Arthur Stanley Brown

Arthur Brown was born in Merinda, Queensland, on 20 May 1912 and moved to Townsville with his parents when he was four. Following the separation of his parents, he moved to Melbourne, Victoria, with his mother, where he remained until he got a drivers licence when he moved back to Townsville and obtained work as a meatpacker. He was exempted from military service in World War II as his job was listed as a Reserved occupation, and in 1946 he became a maintenance carpenter with the Queensland Department of Public Works, where he was known to his workmates as a polite, immaculately dressed man who ironed knife-edge creases in his work uniforms. He was nicknamed The Scarlet Pimpernel based on the verse from the play[1] as he could be anywhere at any time due to flexible work hours and self-supervision.

In 1944 Brown married Hester Porter (Née Andersen) following her divorce and became a stepfather to her three children. According to Hester's older sister Milly, Hester later told her that she was afraid of Brown and that she had caught him molesting a child and was trying to prevent him from being alone with children. Hester once gave a female relative the "prized" lacework she'd inherited from her mother, saying that she didn't want "his next lady love to get it". When asked whom she meant, Hester had replied "Charlotte, of course". On 15 May 1978 Hester, by now bedridden with arthritis, died after hitting her head in a fall, and Hester's younger sister Charlotte, who had five children, moved in with Brown. The couple married later that year. Some members of Hester's family believed Brown had killed Hester. One relative recalled that Brown wasn't grieving the day Hester died but was "shaking with fright" and looked worried. Brown told family members that he had paid for a post-mortem that found the death to be an accident, but investigating police found this to be untrue and believe the family doctor had written out a death certificate without examining the body, which Brown had had cremated.[2]

In 1982 another of Hester's sisters told her parents that Brown had molested her while a small girl. After this, many more of the Anderson extended family came forward to say they also had been molested. Following legal advice that taking the matter to court could be traumatic for the victims, the incidents were to be kept a family secret. It was not entirely secret, however, as an entry in Christine Millier's diary dated 23 January 1991 and produced at his trial in 1999 reads: "Kids and I went for walk to Strand. Arthur Brown drove by and the kids called him "rock spider", shouting it out. Eventually they told me what a rock spider was".[3]

Five-year-old Susan and seven-year-old Judith MacKay disappeared on the morning of Wednesday, 26 August 1970 from a school bus stop 200 metres (660 ft) from their home in the Townsville suburb of Aitkenvale less than 10 minutes after leaving home. A search for the missing girls was mounted after they failed to return home after school and continued until the girls' bodies were found on Friday in the dry bed of Antill Creek, 25 km (16 mi) south-west of Townsville. Susan was found first and a trail of footprints from her body led searchers 70 metres (230 ft) to where Judith's body lay. It was speculated that Judith had fled while Susan was being killed and had then been run down. A post-mortem revealed that Susan had been raped, strangled and stabbed three times in the chest, possibly after death. Judith had also been raped and stabbed three times in the chest but cause of death was determined to be asphyxiation by sand. Their school uniforms, straw hats and shoes were beside them, with each shoe containing a neatly folded sock while their uniforms were folded neatly inside their schoolbags.[4] The community was outraged, with one policeman stating that he wouldn't go home until they caught the killer. The officer slept at the Townsville police station while his wife brought him food and clean clothing. He died of a heart attack two weeks later.[5] Police initially declined to post a reward but after interviewing more than 6,000 men who lived in the area and having no progress in the investigation, posted a reward of $10,000 (2011: $101,500) with an offer of a pardon for any accomplice who came forward.[6]

One witness saw the girls talking to a man in a car at the bus stop at 8:10 am.[5] Just after 11 am a car pulled into a service station at Ayr, 85 km (53 mi) south of Townsville and the driver bought $3 (around 25-litre/ 5 gll) of petrol. The two girls were in the car and the station attendant, Jean Thwaite, recalled the younger girl saying "Are we there yet?" followed by the older girl asking the driver, "When are you taking us to mummy? You promised to take us to mummy." Not long after, Neil Lunney, a soldier recently returned from Vietnam, spoke to a driver who had cut him off. Lunney stated that he saw two girls in Aitkenvale school uniforms in the vehicle and that the driver appeared to be trying to avoid being seen. The evidence given by the station attendant and Lunney were both rejected as unreliable as, in contrast to all the other witnesses who identified the car as "looking like a Holden", they had both identified the car as a Vauxhall and neither were questioned "in depth". Several witnesses reported the girls being driven around in a car. Two witnesses later reported seeing a man walking towards a car from the direction of the murder scene around 1 pm that day.[5][7]

Identification of the vehicle and suspect

Two witnesses claimed the vehicle was a blue Vauxhall Victor, a very uncommon car at the time.

Several witnesses described the vehicle as blue in colour and "looking like" a Holden EH.

The media reported that the vehicle was a Holden FJ

Several witnesses claimed the car looked like a Holden EH. Two witnesses said it was a blue Vauxhall Victor, a very uncommon car at the time. A car seen parked near the murder scene was described as an earlier model Holden (possibly a Holden FJ). Despite the various descriptions of the vehicle, the two witnesses who saw the children inside the car gave matching descriptions of the driver; with him having high cheekbones, narrow skull, short dark hair and, as one put it, "Mickey Mouse ears", and both were in agreement that the vehicle had a driver's door that was a different colour from the rest of the vehicle. One of these was to eventually be a key witness at the trial as he identified Brown as the driver with two young passengers that he had argued with over erratic driving that day. Although 28 years had passed, Brown's appearance had barely changed and he was still very much recognisable as the same person when compared to photographs of him taken in the 1970s. This would be an important factor in identifying him as matching the sketch of the suspect in the Beaumont and Adelaide Oval abductions.

Inexplicably, the two witnesses who said the vehicle was a Vauxhall, later changed their minds and signed statements that the vehicle may have been an FJ Holden. The Police, believing the car seen parked near the murder scene was the offender's, concentrated on finding the vehicle rather than the driver, no sketch or photofit picture of the suspect was ever released and, despite evidence from the witness who refueled the car that the petrol cap was on the left side which ruled out the vehicle being a Holden, the media only ran pictures of FJ Holdens.[5]

Police were unable to locate the car at the time and the murders remained unsolved. Arthur Brown, who matched the suspects description and owned a blue Vauxhall Victor with an odd coloured drivers door, was never a suspect in the original police investigation. The evidence given by the two witnesses who identified the car as a Vauxhall was rejected as unreliable solely due to the belief held by police that the car was a Holden. They were never questioned in depth which police later admitted hindered investigations as both were the only witnesses to speak to the suspect while the girls were in the car.[7]

The Mackay family moved to Toowoomba several months after the murders.

In 1998, a cousin of Brown's wife who was now living in Perth, Western Australia, who had been one of Brown's victims and also had suspicions about his involvement with the MacKay sisters, decided to phone Crimestoppers after they aired a program on the case.

Sergeant David Hickey of the Queensland homicide squad, who was conducting the cold case review of the MacKay murders, returned the call three days later. The ensuing months of investigations by Detectives David Hickey and Brendan Rook, including interviewing other family members resulted in 45 cases against Brown relating to pedophilia and circumstantial evidence linking him to the MacKay murders. Investigations continued and evidence accumulated. Brown, who had been working as a carpenter at the MacKay sisters' school at the time, had been obsessed by the case, falsely claiming he knew the girls' father and two weeks after the murders he had offered to take two of his wife's cousins to view the murder site. He had replaced the odd-coloured door from his blue Vauxhall Victor, buried it, then later dug it up and took it to the rubbish tip explaining to his family he did it because he didn't want anyone interviewing or annoying him. Many of his victims were taken to Antill Creek to be molested and one instance was only 20 metres (66 ft) from where the girls' bodies were found.[2]

Brown had twice previously confessed to the murders. In September 1970, Brown was drinking with 19-year-old John White in the White Horse Tavern in Charters Towers. White, who did not know Brown, claimed that Brown had asked if he had been following the murder of the Mackay sisters a few days earlier and had then stated that police were looking for the wrong car and that he had committed the murders. White reported the conversation to the local police who had dismissed the claim after speaking to "Arty Brown". In 1975, Brown confessed to the murders to his apprentice John Hill who said he never came forward before because it seemed totally out of character and he thought Brown was joking.[8]

Brown was arrested on 45 charges of sexual assault and the rape of six children three to ten years of age and for the murders of Susan and Judith MacKay.

The trial of Arthur Stanley Brown for the murders of Judith and Susan Mackay began on 18 October 1999.

Although evidence regarding Brown's pedophilia had been given at the committal hearing it had been ruled prejudicial at trial and therefore could not be put before the Supreme Court jury. The jury were unable to reach a decision on the strong but circumstantial evidence.

Trial was set for 25 July 2000 where the defense argued Brown was unfit to plead and a new trial was set for 31 July but before it could start newspapers reported that "the case did not proceed for legal reasons which cannot be published". The court suppressed release of the legal reasons until July 2001.[9]

In 2001 it was revealed that Brown's lawyer had applied for a section 613 verdict (unfit to be tried) from the jury. The jury had rejected the application, but in the meantime Brown's wife Charlotte had referred the case to the Queensland Mental Health Tribunal who ruled that Brown had progressive dementia and was also suffering from Alzheimer's disease, and was thus unfit to stand trial. The Attorney-General lodged an appeal and the court concluded that the Mental Health Tribunal did not have the jurisdiction to overrule the jury and commissioned an independent psychiatric report. In July 2001 the report concluded that Brown was unfit to stand trial because he was suffering from dementia and Alzheimer's disease. Although the psychiatric report could not overrule the courts finding that the trial could proceed, Queensland's Director of Public Prosecutions, Leanne Clare, announced on 3 July that her office had decided not to proceed with the retrial and all charges against Brown were dropped.[9]

His wife of 24 years Charlotte Brown (formerly Anderson) died in April 2002. Ostracized by his family, Arthur Brown moved into a nursing home in Malanda, north Queensland where he died three months later on 6 July, officially an innocent man. Brown left instructions that no funeral notices be placed and only one stepdaughter had knowledge of the funeral details. His death was not reported until several weeks after the funeral. Stepson Robert stated "I can't believe such an insignificant little arsehole had such a profound effect on so many people's lives."[10]

Along with Bevan Spencer von Einem, he is considered to be the best suspect for the Beaumont children disappearance as he bore a similarity to an identikit picture of the suspect for both the Beaumont children and Adelaide Oval cases. Brown is also a suspect in several other child murders and disappearances.[6]

A search for a connection to the Beaumonts was unsuccessful as no employment records existed that could shed light on his work history such as showing holidays when he may have travelled interstate. Some of the records were believed lost in the 1974 Brisbane flood and it is also possible that Brown, who had unrestricted access to government buildings, may have deleted his own employment files. Brown is considered a suspect for the Beaumont children disappearance, based on the connections that have been made between him and the Adelaide Oval Abduction.

Although there is no proof that he had ever visited Adelaide, a witness recalled having a conversation with Brown in which he mentioned having seen the Adelaide Festival Centre nearing completion which places him in Adelaide after June 1973. The oval abduction occurred on 25 August 1973. Another witness who earlier had reported seeing a man[11] near the oval carrying a young girl while another older girl in obvious distress followed, identified Brown as the man she had seen after seeing his picture on television in December 1998 in relation to his arrest for the MacKay murders. She had reported that the man was wearing a pair of horn rimmed glasses which had fallen to the ground, been picked up and placed in a pocket. Brown is known to have worn horn rimmed reading glasses which police consider a significant point in the identification. This identification though is based on that of a woman who was aged 14 when she saw him, only for one minute, and who then saw a picture of Brown, now aged 86, 25 years later, albeit Brown at 86 compared to a photo of him taken in the 1970s showed little change in his appearance.[12][13]

• Fourteen-year-old Marilyn Joy Wallman disappeared while on the way to school at Eimeo Queensland, on 21 March 1972. Witnesses saw a blue Vauxhall in the area around the time of the disappearance.
  Brown and his wife Hester had visited relatives in Mackay (13 km from Eimeo) but his car (a blue Vauxhall) had broken down and the couple returned home by train. Brown returned to Mackay alone to pick up the car and police speculate that if the couple had taken an early train, Brown could have been passing Eimeo at the time that Wallman disappeared.[2][13] In 1974 fragment of skull was discovered 40 kilometres away from where Wallman went missing and was positively identified as being Wallman's through DNA analysis in January 2015.[14][15][16]
• Eighteen-year-old Catherine Pamela Graham was murdered in Oak Valley, 18 kilometres south of Townsville on 28 July 1975.
  Graham had been selling books door-to-door on the day she was murdered and had been seen door-knocking close to Brown's house. Her body was discovered only 500 metres from where the bodies of the Mackay sisters had been found in 1970. Police have evidence that two men were involved in the murder but admit that the disposal of Graham's body was very similar to that of the Mackay sisters and that there are other similarities which have not been released to the public.[13]

• Photograph of Arthur and Charlotte Brown 27 October 1999
• The Beaumont Children: Arthur Stanley Brown
• Photograph of Arthur Brown 2 October 1987