Snowtown serial killings accomplice Mark Ray Haydon has not been released, Parole Board slams TV media ‘misinformation’

There’s been a stern response after a media outlet incorrectly reported that the criminal who covered up Australia’s worst-ever serial killing spree was “a free man”.

Mark Ray Haydon, right, with John Justin Bunting, centre, and Robert Joe Wagner, left, following their arrest. Picture: Michael Milnes

Serial killings accomplice Mark Ray Haydon has not been released to live in the community – and the head of the Parole Board has slammed a media outlet for its “irresponsible misinformation”.
But Nine’s news director says he stands by his station’s story.

Late on Wednesday, Nine News claimed Haydon had been freed from the Adelaide Pre-Release Centre in “a low-profile, secretive operation”.

The report was broadcast after Haydon’s scheduled Supreme Court appearance on Wednesday was postponed until next month, and was picked up and repeated on ABC News.

Haydon’s 25-year prison term ends next month. Picture: Michael Milnes

Parole Board chair Frances Nelson KC told The Advertiser that Nine’s report was incorrect.

“Haydon has not been released to an address in the community, and I take exception to members of the media who publish misinformation,” she said.

“It’s irresponsible, it’s unfair to the victims.”

“I have spoken to members of the media who have contacted me (about this) so I cannot understand where this misinformation has come from.”

Haydon’s 25-year prison term, for covering up the infamous murder spree, ends on May 21 – he is on parole, and living in the Adelaide Pre-release centre, until that date.

In response, the government has both rewritten state law and sought to have Haydon declared liable to an extended supervision order, claiming he remains a danger to the public.

Such supervision would see Haydon – whom artists are not permitted to sketch, by order of the court – subject to parole-like conditions even after his sentence expires.

On Wednesday, Ms Nelson said Haydon continued to live in the Pre-release centre, to which he must return each night to obey his curfew.

She said he was transferred to that centre at the expiration of the 60-day period in which the government can seek a review of the decisions of the Parole Board.

Ms Nelson said the lack of a challenge to the Board’s decision had “maximised the period that Haydon can be supervised” ahead of the expiration of his sentence.

Nine’s news director, Jeremy Pudney, said he stood by the broadcast and its content.

He said Nine’s journalists had been issued a statement by the Parole Board saying Haydon “has been released onto parole”.

“Before today, the South Australian public did not know Mark Haydon had officially been granted parole,” he said.

“(They) certainly didn’t know he was being given his freedom during the day … they do now as a result of the questions asked by Nine News.”

Both Haydon’s release on parole to the Pre-release Centre, and his ability to go out in the community on day leave, were announced by the Board in February.