# 369: Valda, Sally & Damien Connell

An episode of [Morbidology](https://invisiblenetwork.ai/podcast/1463979546), 13 Jul 2026, 47 min.

Audio: https://prefix.up.audio/s/dts.podtrac.com/redirect.mp3/s.gum.fm/s-610c47a4222ada0024acb2d8/pscrb.fm/rss/p/prfx.byspotify.com/e/tracking.swap.fm/track/2IMk17EdnEqyRhJTIpIU/claritaspod.com/measure/api.spreaker.com/download/episode/72496794/morbidology_369_valda_sally_and_damien_connell_a_free.mp3

On the evening of 11 August, 1978, Paul Connell returned to his home in Swansea, Australia, to find his wife and two youngest children missing. The house had been ransacked and broken into. Just a few moments after he returned, he received a strange phone call… SPONSORS - Nutrafol: Find out why Nutrafol is the best-selling hair growth supplement. Use code “MORBIDOLOGY10” for $10 off at: http://nutrafol.com/ Whisker: Learn more about Whisker Litter-Robot models and starter kits today. Take an additional $50 off bundles with code MORBIDOLOGY at: http://whisker.com/morbidology Drip Drop: DripDrop uses science-based formulas for rapid hydration, so you feel results fast while getting 3x the electrolytes of leading sports drinks. Get 20% with promo code "MORBIDOLOGY" at: http://dripdrop.com/ Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/morbidology--3527306/support.

## Transcript

[0:50] Speaker 1: Swansea sits at the southern edge of the Hunter Region,
[0:52] Speaker 1: about an hour and a half north of Sydney in Australia.
[0:56] Speaker 1: It has water on all sides, the lakes to the west,
[0:59] Speaker 1: the Ocean to the east, and the Swansea Channel connecting
[1:02] Speaker 1: the two of them. Settlers first arrived in the eighteen fifties.
[1:06] Speaker 1: They built a town, and over the following century it
[1:09] Speaker 1: grew slowly into a coastal community. By the nineteen seventies,
[1:13] Speaker 1: Swansea was the kind of place that people passed while
[1:15] Speaker 1: heading elsewhere. It had a petrol stop, a row of shops,
[1:19] Speaker 1: and little all else except for the lake. Families came
[1:23] Speaker 1: in the summer and rented shacks near the water in winter.
[1:27] Speaker 1: The highway carry trucks south to Sydney. The Pacific Highway
[1:32] Speaker 1: in nineteen seventy eight was not the road that it
[1:35] Speaker 1: later became. There was no bypass, no motorway standard. It
[1:40] Speaker 1: was a two lane highway that ran directly through the suburb,
[1:43] Speaker 1: close to the lake. Shore, passed properties and service stations,
[1:47] Speaker 1: and the occasional cluster of gum trees. It curved and
[1:51] Speaker 1: it dipped, and some sections of road ran close to
[1:54] Speaker 1: the edge of a steep embankment that fell away into scrub.
[1:59] Speaker 1: It was a road that it seen accidents. The morning
[2:02] Speaker 1: of the thirteenth of August nineteen seventy eight was cold
[2:05] Speaker 1: and gray. It was the middle of winter in Australia.
[2:09] Speaker 1: Sometime in the morning a call came in to the
[2:11] Speaker 1: local police. Detective Brian Mooney was to splash to a
[2:15] Speaker 1: stretch of the Pacific Highway south of Swansea. A vehicle
[2:19] Speaker 1: had gone off the road and down an embankment into
[2:21] Speaker 1: the scrub below. It was not, on its face, unusual.
[2:27] Speaker 1: The call had come from a tow truck driver named
[2:29] Speaker 1: Ken Ferguson. He'd been out to the same vehicle the
[2:33] Speaker 1: previous night. He had winched it free, washed it drive away,
[2:37] Speaker 1: and had now been called back to the same stretch
[2:40] Speaker 1: of road to find it there again. Detective Mooney made
[2:44] Speaker 1: his way out to the scene. The car was a
[2:47] Speaker 1: gold hold in sedan. It sat at the bottom of
[2:50] Speaker 1: the embankment, pushed into the scrub. The guardrail above it
[2:54] Speaker 1: buckled and broken. The tow truck was already there. He
[2:58] Speaker 1: attached the winch cable and started to drag through the
[3:00] Speaker 1: dirt and scrub up towards the road. Detective Mooney stood
[3:04] Speaker 1: near the top of the embankment and watched the vehicle
[3:07] Speaker 1: come up. The car was almost at the road when
[3:10] Speaker 1: the bootlatch gave. It had taken damage in the crash.
[3:14] Speaker 1: The metal warped just enough that the mechanism no longer held.
[3:18] Speaker 1: As the car was hauled up over the lip of
[3:21] Speaker 1: the embankment, the boot swung open. Nobody was prepared for
[3:26] Speaker 1: what they would find inside. Chapelain was a quiet residential
[3:45] Speaker 1: strait in Bouxham Hills, about thirty kilometers northwest of Sydney
[3:49] Speaker 1: City Center, in the stretch of suburbia known as the
[3:52] Speaker 1: Hills District. This district was known as the Bible Belt
[3:56] Speaker 1: of Sydney in reference to the number of churches that
[3:58] Speaker 1: were there. The families who settled there tended to be
[4:02] Speaker 1: the kind who put down deep roots Catholic Protestant, community
[4:06] Speaker 1: minded people who knew their neighbors, who sent their children
[4:10] Speaker 1: to the local parish school, who turned up on Sundays.
[4:14] Speaker 1: The Connalls were among them, living in their five bedroom,
[4:18] Speaker 1: split level home in the neighborhood. Paul Connell was a builder.
[4:22] Speaker 1: He was said to be a steady and practical man.
[4:26] Speaker 1: He liked to get things right. He drove to work
[4:29] Speaker 1: each morning and came home each evening to a house
[4:31] Speaker 1: that was full of noise and movement and children, and
[4:34] Speaker 1: by all accounts, he considered this a reasonable deal. His wife, Falda,
[4:39] Speaker 1: was thirty nine years old. Walda had grown up with
[4:43] Speaker 1: a sister named Ley, and she would remain close with
[4:45] Speaker 1: her all her life. Paul and Valda had built a
[4:49] Speaker 1: live together that included six children, seventeen year old Gary,
[4:54] Speaker 1: sixteen year old Linda, fourteen year old Lisa, twelve year
[4:57] Speaker 1: old Allison, ten year old Sally, and four year old Damien.
[5:02] Speaker 1: It was a bustling household, but that's how Paul and
[5:05] Speaker 1: Valda liked it. Gary would later describe his childhood as fantastic.
[5:11] Speaker 1: They were all close knit and enjoyed nothing more than
[5:14] Speaker 1: spending time together as a family, and Saint Michael's Roman
[5:19] Speaker 1: Catholic Church was the center of their community life. The
[5:23] Speaker 1: family were regulars there. The parish school, Saint Michael's Roman
[5:27] Speaker 1: Catholic Primary School, sat about a kilometer from the family's home.
[5:32] Speaker 1: It was where the younger children went, it was where
[5:35] Speaker 1: Valda drove each morning to drop them off and each
[5:38] Speaker 1: afternoon to collect them. The afternoon of the eleventh of
[5:41] Speaker 1: August nineteen seventy eight was unfolding the way it always did.
[5:46] Speaker 1: Valda had spent part of the afternoon at the tennis
[5:49] Speaker 1: courts with some friends, the community courts that sat across
[5:53] Speaker 1: a small park and creek from the house on Chapel Lane.
[5:57] Speaker 1: It was the middle of winter, but the day was
[5:59] Speaker 1: clear enough. Val The played, and afterwards she drove to
[6:02] Speaker 1: collect Sally from a friend's house near Saint Michael's. She
[6:07] Speaker 1: had gone there to play after school. Damien was with her,
[6:11] Speaker 1: as he usually was on a Friday. Sally came out
[6:15] Speaker 1: of her friend's house, she got in the car. They
[6:18] Speaker 1: headed home. That evening, Paul Connell finished work and drove
[6:28] Speaker 1: home to Buckham Hills. He pulled into Chapel Laine and parked.
[6:34] Speaker 1: He immediately noticed that Valda's gold holding wasn't parked in
[6:37] Speaker 1: the driveway. He entered the house and found it completely quiet.
[6:44] Speaker 1: That in itself was strange, but things were about to
[6:47] Speaker 1: get even stranger. The house was in complete disarray. Draws
[6:52] Speaker 1: were wide open, with items strown about the furniture and floor.
[6:57] Speaker 1: It had clearly been ransacked items were missing, including a
[7:01] Speaker 1: double barreled shotgun, a cassette player, a digital clock, and
[7:05] Speaker 1: around fifty two dollars. Paul moved through the rooms and
[7:09] Speaker 1: called out for his wife and children. He was met
[7:13] Speaker 1: with silence. He then entered the rumpus room downstairs. One
[7:18] Speaker 1: of the windows had been forced open. Moments later, the
[7:22] Speaker 1: phone started to ring in the house. Paul picked it up,
[7:25] Speaker 1: hoping that it was Walda with an explanation. Maybe she
[7:29] Speaker 1: had stopped at a friend's house with the children. Paul
[7:32] Speaker 1: was surprised to hear a man's voice on the other
[7:34] Speaker 1: end of the line. He sounded calm as he identified
[7:38] Speaker 1: himself as Warren. He said that he and Walda had
[7:42] Speaker 1: been having an affair that had been going on for
[7:45] Speaker 1: some time. The man told Paul that Walda had made
[7:48] Speaker 1: the decision to leave him, but that she would contact
[7:51] Speaker 1: him soon to figure out what to do about Sally
[7:54] Speaker 1: and Damien. He said that they were currently on their
[7:57] Speaker 1: way to Queensland together. The man admitted he had ransacked
[8:02] Speaker 1: the home and confirmed he had stolen the items that
[8:05] Speaker 1: were missing. He then added that he wished he also
[8:08] Speaker 1: stole the color television set. Paul listened the story was,
[8:14] Speaker 1: on its face implausible. The Connalls were a close family,
[8:20] Speaker 1: but the man on the phone was specific. He was steady,
[8:24] Speaker 1: and he didn't sound like someone making things up. The
[8:28] Speaker 1: man then hung up, and Paul stood for several moments
[8:31] Speaker 1: in stunned silence. When the rest of the children returned home,
[8:35] Speaker 1: he told them, either Mum has left us or something
[8:39] Speaker 1: terrible has happened. Paul then contacted police. They arrived at
[8:44] Speaker 1: the family's home and found the story credible enough to
[8:47] Speaker 1: act on with caution. They didn't know the Connalls. This
[8:51] Speaker 1: very well could have been a domestic matter. Maybe Walder
[8:55] Speaker 1: truly was having an affair and left with her two
[8:58] Speaker 1: youngest children. They had no evidence to contradict it, and
[9:02] Speaker 1: the man on the phone had offered it with such
[9:04] Speaker 1: composure that doubt had not yet fully taken hold. Police
[9:09] Speaker 1: logged it and began making inquiries. By the next morning,
[9:13] Speaker 1: detectives had shared information about Valda, Sally, and Damien's disappearance
[9:18] Speaker 1: to the public. They asked that if anybody had seen
[9:21] Speaker 1: them or heard from them, to get in contact immediately.
[9:25] Speaker 1: They released photographs and a description. Valda stood about five
[9:30] Speaker 1: feet two inches tall, with blue eyes and short brown hair.
[9:34] Speaker 1: Sally was four feet six inches tall with straight blonde
[9:37] Speaker 1: hair over her shoulders. Damien was around four feet tall
[9:41] Speaker 1: with blue eyes. Detectives examined the home and found that
[9:45] Speaker 1: none of their clothing was missing. If they had left willingly,
[9:49] Speaker 1: they hadn't packed any bags. Paul commented, it was cold
[9:54] Speaker 1: last night. If she had left us willingly, why wouldn't
[9:57] Speaker 1: she have taken more clothes for herself and the children.
[10:00] Speaker 1: She didn't even take any cosmetics or lipstick. Two days
[10:14] Speaker 1: had passed since Valda, Sally, and Damien had vanished. That morning,
[10:18] Speaker 1: Paul got the children up and ready for mass. He
[10:22] Speaker 1: was devastated and confused, but he still had a family
[10:25] Speaker 1: to care for. It was a Sunday. Detective Brian Mooney
[10:31] Speaker 1: was already up. He had been a plane's closed detective
[10:34] Speaker 1: with Belmont Police for several years. He had also served
[10:38] Speaker 1: in Vietnam. That morning, he responded to the call for
[10:41] Speaker 1: the vehicle off the road at the Old s Bens
[10:44] Speaker 1: on the Pacific Highway near Swansea. It was a gold holden.
[10:49] Speaker 1: It was almost at the lip of the embankment when
[10:52] Speaker 1: the book gave way and sprung open. Detective Mooney glanced inside,
[10:57] Speaker 1: not expecting to see much, but he later said what
[11:01] Speaker 1: he saw stayed with him for the rest of his life.
[11:05] Speaker 1: He had repeated nightmares about it. In the boat with
[11:09] Speaker 1: three bodies, a woman and two small children. They had
[11:14] Speaker 1: been bound and gagged with old rags and then stabbed
[11:17] Speaker 1: to death. It was Walda, Sally, and Damien. Valda had
[11:23] Speaker 1: been stabbed a total of thirteen times. Sally had sustained
[11:27] Speaker 1: six stab wounds, and Damien had been stabbed twice. Detectives
[11:31] Speaker 1: now had three bodies but no suspect. They immediately began
[11:35] Speaker 1: their investigation and learned that the car had been seen
[11:39] Speaker 1: in various places over the past thirty six hours. It
[11:43] Speaker 1: had been on the same road the night before and
[11:45] Speaker 1: had veered off the road. The driver had called the
[11:49] Speaker 1: tow truck company for help. It was a man and
[11:53] Speaker 1: he was alone ken The tee truck driver noticed he
[11:56] Speaker 1: had cuts on two fingers on one hand. He suggested
[12:00] Speaker 1: he go to the hospital and have it looked that.
[12:04] Speaker 1: After the car was recovered, the man got back behind
[12:06] Speaker 1: the wheel and drove away. That same man was then
[12:10] Speaker 1: seen at Belmont Hospital some time over the night. He
[12:14] Speaker 1: had a self inflicted stab wound, but he gave a
[12:17] Speaker 1: false name. He had been stitched up and then discharged
[12:21] Speaker 1: with no questions asked. That same man was also seen
[12:25] Speaker 1: at the Mosson Hotel at Cave's Speech, a pub on
[12:29] Speaker 1: the southern shores of Lake mac Carry. He had spent
[12:33] Speaker 1: the Saturday evening there. He'd even tried to pick up
[12:36] Speaker 1: a woman, but she turned him down and he left irritated.
[12:40] Speaker 1: It had since been discovered that all while this was happening, Valdas,
[12:44] Speaker 1: Sally and Damien lay dead in the car's boot. A
[12:49] Speaker 1: description of the man went out to the public. He
[12:52] Speaker 1: was estimated to be in his thirties or four days,
[12:54] Speaker 1: with a long face and dark hair. The case drew
[12:57] Speaker 1: significant media attention, moved across the state within a single
[13:02] Speaker 1: news cycle. It wasn't a stranger who came forward to
[13:05] Speaker 1: identify the man. It was somebody on the margins of
[13:09] Speaker 1: the same criminal world the man moved through. He was
[13:13] Speaker 1: a local figure, well known to police, and he said
[13:16] Speaker 1: he had spent part of that Sunday in the company
[13:18] Speaker 1: of this man. He identified the man as John Ernest Cribb.
[13:37] Speaker 1: John Ernest Cribb was born on the fifth of August
[13:39] Speaker 1: nineteen fifty. He grew up in the Bouckham Hills. He
[13:44] Speaker 1: was the son of a family who would later relocate
[13:47] Speaker 1: to the mid North coast of New South Wales. Crib
[13:50] Speaker 1: had attended the Marist Brothers Catholic School in Paramatta, the
[13:54] Speaker 1: same religious tradition that anchored the Connells to Saint Michael's.
[14:00] Speaker 1: In the broadest strokes, they might have been neighbors. They
[14:04] Speaker 1: might have passed each other on the street without either
[14:07] Speaker 1: one registering the other at all. They had nothing else
[14:10] Speaker 1: in common. But the time Crab was fourteen years old,
[14:14] Speaker 1: he was smoking cannabis and drinking. By seventeen, he had
[14:18] Speaker 1: moved on to LSD. His youth was troubled. His criminal
[14:23] Speaker 1: history began in nineteen sixty eight when he was seventeen
[14:26] Speaker 1: years old property offenses, at first, the kind of low
[14:30] Speaker 1: level opportunistic crime that the court deals with in volume,
[14:35] Speaker 1: but it only escalated over the following years. Creb moved
[14:39] Speaker 1: from property offenses into armed robbery, cycling through the criminal
[14:43] Speaker 1: justice system. He was arrested, he was sentenced, he served time,
[14:48] Speaker 1: and then he was released. In nineteen seventy two, he
[14:52] Speaker 1: received the ninety year sentence for armed robbery he served
[14:56] Speaker 1: just six years. By early nineteen seve seventy eight, John
[15:00] Speaker 1: Ernest Crab was twenty seven years old, out on parole
[15:04] Speaker 1: and living in the western suburbs of Sydney. He was not,
[15:08] Speaker 1: by the accounts of those who had encountered him in
[15:10] Speaker 1: those months, visibly erratic, not the kind of person who
[15:14] Speaker 1: announced himself as dangerous to a stranger on the street.
[15:19] Speaker 1: He was simply a man out on parole, moving through
[15:21] Speaker 1: a city that had no particular reason to pay him
[15:24] Speaker 1: any attention. The conditions of his release required him to
[15:28] Speaker 1: stay out of trouble. But on the morning of Friday,
[15:31] Speaker 1: the eleventh of August nineteen seventy eighth, creb broke into
[15:35] Speaker 1: a house in Bouckham Hills. After John Ernest Crabb was
[15:45] Speaker 1: identified as the leads suspect, he was tracked on to
[15:48] Speaker 1: a weatherboard house in Union Street. At about five forty
[15:52] Speaker 1: five pm on Sunday, two teenage girls named Kerrie and
[15:55] Speaker 1: Tina Edson came running out of the house and called
[15:58] Speaker 1: for the help of their neighbor, missus J. Bennett. They
[16:01] Speaker 1: said that crib was holding two women hostage. The girls
[16:05] Speaker 1: had met him earlier and he had come back to
[16:07] Speaker 1: their house with them. The radio was on and the
[16:10] Speaker 1: host described the suspect wanted in the triple murder. Carry
[16:15] Speaker 1: and Teena looked at each other and then back to Crib.
[16:18] Speaker 1: They asked if it was him. He said that it
[16:21] Speaker 1: was Carry and Tana ran from the house and over
[16:25] Speaker 1: to mister Bennett. Tina recalled, when we ran, we saw
[16:29] Speaker 1: him bald out of the house. He went to a
[16:32] Speaker 1: house two doors away and grabbed an elderly lady and
[16:35] Speaker 1: held a knife to her throat. It was their neighbor,
[16:38] Speaker 1: Joyce Avery. Mister Bennett ran to a nearby shop and
[16:42] Speaker 1: asked the shopkeeper, mister m Marks, to come to the
[16:45] Speaker 1: house with him. Together, the two men entered the house.
[16:50] Speaker 1: They found that Crib was holding two women hostage, Joyce
[16:54] Speaker 1: and her adult daughter. They rescued the daughter, but Creb
[16:57] Speaker 1: grabbed Joyce and held a knife to threat. He threatened
[17:02] Speaker 1: to stab her if the men didn't leave. They went
[17:05] Speaker 1: outside and waited for the police to arrive. More than
[17:09] Speaker 1: fifty officers surrounded the house, many armed with gas masks
[17:13] Speaker 1: and sledge hammers. Others had shotguns and rifles. Detective Inspector
[17:19] Speaker 1: Gibson said to reporters time is immaterial in this sort
[17:23] Speaker 1: of thing. In an effort to get Creb to surrender,
[17:26] Speaker 1: detectives allowed a friend to enter the house. He tried
[17:30] Speaker 1: to persuade him to let Joyce go and come outside,
[17:33] Speaker 1: but he refused. Several officers were able to break into
[17:37] Speaker 1: the house. They found Creb and the grandmother in the
[17:41] Speaker 1: laundry room. He told them not to come inside, that
[17:45] Speaker 1: he would stab her if they did. The laundry room
[17:48] Speaker 1: was in the middle of the house and officers were
[17:51] Speaker 1: able to speak with Crib and Joyce through the door.
[17:54] Speaker 1: Joyce was given blankets, coffee, and aspirin, and she seemed
[17:58] Speaker 1: to be in good health. Over the next eleven hours,
[18:01] Speaker 1: officers tried to talk to Crib and get him to
[18:04] Speaker 1: come out, but he wouldn't give up. Finally, in the
[18:08] Speaker 1: early morning hours, six officers rammed the laundry door open.
[18:13] Speaker 1: Joyce began to scream. When they entered, they found Crib
[18:17] Speaker 1: on the floor with the twenty centimeter knife protruding from
[18:21] Speaker 1: his chest. He had stabbed himself. Joyce was rescued and
[18:25] Speaker 1: led out of the house, while Crib was transported to
[18:28] Speaker 1: the hospital. She later said of her ordeal, it was
[18:33] Speaker 1: very frightening, but he treated me all right. Creb underwent
[18:45] Speaker 1: surgery at hospital and was reported to be in stable condition.
[18:50] Speaker 1: While this husband, Paul, was placed under heavy sedation. He
[18:54] Speaker 1: was supported by family and friends who moved into the
[18:57] Speaker 1: family home to help care for the other children. He
[19:01] Speaker 1: was spared the horrific task of identifying his wife and
[19:05] Speaker 1: two youngest children. The family doctor, who was a close friend,
[19:10] Speaker 1: volunteered instead. The next day, Crib was released from hospital
[19:15] Speaker 1: and charged with three counts of murder. As the charges
[19:19] Speaker 1: were handed down, he leant on the shoulder of a
[19:21] Speaker 1: detective and began to cry. Just a couple of miles away,
[19:25] Speaker 1: at Saint Patrick's Church, around two thousand people gathered for Valda,
[19:29] Speaker 1: Sally and Damien's funeral. Mourners lined the walls, while hundreds
[19:33] Speaker 1: more stood outside. Over one hundred raiths had been placed
[19:37] Speaker 1: on the grass verge awaiting the cortege. Many in attendance
[19:41] Speaker 1: were school children, some too young to fully comprehend what
[19:44] Speaker 1: had happened, but knowing that their friends weren't coming back
[19:48] Speaker 1: to school. Bishop Edward Clancy delivered eulogy, telling the mourners,
[19:54] Speaker 1: this is a sad and tragic occasion. That brings us together,
[19:58] Speaker 1: an occasion where words are inadequate, when words are too
[20:01] Speaker 1: clumsy and in ebpt to fully express or deep and
[20:04] Speaker 1: heartfelt sorrow. After the service, two rows of children formed
[20:09] Speaker 1: a guard of honor stretching four hundred meters west along Victoria.
[20:13] Speaker 1: Wrote police letter said that the funeral was one of
[20:17] Speaker 1: the biggest the districts had ever seen. As the family
[20:20] Speaker 1: were led to rest, the case was proceeding through the court.
[20:25] Speaker 1: At a hearing in court, it was revealed that Crib
[20:27] Speaker 1: had confessed to the triple murder after the hostage situation.
[20:33] Speaker 1: When he was in an ambulance, he turned to Detective
[20:35] Speaker 1: Sergeant Maroney and said, I shouldn't have killed them. He
[20:40] Speaker 1: asked Crib who he had killed. He responded, you know,
[20:46] Speaker 1: let me die. He asked him once more. Crib responded
[20:51] Speaker 1: and mentioned Valda, Sally and Damien. He then started to cry.
[20:57] Speaker 1: This wasn't the only confession that Crib made. He said
[21:00] Speaker 1: that he had broken into the Connell home on the
[21:02] Speaker 1: eleventh of August when Valda was picking up Sally with Damien.
[21:07] Speaker 1: They came home just as he was leaving. He was
[21:10] Speaker 1: holding the shotgun he had just stolen. He forced Valda
[21:14] Speaker 1: and the children back into the car. Waldn Damien sat
[21:18] Speaker 1: up front with him, while Sally sat in the back seate.
[21:21] Speaker 1: Crib was asked why he had taken them, and he replied,
[21:25] Speaker 1: if I left her, she would have rung the police.
[21:28] Speaker 1: Crib said that he drove to Barral Rewards and took
[21:32] Speaker 1: Sally with him to ring her husband Paul. He told
[21:35] Speaker 1: him they had been having an affair and had run
[21:37] Speaker 1: away together. They then got back into the car and
[21:40] Speaker 1: drove north. Crab ran out of petrol and he ordered
[21:43] Speaker 1: Walda and the children to hide in a bush while
[21:46] Speaker 1: he went to a petrol station to fill a bottle
[21:48] Speaker 1: up with petrol. He then picked them back up and
[21:53] Speaker 1: drove north of Newcastle. The detective said it seemed strange
[21:57] Speaker 1: they would just wait there instead of runaway. Crib said
[22:01] Speaker 1: he told Vada he had a shotgun and would find
[22:04] Speaker 1: them and kill them if they moved from here. They
[22:07] Speaker 1: drove to Mangrove Mountain, where Crib said he raped Falda.
[22:13] Speaker 1: They then headed to Ellenborough Falls. Crib showed them a
[22:17] Speaker 1: spot where he said he would let them go. He
[22:20] Speaker 1: then drove to Comboyn to show them where to walk
[22:22] Speaker 1: to get back home. Crib then drove back towards Wingham,
[22:28] Speaker 1: but then he pulled over. He bound and gagged all
[22:31] Speaker 1: three and then stabbed them to death. After the confession,
[22:36] Speaker 1: crib said he would direct police to where the murders
[22:38] Speaker 1: had taken place. With two detectives, they drove out to
[22:42] Speaker 1: an area and searched for some time. The detectives came
[22:46] Speaker 1: across a spot that had bloodstains and congealed blood among
[22:49] Speaker 1: the leaves. Grib asked, is that it don't take me
[22:55] Speaker 1: near it. I don't want to look at it. After
[22:58] Speaker 1: that testimony, it was decided that the rest of the
[23:00] Speaker 1: evidence would be heard in closed to court. The decision
[23:04] Speaker 1: was made after newspapers reported in detail about the confession.
[23:09] Speaker 1: After the hearing, crib was ordered to stand trial for
[23:11] Speaker 1: the murders, but that trial would never happen. On the
[23:27] Speaker 1: third of March nineteen seventy nine, Prosecutor R. W. Job
[23:31] Speaker 1: appeared before Mister Justice O'Brien and informed the court that
[23:34] Speaker 1: John Ernest Cribb had been found unfit to stand trial.
[23:39] Speaker 1: He had been diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia. He was to
[23:43] Speaker 1: be transferred to Morissett Hospital a psychiatric facility on the
[23:47] Speaker 1: western shores of Lake McCarry, about an or north of Sydney,
[23:52] Speaker 1: where he would be traded in the ward for the
[23:54] Speaker 1: criminally in saying. The Attorney General would be asked to
[23:58] Speaker 1: impanel a special jury some future date to determine whether
[24:02] Speaker 1: he was fit to face the charges against him. The
[24:05] Speaker 1: charges were three coinns of murder. Mor said hospital sat
[24:10] Speaker 1: on the large property at the edge of the lake.
[24:13] Speaker 1: It had been operating since the late nineteenth century, a
[24:17] Speaker 1: vast complex of old sandstone buildings and new wings set
[24:21] Speaker 1: behind high walls surrounded by bush. By nineteen seventy nine,
[24:25] Speaker 1: it housed some of New South Wales' most dangerous psychiatric patients,
[24:30] Speaker 1: men who had committed serious crimes and been found onfit
[24:32] Speaker 1: to face justice were not guilty on grounds of mental illness.
[24:38] Speaker 1: Crib had been inside the hospital for less than a
[24:41] Speaker 1: month when he began planning to leave. His accomplice was
[24:45] Speaker 1: William John Monday. Monday was twenty seven years old, the
[24:49] Speaker 1: same age as Crib. He had been sentenced the previous
[24:53] Speaker 1: November to thirty years for a series of kidnapping, rape,
[24:57] Speaker 1: and armed robbery offenses involving three couples kidnapped from a
[25:01] Speaker 1: park and dune. This over Christmas nineteen seventy seven and
[25:05] Speaker 1: into January nineteen seventy eighth. The judge had denied him
[25:08] Speaker 1: the hope of parole. Less than five months later, Monday
[25:13] Speaker 1: was in Morset Hospital undergoing psychiatric treatment and he and
[25:17] Speaker 1: Cribb had found one another. Two other inmates joined the plan,
[25:22] Speaker 1: George Derrick Johnson and Stephen Felshaw. Together the four men
[25:27] Speaker 1: obtained a hacksaw. They cut through the steel bars on
[25:30] Speaker 1: a window. Then they tied two wooden planks together to
[25:33] Speaker 1: make a rough ladder and used it to scale the
[25:36] Speaker 1: four meter wall around their section of the hospital. They
[25:40] Speaker 1: went over the wall in darkness. This wasn't the first
[25:43] Speaker 1: time the hospital had seen an escape of this kind.
[25:47] Speaker 1: On the twenty fifth of January nineteen seventy five, six men,
[25:51] Speaker 1: including Johnson, had gone over the same wall. They had
[25:55] Speaker 1: been recaptured within a day. This time it wouldn't be
[25:59] Speaker 1: so straightforward. Johnson and Felshaw were recaptured within twelve hours,
[26:04] Speaker 1: but crib and Monday weren't. Their first act as free
[26:08] Speaker 1: men was to call a taxi. The driver who responded
[26:12] Speaker 1: to the call was a woman named Colleen Villis. It
[26:15] Speaker 1: was three thirty in the morning. The two men directed
[26:19] Speaker 1: her towards Cave's Beach, the same beachside suburb near Swansea
[26:23] Speaker 1: where eight months earlier crib had spent a Saturday night
[26:27] Speaker 1: drinking at the pub with three bodies in the boot
[26:29] Speaker 1: of the car parked outside. They knew the area they
[26:34] Speaker 1: had chosen it deliberately. When they arrived, they tied Colleen's
[26:37] Speaker 1: hands and feet and threw her into a ditch. Then
[26:41] Speaker 1: they drove off in her taxi. By morning, their faces
[26:45] Speaker 1: were on the front pages of every newspaper in New
[26:48] Speaker 1: South Wales. Police in the public were worned not to
[26:51] Speaker 1: approach them under any circumstances. Detective Inspector Norm Sheather said
[26:58] Speaker 1: they are extremely dangerous. I urge people not to go
[27:01] Speaker 1: near them. He added that they were believed to be armed.
[27:06] Speaker 1: What followed was described by investigators at the time as
[27:09] Speaker 1: the biggest man hunt the state had seen in twenty years.
[27:13] Speaker 1: More than fifty detectives were assigned to the search. Roadblocks
[27:17] Speaker 1: were set up in Swansea, more set in Hexham, the
[27:21] Speaker 1: roads radiating out from the lake, trying to create a
[27:24] Speaker 1: net around the area where the escape had happened, sidings
[27:29] Speaker 1: came in from across the state and were chased on
[27:31] Speaker 1: one by one. A house in Warawong was raided after
[27:36] Speaker 1: a report that Monday was there. He wasn't. Days passed,
[27:41] Speaker 1: the men stayed ahead of the search. By the second
[27:45] Speaker 1: weekend after the escape, detectives had a new lead. Cribon
[27:49] Speaker 1: Monday had made their way Inland far Inland West across
[27:54] Speaker 1: the ranges to the country around Bathurst. They went to
[27:58] Speaker 1: Monday's aunt's house and asked for her help. Kathy Leanne
[28:03] Speaker 1: turned them away from her farmhouse. They threatened to make
[28:06] Speaker 1: her pay if she called the police. She was terrified.
[28:11] Speaker 1: The two men then went to a farmhouse nearby. Its owner,
[28:15] Speaker 1: seventy year old Thomas Tobin, was alone on its property
[28:18] Speaker 1: when the two men forced their way in. They tied
[28:22] Speaker 1: him up, went through the house and stole money in shotguns.
[28:26] Speaker 1: Before they left, they told Thomas something that detectives would
[28:29] Speaker 1: repeat to the press in the days that followed, that
[28:33] Speaker 1: if they were cornered by police, they were prepared to
[28:36] Speaker 1: shoot it out. Detectives now believed the two men had
[28:53] Speaker 1: changed their appearance, possibly growing beards, and were hiding somewhere
[28:57] Speaker 1: in a country town and carefully armed and watching for
[29:02] Speaker 1: the patrols closing in around them. The days continued to pass.
[29:07] Speaker 1: Then on a weekend in mid April, the two men
[29:10] Speaker 1: surfaced in Sydney. The Hukkua Club stood on Hall Street
[29:14] Speaker 1: in Bondai, a Jewish community club and entertainment venue, well
[29:19] Speaker 1: known and well it ended, the kind of place that
[29:21] Speaker 1: drew a crowd on a Friday night. It was outside
[29:25] Speaker 1: the club that Crib and Monday found two seventeen year
[29:27] Speaker 1: old girls. They'd been out for the night. They were
[29:32] Speaker 1: standing outside when Crib approached them. They were abducted at gunpoint.
[29:38] Speaker 1: What followed lasted thirty five hours. The girls were ordered
[29:42] Speaker 1: to walk about half a kilometer to the builtmore private
[29:45] Speaker 1: hotel in Campbell Parade. Monday was their wedding. The girls
[29:50] Speaker 1: were tied with strips of bed sheets to the furniture.
[29:54] Speaker 1: They were repeatedly sexually assaulted and beaten by both men
[29:58] Speaker 1: over the course of a day and a half. They
[30:01] Speaker 1: managed to free themselves about ten a m on Sunday.
[30:05] Speaker 1: They went straight to police to report their ordeal. One
[30:08] Speaker 1: of the detectives remarked, I'm amazed that Crab had been
[30:12] Speaker 1: able to march the girls through the street on a
[30:14] Speaker 1: Friday night without being seen by any one. The two
[30:17] Speaker 1: girls were taken to hospital, where one needed eighteen stitches
[30:21] Speaker 1: to an injury she had sustained. When detectives searched the hotel,
[30:25] Speaker 1: they found various items that the men had stolen. There
[30:29] Speaker 1: were suitcases filled with clothing, a portable colored television set,
[30:33] Speaker 1: and a small amount of cash. They waited there for
[30:37] Speaker 1: a while, hoping they would return, but they never did.
[30:42] Speaker 1: The girls told detectives that both men were heavily armed,
[30:46] Speaker 1: Both of them had long hair, and Crab was now
[30:48] Speaker 1: swarting a short mustache. Detectives announced we must warn citizens,
[30:54] Speaker 1: particularly young women, to be particularly careful until Crab and
[30:58] Speaker 1: Monday are caught. Despite their best efforts, Crib and Monday
[31:02] Speaker 1: seemed to always be one step ahead, but not for long.
[31:21] Speaker 1: On the morning of the eighteenth, after two weeks on
[31:23] Speaker 1: the run, police received a siding of Crib in King's
[31:26] Speaker 1: Langley Parkley area. Over one hundred police officers descended on
[31:31] Speaker 1: the scene and made what was described as a human perimeter.
[31:36] Speaker 1: They began a house to house search, knowing that who
[31:38] Speaker 1: they were looking for had said he would kill a
[31:40] Speaker 1: police officer if he tried to arrest. Reports came in
[31:45] Speaker 1: that he had forced his way into a house at
[31:47] Speaker 1: gunpoint and demanded clothing and a razor from a terrified housewife.
[31:52] Speaker 1: A few hours later, he forced his way into another house,
[31:55] Speaker 1: tied up the resident, and stole his car. Crib was
[31:59] Speaker 1: caught in Penni later that day. His car was chased
[32:03] Speaker 1: by a convoy of police vehicles until he turned into
[32:06] Speaker 1: the driveway of a house on Wentworth Avenue. Two uniformed
[32:11] Speaker 1: officers saw him stop their car and went for him.
[32:16] Speaker 1: He was reaching into a bag. Inside was a cut
[32:19] Speaker 1: down zero point four to ten caliber shotgun when they
[32:22] Speaker 1: seized him. He was handcuffed and taken to Blacktown Police Station.
[32:27] Speaker 1: One Down, One to go set a detective from the
[32:30] Speaker 1: CIB homicide Squad. Monday was found the following day in
[32:34] Speaker 1: a very different kind of ending. A constable surprised him
[32:38] Speaker 1: at a tap near a workman's shed at Waterfall Football Oval.
[32:43] Speaker 1: Monday had been living rough in a hidden bush camp
[32:46] Speaker 1: nearby and had come out in the open for water.
[32:49] Speaker 1: He was taken without incident. Between them, Crib and Monday
[32:53] Speaker 1: had committed thirty one offenses. In the fourteen days they
[32:56] Speaker 1: had been free, but justice was finally catching up. On
[33:01] Speaker 1: the twenty third of May, Crib appeared in court. He
[33:04] Speaker 1: pleaded guilty to the murders of Valda, Sally, and Damien.
[33:08] Speaker 1: He additionally pleaded guilty to raping Valda. During the court proceeding,
[33:13] Speaker 1: some more facts of the case were revealed. On the
[33:16] Speaker 1: day of the murders, Crib had spent the day drinking
[33:19] Speaker 1: in a hotel. When he left, he decided to rob
[33:22] Speaker 1: a house in the Boucan Hills area. After being disturbed
[33:27] Speaker 1: by Valda and the children, he abducted them. Crib admitted
[33:31] Speaker 1: that he had made that phone call to Paul to
[33:33] Speaker 1: stop him from calling the police immediately. He said he
[33:37] Speaker 1: thought it would give him a better chance of getting away.
[33:40] Speaker 1: He said he had intended at first to let the
[33:43] Speaker 1: family go, but somewhere on that dark road north, he
[33:48] Speaker 1: told himself that he had made a mistake, that he
[33:51] Speaker 1: had given Valda his name, that she knew who he was,
[33:55] Speaker 1: and that if he let her go, she would tell
[33:57] Speaker 1: police and there would be no getting away. So he
[34:01] Speaker 1: went back. He said he killed val the first, then Damien,
[34:06] Speaker 1: then Sally, Sally and Damien were bound and gagged when
[34:11] Speaker 1: their mother was killed. They were alive when she was stabbed.
[34:16] Speaker 1: They remained alive until he turned on them too. After
[34:21] Speaker 1: the murder's, Crib said, he drove to his parents' house
[34:24] Speaker 1: and collected a shovel. He intended on bearing the bodies,
[34:29] Speaker 1: but the car went off the embankment at the s
[34:31] Speaker 1: Bends before he got the chance, and when the boot opened,
[34:36] Speaker 1: the choice was taken from him. After the guilty play,
[34:46] Speaker 1: John Ernest Crib was sentenced to three consecutive terms of
[34:49] Speaker 1: life imprisonment. After sentencing, Crib moved through the New South
[34:53] Speaker 1: Wales prison system. It seemed that he didn't forget about
[34:57] Speaker 1: the two girls he had abducted and raped while he
[35:00] Speaker 1: was on the run. That Christmas, he sent them both
[35:04] Speaker 1: a Christmas card. He was not a straightforward prisoner. In
[35:10] Speaker 1: the years immediately following his conviction, he attempted to escape
[35:13] Speaker 1: custody on a second occasion. By September nineteen eighty five,
[35:18] Speaker 1: he was settled into custody in a way that would
[35:20] Speaker 1: last for the rest of his life. He was thirty
[35:23] Speaker 1: five years old and he would never be free again.
[35:27] Speaker 1: In nineteen eighty two, Crib became a Christian by the
[35:30] Speaker 1: early nineteen nineties. He had spent over a decade inside,
[35:34] Speaker 1: He had completed programs, He had the support of prison chaplains, ministers,
[35:39] Speaker 1: prison visitors. He had, according to the accounts of those
[35:43] Speaker 1: who encountered him in those years, presented as a man
[35:46] Speaker 1: who had reflected on what he had done and found
[35:49] Speaker 1: something that resembled remorse. He had even married one of
[35:54] Speaker 1: the prison visitors who had come to know him over
[35:57] Speaker 1: the years. She was by the time his case came
[36:01] Speaker 1: back before the court's gravely ill. Several psychiatrists and psychologists
[36:06] Speaker 1: who assessed him in those years reported that he appeared
[36:09] Speaker 1: to be a reformed character. A number of Christian ministers
[36:13] Speaker 1: said the same. Reverend Tom Douglas even said he would
[36:17] Speaker 1: employ him as an assistant in his pastoral activities on
[36:20] Speaker 1: his release. Prison officers who had worked alongside him for
[36:24] Speaker 1: years said the same. Whether any of this was true
[36:28] Speaker 1: was a question that only Crib could answer. In nineteen
[36:32] Speaker 1: ninety three, he applied for a sentence redetermination a non
[36:36] Speaker 1: parole period to be set. The possibility, however remote, of
[36:41] Speaker 1: one day walking free implication was heard by Justice Peter Newman.
[36:47] Speaker 1: What Justin Newman found in working through the material before
[36:50] Speaker 1: him with something that cut through the psychiatric reports and
[36:54] Speaker 1: the ministerial endorsements and the years of apparent transformation. The
[37:00] Speaker 1: letter had come to light, written by Crib to the
[37:02] Speaker 1: court in the preceding year. In it, he claimed he
[37:06] Speaker 1: had not raped Walda at all. He further claimed that
[37:10] Speaker 1: the murders had been instigated by her refusal to admit
[37:13] Speaker 1: that Sally was his daughter. In his letter, he wrote,
[37:18] Speaker 1: I deny that I raped val Connall. These crimes were
[37:21] Speaker 1: instigated by fourteen and a half years of hate, the
[37:25] Speaker 1: result of sexual assault perpetrated on myself at the age
[37:28] Speaker 1: of fourteen, the murder of my best friend George Colvin
[37:32] Speaker 1: in nineteen seventy. The denial by val Connall that Sally
[37:36] Speaker 1: was my daughter, having told me ten years previously that
[37:39] Speaker 1: she was. There was no basis for either claim. There
[37:44] Speaker 1: had never been any suggestion of a prior relationship between
[37:47] Speaker 1: Crib and Valda Connall. He had not known her. He
[37:51] Speaker 1: had chosen her house at random on the day he
[37:54] Speaker 1: decided to commit a robbery. The claim was not only false,
[37:59] Speaker 1: it was an attack on a woman who had died
[38:00] Speaker 1: at his hands, and on the memory of a ten
[38:03] Speaker 1: year old girl whose parentage he was now fabricating to
[38:06] Speaker 1: shift the weight of what he had done. Justice Newman
[38:10] Speaker 1: described the claims as grotesque lies. He found that they
[38:13] Speaker 1: contradicted everything that had been said about Crib's reformation, and
[38:17] Speaker 1: that they represented an attempt to manipulate the court into
[38:21] Speaker 1: releasing him, and a profound lack of contrition. As for
[38:26] Speaker 1: the people who had spoken in his favor, the ministers,
[38:29] Speaker 1: the prison visitors, the well meaning men and women who
[38:32] Speaker 1: had sat with him and believed what he told them,
[38:35] Speaker 1: Justice Newman concluded that they had probably been deceived. His
[38:40] Speaker 1: application was dismissed. Cribb's accomplice, William Monday, did not survive
[38:46] Speaker 1: to try the same. In nineteen eighty one, while incarcerated
[38:51] Speaker 1: at Paramatta Jail, Monday was involved in the murder of
[38:54] Speaker 1: a fellow inmate named Stephen Shipley. He was sentenced to
[38:59] Speaker 1: a further term of life in prison. That same year,
[39:02] Speaker 1: he married Faye mac Manus, his childhood sweetheart. He cried
[39:07] Speaker 1: during the ceremony as they shared their wish to have
[39:09] Speaker 1: his sentence reduced, but that would never come. In nineteen
[39:14] Speaker 1: ninety three, Monday was found dead in his cell at
[39:17] Speaker 1: lith Grow Correctional Center. He was forty one years old.
[39:22] Speaker 1: In two thousand and eight, Crib tried once more for freedom.
[39:26] Speaker 1: He applied to the New South Wales Supreme Court for
[39:28] Speaker 1: a redetermination for his life terms. He wanted to be
[39:32] Speaker 1: given a minimum and maximum sentence. While the Sun, Gary
[39:38] Speaker 1: spoke to the media for the first time about the ordeal.
[39:42] Speaker 1: He said, it doesn't worry me talking about it, as
[39:45] Speaker 1: long as I don't stop and dwell on it. He continued, stating,
[39:50] Speaker 1: you just keep on keeping on, You get up and
[39:53] Speaker 1: you get through another day. My next youngest sister started
[39:57] Speaker 1: cooking the meals and cleaning up the house. Dad went
[40:00] Speaker 1: through a roller coaster of ups and downs, and he
[40:03] Speaker 1: wasn't always thinking straight. I finished school three months after
[40:06] Speaker 1: it happened. I felt I had to be strong. After
[40:10] Speaker 1: a couple of months, everyone stopped talking about it because
[40:13] Speaker 1: they thought it was going to upset the others. You
[40:16] Speaker 1: think I won't say anything because it might upset so
[40:19] Speaker 1: and so, so you say nothing at all, and after
[40:23] Speaker 1: a while it gets harder and harder to talk about
[40:26] Speaker 1: Mum and the kids. He said that growing up they
[40:29] Speaker 1: were all told to suppress it, but he wished they
[40:32] Speaker 1: could have spoken more about what had happened. He particularly
[40:36] Speaker 1: wanted to speak about the happy times, he said, because
[40:40] Speaker 1: it was a fantastic childhood up until that day. Gary
[40:46] Speaker 1: said that his grandmother was never able to say Valda's
[40:49] Speaker 1: name again. She and Valda's father visited the graves almost
[40:53] Speaker 1: every single day. It was the family's belief that Crib
[40:57] Speaker 1: should just rot in hell and they should throw away
[40:59] Speaker 1: the key. Their lives became about maintaining their daughter and
[41:04] Speaker 1: grandchildren's graves. By this point, Crib had been inside for
[41:08] Speaker 1: almost thirty years. He had the record's note, completed the
[41:13] Speaker 1: custody based intensive therapy program for sexual offenders, and had
[41:18] Speaker 1: again been assessed by psychiatrists appointed by the Crown. The
[41:22] Speaker 1: Director of Public Prosecutions, Nicholas Cowdery, made the Crown's position
[41:27] Speaker 1: plain the crimes fell into the worst category of murder
[41:30] Speaker 1: cases and warranted life in prison without release. In the end,
[41:36] Speaker 1: Crib withdrew the application before it was hurt. The years continued.
[41:47] Speaker 1: By twenty twelve, Crib was sixty one years old and
[41:50] Speaker 1: his health was deteriorating. He was diagnosed with moderate coronary disease,
[41:55] Speaker 1: coronary artery insufficiency, aortic regurgitation, and high blood pressure. It
[42:01] Speaker 1: emerged that he had a family history of heart problems.
[42:05] Speaker 1: He was prescribed medication and monitored regularly by Justice Health.
[42:10] Speaker 1: He had been moved at some point in the intervening
[42:13] Speaker 1: years to Goldburn Correction Center, a seventy five bed supermax
[42:17] Speaker 1: facility in the southern tablelands of New South Wales. The
[42:22] Speaker 1: highest security prison in Australia, it hosed the state's most
[42:26] Speaker 1: dangerous inmates. It was where the system put people it
[42:29] Speaker 1: had decided needed to stay. In August of twenty seventeen,
[42:34] Speaker 1: Judy's age and worsening cardiac condition, Crib was referred for
[42:38] Speaker 1: health care planning. A medical officer reviewed him. A corrective
[42:43] Speaker 1: officer who had worked alongside him for more than a
[42:45] Speaker 1: year was present for parts of that process. The medical
[42:49] Speaker 1: officer's notes recorded that Crib was by that point what
[42:53] Speaker 1: they described as world weary. He told them clearly and
[42:57] Speaker 1: without apparent distress, that he didn't not wish for his
[43:00] Speaker 1: life to be prolonged by medical intervention. In accordance with
[43:05] Speaker 1: that wish, a not for resuscitation plan and an advanced
[43:09] Speaker 1: care directive were signed on the twenty ninth of August
[43:12] Speaker 1: two thousand and seventeen. Crib thereafter declined transfers to other
[43:16] Speaker 1: facilities where his heart condition might be more intensely managed.
[43:22] Speaker 1: He stayed at Goldburn. He'd been there for a long time.
[43:26] Speaker 1: He intended this day. On the nineteenth of February two
[43:30] Speaker 1: thousand eighteen, crib reported feeling unwell. He was seen by
[43:35] Speaker 1: a Justice Health nurse and given panadol for stomach cramps.
[43:40] Speaker 1: A follow up review was scheduled. The next morning, a
[43:44] Speaker 1: corrective officer observed him lying down in the prison yard.
[43:49] Speaker 1: He was brought to the medical clinic and assessed. A
[43:52] Speaker 1: second sale certificate was issued, allowing him to remain in
[43:56] Speaker 1: his cell. There was a heat wave the next day.
[44:00] Speaker 1: Crib wasn't well enough to be out in the hate.
[44:03] Speaker 1: He was escorted back to his cell. At two thirty
[44:07] Speaker 1: four in the afternoon, a corrective officer checked on him.
[44:11] Speaker 1: He appeared without obvious issue. That was the last time
[44:15] Speaker 1: that John Arnest Cribb was seen alive. At eight twenty
[44:19] Speaker 1: eight on the morning of the twenty first of February
[44:21] Speaker 1: twenty eighteen, during the morning, on lock the door of
[44:25] Speaker 1: his cell opened, he was found unresponsive and pronounced dead.
[44:31] Speaker 1: The cause of death was established by a post mortem examination.
[44:35] Speaker 1: He had died of a build up of blood in
[44:37] Speaker 1: the sack that surrounded the heart, which was caused by
[44:40] Speaker 1: a erptic aortic dissection, a tear in the inner wall
[44:44] Speaker 1: of the largest blood vessel in the body. His heart,
[44:48] Speaker 1: in the end had simply given out. John Arnest Cribb
[44:51] Speaker 1: was sixty seven years old. He died as Justice Newman
[44:55] Speaker 1: had intended inside prison. Paul Connell never remarried. He died
[45:04] Speaker 1: on the eleventh of August twenty twenty three, forty five
[45:08] Speaker 1: years to the day of the tragedy. He was buried
[45:11] Speaker 1: at castle Brook Memorial Park Cemetery. His death notice said
[45:16] Speaker 1: he passed away peacefully to join his wife Falda and
[45:20] Speaker 1: their two youngest children, Sally and Damien. Well, that is
[45:49] Speaker 1: it for today's episode of Morbidology. As always, thank you
[45:52] Speaker 1: so much for listening, and I'd like to say a
[45:54] Speaker 1: big massive thank you to my new supporters are on, Patrion,
[45:57] Speaker 1: Diane and Holly. All know Morbidology is a one woman team,
[46:01] Speaker 1: so the support up on their seriously goes such a
[46:04] Speaker 1: long way, and I genuinely am eternally grateful. Over on Patreon,
[46:07] Speaker 1: I upload ad free, early release and bonus episodes of Morbidology.
[46:11] Speaker 1: Plus there's also sometimes behind the scenes of various episodes,
[46:16] Speaker 1: and I also send though a thank you card along
[46:18] Speaker 1: with some Patreon exclusive merch. AD free, early release and
[46:22] Speaker 1: bonus episodes are also available over on Apple subscriptions. Remember
[46:27] Speaker 1: the shack is out at morbidology dot com for more
[46:29] Speaker 1: information about this episode and to read some true crime articles.
[46:33] Speaker 1: Until next time, take care of yourselves, stay safe, and
[46:36] Speaker 1: have an amazing week.

Shows are listed from Apple Podcasts' charts and directory, and Podcast Index where it is used. Every show and episode belongs to its publisher and plays from the publisher's own feed; this site hosts none of them.