Shandee Blackburn’s accused killer John Peros wants his ‘day in court’

John Peros has gone to Queensland’s Court of Appeal in an attempt to revive his failed case that he was defamed in an episode of the podcast Shandee’s Story.

Shandee Blackburn with John Peros, the main suspect in her murder.

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The man found by a coroner to have savagely killed his former girlfriend Shandee Blackburn in Mackay should be given his “day in court” to vindicate his reputation, his lawyers say.

John Peros has gone to Queensland’s Court of Appeal in an attempt to revive his failed case that he was defamed in an episode of Shandee’s Story, The Australian’s investigative podcast which exposed major failures in the state’s DNA laboratory and led the government to launch two commissions of inquiry.

His appeal revolves around whether the coroner’s findings and extensive previous publicity should have been admissible in the defamation case, and if he already had a bad reputation to the point no serious harm was caused in the episode.

Shandee Blackburn’s mother Vicki and sister Shannah at the site of her murder in Mackay. Picture: Lyndon Mechielsen

Mr Peros’s barrister, Rob Anderson KC, told the court in Brisbane on Tuesday that there could be no doubt the former amateur boxer faced “very serious” allegations in the podcast’s episode 13.

Shandee’s sister, Shannah Blackburn, said in the episode she was “100 per cent” sure he was the killer who launched at Shandee with a knife as she walked home from work late at night in the central Queensland sugar and mining town in 2013.

Listeners would have reached a settled view that Peros was 23-year-old Shandee’s killer after hearing the episode, his lawyers have argued.

Mr Anderson said the seriousness of the defamation was elevated by the broad reach of the podcast and the reputation of its creator, national chief correspondent Hedley Thomas, as an award-winning, credible and well known investigative journalist.

Shandee suffered 23 stab and slash wounds to her face, neck, chest and arm in the ­frenzied knife attack.

Shandee was murdered while walking home from work in 2013.

Mr Peros has denied any involvement and was in 2017 acquitted of the murder by a jury, but coroner David O’Connell found in August 2020 that he had killed Shandee.

Mr Peros brought his defamation action against Nationwide News as publishers of The Australian, as well as Thomas and Shannah Blackburn in Queensland’s Supreme Court.

In August 2024, judge Peter Applegarth ruled Mr Peros had failed to prove he suffered serious harm to his reputation in the episode and dismissed the case.

Justice Applegarth said that “unsurprisingly, the coroner’s finding that the plaintiff (Mr Peros) violently killed Ms Blackburn was widely reported” and had already delivered a blow to his reputation.

Peros, an amateur boxer, has always denied any involvement in Shandee’s murder.

By the time episode 13 was published, listeners to the first 12 episodes would have already reached the view Mr Peros was the killer, despite his acquittal, Justice Applegarth said.

Earlier media reporting on the coroner’s findings and prior episodes of the podcast were allowed into the proceedings.

Mr Peros has asked the Court of Appeal to set aside the order dismissing the defamation proceeding and to find he has suffered serious harm.

If the court makes those orders, the case will effectively become a trial over whether Mr Peros did in fact kill Shandee.

An outline of submissions prepared for Mr Peros in his appeal states that the episode of the “extremely popular” podcast accused him of Shandee’s murder.

“The appellant seeks to vindicate his reputation and have his `day in court’,” the submissions state.

The appeal is being heard before judges John Bond, Susan Brown and Soraya Ryan.

Arguing that the coroner’s findings and associated media reporting was rightly admitted, Mr Sibtain said the court needed to understand the context of episode 13 and would be led into error if it only had part of the true picture.

The cause of the harm to Peros’s reputation was the coroner’s findings, which were in the public domain, had the same standard of proof as civil cases and were made by a judicial officer, and had been communicated “over and over again” to listeners prior to episode 13.

Mr Anderson, appearing with barrister David Helvadjian for Mr Peros, said serious harm was “not diminished or erased simply because the same thing was said previously”.

The court heard the case could come down to precedents in British courts, and whether they applied in Queensland. Judgment will be delivered at a later date.