Wednesday, 21 September 2022

Statements on reports, papers and petitions

Parole eligibility

Petition

Mr LIMBRICK (South Eastern Metropolitan) (17:15): I wish to make a statement on the petition regarding the life imprisonment of the Frankston serial killer. When a libertarian stands in this place and calls for someone to spend the rest of their life in prison, you can know that they do not do it lightly, but even libertarians believe that some people are so dangerous to society that they must be separated from us forever—and if anyone fits this description, it is this person. He viciously murdered three women back in 1993—Elizabeth Stevens, Debbie Fream and Nat. At the time, when he was sentenced, we felt that there was justice. He was sentenced to three life terms without parole plus eight years for another attempted murder. Subsequently we were shocked that on appeal—for a technical reason, which to this day I feel was totally wrong—that sentence was reduced to 30 years non-parole on a life term. That 30 years ends next year. Next year Denyer will be eligible for parole, and for those that were close to this and indeed for the people of Frankston who were also shocked by what I would consider an injustice, we have been waiting, dreading this day for almost 30 years now.

I have spoken to the government repeatedly about this and asked for them to take action. For whatever reason, much to my disappointment, they have not taken any visible action that I am aware of, and it is too late in this term of Parliament to take any action now. The government appears to have chosen the course of placing complete faith in the system. I must say that I have my concerns about doing that. However, that is the course that we are on now. All I was asking of the government—and there is still time for the government to do this—is to provide some sort of reassurance to the people who were affected by this that Denyer will never kill another woman. That is all we want.

I will give my commitment that, whether I am elected or not, next year I will be paying very, very close attention to this issue, which I believe will become a large issue because there are many people interested in this. As we saw from the petition, over 5000 people signed that petition. There are many, many people who have contacted me about this; they are very concerned. Again, I reiterate that I think it is imperative that the government provide some sort of reassurance to people. All I can do personally is provide a commitment that I will continue to hound the government, either inside or outside this place, to make sure that no other woman is harmed by this man. That is all I have to say on this.