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Murder Beyond Belief

Child murder is considered the most despicable of all crimes. There was a time when it was an automatic death sentence. Many believe that still should be the case today. And, while all child killings are deemed to be the worst imaginable by the families and loved ones of the deceased, there are some that are so terrible that they defy belief. Such is the senseless and brutal murder of Nicole Hanns. And, as if the murder of their precious little girl wasn’t enough for Nicole’s parents, Gwen and Peter, to cope with, years later they had to stand by and watch as her killer was released from prison.

In 1972, John David Lewthwaite watched through a window as nine-year-old Anthony Hanns had a bath at his parents’ home in Greystanes, in Sydney’s west. He fantasised about killing the boy’s parents and abducting, raping and murdering the boy. Two years later, on the night of 26 June 1974, the 18-year-old Lewthwaite returned to the house, but attacked Anthony’s sister Nicole Margaret Hanns instead, stabbing the five-year-old 17 times. He used such force that some of the blows went right through her tiny body, injuring her heart, lungs and liver. At the time Lewthwaite was on parole after serving 15 months of a six-year sentence for arson.

When he arrived at the house, Lewthwaite silently cracked a window pane and removed the jagged glass. He then selected a long sliver to stab his intended victim with; he later exchanged it for a carving knife from the kitchen. Lewthwaite then went to young Nicole’s bedroom and turned on the light. Nicole woke up. Lewthwaite motioned to her to keep quiet, then rolled her onto her stomach and stabbed her repeatedly in the back and on the arms. The attack was so violent that the knife buckled into the shape of a horseshoe.

Nicole’s screams woke the family. Lewthwaite fled. Still wearing his blood-soaked clothing he took a train to North Sydney, where he exposed himself to a group of schoolboys the next day. He visited three churches, trying to make a confession, then contacted a parole officer he knew. ‘I think I have hurt a little girl,’ Lewthwaite said. Police were called. He confessed to the murder.

At his trial, in December 1974, Lewthwaite pleaded not guilty to murder but guilty to the manslaughter of Nicole Hanns. Court-appointed psychiatrists agreed that he was sane at the time of the murder, and said he was a danger to society.

It took the jury 90 minutes to find Lewthwaite guilty of murder. In sentencing him to life, Justice Slattery stated that he had the utmost concern as to whether Lewthwaite should ever be released. ‘Regrettably, there is no future for you in society, and unless medical science can come up with a solution, there appears to be no solution to your psychiatric problems,’ he said. ‘The ferocity and extent of the particularly savage killing of the child indicate that you are not capable of ever leading a normal life in the community.’

In 1975, Lewthwaite escaped from Morisset Psychiatric Hospital, but he was soon recaptured. He escaped again in 1985 after being allowed out of Long Bay Jail on day leave to see his psychiatrist. The Hanns’ house was put under surveillance – police feared he would return to kill Anthony – but he was caught two days later.

Lewthwaite’s escape brought to the public’s attention the fact that he was allowed to leave jail unaccompanied, even though he had committed one of Australia’s most appalling crimes only 10 years earlier. Gwen Hanns sobbed when she heard of Lewthwaite’s escape. She expressed her disgust with the prison system and demanded to know why a child killer was allowed to wander the streets alone.

‘It [Lewthwaite’s escape] brought back everything – the agony we have tried to keep at the back of our minds all these years,’ she said. ‘If the people who let him out had to go through what we have been through, they would be the first to throw away the key.’

In December 1986, Gwen and Peter Hanns were awarded the maximum $20,000 criminal injury compensation for Nicole’s death. Justice Slattery commented that since the child’s murder, the couple had led a secluded life. ‘The couple had recovered to a degree until Lewthwaite’s escape,’ he said. ‘They have undoubtedly suffered great trauma.’

Then, in July 1992, Lewthwaite’s life sentence was reduced to a minimum of 20 years. Lewthwaite, by now a devout Christian, would be eligible for parole after 25 June 1994. He was reclassified as a C3 level prisoner at Cooma jail, making him eligible for day release.

The New South Wales Liberal government’s attorney-general, John Hannaford, vowed to make amendments to the Sentencing Act, giving the Crown the ability to appeal such decisions. Other politicians pledged their support. The conservative Independent MP for Tamworth, Tony Windsor, said that Lewthwaite should be kept behind bars; Labor MP Carl Scully pledged his support to stop Lewthwaite being given parole or day release. Gwen Hanns said Mr Hannaford’s intended reforms didn’t go far enough: she would accept nothing less than a guarantee that Lewthwaite would be kept imprisoned for life. Mr Hannaford said he didn’t believe Lewthwaite’s release was in the community interest, but that vetoing his parole would leave the system open to political abuse.

Gwen Hanns lobbied against Lewthwaite being granted parole. On 29 August 1994, the Offenders Review Board denied his application, but allowed him to participate in a monthly day-release program.

With Mr Scully’s support, Gwen Hanns opposed Lewthwaite’s day release. Their cause was backed by Bob Carr, then the leader of the New South Wales Labor Opposition. Mr Scully alleged that psychiatric reports on Lewthwaite suggested he would kill again. Prison informants alleged that he had raped an inmate in jail.

Lewthwaite was again refused parole on 6 October 1995 and 19 July 1996. Again, Gwen Hanns had campaigned against his release. She was also there in 1997, demanding psychiatric assessments of Lewthwaite in her ongoing battle to keep him behind bars. ‘I don’t want the public to think I’m out for vengeance,’ she stressed. ‘My main worry is other kids, other parents’ children who may become Lewthwaite’s next victims. What I’m saying is I’d rather he got me than someone else’s baby. If he’s cured, if he has been treated and tested, then let the doctors tell me – and prove to me he is no longer a danger to society. While I get sick and tired of fighting to keep Lewthwaite in jail, I’m never going to give up. While there’s breath in me, I’ll never stop this fight.’ She also compiled a list of 22 criminals who had committed murder after being released from jail, where they had served time for serious crimes.

On 2 May 1997, with Bob Carr’s Labor government now in power in New South Wales, Lewthwaite’s application for day release – the first step on the road to parole – was rejected. Instead, he was transferred to the new Metropolitan Reception and Remand Centre and placed on an in-jail work program.

In June 1997, Lewthwaite wrote a letter to the Sydney Morning Herald claiming that politics – not the fact that he had viciously murdered a child – was keeping him in prison. He said he wanted to be accepted as a man who has come to terms with his homosexuality. He stated that he had a long-term partner and had overcome the urge to sexually abuse boys. He added that he had taken God into his life not simply to improve his chances of parole, but to provide spiritual guidance.

‘I am not an evil, cold-blooded killer,’ he said. ‘If I knew 23 years ago that the torture of uncertainty I would be put through when I finally was eligible for parole, the light at the end of what seems to be a tunnel that goes on forever and is all but extinguished whenever a politician who knows nothing about me except a 23-year-old crime decides to jump up and down for his votes, if I knew that I would be made to feel like the most despicable person alive by people who generate nothing but hatred, then I would never have applied to be released from jail.’

He went on to say that he felt eternal remorse for his crime, but believed he had earned a future out of prison. ‘If there had been a death penalty in 1974, I would have gladly placed the noose around my own neck,’ he said. ‘What’s done can’t be undone.’

Gwen Hanns didn’t believe him. ‘He had over 20 years to say he’s sorry – why now?’ she asked. ‘Because he thinks it will get him out.’

On 2 March 1998, the parole board rejected Lewthwaite’s annual application for parole, saying, he ‘should remain in jail because he would not be able to adjust to normal lawful community life, there was a risk that he would reoffend, he needed further participation in a pre-release program and his release would not be in the public interest.’

Lewthwaite was given the chance to present his case for release at an open public hearing held on 27 April 1998. At this hearing the board heard arguments against his release from Gwen Hanns and Dr Rod Milton, a forensic psychiatrist. The board announced that Lewthwaite would stay in prison.

At another parole application in 1999 he was successful and, on 21 June 1999, he walked from prison – under the strictest parole conditions the law would allow, but nevertheless a free man. John Lewthwaite lives in rural New South Wales with his long-time male partner, who he met inside prison.