Codey Herrmann, Arthur Freeman: When Victoria’s worst criminals will be eligible for parole
Rapists, child murderers and sex offenders - they are some of Victoria’s most violent criminals. See when they are eligible for parole.
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From a father who threw his four-year-old daughter over the West Gate Bridge to a taxi driver and predator who raped his female passenger, this is when Victoria’s worst criminals will be eligible for parole.
Some could be freed this year, while others will remain behind bars for decades before their release.
Here are Victoria’s most violent criminals, and the dates of when they are eligible for parole.
Leonard Levett
Serial sex offender Leonard Levett, 50, will be eligible for parole in 2024 after he was sentenced to a minimum of nine-and-a-half years in 2014.
He almost got away with two terrifying attacks on young women in the 90s — until a teenager he preyed on provided the clue to his undoing.
Judge Barbara Cotterell said the “heartless disregard” he showed an 18-year-old schoolgirl and 21-year-old nursing graduate during ”random and violent rapes” in 1992 and 1996 did not accord with him being a loving and protective parent to his two children.
It was not until almost two decades later the North Dandenong truck driver was linked back to the cold case crimes, after being convicted of two counts of an indecent act with a child in 2010.
Robert Byrnes
Rapist taxi driver Robert Byrnes, 46, will be eligible for parole later this year after he sexually molested a passenger in October 2012, repeatedly groping the woman before she fled the taxi.
Less than an hour later he picked up another woman who had been out with friends celebrating a 21st birthday.
After again forcing himself on to his passenger, Byrnes placed his cap over the vehicle’s internal CCTV monitor, parked the cab and raped the woman.
John Lindrea
John Lindrea, 59, will be eligible for parole in 2030 after he was sentenced to jail for armed robbery over a hold-up he and an accomplice did in 2020.
Lindrea and an unknown accomplice cut a hole in the tin roof of the Westmeadows Tavern, north of Melbourne, to gain access about 3am on March 2 last year.
The pair, wearing balaclavas and armed with loaded sawn-off shotguns, then lay in wait for the tavern’s assistant manager to arrive.
When she entered about 4.45am, the gunmen pointed the weapons 15cm from her face and yelled, “Get on the ground”.
They then forced her to open three safes and two ATMs, stuffing more than $176,000 into a green canvas bag, before locking her in a cupboard.
His conviction added to his rap sheet.
In 1993, he was jailed for 25 years over the double murder of Kaelene McDonald and Andrew Johns, who he shot dead when asked to leave a house-warming party he had gatecrashed in Kinglake in 1992.
He has also been convicted over two bank hold-ups, and spent two months on the run after escaping the old Pentridge Prison.
Arthur Freeman
Arthur Freeman will be eligible for parole in 2043 after he threw his four-year-old daughter, Darcy, off the West Gate Bridge during peak-hour traffic in 2009.
He had been driving the little girl to her first day of school, murdering her during a custody battle with her mother.
Freeman was arrested the same day outside the Federal Court complex in Melbourne’s CBD and spent two years arguing he was not guilty by way of mental impairment.
The then 37-year-old was found guilty after a marathon five-day jury deliberation and sentenced to life imprisonment with a non-parole period of 32 years.
At the time, Supreme Court Justice Paul Coghlan said Freeman had shown no remorse in the two years since the “horrible act” that breached the basic trust between father and child.
“One of the unfortunate features of this case is that others blame themselves,” he said.
“You are responsible for it. And nobody else.”
Codey Herrmann
An evil killer who raped and bashed to death international student Aiia Maasarwe in an unprovoked attack could be free in 27 years.
Codey Herrmann, 21, was jailed in 2019 for 36 years, but will be eligible for parole after serving just 30.
Aiia Maasarwe, 21, had been at a comedy show with friends in the city, and was walking home after getting off the Route 86 tram near La Trobe University.
She called her sister Ruba in Israel after she got off a tram while she walked home, telling her “I didn’t expect you to answer”.
It would be the last words she would say to her sister.
Ruba then heard her sister screaming and saying “You piece of s---” in Arabic, before hearing four loud thuds.
Those noises were Codey Herrmann, 21, who pleaded guilty to the rape and murder of Aiia at Bundoora on January 16 2019.
Prosecutor Patrick Bourke told the court Herrmann hit Aiia over the head four times with a metal pole before dragging her body behind a hedge, where he raped her.
Mr Bourke said Herrmann then struck Aiia to the head a further nine times, fracturing her skull, before fleeing the scene.
Shibu Paul
A Silver Top taxi driver who raped his female passenger after picking the victim up from outside a Frankston pub will be eligible for parole in 2026.
Shibu Paul, 48, was sentenced in the County Court in July last year to a minimum five years and three months’ jail after he was found guilty of rape and four charges of sexual assault.
Paul violated his 23-year-old victim during the early hours in mid-June 2018.
The victim had been at a party before making her way to the Deck Hotel in Frankston.
Security denied the victim entry so she walked to get a kebab before an off-duty policeman found her on the ground.
The man shared his Silver Top taxi with her but left the victim in the cab alone when he was dropped off first.
Paul, who pounced shortly after dropping the cop off, covered the cab’s internal camera then sexually assaulted the victim who was asleep in the back seat.
Paul then drove the cab to Edithvale where he parked and sexually assaulted his victim again.
Abdul ‘Danny’ Jalloh
A Melbourne Latin dance night promoter who raped a woman after gifting his victim with drink cards at a Crown Club 23 event will be eligible for parole in early 2026.
Abdul “Danny” Jalloh, 39, was sentenced in the County Court in April 2022 to a minimum three years and nine months’ jail after he was found guilty of rape.
Jalloh met his victim then added her to a Facebook group where he shared flyers advertising the Latin dance nights that he organised at various Melbourne night clubs.
The victim attended a Latin dance event at Club 23 on where Jalloh was host in late-2017.
Jalloh and the victim walked along the Yarra River, before catching a taxi back to the woman’s Southbank apartment.
The victim recalled Jalloh was “getting handsy” shortly after arriving at the apartment.
“No, that’s not happening,” the victim said.
“This isn’t happening because you’re married.”
Jalloh then got naked and forced himself on the victim.
Justin Mathieson
A vile rapist who hunted and attacked women at Bayside beach walking tracks, leaving his victims scared and living in fear, will be eligible for parole in 2028.
Justin Mathieson, 32, was sentenced in the County Court to a minimum seven years and six months’ jail after pleading guilty to four charges of rape, and indecent assault.
Mathieson raped multiple women in separate attacks which took place at the Bay Trail and near Elwood Canal in February and October 2012.
The court heard Mathieson threatened a victim with a pair of scissors, telling her he was “really horny” and “just wanted sex.”
The vile fiend told his other victim: “Look in my eyes, I’m not going to hurt you, I just want sex.”
Hayden Cox
A drug dealer who used unsuspecting mules-for-hire to deliver more than 15kg of illicit substances will be eligible for parole in 2029.
Hayden Cox, 34, was sentenced at the County Court in April 2022 for a drug importation scheme a judge described as requiring a “degree of planning and premeditation”.
Cox ordered packages containing between 500g and 9.3kg of party drugs including MDMA and ketamine delivered from Europe to rented mailboxes and lockers across Melbourne.
He then hired couriers from Airtasker — a popular online service that allows people to outsource everyday tasks — to collect the packages and deliver them to residential addresses.
The mailboxes and Airtasker account were opened using lost IDs — including a driver’s licence found near the St Kilda bar Cox operated — with the drug-dealer and his girlfriend at times pretending to be the individuals or family members of the stolen identities.
Cox was sentenced to 12 years behind bars with a non-parole period of seven years.
Obiyo Nwigwe
Former Bendigo and Ballarat doctor Obiyo Chigozie Nwigwe was jailed for six years and six months in July last year after raping a 13-year-old girl three times in 2020, but will be eligible for parole in October 2025.
At the time he was working as a trauma specialist at Bendigo Hospital and his wife was away in England completing her studies.
The 44-year-old initially told police the complaint was “all lies” and “part of an attempt to defame me”, but it later emerged he had confessed his crimes to a Ballarat pastor.
A police search of Nwigwe’s phone uncovered more than 1000 text messages between him and the victim, including one Nwigwe sent of himself stark naked.
Judge David Sexton said Nwigwe’s crimes had devastated virtually every aspect of his victim’s life, and had destroyed the teenage girl’s family.
“(As a doctor) you must surely have known of the likely impact of your sexual offending on your … victim,” Judge Sexton said.
“You betrayed their trust spectacularly.”
He was jailed for a minimum term of four years and three months, but police have recently launched an appeal arguing the sentence was too soft.
Rodney Eric Hampton
Bendigo man Rodney Hampton was jailed for 11 years in December last year for raping a 20-year-old girl and a 16-year-old girl but will be eligible for parole in 2029.
The 58-year-old was arrested at his Strathdale home in November 2020 after a DNA sample taken from him two years earlier was matched to the “horrific” crimes.
Hampton was jailed for 11 years in December by Judge Mark Dean who described the offending as “every parent’s worst nightmare”.
The court heard he had raped a 20-year-old girl walking home from a night out and a 16-year-old girl just two months later in the 1980s.
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