was in a rage. Miller claims he cursed and abused Worrell expecting to be killed himself but Worrell said nothing. Vickie was then taken to Truro.
February 9, 1977 Connie Iordanides 16 (AKA Connie Jordan)
Picked up in the city centre and offered a lift home Connie became frightened when then they drove in the wrong direction. Miller stopped at Wingfield and Worrell forced the screaming girl into the back seat while Miller did nothing. He left the car for a while and after returning drove to Truro.
February 12, 1977 Deborah Lamb 20
Deborah was hitchhiking on West Terrace when picked up. They drove to Port Gawler where Miller went for his walk. When he returned to the car Deborah was not there but worrell was pushing sand into a hole with his foot. Deborah was later found buried at the spot.
February 19, 1977 Deborah Skuse (killed in the motor accident that claimed Worrell's life)
Deborah was the girlfriend of a friend. After he broke up with her Miller and Worrell took her to mount Gambier for the weekend but Worrell got in one of his "black" moods so they decided to return to Adelaide on the Saturday afternoon. Worrell was driving when the car blew a tyre and rolled several times throwing all three onto the road. Worrell and Deborah died while Miller broke his shoulderblade.
All the victims had been strangled although there was a strong suspicion that the last of the victims, Deborah Lamb, had been alive when buried.
It has been suggested by criminologist, Professor Paul Wilson, that had Worrell not been killed, the Truro murders may have become a much more devastating killing spree as Worrell was following the "established behavior of some serial killers" with the time between murders getting shorter. Miller himself told Worrell's girlfriend before his arrest that "It was getting worse lately. It was happening more often. It was perhaps a good thing that Chris died".
Accused
Miller stood trial for the murders, and was found guilty of six of the seven murders (with the exception of the first murder, Veronica Knight) on March 12, 1980. Unusually, he was convicted of murder despite having never touched a victim.
The testimony at his trial revealed a terrifying story. Miller and Worrell would cruise the local streets in Worrell's 1969 blue and white Chrysler Valiant every night, looking for women that Worrell could have sex with. Worrell was 23, charismatic and good-looking, and this was a time of sexual revolution in Australia, so Worrell regularly "picked up" local girls. Miller would drive Worrell and the woman to a secluded place, where Worrell would have sex with the women, often after tying them up, while Miller waited outside the car. Then Miller would drive them back into town and drop them off.
Miller described how the "pick-ups" became more and more terrifying. First, Worrell started occasionally raping the women. Then he started murdering them. Miller was unaware that murder would occur prior to it happening - he stated that it only happened some times and not others. It appeared that as the violence increased, Miller became increasingly scared of Worrell.
Miller maintained:
"They can give me life for knowing about the murders and not reporting them. But they charged me with murder .. It's a load of bullshit."
Following the trial one of the jurors hired a lawyer to petition the Attorney-General for a retrial. South Australian Chief Justice Len King agreed that Miller should be granted another hearing on the grounds that the judge at his trial, Mr Justice Matheson, had instructed the jury to find Miller guilty of murder. However, the Attorney-General, Chris Sumner, refused to grant a retrial.
Legally, Miller argued that he never engaged in any murders directly, nor did he explicitly agree prior to going out cruising for women that he would support Worrell in the murders. Nevertheless, he was found guilty of murder because he was found to be a part of a joint criminal enterprise. This created subsequent legal difficulties over the definition of a joint criminal enterprise, but these have largely been resolved on the basis that this was a special, and particularly horrifying, case.
In 1999, Miller applied to have a non-parole period set and on February 8, 2000, Chief Justice John Doyle granted a non-parole period of 35 years making Miller eligible for parole in 2014.
Death
On October 22, 2008, it was reported that James Miller had died of terminal cancer, at the age of 68.
7. Christopher Worrell (7)
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| (Christopher Worrell) |
James William Miller (1940 – October 22, 2008) and Christopher Robin Worrell (1954 – February 19, 1977) were among Australia's first "tandem" killers — two men who sought out and killed seven women. The Truro murders of the late 1970s ended when Worrell was killed in a car smash.
A.K.A.: "Truro murderer"
Classification: Serial killer
Characteristics: Rape - Bisexual
Number of victims: 7
Date of murders: 23 December 1976 – 12 February 1977
Date of birth: 1954
Victims profile: Veronica Knight, 18 / Tania Kenny, 15 / Juliet Mykyta, 16 / Sylvia Pittman, 16 / Vickie Howell, 26 / Connie Iordanides, 16 / Deborah Lamb, 20
Method of murder: Strangulation
Location: Truro, South Australia, Australia
Status: Worrell and a female friend were killed in a car accident on February 19, 1977
Discovery
On 25 April 1978, William 'Bill' Thomas and Valda Thomas found what they thought was the bone from the leg of a cow whilst mushrooming in bushland near the South Australian town of Truro. Upon closer inspection, they noted the bone had a shoe attached and inside the shoe was human skin and painted toenails. Clothes, blood stains, and more bones were found nearby. The dead woman was later identified to be Veronica Knight, an 18 year old girl who had vanished from an Adelaide street around Christmas of 1976.
A year later, on April 15 1979, four bushwalkers discovered the skeletal remains of 16 year old Sylvia Pittman, about 1 km from where Veronica's remains had been located. Pittman had disappeared around the same time as Knight.
Serial killing was a new phenomenon in Australia at the time, and police faced a difficult task of piecing together evidence. There was the strong suggestion of a link between the two dead women found in the Truro bushland, and five other young women reported missing in Adelaide at the time.
Eleven days later a huge search party discovered two more skeletons in a paddock on the opposite side of the road. They were the remains of Connie Iordanides and Vicki Howell, two of the five missing girls.
Arrest
Christopher Worrell, described as young, charismatic and psychosociopathic, and James Miller, a 40 year old labourer, described as a drifter and homosexual partner of Worrell, are believed to have committed the murders.
Miller first met Worrell when both were in prison together, Miller for Breaking and entering, Worrell for Rape and breaching a two year suspended sentence for Armed Robbery. After release they formed a dominant/submissive relationship and both lived and worked together. Though Worrell was not himself homosexual, Miller was infatuated with him and Worrell would allow Miller to perform sexual acts on him while he read pornographic, and predominantly BDSM, magazines. As Worrell preferred women this later ceased and they became more like brothers.
Worrell and a female friend were killed in a car accident on February 19 1977, thus ending the murders. Miller survived the car accident.
Miller suffered depression and became homeless after Worrell's death. Miller's state of mind and a chance comment were to eventually give police a breakthrough when at Worrell's funeral, his former girlfriend, Amelia, told Miller that Worrell had had a suspected blood clot on the brain. This prompted Miller to tell her about Worrell's fascination with thrill killing and he suggested the clot was possibly responsible for the moods that led Worrell to kill.
In May 1979 she collected a AUD$30,000 reward after providing the information to police leading to Miller's arrest and capture. Amelia said that she had not come forward earlier because she had no proof the admission was true and that there wasn't much point in going to the police as Worrell was dead. It was only after reading of the murders in the newspaper that she came forward. It is highly likely that the murders would have gone unsolved if Amelia hadn't come forward.
Miller was brought in for questioning on May 23 1979. He initially denied knowing anything but eventually stated Amelia had "done what I should have" and told detectives there were three more. Miller was driven under guard to Truro, Port Gawler and the Wingfield dump where he pointed out their locations.
Victims
December 23, 1976 Veronica Knight 18
Veronica had become separated from her friend while shopping and accepted a ride home. Miller claims they talked her into going for a drive in the Adelaide foothills. Worrell parked while Miller went for a walk. Returning to the car he found Veronica dead and allegedly angrily confronted Worrell who pulled a knife and threatened him. Worrell was in a "black" mood and wouldn't talk, Miller helped him dump the body at Truro. The next morning they both returned to work.
January 2, 1977 Tania Kenny 15
Miller and Worrell picked up Tania who had just arrived in the city after hichhiking from Victor Harbour. They drove to Miller's sister's home and Miller sat in the car while Worrell and Tania went inside. Worrell later returned and asked for help. Allegedly an argument occurred and Worrell threatened to kill Miller if he did not help. That night they buried Tania at Wingfield.
January 21, 1977 Juliet Mykyta 16
Julie was waiting at a bus stop after finishing a part time job in the city when Worrell offered her a lift home. Instead he drove her to Port Wakefield. This time Miller sat in the car while Worrell tied her up. This was not unusual behaviour as "it was Worrell's kink" so miller though nothing of it. Miller alleges he then went to take a walk but turned around after hearing a disturbance. Julie was out of the car and falling to the ground. Worrell turned her over and began strangling her. Miller claims he tried to pull him off but was not strong enough and again Worrell threatened to kill him. Later Julie joined the others at Truro.
February 6, 1977 Sylvia Pittman 16
Picked up as she waited for a train at the Adelaide Railway Station. They drove to the Wingfield area where Miller went for a walk and later helped dispose of the body at Truro.
February 7, 1977 Vickie Howell 26
Worrell rang Miller to pick him up from the Adelaide Post Office. When he arrived Vickie was already with him. Vikie had recently separated from her husband and was happy to go with them to Nuriootpa. Stopping the car Miller went for a walk but soon returned to find everything ok so he then took a longer walk. When he returned Vickie was dead and Worrell was in a rage. Miller claims he cursed and abused Worrell expecting to be killed himself but Worrell said nothing. Vickie was then taken to Truro.
February 9, 1977 Connie Iordanides 16 (AKA Connie Jordan)
Picked up in the city centre and offered a lift home Connie became frightened when then they drove in the wrong direction. Miller stopped at Wingfield and Worrell forced the screaming girl into the back seat while Miller did nothing. He left the car for a while and after returning drove to Truro.
February 12, 1977 Deborah Lamb 20
Deborah was hitchhiking on West Terrace when picked up. They drove to Port Gawler where Miller went for his walk. When he returned to the car Deborah was not there but worrell was pushing sand into a hole with his foot. Deborah was later found buried at the spot.
February 19, 1977 Deborah Skuse (killed in the motor accident that claimed Worrell's life)
Deborah was the girlfriend of a friend. After he broke up with her Miller and Worrell took her to mount Gambier for the weekend but Worrell got in one of his "black" moods so they decided to return to Adelaide on the Saturday afternoon. Worrell was driving when the car blew a tyre and rolled several times throwing all three onto the road. Worrell and Deborah died while Miller broke his shoulderblade.
All the victims had been strangled although there was a strong suspicion that the last of the victims, Deborah Lamb, had been alive when buried.
It has been suggested by criminologist, Professor Paul Wilson, that had Worrell not been killed, the Truro murders may have become a much more devastating killing spree as Worrell was following the "established behavior of some serial killers" with the time between murders getting shorter. Miller himself told Worrell's girlfriend before his arrest that "It was getting worse lately. It was happening more often. It was perhaps a good thing that Chris died".
Accused
Miller stood trial for the murders, and was found guilty of six of the seven murders (with the exception of the first murder, Veronica Knight) on March 12, 1980. Unusually, he was convicted of murder despite having never touched a victim.
The testimony at his trial revealed a terrifying story. Miller and Worrell would cruise the local streets in Worrell's 1969 blue and white Chrysler Valiant every night, looking for women that Worrell could have sex with. Worrell was 23, charismatic and good-looking, and this was a time of sexual revolution in Australia, so Worrell regularly "picked up" local girls. Miller would drive Worrell and the woman to a secluded place, where Worrell would have sex with the women, often after tying them up, while Miller waited outside the car. Then Miller would drive them back into town and drop them off.
Miller described how the "pick-ups" became more and more terrifying. First, Worrell started occasionally raping the women. Then he started murdering them. Miller was unaware that murder would occur prior to it happening - he stated that it only happened some times and not others. It appeared that as the violence increased, Miller became increasingly scared of Worrell.
Miller maintained:
"They can give me life for knowing about the murders and not reporting them. But they charged me with murder .. It's a load of bullshit."
Following the trial one of the jurors hired a lawyer to petition the Attorney-General for a retrial. South Australian Chief Justice Len King agreed that Miller should be granted another hearing on the grounds that the judge at his trial, Mr Justice Matheson, had instructed the jury to find Miller guilty of murder. However, the Attorney-General, Chris Sumner, refused to grant a retrial.
Legally, Miller argued that he never engaged in any murders directly, nor did he explicitly agree prior to going out cruising for women that he would support Worrell in the murders. Nevertheless, he was found guilty of murder because he was found to be a part of a joint criminal enterprise. This created subsequent legal difficulties over the definition of a joint criminal enterprise, but these have largely been resolved on the basis that this was a special, and particularly horrifying, case.
In 1999, Miller applied to have a non-parole period set and on February 8, 2000, Chief Justice John Doyle granted a non-parole period of 35 years making Miller eligible for parole in 2014.
Death
On October 22, 2008, it was reported that James Miller had died of terminal cancer, at the age of 68.
6. Paul Steven Haigh (7)
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| (Paul Steven Haigh) |
Paul Steven Haigh is an Australian serial killer currently serving six sentences of life imprisonment without the possibility of parole for the murder of seven people in the late 1970s.
Classification: Serial killer
Characteristics: Robberies - Disputes
Number of victims: 7
Date of murder: 1978 - 1979 / 1991
Date of birth: September 5, 1957
Victim profile: Evelyn Adams, 58 / Bruno Cingolani, 45 / Wayne Keith Smith, 27 / Sheryle Gardner, 31 / Danny Mitchell, 10 / Lisa Brearley, 19 / Donald George Hatherley, 36 (inmate)
Method of murder: Shooting - Stabbing with knife
Location: Victoria, Australia
Status: Sentenced to six sentences of life imprisonment without the possibility of parole
The crimes
1978
In 1978, in the first two weeks after being paroled for a string of armed holdups, in separate armed robberies Haigh shot dead TattsLotto agency worker Evelyn Adams, aged 58, and 45-year-old pizza shop operator, and father of two, Bruno Cingolani.
1979
In 1979, Haigh began killing people he believed knew too much about his crimes. Haigh shot dead his associate Wayne Keith Smith, aged 27, and his associate’s former girlfriend Sheryle Gardner, 31. Haigh also shot dead Gardner's son Danny Mitchell, 10, who was sitting beside his mother in their car, to stop him identifying his mother's killer. Haigh's most brutal attack was committed against his girlfriend, Lisa Brearley, aged 19, whom Haigh stabbed 157 times after allowing another man to rape her at knifepoint.
1991
Haigh's last victim was sex offender Donald George Hatherley whom Haigh murdered in a jail cell at Pentridge Prison in 1991. Haigh claimed he "assisted" Hatherley to commit suicide by placing a noose around his neck, kicking a cupboard out from under him then pushing down on Hatherley's shoulders. A jury found Haigh guilty of Hatherley's murder.
Won right to appeal
On 19 April 2011, at a hearing before Victorian Court of Appeal justices Peter Buchanan, Geoffrey Nettle and Emilios Kyrou, Haigh won the right to have his sentence reviewed to determine whether he should be entitled to parole, after he appealed a 2009 Victorian Supreme Court (Trial Division) decision to deny his request to be given a minimum term. Haigh argued that the 2009 decision by Justice Betty King was flawed because it had been based on a 2005 pre-sentence report that was later withdrawn by the Victorian Parole Board and replaced in 2007.
The appeal was rejected on 13 December 2012.
5. Ivan Milat (7 – 12+)
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| (Ivan Milat, 1971 mug shot) |
Ivan Robert Marko Milat (born December 27, 1944 in Newcastle) is a serial killer who murdered several tourists and hitchhikers in the 1990s in New South Wales, Australia. The killings were dubbed the backpacker murders by the press at the time. Milat is currently serving a life sentence for the murder of seven hitchhikers, several of whom were international backpackers. He is of Croatian ancestry.
A.K.A.: "The Backpacker Killer", "The Backpacker Murderer"
Classification: Serial killer
Characteristics: Rape
Number of victims: 7 – 12+
Date of murders: 1989 - 1992
Date of arrest: May 22, 1994
Date of birth: December 27, 1944
Victims profile: James Gibson, 19, and Deborah Everist, 19 / Simone Schmidl, 21 / Gabor Neugebauer, 21, and Anja Habschied, 20 / Caroline Clarke, 21, and Joanne Walters, 22
Method of murder: Stabbing with knife / Shooting
Location: New South Wales, Australia
Status: Sentenced to seven consecutive life sentences plus 18 years on July 27, 1996
Ivan Milat had been acquitted on rape charges in 1971. His lawyer at this time, John Marsden, claimed in July 2005 that Milat was helped by a woman in his murder spree.
Backpacker murders
In September 1992 the bodies of British tourists Joanne Walters and Caroline Clarke were found buried in an area known as "Executioners drop".
In October 1993, two more bodies were discovered along the same stretch of the remote Belanglo State Forest. The bodies were identified as those of 19-year-old James Gibson and Deborah Everist, also 19. Both had gone missing in 1989. It then became apparent that a serial killer had been responsible for all these murders.
On 1 November the same year, a fifth body was found, identified through dental records as Simone Schmidl, a 20-year-old German national who had vanished in January 1991.
More than 300 police officers conducted a search of the area on November 4, and found two more skeletons, identified as the remains of 21-year-old Gabor Kurt Neugebauer and his 20-year-old girlfriend, Anja Susanne Habschied, German tourists who had vanished two years previously. Habschied had been decapitated. Police revealed that all victims had been killed by multiple stab wounds.
Forensic examinations of evidence gathered at the scene revealed cartridges from a .22 Ruger rifle near Clarke's body. These were tested against cartridges that had been taken from a farmhouse outside Sydney. A possible eighth victim was provisionally added to the list in November.
An examination of unsolved murders turned up the name of Diane Pennacchio, a 29-year-old mother whose body had been found in bushland in 1991. She had been stabbed to death and the body had been placed face down with hands placed behind her back near a fallen tree, as had those of the previous victims. A triangular canopy of sticks had been built over the bodies and covered with ferns.
It was not until the end of February 1994 that there was a breakthrough in the investigation. A 20-year-old woman stated to police that while backpacking in January 1990 in New South Wales she was offered a lift, which she had accepted. While in the vehicle the driver had behaved strangely, and she got out of the vehicle and ran into the Belangalo State Forest. As she ran, the driver fired shots at her, but missed.
A second witness, British tourist Paul Onions, told police that in 1990 he accepted a lift from a driver in the same area, who then produced a gun from the glove compartment of the vehicle. As he ran, the driver fired shots at him. Onions was able to identify the driver from police photographs and identify the vehicle.
Arrest
In May 1994 police carried out dawn raids on seven properties, taking three men into custody. One of these men was 49-year-old Ivan Milat, who was charged with armed robbery and discharging a firearm; he was later to be charged with the murders. Another was Milat's brother Walter. During the raids police found a .22 calibre rifle that matched the type used in the backpacker murders.
Ivan Milat appeared in court for the initial robbery and weapon charges on May 23. He did not enter a plea. On May 30, following continued police investigations, Milat was also charged with the murders of seven backpackers. At the beginning of February 1995 Milat was remanded in custody until June that same year. In March 1996 the trial finally opened and, in July, he received seven life sentences, one for each of his victims....
Appeals
Milat appealed against his convictions on the basis that the quality of legal representation he had received was too poor, and therefore constituted a breach of his common law right to legal representation, established in the landmark case of Dietrich v. The Queen. However, Gleeson CJ, Kirby P and Mahoney JA of the NSW Court of Criminal Appeal held that the right to legal representation did not depend on any level or quality of representation, unless the quality of representation were so low that the accused were no better off with it. The Court found that this was not the case, and therefore dismissed the appeal.
In 2004, Milat had an application to the High Court heard by Justice McHugh. The orders sought were that Milat be allowed to either attend to make oral submissions in an impending appeal for special leave to the court and that, alternatively, he be allowed to appear via video link. The application was dimissed on the grounds that the issues raised could be adequately addressed by written submission.
The grounds of his impending appeal were that the trial judge had erred by allowing the Crown to put a case to the jury unsupported by its own witnesses and had also put forward alternative cases to the jury, one of which had not been argued by the Crown. McHugh J indicated that this appeal may be defeated because it has been brought out of time.
Further controversies
In June 2006 Milat was embroiled in controversy when it was found that he had a television and toaster in his prison cell. Martha Jabour, leader of a group calling itself the Homicide Victim's Support Group, described the privileges as "an insult to the families of his victims". The privileges were quickly withdrawn after a media campaign stirred up the NSW Parliament and Department Of Corrective Services. After his privileges were withdrawn, he again threatened suicide, and was moved to a "safe cell" and placed under 24-hour video surveillance.
Other possible murders
In May 2005 Boris Milat (one of Ivan's older brothers) said in an interview with the Australian Broadcasting Corporation's Australian Story "wherever Ivan has worked, people have disappeared" He also said when asked how many people he thinks Ivan killed, "about 20 or so..."
At present there are about 6 unsolved murder cases where Ivan is a suspect.
References
Mark Whittaker and Les Kennedy (1998) Sins Of The Brother
The 2005 Australian film Wolf Creek is based on the backpacker murders, among others.
A miniseries on the Seven Network, entitled Catching Milat, was screened in 2015, focusing on the members of "Task Force Air" who tracked Milat during the time of the murders.
4. Eric Edgar Cooke (8)
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| (Eric Edgar Cooke) |
Eric Edgar Cooke (25 February 1931 – 26 October 1964), nicknamed the "Night Caller", was an Australian serial killer. From 1959 to 1963, he terrorised the city of Perth, Western Australia, by committing 22 violent crimes, eight of which resulted in deaths.
A.K.A.: "The Night Caller"
Classification: Serial killer
Characteristics: Unusual serial killer whose methods seemed as random as his choice of victims. His behaviour was inconsistent and bizarre
Number of victims: 8
Date of murders: 1959 / 1963
Date of arrest: September 1, 1963
Date of birth: February 25, 1931
Victims profile: Jillian Macpherson Brewer / Brian Weir, 29 / John Sturkey, 19 / George Walmsley, 54 / Shirley Martha McLeod, 18 / Constance Lucy Madrill, 24 / Patricia Vinico Berkman, 33 / Rosemay Anderson
Method of murder: Shooting - Sttabing with knife - Strangulation
Location: Perth, Western Australia, Australia
Status: Executed by hanging at Fremantle Prison on October 26, 1964
Early life
Eric Edgar Cooke was born on the 25 February 1931 in Victoria Park, a suburb of Perth and was the eldest of three children.
As a child Cooke's father showed no passion towards his oldest child and only son, and would often become a victim of his fathers' alcoholic addiction resulting in beatings for no apparent reason. Cooke was beaten by his father when he tried to protect his mother from his father's violent outbursts of rage.
Cooke had been bullied at school for the impediments of a hare lip and a cleft palate, although whether this contributed to his later crimes is unknown. The operations left him with a slight facial deformity and he spoke in a mumble.
Cooke would later serve 18 months in jail for burning down a church after he was rejected in a choir audition.
At age 21 Cooke joined the Permanent Military Forces but was discharged three months later after it was discovered that before enlistment he had a series of convictions for theft, breaking and entering, and arson.
A year later on the 14th of October 1953, Cooke aged 22 married Sarah (Sally) Lavin, a 19-year-old waitress, at the Methodist Church in Cannington. They were to have seven children.
Murders
Cooke's strange killing spree involved a series of seemingly unrelated hit and runs, stabbings, stranglings and shootings which had Perth completely terrorised. This was an unusual serial killer whose methods seemed as random as his choice of victims. His behaviour was inconsistent and bizarre.
The various shootings had been carried out with several different rifles. Victims had been stabbed with knives and scissors, and hit with an axe. One victim was shot dead after answering a knock on the door, several were killed after waking while Cooke was robbing their homes; two were shot while sleeping without their homes being disturbed; after stabbing one victim, he got lemonade from the refrigerator and sat on the verandah drinking it; another victim was strangled with the cord from her bedside lamp, her dead body raped, then dragged to a neighbor's lawn, where she was violated with an empty whisky bottle which was left cradled in her arms.
In the 1960s, people often left the keys in their cars' ignition overnight, and Cooke would steal a car almost every night, returning it before the owner awoke. It was later discovered that the cars involved in several hit and runs had been returned without the owners realising they had been stolen. Cooke was to later claim he just wanted to hurt people.
During the police investigation, more than 30,000 males over the age of 12 were fingerprinted and more than 60,000 .22 rifles were located and test fired.
Cooke was finally caught after a rifle was found hidden in a bush in August 1963. Ballistic tests proved the gun had been used to murder Shirley McLeod. Police returned to the location and tied a similar inoperable rifle to the bush with fishing line, constructing a hide in which police waited for the owner to collect it, which Cooke did 17 days later. When captured, Cooke confessed to numerous crimes, including 22 violent crimes - 8 murders, and 14 attempted murders. He was convicted on the specimen charge of murdering John Lindsay Sturkey, one of Cooke's five Australia Day (1963) shooting victims.
In his confessions, Cooke demonstrated an exceptionally good memory for the details of his crimes irrespective of how long ago he had committed the offences. For example, he confessed to more than 250 burglaries and was able to detail exactly what he took, including the number and denominations of the coins he had stolen from each location.
Conviction and execution
The other murder confessions included those of Jillian Brewer and Rosemary Anderson for which Darryl Beamish and John Button had already been convicted and imprisoned. Cooke's confessions were referred to in appeals by Beamish and Button but, in Button's case which was heard first, although Cooke had given details withheld by police that only the killer would have known, little credence was given to Cooke's testimony as the vehicle Cooke claimed he had used had an external steel sunvisor, the appeal judges did not believe a body could be thrown "over the roof" as Cooke claimed without ripping the visor off.
Beamish's appeal was dismissed after the judges cross-referenced Cooke’s evidence with that of the Button appeal. West Australia Chief Justice Sir Albert Wolff called him a "villainous unscrupulous liar" and the prosecution claimed that both confessions were an attempt to prolong his own trial.
Pleading not guilty on the grounds of insanity, at trial Cooke's defence lawyers claimed that Cooke suffered from schizophrenia but this claim was dismissed after the director of the state mental health services testified that he was sane. The state would not allow independent psychiatric specialists to examine Cooke.
Cooke was convicted of willful murder on 28 November 1963 after a three-day trial by jury in the Supreme Court of Western Australia before Justice Virtue. He was sentenced to death and despite having grounds to appeal ordered his lawyers not to apply claiming that he had killed and deserved to pay for what he had done. Ten minutes before the sentence was carried out Cooke swore on the Bible renewing his rejected claim that he had been the killer of Jillian Brewer and Rosemary Anderson. Cooke was the last person to be hanged in the state of Western Australia, on 26 October 1964.
Cooke is buried in Fremantle Cemetery, above the remains of the child-killer, Martha Rendell, who was hanged in Fremantle Prison in 1909 and was the last woman to be hanged in Western Australia.
The wrong men
Two other Australians were convicted of crimes later attributed to Cooke:
Darryl Beamish, a deaf mute convicted in 1961 for the 1959 murder of Jillian Macpherson Brewer, a wealthy woman originally from Melbourne. He served 15 years despite Cooke's 1963 confession to the crime. His conviction was quashed in 2005 after evidence pointed to Cooke being the killer.
John Button, who was jailed for five years for manslaughter in the death of his girlfriend, Rosemary Anderson, a conviction that was quashed in 2002 after evidence proved Cooke was the killer.
Media
A memoir, The Shark Net by Robert Drewe – later made into a movie – provides one author's impressions the effect the murders had on the Perth of that era. According to the book, more people bought dogs for security and locked back doors and garages that had never been secured before.
"The Nedlands Monster" also features in Tim Winton's 1991 novel Cloudstreet.
The Walkley Award-winning journalist, Estelle Blackburn, spent six years writing the biographical story Broken Lives, about Cooke's life and criminal career, focussing particularly on the devastation left on his victims and their families
3. Robert Joe Wagner (10)
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| (Robert Joe Wagner) |
Robert Joe Wagner (born 28 November 1971 in Parramatta, New South Wales) is an Australian serial killer, currently serving ten consecutive sentences of life imprisonment without the possibility of parole for his role in the murder of ten victims of the Snowtown murders. Wagner, driven to murder by his hatred for pedophiles, has been described as being amongst "Australia's worst" serial killers.
Wagner fried and ate the flesh of his final victim, David Johnson. At his sentencing, Wagner rose in the dock and stated:
"Pedophiles were doing terrible things to children. The authorities didn't do anything about it. I decided to take action. I took that action. Thank you."
On 27 September 2002, Wagner pleaded guilty to three charges of murder for the murders of Barry Lane, Fred Brooks and David Johnson. He would plead not guilty to the remaining seven murder charges against him, and eventually be convicted of them, bringing the total number of victims to ten.
A.K.A.: "The Snowtown murders" - "The Bodies in Barrels murders"
Classification: Serial killer
Characteristics: "Degenerate sub-culture" of murderers - Cannibalism - Torture
Number of victims: 10
Date of murders: 1992 - 1999
Date of arrest: May 20, 1999
Date of birth: November 28, 1971
Victims profile: Clinton Trezise, 22 / Ray Davies, 26 / Michael Gardiner, 19 / Barry Lane, 42 / Thomas Trevilyan, 18 / Gavin Porter, 29 / Troy Youde, 21 / Frederick Brooks, 18 / Gary O'Dwyer, 29 / Elizabeth Haydon, 37 / David Johnson, 24
Method of murder: Shooting - Strangulation
Location: Snowtown, South Australia, Australia
Status: Sentenced to ten consecutive sentences of life imprisonment without the possibility of parole on September 8, 2003
The Snowtown murders, also known as the Bodies in Barrels murders, were the murders of 12 people in South Australia, Australia between August 1992 and May 1999. The crimes were uncovered when the remains of eight victims were found in barrels of acid located in a rented former bank building in Snowtown, South Australia on 20 May 1999. The town of Snowtown is in the Mid North of South Australia, 145 km north of Adelaide. Though Snowtown is frequently linked with the crimes, the bodies had been held in a series of locations around Adelaide for some time, and were moved to Snowtown in early 1999, very late in the crime spree that had spanned several years. Only one victim was killed in Snowtown; none of the victims or the perpetrators were from that town.
Eight bodies were found in plastic barrels in the disused bank vault on 20 May. Three days later two bodies were found buried in a backyard in Salisbury North, a suburb north of Adelaide. By the end of June, nine of the ten victims had been identified. The discoveries followed a lengthy, covert criminal investigation by South Australian Police. During the investigation two mysterious deaths already known to authorities were found to have been murders perpetrated by the "Snowtown" murderers.
A total of four people were arrested and charged over the murders. All were convicted of the murders or assisting in the murders. This group was largely influenced by ringleader John Justin Bunting. Much detail was not made public with the cases having been subject to over 250 suppression orders, many of which have not yet been lifted.
Perpetrators
John Justin Bunting (b. 1966 in Inala, Queensland) was convicted of murdering all listed victims except Suzanne Allen. He is considered to have been the central figure throughout all of the killings and torture and the one whose personality provided motivation for the other perpetrators. While psychological reports are not available to the public, it has been suggested by forensic psychiatrist Professor Kevin Howells, who has worked at Broadmoor Hospital in the United Kingdom, that Bunting's behaviour suggested he lacks emotion and the capacity to empathise with his victims. Howells believes Bunting fits the profile of a psychopathic killer who derives satisfaction from controlling his victims. When he was young, his favourite pastime was burning insects in acid, and during his teenage years he was a neo-Nazi. During adulthood Bunting developed a deep hatred of paedophiles and homosexuals.
Robert Joe Wagner was befriended by Bunting in 1991. He was encouraged by Bunting to assist him in the various murders, and complied.
Mark Ray Haydon was not convicted of any of the murders, but pleaded guilty to helping the serial killers dispose of the bodies.
James Spyridon Vlassakis, along with his mother and half-brother, lived with Bunting, and was gradually drawn into helping with the murders and torture. Later became the Crown's star witness.
Elizabeth Harvey, Vlassakis' mother, who knew about the murders, and with Bunting's encouragement, assisted in one of them. Died of cancer after the arrests of Bunting, Wagner, Vlassakis, and Haydon.
Thomas Trevilyan assisted in the murder of Barry Lane in 1997, murdered by the other gang members prior to police involvement.
Jodie Elliott, sister of Mark Ray Haydon's wife Elizabeth Haydon, was a woman with below-average intelligence who had become besotted with Bunting. She impersonated a deceased former acquaintance of Bunting's, Suzanne Allen, to collect her social security payments. Elliott's son Frederick Brooks was later murdered by the gang.
The murders
Bunting moved into the Salisbury North home in 1991 and quickly befriended Wagner and his boyfriend Barry Lane, and Mark Haydon, who all lived nearby.
The various victims were mainly chosen on a whim by John Bunting for imagined infractions. He especially hated paedophiles, and some victims were murdered as Bunting suspected them of being a paedophile, usually based on flimsy evidence or rumour. Others were killed due to dislike of obese people, or drug users or because they were gay men. Most of the victims were friends or acquaintances of at least one of the group. Others were relatives, sometimes living in the same house as one of the killers. Others were briefly befriended and drawn into the group as they were picked as easy targets to satisfy Bunting's desire to commit murder. Usually victims' social security and bank details were obtained, and the murderers or their associates impersonated the victims to continue to collect their pensions after their deaths. Although a total of $97,200 was obtained in this manner, social security fraud was not judged to have been the primary motive for the killings.
The final murder was conducted in the bank building after the barrels had been moved there for storage. Of the scene encountered in this building, one Snowtown officer said: "It was a scene from the worst nightmare you've ever had, I don't think any of us was prepared for what we saw." The building was littered with tools used by the killers to torture and murder their victims, including:
Knives
A bloodstained saw
Double barrel shotgun
Coils of rope
Rolls of tape
Rubber gloves
Cloths
A Variac metallurgy tool that the killers used to administer electric shocks to the genitals and other sensitive parts of the victim's body
The pathologists report later revealed that prolonged torture had taken place using everyday tools such as pincers, pliers and clamps — examples of all of these were found in the vault. Wendy Abraham QC, the deputy Director of Public Prosecutions, reported at the Supreme Court of South Australia that the victims were forced to call their torturers 'God', 'Master', 'Chief Inspector' and 'Lord Sir'.
Ray Davies was garrotted with a piece of rope and a tyre lever after being placed in a bath, attacked with clubs, repeatedly beaten about his genitals and having a toe crushed with a pair of pliers.
Frederick Brooks received electric shocks to his penis and testicles, and had a burning sparkler pushed down into his penis; after his toes were crushed and his nose and ears burned with cigarettes, he was allowed to choke to death on his gag.
A piece of the flesh of the eleventh and final victim, David Johnson, was fried and eaten by Bunting and Wagner.
The victims
Clinton Trezise, 22 (d. Aug 1992) was found buried in a shallow grave in 1994 at Lower Light. Was killed in Bunting's living room at his home in Salisbury North, by being bashed with a shovel after being invited in for a social visit.
Ray Davies, 26 (d. Dec 1995), a mentally handicapped man who lived in a caravan in the back yard behind Suzanne Allen's house who became a target after her accusation that he was a paedophile. Harvey assisted in his torture. Davies was never reported missing.
Suzanne Allen, 47. Allen was a friend of Bunting's. She died some time after Davies, and her remains were found buried above his in the garden of the house at Salisbury North. Her remains were wrapped in eleven different plastic bags. Her death was concealed by the accused and they continued to collect her pension, but they later claimed she had actually died of a heart attack. Based on the evidence presented at trial, the jury was unable to decide without doubt that she had been murdered.
Michael Gardiner, 19 (d. Aug 1997) an openly gay man murdered after a suspicion arose that he was also a paedophile.
Barry Lane, 42 (d. Oct 1997), a gay man and cross dresser who had been in a relationship with Wagner at the time Bunting first met them in 1991 when he moved to their neighbourhood. Trevilyan was a later boyfriend of Lane's. Lane had been tortured by having his toes crushed with pliers.
Thomas Trevilyan, 18 (d. 1997) was found hanging from a tree near Kersbrook in the Adelaide Hills, and was initially presumed to have committed suicide. He had helped in the murder of Barry Lane, but was later killed after discussing the crime with others. He was known to his family to have suffered from paranoid schizophrenia and was easily persuaded.
Gavin Porter, 29 (d. Apr 1998), a heroin addict and friend of Vlassakis. After Bunting, Elizabeth Harvey, Vlassakis, and Youde moved to Murray Bridge, South Australia, Porter also moved in. Bunting decided he should be the next victim after he was pricked by a discarded syringe Porter left on the couch in the living room. Porter was strangled in his car parked on the property.
Troy Youde, 21 (d. Sep 1998), Vlassakis' half-brother and son of Elizabeth Harvey who was living with them at Bunting's Murray Bridge house at the time of his death. He was killed in the house after being dragged from his bed while asleep. This was the first murder Vlassakis participated in.
Fred Brooks, 18 (d. Sep 1998). The intellectually disabled son of Jodie Elliott, a woman in love with Bunting, was chosen by Bunting as an easy victim and lured to his house where he was attacked and brutally tortured.
Gary O'Dwyer, 29 (d. Nov 1998), man disabled in an earlier car accident and on a pension, O'Dwyer was a stranger, picked as an easy target. Was killed in his home in Frances Street, Murray Bridge, by Bunting, Wagner and Vlassakis.
Elizabeth Haydon, 37 (d. Nov 1998), Mark Haydon's wife, killed by Bunting and Wagner in her home while her husband was out.
David Johnson, 24 (d. May 1999) Vlassakis' half-brother. Murdered by Bunting in the bank building having been lured there by Vlassakis. He was the only victim to have died in Snowtown.
The investigation began to take shape after Elizabeth Haydon's brother reported her missing within days of her disappearance. Her brother did not believe her husband Mark Haydon's explanations for her disappearance, which seemed to contradict each other in varying versions he gave, and the brother also did not believe she would leave without her two young sons. Police found it suspicious that her husband had not reported her missing, and investigated her disappearance. Elizabeth Haydon was closely affiliated with all of the murderers, so they all fell under close scrutiny once police started their investigations.
The discovery that Trezise and Lane had known each other was one of the first clues in the police discovering that there was more than a routine missing person investigation.
The storage of bodies
The discovery of the barrels in May 1999 in Snowtown was the culmination of five years of criminal investigation. Police involvement with the then unlinked crimes had begun with the discovery of human remains at Lower Light. After Elizabeth Haydon's disappearance, the police installed a listening device in Mark Haydon's house in Smithfield Plains, recordings from which were later used as court evidence.
The remains found at Lower Light were later determined to have been those of Clinton Trezise, who had been murdered in Bunting's living room at Salisbury North, South Australia. Ray Davies and Suzanne Allen were found buried in the back yard of that house.
The bodies in barrels were variously stored in several places before finally being moved to the bank vault in Snowtown. These included a shed behind Bunting's house at Murray Bridge in April 1998; the three barrels were then moved to Haydon's property at Smithfield Plains later in 1998. Then five barrels were stored in a Toyota Land Cruiser at Hoyleton, a locality on the Adelaide Plains near the Clare Valley, with a sixth in a Mitsubishi Sigma back at Murray Bridge. Both of these vehicles were later moved to Snowtown, and afterwards the barrels moved into the bank vault, which had been rented by Haydon, using the name "Mark Lawrence", the name he had used before he married.
The movement of unfamiliar vehicles to Snowtown, a small town where strangers stand out, and loading activity at the old bank led to the bank building being searched. Of the Snowtown location one local police source said, "From what I understand there was no person involved in those murders from within Snowtown or the surrounding district. They were murdered elsewhere and the drums were brought to Snowtown because it was a quiet little town and there was a premises ideal for the persons involved."
Examiners attempting to identify the remains found them mummified rather than dissolved, the latter being the apparent intention of storing the bodies in barrels of acid. The killers had chosen hydrochloric acid which mummified the remains.
Trials
After a series of pre-trial hearings, the first of the accused to be sentenced was Vlassakis, who was given four life sentences on 21 June 2001 after pleading guilty to four murders. Later that summer, Bunting, Haydon and Wagner each pleaded not guilty to 10 counts of murder. Many of the charges against Haydon were later dropped due to insufficient evidence.
The Supreme Court trial for Wagner and Bunting began on 14 October 2002 and within a short space of time the court experienced difficulties with the jury. At least one juror refused to continue due to the horror of the evidence and some sources report that a total of three jurors withdrew from the panel for this reason. Both Bunting and Wagner were found guilty on 8 September 2003. Bunting was convicted of eleven murders and Wagner, who had pleaded guilty to three murders, was convicted of seven; both appealed their convictions. They were each sentenced to imprisonment for life on each count to be served cumulatively; the presiding judge, Justice Brian Martin, stated that the men were "in the business of killing for pleasure" and were also "incapable of true rehabilitation".
The proceedings against Haydon continued into 2004, and on 2 August a trial opened in which he was charged with two counts of murder and six counts of "assisting offenders". Haydon testified that he was not party to the crimes. However, on 19 December, the jury returned from four days of deliberations, convicting Haydon of five counts of assisting in the crimes and reaching no verdict on the two counts of murder and the remaining charge of assistance. Haydon was held in detention as of December 2004 awaiting a possible retrial. In May 2005 the Supreme Court dismissed an appeal by Bunting and Wagner, who have now exhausted their avenues of appeal in South Australia. In September 2005 the murder charges against Haydon were dropped in return for guilty pleas to two new charges of assisting in the killings of his wife, Elizabeth Haydon, and Troy Youde. Prosecutors also agreed to drop an additional charge of assisting offenders in relation to the murder of David Johnson.
The final outstanding murder charges against John Bunting and Robert Wagner, concerning Suzanne Allen, were dropped on 7 May 2007, when a jury was unable to reach a verdict.
Community impact
Bunting and Wagner have been described, alongside backpacker murders killer Ivan Milat as Australia's worst serial killers.
The particulars of the case, especially the manner in which the victims were found, horrified and fascinated the public. The murders garnered Snowtown much unwanted attention, and the town is now best-known for the murders. According to local residents, in the 18 months following the discovery in the disused bank vault, a steady stream of unwelcome visitors would stop to look at and photograph the building.
At the time, the local press reported a suggestion that the town's name be changed to avoid the stigma now associated with the name, although this suggestion was never acted upon. One suggested new name in press reports was "Rosetown".
The house in Salisbury North was owned by the South Australian Housing Trust, and has been demolished. Today units for older people are in its place.
Film
A movie, "Snowtown", regarding the life of John Bunting was released in Australia on 19 May 2011
Books
Snowtown Murders: The Real Story Behind the Bodies in the Barrels Killings, Andrew McGarry, ISBN 0-7333-1482-1
Snowtown: The Bodies In Barrels Murders: The Grisly Story of Australia's Worst Serial Killings, Jeremy Pudney, ISBN 0-7322-6716-1
All Things Bright And Beautiful: Murder In The City Of Light, Susan Mitchell, ISBN 1-4050-3610-9
2. John Lynch (10)
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| (John Lynch) |
John Lynch (1813 – 22 April 1842) was an Irish-born Australian serial killer, convicted for the murder of Kearns Landregan, but is believed to have killed 10 people in the Berrima area of New South Wales from 1835 to 1841. Possibly the worst serial killer in Australian history, Lynch was a bushranger who murdered and robbed cattle herders and laborers in the trails around Berima.
Lynch was sentenced to death, and was executed in 1842.
A.K.A.: "The Berrima Axe Murderer"
Classification: Serial killer
Characteristics: Robberies
Number of victims: 10
Date of murders: 1835 - 1841
Date of arrest: February 21, 1841
Date of birth: 1813
Victims profile: Thomas Smyth; William Frazer (son & father); a young black boy (maybe 'Billy') and Edmund Ireland; John and Bridget Mulligan and her children John and Mary MacNamara and Kernes Ladrigan
Method of murder: Bashed to death with a heavy blunt instrument
Location: Berrima, New South Wales, Australia
Status: Executed by hanging at Berrima Jail on April 22, 1842
Background
John Lynch was born in 1813 in Cavan, Ireland. In 1830, he was convicted of false pretences in Cavan, and two years later he was sentenced to penal transportation to Australia. Lynch, at 19-years-old, left Ireland on the ship Dunvegan Castle II, on 1 July 1832 sailing from Dublin to New South Wales. On 16 October 1832, the ship docked at Port Jackson and Lynch was billeted out to Berrima, a village founded that year and located in the southern highlands of New South Wales, roughly 130 kilometres from Sydney.
Lynch was a small but solidly-built man at just 5’3” in height, and worked as a convict labourer on various farms before joining a gang of bushrangers. An 1835 incident saw him and two others convicted for the killing of Tom Smythe, after Smythe had given evidence against Lynch's gang. Despite his admission to the crime the jury did not believe him and set him free, while the other two were hanged.
Murders
Lynch's murder spree started after he went to the farm of T.B. Humphrey, where he had previously worked, and stole eight cattle before setting out for Sydney, where his intention was to sell them. At Razorback Mountain, he met a man called Ireland along with an Aboriginal boy who were driving a full cattle herd loaded with wheat, bacon and other produce. The cargo was meant to be delivered to Thomas Cowper, who was a stranger to Lynch, and decided it would be more profitable to take Ireland’s load and sell it rather than his initial intention. Early one morning, Ireland asked the boy to help round up the cattle, and once they were away from the camp Lynch crept up behind him and smashed the back of his head with a tomahawk, killing him. Returning to camp while Ireland was making breakfast, Lynch distracted him before crashing the tomahawk into the back of his head, killing him too. Lynch hid both corpses and continued to Sydney to execute his plan with his stolen merchandise.
On his way back from Sydney, close to Razorback Mountain, he met a father and son called Frazer, who were driving a cattle herd owned by a Mr Bawten. Lynch fancied this herd and decided he would have to kill the Frazers to get it, accompanying them on their journey. That night, they camped near Cordeaux Flat, and the next morning Lynch killed both men and then buried their bodies.
After killing the Frazers, Lynch decided to deal with the Mulligans, who had owed him £30 for stolen goods they had purchased off him. He visited the Mulligan farm and killed the four members of the family before gathering the bodies, built a pyre and set them alight. Lynch claimed to be the new owner of the property, and he bought it off the surviving Mulligans as the family left town without a word to anybody.
Arrest and conviction
On the morning of 19 February 1841, Hugh Tinney was on his way to Sydney with a herd of cattle. After stopping near the Ironstone bridge, which crosses the Wingcarribee River on the edge of Berrima, Tinney noticed a dingo rummaging in the undergrowth trying to get at whatever was hidden there. Tinney chased off the dingo, and a closer inspection revealed the body of a man. The man had received a various severe blows to the back of his head by a large blunt instrument, and items on the dead man's body identified him as a local farmhand named Kearns Landregan. Landregan was last seen just two nights previously, having dinner in the company of a farmer calling himself John Dunleavy at the Woolpack Inn in Nattai, close to Berrima and not far from where the body was discovered. The police then called on to a farm which had been home to a family called Mulligan but was now owned by Dunleavy, who maintained that he had bought the farm from the Mulligans for £700. Dunleavy also said that all of the Mulligans had apparently packed up and left town without telling a soul. The barmaid from the Woolpack later identified Dunleavy and Lynch as the same person. With that information and other strong evidence gathered by police on 21 February 1841, Lynch was charged with the murder of Landregan.
Lynch's trial began in Berrima courthouse on 21 March 1842 before the chief justice of New South Wales, Sir James Dowling. Despite the evidence presented to the court, Lynch maintained his plea of innocence, but the jury found him guilty in less than an hour. He stuck steadfastly to his story of being innocent, as he went through the appeals process, and it was only after this procedure was exhausted that he confessed to his crimes.
Lynch was executed by hanging in Berrima Gaol on 22 April 1842.
1. John Justin Bunting (11)
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| (John Justin Bunting) |
John Justin Bunting (b. 4 September 1966 in Inala, Queensland) is an Australian serial killer from Adelaide, South Australia, currently serving eleven consecutive sentences of life imprisonment without the possibility of parole for his role in the murder of 11 victims of the Snowtown murders.
Bunting, driven to murder by his hatred for pedophiles and homosexuals, has been described as a skilled manipulator of people and "Australia's worst serial killer".
Bunting was the ringleader of a "degenerate sub-culture" of murderers whose victims were people they already knew. Under the instruction of Bunting, the group would prey upon the weak so they could steal their welfare payments. His crimes led to the longest and most expensive investigations and criminal trials in South Australia's history.
Bunting lived in Murray Bridge, South Australia from November 1991, living on Lohman Street until he moved to Burdekin Avenue in May 1997 where he remained until September 1998. Two of his victims were found in the backyard of his former home in Waterloo Corner Road, Salisbury North, a northern suburb of Adelaide, with the remaining eight discovered in a vault of a disused bank rented by Bunting and Haydon in Snowtown, South Australia, 140 km north of Adelaide. Bunting insisted on playing the 1994 Live album Throwing Copper during many of his later murders.
A.K.A.: "The Snowtown murders" - "The Bodies in Barrels murders"
Classification: Serial killer
Characteristics: Ringleader of a "degenerate sub-culture" of murderers - Cannibalism - Torture
Number of victims: 11
Date of murders: 1992 - 1999
Date of arrest: May 19, 1999
Date of birth: September 4, 1966
Victims profile: Clinton Trezise, 22 / Ray Davies, 26 / Michael Gardiner, 19 / Barry Lane, 42 / Thomas Trevilyan, 18 / Gavin Porter, 29 / Troy Youde, 21 / Frederick Brooks, 18 / Gary O'Dwyer, 29 / Elizabeth Haydon, 37 / David Johnson, 24
Method of murder: Shooting - Strangulation
Location: Snowtown, South Australia, Australia
Status: Sentenced to eleven consecutive sentences of life imprisonment without the possibility of parole on September 8, 2003
Rock spider wall
Bunting had fashioned a "rock spider wall" on a wall of a spare room in his house. The chart, created using paper notes and wool, was an interconnected web of names of people Bunting suspected to be pedophiles or homosexuals. At times Bunting would randomly select a name from the wall and call them, insinuating they were pedophiles and "would get what's coming to them".
Relationship with James Vlassakis
Bunting was married to Elizabeth Harvey, mother of co-offender James Vlassakis. Bunting spent a lot of time with Vlassakis, assuming the role of a father figure. Bunting regularly communicated to Vlassakis his hatred for pedophiles and homosexuals. Vlassakis confided in Bunting that his stepbrother, Troy Youde, had molested him at the age of 13. Bunting replied by suggesting that Youde be bashed.
Vlassakis later gave evidence against Bunting, Wagner, and Haydon at their criminal trials. Elizabeth Harvey has since died of cancer.
Relationship with Robert Wagner
Bunting met Wagner when he moved to Waterloo Corner Road. Wagner was living with Barry Lane at the time; both men assisted Bunting in disposing of the body of his first victim, Clinton Trezise. Wagner later assisted Bunting in the remaining ten murders.
Murders
Clinton Trezise
Bunting's murder spree began in August 1992, with the murder of Clinton Trezise, 22. Trezise was bashed to death with a shovel in Bunting's living room after being invited inside for a social visit. Bunting accused Tresize of being a pedophile and referred to him in conversations after his murder as "Happy Pants". Trezise was found buried two years after his murder in a shallow grave on 16 August 1994 at Lower Light, South Australia. It was another three years before Bunting murdered again.
Trezise's murder remained unsolved for some time and in 1997 he was the subject of two episodes of the Australian television show Australia's Most Wanted. Bunting watched an episode of the show with Vlassakis and his mother. Bunting boasted to Vlassakis, "That's my handiwork" and revealed to Vlassakis that he had murdered Trezise while living at Waterloo Corner Road, Salisbury, and that he disposed of Trezise's body in Lower Light with Wagner and Lane's assistance.
Ray Davies
Ray Davies was an intellectually disabled man who lived in a caravan behind the house of Suzanne Allen in Salisbury North. Davies, a former lover of Allen, became a target for murder after Allen accused him of making sexual advances to her grandsons.
Davies was murdered by Bunting and Wagner in December 1995 and was never reported missing. Bunting and Wagner were later seen cleaning Davies' caravan. They moved it to a house in nearby Elizabeth, where it was painted and sold two months after Davies' murder. Bunting continued to claim Davies' welfare payments.
Davies' body was later recovered by police buried in the backyard at the former home of Bunting in Waterloo Corner Road, Salisbury North.
Michael Gardiner
Michael Gardiner was an openly gay man murdered by Bunting and Wagner in August 1997. Gardiner shared a house with friends nearby.
Robert Wagner did not like Gardiner due to his open homosexuality.
After Gardiner's murder, Bunting had Frederick Brooks call friends of Gardiner and impersonate him. Brooks demanded from them belongings such as Gardiner's wallet, saying Gardiner required it for identification purposes. Bunting wanted it to gain access to Gardiner's personal funds.
His body was found by police stored in one of six drums in the bank vault in Snowtown. The body of Barry Lane was also located in the same barrel. One of Gardiner's feet had been removed so the lid of the drum could be closed.
Barry Lane
Lane was an open homosexual and crossdresser. Lane had previously been in a relationship with Robert Wagner from 1985 until 1996. The pair shared a house in Bingham Road, Salisbury North near the home of Bunting. Lane's relationship with Wagner began when Wagner was 13. He was last seen alive in October 1997.
Bunting often referred to Lane as being "dirty" and as a pedophile. On the day of his murder, Lane was forced by Bunting to call his mother; he told her he would be moving to Queensland and that he wanted nothing further to do with her.
Bunting had also learned of Lane telling others about the earlier murder of Clinton Tresize. Lane had assisted Bunting to conceal Tresize's body. After Lane's murder, Bunting assumed control of Lane's vehicle and claimed his welfare payments. Thomas Trevilyan was also involved in the murder of Lane. It was alleged Bunting only associated with Lane to gain further information about pedophiles in the area.
Lane's dismembered body was found by police in a drum in the bank vault in Snowtown, along with the body of Michael Gardiner.
Thomas Trevilyan
Thomas Trevilyan was described as having psychiatric problems and wore only army style clothing. He would at times run outside his house with a knife if he heard unfamiliar noises, and was known to regularly travel long distances on foot. He shared a house with Barry Lane for a period of five months from April to October 1997. Trevilyan had assisted Bunting and Wagner in the earlier murder of Barry Lane. Bunting murdered Trevilyan after finding out he told others of his involvement in Lane's murder.
Bunting told others that Trevilyan had started to "fuck up" and "go mental" and that he would be a risk. Trevilyan was driven to Kersbrook in the Adelaide Hills by Bunting and Wagner. He was forced to stand on a box while a noose was fastened around his neck and the box kicked from under him.
Trevilyan's body was found on 5 November 1997. Police initially treated Trevilyan's death as a suicide.
Gavin Porter
Gavin Porter, 31, was a friend of Vlassakis' from Victoria. He moved into the house shared by Bunting and Vlassakis in 1988. Bunting referred to Porter, a heroin addict, as a "waste" who no longer deserved to live. Bunting was angered after being pricked by a used syringe discarded by Porter on the sofa. Porter was murdered by Bunting and Wagner while sleeping in his car in the driveway of Bunting's house after working on his car. Porter's body was stored in a barrel before being moved to Snowtown.
Troy Youde
Troy Youde was a half brother of Vlassakis. Vlassakis had earlier confided to Bunting that Youde had molested him when younger. In August 1998, Bunting, Wagner, Vlassakis, and Haydon visited Youde. Bunting, Wagner and Vlassakis dragged him from his bed and murdered him. Youde's body was dismembered and stored in a barrel and later moved to Snowtown.
Frederick Brooks
Frederick Brooks was the intellectually disabled son of Jodie Elliot and nephew of Elizabeth Haydon. He was murdered by Bunting, Wagner, and Vlassakis on 17 September 1998.
Brooks' body was moved to a car which was later collected by Mark Haydon. The body was later located by police in the disused bank vault in Snowtown. Mark Haydon continued to access the welfare payments of Brooks.
Gary O'Dwyer
Gary O'Dwyer, 29, was an intellectually disabled man who lived alone in Frances Street, Murray Bridge. His disabilities arose from a car accident earlier in life. Bunting had Vlassakis learn personal information about O'Dwyer and whether he had any family. O'Dwyer was seen by Bunting as an easy target and murdered so Bunting could gain from O'Dwyer's welfare payments.
O'Dwyer's body was found by police in the bank vault in Snowtown. His body contained burn marks which were inflicted by using a variac machine to apply electric shocks.
Elizabeth Haydon
Elizabeth Haydon was the wife of Mark Haydon, and shared a house with him at Blackham Crescent, Smithfield Plains, a northern suburb of Adelaide. Elizabeth's sister, Jodie Elliot, who had a brief relationship with Bunting in 1998, lived at the rear of the Haydons' house. Elizabeth was Bunting and Wagner's second-to-last murder victim and the only female victim.
Elizabeth was murdered on 20 November 1998 while Haydon and Elliot were away from the house. Elizabeth was reported missing by her brother Garion Sinclair to police at 3pm the following day. Haydon would later assist in concealing his wife's murder.
Police inquiries into Elizabeth Haydon's disappearance led them to the disused bank in Snowtown, which eventually led to the discovery of eight bodies stored in a vault, including that of Elizabeth Haydon. Police later arrested Bunting, Wagner, Vlassakis, and Elizabeth's husband, Mark Haydon for the murders.
David Johnson
Johnson was lured to the disused bank in Snowtown by his stepbrother, James Vlassakis, on 9 May 1999. Johnson was not homosexual, but Bunting would often refer to him as a "faggot" and say he needed to die.
Vlassakis had earlier told Johnson about a computer for sale near Clare, South Australia. Vlassakis drove him to Snowton to ostensibly look at this computer.
Shortly after Johnson entered the bank building, he was grabbed by Wagner around the throat and strangled. Wagner then applied handcuffs to Johnson and he was forced by Bunting to read a script Bunting had earlier prepared, as well as provide his bank account PIN. Johnson's voice was recorded on a computer equipped with a microphone.
Wagner and Vlassakis drove to Port Wakefield and attempted to access Johnson's bank account, leaving Bunting and Haydon with Johnson in the disused bank. Wagner and Vlassakis were unsuccessful in withdrawing funds from Johnson's account. When they returned to Snowtown, Johnson was dead.
Bunting and Wagner dismembered Johnson's body, then fried and ate parts of his flesh.
Johnson was the final murder victim before the group was apprehended.
Criminal trial
Bunting was tried together with Robert Wagner. On 8 September 2003, Bunting was found guilty and convicted on 11 counts of murder. He was Australia's most prolific serial killer.
Suzanne Allen
The remains of Suzanne Allen were found buried at Bunting's house at Salisbury North, wrapped in 11 different plastic bags. Her death was concealed by the accused and they continued to collect her pension, claiming a total of $17,000. They claimed she had died of a heart attack. Murder charges regarding the death of Allen were eventually dropped by the prosecution due to lack of evidence.
Films inspired by events
In March 2010, Screen Australia announced funding support for Snowtown, a true crime film based on the murders. The film was to be produced by Warp Films Australia. It would be the first full length feature directed by Justin Kurzel.