Deadly nightclub fire lit on purpose for insurance scam: rumour

Two men were convicted for deadly nightclub fire that claimed 15 people’s lives in Brisbane’s Fortitude Valley in 1973. DETAILS

A woman says she was “seriously threatened” to keep quiet after being told a rumour that the manager of the Whiskey Au Go Go had set the deadly nightclub fire himself as part of an insurance job gone wrong.

Vivienne Spooner today told an inquest into the fire that the day after the arson attack in March 1973, she and her then boyfriend were at the Caltex service station he managed across the road from the club.

She said a man named George Freeleagus, who also worked at the service station, told her partner Julian Burley he knew who lit the fire and why.

The Whiskey Au Go Go nightclub the morning after the blaze

“And he said that John Bell had lit the fire and it was for insurance,” Ms Spooner told the court.

“And it had gone wrong, it wasn’t supposed to be like that, it was supposed to be a small fire, that’s all I knew.”

John Bell was the manager of the popular nightclub at the time of the blaze which claimed 15 lives.

Ms Spooner said Mr Freeleagus told her he had been inside the nightclub when the fire started.

“He said John had run through the nightclub at high speed and he’d seen him and then they realised there was a fire, there was smoke and it was coming in and they needed to get out,” she said.

The interior of the Whiskey Au Go Go after the fire

She gave evidence that in the days after the nightclub firebombing, Brian Little, one of two brothers who owned the club, was waiting outside the apartment she shared with Mr Burley when they arrived home.

Ms Spooner said Mr Little beckoned Mr Burley over to his car and they had a conversation she could not hear.

When Mr Burley returned, Ms Spooner said she asked what the club owner wanted.

“He was pretty quiet,” she said.

“He said well basically we’re to shut our traps about what happened, about what we were told.

“And it wouldn’t be good for us if we spoke about it to anybody.”

The Whiskey Au Go Go nightclub after the blaze

Ms Spooner said she understood that to mean the information they were told by Mr Freeleagus.

Ms Spooner was asked whether she ever went to police regarding the allegations or the threat.

“Well no because we were threatened, I mean seriously threatened,” she said.

John Andrew Stuart and James Finch were charged with the arson and murder arising from the nightclub fire and they were later convicted at trial.

The inquest is seeking to identify whether anyone other than Finch and Stuart played a role in the attack and will assess the adequacy of the investigations into the inferno.