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List of Australians convicted of crimes

This is a list of notable Australian people who have been convicted of serious crimes both in Australia and overseas. The criterion for notability is either an article on the individual, or the crime they were convicted of, in the English Wikipedia.

Bank robbers

Child sex offenders

  • Brett Peter Cowan, Australian murderer and child rapist who was convicted of the murder of Daniel Morcombe
  • Mr Cruel, an unidentified Australian serial child rapist who attacked three girls and is suspected of murdering Karmein Chan in the northern and eastern suburbs of Melbourne, Victoria.
  • Robert 'Dolly' Dunn (1941–2009), paedophile.
  • Dennis Ferguson, paedophile.
  • Rolf Harris, Australian entertainer convicted of multiple counts of indecent assault while living in the UK involving underage girls
  • Robert Hughes, actor convicted of ten child sex offences committed against five young girls, sentenced to 10 years and 9 months with a non-parole period of six years. Deported to the United Kingdom following his release.
  • Brian Keith Jones, aka "Mr Baldy", serial paedophile, jailed indefinitely in 2006 for breaches of parole
  • Bernard McGrath, paedophile, a member of the Hospitaller Order of St John of God who had five separate criminal trials for his crimes against vulnerable children with mental and physical disabilities in New Zealand and Australia. McGrath's offending was so prolific the true number of his victims will never be known.
  • Milton Orkopoulos, NSW state MP and child sex offender
  • Patrick Power, Crown Prosecutor convicted of possessing child pornography
  • Gerald Ridsdale, paedophile, Australian Catholic priest convicted of sexual abuse against many children.
  • Peter Scully, paedophile convicted of abduction, human trafficking, rape, torture and murder, sentenced to life imprisonment in the Philippines.
  • Gregory Sutton, paedophile, member of the Catholic religious order the Marist Brothers.

Drug traffickers

Families

Notable Australian criminal families:

Fraudsters

Gangsters

Murderers

Rapists

Serial killers

  • Catherine Birnie, rape and murder of four women in Perth in 1986
  • David Birnie (1951–2005), rape and murder of four women in Perth in 1986
  • Gregory Brazel, shot dead a woman in 1982 armed robbery, and murdered two sex workers in 1990
  • John Bunting, Adelaide-based serial killer, with partners Robert Wagner and James Vlassakis was responsible for the murder of 12 victims known as the Snowtown murders or bodies in a barrel murders.
  • Robert Francis Burns, murdered eight men between 1876 and 1881 in Victoria and New South Wales
  • Eric Edgar Cooke, The Nedlands monster
  • Bandali Debs, convicted of murdering two police officers and two sex workers in the 1990s
  • Paul Denyer, Melbourne-based serial killer during the early 1990s dubbed the "Frankston Serial Killer"
  • Peter Dupas, Melbourne-based serial killer who killed several times upon release from prison
  • Bradley Robert Edwards; convicted of killing two women and suspected of killing a third in Claremont, Western Australia during 1996–1997.
  • Leonard Fraser, also known as "The Rockhampton Rapist"; killed four to seven women in Rockhampton, Queensland
  • John Wayne Glover (1932–2005), the Sydney North Shore granny murderer
  • Caroline Grills (c.1888–1960), also known as "Auntie Thally"; serial poisoner of five family members
  • Paul Steven Haigh, convicted of the murders of six people in the late 1970s and another in 1991; currently serving six life sentences without the possibility of parole
  • Matthew James Harris, strangled a friend's brother, a female friend and a male neighbour to death over five weeks in 1998 in Wagga Wagga
  • Thomas Jeffrey, Tasmanian penal colony escapee responsible for the murders of five people; executed in 1826
  • Eddie Leonski, American serial killer known as the Brownout Strangler
  • John Lynch, convicted of the murder of Kernes Landregan in 1842 near Berrima, New South Wales; prior to his execution he confessed to murdering ten people during the period 1836 to 1842.
  • William MacDonald, also known as "the Mutilator"; killed at least five men between June 1961 and April 1963
  • John and Sarah Makin, baby farmers convicted for the murder of Horace Amber Murray; suspected of the murders of 13 infants.
  • Ivan Milat (1944–2019), convicted of the murder of seven young men and women between 1989 and 1993; known as Australia's most prolific serial killer. His crimes are collectively referred to as the "Backpacker murders".
  • Martha Needle, poisoned five family members
  • Martha Rendell, killed three stepchildren with hydrochloric acid in the 20th century; last woman to be hanged in Western Australia
  • Lindsay Robert Rose, serial killer and contract killer who murdered five people between 1984 and 1994
  • Arnold Sodeman, the schoolgirl strangler
  • Christopher Worrell and James Miller. Miller was convicted of the Truro murders, the murder of seven people women and girls in 1976–1977. It was accepted in court that Worrell, who died in a car accident in 1977, physically committed the murders, and that Miller was guilty as part of a joint criminal enterprise.

See also

References