2025.3.31 Four decades of questions over teen’s train track death, as new inquest opens
A cream-coloured stolen car, towel and white box are key to unanswered questions that have lingered in the 37 years since Indigenous teenager Mark Haines was found dead on train tracks.
Haines’ body was found on the tracks south of Tamworth in NSW on the morning of January 16, 1988, not far from the crashed car.
An autopsy showed the Gomeroi teenager died from a traumatic head injury.
The initial police investigation concluded the 17-year-old lay on the tracks either deliberately or in a dazed state, something his family has never believed.
A new inquest is examining the circumstances of Haines’ death and the original police investigation, after a long campaign by his uncle Don Craigie to re-visit the case.
Craigie took part in a traditional smoking ceremony outside the Coroners Court of NSW, in western Sydney, in front of Deputy State Coroner Harriet Grahame this morning.
Opening the final week of hearings, counsel assisting Chris McGorey outlined the hours before and after Haines’ death.
As a goods train travelled from Werris Creek station to West Tamworth before dawn on January 16, the crew noticed what appeared to be a white box on the tracks, McGorey said.
The train travelled over the box in pouring rain about 5.45am, making a sound like hitting a small animal.
When the crew travelled back to the area on a different train about 6am, the driver got a “fleeting” glimpse of a body in the middle of the tracks but was unable to stop before running over it.
Emergency services soon found Haines’ body with a towel or blanket under his head.
But none of the workers recalled seeing anyone putting it there while recovering his body, McGorey said.
Police also found a light-coloured Torana near the train tracks, its windscreen on the ground, which appeared to have rolled.
The car may have been stolen from a Tamworth home about 3.47am and had boxes of Christmas presents and blankets inside it, McGorey said.
“A number of questions have arisen over the past 37 years,” he told the inquest.
He said the coroner may consider questions including how and why Haines came to be on the tracks, who may have been with him at the time and which of the two trains hit him.
Previous hearings have been told of swirling rumours about several Tamworth locals knowing more about Haines’ death, including friends who were among the last to see him alive.
His close friend Glenn Mannion, who gave evidence at the 1988 inquest, denied any kind of involvement.
“I have no idea what happened to Mark or how he ended up out there,” Mannion said, under questioning at the inquest today.
“100 per cent, absolutely, it was not me.”
The hearings are due to continue into Friday.
2025.3.29 Private search launched for Joanne Ratcliffe and Kirste Gordon more than 50 years after disappearance
A group of locals and geologists armed with an excavator and cadaver dogs are set to search for evidence of two girls more than 50 years after they disappeared.
A new, private search for evidence related to two girls who disappeared from an oval in Adelaide more than 50 years ago has kicked off.
Joanne Ratcliffe, 11, and Kirste Gordon, 4, were with their families at an AFL match at Adelaide Oval on August 25, 1973.
The two girls left the Edwin Smith stand, where they were seated with their families, and went to the toilet together at about 3.45pm.
When the two girls failed to return, Joanne’s father began searching for them, and a missing person’s report was filed a short time later.
Witnesses claim they saw the two girls being forcibly removed and carried away by a man, believed to be aged in his 40s.
Joanne and Kirste were never seen again, with police long believing they were likely abducted and murdered.
A composite sketch of the man believed to have taken the girls – in which he is wearing a distinctive hat – was released by SA Police in September 1973, and has been regularly associated with the case in the decades since.
Journalist Bryan Littlely, who co-founded missing persons awareness group Leave A Light On Inc alongside Ratcliffe’s sister Suzie, is leading the search, which is set to look at multiple areas including a private property north of Yatina, according to ABC News.
“Families of long-term missing persons, we can’t move on, we’re living a life of limbo, not knowing what happened to our love ones,” Suzie told the network.
Littlely claimed the girls may have been murdered at a Yatina shack before their bodies were put in barrels and left at Pekina, the broadcaster reported.
Locals, cadaver dogs, geologists and even an excavator are set to search the areas.
“We don’t have the belief that we would find human remains themselves but we might find something else,” Littley said.
Pekina reservoir is set to be searched on Sunday.
However South Australia Police Commissioner Grant Stevens earlier said police had “previously searched that location and at this point in time we don’t believe there is any evidence that warrants any further investigation in relation to those circumstances”, the ABC reported.
A South Australia Police spokesperson said the disappearance of the two girls “remains an active and ongoing investigation and police are not in a position to comment at this time”.
2025.3.24 Sydney author Lauren Tesolin-Mastrosa arrested over ‘pedophilia’ book
The fiction novel, which follows the relationship between an 18-year-old girl and her father’s friend, sparked furore online.
Police have arrested a Sydney author on child abuse material charges following global outrage over her book entitled: “Daddy’s Little Toy”.
Christian charity marketing executive Lauren Tesolin-Mastrosa, who writes erotic fiction under the pen name “Tori Woods”, caused an online furore following the release of her latest novel, which outlines the relationship between an 18-year-old and her father’s friend.
Readers said that in the book, whose cover features children’s building blocks, the man speaks about how he desired the teen since she was three years old.
Police arrested Ms Tesolin-Mastrosa on Friday after receiving reports about the book.
“About 12.30pm [on Friday] detectives attended a home on Penn Street, Quakers Hill and arrested a 33-year-old woman before being taken to Riverstone Police Station,” NSW Police wrote in a statement.
“At the home, police executed a search warrant – seizing several hard copies of the novel – to be forensically examined.”
Ms Tesolin-Mastrosa was charged with possessing child abuse material, disseminating child abuse material, and producing child abuse material.
She was granted conditional bail to appear before Blacktown Local Court on Monday 31 March 2025.
2025.3.24 Man charged with murder almost two decades after step-father’s disappearance
A man has been charged with murder over the 2006 disappearance of Victorian man Christopher Jarvis, weeks after another man was sentenced over the decades-old cold case.
Missing Persons Squad detective today charged a 72-year-old man from Wangoom, near Warrnambool, with murder after the 38-year-old went missing in the same town.
He is expected to face Warrnambool Magistrates’ Court this afternoon.
It is the second breakthrough in the case in in weeks, after Glenn Fenwick, 61, was sentenced earlier this month after pleading guilty to manslaughter.
Jarvis, was last seen around 6am on June 13 2006, when he left the home he shared with his partner and stepchildren on Warrne Road in Wangoom.
When he didn’t arrive at work, his colleagues contacted his partner around 7.30am.
His car was located on fire at popular Warrnambool lookout Thunder Point about 8am.
Initial enquiries deemed Jarvis’ disappearance as not suspicious, but the case was later handed over to the Missing Persons Squad following information from the public.
Jarvis’ remains have never been located.
Fenwick was sentenced to a maximum of five-and-a-half years jail on March 11, but could be eligible for parole as early as August this year.
The court heard Jarvis was killed over an ongoing property dispute.
In August 2023, prosecutors dropped a murder charge against a 71-year-old man in relation to the case.
It’s been more than half a century since Joanne Ratcliffe and Kirste Gordon vanished, and every year that passes brings more questions.
Joanne was 11 and Kirste only four when they disappeared from Adelaide Oval in 1973, almost certainly abducted and murdered.
“I’m adamant this is going to solve the case, if it doesn’t at least it’s checked out,” South Australian journalist Bryan Littlely said.
A team of private investigators will explore two key mid-north sites between Jamestown and Orroroo.
First, they’ll dig at a farm just north of the small community of Yatina, before revisiting a tunnel at the nearby Pekina Reservoir.
The locations have been pinpointed in handwritten claims by convicted paedophile Mark Trevor Marshall, who accused his own grandfather, Stanley Arthur Hart, of abducting the little girls.
While Hart’s mid-north farmhouse was previously searched by police, this new private effort focuses on sites nearby.
“The statement that Mark Marshall made, put an X on the map on that exact spot, and said this is where the two girls were buried and disposed of in barrels,” Littlely said.
In 2009, the private investigation team did find barrels in the tunnel, but they contained no trace of the girls. This weekend’s search will go further.
“If it’s thoroughly excavated and thoroughly searched, then we can rule that out,” Ratcliffe said.
Last month there was a privately run dig at North Plympton relating to the disappearance of the Beaumont children in 1966. Nothing was found; now, new hope, albeit faint, comes to the equally tragic Ratcliffe-Gordon case.
“I’m tired of being quiet, I’m tired of waiting, I’m tired of just being tired, I want the girls home,” Ratcliffe said.
2025.3.21 Mother loses appeal after forcing daughter to marry killer
A mother who forced her daughter to marry her eventual murderer has lost an appeal against her prison sentence.
Sakina Muhammad Jan, 48, challenged her three-year jail term in the Victorian Court of Appeal, claiming she should have been shown mercy and spared jail time.
But the appeal was thrown out on Friday after the court found the sentence was adequate given the seriousness of the crime.
Jan was the first person in Australia to be sentenced for causing a person to enter into a forced marriage since it became an offence in 2013.
She was in May 2024 found guilty of forcing her daughter Ruqia Haidari to marry Mohammad Ali Halimi in August 2019.
Halimi killed his young bride five months after their wedding and is serving a life sentence for her murder.
Jan’s barrister Patrick Tehan KC argued the sentence was manifestly excessive and the sentencing judge failed to consider Ms Haidari’s death was extra-curial punishment for his client.
But Justices Karin Emerton and Lesley Taylor ruled the judge was correct to sentence Jan to an immediate term of imprisonment.
“It must be the expectation generally that anyone who coerces another into marriage against their will lose their liberty as a result,” the judgment read.
“The actual sentence imposed was well within the sound exercise of the judge’s sentencing discretion.”
Justices Emerton and Taylor found forced marriage was a violation of human rights and Jan’s conduct was a serious example of the offence.
They agreed Jan was remorseful for her daughter’s death and she had no reason to think she would be murdered.
But they found forced marriages posed an inherent risk, so Haidari’s death was “unforeseen but nonetheless far from fanciful”.
The justices refused Jan leave to appeal her prison sentence.
Justice Christopher Boyce found Jan’s sentence was manifestly excessive and her punishment was far beyond what was proportionate.
He indicated he would have re-sentenced her to a 12-month good behaviour bond but his decision was overruled by the majority of Justices Emerton and Taylor.
2025.3.20 Youth crime in Victoria spikes to highest rate in decades
Crime committed by young people across Victoria has reached its highest level in three decades.
New data from the Crime Statistics Agency (CSA) revealed that the overall number of criminal acts has also climbed to the highest rate since 2016.
Victoria Police Deputy Commissioner Bob Hill described the rising crime rate as “totally unacceptable”.
Youth offending spike
Crime committed by people aged 10-17 has risen to its highest level since electronic records began in 1993.
Police believe repeat child offending was a key factor in the overall increase in crime, up 16 per cent.
“We completely understand the community concerns around young offenders breaking into homes, stealing cars, and putting other people at risk on our roads,” Hill said.
“Be assured that police are arresting the state’s worst young offenders again and again – youth gang members, child car thieves and underage burglars were arrested 3400 times last year as part of Operation Alliance and Operation Trinity.
“As a society, we simply cannot tolerate this level of offending. The time has come for Victorians to feel safe in their homes again and for young offenders to be held accountable.”
It comes just days after the “toughest bail laws” in the country were introduced into state parliament, with the first stage coming into effect immediately.
The deputy commissioner said police had worked closely with the government surrounding changes to the bail laws, and welcomed the latest announcement.
Hill said there was a critical need to strengthen bail laws.
“We have every confidence that the changes will lead to a reduction in youth offending and crimes such as aggravated burglaries,” he said.
Aggravated burglaries also hit record levels, with police revealing a “hardcore group” of youth offenders aged 14-17 responsible for the sharp rise.
Police anticipate the new bail laws would see a drop in the number of homes being broken into.
Overall crime rises
The overall crime rate also spiked by 13.2 per cent from last year, reaching the highest rate since 2016.
Police managed to arrest about 201 people a day, meaning 26,519 people were arrested a combined total of 73,539 times.
The highest recorded crimes included theft from motor vehicles, which police described as the most “common and fastest” growing crime.
More than a third of offences were related to number plate theft, and the number of car thefts jumped 41 per cent.
Family violence incidents also surged, with 8482 offenders arrested 15,487 times.
“While youth crime is playing out on our streets and in our newspapers, the scourge of family violence carried out behind closed doors has hit record levels that see police responding to an incident every five minutes,” Hill said.
“Highly difficult economic times are also having a significant impact on crime, with financial pressures a common cause for family violence, while more people are resorting to stealing from shops to feed and clothe themselves and their family.”
2025.3.18 Teacher jailed for five years after admitting ongoing sex abuse of child
A young person has told a judge how they were groomed by their teacher as a 12-year-old female for ongoing sexual abuse, leaving them a “damaged person”.
Kellie Ann-Marie Whiteside, 44, pleaded guilty on Tuesday in Brisbane District Court to one count of repeated sexual conduct with a child.
Crown prosecutor Cameron Wilkins discontinued 29 charges of indecent treatment of a child under 16 against Whiteside.
Chief Judge Brian Devereaux heard Whiteside was working as a science teacher in a school south of Brisbane when she turned a friendship with the victim into sexual abuse.
Wilkins said Whiteside discussed frustrations in her sex life with her husband and swapped intimate images via Instagram and Snapchat messages with the victim.
“The relationship turned sexual in March 2015. At this time the complainant was still 12 years of age but was soon to turn 13,” Wilkins said.
“That relationship ultimately continued past the (victim’s) 16th birthday and until it ended in March 2023 when (the victim) was 20 years of age.”
Whiteside kissed the young person – who now identifies as non-binary – on school grounds and this led to sex acts committed in soccer club toilets, in car parks and in hotels.
Wilkins said Whiteside used manipulation by giving the victim alcohol and demanding their text message exchanges remain secret.
The victim read their impact statement to Devereaux and said they now found it hard to form meaningful relationships.
“It is common for me to have panic attacks due to my overwhelming anxiety and fear (that) I will always be a damaged person with a warped mindset.”
The victim said their parents now felt guilty as if they had failed to protect them.
“I was taught about stranger danger … I was not prepared for a predator to be an adult who was in a position of power … who was a woman,” they said.
“My parents trusted her. I trusted her too.”
The victim’s mother said major milestone events in her child’s life were now “tainted” as Whiteside had been involved.
“We were robbed of the joy of watching our child grow up without fear, in a place we thought was safe,” she said.
Defence barrister James McNab said Whiteside had been suffering from post-natal depression and difficulties in her marriage at the time of offending.
“She has now lost her job as a teacher and will never work in the profession again,” he said.
McNab said Whiteside made extensive admissions when questioned by police and had attended rehabilitation counselling.
Devereaux told Whiteside she had committed an outrageous breach of the trust put in her as a teacher and had caused terrible consequences for the victim and their family.
“You took advantage of a young child at a difficult time in her life,” he said.
“I accept (the psychologist’s) opinion that you are not highly likely to offend in this way again.”
Whiteside was sentenced to five years’ imprisonment and will be eligible to apply for parole in March 2027.
2025.3.18 NSW murder rates soar to decade-high due to ‘unusually high’ sprees
New South Wales’ murder rate has reached its highest level in a decade after multiple major deadly crimes last year, including the Bondi Westfield stabbing massacre.
The NSW Bureau of Crime Statistics and Research (BOCSAR), in its quarterly December 2024 report published today, found 85 people were killed in 2024 — the most since 93 people were murdered in 2014.
Of those 85 people — 46 men, 26 women, 13 young people and children — 45.9 per cent were domestic violence-related and 22 of them were killed across eight incidents affecting multiple victims.
In comparison, in the 14 years prior to 2024, there were on average two multiple-victim murder events each year.
BOSCAR executive director Jackie Fitzgerald said the murder rates were “one unfortunate outlier in the latest crime statistics”.
“The large number of murders in 2024 is due to an unusually high number of events involving multiple murder victims; with the incident in April 2024 at the Westfield Bondi Junction shopping centre accounting for six victims alone,” she said.
Six people were killed by lone attacker Joel Cauchi at the Westfield Bondi Junction in Sydney on April 13, 2024.
BOSCAR also found domestic violence assault was up 3.1 per cent per year on average and sexual assault increased up 8.8 per cent per year on average in the 10 years.
The 13 major crime categories remained at a steady rate over the past two years to the December quarter.
“For many offences, the recent stable trend follows years of decline,” Fitzgerald said.
“As a consequence, recorded incidents of robbery, break and enter, general stealing and malicious damage to property are all much lower than a decade ago.”
2025.3.11 Western Australia child killer Dante Arthurs up for parole in weeks
It was one of the most horrific crimes imaginable, a little girl raped and murdered in a Perth shopping centre toilet.
Now child killer Dante Arthurs is up for parole in weeks and the family of his victim, Sophia Rodrigues-Urrutia Shu, fear he’ll strike again if released.
It’s a crime that still haunts Western Australians nearly two decades after the eight-year-old was robbed of her innocence and life.
“At the time this was considered one of this nation’s most horrific crimes,” former police officer Paul Litherland told 9News.
Arthurs was jailed for life with a minimum of just 13 years, a sentence that sparked outrage and eventually law reforms.
He has already been denied parole twice and his next review is due in May.
“The country is still reeling from this and the family is still reeling from this crime,” Litherland said.
A petition to keep the predator locked up has attracted more than 150,000 signatures.
“I started the petition in 2019 just to send a message to the decision makers that I didn’t want this to be a tick of a box,” Litherland said.
He was the family’s police liaison officer and a parent at Sofia’s school.
“It shocked me to the core and the impact it had on our community is something I’ll never forget,” he said.
Sofia’s family is now forced to relieve what happened to her in the shopping centre toilet every three years when Arthurs’ parole is reviewed.
“Also very concerning to them if he does get out to have that constant fear that he might reoffend,” Litherland said.
Police Commissioner Col Blanch said: “I think people know me well enough to know what I think Dante Arthurs should be doing for the rest of his life.”
The family is hoping the parole board shares a similar view.
Che Kennedy, 28, is accused of assaulting a woman before setting her house on fire with the dogs still inside.
A man has been charged after allegedly assaulting a woman before setting a house on fire and killing three dogs.
Police were patrolling Kaitlers Road in Lavington, a suburb of Albury on the NSW border, about 11.45pm on Friday when they noticed smoke coming from a home.
The officers rushed to the scene where they discovered a home engulfed in flames and immediately called firefighters.
Firefighters extinguished the blaze and discovered three dogs dead inside.
Police will allege Che Kennedy, 28, assaulted a 34-year-old woman known to him before setting the house on fire.
He was arrested by police at a property on Goolagar Crescent, in Springdale Heights, about 4.30pm on Sunday.
He has been charged with nine offences, including assault occasioning actual bodily harm, two counts of breaching an AVO, intimidation, arson, drug possession, and three counts of animal cruelty.
He was refused bail to appear before Wagga Wagga Local Court on Sunday.
2025.3.6 Victorian man could face 300 charges after allegedly upskirting women and girls, court told
A regional accounting firm director allegedly filmed underneath the skirts of about 150 women and girls, a court has been told.
A regional accounting firm director, who has been accused of upskirting up to 150 women and girls around Victoria, may face more than 300 charges.
BeFinancial director Derek Anthony Grima appeared in Ballarat Magistrates’ Court on Thursday via video link as his defence told the court that he was expecting hundreds of additional charges to be filed against his client.
Mr Grima was initially charged with two counts of producing intimate images, two counts of possessing child abuse material and stalking after police searched several Ballarat addresses on February 7 and seized electronic devices.
At Mr Grima’s first appearance at Ballarat Magistrates’ Court on February 10, the court was told police suspected there could be up to 150 alleged victims, the Herald Sun reported.
Police alleged Mr Grima, who was 39 at the time, filmed people at recreational facilities and retail stores in Ballarat and Melbourne between January 1 and February 7.
On Thursday, the court was told Mr Grima was now facing 118 charges relating to a series of alleged upskirting incidents.
Defence lawyer Benjamin Smith said he had been advised a further 200 charges were expected to be laid against his client.
The prosecution questioned whether it was appropriate for the matter to continue in the Ballarat Magistrates’ Court given its “seriousness and complexity”.
However, Magistrate Mark Stratmann said it was “premature” to uplift the matter to a higher court at this stage, but it should be adjourned for Mr Grima’s “benefit” in case more charges are laid.
Mr Smith said he was eager to avoid delay due to his client’s “vulnerabilities”.
Mr Grima was remanded to appear at Ballarat Magistrates’ Court via video link on March 25.
One business was broken into three times in two weeks, forcing it to bolster security measures and change operations.
2025.3.5 Megan Skye Blancada sentenced to prison for sexually abusing 14-year-old boy
A part-time actor and bikini model who abused a 14-year-old boy expressed some disturbing thoughts before her sentence.
A predatory pedophile and part-time bikini model who lured a 14-year-old boy to her car for sex made some disturbing remarks before receiving a significant prison sentence for her predatory behaviour.
Megan Skye Blancada, 39, was sentenced to five years in prison at the South Australian District Court on Wednesday after admitting to sexually abusing a 14-year-old boy on several occasions between 2021 and 2023.
Before the sentence, Blancada was heard telling supporters outside the court “there’s only so long you can have sympathy for the victim”.
Judge Anthony Allen slammed Blancada’s behaviour as “breathtakingly brazen” and the model, who regularly posted photos of herself in bikinis across social media, wept in the dock as he read out the sickening details of her offending.
“Quite frankly, you did not need to be a high functioning individual to know what you were doing was illegal and morally repugnant,” Judge Allen said.
The victim, who cannot be named for legal reasons, said at an earlier court hearing that Blancada had “manipulated” and “used” him.
“She started texting me, trying to talk to me,” he said.
“I was confused … she would compliment me as if she liked me … it felt nice, and this is how she tricked me.
“She would say how horny I make her, how I look hot in my school clothes, that I should send her photos … she manipulated me, used me and raped me.”
Blancada’s sick behaviour involved four instances of contact offending, Judge Allen said on Wednesday.
In one instance, she attended a sleepover at the victim’s house and during the night she followed the victim to the bathroom, where she sexually abused him.
In another instance, Blancada and the victim’s family were dining together at a restaurant, where she abused the boy during the meal.
She also abused him at his home after she returned there after dinner one evening.
Her final episode of contact offending happened when the boy was in year 9 and walking to school.
She encouraged him into her car, Judge Allen said, and then drove to a building site where she sexually abused him.
Blancada also engaged in sexualised communications with the boy for two years over Snapchat that Judge Allen described as “classic grooming-type behaviour”.
She sent images to the child of her holding her own breast and other images of her engaged in sexual activity.
The victim saved 15 images and video exchanged over the messaging platform across 2021, 2022 and 2023, but Judge Allen said the victim estimates more than 1000 images and videos were exchanged.
“This aspect of the sexual abuse is extremely concerning,” Judge Allen said.
“It was persistent, invasive and occurred over a relatively lengthy period of time.
“It serves as the disgraceful backdrop to the episodes of contact offending. It matters not that the victim reciprocated the communications. He was a child, you were an adult.”
A police examination of Blancada’s phone following her arrest revealed she had plugged in the search term “sexual relationship with a 14 year old”.
In online profiles, Blancada advertises herself as a fitness model and mentions her roles in films such as Hey Hey Its Esther Blueburger and Wolf Creek.
Her Facebook posts also show off a glamorous lifestyle, with multiple posts showing off her bikini modelling jobs.
In a post from August 30, 2023, she shows a Jadore dress and writes: “Attending a red carpet event in Sydney definitely in a need of a dress from @dressforanight and they did not disappoint.”
Blancada also claims to have modelled for Mitsubishi and Bank SA.
On Wednesday, she appeared close to vomiting during Judge Allen’s sentencing remarks, dry retching in the dock.
Blancada’s legal team had earlier argued for a good behaviour bond as punishment, saying Blancada suffered from a borderline personality disorder at the time of the offending but had since learnt how to better control her herself.
But Judge Allen rejected those arguments on Wednesday and sentenced Blancada to five years and one month in prison, with a non-parole period of two years and five months.
“I do not accept as a consequence of those factors (Blancada’s mental health problems) that moral culpability … are significantly diminished in the circumstances of this case,” he said.
“The gravity of your offending means that a sentence of imprisonment is the only appropriate penalty.”
Tears streamed down Blancada’s face as she was led away from the dock.
2025.3.3 Parents of methanol victims Holly Bowles and Bianca Jones want answers
The parents of two Melbourne women who died due to methanol poisoning in Laos late last year have called for travellers to boycott the country until it investigates the deaths properly.
Holly Bowles and Bianca Jones were among six people who died after drinking tainted alcohol in the tourist town of Vang Vieng in November.
Their parents have told the ABC the investigation into the tragedy has been “disgraceful” and “horrendous” and that they’ve been kept in the dark by authorities in Laos.
The factory where the drinks were believed to have been distilled remained closed, but the ABC can reveal that one of the bars where the girls were drinking before they fell ill has reopened.
While the Nana Backpacker Hostel where the girls were staying has not reopened, its staff members who were arrested — all foreign nationals — have been released from custody.
They are now understood to be under house arrest with their passports confiscated.
Victoria Police has announced a $1 million reward for information relating to the murder of Gianni “John” Furlan in Melbourne’s north 27 years ago.
Mr Furlan, then 48, was killed when his car exploded in Coburg North on Monday, August 3, 1998.
Later, investigators would determine commercial explosives had been attached to the car.
“Despite an extensive investigation by members of the Arson and Explosives Squad and a number of public appeals for information over the past 27 years, nobody has ever been charged with John’s death,” a Victoria Police spokesperson said.
Furlan murdered on his way to work
On the day he was killed, Mr Furlan was driving his white Subaru Liberty sedan north along Lorensen Avenue in Coburg North, near Merlynston Railway Station, when the car exploded.
“John was alone in the vehicle and was driving his usual route from his home address on Sydney Road to his auto-wrecking business on Sages Road,” the police spokesperson said.
“As he always did, he stopped at the Merlynston News Agency for a coffee and the newspaper on the way.
“At approximately 8:35am, while still in motion, a bomb in John’s car detonated.”
Police said the explosion was heard up to 5 kilometres from the scene and catapulted the vehicle “15 metres down the road, shattering nearby shop windows and spraying debris over 300 metres away”.
In the days before his death, police said Mr Furlan travelled to Hobart to visit a friend and left his car parked at his home behind a high timber fence.
“Investigators believe his car was fitted with an explosive device during this time,” police said.
“Witnesses reported seeing two suspect vehicles in the days before John’s death.”
Police previously offered a $100,000 reward for information relating to Mr Furlan’s death in 2000.
2025.3.3 Lisa Margaret Lines, Zacharia Bruckner plead not guilty to attempted murder at South Australian Supreme Court
There has been a major update in the case of a gruesome alleged love triangle attempted murder plot involving an axe, a hit man and a failed pillow snuff.
Alleged lovers Lisa Lines and Zacharia Bruckner have appeared in court in person for the first time to enter their pleas to shocking allegations they tried to knock off Ms Lines’ former partner in a series of convoluted murder plots.
The pair sat in the dock at the South Australian Supreme Court on Monday, with Ms Lines wearing glasses and a polka dot blouse with her hair tied in a bow.
Mr Bruckner wore a green prison jumper.
Police have charged Ms Lines and Mr Bruckner with one count of attempted murder for an alleged kill attempt on Jonathon Hawtin in October 2017 at his Adelaide Hills home and two counts of conspire to commit murder for allegedly plotting to kill Mr Hawtin and his mother Rhonda through a hit man from between December 29, 2021, and November 15, 2023.
A third alleged offender, Letiticia Fortune, is also charged with attempted murder for an alleged attempt on Mr Hawtin’s life while he lay in hospital recovering from the 2017 incident.
On Monday, Ms Lines and Mr Bruckner pleaded not guilty to the charges before Justice Julie McIntyre.
Ms Fortune pleaded not guilty to her charge in Adelaide Magistrates Court last month and she will be arraigned at the Supreme Court in May.
The court was told on Monday the cases of Ms Lines, Mr Bruckner and Ms Fortune would be married up to run together following Ms Fortune’s May appearance.
Police allege the squall of violence started in 2017 when Mr Bruckner allegedly attacked Mr Hawtin with an axe, striking him in the neck.
Mr Bruckner then shot himself with a gun, police allege, so the axe attack would appear to be in self-defence.
Mr Hawtin was left a tetraplegic from the alleged attack.
As he lay in a hospital bed recovering from the axe attack, the police allege Ms Fortune plotted to smother Mr Hawtin with a pillow but was stopped by hospital security guards and fled the scene.
Prosecutors also allege Ms Fortune and Ms Lines were lovers at the time.
Police further claim undercover police operatives secured evidence that Ms Lines and Mr Bruckner conspired to use a hit man to kill Mr Hawtin and his mother.
Police initially believed Mr Hawtin had tried to kill Mr Bruckner after he started a relationship with Ms Lines.
Mr Hawtin was acquitted of attempted murder following a trial at the South Australian Supreme Court in 2019.
Ms Lines left Australia and settled in Taiwan following Mr Hawtin’s acquittal.
She was arrested in November 2023 on the tiny Pacific island nation of Palau and then extradited to Adelaide to face the allegations against her.
At a hearing in December at Adelaide Magistrates Court, the court was told spots of blood had been found on Ms Lines’ tracksuit after the alleged 2017 attack.
Dominic Agresta, appearing for Ms Lines at the time, said “the only inference you can draw from that blood is an inference as to her presence in the shed at some point”.
“The difficulty for the Crown in my submission is that there was no dispute at the trial … that my client entered the garage after the events, where she is said to have seen both Mr Bruckner and Mr Hawtin supine on the ground both bleeding,” he said.
Mr Agresta told the court that Ms Lines’ actions after finding Mr Bruckner and Mr Hawtin bleeding in the shed were “inconsistent” with a murder plot.
She dialled triple-0 and tried to stop the bleeding from both Mr Bruckner and Mr Hawtin, Mr Agresta said.
“It (the triple-0 call) demonstrates there is panic, obvious sincere panic in my client’s voice at the time she made the call,” he said.
Prosecutor Timisha Ward argued the triple-0 call did not mean Ms Lines may not have been a part of the plot.
“There is a reasonable inference to be drawn that Dr Lines called trip zero and assisted Mr Hawtin in order to exculpate herself from involvement in the offending and indeed to disguise the offending as an act of self-defence,” she said.
Ms Lines holds a PhD in social sciences from Flinders University.
2025.3.3 Nadia Khalil appeals conviction for sexually abusing detainees at Reiby Juvenile Justice Centre
In short:
Prison guard Nadia Khalil, who was sentenced to a maximum 12 years’ jail in 2021, has alleged a miscarriage of justice and wants a retrial.
She worked for decades at Reiby Youth Justice Centre, which houses New South Wales’ most troubled teenage offenders.
What’s next?
The appellant judges have reserved their decisions.
A former New South Wales juvenile corrections officer jailed for sexual abuse is appealing her conviction and prison sentence on the grounds she was the victim of a miscarriage of justice.
In 2021 Nadia Khalil, 51, was sentenced to 12 years behind bars with a non-parole period of more than seven years for sexually assaulting five boys at Reiby Juvenile Justice Centre, near Campbelltown on the outskirts of Sydney.
A jury in the NSW District Court found her guilty of 20 child sex and indecent assault offences.
Reiby houses children up to 15 years old and the state’s youngest detainees have been incarcerated there.
Khalil’s offending occurred between 1997 and 2005 and the court was told she abused her position of trust and authority and had shown no remorse.
In the NSW Court of Criminal Appeal on Monday her barrister, Phillip Boulten SC, argued there had been a miscarriage of justice in relation to a report by clinical and forensic psychologist Christopher Lennings that was admitted as evidence.
Dr Lennings’s website says his areas of research interest include violent and sexually violent young offenders, youth suicide and child protection.
The court heard the doctor was asked to review literature regarding young males being sexually victimised by staff in detention centres.
“We say his evidence was not based on specialised knowledge of youth detention guards” Mr Boulten said.
‘Particular characteristics’
Mr Boulten took issue with the way Dr Lennings characterised prison guards.
“The nub is that people in the cohort of my client had particular characteristics and conducted themselves in particular ways,” Mr Boulten said.
“They were unqualified, ill-equipped for the job, essentially unregulated, and they operated in a culture where they essentially looked after each other … when they knew that one of their cohort was acting corruptly.
“The evidence was tendered for purpose in buttressing the credibility of the complainants.”
Mr Boulten called for a retrial.
“It should have been the subject of very carefully framed directions [by the judge], if possible, and none of that happened.
“We say what happened resulted in a miscarriage of justice and as a consequence the verdicts should be overturned and a new trial should be granted.”
‘Very important’ evidence
Crown prosecutor Monica Millward said Dr Lennings was highly qualified and had “written many research reports that deal with juvenile offenders, young offenders”.
“The evidence of Dr Lennings was a very important piece of evidence,” she said.
“The Crown did not at any point relate the evidence of Dr Lennings to the evidence of the youth workers.”
Ms Millward said that evidence could not be ignored.
“I caution against downplaying the significance of the evidence,” she said.
“The use of the evidence in this case does not support the contention that Dr Lennings’s evidence gave rise to a miscarriage of justice.”
The court heard Dr Lennings was a collaborative research committee member with the NSW Department of Juvenile Justice between 1997-2004.
The Crown said his expertise was relevant, which Mr Boulten disputed.
Appellant justices Peter Garling, Judge Dina Yehia and Belinda Rigg have reserved their decisions.
Khalil will be eligible for parole in June 2028.
2025.3.1 Seven-day search for Beaumont children concludes at former Castalloy site in Adelaide’s west
In short:
The search for the missing Beaumont children at North Plympton has concluded and failed to unearth any remains.
Nine-year-old Jane, seven-year-old Arnna and four-year-old Grant went missing from Adelaide’s Glenelg Beach on Australia Day in 1966.
What’s next?
Independent MP Frank Pangallo says he has received “significant information” he will pass on to the South Australian police.
The seven-day search for the missing Beaumont children at the former Castalloy site, in Adelaide’s west, has failed to unearth any signs of remains but MP Frank Pangallo says he’s received “significant information” from “extremely credible people”.
The independent MP announced early on Saturday afternoon that the search, which he claims was “the biggest clandestine grave dig in the world”, had officially concluded.
“After seven days of what I’m told is the biggest clandestine grave dig in the world, which saw the removal of almost 10,000 tonnes of soil and a number of holes dug here in the Castalloy site, unfortunately we haven’t turned anything up,” he said.
“There is a tinge of disappointment in my voice … but at the same time I am gratified and satisfied that we gave this one hell of shot.
“I think we can walk away satisfied we’re not going to find the remains here.”
Nine-year-old Jane, seven-year-old Arnna and four-year-old Grant went missing from Adelaide’s Glenelg Beach on Australia Day in 1966.
At the time, several witnesses provided a description of the children being seen with a tall, tanned, thin-faced man, with short blond hair.
The private search at the Castalloy site started on Saturday, February 22 by a local earth-moving firm in conjunction with two forensic archaeologists.
It was the third search at the site with previous searches also held in 2013 and 2018.
Mr Pangello said that although the unsuccessful search was disappointing, it has generated a renewed interest in the cold case and has seen fresh information come to light.
“There has been some significant information that has been passed on to me from extremely credible people,” he said.
“I’ve already spoken to Major Crime… and I gave [them] my assurance that any information we have gleamed and people would like me to pass on, will be passed onto South Australian Police.”
Mr Pangello said he received a large amount of support from the wider community and dismissed claims the search had been a “failure”.
“People all want to achieve one thing and that is to see the matter resolved and solved and the remains found,” he said.
“The thing is this story hasn’t ended here, there’s a chapter that’s been closed at the Castalloy site … however, it [the story] continues and it will continue as long as people show an active interest in trying to get the answer of what happened on January 26, 1966.
“The failure would be if suddenly everyone decided to switch off and not show an interest in what happened to the Beaumont children.”
Mr Pangello said he still holds hope the three siblings will be found “in [his] lifetime”.
“Somebody knows something, please come forward if you know,” he said.
Mr Pangallo previously said the search would be more extensive than those conducted before, adding new information had since come to light suggesting the 2018 excavation might “not have gone deep enough”.
SA Police announced at the time that they had been kept apprised of the plans of those involved in the search.
“The individuals conducting the fresh excavation at the site are following a theory that SAPOL believes is not supported by evidence and available information,” a police spokesperson said.
The site on Mooringe Avenue at North Plympton was once owned by Adelaide businessman Harry Phipps – who police had previously described as a person of interest in the case.
Mr Phipps, who died in 2004, was among about a dozen others who police had listed as a person of interest.
Mr Phipps’s son Haydn, who was 15 at the time the children went missing, claimed to have seen the children at his family home in Glenelg – he also told police he was violently abused by his father as a child.
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