The Queen v Camilleri [2013] VSC 676

2 The Crown contend that: you took Prue Bird from her home on Sunday 2 February 1992 and did so with Mark McConville and one other; that Prue Bird was held captive in a shed for a period of time; she was likely to have been sexually assaulted; and was later murdered by you or you and McConville some time between 2 February and 11 February 1992.

3 You contend that you acted alone, that you came upon Prue Bird as she walked along the street past a school or park. You grabbed her around the neck, closing off her windpipe, put her into the back seat of the car face down and at some point tied her hands and feet with electrical cables. You said you drove around for two to three hours, and when you spoke with her, she did not answer. It was then that you realised Prue was dead.

4 On your own account, you abducted Prue Bird and, by your plea, you acknowledge that you murdered her. By your plea of guilty, you are taken to have admitted all of the elements of the crime of murder. Your counsel, Mr Kelly, submitted that your actions, as you describe them, are consistent with an intention to cause really serious injury to Prue Bird.

5 Clearly, the facts and circumstances surrounding Prue Bird's murder are in dispute. The Crown submit that this was a murder that involved planning and acting in concert with others and, as such, being a premeditated crime, is a more serious example of the crime of murder than if it were the spontaneous, random act involving you acting alone, as you contend.

6 The Crown further submit that your account is fanciful and, because you contend that Prue Bird's death was an accident, inconsistent with your plea of guilty to murder.

7 Insofar as it is contended that you were acting with Mark McConville and another and that the abduction and murder was planned, the Crown must satisfy the Court of these aggravating factors beyond reasonable doubt. Matters upon which you rely which go in mitigation of the offence need only be satisfied on the balance of probabilities.

8 The Crown contend that your subsequent conduct in abducting, sexually assaulting and murdering two young girls for which you were convicted and sentenced to two sentences of life imprisonment without parole in 1999 (colloquially known as the "Bega schoolgirl murders") is demonstrative of a tendency on your part to abduct young girls, sexually assault and murder them, and therefore it is likely to be the case that, some five years earlier, having abducted Prue Bird and murdering her as you admit, you are likely to have sexually assaulted her. This contention cannot be sustained. You were adamant in your denial that you did not sexually assault Prue Bird, and Ms Williams SC, who appeared on behalf of the Crown, conceded that there was no evidence that Prue Bird was sexually assaulted and I proceed on that basis.

9 Likewise, the Crown has not relied upon any cogent evidence concerning the motive for the murder of Prue Bird. It is the fact that Prue Bird was the granddaughter of a woman who was married to Paul Hetzel, who gave evidence on behalf of the Crown in the trial of Rodney and Craig Minogue and others for offences arising from the Russell Street bombing in 1986. Whether retribution be the motive or not, the Crown has not sought to prove it beyond reasonable doubt and I proceed on that basis.

11 In 1992, Prue Bird was 13 years old. She lived with her mother, Jenny, her mother's friend Isabelle Taiatini, and her half-sister and half-brother at 122 Justin Avenue, Glenroy. She went to Glenroy High School and had been at school every day of the week prior to her disappearance.

12 On Saturday 1 February 1992, Prue had returned from her friend's place at 10.30pm. She spoke with her mother and purported to go to bed. In fact, she climbed out of her bedroom window and returned to where she had been earlier that night at a house in View Street, Glenroy. She remained there until a friend rode her home on his bicycle at 5.00am. She returned to the house by climbing back in through her bedroom window.

13 Jenny Bird next saw her daughter when she looked into Prue's bedroom at 12.45 on Sunday afternoon and saw that she was asleep. Mrs Bird did not disturb her. She then left the house and went with a friend to the Broadmeadows baths, leaving behind Isabelle Taiatini and Prue at home. This was the last time Mrs Bird saw her daughter.

14 Mrs Taiatini was packing to move out of the house later that day. At 1.20pm, friends of Mrs Taiatini arrived to help her with the packing. At the time, Prue was preparing herself a meal of corn. This couple, the Yorkes, spoke with Prue and said she appeared to be happy. The Yorkes left shortly after to collect a trailer to assist in the move. Ten minutes later, Mrs Taiatini answered the telephone. The call was for Prue. The caller was a young male, but did not identify himself. Prue spoke on the phone for some three minutes, and it appeared to Mrs Taiatini that her mood changed after this call. Mrs Taiatini left the house and went into the garage to continue with the packing. She heard the phone ring again and Prue answer it, and a short conversation was had. At 2.25pm, the Yorkes returned. They did not enter the house, which is separate from the garage, and did not notice anything untoward. They left at 2.40pm. Mrs Taiatini then shut up the garage and went back into the house. She saw that the television was on, there was a meal of corn with a fork still in it on the table in the loungeroom, the front door was open and Prue was not at home.

15 At 2.40pm, Mrs Taiatini locked the house and went to the Broadmeadows baths to meet Mrs Bird, as had previously been arranged. She told Mrs Bird that Prue was up and had gone out. When they returned to the house at 6.00pm, the house was in the same state as when Mrs Taiatini had left it. Later that evening, Mrs Bird began ringing family and friends in an endeavour to locate Prue, all to no avail. The contents of Prue's schoolbag were found upended on her bed. Her school bag and a pair of black trousers were missing. Mrs Bird was later to tell the police that Prue was fussy with her appearance and would not have left the house without a shower and make-up, and would not have taken her schoolbag out with her on a weekend. Prue Bird was reported missing on the following day, 3 February 1992.

16 Despite an extensive police investigation, neither Prue Bird nor her remains have ever been located.

17 In February 1992, you were 22 years old. On 11 February 1992, you were spoken to by the police at the Lidcombe Railway Station in New South Wales. You were found to be in possession of a knife. You were arrested in respect of outstanding warrants and remanded in custody.

18 In 1992, Mark McConville was 29 years old. He was known to be a violent man and a drug dealer. He died on 19 August 2003 at 40 years of age. At that time, he was undergoing a sentence for armed robbery, kidnapping and intentionally causing serious injury.

19 At the time of Prue Bird's disappearance, McConville drove a 1986 blue Ford Laser hatchback with the Victorian registration number "DQM 678".

20 In November 2008, Victoria Police posted a $500,000 reward for any information leading to the arrest of those responsible for the disappearance and death of Prue Bird.

21 A number of prisoners came forward, alleging that you had made admissions to them. Neither the Crown nor your counsel contended that these admissions are reliable and should be acted upon. All of them came forward after the reward had been posted. The alleged admissions, in some instances, bear similarities with what you told the police, but differ where it is you say that Prue's body is to be found. In one instance, it was said the body of the deceased was buried near where the bodies of the two Bega schoolgirls were. In February 2012, police mounted an extensive search of the area known as Fidlers Green Track, Flat Road Creek, eight kilometres south of the New South Wales/Victorian border. This was the area in which the Bega schoolgirls were murdered. Approximately 20 people assisted in the search of the area, including cadaver dogs, but the search proved fruitless.

22 You told another prisoner that you placed Prue Bird's body in an old refrigerator in a rubbish tip near the Kananook Railway Station, where you slept overnight and drove back to Sydney the following day. Investigations revealed that Sims Metal operated a yard near Kananook Railway Station and have done so since 1959. Inquiries ascertained that all refrigerators on site were physically inspected, opened and degassed prior to leaving the site. Further, there was no scrubland at this site or near this site consistent with the account that you were alleged to have given of carrying the deceased through scrubland. It appears that the admissions made to one of the prison informers, witness E, and what you later admitted you said to another prisoner, witness A, were made so as to ensure that they received a share of the reward. In these circumstances, the submission and concession that the admissions ought not be relied upon was properly made.

23 In February 2009, police intelligence intercepted a letter you wrote to your sister Annette, saying that you were thinking of putting your hand up for another three murders. On 29 September 2009, you wrote to Witness A, telling him that it was "only the little girl you have ever given a second thought about" and that you cannot bring yourself to say her name. You wrote of tying her hands behind her back and lying her face down on the floor of the car, and that you regarded her death as an accident. The account you gave to Witness A is largely consistent with the account you gave to the police when they interviewed you some two to three days later. You also said that she was buried near a man and that you carried her body through scrubland.

24 On 1 October 2009, members of the Homicide Squad, at your request, attended Barwon Prison and spoke with you extensively. You told them in that conversation that you were responsible for Prue Bird's death. You were formally interviewed by the police the next day. You maintained that you were responsible for Prue Bird's death, but that it was an accident. You told the police that you had tied Prue's hands behind her back and then her feet, connected them together with cables and put her face down in the back seat of the car, a white unregistered Valiant, that Prue was in your car for two to three hours and that when you pulled over to the side of the road, she was dead. You also told the police that you had come down from New South Wales, you were living in Liverpool at the time, you were looking for a man who lived in a house with big gates in Heidelberg, you had first come to Melbourne when you were ten years old, and that you had got away from some people who had brought you here and you ended up going to a watchhouse and the police contacted your mother, who came to collect you. You told the police that you had been to Melbourne as a kid or teenager 20, 30 or 40 times, but that in your 20s, you had come some three or four times, and that this occurred on your second or third trip to Melbourne. You told the police something had set you off in Sydney and you came straight down. You also told the police that you were on drugs at the time, using cocaine and having acid trips. You said that no-one else was involved.

25 Three weeks later, on 24 October 2009, you were visited by your sister Annette. You told her that you were responsible for the death of a young girl and that she was buried near the body of a man who had assaulted you when you were a young boy. You had found that man again years later by chance and abducted him, with the intention of going to find the other male whom he had given you to and who had also abused you. You told her that the man that you abducted died in your company and is buried near where the body of the young girl is also buried. Despite your sister's urging, you declined to reveal the location of where the girl's body is buried, because to do so, you said, would reveal the location of the man's body and, in doing so, you would lose control over him.

26 The police interviewed you again on 8 February 2012. On this occasion, you were more expansive about what you say occurred and gave a significantly different account. You told the police that you came to Victoria looking for someone, that you drove a white Ford Falcon XT around Heidelberg and took a girl from the side of the road as she was walking towards a school or a park. She would not tell you where her father was, so you had grabbed her around the neck and threw her into the back seat of the car. You kept asking her questions and she did not reply. You said you hogtied the girl, possibly when she was already dead. You dumped her body somewhere near some railway lines, you carried the body some distance over your shoulder and left the body near a body you had left at the same location a day and a half earlier.

27 You could not explain why you would think it was that this girl was connected to this other man who had assaulted you. You said you parked your car on the side of the road and, as this girl walked up to it, you asked her where did her father go. She replied she did not know you, and you said to her, "He told me you would show me where your dad was". She walked off and you grabbed her in such a fashion that you closed off her windpipe so that, you said, she could not breath and could not fight. You then drove off and drove around, talking to her and asking her where her dad was. At one point, you pulled into a car park under a building and went to the back of the car and may have got the cables out at this time. You later cut the ties with a Stanley knife so you could carry the girl's body over your shoulder. When giving this account, contrary to what you said in your first interview, you told the police that you were not on drugs at this time.

28 You also told the police that you bought and drove a VG Valiant, but also mentioned buying a station wagon and driving it around for three or four weeks at about that time. You told the police that you owned two VG Valiants and described one as white with brown seats. When asked about Mark McConville, you said that perhaps you knew him by sight, but not by name, and did not know him outside of prison.

29 A statement from one prisoner was put to you, including a part where it was alleged you said that you raped and strangled a girl and buried her in the backyard of a house in Glenroy. You appeared to spontaneously answer, "What a fucking drama. I never touched her. We never fucking sexually touched her or anything like that" (p 2222 of the depositions), and you otherwise denied that such a conversation took place. It is noteworthy that in that answer, you referred in the plural to "we", not "I'.

30 A number of admissions which you were said to have made to other people were put to you, and all but one you denied making. You agreed you had told certain things to Witness A, including that the girl was lying face-down on the floor of the car and that what you told him was the truth, except where you said you had buried Prue in a hole, which you had dug, placed rocks over and backfilled. You told the police you had left Prue lying on her side in something less than a shallow grave. You said that you had only made these admissions to this prisoner because he was pressuring you to confess so that he could receive the reward.

31 You have always maintained that Prue is buried close to the body of a man who abused you. You have refused to name that man, nor have you nominated the name of the man you were looking for as you drove around the streets in Glenroy, other than to say you thought he lived in Heidelberg and that he was German. The depositions contain a statement from your mother that when you were a young boy, you went missing and a week later she was contacted by the police at Russell Street, in Melbourne, to say they had you. You were then aged 11 or 12. Your brother drove your mother to Melbourne to collect you, lending some support that you were brought to Melbourne when you were a very young age, but without more information from you, your account cannot be further verified.

32 During an adjournment of the plea, you let it be known that you were prepared to assist the police in locating Prue Bird's body. To that end, the police provided you with various maps of the area around the Kananook Railway Station, and on 6 August 2013, you were taken to the area around Skye Road and McClelland Drive, Frankston, the site of the old Frankston tip. On that field excursion, you told the police that the only reason you stopped in the vicinity of Skye Road and McClelland Drive was because you could smell a tip. It was night time. You parked your Valiant on the main road and walked through bushland. You cut two wires in the bottom of a cyclone fence, stuck a stick into it, thereby gaining access under the fence, and went down to the tip. You again gave the account of meeting a man in Sydney, torturing and murdering him, subsequently dismembering his body and scattering his body parts at the tip. You appear to say that, a couple of days later, you took Prue's body to that same tip and placed it in a 1960's wooden wardrobe. You reiterated to the police that Prue's death was not planned, that you were only looking for the other man's offsider, that you had been told by him that his mate was European, as in German or Hungarian, that he had a family, a young daughter and he was married, and that he lived in Heidelberg. You also told the police that you did not care about him, but "Prue was not supposed to happen". You just grabbed her, it was not planned. You were only up here looking for this bloke's offsider, you did not know any of these other people, and you only found out "in the yard", which I take to be a reference to the prison yard, and when you started to make inquiries and had seen the picture. You told the police you were 80% sure that the location identified by you was accurate. At a later point you indicated that the location was within a 20 kilometre radius of Kananook Railway Station.

33 Inquiries revealed that the area you nominated as the site where you placed Prue's body was not in fact utilised as landfill until December 1992, although it had previously been used as a tip up until 1985. At the time you say that you went there, it was used as storage for crushed rock and concrete. In 1992, the area that was used as landfill was in fact 700 metres away. Detective Senior Constable Toey obtained the details of other landfills operating in 1992 within a 20 kilometre radius. On 16 October 2013, he attended the Metropolitan Remand Centre to discuss these locations with you. Instead, the maps you had previously been given were returned to him. The envelope bore a notation, "40.299F8". Enquiries revealed this was a reference to the Kananook railway station, but you otherwise refused to assist him further.

34 You did not give sworn evidence on the plea. Mr Kelly, who appeared on your behalf, conceded that there was no evidence supporting your account and it would be difficult to be persuaded on it on the balance of probabilities.

35 Your account is implausible. You initially contended that Prue's death was an accident, which is inconsistent with your plea of guilty. There are significant variations in your accounts, including that you have given at least three different versions of how it was that Prue was situated in the back of the car, and the apparent variation in how often you said you went to the tip and whether you disposed of the two bodies on the same occasion, including the implausibility of your contention that you were driving around the streets of Melbourne with the dismembered body of a man in your car. Your account does not sit with other evidence given on the plea, and indeed the fact that your account is not supported by any other evidence, other than the evidence that there was a tip some 700 metres from the area where you say you left Prue Bird's body. Accordingly, I am not persuaded on the balance of probabilities that Prue Bird is likely to have met her death as you contend she did.

36 That conclusion does not, however, dictate satisfaction beyond reasonable doubt of that which the Crown contends. The Crown relies in particular upon the evidence of three witnesses in support of its submission that you acted in concert with Mark McConville and another in abducting Prue Bird from her home and subsequently murdering her.

37 Witness M made her first statement to the police on 2 April 1992, that is, within eight weeks of Prue's disappearance. She was Prue's best friend and was 14 years old at the time. She told the police that on an occasion during the Christmas holidays, she was at Prue's home. She and Prue had been there for about five minutes when there was a knock on the front door. She heard a male voice ask if Daniel was home. Prue was heard to say that no Daniel lived there, and the male then said that the car in the driveway looked like Daniel's. About half an hour later, witness M was walking home from Prue's house when a man driving a small, light blue, square shaped car drove along Bindi Street, beeping the horn. He came past her again and waved at her. When witness M got to Ray Street, he stopped beside her. He was smiling and waving. Witness M ran back towards Bindi Street and took refuge in a neighbour's house. She had not seen this man before and did not see him again. She later described this incident to Prue, who said it sounded like the man who had come to the front door earlier. On 5 January 2010, witness M made a second statement in which she put this incident as occurring around a week or a couple of days before Prue went missing. Witness M described the driver as having short blonde hair, average build, in his late 20s to early 30s. She described the car as a four door sedan, blue coloured, small and square, something like a Nissan Bluebird.

38 In cross-examination, witness M confirmed that this occurred in the days or weeks before Prue's disappearance and that when she was walking along the street, the car was going at her pace. Witness M said she knew it was around the time of Prue's disappearance because the incident had never left her mind and gave her a sick feeling at the time.

39 In January 2010, while holidaying at Ocean Grove, witness M received a message about something in the paper about Prue. This was a reference to the newspaper article that appeared in December 2009. She spoke to her father and asked him to keep the paper and, when she returned from holidays on 4 January, she saw the photo published with the article. It was a photo of you. Witness M said she experienced the same feeling when she observed that photo as the feeling she had the day the man followed her.

40 She spoke to the police the next day and described the person she saw all those years ago as having, "light blondie hair colour and a rather large nose", and told the police that when she got home on that afternoon in 1992, she rang Prue and asked her what the man at the door had looked like. They described the man to each other and he seemed to be wearing the same clothes. Later, she said she and Prue spoke about that man having a big nose.

41 Witness M said that prior to looking at the photo in the newspaper, she had no expectation that it would be the man in the car because her father had told her he was Maltese, and she expected the photo to be of a man who looked Maltese, like her partner. She had remembered a man she described as "more Australian-looking" with blonde hair. Witness M said the nose and hairstyle of the man in the photo looked exactly like the man she had seen, as she had seen him sitting side-on.

42 On 27 January 2011, witness M was shown a photoboard displaying numerous cars, and picked two photos as being the vehicle she saw in 1992. Significantly, one of those photos was of the blue Laser hatchback sedan driven by McConville at that time.

43 I regard witness M as a witness of truth. She has described two unusual events which occurred on the same day proximate to Prue's disappearance. She confirmed with Prue on the telephone that they were talking about the same man, and she recognised a photo of you taken some five years after Prue's disappearance because it evoked in her the same response she had when she was being followed by the man in the blue car. She also confirmed that the nose and hair looked exactly like the side view of the man she had seen in the car. Her identification is further supported by the fact that she had no expectation that the photo would resemble the person she saw. She did not read that particular newspaper and had not followed the Bega schoolgirl murders, although she acknowledged that there was a reference to them in the article. Further, she identified a car which was, in fact, Mark McConville's car.

44 Mr Kelly submitted that witness M's identification was unreliable because she only provided a specific description of the person she said she saw after she had seen your photo in the newspaper. That may be so, but her emotional response upon viewing the photo in the newspaper article is telling, as was her response that she did not give a description at the time of her first statement because she was not asked.

45 Witness M's evidence places a person identified as you in the vicinity of Justin Avenue and in a car fitting the description of the car owned by Mark McConville and later identified as a Ford Laser hatchback. It also permits the inference to be drawn that you were the person who knocked on the door at 122 Justin Avenue and, because the girls had only been at the house a short time, that the house was under surveillance.

46 I turn now to witness K. Witness K made four statements and spoke to the police on several occasions. In essence, she said that towards the end of 1991, she was living with Mark McConville in a flat in Kensington. On one occasion, you came to the flat and Mark McConville was upset that you had. She described you as tall with blonde hair. Witness K then detailed three occasions when you, she and McConville met. The first occasion was at a pizza place. The second, when you were driving an old station wagon and picked them up as they were walking towards that pizza place. On this occasion, you told McConville you had to "knock a girl off", or you were "fucked" and that the girl was a Crown witness who lived in Glenroy and McConville agreed. On one of the occasions at the pizza place, witness K said you told her you came from up north in New South Wales.

47 On the third occasion, witness K said you picked her and McConville up at their flat in a really nice new car, and told them you were going to look for the girl. On this occasion, they spent two or three hours driving around, looking at houses. As I understand it, witness K said that you, McConville and she went over to the Glenroy area again on another occasion, looking for the house that Prue Bird lived in and also drove past a school. You indicated that this was the school the girl attended and that she often walked home at lunch time. I interpose to say that Mrs Bird later confirmed that Prue sometimes did come home for lunch. Witness K said that you and McConville found the house where you thought the girl lived. She described it as a nice looking average house, "there wasn't anything remarkable about it", there were a block of shops nearby with a fish and chip shop and a bottle shop. On 24 January 2011, witness K was taken on a drive through the streets of Glenroy with Detective Senior Constable Toey and Detective Leading Senior Constable Rae. Regrettably, the field trip was not video or audio recorded, a significant omission in my view. Witness K gave evidence that as they drove around she recalled the name Justin Avenue as being familiar and invited the police to drive slowly down that street. She nominated two houses opposite each other as being "extremely familiar" although the garden at one was very different. She also identified the school that you said the girl had attended, although the name of the school she identified is not recorded anywhere. Apparently, Detective Leading Senior Constable Rae rang Mrs Bird out of the hearing of witness K and confirmed that Prue Bird did indeed go to that school. Detective Senior Constable Toey in evidence before me nominated, by reference to the Melways map, Exhibit AE, the school. It is now called the Box Forest Secondary College. As I understand the maps, it is the only secondary college in that vicinity, although there are a number of primary schools. Witness K also took the police to nearby shops, which are now unmarked and closed. Mrs Bird also confirmed in that telephone call that there had been a fish and chip shop and a bottle shop in that shopping strip on the corner of Justin Avenue and View Street. Council records and a statement from the previous owner confirm that a licensed grocer did operate at those shops in 1991 and 1992. On 27 January 2011, witness K was shown a photoboard of houses. She nominated two houses that looked, she said, "a lot like the house she saw in Glenroy when 'she, Mark and Les were in the car'". Witness K preferred photo 6 which was in fact a photo of Prue Bird's house as it was around the time of her disappearance. The evidence is the house is now of a very different appearance than it was in 1992.

48 In November 2009, Witness K was shown a photoboard which included your photo. She did not identify you; indeed, she nominated two other persons, but, either five days later or in January 2010, it is not clear which, on her own initiative, she rang Detective Senior Constable Densley, who was at that time attached to the Homicide Squad, and told him that your photo had been in the photoboard, but that she had not wished to identify you. She had been fearful, emotional and exhausted, having given evidence over two days in the Supreme Court in another trial. Subsequently, on 24 January 2011, she was shown a photoboard and picked out two photos as most likely to be you, one of which was. You appeared in that photo with dark hair.

49 Witness K also said in her statement that one or two days after her son's second birthday, which was 13 February 1992, she was staying at a friend's house at Tecoma and another friend wanted to purchase speed, so she agreed to contact McConville. They met at a service station in Ascot Vale and McConville had said he had to get speed from his mother's house, and so he took witness K with him for a walk and told her that he was not going to give her friend any drugs.

50 The next thing witness K remembered was waking up in a shed at McConville's parents' place, lying on a bed. She felt "really drugged" and there was a small metal karate baton between her legs. She realised that there was someone else in the shed with her. She saw a young girl aged around 13. The girl was huddled on the floor and looked really frightened. The girl had dark hair, was of slim build, and was wearing jeans and a dark top. She was crying and really stressed out. She said her name was Prue, she had been taken from her house and told that if she "fucked up", she would "be knocked straight away". The girl kept saying she wanted to go home to her mother. They spoke about her wanting to become a hairdresser, which Mrs Bird later confirmed was the case, and the girl said something about her lunch at home when she was taken.

51 Witness K said that McConville returned later that day to the shed and threatened both witness K and Prue with a knife. Witness K said in her statement that she was eventually freed from the shed, leaving Prue behind. Witness K also said in her statement that she had realised that this girl must have been the girl that Mark and Les had been looking for in Glenroy. She went on to say in her statement, "Mark eventually let me out of the shed, leaving the girl behind. This was the last time I saw the girl and I don't know what happened to her. I began haemorrhaging and I went to mum and dad's, and mum later took me to the Ferntree Gully Hospital, where I was treated for my injuries. I was later discharged".

52 Witness K also said in her statement, signed on 24 January 2011, that she had recently seen an image of the girl on TV that related to a missing person case and the girl looked a lot like the girl she had seen in the shed. In July 2009, witness K accompanied the police to the Doongala State Forest in search of a body. No body was found.

53 Witness K was cross-examined, and it must be said her credibility in many respects was successfully challenged. Witness K gave evidence that she had been locked in the shed twice for substantial periods of time. Whereas in her statement she had said that the occasion that she was locked in the shed was a day or two after her son's birthday, 13 February 1992, witness K now said she could be out a week here or there on the dates and that McConville had been living in the shed a month or a little more when she had been locked in the shed, and that this was the second occasion, which was about a month after he had moved to the new address, and at a time when his parents were already living there. Witness K said she had been locked in the shed for more than two days. She had been drugged, and she was also injecting herself with amphetamines while in the shed. When she woke up she heard something, looked up and saw Prue. She did not know whether she was drugged or what happened after that, but when she re-awoke the next day or the day after, she was the only one in the shed; the girl had gone. This is a significant and irreconcilable variation from what witness K had said in her statement. The variation in such critical evidence is not answered, as witness K seemed to say that she had made a mistake.

54 Witness K was also cross-examined about a severe assault she endured at the hands of Mark McConville, which medical records suggest was around December 1991 - January 1992. Witness K said that after this assault, which occurred in the city, she and another girl, witness N, were driven to the Doongala State Forest, where McConville stabbed her twice with a knife and broke her nose, jaw and arm. There was also a second occasion when she was driven by McConville, again with witness N, to the Doongala State Forest and both were tied to the same tree for two nights and three days. On this occasion, witness K says she saw the corpse of a young woman nearby. She described the woman, she thought, as being 23, young, with dark hair. Witness K said that McConville kicked the deceased female and stated he and another person, being one Collins, were responsible for her death and he expressed his hatred of her.

55 In speaking with Detective Senior Constable Densley and Detective Sergeant Fitzgerald on 11 May 2009, witness K said to them that she had the awful feeling that it may have been Prue Bird's body in the Doongala State Forest. She also told them, during that meeting, that she, McConville and another male had been driving around the Glenroy area, looking for the girl who was a relative of a witness who gave evidence in the Russell Street bombing. Significantly, witness K agreed that any trips to the Doongala State Forest had taken place before she had been put in the shed. Witness K described the shed as old with old wooden shelves and tins of paint, a bed and bed linen hanging as curtains, a kettle and a lot of junk. Some time after witness K had been released from the shed, she was taken to the Ferntree Gully Hospital, haemorrhaging. She could not say when this was.

56 Witness K was also cross-examined about the reward. She professed to know nothing about it until the question had been posed and she later said it had been mentioned by her mother as a joke. Detective Sergeant Brent Fisher gave evidence that he discussed the reward with witness K on 5 December 2012.

57 Witness K said in cross-examination that when she spoke with Detective Senior Constable Densley about the body she saw in the Doongala State Forest, she also told him about the girl in the shed. Detective Senior Constable Densley gave evidence that witness K said nothing to him in any conversation about Prue Bird being in a shed with her. His notes do not record that she had told him that she had been locked in a shed with Prue Bird; indeed, he gave evidence that over the many hours that he had spent with witness K, she had never said anything about seeing a girl in a shed. Detective Senior Constable Densley's notes reveal that witness K told him she was at home in 2000 watching television and saw a Crimestoppers report relating to the disappearance and suspected murder of a young female. The images shown led her to believe the deceased female she saw in the Doongala State Forest in 1990 was this missing female. She believed the deceased female that she saw in the Doongala State Forest was that of a young female abducted from her home in Glenroy and that she was aware this missing female was a family relation of a Crown witness who gave evidence in the Russell Street bombing. It was also in this conversation on 11 May 2009 that witness K said that McConville, herself and another male had been driving around the Glenroy area looking for a girl who was a relative of a witness who gave evidence in the Russell Street bombing, and she was present in the car at the time and overheard McConville and the other male discussing these details. She indicated to Detective Senior Constable Densley, as his notes record, that she did not know the identity of the other male, but later said she may know him, but did not want to name him due to her fear of him.

58 Detective Senior Constable Densley also gave evidence confirming the notes of a conversation he had with witness K on 5 January 2010, which reads as follows:

discussed finding and bumping girl who related to Crown witness in Russel St bombing. Drove around for two or three days with Camilleri and McConville in Glenroy area to look for girl. On last day Camilleri and McConville identified the house she may live in, never saw Camilleri again. Not long after went out with friends and was to meet McConville at 8.30. McConville didn't show. At about 5.30 to 7.00am McConville drove to the pub - - McConville was angry and covered in dirt. Not long after heard of missing girl in media.

Witness K, in cross-examination, confirmed she must have said that to Mr Densley, although she could not recall the conversation.

59 Witness N also gave evidence. She said that on two occasions, she was with witness K when Mark McConville drove them into a bush location and tied them to trees, but there was never a time when she and witness K were tied to the same tree and she never saw any dead person in the vicinity of where they were. Clearly, her evidence does not confirm witness K's evidence as to the sighting of a body.

60 Witness K's evidence that she was locked in a shed by Mark McConville is, however, supported by the statement of Gabriel Kelly that Mark McConville also locked her in a shed. I accept that this is something that he would do and, to that extent, on that point witness K's evidence is supported.

61 A house with a shed or bungalow on the property was indeed purchased by Mrs McConville and her partner, but not until 17 February 1992. Although the vendor said he vacated the property earlier than the settlement date, there is nothing to suggest that Mark McConville would have had access to the shed between 2 February and 17 February 1992, and certainly not in circumstances where McConville could be confident that he could detain and secure not one, but two females in a shed on a property to which exclusive possession had not yet passed. In any event, witness K said that McConville's parents had already moved in when she was locked in the shed and that this was the second time he had locked her in the shed for a substantial period of time, and that McConville may have been there already for a month or a little more. Witness K also said that McConville's mother kept stealing clothes for her and Prue to wear, suggesting perhaps that if this were true, it must have been after the settlement date of 17 February 1992. That this incident occurred in February is not confirmed by the medical records, which record that witness K attended her GP on 20 February 1992 worried about losing the custody of her child, and attended also on 13 and 30 March, and had an ultrasound on 31 March 1992, which confirmed that she was pregnant.

62 I am satisfied that witness K was held in the shed at Mark McConville's mother's property in Ascot Vale, but the evidence suggests this must have been after 17 February 1992, and if Prue was still alive then and in the shed with witness K, then you could not have been involved in her murder, as you were in custody from 11 February 1992. Witness K said that Prue told her she had been taken from her house, and mentioned something about a lunch at home when she was taken, and something about wanting to be a hairdresser. I acknowledge that the reference to hairdressing, an interest of Prue's subsequently confirmed by Mrs Bird, is curious. But there have been many public appeals for information by different investigators over the years and there is no evidence before me as to what has been in the public domain over the 20 years since Prue disappeared. It does seem incredible that witness K should recall the particular topic of hairdressing and lunch being left at home, matters which are not particularly memorable, and yet be confused, uncertain and inconsistent on other, more vital and significant aspects of her evidence.

63 Further, if it were the truth that witness K had been locked in a shed with Prue Bird, she would have known that the body she saw in Doongala State Forrest could not have been that of Prue Bird. In any event, the alleged sighting of a body in Doongala State Forrest pre-dates Prue Bird's disappearance. I accept, despite witness K's evidence on the point, that she did not inform Detective Senior Constable Densley that she was locked in the shed with Prue when he spoke with her on 5 January 2010. Had it been the case that she had been detained in the shed with Prue, it is reasonable to conclude that this would have, on the occasion when she spoke about McConville arriving at the Kilkenny Hotel, angry and covered in dirt and not long after she heard about the missing girl in the media, triggered her recollection of being locked in the shed with Prue Bird. It did not.

64 Witness K admitted that throughout the time of her association with Mark McConville on many occasions she was drugged, bashed, assaulted and rendered unconscious by him and that she was using amphetamines during this time, including the time she was held in the shed. Clearly this was a chaotic time in her life when it appears many bizarre things happened to her and when she was regularly drug-affected, all matters which point to her potential unreliability as a witness. Further, much of her evidence was confused, inconsistent, unsupported and therefore unreliable. I do not regard witness K's evidence, insofar as she says that she was locked in a shed with Prue Bird, as truthful and reliable. Accordingly, approaching her evidence with considerable care and scrutiny, and relying upon support for it as revealed by other evidence, I am of the view that, nonetheless, aspects of her testimony may be relied upon. They are as follows:

(1) Witness K did identify you from a photoboard in January 2011. She could not have done that if she did not know what you looked like in 1992 and thereabouts. That is, if she had not known you at that time and there is no evidence to suggest that she knew you in any other way than through her association with Mark McConville. It should be noted that as you appear in that photo on the photoboard is materially different from how you appeared in the photo that was published in the newspaper in December 2009, so there can be no displacement effect.

(2) Witness K told the police you came in different cars, one of which was an old station wagon. You admitted to the police that you were driving different cars in Melbourne at this time, including a station wagon.

(3) Of all the people in the world that witness K has nominated as being with McConville as they drove around the streets of Glenroy looking for a young girl, she has nominated you, a person who has subsequently admitted to the murder of that very girl.

(4) Witness K first spoke to Detective Senior Constable Densley in May 2009 at a time when he was involved in the investigation into the Abbey murders. She spoke to him originally about McConville in association with Prue Bird's death. She nominated you as being involved either in November 2009 or January 2010. There is nothing in the evidence which suggests that she knew at this time that you had made admissions to the murder of Prue Bird.

(5) Although I would be more confident in accepting the reliability of the identification of the house at 122 Justin Avenue on the field trip if that trip had been video or audio recorded, nonetheless, witness K did identify the house from the photoboard and no challenge was made to the integrity of that identification process. Witness K would not have been able to identify that house if she had not seen it previously. I acknowledge, however, that insofar as witness K said the name of the street was familiar, she did give evidence that you and McConville did not know the address, and the name Justin Avenue does appear in the newspaper article, tendered as Exhibit B.

(6) Witness K was also able to identify the strip of shops and, in particular, shops which are now closed. True it is she recalled going to Glenroy on an occasion when she was with Gabriel Kelly and her partner, Paul, and they purchased alcohol from the shop and drank it at a reserve with Mark McConville. Of course, it may be that she recalls the liquor outlet from this excursion, but that would not account for how it is she would be able to identify the house at 122 Justin Avenue from the photoboard. Further, the fact that she was able to identify some of the shops in that strip suggests to me that she must have been in that area on more than one occasion.

(7) I am satisfied that witness K knew you through McConville at the relevant time and could only have known you through McConville and that she was with you and McConville on occasions, driving around the streets of Glenroy, looking for a young girl. Witness K had no reason to be in Glenroy unless it was with McConville.

65 I turn now to witness L. Witness L came forward in 2009, having contacted Crimestoppers. She was spoken to by Detective Acting Sergeant Sharon Bell on 21 September 2010, as she drove around the streets of Glenroy in a field trip which was audio recorded. In 1992, Witness L was 18 and lived in the local area. On the Sunday, she was walking home from the shops, eating an ice-cream. She was 30 metres from Prue's house, walking past it on the way to Bindi Street. She saw two cars; a newer car, a Ford sedan, and a little car like a hatchback. The little car was parked opposite the house next door to Prue's. It had two men in it, and something about it made her fearful or sense danger, in the sense that she thought they had done an armed robbery or something like that. There was either the presence of guns or masks. The other car was across the intersection, on the other side of the road. That car had one man in it who was sitting, smoking and staring at her. She knew the two cars were connected because the little car had done a U-turn and sat next to the other car for a second, and words were exchanged. As witness L turned the corner, she heard the engine of the car start up. She walked on some one or two houses and went onto the nature strip to have a look. She saw the sedan reverse into the driveway and two men standing at the door of Prue Bird's house. Witness L described the two men at the door, one over six feet tall, stocky, and the other a smaller one. The taller, stocky man was either bald or near bald. As she walked further down the street some five or six houses, the car drove past with Prue in the back with her two hands at the back side window. She initially thought Prue was waving at her. Prue then moved to the back window and began banging on it with two hands, as if to say "help me, help me". She thought Prue was going back to her grandparents and did not want to. In cross-examination she explained this by saying, "you don't think your friend's going to be kidnapped". In re-examination, Witness L said the two men got out of the blue laser and they were both standing at the door. The smaller of the two men got into the other car with Prue, which was the car that had the man already sitting in it. When that car went past, she recognised the man in the passenger's seat as the same man in the little car and had been standing at the door. The men appeared to be in their 30's.

66 Witness L first heard Prue was missing some ten months later when she saw a flyer on a pole. She had moved out of the area in 1992, had only told her mother and sister what she saw, and had never spoken to anyone else about Prue. Years later, she saw a photo which she thought looked very similar to one of the men in the cars, and it was "either Craig or his brother. A photo of both was in the paper that day". Witness L, at her suggestion, was later hypnotised, but this did not advance her account, other than to say that the number plate of the Ford sedan was "AT or CAK 357" and that it was dark blue. She had written the number down and stuck it on the fridge. She said that she was 90% sure that one of the drivers was Craig Minogue. It is not disputed that Craig Minogue was in custody at the time of Prue Bird's disappearance, but Rodney Minogue was not.

67 The psychologist who performed the hypnosis, Andrew McNeish, agreed that a person under hypnosis may tell the truth or what they believe to be the truth, may fantasise or lie, and it is impossible to know if the memory is true or not. There is a danger that a person under hypnosis will thereafter accept a pseudo-memory as genuine. For these reasons, quite properly, the Crown placed no reliance on anything new or different said by witness L during the hypnosis, but that does not mean that her account of what she said to Detective Acting Sergeant Bell prior to hypnosis is to be discounted. Indeed, I take the view that what she said to the police was indeed very credible and the fact that she was prepared to be hypnotised indeed bolsters her credibility, because she would be less likely to submit to such a process if she was fabricating her account.

68 Mr Kelly submitted that the measure of witness L's suggestibility is demonstrated by her purported identification of Craig Minogue and the nomination of the day on which she observed these events as a Sunday, which she had never said before and therefore, he submitted, her evidence was generally unreliable. I do not accept that this was so. The witness stated that "there were photos of both Craig Minogue and his brother in the paper and that he looked very similar to one of the men in the cars". Although she had not previously said that it happened on a Sunday, she had not nominated any other day and described it as a beautiful Sunday afternoon, she was getting an ice cream. This was, after all, early February. The weather was such that Mrs Bird had gone to the local baths and the events did occur in the afternoon. Further, in your record of interview, you confirmed that it was a hot day.

69 Although 18 years had passed before witness L came forward with this information, she explained that this was because she had been in fear of her life and that of her child, and that she had moved away from the area and it was not until more recent times that she had the confidence to come forward, after undertaking a 'Hope for the Future' course. She is currently seeing a psychologist and psychiatrist and has been told that she may have bipolar disorder. In 1992, she was experiencing mood swings and depression, but she was not prescribed any medication then, or now.

70 There is no reason to doubt that witness L was in the street on the day she said she was. Although it was not suggested that she was giving false evidence, or motivated to do so, nonetheless there would be no reason to nominate more than one person and more than one car, if it was not what she had seen.

71 Witnesses' M, K and L do not know each other. There is no suggestion of collusion. They each came forward independently of each other and, in M's case, had made an initial statement to the police very close to the events, when she was a young girl. Witnesses' L and M gave sworn evidence consistent with their statements. It was not suggested that they had a motive to give false evidence, nor was it suggested that they knew of the reward. Witness M describes a man whom she identifies as you in a small light blue hatchback later identified as the car driven by McConville in the vicinity of Prue's house at a time prior to her disappearance. That person was acting menacingly and followed witness M as she walked down the street. Witness M describes a light blue hatchback in her statement, consistent with what witness L saw and consistent with McConville's possession of such a car. Witness L, on the very day of Prue's disappearance, saw two cars and three men in the vicinity of Prue's house. She saw two men at the front door of 122 Justin Avenue and then saw Prue being driven away in a car with one of the two men who had been at the door. Prue appeared, to her, to be gesturing for help.

72 The Crown also relied upon the evidence of Kathleen Warren, which evidence was not challenged by cross-examination. Her house was on the corner of Justin Avenue and Bindi Street. She had been disturbed from her sleep at 3am, in the early hours of 2 February 1992. She saw a man walking along the footpath, heard a car start-up and a light blue coloured two-door car drive slowly along Bindi street. It turned south into Justin Avenue and then turned into View Street, and then she heard it turn, she thought, into View Street. She purported to identify the person she had seen as he walked past her fence, but she had only seen him for a couple of seconds. She described that person as 5'9 as measured against the fence, neat looking, fair coloured hair and a fair complexion. Clearly, given the circumstances of the identification, it should be treated with extreme caution. Accordingly, I do not act upon it. However, this further evidence does suggest that there was a blue car in the area at a time proximate to the events.

73 The Crown also relied upon a telephone conversation you had with a former girlfriend while you were in custody in which you spelt out the name "McConville" to her and told her that the police were trying to associate you with him. The Crown contend that your spelling out the name "McConville" in that conversation had some sinister meaning, but a fair reading of the transcript of that conversation does not lend itself to that interpretation.

74 The Crown also relied upon the evidence that your sister owned a white VG Valiant but that this was not purchased until 3 June 1992. Therefore, this could not be the white VG Valiant that you maintained you were driving on the day you accosted Prue Bird. As I understand the evidence, you have never said that it was your sister's car that you were driving at the time and it appears from your various accounts and the evidence of witness K that you drove a number of different cars around this time, you admitted that you were in the habit of stealing cars and, indeed, you have convictions for theft.

75 Of course, the Crown does not have to prove the identity of the persons it contends you were acting in concert with, but I am satisfied by the combined force of the evidence that you and McConville drove through the streets of Glenroy, looking for the house where a young girl lived prior to 2 February 1992, and that you and two others, one of whom was possibly McConville, took Prue Bird from her home. It follows, therefore, that you did not act alone and this was not an unplanned act. Although the evidence does not disclose how it is that following upon her abduction Prue was murdered, the only reasonable inference to be drawn from that conclusion is that the persons who abducted Prue from the home also murdered her and, by your plea, you acknowledge that you did so murder her. I propose to sentence you on that basis.

76 The maximum penalty for the crime of murder is life imprisonment. Your conduct, as I have found it to be, is a serious and grave example of the crime. Even if your own account were acceptable, that would still be so. You were involved with others in the abduction of a defenceless 13-year-old child from the sanctuary of her home, in circumstances which must have been terrifying for her. You have admitted to murdering her; her body has never been found and most likely never will. Your conduct bespeaks criminality of a very high order and is demonstrative of a cruel and callous disregard for the sanctity of human life.

77 Mrs Bird, in her victim impact statement, which she read to the Court, spoke eloquently of the unbearable grief she has endured. Mrs Bird said that she had written to you twice, asking you to return Prue's remains so that she could bury her with the dignity that she deserved. Mrs Bird said that, in her despair, she has been taken to the darkest of places and on 2 February 1992, the life she once knew was all gone. She feels disrespected and not heard. She has lost her trust in the police and lost her faith. In her words, you have destroyed her life and given her a life sentence. Through your counsel, you proffered a feeble apology to Mrs Bird that you were genuinely sorry for what you had put her through; hardly an expression of complete contrition and remorse. True it is that since Mrs Bird addressed you directly when reading her victim impact statement, you have cooperated with the authorities in making yourself available to the police and accompanying them to the site of the old Frankston tip and endeavouring to identify the location where you say you disposed of Prue Bird's body. Such cooperation may, of course, be entirely self-serving or may be genuine. Nonetheless, you did cooperate with the authorities to that extent, and such cooperation may be consistent with some compassion for Mrs Bird's position and with some very, very qualified remorse.

78 All that can be said is that, by your plea of guilty, you have at least given Mrs Bird some small comfort that at least one person has been brought to justice and held accountable for her daughter's murder. True it is that until you confessed in 2009, the crime remained unsolved and, to that end, your plea has had considerable utilitarian value. Not only has your plea saved the community the cost of a trial, which would have been a somewhat lengthy and complex one, but you have saved the witnesses and, in particular, Mrs Bird, the ordeal of one. Nonetheless, it remains the case that, were it not for your confession, the Crown quite possibly would not have had anyone to charge and, had you not pleaded guilty, the matter would have gone to trial.

79 I turn now to matters personal to you. You were born on 31 May 1969, therefore you were 22 when you committed this murder. The further indictment alleges that at that time, you had secured 126 prior convictions. In June 1990 at the Townsville District Court, you were convicted on one charge of assault occasioning actual bodily harm and sentenced to 9 months' imprisonment cumulative with the sentence you were then undergoing. As at 1992, this was your only prior conviction for violence. You were released from custody in March 1991 and it appears that you were subject to community supervision in Queensland until June 1992. It follows therefore, that you committed this murder while you were on parole in Queensland. Between 1992 and 1997, you secured 19 further convictions, but they were for offences of dishonesty and street offences, and, apart from a sentence of periodic detention, they resulted in fines and non-custodial dispositions.

80 You are one of six children. Your parents separated shortly after you were born and you were not reunited with your father until you were in your teenage years. From the age of seven, you and your siblings were placed in foster homes in New South Wales. You returned to live with your mother and her new partner when you were nine, but there were tensions and ultimately you were declared uncontrollable and sent to the Yasmar Remand Centre in Sydney. You absconded from there after some four or five months and went to live in the streets of Kings Cross. You were ten at the time. When you were living on the streets in Kings Cross, you say you were subjected to a series of assaults that you had detailed in your interviews with the police. Between the ages of 11 and 13, you lived in a boys' home at Muswellbrook and at times lived on the streets at Kings Cross. When you were 13, you were ordered to live at a detention centre for minors until the age of 15 when the order lapsed. You then went to live with your father in Brisbane and found employment. Upon being arrested and remanded in custody for stealing a car, you were then released to the care of your sister.

81 Subsequently, you made your way to Kings Cross and there formed a relationship with a young woman. The two of you went to Queensland. The relationship lasted two years, but it was strained by your drug use and continuing association with people you had met at Kings Cross. Ultimately, the relationship ended. You, it is said, "went off the rails" and committed a number of burglaries and theft of cars. You were released from gaol in 1991 and returned to your sister and then made your way to Sydney. At some point, of course, you travelled to Melbourne, in possibly late 1991 and early 1992. By 11 February 1992, you were back in Sydney. Later in 1992, you met a woman and lived together in Yass, where you worked in a bakery and at a meatworks. You were charged with offences relating to this woman's daughter, which led to your separation. That trial was discontinued and a re-trial ordered. It was at this time, acting in concert with another, that you committed the Bega schoolgirl murders. It is said that you had, in the past, used marijuana, cocaine and amphetamines recreationally, but at this time your amphetamine use escalated dramatically.

82 You have been in custody since 26 November 1997, and on 27 April 1999, you were sentenced to life without parole in respect of each of the murders of two young girls, the "Bega schoolgirl murders". You were 28 when you committed those murders.

83 You are now 43 and the father of four children, the youngest of whom, a boy, you have never seen. You have converted to Islam. You are studying Arabic and completing a degree in horticulture. It is said that you have been on antidepressants for the last seven years and receive counselling with a psychiatrist on a weekly basis. You have been in protection since being taken into custody and have been held most recently at the Melbourne Assessment Prison, having been transferred from Barwon Prison as a result of a serious assault in which you sustained a fractured skull, a fractured eye socket and stab wound to the face. It was submitted that you were assaulted because it was erroneously thought, with all the police attendance upon you at prison, that you were informing on other prisoners.

84 In sentencing you, I take into account your plea of guilty and give you a discount for it. I take into account your very limited expression of remorse, such as it is. I also take into account your dysfunctional childhood and teenage years, and your prior convictions as they stood in 1992. I take into account also that you are serving two sentences of life imprisonment without parole, which, although not prior convictions for these purposes, do form part of your antecedents and are properly to be considered. Nothing has been said about your prospects for rehabilitation, even allowing for the fact that it is possible to live a rehabilitated life in custody, and subsequent events have come to show that your utter disregard of human life is entrenched.

85 Against these considerations stand the nature and gravity of the offence here committed, and the need to pass a sentence which will punish you, act in denunciation of your conduct and give effect to specific and general deterrence. The sentencing discretion must, however, be exercised in the context that you are presently serving two life sentences without parole. That is, you will remain in custody until the day of your death and any sentence imposed by this Court must be served, by you, concurrently.

86 Ms Williams SC and Mr Kelly submitted that it is appropriate to fix a term of years, rather than a life sentence, and that it should be a straight sentence; that is, it is not appropriate to order a non-parole period. The fixing of a term of years addresses the nature and gravity of the offence of murder. It addresses also your prior criminal history as it stood in 1992 and therefore does not seek to punish you twice for subsequent murders. It also addresses the appropriate discount for the plea of guilty while taking into account your cooperation with the police, including that you came forward, and your extremely limited remorse, as I have found it to be, insofar as you may be said to have expressed it to your sister, another prisoner and in your apology, such as it was, to Mrs Bird.

87 The fixing of a non-parole period is governed by s 11 of the Sentencing Act 1991 (Vic). It provides that if a court sentences an offender to be imprisoned in respect of an offence for inter alia (b) a term of two years or more, the court must, as part of the sentence, fix a period during which the offender is not eligible to be released on parole unless it considers the nature of the offence or the past history of the offender make the fixing of such a period inappropriate.

88 Although you committed this murder prior to the Bega schoolgirl murders, nonetheless, those murder convictions form part of your past history.

89 Although it may appear to be artificial to contemplate the fixing of a non-parole period given your current circumstances, nonetheless I am required to give consideration to the fixing of a non-parole period. I am satisfied, however, that the nature of this offence, your past history which includes two convictions for murder, the fact that you will never be released back into the community, and that you present as a real and serious danger to the community, and especially to young girls, all render it inappropriate to fix a non-parole period, and I decline to do so.

90 By reason of your two convictions for murder, you are to be sentenced as a serious violent offender in respect of this charge. Accordingly, pursuant to s 6D of the Sentencing Act, having been satisfied that a period of imprisonment is justified, in determining the length of that sentence, I have and do have regard to the protection of the community from you as the principal purpose for which the sentence is imposed, and may, in order to achieve that purpose, impose a sentence longer than that which is proportionate to the gravity of the offence considered in light of its objective circumstances. The Crown does not submit that I should impose a disproportionate sentence, and I do not do so, satisfied as I am that the sentence I will impose will serve to protect the community at large from you.

91 Accordingly, you are convicted and sentenced to 28 years' imprisonment. Pursuant to s 6E of the Sentencing Act 1991 (Vic) I otherwise direct that the sentence be served concurrently with the sentences you are presently undergoing.

92 Were it not for your plea of guilty, pursuant to s 6AAA of the Sentencing Act 1991 (Vic), I declare that I would have sentenced you to life imprisonment and, because the considerations are the same, would not have fixed a non-parole period.

93 I will have it caused to be noted in the records of the Court that you have been sentenced as a serious violent offender.