“WHO KILLED HER?”: BETTY SHANKS (1952)
This year marks 62 years since Betty Thomson Shanks – a kind, thoughtful young woman, was brutally murdered in the Brisbane suburb of Wilston, only a few hundred meters away from her home. It is still Queensland’s longest running cold case. This was the crime said to have stolen Brisbane’s innocence. The Brisbane of the 1950s was a place of unlocked doors, open windows and the belief that women would be safe walking home in the evening – all of that changed within 24 hours of the murder, there were fears the maniac would strike again.
There have been plenty of theories and speculation about this cold case including possible suspects and false confessions. There have been four major theories about who killed Betty; one of them was an accusation that came to light in 1999.
The allegation caused a sensation at the time and was reported on the front page of the Courier Mail. A woman (Desche) accused her father of murdering Betty Shanks. She told authorities her violent and short tempered father Eric had been having an affair with Betty Shanks and was furious she had returned late from a lecture that fateful night.
According to Desche, the night of the murder her father left her with her brother in the family car, just around the corner from the crime scene. Her father disappeared leaving them alone while he flew into a frenzied attack, beating, kicking and strangling Betty to death. Returning home, he stripped off his bloodied clothes and burnt them. The next morning he ordered Desche to clean the car and his shoes.
Desche remembered cleaning off slimy brown material from the car, a substance she now believes was blood.
“I started picking stuff off his shoes with my fingers to get all the bits out of the groove where the leather meets the sole.” she said. “I thought I was picking off mud because it was kind of slimy, brown and other colours. Now I realise it was skin, tissue, hair.”
Detectives investigated Desche’s allegations, but were unable to link her father to the killing. This was a claim many thought would finally solve the infamous murder mystery, but there has been no evidence to suggest his guilt.
Former journalist and author of Who Killed Betty Shanks – Ken Blanch believes the killer may still be alive. Tonight listen to this fascinating story on Australia’s longest running true crime show “True Crimes” – presented by Jack Sim on 4BC Nights with Walter Williams. Thursday evenings 9.35pm on Radio 4BC.
PURCHASE THE BOOK “WHO KILLED BETTY SHANKS” BY KEN BLANCH HERE
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“I AM SURE I FIRED THREE” THE HOLLAND PARK TAXI MURDER (1939)
This year marks 75 years since Derwent Evans Arkinstall murdered taxi driver Howard Thomas Chambers at Holland Park on Brisbane’s Southside. In June 1939, Brisbane was shocked when it was learnt that the killer was only 18 years of age. An electrician’s apprentice Arkinstall seemed a most unlikely killer. Indeed when interviewed by police soon after his arrest in Bangalow New South Wales where he had fled after committing the crime, he seemingly did not realise the gravity of what he had done: “It was not an accident, and I did not do it deliberately, yet I do not know how I did it. I just took the revolver out of my pocket and fired it.”
Derwent Arkinstall (Right) along with Detective-Sergeant Snowden, of Lismore (Left)
It was truly a terrible crime. Tom Chambers was a veteran cabbie, 74 years of age. His body was found at Slack’s Creek. He had been shot twice in the back of the head and once in the forehead – to make sure he was dead.
When he appeared in Brisbane Police Court Arkinstall was asked whether he admitted he had fired the shots that had killed Chambers. Cold-bloodedly the youth responded “They say there were only two shots, but I am sure I fired three”. Arkinstall was found guilty of murder in the Supreme Court soon after.
He would spend 43 years living behind the walls of Boggo Road Gaol becoming Australia’s longest serving prisoner at that time. In “Boggo” he was regarded as a dangerous trouble maker. In 1946 notorious escapologist Arthur Halliday, Arkinstall and Victor Travis staged one of the most daring prison breaks in Australian history. For this he was never trusted again.
His release 31 years ago was controversial. He had only one word for reporters at the time when asked what it was like to be leaving prison – “wonderful”.
The 62 years old had been released to die as a free man. In this case justice could truly have been said to have been served – prison had claimed the best part of Arkinstall’s life.
Listen to True Crime – every Thursday at 9.30pm on Radio 4BC for this and more crime stories.
THE CHERMSIDE TOMAHAWK MURDER (1959)
In 1983, Brisbane residents were shocked to read of a campaign to release a forgotten murderer from behind the bars of Boggo Road Jail. Wife killer, Jack Foy 66, was at the time Queensland’s longest serving prisoner. His savage crime, his first and only offense shocked the people of Chermside 24 years earlier.
Left: Jack Foy 1959
Right:Jack Foy 1983
Out on the “back track” of Number 2 Division at Boggo Road Gaol, a lonely lifer weeded and swept. This elderly figure caused no trouble and longed to hear the sound of birds once again. When asked by a new prison officer what he was in for, Jack Foy would reply ‘I got life because his wife nagged me’.
Though now a frail crippled old man, on the 18th of June 1959 Jack Foy was a fit, hardworking labourer, well-liked by his neighbours and friends, but also an alcoholic.
The 42 year-old council worker and local handy-man was addicted to drink. He and his wife Lola 41, lived in Kingsmill Street Chermside. Jack was an epileptic and should not have been drinking; a fact Lola reminded him of daily. It seems that her nagging resulted in Jack picking up a tomahawk and striking her in the head. The Foy’s neighbour Mrs Jarvis was horrified when Jack walked over to the fence and handed over his little daughter saying ‘I’ve killed Lola, could you look after the kids and call the Police?’
Foy seemed like an unlikely killer in late 1983 after 25 years in Prison, Jack Foy was released to die as a free man.
When does “life” imprisonment mean for life?
Listen to True Crime – every Thursday at 9.30pm on Radio 4BC for this and more crime stories.
THE HUSBAND WHO DROWNED HIS WIFE (1961)
The public interest in and media coverage of the trial of Gerard Baden Clay mirrors that of half a century ago when Dutchman Hank Plomp claimed his pregnant wife vanished at night after a swim. When 30 year-old Brisbane City Council bus driver Hendrikus Plomp staggered out of the surf at Southport 53 years ago to report his wife Fay missing, something didn’t add up. The saga of Plomp would carry on for years in Queensland’s courts and newspapers, and inside the walls of Boggo Road Gaol where Plomp was to serve his time. Like the case of Baden Clay, no one saw what actually happened.
Hank Plomp and his wife Fay, lived in Petrel Street Inala, Brisbane. They had two young children, Faye was pregnant with a third, at the time of the tragedy.
On February 24, 1961 Plomp took his wife to the Gold Coast on a day trip. At 6.30pm they drove to Southport. Fay, a good swimmer wanted to have one last dip at Main Beach, they entered the water leaving their son in their car.
What happened next depended on who’s version you believe. Police maintained that Plomp told them that waves knocked he and his wife over twice and that Fay was dragged under. Plomp grabbed the shoulder strap of her swim suit, but it broke and she disappeared underwater. Plomp then raised the alarm at a nearby shop ; Police were called. This version of events relayed by Plomp was later denied by him. Detectives claimed that when her body was found later that night her shoulder straps were intact.
Fay’s family and friends suspicions of murder were confirmed 45 minutes before her funeral when Hank claimed his wife’s insurance. Plomp it seemed had been living a sordid lie. After his wife’s death, he was put on trial for rape of another woman and it was revealed he had a mistress, who he had promised to marry. It seemed he had taken the advice of a work colleague ‘If you want to get rid of your wife, the easiest way is to take her swimming and hold her under. Then feel sorry and start to cry.’
The council bus driver had thought his plan to be cunningly simple. Ultimately a jury convicted him of murder after just 90 minutes. After many years Plomp was released from Boggo Road Gaol after a series of appeals against his conviction… He returned to Holland taking his family with him.
The question remains: was the shoulder strap broken or intact?
Listen to True Crimes – every Thursday at 9.30pm on Radio 4BC for this and more crime stories. Next THE CHERMSIDE TOMAHAWK MURDER (1959)