Why is Labor letting a psychopathic rapist out of jail?
Two Labor governments – the one freeing a rapist and the one paying his NDIS bills – are fighting over who pays for his care.
David Balding was just 10 years old when his sister, Janine, was abducted from a Sydney train station in 1988 by a group of young men. One was just 14 years old. They brutally assaulted her over hours – and eventually threw her into a dam to drown.
“What they put her through, they should never, ever be out of jail, as far as I’m concerned,” Balding says.
Now, after almost 40 years, Janine’s surviving relatives face a sinister new fight for justice: one of the men convicted of her slaying will be released into the community – with support from the taxpayer-funded National Disability Insurance Scheme.
Christine Middap, an associate editor with The Australian, broke the story and interviewed David Balding.
Middap says: “David is a businessman in Wagga Wagga. So this is the town where Janine grew up.
“Her parents were there until their deaths in recent years.
“David is a really strong advocate for Janine. He’s really determined to ensure that her memory stays front and centre.”
“You can’t keep people in jail forever unless there are exceptional circumstances.
“He’s now set to be released on an extended supervision order.”
When is Wilmot getting out of jail?
Wilmot will appear before a judge on Thursday for the supervision order to be approved.
The NSW Government didn’t attempt to keep him in custody – in fact, it sought his release under strict conditions.
“The state of New South Wales actually applied for the extended supervision order. It’s not always easy to get one of those.
“They have kept him in jail beyond his sentence since 2019 on a continuing detention order.
“So they’ve already argued twice before the Supreme Court that he’s too dangerous to release.
“Now, notwithstanding the fact that he appears still too dangerous to be released, the state of New South Wales on this occasion applied for a supervision order.
Wayne Wilmot’s role in Janine’s death
Wayne Wilmot was 15 years old when he conspired with four other teenagers and one adult to kidnap Janine.
The court found he didn’t participate in her rape or murder, but he was held liable for the assault because of his involvement.
Psychopathic traits, no remorse
Experts have diagnosed him with psychopathic traits and warned that he poses a “significant risk” of reoffending if he’s freed.
But Wilmot will get eight hours of help with day-to-day activities every week, and double that in support for “economic and community participation”. He’ll also have taxpayer-funded access to healthcare and behavioural experts.
He’ll also be subject to a strict curfew and will be required to wear an electronic ankle monitor.
That raises fears for the NDIS’ low-paid workers.
Christine Middap: “I think he would be in some sort of supported group home.
“But this is a perpetrator who forensic psychologists have consistently found has no insight, no remorse. He really hates women, and he sees nothing wrong with attacking women who he thinks sexually available to him.”
NDIS workers at risk
Christine Middap: “If I was a female support worker, I wouldn’t want to go anywhere near this man. And to be honest, if I was a male, I wouldn’t either.
“Maybe this is delivered over the phone or something, but, but they would need to be a great care taken with dealing with this guy.”
The fear for workers’ safety is shared by David Balding.
“I don’t know how those ankle monitors and stuff like that work,” Balding says.
“I’d be very concerned.”
On the question of NDIS support, Balding says simply: I reckon it’d be better spent somewhere else.”
Wayne Wilmot has spent his entire adult life in prison and several attempts have been made over the years to rehabilitate him.
David Balding: “He doesn’t show any remorse for anything.
“He just … He’s who he is.
“And that’s … That’s who he’s going to be, I think.”
Wilmot’s reign of terror
Wayne Wilmot served just eight years in prison for his part in Janine Balding’s brutal slaying.
Over the 20 months that followed, while on parole, he embarked upon what can only be described as a Reign of Terror.
It’s believed he terrorised at least eight victims – including what appear to be completely random attacks on women whom he had never met before – with one railway station employee subjected to a horrific attack.
He threatened another woman with a knife, but she managed to flee.
Wilmot was sent back to prison for those crimes, where he’s been treated as a “high-security prisoner”.
His sentence was officially up in 2019, but he was kept behind bars under what’s known as a Continued Detention Order.
The judge who granted that order said Wilmot’s long rap sheet and his “pattern of offending” meant setting him free was simply too risky.
The order was extended in 2021.
He ‘will likely attack’ a young woman
One forensic psychologist said it’s highly likely Wilmot will reoffend and, if that happens, the attack would be “most likely to involve a penetrative sexual attack upon a young woman previously unknown to him’’.
They added that “any offence would probably be impulsive, opportunistic, and target a vulnerable woman”.
Wilmot has himself admitted he has a problem with women and he believes they’re deserving of the violence inflicted upon them.
But NDIS Minister Bill Shorten told Christine the program has a responsibility to disabled people – even ex-cons.
Christine Middap: “What’s interesting in this case, though, is that looking through all of the judgments, I can’t really say that one woman has a mental disorder as such beyond, sort of, sort of pathological traits. And, he has a severe personality disorder. So that probably does qualify him. But look, as David Balding said, he can think of people who are a lot more worthy to get this help.”
Will Wilmot definitely be freed?
Christine Middap: “Yeah. Because the state of New South Wales has actually put forward the application and obviously Wayne Wilmot’s lawyers are supporting that, then I think that’s the only reasonable next step.
“Now, Bill Shorten’s office has indicated they are looking at the NDIS funding aspect of his release. There’s a concern really that prisoners who are going into the parole system – the state system – should be supported by the state system and not the NDIS system.
“So there’s a concern that I suppose the NDIS is being used as a dumping ground.
“So I think there will be, you know, some consideration of whether he should have qualified for NDIS support.”
A murder that shocked NSW
Janine Balding was just one month off her 21st birthday when she died. She planned to get married less than six months later, in March of 1989.
She was working as a bank teller at what was known then as the State Bank of New South Wales, in a branch on George Street in the middle of Sydney.
It was complete happenstance that Janine was the victim of this most awful of crimes – something that has haunted NSW over five decades.
She had just arrived by train at Sutherland station in Sydney’s south after a busy day at the bank. She was walking to her car when the group of young people – who were all homeless – approached her, pulling out a knife and forcing her into a car.
A court would later hear one of the boys had earlier suggested to the others: why don’t we get a sheila and rape her?
They raped and abused her inside the car as they drove to Minchinbury in the city’s west, then one of them suggested killing her.
The men gagged and hogtied her, dragged her along the ground and then threw her into a dam to drown.
They stole her bank cards and jewellery, but after bragging to other homeless kids about what they’d done, they were eventually caught.
The three main perpetrators – Matthew Elliott, Bronson Blessington and Stephen ‘Shorty’ Jamieson – were given life sentences plus 25 years and are still in prison.
The girl, Carol Arrow, was given a nine-year sentence.
Blessington now holds scripture classes for other inmates, and says he is deeply repentant for what he did.
DNA drama causes more pain
That’s a lingering controversy about the identity of one of the killers.
The man who’s in jail, Stephen ‘Shorty’ Jamieson, has always insisted he was not there.
There’s another man, Mark Wells, also known as Shorty, who was known to wear a bandana, and there’s a campaign led by a lawyer named Peter Breen to have DNA testing performed on a bandana found at the scene of the crime to establish if the wrong man were convicted.
David Balding insists the right Shorty is in jail.
David Balding: “It hasn’t ended. It has not ended. We’ve got the right people. They’re where they belong. There’s no new evidence. It’s all been looked at before.
“This ‘wrong Shorty’ garbage – that’s why the first trial was aborted.
“They investigated that, found nothing in it, found they had the right people.“
Asked how Janine’s mother would feel about Wilmot being released, David Balding says: “Angry. Very angry. She’s seen him out before, and she’s seen what’s happened. Then this was – this took its toll on her life. It cut it short, for sure.”
This is an edited transcript of The Australian's daily news podcast The Front. Listen wherever you get podcasts, and on The Australian’s app.
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