RedHanded - Episode 56 - Snowtown: The Bank Vault Body Barrels - Part 2

Episode Date: August 9, 2018

This week in the concluding episode of the harrowing Snowtown saga; John Bunting and Robert Wagner start to spiral. As they killed with increasing impunity, the net began to close - and their eventual capture led to a trial so gruesome members of jury walked out in disgust.   See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

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BetMGM operates pursuant to an operating agreement with iGaming Ontario. They say Hollywood is where dreams are made. A seductive city where many flock to get rich, be adored, and capture America's heart. But when the spotlight turns off, fame, fortune, and lives can disappear in an instant. Follow Hollywood and Crime, The Cotton Club Murder on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Hannah. I'm Saruti. And this is Red Handed. Welcome back. Last week, we left you just as Barry Lane was being dismembered by John Bunting, Mark Hayden, and his former lover, Robert Wagner. As

Barry's flatmate, Thomas Trevelyan, watched. And some people claim that he joined in too. Thomas had very severe mental health issues. He was a paranoid schizophrenic. And some people claim that he joined in too. Thomas had very severe mental health issues. He was a paranoid schizophrenic and after watching the torture and murder of Barry Lane, he was understandably the most vulnerable he had ever been. Thomas would walk around carrying a large knife and wearing camouflage. He was a fully fledged member of the tinfoil hat brigade and was constantly worried about being tracked by satellites, which in the 90s sounded ridiculous and everyone would have had a good laugh at him. But look at where we are now. Fully correct. We are all being tracked by satellites all the time. All right, Alex Jones.

We are. How do you think Google Maps works? Thomas Trevelyan moved in with Robert Wagner and his new partner, Vicky Mills, after Barry's murder and stopped taking his medication. After Barry was gone, one would assume that Thomas couldn't pay all of his rent himself and that's why he moved in with Wagner. I also, I was thinking about this, whether I think Thomas joined in with the murder or not. It seems odd that afterwards he would move in with one of the murderers if he wasn't involved. Do you know what I mean? Like, I know he's incredibly vulnerable mentally, but I just, that doesn't quite sit right with me, I don't think.

While living with Wagner, Thomas's behaviour became incredibly erratic. He started to threaten their dog and ran around the house with a large knife, which is less than ideal in a house full of children. So John Bunting and Robert Wagner took Thomas out for a drive. His body was found in November 1997, hanging from a tree by the side of the road. Now this is really an out-of-character kill for Robert and John. They didn't take the pleasure they took with Barry Lane. They just needed him out of the way.

And at just 18 years old, he didn't even have anything worth stealing. No one, including police and forensic pathologists, treated Thomas Trevelyan's death as suspicious. After all, he was a paranoid schizophrenic who had just come off his medication. It's hardly beyond the realms of imagination that he would have been driven to suicide. And police and forensic pathologists were fooled. They believed that Thomas had killed himself. Thomas had left behind a lead though, because he had told his cousin that Bunting and Wagner had killed Barry Lane and that they were using his PIN number. She initially discounted this as schizophrenic ramblings but

after Thomas's death she couldn't help wondering if it might be true so she rang the police and was overwhelmed with relief when the police told her that Barry Lane was alive and well. He'd just moved to Queensland and they knew that he was alive because he was still withdrawing his pension. I hardly think that when this woman is coming to you and telling you that they've taken his pin after murdering him and they're like no no he's alive and well he's still withdrawing his money. But that's the police throughout this case that's what they use like if I go missing and all they do is check my bank account so I'm going to be pretty annoyed pretty especially imagine if i'm telling them someone killed her and took her pin and her bank account

details oh no no she's still alive because she's using it what yeah because of course this was and i do wonder whether how well known thomas was to police or he is a paranoid schizophrenic so i can understand why people were hesitant to believe what he was saying but that doesn't mean you shouldn't look into it especially when people are dropping like flies in this town anyway. That's the thing with this case, because of course it wasn't true. Because Barry Lane hadn't just moved to Queensland and using his bank card there to withdraw his pension. He'd been cut up into little pieces, was currently sat in a barrel covered in acid. Jamie Vlasakis was still living with John Bunting and Elizabeth Harvey in Murray Bridge.

And by this time, he was big into heroin. He decided to move his equally drug-addled mate, Gavin Porter, into the house in Murray Bridge as well. These lot really just seem to love living with literally anyone they come across. Like, I know it possibly could be a financial issue of, you know, more people to split the rent with. But it really does seem everyone just lives with everyone all the time. It's quite bizarre. John Bunting hated drug addicts. He overlooked it with Jamie because he saw him as family and he's his little disciple after all. But John Bunting hated Gavin Porter with a passion. And to be honest, Gavin Porter does sound like a bad house guest because he would, amongst other things, leave dirty syringes lying around the house.

There are children in there. That is disgusting. And by April 1998, John Bunting had had it. Jamie came home one day and was told that John needed him in the shed. And quick note about the shed, John Bunting's shed was very much like you needed permission to enter the shed you couldn't just walk in there if you live with someone you know your partner whatever and they have a secret room or a space or a shed where you're not allowed to go when they're not there or without their permission red flag red flag yeah absolutely unsurprisingly when he went down to the shed he he saw Gavin Porter's body lying on the floor.

He had been beaten incredibly badly and he wasn't breathing. And I'm going to say, OK, you've got a difficult house guest. You've got somebody who has the awkward thing. They've outstayed their welcome. Maybe you just have that difficult conversation with them and you're like, hey, I think it's time for you to move out. They're just like, no, we'll just murder our way out of all of our problems the same with thomas trevelyan as well like very different kill for them but he he was getting in the way he was erratic they needed him gone this is the thing that's absolutely crazy i mean when they're killing people to steal from them it's one thing because i think they get off on the kill and

they also get the sort of financial rewards from it but gavin porter was like a heroin addict that didn't have anywhere to live and was living here they killed him just because they couldn't be bothered to be like move out exactly and I guess that John obviously fucking hated him because he was a drug addict but still this is the way they see the resolution to all of their problems is to just murder anyone who gets in their way well they have been getting away with it they have been at this point so I can understand absolutely what it may not understand but I get it from they're like, oh, well, you know, we've killed, I mean, how many people have they killed?

Up to 0.5, 6 people. It's just insane because. Just do it again. It's like you said, everyone around them goes missing or turns up dead. And it's just, that's the crazy thing. Normally, serial killers, rule number one, don't kill people you know, because it will immediately be linked back to you. That's why serial killers, serial killings are the hardest to the hardest crimes to investigate these guys

they are so it's insane they just kill everyone who moves into their house and they get away with it and then john and robert at this point now show jamie the two barrels in the shed that contained the bodies of michael gardner and barry, covered in hydrochloric acid. Jamie was forced to put his friend into the third barrel and cover him with acid. In later police interviews, Jamie would describe feeling violently sick, but being too afraid of John Bunting to do anything but what he said. So we played along and we can decide how far we actually believe him later on. By August 1998, Jamie was 21 and still living in Murray Bridge. His eldest half-brother Troy Ewed lived there too. Jamie was asleep one night when he was

woken up by Bunting and Wagner. They handed him a pair of handcuffs and led him to Troy's room. They told Jamie that this was his chance to get his revenge on Troy for raping him all those years ago. They handcuffed Troy and dragged him to the bathroom. Wagner and Bunting made Troy address them as God, Lord Sir, Master, and my personal favourite, Chief Inspector. And they were clearly having the absolute time of their lives. Like, this is a game for them. It's so obvious. This is the thing. It's like, Troy's been living in that house the whole time. Yes, he did sexually abuse and rape his brother jamie when they were younger but like how long has this been stewing is it just one day bunting decides yeah we're gonna kill troy now and we're gonna use it as the reason because he

raped you what that's exactly i think that's exactly the order it happens in bunting decides he needs to kill someone he looks around see who who's just kicking around and he's like okay i could probably shoehorn this in some sort of way to put you on the kill list yeah absolutely and this is what we said in the first episode about how vigilante killers will inevitably fall apart into a situation like this where he can just look at troy decide some reason for why he wants to kill him and set that into action out of seemingly nowhere they also forced t Troy to apologise to Jamie. They made him speak into a tape recorder,

telling his mother, Elizabeth Harvey, John Bunting's partner, let's remember. That's what is really shocking. And with the rest of the victims in this episode, we see it so clearly. Like, Bunting doesn't give a fuck who he's killing. It's genuinely like he can't make the connection between this woman, his partner, and her son. He can't understand that killing her son might upset

her. Like, he doesn't make the link. It doesn't matter to him. So they get Troy to explain to his mum in this recording that he's going out to explore the world. Bunting is getting smarter too. Getting his victim to speak on the phone mid-torture session was much too risky. They could cry out or beg for help, so recording them speak into a tape recorder gave him much more control over the situation. They got Troy to give up his PIN number and then Wagner strangled Troy to death. Wagner was definitely the muscle man. He was taller and bigger than John, so he would almost always finish the victims off. Once Troy was dead, Jamie helped Robert and John

to dismember his brother and they put him in a barrel and kept him in the shed with the others. When Elizabeth Harvey came home with her younger sons, John told her that Troy had gone off with his friends. When Troy didn't come home, Elizabeth was really worried. So John told her that Troy had met a girl, found a job and moved away. How she took his word for this, I have no idea. But she chose to believe it and they continued with their lives until they needed to move to another house. Bunting knew that moving the barrels containing the bodies of Michael Gardner, Barry Lane and Gavin Porter would be far too risky. So he buoys them off onto another one of his devoted followers, Mark Hayden, who agreed to store the barrels in his garage.

In his what? Oh, fuck off. Store the barrels in his garage. Hayden lived with his wife, another Elizabeth, who Bunting absolutely hated because she was overweight, had many of her children taken off her by social services, and because she had herpes. She doesn't sound like the best, but...

But how does he know she's got herpes? Why is she telling people that? Why is her husband sharing that information with his friends? That's true. And also, if it's just you and your husband, how are you... Well, can you still get herpes? There's not, like, a fair thing going on.

It's one of those things that once you contract it, you have it forever, so she could have got it at any point. And it just lies dormant. Hayden and his wife also shared this house with Elizabeth Hayden's sister, Jodie Elliot, and her teenage son, Fred Brooks, who had severe learning difficulties but by all accounts was a really lovely and gentle kid.

John Bunting was around the Hayden house all the time, presumably so he could be close to his precious barrels of death. He also quite liked being around Jodie Elliot and flirted with her loads. I have seen in some places that Jodie and John were in a relationship at one point, but I'm not entirely sure if that's true. But would it shock me that John Bunting is shagging around a bit? No, not really. So I think there's definitely some sort of romantic something happening, whether it's just flirting or whether it's a full-blown relationship, I don't know. But despite fancying his mother, John Bunting hated Fred. He was convinced that although he was just 17, that Fred was a paedophile.

And in September 1998, John jamie robert and fred brooks were all playing a game with handcuffs and who does that remind you of who else plays a handcuff game john wayne gacy exactly i don't it's kind of like they're just like oh serial killer 101 like what can we do next to spice it up a bit like it's like reading like the karma sutra of death come here kid put these handcuffs on i'll show you a trick exactly the trick is i take you into the bathroom torture you to death so they're playing the handcuff game and just like john wayne gacy did when the handcuffs are on fred that's it game over they lead him to the bathroom and they begin their torture they force fred to

record a message admitting that he was a pedophile that, that he had got a 13-year-old girl pregnant and he was moving to Perth to be with her. And quick warning, this torture description gets very, very graphic. You are going to clench your bum cheeks. You have been warned. If you don't want to listen to it, just skip forward. Bunting, Wagner and Vlasakis, who was a willing participant in this torture by now, crushed Fred Brooks' toes with pliers, they burned a smiley face into his head with cigarettes, they injected water into his testicles, and they pushed lit sparklers into his penis.

And eventually, after about seven hours of this hell, Fred Brooks choked to death on the gag in his mouth. Instead of putting Fred's dismembered body into a new barrel, the group split Fred Brooks' body parts amongst the three barrels that were already there. Very economical. You don't just want to be buying a new barrel and a whole load of acid for every person you murder. You've got to keep those profit margins tight. You can't just be using all that money to buy barrels. Use what you've got. It's very resourceful. And a few days later, Jodie Elliott received a call from her son. A quote-unquote call from her son. Because of course, it was just the pre-recorded message

that Bunting had extracted from him. This call recording told her that he was leaving. And what's interesting in this recording as well, or on this call as far as Jodie's concerned, is that he's being really abusive towards her. But this was due to the fact that he's being really abusive towards her but this was due to the fact that he was being tortured when he recorded it. Jodie was shocked and upset by the abuse. It certainly didn't sound like her son but she was pleased that he was alive. John, Robert and Jamie wasted no time in getting their hands on Fred's welfare payments. It really seems that Bunting feels no affinity with anyone. He has no problem at all with killing the son of a woman that he liked and also the son of the woman he liked who had severe learning

difficulties yeah he just decided out of nowhere with no proof that he was a pedophile and that was good enough a reason to kill him probably because he knew he had learning difficulties and maybe he was getting more welfare contributions do you think that's a fair reason yeah i think so and also like he he's totally he's not averse to killing people with issues like ray davis severe learning difficulties thomas trevely and paranoid schizophrenic and now fred brooks like it doesn't matter to him if anything like you said they're better targets they're easier kills absolutely go after the vulnerable that is the mo here and despite the drawn out torture of poor fred brooks bunting and w Wagner were already ready for their next kill.

And this is just so classic. We see it time and time again with serial killers. That cooling-off period between kills starts to narrow. And their next victim fit their profile perfectly. He was a vulnerable, young, single man who lived in the Murray Bridge neighbourhood. And, added bonus for John Bunting, he looked very similar to Troy Youde. Gary O'Dwyer was the man in their crosshairs. He was severely

epileptic and had suffered brain damage in a motorbike accident a few years before. It had only been a month since the murder of Fred Brooks, but Bunting was ready to strike again. So he sent Jamie on a reconnaissance mission. Jamie went over to Gary O'Dwyer's house and befriended him. He managed to find out that Gary was receiving welfare payments and Jamie suggested that he could introduce Gary to his friends. Gary was delighted to have such an interested neighbour. He had only just moved to the area and he was so happy at the prospect of new friends

which is heartbreaking. Like I don't know why but this one got to me so much. It's heartbreaking because of course Bunting and Wagner Jamie introduced Gary to John and Robert, and they had a few drinks at Gary's house on the 28th of October 1998. But it wasn't long before Robert Wagner had Gary O'Dwyer in a headlock on the floor. Gary told the three his PIN number while they tortured him, and they recorded him admitting again that he was a paedophile, and they recorded another message in which he said that some of his friends were going to help him move to Perth. Then, just like with the others, they dismembered Gary O'Dwyer and put him in a barrel full of acid in Mark Hayden's shed. He was only 21 when they killed him. If anyone mentioned that they hadn't seen Gary in a barrel full of acid in Mark Hayden's shed. He was only 21 when they killed him. If anyone mentioned that they hadn't seen Gary in a while, Bunting simply told them that he had been

beaten up by some people who were still threatening him, so he had been forced to leave town. But it still wasn't enough. Mark Hayden's wife, Elizabeth, was causing trouble, and very conveniently, she disappeared. And now we're back at the top of our story. Elizabeth's brother reported her missing and her husband Mark didn't. And this caught the police department's eye. Not only were Mark and Elizabeth fighting more fiercely than ever, Mark had told John Bunting that his wife, Elizabeth, knew about the murder of Clinton Trezoas all those years ago in lower light. And that was it for John Bunting. She had to go. But he did it behind her husband's back.

Robert and John waited for Mark Hayden to be out of the house before they pounced on the 21st of November 1998. They attacked Elizabeth in her own house and dragged her to the bathroom where they tortured and strangled her. Then they put her in the boot of Bunting's car and eventually put her in a barrel in the garage, presumably when Mark Hayden wasn't looking. But according to Jamie Vlasakis, when Bunting and Robert Wagner revealed his wife's dismembered body in the barrel in the garage, all Mark Hayden did was laugh.

Then the barrels all get moved to Snowtown and eventually, as we know from last week's episode, they're moved into the bank. When Hayden's house was searched by the police, they found all of Elizabeth's personal effects. And Mark had no answer as to why she would have left them behind. And remember, when the police searched Hayden's house, the barrels have gone, but their stench remained. So get this, the Ontario Liberals elected Bonnie Crombie as their new leader. Bonnie who? I just sent you a profile. Her first act as leader asking donors for a million bucks for her salary. That's excessive.

She's a big carbon tax supporter. Oh yeah. Check out her record as mayor. Oh, get out of here. She even increased taxes in this economy. Yeah. Higher taxes, carbon taxes. She sounds expensive.

Bonnie Crombie and the Ontario Liberals. They just don't get it. That'll cost you. A message from the Ontario PC Party. I'm Jake Warren, and in our first season of Finding, I set out on a very personal quest to find the woman who saved my mum's life. You can listen to Finding Natasha right now exclusively on Wondery+. In season two, I found myself caught up in a new journey

to help someone I've never even met. But a couple of years ago, I came across a social media post by a person named Loti. It read in part, Three years ago today that I attempted to jump off this bridge, but this wasn't my time to go. A gentleman named Andy saved my life. I still haven't found him.

This is a story that I came across purely by chance, but it instantly moved me. And it's taken me to a place where I've had to consider some deeper issues around mental health. This is season two of Finding. And this time, if all goes to plan, we'll be finding Andy. You can listen to Finding Andy and Finding Natasha

exclusively and ad-free on Wondery+. Join Wondery in the Wondery app, Apple Podcasts, or Spotify. Hi, I'm Lindsey Graham, the host of Wondery Show American Scandal. We bring to light some of the biggest controversies in U.S. history, presidential lies, environmental disasters, corporate fraud. In our latest series, NASA embarks on an ambitious program to reinvent space exploration with the launch of its first reusable vehicle, the Space Shuttle. And in 1985, they announced they're sending teacher Krista McAuliffe into space aboard the Space Shuttle Challenger, along with six other astronauts.

But less than two minutes after liftoff, the Challenger explodes. And in the tragedy's aftermath, investigators uncover a series of preventable failures by NASA and its contractors But despite the police officers sniffing around, Bunting, Wagner and Vlasakis did not stop their murderous rampage. And on the 9th of May 1999, Jamie told his former stepbrother, David Johnson, that he could sell him a computer on the cheap. And remember, their whole cover-up about why they needed that bank vault was they could store all these computers that they were going to sell. But he told him if he wanted this computer that they were going to have to drive to Snowtown together in order to get it. See, David had a job, which Bunting thought made him a yuppie. What was his job? Was he like a financial investment guy who was like, you know, a two bedroom flat in Dulwich?

Like what makes him a yuppie just because he had a fucking job? That does make you a yuppie, by the way, in case anyone's wondering. Absolutely. As long as it's got a fireplace, you're a yuppie. That's what does it. And a French bulldog. So, you know, he thought, this yuppie, he needs a computer. Let's tell him we can sell a computer and get him down to Snowtown.

And being a yuppie as well, again with Bunting, that was reason enough for him to make the kill list. Literally, what other reason is there for this guy to be on this kill list? It's absolutely insane. And Jamie was more than happy to deliver his former stepbrother, David Johnson, to Bunting. And I think it's really important to ask at this point, is he just following orders or is he into this? And just in case you need a reminder of just how incestuous the whole thing is with David Johnson, he is a son of Marcus Johnson, who was married to Elizabeth Harvey before she started going out with John Bunting. I really don't know where I stand with Jamie Vlasakis.

I completely get that he's this incredibly impressionable young kid and Bting's taken him under his wing but as we see later on he he does say that he was just too scared to say no and i don't know if i believe that because he's delivering his brother straight into his hands absolutely i uh more towards the side that jamie is into this and is not an innocent person just following orders because he's scared for his life. And, you know, this again is just another heartbreaking situation, just like with Fred, because David was super excited about his new computer. He jumped into Jamie's car and together they headed off to Snowtown with no questions asked by David. They had been stepbrothers after all, and why would he ever suspect him the police intercepted a call

between versakis and bunting on the car drive over bunting told jamie that his voice was the voice of happiness surprisingly poetic for a man who loves murdering people and hiding their bodies in barrels he tells them you know the machine was all set up doesn't mean the computer well they're speaking in code so i because i think at this point they know they're being listened to like a lot of the police talk about them speaking in code and they never say anything over the phone that's like explicit so he's saying the machine is set up referring to the computer but he actually means we're ready to go wow that's intense and once in snowtown jamie took david into the old bank where

the bodies were being held in the barrels and bunting and wagner were lying in wait once david was inside they handcuffed him and pinned him to the ground then they continued their usual routine of torture and the extraction of pin numbers jamie and robert took david's bank cards to the atm to check that the details david had given them were actually correct. This meant they left David alone with Bunting and David managed to actually briefly overpower Bunting and kicked him in the ribs and this made Bunting absolutely furious. So he strangled David Johnson immediately. When Wagner and Vosakis returned to find David already dead, Wagner, get this, was absolutely furious because the strangling was his job and it was the bit that he looked forward to apparently and Bunting had

stolen it from him. Just absolutely proof that Wagner is fully into this. There is no doubt. I think he is a bit of an idiot henchman, but he's very, like he's into it for sure. Yeah. Bunting quickly dismissed Wagner and told him and Vlasakis that they would need to put on their playsuits because this one was going to be a slice and dice. By playsuits, Bunting meant disposable overalls, which were needed because they were going to make a mess by slicing and dicing David Johnson's body. He's such a gimp. Yeah.

Why is he still speaking in fucking code at this point? Like, if the police were listening, they'd just listen to you strangle a man to death the men be like oh better get those male rompers on boys we've got a slice and dice party to get to wait he enjoys it though like he gets the people he's torturing to call him like god it's all a game for him like i think he enjoys the the different use of language they needed to cut david johnson up because he has to go in the barrels and there are already seven bodies in six barrels so they were going to have to cut him up pretty small if he was going to fit. Vlasakis would later claim that he said to Bunting that he didn't think the body needed to be cut up, that there was plenty of room but Bunting and Wagner unsurprisingly

totally ignored him and cut David Johnson, Jamie's once stepbrother, into tiny pieces and shoved him into the barrels. David Johnson thought he was going to buy a cheap computer from his stepbrother and he ended up being dismembered. But not all of David Johnson's body made it into the barrels. Bunting and Wagner decided that they wanted to take some of him home with them. Just cutting people up into pieces wasn't enough for Bunting and Wagner anymore. Coming to visit their victims in the bank wasn't enough either. They wanted to take a bitter victim with them wherever they went. And I think you can tell where this is going, but before we get there, let's talk about Robert Wagner for a second. He's not just following orders. I think in the beginning that's possible, but there's no question that he's enjoying what he's doing by

this stage in the game he needs the murderous antics to ramp up just as much as john bunting does and this is illustrated perfectly when they all got back to robert wagner's house and wagner cooked a piece of david johnson in a frying pan and ate it john bunting ate it too jamie vlasakis claims that he declined the offer of eating the flesh of his stepbrother, but whether he actually did, we will never know. Unlike other victims, David Johnson was actually missed. Bunting, Wagner and Vlasakis were starting to get sloppy with their victim choices. David, you see, had been engaged to a girl in Adelaide when they murdered him, and she obviously noticed that he was gone. When anyone asked after David, you see, had been engaged to a girl in Adelaide when they murdered him, and she obviously noticed that he was gone.

When anyone asked after David, Bunting and his cronies gave the same story that they had given every other time. They said David had met another woman and he had run off with her. David's fiancée, however, turned up at his house four days after he disappeared, and when she arrived she found John Bunting and Robert Wagner doing doing their favourite postkill thing and moving out David's furniture. Can you imagine? Your fiancé is missing. You haven't heard from them in four days and you turn up at their house and people are just casually shifting his tables and sofas around.

When they're caught doing this, Bunting just tells her that David had run off with another woman. And of course she was absolutely distraught. But apparently she was convinced of this story when she rang David's phone and a woman picked up. But the woman was, of course, one of Bunting's affiliates that they had put up to the job. Her name was Gail Sinclair and she was the sister of Elizabeth Hayden. Which is also pretty fucked up because Elizabeth Hayden is dead at this point. And her sister is still helping out John Bunting. And this is how much forethought

he's put into this lie yeah you can have this phone and then when if the fiance calls you pretend to be the woman he's run off with no one's asking any questions no one is asking any questions they're just doing as they're told they're getting sloppy with their victim choices but they seem to be getting more criminally sophisticated with things like this to trick the people that they're trying to cover up the crimes. And like the recording of them speaking rather than putting them on the phone. Like they are getting smarter, but at the same time, they're not in their victim selection. It's kind of like a scale.

But I think what it is, is it's like we normally see with serial killers that they're getting more criminally sophisticated because of the experience that they're gaining. But at the same time, they're devolving. They're getting more erratic. They're getting more violent. It's escalating. Things like the cannibalism starts to appear. So I think they're sort of spiralling, but at the same time becoming more experienced.

It's a weird mix. And here's another thing I don't understand. This all happens in May 1999. Did everyone have mobile phones then? I don't think so. I don't know. I mean, this is a very low socioeconomic group. I'm not convinced that everyone would have a Nokia 3310. I don't know how I feel about that. And I'm raising this question because in the story, David Johnson's fiance is convinced that he's run off with another woman because she calls his phone, which has to be a mobile because otherwise she's just ringing his house phone in the house she stood in like that doesn't make any sense

so either i think the phone thing isn't true or everyone had a mobile phone and i've just misunderstood the time period possibly i don't know let us know what you think like whether it would be normal to have a phone in 1999 i think i got my first phone in 2002. How old were you? I think I was 12 or 13. I don't know. I had like a shit phone when I was like 15. Like a Motorola with like a massive aerial. I definitely had a 3310 was my first phone. But it's because I had to walk a mile to the bus stop to get the bus to school. I needed to be able to communicate with my parents that i was alive i never had a nokia you know sure i went for a motorola too do you remember that tiny tiny phone i forgot yeah oh the teeny tiny yeah i remember i had one of those because i was like oh it's so cute and i had one of those it was terrible i don't know how i ever typed anything on there

yeah i don't think i could go back to using one like a triple a triple push button did you ever have a blackberry i did have aBerry for a brief period of time. I never had a BlackBerry either. Did you not? Very out of the loop with what phones were on trend while we were growing up. Hey, you're all right. You've got an iPhone now. Now we're up to the 21st of May, 1999, which, if you'll remember, is when Detective Greg Stone and his team discover the bodies in the barrels at the abandoned bank in Snowtown. Early in the morning the day after this vile discovery, John Bunting,

Robert Wagner and Mark Hayden were all arrested. The bodies in the barrels couldn't be identified because they were submerged in acid or cut up into little bits or both. So all three of them were charged with the murder of persons unknown. Very shortly after this, the investigating detectives received a call from a lawyer employed by Jamie Vlasakis, advising them that Jamie had information about the Snowtown bodies. The arrests of Hayden, Bunting and Wagner had terrified Jamie, and this offer of information to the police was his last shot at saving his arse. He knew that the police would catch up with him eventually. And you can

take this confession in two ways either one it was a desperate attempt to get himself a shorter sentence and therefore he makes himself out to be too scared to say no to john bunting or two he is actually telling the whole truth and he wants the police to know every horror that john bunting had inflicted over the past 10 years with jamie like you you have to decide whether you believe him or not and personally i feel at this point like wagner bunting and hayden have all been arrested like he knows he is next like he knows it is only a matter of time so i think this is a preemptive strike from him to be like i'm going to try and get out of this any way I can. Maybe they'll give me immunity if I give them up.

I don't think that his statement is necessarily an indication that he was just following orders. He was just too afraid of John Bunting to say no. But that's very much the argument he makes in court. I think this is like the perfect situation. You tell them every horrible thing that John Bunting and Wagner ever did. And that also paints it in a frame of, of course, any normal person would have been terrified had they been associated with men like this. And also, the more horrifying he can make it sound, not that he has to embellish or try very hard, the increased likelihood that John Bunting and these guys will go away for a

very, very long time and he'll be safe. This is the perfect scenario if he had gotten away with them believing that he had just been too scared to say no. That's a really good point. And over the course of six days, Jamie Vlasakis gave an 800-page statement to the police. And this statement revealed what kind of man the police were dealing with in John Bunting. This statement goes all the way back to Clinton Trezoas, like he really starts right from the beginning and takes the police through every step of the process. Vlasakis was told that in exchange for his statement, his immunity from prosecution would be considered. That's the key word. Months after he gave his statement, he was told

that his immunity request had been denied by the court and that he would stand trial, just like Hayden, Wagner, and of course, Bunting. As the investigation progressed and bodies began to be identified, David Johnson's was among the first, presumably because his remains were the least decomposed, and Jamie Vassakis was charged with his murder. Jamie's now interviewed for a second time, and this statement is 2,000 pages long. I think that's a sign that he's panicking. 2,000 pages? Fucking hell. That's insane.

That's like a bloody Argos catalogue worth of statement. Now, Elizabeth Harvey, Jamie's mum, was also called into questioning and she admitted to the police that she had not seen her eldest son and Jamie's half-brother Troy Ewed in over eight months. Elizabeth Harvey was shocked or at least acted shocked when the police told her that David Johnson's wallet was found in the vault at the Snowtown Bank. Elizabeth assured police that she knew absolutely nothing about what her partner John Bunting had been doing, which I personally think is absolute bollocks. Perhaps she didn't know everything, but surely she had to question where the fuck all that furniture kept appearing from. This is what I mean. Like, either they're all too shit scared of him to ask any questions or they're all just

fucking morons and they just accept that oh this is how the world operates around me I am in no way responsible or engaged with it things just happen and I just shrug my shoulders and get on with my life but I don't know I just don't know with Elizabeth Harvey similarly to Jamie Vasek it's like I don't she's not innocent at all but I don't know how far she was an accomplice or whether she was just afraid. That's true. But let's not forget that Elizabeth had impersonated Suzanne Allen in order to reroute her welfare payments to her house. So we can't know exactly, but at best, she's just a fraudster. And at worst, she knew everything.

It is possible, though, that she was so scared of John Bunting that she did whatever he said. But remember, she stabbed Ray Davies right at the beginning of this murderous campaign. I think I haven't totally decided where I stand with Elizabeth Harvey, but she's most certainly not innocent. The more I think about it, the more inclined I am to believe that... I think everyone in this case is just she knew a incredibly troubled and be just all about self-preservation there is

this scary man who is like if you do everything it's like classic domestic abuse but on a grand scale with john bunting if you do exactly what i tell you to do i'll spare you you can come out of this alive but you have to go along with this enthusiastically. And I think they all do what they need to to survive in this situation. I'm not excusing their behavior, but I don't know. I feel like all of this just became incredibly normalized for them. I agree. Greg Stone and his police team weren't too sure about Elizabeth Harvey either. So they kept pressing her for information and eventually they cornered her. They told her that they had irrefutable evidence of her impersonating Suzanne Allen and that is

all it took for Elizabeth to start talking. She knew she was in big trouble. Elizabeth told police the same story that Bunting had told her, that he had only meant to rob Suzanne and when he got there she was already dead. So he buried her to make sure he wouldn't get in trouble which honestly is the most bizarre logic. I can never think of a situation where I walk into a house even if I am trying to rob it someone's dead and I don't call the police. Doesn't that happen? That's happened recently hasn't it where burglars were in someone's house and they found the owner of the house dead and they rang the police and like gave themselves up and the police were like oh oh, don't worry about it.

On your way. That's the right thing to do. Not like just morally. I mean, like, why tie yourself up into all sorts of crazy situations? Just. Yeah, quit while you're ahead, I reckon, with something like that. There's also all those people that come clean to the police and then get falsely imprisoned. That's always a risk.

But Elizabeth does admit to the benefit fraud because she doesn't really have a choice and the police charge her with it and they let her go for now it wasn't until june 1999 that the police due to an anonymous tip discovered the bodies of suzanne allen and ray davies buried in the garden of 203 waterloo corner road john bunting robert wagner and mark hayden were initially all charged with 10 counts of murder. Jamie Vlasakis was charged with 5 counts of murder. At their lengthy committal hearing, none of them said a word, as in they didn't even enter a plea. They all just sat there in silence like insolent schoolchildren. So, court proceeded as if their silence were a not guilty plea.

Before the trial could get underway though, Elizabeth Harvey died of cancer in 2001 and after hearing about his mum's death, Jamie Vlasakis changed his plea to guilty. He definitely did this to try and get a lighter sentence. Just like with his enormously long statement, Jamie was doing everything he could to cooperate. Eventually, John, Robert and Mark were each charged with 10 counts of murder and Jamie was charged with five and tried separately. On the 21st of June 2001, Jamie Vlasakis was found guilty of the murders of Fred Brooks, Troy Youde, Gary O'Dwyer and David Johnson. He was also charged with the murder of Gary Porter but during the course of the trial that charge was withdrawn. Jamie was 18 when he committed

his first murder and he was 22 when he was sentenced to four back-to-back life sentences. He would only be eligible for parole after 26 years inside and Jamie Vesakis definitely can be described as an impressionable young man and by growing up in such awful circumstances I can see how his moral compass could have been skewed. Because if you're growing up, we learn what's right and what's wrong by the people around us as growing up. Like intrinsic right and wrong, I personally don't believe exists. We construct them as we grow. And I think the classic example of this is like murder is always bad. Anyone will say, oh, like killing someone is wrong, except if you're a soldier in the army and it's wartime, then you're a hero for killing someone. And that is construction.

That's like the perfect example of constructed right and wrong. It's the same action. It's the same thing. But under different circumstances, it has different reactions from the people surrounding it. So with someone like Jamie, who's raped by his two of his stepdads, by his brother, by the guy across the road. And then he grows up. His formative years are formed by someone like John Bunting who has all of these ideas about justice and how his way is right and everyone else is wrong.

I can see how someone as impressionable as Jamie Lee Lissakis, who has no role models, can grow up with a slightly dented moral compass. However, the question remains, how involved is he? Does he want to do it? Does he enjoy doing it? Or is he just afraid of John Bunting? And honestly, did John Bunting take advantage of him completely? I think yes, when he was a kid, absolutely. But I do. And yes, you've got this man in John Bunting who comes along like a father figure, a saviour to come, you know, rescue you from these paedophiles who have been abusing you your entire life. Tells him that it's okay to kill these people.

He's also suffering with the deep-seated wounds and scars, the psychological scars that he suffered from the abuse. I think his entire worldview, his entire moral compass was shaped around the fucking sickness of John Bunting. So whether he enjoyed it or not by the time he was an adult, I almost think becomes irrelevant. I don't think he stood a chance to not. It was his fight back at a world that had been so cruel to him. I don't want to make excuses for Jamie, but I do think that he never stood a chance I think enjoyment or pleasure

from the killing it was way beyond that I think it just became a way of life for him to please the only man in his life who had been anything other than an abuser towards him but ironically John Bunting was probably the most abusive person towards Jamie that he didn't see it that way and then I think when he finally gets the courage to like dob him in he does it to save himself do you know what I mean I think that's Jamie finally realizing that John Bunting can't save him from this situation you know his mum's dead John Bunting is in prison he's been arrested he has literally nowhere to go so he is trying to salvage anything of his life at this point and that's why he's giving like 2 000 page statements and changing his plea he's doing anything to try and make something of himself

because he's 22 and he realizes that this is it for him now and who can blame him but as you can imagine wagner and bunting were not best pleased when jamie dobbed them into the police and they openly taunted him in the courtroom wagner bunting and hayden were initially tried together with charges for the murders of clinton drisois th Thomas Trevelyan added to the existing 10 counts of murder for Bunting and Wagner. Mark Hayden only received a charge for Clinton. These charges were added because of the testimony of Jamie Vlasakis. He said that Bunting always bragged about killing a man in the early 90s and burying him in lower light. During the run-up to the trial, it became very clear that the evidence against Mark Hayden was nowhere near as strong as the evidence against

John Bunting and Robert Wagner, and in the end, Mark Hayden only stood trial for the murder of Troy Youde and of his wife Elizabeth Hayden. He was charged with assisting in six other murders. Before the trial, Robert Wagner changed his plea. He pled guilty to the murder of Barry Lane, Fred Brooks and David Johnson, but maintained his not guilty plea to the nine other charges of murder. The trial began on the 14th of October 2002. This case was so prolific that a jury of 15 people was assembled. The norm is 12 people. So these extra three people were added due to the graphic nature of the evidence and because of the 10,641 pages of evidence, 227 witnesses and a thousand exhibits that would be presented, this trial was expected to drag on for months. Why haven't I been selected for jury service? Like that is my literal dream.

I'm genuinely scared that it will never happen to me. Some people are worried that they'll never get a boyfriend and that love will never happen to them. I am very worried that jury service will never happen for me. I don't know. Doesn't that sound really boring though? I think I used to think being selected for jury service would be like sitting in a courtroom while someone like dramatized and acted out a true crime documentary. I don't think it's like that. I think, listen, 10,641 pages of evidence, 227 witnesses and a thousand exhibits to be presented, dragging on for months. The like really standard tactic used by defense counsels is to just bore the jury to death so that they lose interest, they lose focus, they're not listening anymore,

and then there's reasonable doubt so they don't convict. I think the game is to bore you to death. I don't think it would be fun. I don't know, man. You don't have to go to work. You get your lunch paid for every day. You're just listening to crime. That sounds great.

Sign me up. I would, but choose me for a swift murder trial. A swift and juicy murder trial. No, I don't want someone to stole a plant. I don't care about stuff like that. Give me a fucking triple homicide. Absolutely. Absolutely.

There's no time for that. My mum got picked for jury service and it was literally white collar. Someone was embezzling money from the company. Oh, boring. No, fart sound. So boring. Anyway, this one was quite traumatic though because the first jury only lasted one day because one of the members of the jury walked out of the courtroom in disgust can you do that can you just like walk out of the courtroom when you've been selected for jury service what i don't know i mean

this guy did but i think it's it's if one member of the jury is compromised they have to have a whole new set of people they can't just swap out one person walking out in disgust i'm like that seems nuts to me as you said when he he or she left a whole new group for the jury had to be selected and it was four months before jamie blasakis was even called to the stand. And when he was, he remained there for an astonishing 32 days. The whole trial took 11 months. The jury deliberated for seven days when it came to the murder of Suzanne Allen. They couldn't come to a conclusion, though.

Reasonable doubt was present. However unlikely it might sound, it was possible, according to the jury, that Suzanne was dead when Bunting and Wagner had got there. But when it came to the other charges though, Bunting would not be so lucky. With the other 11 counts of murder, he was found guilty on every single charge. Wagner was found guilty on 10 counts of murder and at his sentencing, he made it clear that he didn't regret a thing, stating that paedophiles were doing terrible things to children and that the police didn't

do anything about it. He said that this made him angry and that he had decided to take action. John Bunting, on the other hand, remained totally silent. The judge didn't buy the vigilante routine either. He called both men cowards who clearly took pleasure in the acts of killing, torture and dismemberment. And I have to say, I totally agree. Wagner can try and qualify his kills all he wants,

but him and Bunting were definitely in the business of killing for pleasure. It's so obvious. They needed the kick from the kills so much, they ate David Johnson. The judge also felt that neither Wagner nor Bunting had any shot at rehabilitation, so both of them were sentenced to life without parole. And they've both made various appeals, but all of them have been denied. The murder of Suzanne Allen was never brought to a retrial. Mark Hayden's trial started on the 2nd of August 2004. He was convicted of assisting

Bunting, Wagner and Blasakis escape apprehension in the cases of Michael Gardner, Barry Lane, Gavin Porter, Gary O'Dwyer and Fred Brooks. The jury fell to reach a verdict on the cases of David Johnson, Elizabeth Hayden or Troy Ute. No retrial was called and the court accepted a guilty plea from Hayden. A grim discovery was made during the examination of the bodies in the barrels. Elizabeth Hayden had been eight weeks pregnant when she was murdered. Hayden was sentenced to 25 years. In the aftermath of the murders, Snowtown received a lot of unwanted attention. Loads of creeps like us would travel down to the tiny town and take

pictures of the abandoned bank. Snowtown tried to rejuvenate its image by renaming itself Rosetown, but never quite managed it. If you want to have a really shitty day, watch the 2011 Snowtown film. It is draining. That's the only word I can think of to describe it. But what really, really gets me about this case is that if Clinton Trezoas' body had been identified all the way back in 1994, and if his case had been looked into, if his mum had noticed that he was missing before three years after his death, if it had been even scratched a little bit beneath the surface, the police would have been led straight to John Bunting and Robert Wagner. A picture of Clinton was sent to the research centre

where his body was being held and they did digital reconstructions of his face and no one connected the dots. It was all there. It just needed one person to just fucking look at it and no one did. And I really think, obviously it's not for certain, but if Clinton had been identified it was all there it just needed one person to just fucking look at it and no one did and i really think obviously it's not for certain but if clinton had been identified and they had looked into his

death all of this could have been stopped because they would it would have gone straight to john bunting and that's snowtown quite a case to come back with thanks for thanks for sticking with us and thanks for sticking with us through our two-week break there's always that fear when you come back that what if everybody's found a new podcast and they don't want to listen to you anymore oh god yeah I'm so worried you've welcomed us back

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