Ricky Balcombe murder reward: Suspect Karl Hague breaks silence
THE prime suspect in the cold case murder of a teenager in the Geelong CBD has opened up about his 22 years in the frame as a new probe seeks to solve the killing.
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THE prime suspect in the murder of teenager Ricky Balcombe has opened up about his 22 years in the frame as a new cold case probe seeks to finally solve the Geelong CBD killing.
Prime suspect Karl Hague claims he has nothing to hide and defiantly encouraged authorities to “bring on” any future investigations.
“Bring it on because I didn’t do it. I won’t run,” he said this week.
Hague, a former jailbird who says he is now a reformed law-abiding citizen, claims he has been unlucky and was the victim of a tunnel-visioned investigation and police conspiracy.
He said the real killer remained out there and may have been involved in a fight a week prior to the murder.
Ricky Balcombe, just 16, brutally stabbed to death at the entrance to Market Square on May 5, 1995.
Police charged Hague with Ricky’s murder in 1996, but the case against him was abandoned a week before his 1998 Supreme Court trial after one witness hung himself, another overdosed and a third had a mental breakdown.
The police case focused on a fight in a car park near the central Geelong pool hall (today the Westfield precinct) that took place about a fortnight before Ricky’s murder. The fight between Hague and Ricky and their friends led to a brawl between the two groups later the same night. Breaking his silence on details of the case Hague, now a Bell Post Hill father of two, said he didn’t even know Ricky was part of the rival group.
“That night we were just sitting there drinking,” Hague said. “Some of the guys at the phone box near Coles ... something was said, and a couple of people I was with ran over and a fight started so we ran over. It only lasted a couple of seconds. There was only two of them. We didn’t know who they were.
“About midnight I turned around and about 40 people were coming towards us with chains and bats and smashed up the car before we fled.
“What happened with the fight between groups of blokes was just a silly drunken fight late at night, I didn’t even know it was Ricky Balcombe.”
Hague this week claimed police corruption and a string of lies were used to build a case against him — even calling for a Royal Commission into the case.
Hague claimed a prison cellmate who told police Hague had confessed Ricky’s stabbing murder must have been paid off.
And while Ricky’s family have told of their fears the case’s witness problems were caused by Hague, the prime suspect said the problems were due to police pressure. “I f**ked up a lot but I certainly never killed anyone,” Hague said. “I was meant to have come into town and found someone I didn’t know, happen to find him walking there ... back in the day pre-mobile phones, then gone and done that.”
“Once you’ve got a name for yourself you’ve got a name for yourself and it’s a very hard to change. When you’re a young kid you try and get a name for yourself but when you get older you spend all your time trying to get rid of it.”
Hague’s criminal history includes a stint in Pentridge for trying to run down a policeman, resisting and assaulting police and dishonesty offences as a 20-year-old in the early 1990s.
In February 2009 he threatened to blow up the Waurn Ponds Hotel in a dispute over pinball and video game machines.
In September that year Hague, who says he is now a certified occupational health and safety officer, fired shots from a handgun at two men outside a Corio pizza shop — earning a two-and-a-half jail term.
Mr Hague this week said he wanted to move on with his life with new love Corynne Pyle.
“When I got interviewed on several different occasions I made a full and frank admission to where I was. I was on the other side of town, out in Norlane when it happened, I was on the way to my then girlfriend’s house in Drumcondra on a pushbike because I didn’t have a licence,” he said. “It’s more sad for his family though, they’ve been led up the garden path with this bullsh-t.
“I’m trying to rebuild my life.”
New partner Corynne Pyle first met Hague as a 13-year-old before reconnecting with her former neighbour two years ago.
“For me to fall in love with a man with a past like Karl’s — once you know Karl there’s no question whether he did it or not,” she said. “We have so much empathy for the Balcombe family, we want police to find the right killer so both are families can find peace.”
Police still say Hague remains the prime suspect in the cold case with a new $1 million reward for information unveiled earlier this month.
Anyone with information is urged to contact Crime Stoppers on 1800 333 000.
In his own words
(A transcript from part of the interview with Karl Hague)
EP: It was no secret people were scared of you at the time of Ricky’s murder. You had a tough-guy reputation. Why were you known as the bloke who could look after himself?
KH: I don’t know where this reputation comes from. I’m actually s--- scared of knives. I’d rather put a gun to someone’s head than a knife. I’d walk round and get in scraps but I wasn’t a thug. I never knew anything about the Blue or the Red Bandanas (one of the gangs police claim Ricky was involved in). I never hung out with any of them, gangs weren’t my thing. Cars, radio-controlled planes and motorbikes were. I’d never shy away from a fight, when push comes to shove you defend yourself, but I’ve never been one to go out and look for a fight.
Why do you think police investigated you as the No. 1 suspect?
KH: They just built the case right from the word go. I f----- up a lot — but I certainly never killed anyone. Corey Munn ended up hanging himself because he couldn’t handle the pressure being put on him. The police don’t want to pursue that line because they don’t want to be proven wrong.
What was your criminal record like at the time of the Balcombe murder?
KH: I’d just done a year in prison for driving while disqualified, handling stolen goods, which was car parts, assault after police bashed me. I copped 18 months and as a 20-year-old I went straight to Pentridge. Some b------- deserve to be locked up for a long time, not me.
Why did you come back to Geelong after prison?
KH: Why would I run? I won’t run from nothing and I won’t hide from nothing. A guilty person would run, a guilty person wouldn’t sit here and be interviewed. The guy who did it is hiding.
Why do you think the killer has never been prosecuted?
KH: I believe people know who did it but don’t say anything to the cops. That was the attitude back then. The law does work in weird and funny ways, in this case the way it has gone so far has worked against me, but everything does come out in the end. I don’t know a name.
If you’ve been innocent all along, why haven’t you sued the Government over your lengthy arrest?
KH: When I walked out of Pentridge in 1997 after 14 months I was told I could be eligible for compensation, but I said I was tired of it all and just wanted to be left alone. I don’t want money from something I didn’t do, from the loss and death of an innocent boy.
It’s a big jump to go from driving an unregistered car to firearms charges. What led to that?
KH: The stress and pressure of the Ricky case, it changes you. You don’t think right. If I wanted to shoot this guy dead I would’ve. I’d been badgered for years and I thought doing this would scare him off. It was the mental torture of it all.
What would you say to the cold case detectives re-examining the case?
KH: I hope she does her job right. Go back to the start. There were 13 or 14 witnesses who haven’t been interviewed, those doing their grocery shopping at the time. They released two photofits that were tendered to the court, the first had mousy brown hair and blue eyes. The second wavy shoulder length hair. Both looked nothing like me.