Category Archives: Crime – Australia

Julia Gillard’s former partner Tim Mathieson convicted after sexually assaulting sleeping friend

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Court hears the woman fell asleep and awoke to find Mathieson sucking on her breast in March 2022

Julia Gillard’s former partner Tim Mathieson has been convicted and fined $7,000 for the sexual assault of a friend that left her feeling so unsafe she moved interstate.

The 67-year-old formally pleaded guilty in the Melbourne magistrates court on Thursday.

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Information and support for anyone affected by rape or sexual abuse issues is available from the following organisations. In Australia, support is available at 1800Respect (1800 737 732). In the UK, Rape Crisis offers support on 0808 500 2222. In the US, Rainn offers support on 800-656-4673. Other international helplines can be found at ibiblio.org/rcip/internl.html

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Melbourne shooting: man killed outside shopping centre in Craigieburn in targeted attack

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Man dies outside shopping centre in Melbourne’s north and another taken to hospital with serious injuries

A man has been shot dead outside a shopping centre in Melbourne’s north in what police believe was a targeted attack.

Emergency workers arrived at Craigieburn Central shopping centre on Windrock Avenue just before 3pm on Saturday after reports of several shots fired.

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Court finds boy, 14, is too young to be held criminally responsible for death of Melbourne teen Declan Cutler

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Supreme court says there’s reasonable possibility the child, then aged 13, didn’t know his conduct was ‘seriously wrong’

A Victorian judge has ruled a boy, who was aged 13 when Melbourne teenager Declan Cutler was killed, is too young to be held criminally responsible for his murder.

The boy, who cannot be named for legal reasons, faced a judge-alone trial in July after he was identified as one of eight boys who attacked and killed 16-year-old Declan as he left a birthday party last year.

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Police charge man with attempted murder of two women over ANU campus stabbing

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Police allege the man initially attacked a male student with a frying pan then stabbed two female students

The man alleged to have stabbed two young women during an attack at the Australian National University appeared in court on Monday charged with attempted murder.

Alex Ophel, 24, appeared briefly before the ACT Magistrates Court, wearing a grey tracksuit and white thongs, one day after he allegedly stabbed two 20-year-old women on the ANU campus, leaving one with critical injuries.

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Keilor shooting: man killed at Melbourne cafe in organised crime attack

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Victoria police believe a shooting in the city’s north-west that left a man dead and another injured was targeted

Police in Melbourne have launched an investigation after a fatal shooting in the suburb of Keilor in the city’s north-west.

The man killed is yet to be formally identified.Officers say the shooting appears to have been targeted.

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Teenager charged over attack on boy walking home from school in south-east Melbourne

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A Frankston boy, 14, was charged with offences including armed robbery and intentionally causing serious injury

A teenager has been charged over a violent attack in Melbourne on a boy walking home from school that left him with life-threatening injuries.

The 14-year-old was confronted by a group as he left Glen Eira College in Glen Huntly on Monday afternoon.

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Inquiry into sexual abuse at a Melbourne school to probe allegations at 18 others

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Kathleen Foley, SC, says inquiry will examine other schools where former Beaumaris teachers had worked

An inquiry into historical child sexual abuse at a Melbourne primary school in the 1960s and 1970s will investigate allegations at 18 other state schools where the same teachers also worked.

The Andrews government in June announced a board of inquiry into historical abuse allegations at Beaumaris primary school, in Melbourne’s south-east.

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AFP calls on public to donate childhood photos in bid to combat child abuse with AI

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Project with Monash University will use images to train system to recognise pictures of children on dark web

The Australian federal police want the public to donate their childhood photos to an artificial intelligence project aimed at helping save children from abuse.

The project, run by AFP and Monash University, will help detect child abuse material on the dark web, or on devices that have been seized during criminal investigations.

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Keeping kids in watch houses: why the Queensland government could change the law to suit itself

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Possible ‘robodebt’ scenario left Labor to either move the children or suspend the Human Rights Act – and it chose the latter

Queensland Labor MPs found out on Monday that they were expected to vote to suspend the state’s Human Rights Act, for a second time, to allow for the indefinite detention of children in adult police watch houses.

No one else seemed to have any warning. On Wednesday afternoon – on a particularly dreary day in state parliament – the police minister, Mark Ryan, tacked the law change on to an unrelated child safety bill, allowing it to pass through parliament the following day with no committee scrutiny.

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Reforms needed after ‘horrendous’ Catholic church approach in paedophile priest cases, lawyers say

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Lawyers say strategy a ‘matter of continuing concern’ after church succeeds in permanently blocking claim by two Indigenous men

Lawyers for two Indigenous abuse survivors have called for reforms to address the “horrendous” Catholic church strategy of seeking to permanently block cases where alleged paedophile priests have died.

On Wednesday, the church was successful in permanently blocking a claim made by two Indigenous survivors relating to alleged abuse committed by David Joseph Perrett, an Armidale assistant priest and convicted child abuser, whose crimes the church has known about since 1995.

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Brisbane woman whose body was found hidden in a wall identified by police

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Homicide detectives say skeletal remains partially buried at Alderley apartment block belonged to Tanya Lee Glover

The remains of a woman whose body was hidden in the wall of a Brisbane apartment block for about 13 years have been identified by police, who are investigating why anyone would target “a vulnerable single female in this way”.

Homicide detectives announced the breakthrough in the “jigsaw puzzle” investigation eight months after cleaners discovered her skeletal remains, tightly wrapped and partially buried in a locked area behind the wall in the building at Alderley.

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Sexual offence trials regularly rely on ‘rape myths’ and stereotypes of victim-survivors, NSW study finds

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Analysis of trial transcripts shows prosecutors and defence still focus on conduct of victim-survivor

Prosecutors and defence lawyers regularly rely on stereotypes about how sexual violence victim-survivors should behave and “rape myths” during sexual offence trials in New South Wales, a study has found.

The study, which undertook the largest analysis of sexual offence trial transcripts in the state in 27 years, found many of the procedural reforms that started in the 1980s to improve the experience of sexual violence victim-survivors in the criminal justice system were working.

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Queensland man who says schools should reconsider the cane joins government’s youth justice group

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‘If the parents of kids aren’t able to exercise discipline … then the state needs to be disciplining these kids’, says victims’ advocate

On a Toowoomba Facebook group, frustrated residents share regular updates about vehicles stolen, shops robbed and homes burgled. Some post photos of children accused of crimes; the “bleeding hearts” are shouted down.

Amid the emotion, Ken Cunliffe calls for calm and for the community to focus on solutions rather than politics.

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Melbourne shooting: man gunned down near South Yarra in apparent targeted attack

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Man, 53, died in hospital after being shot multiple times while walking down Almeida Crescent, off Chapel Street

A man who police say had organised crime associations was fatally shot on Friday night in what appears to be a targeted attack near a nightlife hotspot in Melbourne’s south.

Emergency services were alerted on Friday night at about 11.40pm that multiple shots had been fired at a man walking down Almeida Crescent, a side street off South Yarra’s Chapel Street.

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Queensland woman who laced husband’s soup with pills pleads guilty to manslaughter

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Court hears Judith Ann Venn was caring for her husband and was at the ‘end of the road’ when she killed him

Judith Ann Venn had reached the “end of the road” when she gave her husband of more than 40 years an overdose by lacing his favourite soup with pills and killed him, a court has been told.

The now 69-year-old was caring for Lance Hilton Venn, whose bipolar disorder had worsened significantly over the previous 18 months.

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Man shot dead in Canterbury in Sydney’s second ‘targeted shooting’ in two days

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Latest victim is fifth person shot this week, fanning fears city’s underworld gang wars are escalating

A man has been shot dead in Sydney’s south-west, just hours after a high-profile criminal lawyer was shot and injured in the driveway of his home.

The latest victim is the fifth person shot this week, fanning fears the city’s underworld gang wars are escalating.

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Sydney deputy school principal jailed for sexual chats with ‘teenage girl’

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Damian Wanstell was arrested after sending explicit texts to undercover police posing as 14-year-old

A former deputy principal has been jailed after sending protracted sexually explicit chats to someone he thought was a 14-year-old girl.

In sentencing Damian Scott Wanstall on Wednesday, judge Andrew Colefax asked how, as a father, he could discuss sexual acts and arrange to meet up with someone so young for that purpose.

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Greenacre shooting: three in hospital after early-morning ‘targeted attack’ in Sydney

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Three people were found injured in two parked cars, NSW police said, and two are in a critical condition in hospital

Three people have been taken to hospital after an early morning shooting in Sydney.

NSW police superintendent Simon Glasser said police believed it was a targeted attack, with shots fired into two stationary vehicles. They are looking for at least one man in relation to the shooting.

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Alleged threat to kill federal MP made late at night, court told

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Simon Geoffrey Raymond, 39, has been in custody since Tuesday after he was arrested over alleged threats against Anne Webster

A man accused of threatening to kill a federal MP will spend at least the weekend behind bars after a brief court hearing in Queensland.

Simon Geoffrey Raymond, 39, of no fixed address, has been in custody since being arrested by federal police at Brisbane airport on Tuesday.

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Ex-girlfriend of Australian boxer Harry Garside charged with common assault

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Ashley Ruscoe arrested on Wednesday after investigation into alleged domestic violence incident at a Sydney home on 1 March

The ex-girlfriend of Australian boxer Harry Garside has been charged with assaulting him after charges of domestic violence were dropped against the Olympian.

Ashley Ruscoe, 35, was arrested and taken to Waverley police station on Wednesday, when she was charged with domestic violence-related offences.

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In Australia, the crisis support service Lifeline is 13 11 14. If you or someone you know is affected by sexual assault, family or domestic violence, call 1800RESPECT on 1800 737 732 or visit www.1800RESPECT.org.au. In an emergency, call 000. International helplines can be found via www.befrienders.org.

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