David and Catherine Birnie
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David (1951 – October 2, 2005) and Catherine Birnie (born 1951) were an Australian husband and wife pair of serial killers from Perth, Australia. They murdered four women ranging in age from 16 to 35 in their home in the 1980s, and attempted to murder a fifth. These crimes were referred to in the press as the Moorhouse murders, after the Birnie's address at 3 Moorhouse Street in Willagee on the outskirts of Perth.[1]
David Birnie hanged himself on October 2, 2005. Catherine's first opportunity for parole in 2007 was unsuccessful and her case will be reviewed again in 2010. However, West Australian Attorney General Jim McGinty has said that her release is unlikely while he remains in office.[2]
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[edit] David Birnie
| David Birnie | |
|---|---|
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| Background information | |
| Birth name: | David Birnie |
| Born: | 1951 |
| Died: | October 7, 2005 |
| Cause of death: | Suicide |
| Penalty: | Life |
| Country: | Australia |
| State(s): | Western Australia, Australia |
| Date apprehended: | November, 1986 |
Born in 1951, David Birnie was the eldest of several children. His parents were alcoholics, and when he was 10 years old, they divorced. When neither parent wanted custody, he became a ward of the state. In the early 1960s, he was hired at a stable as an apprentice jockey, but was dismissed after a short while when he approached a female customer wearing nothing but a stocking over his head.
By the time he was an adolescent, he was already guilty of several crimes and had spent time in and out of jail for misdemeanors and felonies alike. As an adult, he was a known sexual addict, pornography addict, and paraphiliac.When he was married to his first wife he was apparently very charming, handsome and persuasive. He had one childless marriage prior to his common-law marriage with Catherine.
David Birnie was found dead in his cell in his Casuarina maximum security prison cell on the 7th October 2005. At the time Birnie, 55, was serving a life sentence for the abduction, rape, torture and murder of four women in 1986.
These offences were committed in partnership with his de facto wife Catherine Birnie, 52, who is serving a life sentence in Bandyup women's prison, in Perth's north-east.
[edit] Catherine Birnie
Catherine was also born in 1951. She was 10 months old when her mother died, after which her father took her to live in South Africa with him. At the age of two, she returned to Australia to live with her grandparents, and after a year was sent to live with an aunt and uncle. It was while she was living with her aunt and uncle, at age 15, that she first met David Birnie. Although she and David were casual lovers into their late teens, she married Donald McLaughlin on her 21st birthday. She and McLaughlin had six children, one of whom was hit by a car in infancy.
Shortly thereafter, she abandoned her husband and began cohabiting with Birnie. She had her surname legally changed to match his, and was completely emotionally dependent on him.
She is still alive and serving a life sentence.
[edit] Crimes
Their final victim, the only victim to survive their attacks, was a sixteen-year-old girl, whose name was never released because she was a juvenile. She ran naked and weeping into a grocery store on November 10, 1986 and insisted on seeing the police. When the law enforcement officials arrived, she alleged that she had been abducted at knifepoint by a couple who had taken her back to their house and chained her to a bed, and that the man had raped her while the woman observed. The next morning, while the man was at work, the woman unchained her and forced her to telephone her parents to say she had spent the night at a friend's house and was okay. The woman then led her back to the bedroom, but left to answer the door before securing her. The girl escaped out the window. She told the police the phone number and address of the couple who had abducted her.
When the girl and the police arrived at the Birnies' residence, Catherine admitted that she recognized the girl but refused to answer any more questions without her husband. When the police brought him home, the couple claimed that the girl had not been abducted, but had willingly come to the house to share a bong with the Birnies, and that all sexual activity had been consensual.
The Birnies were detained by police, who tried to trick them into confessing to a crime by intense interrogation. Around dusk, Detective Sergeant Vince Kaitch said in a joking manner to David Birnie, "It's getting dark. Best we take the shovel and dig them up." Birnie replied, "Okay. There are four of them." The Birnies were reportedly very excited, even proud, to show the police the locations of the graves of their four victims: Mary Frances Neilson (age 22), Susannah Candy (age 15), Noelene Patterson (age 35), and Denise Karen Brown (age 21).
When sent to trial, David Birnie pleaded guilty immediately to four counts of murder and one count of abduction and rape. When asked why he pleaded guilty, he gestured toward the victims' families and said, "It's the least I could do." After being found sane enough to stand trial, Catherine was sentenced in the West Australian supreme court. Both were sentenced to life in prison. While incarcerated, they exchanged over 2,600 letters, but weren't allowed any other form of contact.
[edit] References
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This article or section includes a list of references or external links, but its sources remain unclear because it lacks in-text citations. You can improve this article by introducing more precise citations. |
- ^ Kidd, Pual B (12 Feb. 2007). David & Catherine Birnie Abducted & Murdered 4 Perth, CourtTV CrimeLibrary. 2007. Courtroom Television Network, LLC. Australia Women.
- ^ Spagnolo, Joe (19 May 2007). Birnie 'will not be freed'.
- Blundell, Nigel and Susan Blackhall, eds. "David and Catherine Birnie." The Visual Encyclopedia of Serial Killers. London, England: PRC Limited, 2004. 46-49.
- Westch, Elizabeth. "Serial Killer True Crime Library * Serial Killer News." Serial Killer Crime Index. 2005. 12 Feb. 2007.
- "The Moorhouse Horrors". Episode 10 of the Crime Investigation Australia TV series, Foxtel, broadcast by Channel 9 on 30 October 2007. Producer Graham Mcneice. Author David Allender.
