Wednesday, 21 June 2023

Bills

Corrections Amendment (Parole) Bill 2023

Second reading

Debate resumed.

David LIMBRICK (South-Eastern Metropolitan) (14:07): I would like to start by acknowledging the real reason we are having this debate, and that is because of what happened to Elizabeth Stevens, Debbie Fream and Nat Russell 30 years ago. I acknowledge that in the gallery at the moment there are some friends and family of these people: the son of Debbie Fream, who was only 12 days old when his mother was murdered; Karen, Nat’s best friend; and Lisa, Nat’s sister. I am personally involved in this case: Nat was my girlfriend at the time. Thirty years is a long time. I was a teenager with long, curly hair, believe it or not. I am certainly not a teenager anymore.

One of the things that I discovered 30 years ago in my first interaction, I suppose, with the criminal justice system was the supports, or lack of supports, for victims of crime. At the time I managed to avoid the fact that I was somehow connected to the case. The media sort of missed the fact that Nat had a boyfriend, and I was very happy about that because I saw the spotlight that they were getting and I did not want that on me. I just wanted to go away. But I did want to know what happened to Nat, because the cops never told me anything. I did not have a clue what happened. All I knew was that she was gone. To find out, on 20 December 1993 I went to listen to the sentencing of Paul Denyer, and I found out what happened.

Some things are unspeakable, and his crimes are certainly unspeakable. I think I speak for everyone involved in that we found some comfort in the remarks and the decision of Justice Vincent at the time. With regard to the question of parole, I would like to quote something from the sentencing statement that he made at the time. As everyone would know in here, he is a very, very learned man, who many from all sides of politics have great respect for, including me. Here is what he had to say on the topic of sentencing and parole, and this was addressed to Denyer himself:

Unfortunately, I must sentence you now and I cannot abrogate my responsibility to some distant Parole Board. Recognizing the importance of rehabilitation as a sentencing consideration, there are very occasionally situations in which that factor must be subordinated within the confines of a proportionate sentence to the need to protect the public against the truly dangerous. The evidence before this court is tragically clear on that aspect. You do constitute such a danger, and at our present state of knowledge, apart from separating you from society, there is nothing that can be done about it. Any non-parole period which I fix would have to be very long in any event and calculated without reference to the potential risk which you could then pose. Perhaps there will come a day when you will be able to walk among the ordinary people of our community. Whether you will ever do so must await the passage of years and the decision of the Executive Government of the time.

That brings us to today. It is in a way a decision of the executive government of the time, but very different to what he imagined, because after he sentenced Denyer to three life terms, plus eight years for the kidnapping of Roszsa Toth, we felt some sort of closure that justice had been served. It was still very difficult, it was still awful what had happened, but there was some justice.

I did not understand anything about the legal system then and did not understand what was happening, but the next year there was an appeal. I did not follow it closely. I did not really understand it. But what happened at the appeal was this exact paragraph that I just read out to you apparently, through some technicality, was in error or something like that – I cannot remember the exact term they used – and they decided that not setting a parole period was wrong, and they overturned it. It was not a unanimous decision – one of the judges dissented – and they set a non-parole period of 30 years. Of course everyone connected to this case was in absolute shock.

This was not some random event of anger or something where someone made a mistake; this man had been fantasising about murdering women since he was a teenage boy, and he committed many, many other heinous crimes that he confessed to, including assault, harm to animals and stalking potentially hundreds of women. Since we talked about this in 2021 I have had many people contact my office stating that they were stalked by him. I know that the author Vikki Petraitis, who is also in the gallery, has also had many women from Frankston contact her as well and talk about their stories. That stalking ‍– hunting is what he was doing – eventually culminated in murder, which as Justice Vincent stated, he was excited by and continued doing. And as he stated himself, he would have continued murdering until he got caught. He stated that himself.

I do not think that anything that Justice Vincent said in his statement is wrong. I do not see any new treatment technologies, drugs or psychotherapy that would rehabilitate someone of this character. I acknowledge I am a big believer in rehabilitation and reform for prisoners, for people who have done things wrong to turn their lives around. My entire politics is around the defence of liberty, and here I am arguing to take away a single man’s liberty. But it is inarguable that there are some people – very, very, very rare – that are so dangerous they must be separated from society. In fact Justice Vincent said it plainly. He said, ‘You’re not one of us,’ and I think this is true.

What has happened is that for 30 years it has always been in the back of our minds that one day he might get out. One day a distant parole board, whom Justice Vincent was unwilling to abrogate his responsibility to, might make a decision to let him out. Since we started talking about this in 2021 all we have been asking for is a reassurance that he can never harm another woman. I talk to people and they say he will never get out, it will never happen and this sort of stuff. Great, let us state that publicly. But no-one can do that. No-one can actually provide that reassurance, so we are left in the unenviable position where we are forced to continue pushing this.

I totally take the Attorney-General’s words in good faith and the Premier’s apology in good faith, but I am critical of the government because I think that when we raised this in 2021 it could have been dealt with back then. I do not know why it has to take so long to act on this. I would say that despite the criticisms of the mechanism of this bill that has been put forward by the opposition – I actually share some of those concerns about naming single people, and I do see the problems with that – it has already been successful in the sense that the government is acting and has made some commitments, so I would say that it has been successful in that sense.

I think as a path forward from here I am very happy and would be very keen to work with the government on what that legislation and those changes might look like, in conjunction with friends and family who might have an interest in this, and we need to make sure that they happen and soon. Like I said, there are not many of us left that can continue to fight this. We are not going away. I could leave Parliament and I would still be fighting this from the outside; I would probably have more freedom to be naughty doing it that way. But this does need to happen. Something needs to happen. There needs to be some sort of reassurance.

It is not just for the friends and families. It is for the people of Frankston as well. That entire community was traumatised. People have described it to me, and I saw it myself, as like a lockdown, except it was just women. Parents would not want their daughters going out at night or meeting friends. People just decided to stay home, and that has had an intergenerational effect in that town. People that are my age and lived through this back then are parents now and they worry about their own kids. They think back to what happened then. They do not want it to ever happen again, and they do not want the possibility of it ever happening again. That is why I am supporting this bill. Regardless of whether it passes or not, I know from the statements I have heard so far and talking with people privately that everyone agrees that they do not want him to hurt another woman. No-one wants that. I also know that the people voting against this do not want him to get out and harm another woman, so I am not accusing anyone of that. We do need a solution, and I am critical of the government for leaving it so long. But I am happy to take in good faith the government’s statements and actions, and I hope that there are better things in the future.

On the subject of wider parole reform and how victims interact with it, having seen up close now how this works, it needs changes. This is aside from the Denyer issue. The idea that you just get a letter about someone who has done these horrible things to your family saying, ‘Would you like to put in a submission?’ – what do you put in a submission or an impact statement? People do not know how to do that stuff, and it is really, really hard. And as to information about the process and how it works and what is happening, we still do not even know. We know that parole was refused, but we have no idea what actually went on there. I understand that there are privacy issues, but surely there must be some changes that can be made that would improve this process, because it is just absolutely brutal. It is not good for anyone.

I do not want to have to keep fighting this, and I do not want to make it political, because I know we all agree at least on the objective – it is just how we get there. I have been open-minded all along. I have said to the government, ‘I don’t really care how you do this. We just need a solution.’ The government has lots of smart people working for them, and I am sure they can figure out solutions. We must do better in the future for other victims of crime, especially people who have been exposed to this type of trauma. It changes your life. It certainly sent me on a totally different direction than what was going to happen, and I know it did for everyone else.

I would also say that no-one who has been talking about this publicly to my knowledge wants to do it. None of us want to be talking about this; none of us want to be going over and over it. We just want to have some sort of solution or closure, which we felt we had back in 1993, because even today, despite our will, no-one here can actually stand up and say for certain that he is never going to harm another girl the way that he hurt Nat. So we have to act.

Rikkie-Lee TYRRELL (Northern Victoria) (14:24): I am rising today in support of the coalition’s Corrections Amendment (Parole) Bill 2023 to ensure Paul Denyer is unable to apply for parole. To begin with, I would like to thank the families of the victims for their strength and time to attend today. I do not want to even try to imagine the pain this must be causing them.

After reading the sentencing statement for Mr Denyer, I quickly realised that he was a vicious, calculating and evolving predator who was preying on innocent women. In such a short period of time he robbed three young Victorian women of their lives. By anyone who is considering not supporting this bill today, I am left dumbfounded. This bill will ensure that this heinous monster has no chance of ever gaining parole while he is a physically capable individual. If I could change anything in this bill, it would be to deny him applying for parole ever, so that he takes his last breath locked away. I do not have enough faith in our parole system to risk even a minute chance of this creature being released on parole. With the data from 2020–21 – 43.6 per cent of released prisoners reoffended and were returned to prison within the first 24 months of their release – I am not willing to gamble the safety and wellbeing of every Victorian that would be vulnerable to such a predator as Paul Denyer.

It has been made abundantly clear that the prisoner in question has shown no remorse and is seemingly incapable of rehabilitation. To drag the victims’ families through the process time and time again is a barbaric and cruel sentence that they must go through each time he applies for parole. This bill will put an end to their emotional torture. This bill is not unprecedented. It is a necessity in this case. It is my duty as an elected member to ensure that correct legislation is passed in this chamber to guarantee the safety and wellbeing of Victorians. I would be betraying my constituents in the north and every other Victorian if I were to oppose the coalition’s Corrections Amendment (Parole) Bill today.

Jeff BOURMAN (Eastern Victoria) (14:26): It has not been easy sitting here listening to people go through this, particularly Mr Limbrick. I remember this period quite well. I have lived in the south-eastern suburbs of Melbourne more or less since we came to Melbourne. Whilst I did not live in Frankston, I lived in the vicinity, and for a while no-one knew what was going on. Someone said it was like lockdown, and it was. In fact I remember in most of Melbourne women were just scared to go out, and it was because of a single person – and not much of a person.

I am going to go against my normal rule of not using names and I am going to just use names through this because it gets too difficult and I will sound like I have gone off the rails. Denyer is not a normal person. He is broken. There is nothing about him that I can see, other than the fact he draws breath and turns oxygen and food into energy and all that, that is like a normal human being. What normal person in their right mind would send a letter to a member of Parliament who was a victim of his asking for help? I have not seen the letter. I know it exists. I do not want to see it. There is nothing normal about this person.

Having been here through the time when we put the Minogue legislation through so he would spend the rest of his glorious days in the big house – and I hope he dies there, and Julian Knight – I concur with Mrs Tyrrell. I do not think there should be a provision in this bill before us to ever let him out. I do not care how sick he is, I do not care whether he is 2 seconds away from death – bring him out in a box, and bring those other clowns out in boxes too. There are some people that go beyond our rules. As an ex-policeman I am well aware of sentencing and I am well aware of the need for law and order, but every once in a while people come along. Ironically, I think a bill that individually targets someone is better than trying a catch-all thing, because it allows for the fact that there are some people that go beyond normal sentencing. Over the years I have been kind of a bit critical of Justice Vincent, except on this case. I think he got it right, and I am retrospectively appalled that they overturned it back then. Three life sentences plus eight years – how on earth could you set a minimum of 30 years? That is effectively 10 years for each of the girls he murdered. In what society is that just?

As to the government’s proposal, I see some problems with it. I understand that it is a proposal and there is not a lot of structure to it, but there are a couple of things I see. At this stage it will be setting a period of time that people cannot reapply for parole – we will make it five years, 10 years, whatever ‍– but then at that time the victims will have to go through it all again. Whether the intent is to keep them behind bars forever, we do not know what the future brings. No-one thought we would be here debating this in the form it is, yet here we are.

One of the things I have heard is that the government is worried about what the High Court may or may not do about this, but I might also point out that with the proposed reforms I have heard there is a distinct possibility that the two others that should be in jail for the rest of their lives could apply to the High Court and want it applied to them. So I actually wonder if we are opening a door for other victims to be tortured by these people, and I really urge the government – I know they are not going to support this today – to think very carefully about where they go. There are real people at the end of this. As a police officer you deal with the victims a lot and you tend to identify with the victims a lot, but you are generally not a victim. I can only imagine – and as I said earlier to the victims, I only ever want to imagine – what they go through. It is inexplicable – the sorts of things that people can do to each other. Whilst I am obviously a little bit more hardcore and law-and-order than most, I do believe some people can be rehabilitated. But Denyer cannot. He should spend the rest of his days burning in hell – even though I am not religious – and if we cannot do that, he should spend the rest of his days in prison.

David ETTERSHANK (Western Metropolitan) (14:31): Thank you to Mr Limbrick for his contribution. This bill seeks to amend the Corrections Act 1986 to limit the circumstances in which Paul Denyer may be released on parole, a prisoner sentenced in 1993 to three consecutive sentences of life imprisonment for three counts of murder. Last week I had a long conversation with Karen Noone, a close friend of Natalie Russell, and I thank her for her time and for her patience and for her candour. I found our conversation both deeply moving and deeply troubling. I express my profound sympathy to her, to the family and friends of Denyer’s victims and to my colleague Mr Limbrick.

This is a wicked problem. On the one hand we have a wicked man and an evil man and a man who, as I understand it, has expressed no remorse for the crimes that he has committed. Personally, and like the family and friends of the victims, it is unfathomable to me why Justice Vincent’s original decision was watered down. I do not think anyone in this house wishes to see this man set free. On the other hand, we have a central pillar of our democracy, which is the separation of powers between the Parliament, the executive and the judiciary. Put simply, it is, as I understand it, the role of the Parliament to make laws and it is the role of the judiciary to interpret and to apply those laws. This principle has underpinned our Westminster system for more than 300 years.

What makes the debate before us so vexatious is that the parole process serves to repeatedly punish the family and the friends of Denyer’s victims, as they are forced to relive the events and the trauma of their loss. So in seeking to respond to this wicked problem and to this bill, it is incumbent on us to weigh up these conflicting priorities. If this bill was to address how the state responds to serial killers generally, then we should debate that and provide a standard to the judiciary. But it does not. It seeks to step in and replace the role of the judiciary. Politicians are not judges, and we should not attempt to be. That previous parliaments have chosen to legislate this question for specific individuals does not change the primacy of that principle. We should, however, be seeking to address the appropriateness of the current laws and ensuring that the families and friends are not continuously retraumatised. Denyer should be punished, not the families. On this basis, while we have the greatest sympathy for the families and friends, we will not be supporting this bill, and we look to the government to bring forward changes to protect the families and friends of these victims and others who are regrettably affected in the future.

Adem SOMYUREK (Northern Metropolitan) (14:35): I am generally against ad hominem legislation – that is, legislation targeting individuals. I certainly believe in the separation of powers between the legislature/executive and the judiciary, although I believe it is imperfect. I do not believe the executive should be appointing judges, and that is pretty much how our system works at the moment. I also believe in equality before the law. I think it is a fundamental principle of every liberal democracy throughout the world and is certainly entrenched in our charter of human rights. However, I also believe in the consistency of this Parliament. What has happened in this Parliament twice previously is the Russell Street bomber – I have forgotten his name – and Julian Knight have had specific legislation enacted against them, ad hominem legislation, making sure that they never get out of prison. Paul Denyer committed some of the most heinous crimes in Victorian history, targeting young women. I just cannot see how we cannot do everything possible to make sure this man does not leave prison. Again, I say: if the precedent was not there with Julian Knight and the Russell Street bomber, I may have voted the other way on this. But because that precedent is there, I am voting with this bill.

Mr Limbrick, in his powerful address, talked about the local community of Frankston and surrounding suburbs at the time, in 1993. I do not like drawing on my experiences here; I think too many politicians talk about themselves too much in discussing matters before the house. So I was going to pretty much downplay my experience, but I and my wife lived in Chelsea Heights at that time. We were young: my wife was in her early 20s and I was a little bit older, closer to mid-20s – 24 I think. I think I have got the go-ahead from Mr Limbrick’s contribution to talk about the circumstances at that time. I was going to downplay it. Mr Limbrick described it as a lockdown type of situation. It was terrible. It was absolutely terrible. It disrupted everyone’s lives. I could not go to work. My wife did not have a licence, so she had to travel to Frankston by train regularly. She could not leave her house. I could not go to work sometimes. I thought that all of this would sound too dramatic, so I was not going to go through any of this stuff. I was going to paper over it with a few innocuous statements, but I have got to tell you: this man struck fear into the lives of everyone.

As Mr Limbrick was on his feet I was on my phone going through how far away one of the murders was from my house; 6 minutes away it was. That refreshed my memory. It was 6 minutes away. I apologise to anyone that saw me on my phone as Mr Limbrick was talking, but I just thought, ‘Actually how far away was that murder?’ It was a 6-minute drive away. Again, as Mr Limbrick described it, it was like a lockdown of our womenfolk during that time. It was a great relief when he was caught and when he was sentenced to life in prison. We thought he would never get out. We actually thought life meant life. We thought he would never get out. So here we are, 30 years down the track, and I am a legislator. How can I possibly not do everything I can to ensure that this man does not get out? With that, I will be supporting the bill.

Matthew BACH (North-Eastern Metropolitan) (14:40): I want to thank all members who have spoken on this debate, obviously in particular Mr Limbrick. I spoke on another day, so I have not had the opportunity personally to thank the family members of the women who were murdered back in the early 1990s who have been with us today. I do not want to say too much. I would note, as Mr Limbrick has said, that I also take the Attorney-General at face value when she talks about some of the things that the government would like to do now. Nonetheless on this side of the house we agree with him that, in this proposal which entirely mirrors earlier legislation introduced by this government, we have an opportunity now in a way that is strong, yes, but entirely reasonable and proportionate and, as Mr Somyurek has said, in keeping with earlier legislation agreed to by this house to keep the Victorian community safe and to finally provide at least a measure of certainty to families and loved ones who have been lacking that for so long. So I would urge all members of this house – government members, members of the crossbench – to support the bill today.

Council divided on motion:

Ayes (17): Matthew Bach, Melina Bath, Jeff Bourman, Georgie Crozier, David Davis, Moira Deeming, Renee Heath, Ann-Marie Hermans, David Limbrick, Wendy Lovell, Trung Luu, Joe McCracken, Nicholas McGowan, Evan Mulholland, Georgie Purcell, Adem Somyurek, Rikkie-Lee Tyrrell

Noes (19): Ryan Batchelor, John Berger, Lizzie Blandthorn, Katherine Copsey, Jacinta Ermacora, David Ettershank, Michael Galea, Shaun Leane, Sarah Mansfield, Tom McIntosh, Rachel Payne, Aiv Puglielli, Samantha Ratnam, Harriet Shing, Jaclyn Symes, Lee Tarlamis, Sonja Terpstra, Gayle Tierney, Sheena Watt

Motion negatived.