Infamous prison escapee wants to ‘clear the air’ with former lover who hijacked chopper to set him free
JOHN Killick’s lover hijacked a helicopter and plucked him from jail. Now he’s desperate to speak to her again.
CONVICTED bank robber John Killick made Australian criminal history when his Russian lover hijacked a helicopter and freed him from a Sydney maximum security prison under a hail of guard gunfire.
Killick was a career criminal with a penchant for armed bank robberies and forgery.
He was on remand in Silverwater Prison and facing another 10 years behind bars when he pulled off the most daring jailbreak Australia has ever seen, on March 25, 1999.
He had escaped police custody twice before but had made his previous getaways on foot and in less dramatic circumstances than his third and final escape.
Lucy Dudko, 41 at the time, was a librarian studying for a doctorate in history at Macquarie University. It was the first crime she had ever committed.
The tabloids dubbed it a “crime of passion”.
The couple spent 45 days on the run before they were captured by police in a Sydney caravan park. Killick was sentenced to 15 years prison and relocated to Goulburn jail. Dudko was sentenced to a maximum 10 years and sent to Mulawa women’s prison.
But the couple went to extraordinary lengths to keep their love alive.
BEHIND BARS
In prison, they exchanged thousands of letters and had a formal marriage request refused by prison authorities in 2000.
The relationship ended when Dudko sent Killick a final letter informing him she had rediscovered her faith in God and didn’t want to continue their relationship.
Dudko was granted parole in 2006 and has reportedly since changed her name in a bid to keep a low profile. She currently lives and works in Sydney, and declined the opportunity to talk to news.com.au.
Killick, now 73, was paroled in 2014 but soon found himself back in lockup over one of his earlier jail escapes, until his most recent release on January 22, 2015.
The former lovers haven’t seen each other since their arrests 17 years ago.
But that could soon change if Killick has anything to do with it.
Killick last month marked one year as a free man, although his parole isn’t due to expire until September 2022.
His parole conditions initially prohibited him from having any contact with Dudko but those restrictions were lifted last year.
As per Killick’s ‘softened’ parole conditions, he can only contact Dudko directly if she agrees to his request, which news.com.au understands she has not done.
FINDING LUCY AGAIN
In an exclusive interview at his home in Milson’s Point on Monday, Killick told news.com.au he had been in touch with Dudko “on and off” via a third party and that he held hope they would soon reunite.
He was vague on the specifics of their alleged recent communications, saying he didn’t want to upset a notoriously private Dudko by revealing too much.
Dudko has never spoken publicly about the infamous jailbreak or her relationship with Killick.
“She’s turned to God as far as I know,” Killick said. “The (authorities) still don’t want us to have anything to do with each other.
“I don’t know if they think we’re going to run around like Bonnie and Clyde or something, it’s absolutely ludicrous.”
Killick said he and Dudko have unfinished business.
“We need to clear the air,” he said. “A lot has happened and it would be good for us to be able to talk about it. I’d like to see her because we waited so long for the moment.”
Killick said he had sought Dudko’s feedback on a book he was writing about their love affair — which he is currently shopping around to publishers — but had not received a response.
“I would like to discuss with her what I can and can’t put in the book because it’s about her and I … so I would really like to get her approval on things,” Killick said.
“There’s so much that people don’t know and there’s so much misinformation that the true story has got to come out.
“I’ve got everybody pushing me to do it but I’ve held off because she’s not happy about all the publicity (according to the third party contact), she’s a private person.”
Killick’s latest autobiographical work will complete a trilogy.
THE MAKING OF AN ESCAPE ARTIST
His tumultuous past has meant he hasn’t had any trouble sourcing subject matter to fill the pages.
Killick has spent much of his adult life in and out of jail for crimes that include bank book forgeries and armed robberies at banks and jewellery stores.
He said he grew up fearful of his father, a boxer who was often violent towards his family.
“I used to hide under the house from him with my mum,” he said.
He cherished his mother who committed suicide when he was just 17 years old.
Killick said the devastating loss of his mother made him feel like it was him “against the world”.
Within months of her death, Killick committed forgery and his first armed robbery.
He was behind bars by the age of 18. It was the first of many long stints in jail for the avid chess player.
Upon returning to the ‘outside’, Killick met Gloria at a chess tournament. They married and later welcomed their only child John Jnr into the world before divorcing years later.
HOW THEY MET
Killick first met Dudko at a Sydney party in the mid-1990s. She wasn’t interested in Killick at first but the pair soon became inseparable.
Before meeting Killick, ‘Red Lucy’ as she became known, was married to scientist Alex Dudko.
The pair had immigrated to Australia from Russia, in 1993 and had a daughter, Marsha.
Killick said Dudko was isolated in an unhappy marriage so she left her husband for him.
“She had a very similar sense of humour to me and a femininity which are two things I look for in a woman, and she was very attractive too,” Killick said. “I think she liked me because I treated her like a lady.
“We just got along well and when we were going together we were together 24 hours a day for 18 months, we never got sick of each other.”
Killick started robbing banks again — after an alleged eight year hiatus — as his main source of income and to feed his chronic gambling addiction.
But the law finally caught up with him during a failed bank robbery that ended with a Killick shooting at an off-duty police officer in NSW, January 1999.
“He didn’t believe my gun was real so I fired over his head to prove it was … I knew I was never going to hurt anyone … I’m not violent,” Killick said.
THE PLOT TO ESCAPE
Killick, 57 at the time, was on remand in Silverwater Prison and “knew” he was going to be sentenced to at least 10 years in jail.
“You only had to look at my history then see I’d robbed another two banks and you knew I was going away for a long time,” he said.
But he’d spent a lifetime breaking the rules and wasn’t about to start following them.
Killick wanted out. He said he made the decision to escape when Dudko became distraught at the prospect of life without him.
“Lucy came (to visit me in prison) and said ‘I’ve got to get you out’,” Killick said. “I knew I couldn’t get out any other way than by surprise.”
The couple soon hatched a daring escape plan.
Killick said he had the idea to escape prison via a hijacked helicopter because he knew it had been done in other countries.
“Everyone knew it would some day happen in Australia,” Killick said.
The couple discussed likely scenarios that could arise during the hijack and planned how to respond to them.
“It got down to, ‘how do we get a helicopter’ and we thought, ‘OK, you hire one’,” Killick said.
Dudko booked a scenic helicopter tour and went on a trial run before deeming the mission possible.
“(Then we thought about) if she is going to pull a gun on this guy, what’s she going to do … because common sense would tell you he’s going to maybe say ‘get stuffed, you’re not going to shoot me because then we’d crash’,” Killick said.
“But (then I thought) if I was piloting and somebody pulls a gun on me and they’re desperate, maybe they don’t care if they die, and it’s all or nothing, and I might have kids or something, so I’ll do it.
“I think most people (in the pilot’s position) would do it because it’s a pretty desperate thing.”
Killick said he was always confident Dudko would deliver on her promise and the helicopter would land on jail grounds.
“A lot of things aren’t impossible that seem impossible,” he said. “I knew she would do it.”
His only concern was whether or not the getaway helicopter would arrive in the small window of time prisoners were allowed in the yard.
“We only came out on that oval twice a week for an hour,” he said.
THE GETAWAY
On the morning of March 25, 1999, Dudko waited at the airport for Killick to give her the green light.
The helicopter had been booked to fly over the construction site of Sydney Olympic Park, which was conveniently close to Silverwater jail where Killick was being held in Sydney’s west.
Dudko knew that Killick would be in the jail’s exercise yard just before 10am.
“Once I knew I was going to go, I rang her and said ‘I’m going out on the oval for a run and I’ll see you when I get back’, and she knew,” Killick said.
“It was just before the Sydney Olympics and the prison was near the site so it wasn’t unusual for lots of helicopters to be flying in the area.”
Dudko boarded the flight about 9am.
“That morning there was probably 12-14 helicopters that came over and not one of them was her,” Killick said.
“The sweat was pouring off, and I thought ‘what am I going to do? She’s going to land here and I’m not going to be there because they would have taken us away at 10 o’clock.
“It would have been the worst stand up date in history.”
Meanwhile, Dudko spotted the prison grounds from above and sprung into action. She produced a sawn-off shotgun from her handbag and took her chopper pilot Tim Joyce hostage.
“This is a hijack,” Dudko told Joyce.
In a scene reminiscent of the 1975 Charles Bronson movie Breakout — which she’d hired a week earlier — Dudko pointed the gun to Joyce’s head and ordered the chopper down on the jail oval where Killick was waiting.
About seven minutes before Killick was expected to be ordered back inside the prison, the hijacked helicopter arrived. Killick dashed towards the aircraft and jumped on board.
“I’d already had it rehearsed and I said ‘I’m a lifer, you can make a lot of money from 60 Minutes or you can be dead, it’s your choice, you’ve got to get me out of here’,” Killick said.
“And (Joyce) said ‘don’t worry mate, I’ll get you out of here’.”
As the helicopter took off, other prisoners tried to grab on to the aircraft and hitch a ride as guards opened fire on the fugitives and Joyce.
“I didn’t think (the prison guards would) shoot,” Killick said.
“I’d read (a book) that said under the Geneva Convention the prison guard is not allowed to shoot at aircraft because it could be a hostage situation. I got the shock of my life when they hit us twice.
“I got in the helicopter first and I sat down and heard (gun shots) and we were very lucky, (they) missed (anything important), it would have brought us down if it was the tiniest bit closer.
“I think it was fate, just meant to be.”
ON THE RUN
The duo flew to freedom before they ditched Joyce, hijacked a car and went on the run in Victoria and NSW for 45 days.
“We even tried to get jobs as dish hands out the back of a kitchen at one stage,” Killick said.
They became the most wanted people in the country. But their luck soon ran out. The pair was eventually arrested at Bass Hill Tourist Park, where they had booked a cabin under the names Mr and Mrs MG Brown.
“We both knew what we were doing,” Killick said. “It ended up badly but at the time it seemed like a good idea.”
REGRETS
The former flames wrote themselves into Australian criminal folklore when they executed the most daring prison escape of all time but Killick said it’s not something he’s proud of.
“I’m disappointed in myself that I did it,” he said. “When you look back at it, it was reckless and just foolish really.
“I get a lot of people saying ‘you pulled it off’ but I didn’t pull it off because getting out is only a part of it. There’s no use just getting out, you’ve got to be able to carry on from there so it was a failure as far as I’m concerned.
“It caused a lot of trouble for a lot of people. I often look back and I’ve probably got hundreds of victims — if you rob 10 banks you’ve probably got 200 victims — you can shatter people and cause them a lot of trauma and this can transpose across their families and to a lot of members.”
LIKE SOMETHING OUT OF A MOVIE
Despite his regrets, Killick would like to see his story made into a movie one day.
He’s not fussed about which actor might play him but said an actress from A Place Called Home — he can’t remember her name — would be perfect to play Dudko.
He’s adamant that the infamous jailbreak was a love story and said that should be reflected in a movie based on the events.
HOW HE FEELS ABOUT LUCY NOW
But Killick said the romantic connection between him and Dudko has died in real life.
“I truly think there will always be a bond there between us despite what the authorities want to do about it,” Killick said.
“I’ll always like Lucy … and have a sweet spot … but we’re different people now.
“I don’t love her in that respect because there’s too much water under the bridge. But if Lucy came to me tomorrow and needed help I’d be the first one to help her, absolutely.
“I sort of feel I owe her and I regret that I got her into the trouble she got into. It’s the only thing she’s ever done wrong in her life and she’s been tainted by this. She’s paid a huge price.”
LIVING FOR TODAY
Killick now lives with his ex-wife Gloria and is in close touch with their son, who is based in China and regularly visits his parents.
Killick spends his days writing, training at the gym, visiting lawyers and his parole officer, meeting friends at the local club, and feeding the birds that have learned his dining room window is an ideal place to come for biscuits and a chat.
As news.com.au’s interview with Killick came to an end, a cockatoo tapped on the glass of his dining room window with its beak.
“Go away, it’s not dinner time,” Killick told the eager bird. “You’re too early, you’re not supposed to be here, cocky.”
Killick explained he was trying to train the animals to come at certain times of the day but then gave in to the persistent tapping, opened the window and hand fed the cockatoo a biscuit.
“They usually come in and sit on my hand and everything,” he said.
It’s the simple things in life that Killick has learned to appreciate.
“I’m a pretty boring guy at the moment and I want to stay that way,” he said.
“I’m just thankful to be alive and I’m hoping I’ve got another 10 good years to be able to enjoy and to do some good things and maybe at the end they’ll say ‘he was a bad bugger but he came good at the end’.
“And that’s all really I can hope for.”
Follow the conversation on Twitter @newscomauhq | @Megan_Palin
megan.palin@news.com.au
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