What went on inside Parramatta Gaol

It may have shut a decade ago but paranormal activity and torture remains trapped inside the imposing sandstone walls of Parramatta Gaol.

It may have shut a decade ago, but paranormal activity and torture remains trapped inside the imposing sandstone walls of Parramatta Gaol, where some of Australia’s most notorious criminals served time.

Parramatta District and Historical Society’s Judith Dunn used to run tours of the 1842-built prison, and recounted how one of her guests saw a feline fade through a shut door about 15 years ago.

In 2018, the Parramatta Advertiser obtained audio from the Australian Paranormal Phenomenon Investigators during a tour that captured an invisible woman whispering “scared” as members of the public explored the jail where murderers and rapists were once locked up.

It’s believed the voice could have been the spirit of a female prisoner when women occupied the jail briefly.

Site Officer Peter Brown inspects the upper levels of Wing 6 for anything out of place at the Old Parramatta Gaol in North Parramatta. Picture: Angelo Velardo

Deerubbin Aboriginal Land Council, which has managed the O’Connell St site since 2017, has witnessed more than its share of supernatural activity.

Last year, Deerubbin CEO Stephen Wright said he could recount at least six experiences for which there was no logical explanation.

Paranormal activity has been recorded at the jail. Picture: Angelo Velardo

“We’ve had persistent (paranormal activity) where every time a couple of us would walk into the bottom of Wing 6, a certain door on the third floor would always bang,” he said.

Paranormal Entertainment’s Peta Banks, who runs ghost tours at the jail, can relate to his experience.

Peta Banks in the foreboding Wing 6. Picture: David Swift

Parramatta Gaol in the 1970s.

“These are massive steel doors at Wing 6,’’ she said last year. “They wouldn’t budge in a cyclone.”

“There has also been the sound of footsteps in the walkway at that cell block. This is now a common phenomenon that happens on our tours there.”

Mrs Dunn retells a story when a tower guard cast his eyes down to a cell and saw a man escaping his cell through a window.

A Deerubbin employee in a creepy cell of the lower level. Picture: Angelo Velardo

Raising the alarm, his co-workers raced to his bed to thwart the exit. But they found him dead inside the cell. He had just been murdered.

Surely the hauntings are the work of restless souls, including those who were murdered at the vast jail.

“It’s just really historical to me, except when you go inside and then you get oppressive feelings,’’ Mrs Dunn said.

“I think the trauma does imprint itself and there certainly was a lot of trauma. There were bashings, there were murders, you probably start thinking about these things when you’re in the cell area.”

One of the most infamous ghosts is believed to be Leonard Keith Lawson who died in 2003 after being imprisoned at several jails for nearly 50 years for committing multiple rapes and murder.

Neddy Smith — a murderer, heroin dealer and armed robber in the 1970s and 1980s — was locked up at Parramatta for homicides he denied committing in 1983 and 1987.

In 1974, Smith was a medical orderly and saved prison officer Willy Faber’s life after inmate Ray Denning bashed him while he tried to escape.

Ivan Milat, who was locked up at Goulburn Supermax jail for killing seven backpackers and dumping their bodies at Belanglo State Forest, also spent time at Parramatta.

Ivan Milat killed seven backpackers. Picture: Supplied.

He died of throat cancer at Long Bail jail in October last year.

Anita Cobby’s killers — John Travers, Michael Murdoch and Murphy brothers Leslie, Gary and Michael, who died in Long Bay prison last year — were sentenced to Parramatta Gaol after they abducted the nurse from Blacktown, took her to a paddock at Prospect, raped her, cut her throat and left her to die.

Anita Cobby, 26, was raped and murdered in February 1986.

Sydney’s first gangster John “Chow” Hayes and Darcy Dugan, dubbed Australia’s most notorious prison escape artist, were also inmates.

Dugan pulled off multiple escapes from custody including Long Bay jail in 1950 when he clambered up a bathroom roof and over prison walls to break free for 10 days of freedom.

Dugan, who died in 1991 aged 70, was transferred to Parramatta in 1956.

He saw the jail as a fresh challenge and after an unsuccessful jail break in 1958 he returned to Grafton before eventually returning to Parramatta in 1960.

Perhaps not so well known, another inmate in the ‘80s didn’t have the skills to relish fleeting freedom.

He had started digging a tunnel behind the toilet in his cell. The problem is, he let his mum know about the plan during a monitored phone call, giving prison officers easy intel to foil the escape.

Parramatta jail was built in 1798 and staged public executions and lashings at the site that is now Prince Alfred Park but was constructed at its existing site in North Parramatta in 1842.

Mrs Dunn said life on the inside meant meals were meagre and conditions harsh.

A guard keeps watch of the jail in the 1970s.

“Imagine being in a stone jail in June or July with one blanket,’’ she said.

“It was a primitive place and it was built in a depression, and they were told to build the jail watching every penny and that’s why it doesn’t have a beautiful entrance like Goulburn or Berrima or Bathurst.”

It closed in 1997 for 18 months before finally closing in 2011.

Fast forward almost 200 years and there are plans to use the jail as a cultural and education hub.

Like much of Parramatta, it is surrounded by development and construction of the light rail, while film crews take advantage of its theatrical setting.

On Guard – an eight-part podcast – uncovers what really goes on behind bars as former correctional officers share shocking secrets from the frontline of working with some of Australia’s most infamous criminals. Listen below.