Northern beaches: The terrible crimes that shook the peninsula to its core
The northern beaches has been haunted by heinous crimes and chilling cold blooded killings that have been seared into the region’s collective memory. READ ABOUT THESE SHOCKING CASES.
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The Manly Daily revisits eight of notorious crimes as a reminder that beneath the shimmering
surface of our beautiful community, a dark heart can sometimes beat.
THE SUSPECTED MURDER OF TRUDIE ADAMS:
Avalon business college student Trudie Adams was presumed murdered soon after being abducted outside the Newport Surf Life Saving Club early on June 25, 1978 while hitchhiking home from a dance.
Investigators said Ms Adams’ disappearance was linked to 14 known rapes and attempted abductions between Mona Vale and Palm Beach in the 1970s.
A 2011 inquest into the 18-year-old’s disappearance heard she was last seen getting into a Holden panel van on Barrenjoey Rd. Police suggested career criminal Neville Tween — also known as John Anderson — and three other men were suspects in the young woman’s disappearance as well as the series of sex crimes.
Tween, who died in jail in 2013 while serving time for drug importation, denied the accusation and was never charged.
Deputy Coroner Scott Mitchell found her death was caused by a criminal act or misadventure by persons unknown, but declined to recommend any charges be laid.
SERIAL KILLER RICHARD LEONARD AND GIRLFRIEND DENISE SHIPLEY:
The northern beaches was on high alert after this bizarre reign of terror.
On August 2, 1994, Leonard killed Stephen Dempsey, 34, with an arrow fired from a compound bow at Deep Creek Reserve, on the western edge of Narrabeen Lagoon.
He then weighed Mr Dempsey down in the creek before returning that night to dismember the body.
Leonard, 21, then took the body parts to a flat in Warriewood and put them in his freezer.
On November 17, 1994 Leonard, who was into “black magic”and his girlfriend Shipley, took LSD before hailing a taxi to take them from Sydney to Collaroy Plateau, where driver Ezzedine Bahmad was stabbed to death in his cab by Leonard. The driver suffered more than 30 stab wounds.
In December that year Leonard and Shipley disposed of Mr Dempsey’s remains in Pittwater, wrapped in wire. It was discovered on December 21.
Leonard was sentenced to jail for the term of his natural life. Shipley was jailed for eight years for being an accessory after the fact for both murders.
DEE WHY ARMOURED VAN HEIST SHOOTOUT DEATH:
A would be armed robber was shot and killed on Pittwater Rd after trying to hold up a Brinks armoured car outside the Dee Why RSL Club on July 26, 2010.
Dramatic CCTV footage seized by police showed the moment Nathan Brodbeck, who was a former employee of Brinks, being confronted by a security guard.
Brodbeck, 32, a former leading seaman with the RAN, was shot dead as he brandished a pistol and demanded $750,000 from the Brinks cash security truck.
GEORGIA CHANT:
The death of 15-year-old Barrenjoey High School student Georgia Chant from a heroin overdose in a small flat in Narrabeen shocked the peninsula.
Her 26-year-old boyfriend, a heroin addict for seven years, admitted to police that he injected the teenager with the fatal dose on October 9, 2005, which also contained the prescription drug Oxazepam.
The boyfriend was jailed for 20 months for supplying the fatal dose of heroin which killed Georgia.
At the January 2007 inquest into Georgia’s death, a videotaped police interview with the boyfriend was played. In it, he admitted injecting heroin into Georgia’s arm because she did not know how to do it herself “properly”.
CURL CURL STALKER MURDER:
A decision by Rachelle Yeo to end an affair with work colleague Paul Mulvihill ended with her being stabbed to death with a large kitchen knife in her North Curl Curl flat.
Mulvihill, 46, who was married with three kids, could not handle being rejected by his workmate at a pharmaceutical company. For months he stalked and harassed the 31-year-old Ms Yeo, with constant phone calls and emails, to the point that she had to be escorted to her car after work.
Her friends told Mulvihill’s murder trial that he threatened to “take her down” and demanded to know her new address.
Late on July 16, 2012, he got into her flat apartment and stabbed her in the neck and chest.
Her neighbours called triple-0 after hearing a woman screaming “oh my god, oh my god” and yelling for someone to call the police.
Mulvihill pleaded not guilty on the basis of self-defence, but a jury took less than two hours to convict him of murder.
MILLIONAIRE WIFE KILLER ANDREW KALAJZICH:
Multi-millionaire owner of the Manly Pacific Hotel, Andrew Kalajzich, had a seemingly solid marriage with wife Megan.
But that all changed in January 1986 when she was murdered in the marital bed at their Fairlight home, shot twice through the head by a hired hitman.
Kalajzich told police he was also shot at by a robber that had broken into their home. He said he managed to roll off the bed a split second before two bullets tore into his pillow.
His lie was revealed when the hitman, Bill Vandenberg, confessed to the contract killing, for which Kalajzich paid him $20,000.
In 1988, Kalajzich was found guilty of murder and conspiracy to murder and was sentenced to 25 years non parole. Kalajzich, who has maintained his innocence, was released in 2012.
FAMILY GAS MASS MURDER/SUICIDE
In October 2016, Fernando Manrique, a Columbian-born engineer, gassed himself, his children — Elisa, 11 and 10-year-old Martin — his wife Maria Lutz and the family dog Tequila at a home in Sir Thomas Mitchell Dr, Davidson.
He built an elaborate network of pipes above the ceiling and bought two large bottles of carbon monoxide before pumping the odourless gas through ceiling fans as the family slept.
Police broke into the home after a worried neighbour raised the alarm when Ms Lutz did not turn up at her children’s school for canteen duty.
Both children were autistic and the family was reportedly struggling.
There were no notes left at the scene.
BELROSE HOUSE DESTROYED BY FAMILY COURT BOMBER
The attack on Justice Richard Gee’s Belrose home in 1984 was part of a series of bombings and murders directed at the Family Court between 1980 and 1985, targeting judges, a lawyer, their families and members of the community.
Leonard John Warwick, 73, has been convicted and sentenced to life in jail on more than 30 charges including three murders.
Early on March 6, 1984, a Justice Gee’s home in Neridah St was destroyed at 1.45am by a massive gelignite bomb placed under the front veranda.
Justice Gee suffered minor injuries and his son Steven and daughter Alison escaped virtually unharmed from the blast, which scattered debris over a 200m radius.
Sadly, Justice Gee drowned in his swimming pool in January 2017, at the rebuilt home. He was 83.