Justice finally catches up to Kylie Maybury’s killer
SEEING the body of raped and murdered Kylie Maybury lying in a gutter was a tear-inducing and heart wrenching moment I will never forget, writes Keith Moor.
Law & Order
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SEEING the body of raped and murdered Kylie Maybury lying in a gutter was a tear-inducing and heart wrenching moment I will never forget.
Seeing the sick pervert who did it to her pleading guilty in court today — 32 years after he abducted and attacked the six-year-old — is something that will also stay with me forever.
DNA would have been the last thing on paedophile Gregory Keith Davies’ mind as he was raping Kylie in 1984.
The first time DNA evidence was used in a criminal case in Victoria wasn’t until five years later.
More: DNA swab solves Maybury murder
Keith Moor provides insight into hunt for Kylie’s killer
This meant that, fortunately, DNA wasn’t on the radar of sexual predators like Davies at the time Kylie was murdered.
Davies certainly knows about DNA now — because that’s what got him.
Semen he left behind in 1984 was tested in 1995 — by which time DNA technology had advanced sufficiently for scientists to be able to use it as a crime solving tool — and DNA extracted from it was stored on the Victoria Police DNA database.
But it wasn’t until 2016 — after a tip off to police that Davies might be the killer — that homicide squad detectives got a voluntary DNA sample from Davies.
It proved to be a match with the DNA the killer left behind in 1984 and Davies was charged with murdering and raping Kylie.
Seeing Davies plead guilty in court today brought back sad memories of seeing Kylie’s body at the crime scene back in November 1984.
The beautiful six-year-old appeared to be sleeping.
She was lying on her left side, seemingly uninjured.
Her left arm was tucked under her body and her right arm had flopped, like a rag doll, over the gutter and was resting on the footpath.
Kylie’s mother Julie and I have shed tears over it many times since.
We share the same birthday, May 27, and often talked about the case when we made contact on our birthdays over the years.
We had both all but given up hope of the case ever being solved.
That it now has been is thanks to the wonders of DNA technology and the tenacity of the homicide squad detectives who never gave up on solving the murder.
Little did I know that the message I wrote in Julie’s birthday card this year would come true so quickly.
“Getting justice for Kylie would be the best birthday present ever,” it said.
She opened it and read it just minutes before she entered court today.
She listened less than 30 minutes later as Davies admitted he was the sicko who robbed Kylie of her innocence and her life.
That’s a wonderful birthday present neither Julie or I will forget any time soon.