Lamb murders and other horrific Gympie crimes
The Gympie region is deservedly known for its picturesque views, idyllic lifestyle opportunities and unique community spirit. But that same community has been forced to collectively endure some monstrous crimes throughout its rich history, often committed by some equally monstrous people.
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The Gympie region is deservedly known for its picturesque views, idyllic lifestyle opportunities and unique community spirit.
But that same community has been forced to collectively endure some monstrous crimes throughout its rich history, often committed by some equally monstrous people.
From the haunting Lamb family murders almost 40 years ago to the discovery of a dismembered torso at Cedar Pocket, here are some of the region’s most notorious names from over the years
1. Derek Bellington Sam – Kenilworth killer
Derek Bellington Sam was sentenced to 15 years in prison in August 2001 for the murder of 16-year-old Jessica Gaudie.
Sam is also linked to the suspicious deaths of British backpacker Celena Bridge and teacher aide Sabrina Glassop.
The three women disappeared between July 1998 and August 1999 and have never been found.
The 28-year-old Ms Bridge was the first to disappear after she set off for a hike to the Little Yabba Creek camping ground at Kenilworth on July 16, 1998.
Teacher aide Ms Glassop, 47, vanished after last being seen by her mother at her Kenilworth district home on May 29, 1999.
As of January this year Sam remains uncooperative with police, as investigators continue their attempts to find the body of the teenage girl he murdered.
2. Lindy Williams – Grisly discovery at Cedar Pocket
Five years after George Gerbic‘s headless and dismembered torso was discovered at Cedar Pocket in September 2013, his former partner Lindy Yvonne Williams was sentenced to life in prison for his murder.
Williams was charged with murdering Mr Gerbic, 66, following a 10-month police investigation, which included an extensive search of the dead man’s Sunshine Coast property.
Williams, 60 at the time of the trial, was sentenced to life in jail for murder and two years for interfering with a corpse, the maximum penalty allowed for that offence, in the Brisbane Supreme Court on July 27.
Jurors reached their verdict after a two-week trial.
3. Harold Ivan James – Murder-suicide at Amamoor
They were horrible murders which would leave a permanent stain in the Gympie region history books.
A well-known and well-loved Amamoor family, torn apart with two bullets fired from a hateful and vengeful hand.
“Double Murder and Suicide near Gympie” screamed from The Courier-Mail‘s front page on July 18, 1934 after 25-year-old Harold Ivan James shot and killed his alleged 17-year-old lover Phyllis Busby and her mother Olive – before turning the gun on himself at the Busbys’ Amamoor home the previous afternoon.
“A woman and her daughter were shot dead, and their assailant committed suicide at Amamoor, 12 miles from Gympie, this afternoon,” the report opened.
“(Neighbours) were horrified to find Mrs Busby unconscious in the yard, with a bullet wound in the left temple,” it continued.
“She died a few minutes after the two men arrived.
“On the floor of the combined kitchen-dining room they found the bodies of Phyllis Busby and James lying side-by-side, each with a bullet wound in the forehead.”
James had been “keeping company” with Phyllis for two years previously, until the Busby parents ”forbade him to associate with their daughter”.
4. Peter Lamb – Satanic “cleanse” killings at Wolvi
On February 21, 1977, detectives and a Brisbane Homicide Squad arrived at a rundown farm house at Wolvi to discover one of the worst crimes scenes ever described.
The bodies of three children Thomas Lamb, 17, Lorrie Lamb, 12, and Brenda Lamb, 3, were found in a run down farmhouse, each of them murdered by their parents Peter and Irene Lamb in a satanic “cleanse” killing.
Visitor New Zealander Lynette Gail Oakley, also known as Toni Olivia Lavetti, 26, was found on the property with gunshot wounds and severe head injuries.
Upon being found wandering down a dirt road by police responding to the call, Peter Lamb said he was “walking to the Lord” and took them back to the farmhouse.
Lamb believed he could save the world from evil and satanic forces, and convinced his wife that their children and the visitor were possessed by the devil.
Peter Lamb confessed to the crimes and was charged with four counts of murder. He was placed in remand in the psychiatric section of Wacol Prison, where he committed suicide.
Irene wandered for about a week in bushland between the horror house and Boreen Point. A Supreme Court jury later found her not guilty on the grounds of unsound mind at the time of the murders.
She spent years in a mental institution before being released into outside care.
Homicide detective Keith Smith and Gympie ambulance officer Ron Lawrence, who both saw the horrible scene, later spoke of how the murders had deeply affected them.
5. Paul Wilson – Helltown author
Criminologist Paul Wilson branded Gympie with its unwanted “Helltown” tag in 1997, and was later jailed for child sex abuse in late 2016.
A jury found Wilson, 75, guilty of four counts of indecent treatment of a child in the Brisbane District Court in November 2016.
The court heard the girl was aged between eight and 11 and Wilson in his mid-30s when the offending occurred in the 1970s.
Judge Julie Dick sentenced Wilson to 18 months prison suspended after six months.
In 2018, a Gympie Regional Council staff report on the region‘s tourism future found Wilson’s “Helltown” article, published in Australian Penthouse in 1997, was still damaging the local tourism reputation.
6. Stephen John Armitage, Matthew Leslie Armitage and William Francis Dean – Toolara esky death
The trio who subjected their victim Shaun Barker to brutal acts of violence, locked him in an esky and gave him drug-laced water until his death had their murder convictions quashed and downgraded to manslaughter last year.
In April 2014, four months after he was reported missing, the charred and scattered remains of Mr Barker‘s body were found in the Toolara Forestry near Cooloola Cove and Tin Can Bay.
Charged with murder and torture, Stephen John Armitage, his son Matthew Leslie Armitage, and William Francis Dean were found guilty in 2017 and jailed for life.
Courts later heard Mr Barker was bludgeoned, had a finger broken and possibly cut off, had honey dripped on his genitals to attract ants, and was kept in an esky before his death.
In 2019, all three men were successful in their appeals and had their murder charges downgraded to manslaughter, and the torture charges dropped.
Evidence pointed to it being in the best interests of the men to have kept Mr Barker alive, as they wanted information from him.
Early this year, Stephen Armitage and Dean were re-sentenced to 10 years in prison, and Matthew Armitage was sentenced to eight.
7. Russell Crump – wife killer
In 2003, Russell Stewart Henry Crump was convicted of murdering his de facto wife Erica Tomkinson, whose “mutilated corpse” had been found near Gympie the year before.
Ms Tomkinson‘s body was located in an isolated lagoon, at the end of a dirt track in the Toolara Forest in February 2002.
In 2018, a Justice Department spokesperson confirmed Crump had been released on parole sometime that year, but because of security reasons they could not release further information.
8. “Billy” Fox – Glenwood shooter
One of Queensland‘s most notorious killers, William ’Billy’ Kelvin Fox was jailed in 1998 for murdering his ex-wife, Patricia Atkinson, and attempting to murder his son, his son’s girlfriend and his neighbour near Gympie in 1996.
He was also jailed for the 1992 attempted murder of Basia Hellwich, whom he shot three times while she was holding her two-year-old son.
Last June it was revealed Fox had been granted parole and was to be released into the Caboolture community.
However, his parole was revoked just days before his scheduled release following a campaign by Ms Hellwich who appealed to the board at the last minute.
9. Allen James Murray – Killer cleaner
A cleaner who beat his employee to death while on the job “found God” while serving time for manslaughter.
Graeme Hughes‘ body was found “slumped” in a bathtub in a Goomboorian house he had been cleaning with his boss on May 22, 2009.
The back of Hughes‘ skull was severely caved in, and was a “spiderweb of fractures.”
Murray was sentenced to nine years in prison for the manslaughter, but was released by 2017.
10. Philip Tonal Scott – left his son-in-law for dead
In 2008 well-loved family man Peter Brady was shot dead on a suburban street, leaving the Rainbow Beach community reeling.
The 39-year-old had been shot twice and left for dead by his then 75-year-old father-in-law, Philip Tonal Scott, a retired Gympie funeral director.
Scott was arrested at his Pie Creek home in the early hours of the next morning, and eventually charged with murder.
After a jury took three days to find him guilty in 2010, and Scott was sentenced to life in jail. An appeal to overturn the conviction the next year was dismissed by the Supreme Court of Appeal.
11. Barrie Watts and Valmae Beck – the murder of Sian Kingi
Barrie Watts brutally raped and murdered 12-year-old schoolgirl Sian Kingi in the Tinbeerwah Forest, and now he is making a bid for freedom.
Watts and his then wife Valmae Beck were convicted and given life sentences over the horrific killing of Sian Kingi, who was minutes from her Noosa home when they snatched her in 1987.
Beck, a 44-year-old mother of six at the time she committed the crime, died in a north Queensland hospital in May 2008, aged 64.
Watts, who was 34 when he killed Sian and is now approaching his 70s, has made a bid for freedom, the Parole Board of Queensland has confirmed.
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