Townsville Bulletin reveals some of North Queensland’s most shocking crimes from the archives
From bodies stashed beside roads, to drug-fuelled crime sprees and a young child beaten with a garden hose – this is the worst side of North Queensland.
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TOWNSVILLE is no stranger to crime.
With some of the country’s most shocking crimes occurring on our doorstep, the Townsville Bulletin has dug through the archives to revisit some of the worst.
From bodies dumped on Hervey Range Road, to drug-fuelled crime sprees and a young child beaten with a garden hose – this is the most disturbing side of North Queensland.
JULIE HUTCHINSON
Michael Hutchinson killed his wife, put her body in the boot of a car and dumped the mother-of-two on the side of Hervey Range Road.
Julie Hutchinson was last seen in March 2015 – with her husband convicted of manslaughter in March 2017.
On March 9, 2015, Julie failed to turn up to work at Queensland Nickel – but it wasn't until April 3 that her sisters became aware she was missing.
On April 9, her sister Christine Teitzel reported Julie missing. Days later, Hutchinson was arrested.
During his initial interview, he said Julie had become a lesbian, developed a drug addiction and run off into the sunset – claims which have since been rubbished.
About four hours after he arrived at the station for an interview, he returned home,
Hutchinson’s story changed – he said Julie had been involved in a scuffle with a group of strangers from Melbourne, and he had dumped her body on Hervey Range – but he couldn’t remember where. He has never admitted guilt.
From that moment the pressure was on for police to obtain enough evidence to lay charges before they would need to release their prime suspect.
The search of 13 Chelsea Drive, Condon was still under way and Julie’s silver Mazda 6 was nowhere to be seen.
The garage at the property was locked; Hutchinson had told the police the keys were not at the house and investigators were convinced crucial evidence would be found behind the locked doors.
Detective Fred Starr previously told the Townsville Bulletin that as soon as the roller door was opened, the smell was “bad”.
“I’ve been a policeman for a long time and I’ve been to a lot of scenes where bodies have been dead for days and weeks, but the smell was so strong, the word overwhelming would be an understatement … it was actually horrid,” he said.
When officers opened the boot of the vehicle, they were confronted with an abundance of bodily fluids and maggots.
There were also cleaning products and a set of overalls in the boot.
Hutchinson was charged with murder and in the weeks and months to come investigators would work to get evidence against the father-of-two.
Hutchinson was tried for murder in March, 2017.
However, Hutchinson was found not guilty of murder, but guilty of manslaughter and was sentenced to 15 and a half years jail.
READ ABOUT THE SEARCH FOR JULIE’S BODY
GINO AND MARK STOCCO
Gino and Mark Stocco were a father and son duo that became two of the country’s most notorious criminals in recent history.
The pair started their eight-year-stretch “off the grid” after they were released from prison in 2007, with both having served a short stint in custody relating to offences including criminal damage and robbery.
But when they were released, the pair opted to go off the radar.
They began a crime spree on the properties they were working on, and police allege they stole everyday goods such as clothing, food or fuel from properties they had been living at before moving on. At times they would allegedly damage machinery or buildings, with police saying the offending was almost always motivated by a sense of retribution.
Queensland police said the father and son stole from shops to feed themselves in between farm stays and would take small items, such as kettles and towels, from motels they stopped at along their journey.
By 2011 they had made their way to Canowindra, New South Wales, where, after being sacked from their jobs, the pair slashed tyres of vehicles and set fire to a shed.
The pair would continue in their ways for several years, often staying at particular properties for lengthy periods until they returned to the Ingham region in 2014.
While in Ingham, the Stoccos lit up a shed in retribution against a family they perceived to have wronged them.
The blaze caused in excess of a million dollars in damage, destroying the shed along with a new tractor, prized custom-made boats and a farming truck.
The Stoccos were already being sought in connection with a number of offences but remained “low-level offenders” until the arson.
The Stoccos returned to their nomadic ways but found it increasingly difficult to obtain work as their reputation spread through the media.
Their path led them to a cannabis property named Pinevale outside Dunedoo, in NSW.
It was here that the Stoccos’ criminal activity would climax to cold-blooded murder.
They helped the “caretaker” of the property Rosario Cimone, 68, with the growing of cannabis hydroponically but grew increasingly uneasy with the relationship.
Paranoia got the better of them, with Mark telling Gino to kill Mr Cimone. Gino gunned him down with two shots from a pump-action shotgun.
The pair then stripped the 68-year-old and dumped his body in bushland on the property before making their way south.
The pair were arrested on October 28, 2015 after police searched for them for almost two weeks.
Police from four states made the journey to Wellington Correctional Centre in NSW to question the Stoccos.
It wasn’t until February 2016 that North Queensland investigators had their chance to interview the duo.
Gino and Mark Stocco pleaded guilty to a vast array of offences committed in New South Wales, including the murder of Rosario Cimone, shooting at New South Wales police officers and arson.
Gino was 59 and Mark 37 at the time of sentencing in March 2017.
In 2019 there were 82 charges ready and waiting for the Stoccos in Queensland.
READ THE FULL STORY OF THEIR CRIMES AND ARREST HERE
GARBUTT FATAL CRASH
A teenager charged with killing four friends in a stolen car crash received a five-year jail sentence.
On June 7, 2020 Townsville woke to news the four teenagers had died in a horrific crash on Duckworth St.
The only survivor was sentenced in October last year after spending a year behind bars.
In the moments before the crash, the then-14 year old was speeding at an estimated 128km per hour in a 70 zone.
READ THE FULL BREAKDOWN OF WHAT HAPPENED
In court it was revealed the teen’s life had been marred with drugs, violence, abuse and poverty.
“Domestic violence, drinking, (and) drugs were all part of that circumstance,” the boy’s barrister Darin Honchin told the court.
“There was a lack of boundaries,” Mr Honchin said.
“It is almost living on the street but not living on the street
“(His) mother advises that there was a period where she was very heavily into alcohol and drugs a lot and she accepts she was not a good mother.”
BETH KIPPIN
Andrew O’Keefe was found guilty of murdering Beth Kippin in a drug-fulled rage in July, 2016.
Beth, a mother and grandmother, was 81 when she was murdered during O’Keefe’s methamphetamine-fuelled spree.
He broke into her home and stabbed her in the chest, puncturing a major artery.
During the spree O’Keefe also attempted to murder his friend Brittny Speechly-Faulks, stabbing her multiple times and slitting her throat.
During his reign of terror on the streets of Wulguru O’Keefe stabbed another man in the face, threatened a man while armed with a fence paling, tried to break into several houses, and damaged property, all the while naked.
O’Keefe was sentenced to life in prison, and 16 years for each count of attempted murder.
In March this year, O’Keefe applied to appeal his conviction, however it has yet to be listed for a hearing.
READ MORE:
Police arrest Townsville murderer Anthony O’Keefe after violent spree
Police statement sheds light on Beth Kippin’s final hours
Photos of Townsville murderer Anthony O’Keefe revealed
MICHAEL McCABE
On August 15, 2015, a drug fuelled evening turned violent when Michael McCabe was punched, kicked, and stomped before he was bound in cable ties and hauled into the boot of a blue Holden Commodore.
Brent Malcolm Huxley and Jason Douglas Taylor drove McCabe to the isolated Mount Spec Rd, north of Townsville, and left him in a dried up creek bed.
The pair returned after purchasing a range of cleaning products from a service station and hurled rocks at the victim.
In May 2019, a jury heard that Mr McCabe was subject to three brutal attacks over several hours.
Huxley and Taylor were both found guilty of murdering Mr McCabe’s death.
Mr McCabe’s body was not found until a month after his death, with police discovering the severely decomposed remains after Taylor divulged – “I know where the body is”.
During Taylor’s trial, the court was told McCabe’s body was in such poor condition doctors could not determine a cause of death, but skeletal injuries to his skull were so severe, had they been inflicted while he was alive they would have killed him.
LUKE TROW
Six-year-old Luke Trow was beaten to death with a garden hose in his Cockrell St home by Frank Leslie Burrows in 1988.
An article from the Herbert River Express in 1989 says Luke was beaten by Burrows, who was his mother’s de facto partner.
“According to those who attended the crime scene, the child was found lying naked and suffering from horrific injuries,” the article reads.
“Six-year-old Luke died after his liver was split by a blow from a blunt object, which caused him to lose two thirds of his total blood volume.
“And while 120 individual injuries were found on his skin, only half of those were revealed to be fresh injuries.”
Burrows died at the age of 58 in 2016.
THE MACKAY SISTERS
Judith, 7, and Susan, 5, Mackay were abducted from a bus stop, raped and killed in August 1970, in one of Australia’s most horrific murders.
It was common practice for the two young girls to walk to the bus stop on Ross River Road, and their older brother, Alan, would often ride their bikes past them waiting at the bus stop as he made his way to school.
But at 8.25am on August 26, when Alan passed the bus stop, the two girls were nowhere in sight – he assumed the bus had arrived early.
Bill and Thelma Mackay raised the alarm that afternoon when their daughters didn’t come home and the matter was treated as suspicious immediately after it was revealed the pair had never made it to school.
Police commenced searches for the children that evening.
The girls’ bodies were found on August 28, with one of the many people searching for the two girls making the heartbreaking discovery.
Judith’s body was spotted first; she had been raped, strangled, and left wearing only a pair of pink underwear in a small culvert of the creek bed.
Susan’s naked body was found face down in the sand less than 50m away from her sister.
She had also been sexually assaulted and was smothered to death by her attacker.
Both sisters had also been stabbed three times in the chest by their killer.
The murderer had taken the time to neatly fold and pile each sister’s clothing which was found beside their respective bodies. Their school bags were found nearby.
READ A FULL RECOUNT OF THE INVESTIGATION
It was decades later that the girls’ killer was found.
A tip-off led police to Arthur Brown – who was reported to be a sexual deviant and obsessed with the Mackay sisters case.
Brown was charged in 1998 with the murder of the Mackay sisters, along with a range of other sexual offences on other children.
Brown died in 2002 and is suspected of being involved in 13 murders:
>>Grant, Arnna and Jane Beaumont, 1966, Adelaide
>>Judith and Susan Mackay, 1970, Townsville
>>Marilyn Joy Wallman, 1972, Mackay
>>Robin Jeanne Hoinville Bartram and Anita Cunningham, 1972, Charters Towers
>>Joanne Radcliffe and Kirste Gordon, 1973, Adelaide
>>Catherine Graham, 1975, Townsville
>>Eloise Worledge, 1976, Beaumaris, Victoria
>>Hester Brown, 1978, Townsville
TINA WATSON
26-year-old American tourist Tina Watson was killed while scuba diving off Townsville.
On her honeymoon with her new husband, fellow American Gabe Watson, Tina went scuba diving at the site of the SS Yongala in October 2003.
Tina lost consciousness and sank to the bottom, about 20m below the water surface within minutes of beginning the dive.
Her unexplained death came under police investigation both in Townsville and in the United States, during which her husband was named a `person of interest’, resulting in a coronial inquest.
The inquest in 2008 found that Watson should be charged with Tina’s death, with John Tate, counsel assisting the inquest, saying that Watson’s account did not “stand with the evidence”.
Shortly after the inquest, an arrest warrant was issued for Watson over Tina’s murder, starting the extradition process.
Watson voluntarily came to Australia in 2009 to face trial in Townsville.
Originally charged with murder, Watson pleaded guilty to the lesser charge of manslaughter, resulting in a four-year sentence to be suspended after serving one year in custody.
Originally published as Townsville Bulletin reveals some of North Queensland’s most shocking crimes from the archives
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