Gold Coast crime: Glitter Strip’s worst inmates, how they ended up behind bars
The Glitter Strip is home to some of the worst inmates and has been the backdrop for truly shocking crimes. WORST INMATES REVEALED >>>
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THE Gold Coast is famous for its pristine beaches, buzzing night-life and relaxed vibe.
But the Glitter Strip is also home to some of the worst inmates and has been the backdrop for some truly shocking crimes.
These are the Coast’s worst inmates and the vile crimes they committed.
Robin Reid
Along with his accomplice Paul Luckman, Robin Reid was sentenced to life in prison after torturing and stabbing a Marsden boy to death in front of his mate.
The “bizarre” murder of the boy later revealed to be Peter Aston was reported to Beenleigh police at 2am the previous morning after the surviving boy was released by his captors.
Peter Aston’s body was found buried in a shallow, sandy grave on a lonely beach south of Kingscliff.
Terry Ryan told police he and his friend had been abducted by two men in a four-wheel drive and driven to Kingscliff on May 4, 1982.
Police said Terry witnessed the torture and killing of Aston.
The boys had been abducted while Aston was attempting to hitchhike to his hometown of Melbourne.
Terry had agreed to keep him company as far south as the Gold Coast before going home.
Reid and Luckman, both serving army personnel, were arrested and charged before appearing in Tweed Heads Court.
However, death threats against the men led the case to be moved to Sydney where both were found guilty and sentenced to life imprisonment.
Luckman later came out as being transgender, became known as Nicole Louise Pearce and was released from prison in 1999.
Reid remains imprisoned.
Rodney John Dale
Dubbed ‘The Satanic Slayer’, a Gold Coast man thought he would achieve immortality by shooting people and following Satan.
On April 7, 1990, Rodney John Dale walked out onto his Burleigh balcony and began firing at people on the street and into a nearby caravan park. He hit one person.
He then left his Tweed Street unit and wandered down to the street, before opening fire on a woman who had gone onto her balcony to see what was going on, narrowly missing her, showering her in chunks of concrete, her unit peppered with bullets.
He walked down Tweed St, then onto the Gold Coast Highway, shooting both guns indiscriminately and taking off his balaclava. Witnesses described him laughing like a maniac.
He was heard yelling “children of Satan” and “we’ll win, we’ll win”.
During the chaotic 15 minutes elderly couple Kathleen and Llewellyn Lewis were going for a drive to have a drink when their car had bullets rain down on them. Both were hit.
Mrs Lewis died at the age of 77. Her husband survived.
A wedding party’s limousine was also riddled with bullets. The driver Raymond Davis, 61, was shot in the arm and hand. Bridesmaid Mandy Winter, 21, was shot in the leg.
Betty Brodby, 66 was shot in the thigh, John Bristow, 27, Jessie Nowlan, 72, and Thelma Harber 75, were also wounded in the chaos.
In July 1991, Dale pleaded guilty to murdering Kathleen Lewis and the attempted murder of 13 other people in Brisbane’s Supreme Court.
Justice Ambrose sentenced Dale to life in prison on each of the 14 counts.
Rodney Dale is still behind bars, currently serving time at the Borallon Training and Correctional Centre in Ipswich.
Lionel Patea
Double murderer Lionel Patea bludgeoned Gold Coast woman Tara Brown to death with a fire hydrant cover after running her off the road on September 8, 2015.
He was sentenced to life in jail.
Triple-0 operators were forced to listen on as Ms Brown was beaten to death in Molendinar while she was trapped in the wreckage of her mangled car.
Before her death, Ms Brown was screaming for help as she was chased and rammed by a black Jeep being driven by Patea.
Bikie Patea pleaded guilty to the murder of Ms Brown, 24, and later admitted to being part of a group which beat pool builder Greg Duffy to death in the Gold Coast Hinterland.
When he was being sentenced for the brutal murder of Ms Brown, Patea, who converted to Islam, asked to be “ultimately judged by God”.
Patea will not be released from prison before May 29, 2048.
Robert John Fardon
After leaving home at age 14 following a violent confrontation with his father, Robert John Fardon fell in with bikies on the Gold Coast and became an enforcer.
He would later run drugs and guns around Australia.
Considered one of Queensland’s worst sex offenders, Fardon was sentenced to 14 years in jail in the 1980s for the violent rape of a woman.
Just a month after being released from jail, he committed another rape.
Among his shocking crimes was the rape of 12-year-old girl in 1978.
After spending decades in jail, he was released into supervised accommodation in 2013.
Shane Sebastian Davis
A convicted car thief, Shane Sebastian Davis killed South African tourist Michelle Cohn by stomping on her neck.
Michelle was a quiet, reserved girl who had spent Boxing Day 1990 alone at the family’s Oak Lodge apartment at Surfers Paradise and was murdered while the family was away.
Davis had deliberately stomped on her neck and chest, causing deep bruising and for her to stop breathing.
Davis, who lived in a Burleigh caravan park, pleaded not guilty to the murder on December 26, 1990.
However, a Supreme Court jury took just over three hours to find Davis guilty of murder. Aged 20 at the time, he was sentenced to a mandatory life sentence.
Landmark retesting of DNA evidence 20 years later confirmed Davis’ guilt.
Ronald Henry Thomas
One of the men involved in the murder of SP bookie Peter George Wade, 50, and his de facto Maureen Ambrose, 53, in their Gold Coast unit in December 1991 lost his false teeth and left a bloody trail of broken dentures.
Police said one of the assassins lost part of a lower bridge dental plate and some natural teeth in a fierce struggle with Mr Wade.
Ronald Henry Thomas, 43, was found guilty of the callous shooting.
During the forensic examination of the Surfers Paradise murders, palm and fingerprints belonging to Thomas were found.
Thomas was charged with the double murder, convicted in 1992 and given two life sentences.
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