Identify theft murderer Alexander Robert MacDonald learned to ‘shut off emotions’ in army
Amid the horrors of the Vietnam War, a young Alexander Robert MacDonald learned to shut off his emotions and do what needed to be done – whether that be murdering a man in cold blood to steal his identity, or aiming a sawn-off shotgun at an innocent bank teller in Port Douglas.
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Amid the horrors of the Vietnam War, a young Alexander Robert MacDonald learned to shut off his emotions and do what needed to be done – whether that be murdering a man in cold blood to steal his identity, or aiming a sawn-off shotgun at an innocent bank teller in Port Douglas.
A callous, convicted murderer, the once-terrifying MacDonald, 73, appeared in the Cairns District Court on Wednesday via videolink from Lotus Glen, dressed in bottle green and sitting calmly and mostly expressionless on his wheelie-walker.
He was being sentenced for a series of old-school bank robberies spanning the Queensland coast between 1995 and 1997.
MacDonald was convicted in Perth in 1998 of murdering Ron Williams, after choosing the man because he was the same age, they looked similar, and he needed a new identity to escape warrants and launder money from bank robberies.
The fact he had never faced court over those robberies – where he routinely took tellers hostage – came to light during parole eligibility proceedings for his murder sentence.
The court heard in 1997, MacDonald had advertised for a non-existent mining job, and interviewed dozens of “applicants” before selecting lookalike Williams.
He then took the man for a car ride from Melbourne to Perth to the non-existent role before shooting him twice in the head while fishing, burying him at a remote beach in Albany, Western Australia.
He already had many key identity documents and had bank accounts, health insurance and a Myer card in Williams’ name.
MacDonald pleaded guilty in the Cairns District Court to five deprivation of liberty charges and four armed robbery with violence charges, for crimes spanning from late 1995 to 1997 in Port Douglas, Airlie Beach, and Yeppoon.
The court was told that MacDonald would walk into the bank wearing a hat and sunglasses, and would hold the gun at counter-height and instruct everyone to get on the floor and not push any buttons.
He would then take a hostage, leave a black sports bag to fill with cash, and say if the bag was not filled with $100 notes he would kill the hostage.
The court was told the Vietnam veteran had escaped from Borallon Correctional Centre near Ipswich in September 1995 and survived for weeks in the bushland because of his military training before turning up at Cooroy a month later.
From there, he robbed the Yeppoon Commonwealth bank and evaded police before going to rob the Commonwealth Bank at Port Douglas and the Westpac at Airlie Beach – twice – over the next 18 months.
From the four robberies he amassed $230,000 which Judge Tracy Fantin remarked was a “significant amount of money, even by today’s standards”.
The court was told MacDonald spent weeks watching the Port Douglas bank.
On the morning of May 31, 1997, he made his move.
Armed with a sawn-off shotgun, he took a bank employee hostage, and passed a note and an empty bank envelope to other bank staff demanding that they go into the safe and retrieve a large amount of money or he would kill the hostage.
With $15,000 in hand, the court heard he took the man to a river, where he was forced to take a fisherman hostage before fleeing under the mistaken belief police cars were there to catch him.
They were actually there because there was an international VIP in Port Douglas.
Prosecutor Callum Wallis told the court MacDonald “showed signs of callous disregard for his offending” and “showed psychopathic traits”.
“In 1997 the defendant told police ‘I killed a man because I needed to’ – it was ‘cold-blooded’,” Mr Wallis said.
“There is no evidence before the court that he has changed his views of the world, there is nothing to say he is not an ongoing risk to the community.”
However, the self-represented Macdonald said he had a diagnosis of PTSD from serving two missions in Vietnam in 1968 and had come to feel empathy with those who he threatened with his gun during armed robberies, including the former Port Douglas teller, who was diagnosed with PTSD some 10 years after her ordeal.
In sentencing MacDonald Judge Fantin said he had extensive criminal history which began in 1978 – eight years after he returned from two stints in Vietnam.
“You joined the army in 1968. You instructed your barrister at that time that one of the things the army is very good at teaching you is that you do what you have to do and then you take the steps necessary to leave it behind you and you don’t worry about it,” she said.
“When asked about killing the man in Western Australia you said it was something that had to be done. ‘I had to do it. I said shut off, turn off my emotions, and I did.’ Perhaps as a result of your training you saw it in that way.”
She said she accepted that MacDonald had a severe post-traumatic stress disorder and “that disorder is not being adequately addressed in prison”.
Judge Fantin said that MacDonald was an old man with a number of health conditions, which meant there was little risk of him reoffending.
Judge Fantin sentenced the 74-year-old to 15 years prison, declaring 307 days in pre-sentence custody, leading her to fix a parole eligibility date for February 1, 2026.
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Originally published as Identify theft murderer Alexander Robert MacDonald learned to ‘shut off emotions’ in army
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