Gayle Woodford inquest told ‘catalogue of blunders’ led to Dudley Davey being unmonitored before he murdered nurse
A man’s escalating sexual violence against women culminated in the rape and murder of Gayle Woodford – but a “catalogue” of errors left him unmonitored, an inquest has heard.
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A “catalogue of blunders” left repeat sex offender Dudley Davey unmonitored in the months before he raped and killed nurse Gayle Woodford in Far North SA.
At the opening of the inquest today Deputy Coroner Anthony Schapel heard details of Davey’s horrific criminal record against women.
Counsel assisting Ahura Khalali said that part of the inquest would focus on why Davey had not been put on a sex offenders register when released from prison in 2015.
“A catalogue of blunders from the time his original charges were downgraded to when he was released meant Davey slipped through the cracks,” he said.
If Davey had been placed on the ANCOR register he would have had to report his movements and location to police.
The court heard that when Davey was being considered for parole in early 2015 a police officer told the parole board that the man posed a danger to the community.
In the submissions the officer said Davey’s escalating offending against women was similar to offenders who later came before the courts on murder charges.
Ms Woodford was the on-call nurse the night she was abducted, raped and murdered by Davey on March 23, 2016.
The clinic ambulance that had been parked outside her house was missing.
GPS in the ambulance led police to Davey and subsequently Ms Woodford’s body, buried in a shallow grave 1.5km from Fregon.
Mr Kalali said that if not for the GPS, police would have faced a near impossible challenge of finding Ms Woodford’s body.
Keith Woodford gives evidence
Fighting back tears, Mrs Woodford’s husband Keith rejected claims in a statement by a senior executive at Nganampa Health Council that his wife had left the house on a “personal errand” when she was abducted.
“Gayle was there to do a job and the only reason she would have been outside was to help Davey,” he said.
“That statement is disgusting. To think she was outside for some personal errand is absolutely woeful and a slur on her name.”
The coroner’s court also heard that nurses and doctors in the Fregon community, in the APY Lands, had expressed safety concerns to the Nganampa Health Council, which ran the local clinic and was where Ms Woodford worked.
In February 2017, Davey pleaded guilty to Ms Woodford’s abduction, rape and murder at Fregon, in SA’s Far North.
Ms Woodford, 56, was lured from her Fregon home late in the night as Mr Woodford slept in their bed.
She was put in her town ambulance and driven to her death in scrubland on the outskirts of Fregon.
Mr Woodford believed she had left home to attend a common late-night medical emergency.
Davey’s guilty pleas meant his history of escalating violence and sexually motivated attacks against women could be revealed.
The murder occurred six months after Davey had been released from parole conditions.
He had been in prison over a violent indecent assault upon a passed-out woman, in front of shocked witnesses on North Tce in the city in September, 2012.
MORE TO COME
Originally published as Gayle Woodford inquest told ‘catalogue of blunders’ led to Dudley Davey being unmonitored before he murdered nurse
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