Donald Grant on his controversial new book Killer Instinct: Having a Mind for Murder
DONALD Grant’s controversial new book landed him in hot water with murder victims’ families, both sides of politics and the CCC. But his shocking stories have also been praised for shining a light into the dark world of violence committed by the mentally ill.
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DISTINGUISHED psychiatrist Donald Grant has delved into the twisted minds of more sadistic and depraved killers than you could ever imagine.
There was a sadomasochistic cross-dresser who brutally raped and murdered a 21-year-old girl, a mother who hid an infant’s body in a washing machine and the loving wife who cut her husband’s throat from ear to ear.
And there was the killer who drank the blood of her hapless victim after luring him into a park by exposing her breasts and promising him sex.
You know her as the Vampire Lesbian Killer.
Grant’s new book about the tragedies, Killer Instinct: Having a Mind for Murder (MUP) sparked instant controversy. The author was condemned not only by some victims’ families but by both sides of politics as well.
However, Grant’s stories have been praised by judges and leading medicos for shining a light into the dark world of violence committed by the mentally ill.
Those who accuse Grant of acting unethically may be “shooting the messenger” by condemning his book.
An overwhelming number of the cases he discusses have already been dealt with in the courts and those proceedings duly reported in the media.
In several cases, Grant quotes from The Courier-Mail interviews with victims’ families.
The book is a fascinating and frightening opus that examines in great detail the motives of 10 our most brutal killers.
I can’t think of another book like it in the history of Queensland.
There was a whiff of scandal from the outset when the launch set down for the Queensland Supreme Court library was mysteriously cancelled.
Invited guests were told the book would be unveiled by none other than Margaret McMurdo, a past president of the Court of Appeal and a towering figure in the Queensland justice system.
Instead, the book was launched in a quiet corner of Dymocks bookstore in the CBD with McMurdo absent.
But we can imagine the glowing reference she would have given the book.
The clues are in a forward she wrote saying it provided a valuable insight into forensic psychiatry and the legal system “including difficulties in predicting dangerousness”.
“Who hasn’t wondered if given a particular set of circumstances or mental illness, they might be driven to kill another?” she said.
“Forensic psychiatrist Donald Grant, whose reports I read with confidence during my 26 years as a judge, explores that and other big questions, such as who is capable of rehabilitation, who has rehabilitated, and who is beyond redemption.”
Alastair Blanshard, a University of Queensland professor, agreed and praised the work for its “moments of reflection and diagnosis amid the horror of sadism and murder”.
Grant has been interviewing killers for 40 years to determine whether they are fit enough to stand trial.
At 73 he has scaled back his practice and now works no more than three days a week.
In the past he was the director of the Queensland Forensic Mental Health Service and the director of psychiatry at Royal Brisbane and Prince Charles hospitals.
His advice is sought by mental health tribunals and the courts. He’s also an expert on sexual perversions, having assessed “thousands” of offenders.
In a brief phone interview as he is changing planes at Adelaide airport, Grant tells me his prime motivation for writing the book was to explore “why (the murders) occur and how to prevent them”.
He adds: “I’ve tried to write about a complex subject in an approachable way.
“It’s factual and explicit” but Grant says he did not set out to sensationalise. He simply sought to ‘increase our understanding of why violence and murder happens’. In that he has succeeded admirably.
“The facts themselves are shocking,” he says. “I haven’t exaggerated or sought to create sensation in any way.”
He says there are usually two or three psychiatrists asked to offer an opinion about an accused’s mental state.
“I have to tell it as it is. Then it’s up to the courts,” he says.
Grant says he had sympathy for Sonia Anderson who has complained about his chapter on the strangulation murder of her daughter Bianca eight years ago.
Anderson says she was not told about her daughter’s finals words until she read them in the book.
She says Grant told her that he did not know she did not have access to all the evidence presented in the court.
Anderson berated Grant publicly at a book launch in Brisbane last week.
He says: “I feel sorry for that woman; she was very distressed.”
However it was “inevitable” that writing about old cases would “stir things up” for some families.
“When a psychological illness is the cause of a murder, the victim’s family often cannot accept it,” he says.
He denies he has acted unethically by discussing cases. Grant says he had not treated any of the 10 killers whose cases he wrote about.
His book is an introduction to abhorrent behaviours. And he discusses the human aggression in all of us. “I believe a primitive killer instinct still exists in all of us in some dormant form,” he writes.
However, that instinct is “controlled and civilised by our brain, our culture, our education and society’s shared values and established rules of behaviour”.
TRAD BUDGET HOAX
THE Trad State Budget should be seen for what it is – a litany of increased taxes and broken promises.
The deception really began two days before last year’s election when the Palaszczuk Government announced four new taxes to deliver $491 million.
In reality, the Government imposed five new taxes to reap $2.25 billion.
The state-owned power generators raked in massive profits thanks to higher electricity prices that have hurt working families.
Labor budgeted for an income of $482 million but got a $1.241 billion windfall.
LNP energy spokesman Michael Hart says Labor charged $759 million more than it said it would.
“If that’s not a hidden tax, I don’t know what is,” he says.
He is right.
The Palaszczuk Government will continue to rip $1.7 billion in super-profits from these government-owned generators over the next four years.
Trad blotted her copybook again when she said the staggering rise in the numbers of public servants would send the bill soaring to $23.8 billion – up $969 million on the year before.
She quickly attempted to muddy the waters suggesting the workers would be frontline troops. Yet 41 per cent won’t be frontline workers at all. They will be bureaucrats, admin officers and spin doctors.
The Palaszczuk Government had promised to restrict public-servant growth in line with population growth at about 1.75 per cent. Instead Trad forecast public service growth of 7.4 per cent. It’s a broken promise.
Next, we learned the debt will top $83.1 billion.
Shadow Treasurer Tim Mander has been busy with his calculator and points out the interest rate payments alone will amount to $71 million a week – or $10 million a day.
And Labor has no interest repayment plan.
One hundred new schools or two major new hospitals could be built with the money wasted on interest payments in a single year.
The state faces a bigger worry. There has been $76 billion less in private sector investment under Annastacia Palaszczuk and Jackie Trad.
That’s a drop of 40 per cent since the Campbell Newman days.
It suggests the businesses that really create the jobs simply don’t trust Labor.
Indeed, the Sensis Business Index says the Queensland Government is the least trusted in Australia.
ART THAT GETS UNDER THE SKIN
A GREAT guessing game has begun inside the Brisbane arts community: Who coughed up the $2.3 million for the huge Fred Williams masterpiece Forest Pond, now on show at Philip Bacon Galleries in inner Brisbane?
Was it “Queensland Great” Tim Fairfax, the pastoralist turned philanthropist?
Or was it Philip Bacon himself, the ceaseless giver to the Queensland Art Gallery? No. Insiders say the picture was purchased secretly by a “very, very private” female collector.
Speculation is rife. Could the evocative picture now belong to Sicilian-born jobs tycoon Sarina Russo? Or was it snapped up by Gina Rinehart, Australia’s richest dame?
My money is on Rinehart. It’s often said that Williams’ art taught us how to admire the Australian landscape from a new perspective.
The artist’s work depicts the underlying bones and minerals of this great continent. I’m sure the subterranean references would appeal to an iron ore and beef producer like Rinehart. Forest Pond was offered for sale by Williams’ widow Lyn.
PAINTING BONANZA
HALF the 18 pictures in the Fred Williams exhibition at Philip Bacon Galleries have now been sold, with other prices ranging from $45,000 to $330,000.
Feel free to visit. The show closes on June 30.
The recent sale of tens of millions of dollars’ worth of contemporary Australian pictures has me wondering about the total value of works now hanging on the walls of private collectors in this state.
It must be considerable.
In recent years Queenslanders have shelled out big money for pictures by Rupert Bunny, Sidney Nolan, Brett Whiteley, Charles Blackman, William Robinson, Garry Shead, William Dargie, Margaret Olley, Ray Crooke, Jeffrey Smart, Tim Storrier, Sam Fullbrook, Davida Allen, John Olsen, Kenneth Macqueen, David Hinchliffe and Cressida Campbell.
CHINESE SWOOP ON WINERY
ONE of Queensland’s most attractive tourist attractions is destined to fall into Chinese ownership.
Cedar Creek winery, rainforest walk and glow worm cave in the Gold Coast hinterland is expected to change hands for $10 million, with owner John Penglis telling me he is “trying to ease up” as he approaches his 85th birthday.
He says a Chinese firm is “knocking on the door again”.
The timing is right for Penglis, who says he wanted to spend more time with his wife Brenda, 83, and visit his granddaughters.
Penglis is also finalising the sale of his Tamborine Gardens Wedding Resort and his Thumm Estate Winery at Upper Coomera.
He says the glow worm cave has been attracting up to 700 visitors a day on weekends.
Penglis is one of the state’s outstanding corporate warriors.
He “retired” in 1986 and headed for the hills after 33 years in radio and television management.
While the boss of Channel 10 in Brisbane, he also ran two cattle stations.
Originally published as Donald Grant on his controversial new book Killer Instinct: Having a Mind for Murder
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