Snowtown Murders Part 2

Kayla tells the second half of the Snowtown Murders.

Episode Transcript

(00:11):
This podcast discusses true crime, whichmay tell violence, and other material intended
for a mature audience. Listener discretionis advised. Hey, it's Kayla and
it's Lexi, and we are backfor part two of the Snowtown Murders.
We kind of left off let mesee here where Suzanne joined Ray and the

(00:36):
yard basically, and we're moving onto where John and Mak get their fronts
of property in Snowtown. So Ithink we should just die, right,
Eggs, It's gonna be a deepone, you know, It's like it's
already a deep one. Let's justmake it deeper. Maybe the deeper we
died the whole we can use thedirt as a ramp stick us out,

(01:00):
alrighty, So let's see. Oneday, a police knocked on John's door.
They're making inquiries about discrepancies regarding Suzanne'scheck since one had been cashed and
Murray's bridge and not Adelaide, andthe address that was cashed for was his
and not hers. So John justtold them that he was a friend of
hers and was helping her out withher finances. They bought it. So

(01:23):
he was just cashing her checks.Okay. They were like Okay, that
checks out. Whatever. John hadstill gone on calling people to accuse them
of being gay and our pedophiles,and actually started breaking into their houses and
vandalizing them. Instead of just threateningthem, he was like destroying their stuff.

(01:44):
Now, oh wow. The policewere not contacted, as they had
not helped any other time that thesemen call it for help. John had
gone back to Barry for more names, and he gave him the name of
Michael Gardner. John and his crewhad abducted Michael in the middle of the
night. Michael was an openly gayteenager, and they threw him into the

(02:05):
car and headed towards Snowtown, wherethey electrocuted and tortured him to death.
Afterwards, they put his body ina barrel in a barrel of acid.
So this is where they're starting touse the Snowtown bank for their body disposal.
Where do you just get a barrelof acid? So John excelled in

(02:27):
chemistry in high school. He kindof carried that into his adult years where
he made like some kind of itreminded me of like, have you ever
seen Breaking Bad? Actually, no, I'm so sorry, I know what
it's about. I've never actually seenan episode well in the in the in
the show, along with what Johndid is he just mixed chemicals together to

(02:49):
make this type of acid that doesn'tdissolve the plastic, but it'll dissolve people.
Okay, I mean so you'd beshocked at how many acids will do
that. Yeah. So they alsowanted to collect his benefit checks, but
they needed his ID, which waskept at the house that he was renting,
and the landlady had taken it whenshe thought that Michael had disappeared.

(03:13):
She had actually called the police whenhe disappeared, but since he had a
reputation of running away, no onelistened to her. John needed someone to
get it for him, so hehired Fred Brooks to do it, which
was his friend, Mark's sister inlaw's son. Fred called her saying that
he was Michael's friend and that Michaelwas looking for his wallet, so could

(03:36):
she send it to him. Sherefused, saying that if he wanted it
that he could meet up with herto get it, and they ended up
not being able to get his checks. So this lady was kind of like
catching on to what they were doing. She thought something bad happened to Michael,
and she thought these people were involved, but she didn't have any proof
and the police weren't listening to her. So after Michael Barry did not think

(03:58):
he could give John any more infoas he could not stomach it. He
was starting to get a little bitof a conscience for what he was doing
now that people were dying from whathe was doing. The neighborhood had a
man named Thomas Treva Lane. Hewas a mentally ill man who dressed an
army clothes as his dream was tobe a soldier would do to his disabilities,
he was unable to. He alsocarried an Yeah, he also carried

(04:21):
a knife and constantly worked out,so he was pretty strong. He's a
pretty strong man. I feel likewe all know that person, you know
what I mean, Like we allknow like knife gym guy. Yeah,
everyone knows knife gym guy. Likehe just always inexplicably has like a lock
knife on him and he always justgot it at like the show, you

(04:43):
know, Yeah, always wanted tobe a soldier going to the army,
right, Yes, yes, it'slike always just like fantasized by being the
military. Like that's a genre ofperson that continues to be repeated over the
years. Yeah, so one dayBarry invited him over for a d in
the summer of nineteen seventy seven.They hit it off, and Thomas eventually

(05:03):
just moved right on it. Barryhad told Thomas about his experiences with John
and his gang, and these rumorscirculated until they reached John. So John
and Robert went to visit Barry witha six pack to see what had been
going on. They kind of likeshowed up like they were being friendly,
like, hey, like we've beenhearing some stuff. What's been going on?

(05:27):
Okay, like just being like,hey, we just want the tea.
Yeah, basically the istory okay.Yeah, And I'm sure Barry was
still puckering the entire time because Johnshowed about his door. Yeah, Barry
went on about how despicable they wereand just ranted at them for what they've
been doing. And after his rant, John just like nodded to Thomas,

(05:49):
who then grabbed Barry by the neckand dragged him to the bathroom. So
John somehow had Thomas under his controlas well. Wow, Okay, so
this man's not just like insane andviolent, he's also at least to a
degree, effectively manipulative. Mm hmm. Yeah. They put him in the

(06:13):
tub and forced him to call hismom, who he never had a great
relationship with. They made him readoff a script saying that this would be
their last conversation and not who hasmoved into Queensland. Okay. After that,
they tortured him to death and tookhis body to Snowtown to put into
a barrel. And they also startedtaking his benefit checks as well. Jesus,
that's awful. I like, atsome point, I feel like the

(06:35):
bank or something has Sorry, mydog gets very excited when she's being fed
dinner, if you guys can hearthat. Uh, So, I feel
like our dogs are just part ofthe podcast at this point. It's fine.
I feel like, like, howare they not catching on? Like,
I feel like these people are catchinglike ten different people's benefit checks.

(06:59):
Let's see Berry's raised, Suzanne's.I can't remember if there's a fourth person.
It's been a couple of weeks sinceI looked at the script. Uh,
but there is at least three orfour people that they're collecting all these
checks from. Yeah, like enoughthat it's a little suspicious. Yeah,
but I guess no one's like reallychecking to see as long as they're cashing

(07:20):
the checks under their addresses. Iguess like under the correct person's address,
it might not raise any flags.I don't know how that system works.
Especially in the seventies, the policehad a growing interest in Suzanne's checks and
payments, and we're going to andthe payments were going to be halted unless
she called into the offices herself.So he used Jodie to call and pretend

(07:42):
to be Suzanne. So he usedher by sleeping with her so she would
do whatever he wanted. So that'skind of like how he manipulated the women
in his life. Okay, shecalled and resolved his issue, continuing the
checks to him. Thomas has startedto crack under the sure of what he
had done and had a breakdown.Oh John, and yeah, which I

(08:05):
feel like any sane person would,whether like I don't know, you're under
John's control or not, Like Barrystarting to have a breakdown about it,
Thomas is starting to have a breakdownabout it. Yeah, like eventually you're
going to reach that breaking point.M M. John and Robert went to
confront him and expected to find himgoing crazy, and they expected to be

(08:26):
able to just kind of push himover the edge to either commit suicide or
be committed to a mental institution.They were expecting to find him, like,
I don't know, like going likeberserk, and they're like, yeah,
we're just going to push him liketo the edge, okay. And
instead they found him inside catatonic andnumb, like nothing they said or did
was bothering, like could affect him. He was just kind of shut down.

(08:50):
Okay. John was able to convincehim to go into the car,
and together they all drove to AdelaideHills. Mark tied a news around a
tree and John ordered Thomas to steponto a box by the noose. At
first he refused and cried, andthen John talked to him and calmed him
down. Thomas then stepped onto thebox and they tied the noose around his

(09:13):
neck. His body was found amonth later and ruled as a suicide.
Oh my god. Yeah, Idon't know what you say to a person
to convince them to be able tolike hang themselves. Yeah, I don't
know if he's like that manipulative,but that's crazy. Yeah, that's awful.
To deal with everything that John wasdoing, Jamie had turned into a

(09:35):
heroin addict. So Jamie is startingto crack as well, and he's using
drugs to deal with like all thedeath that they have caused. This bothered
John because John saw addicts as weakand subhuman, and he was becoming concerned
as Jamie knew too much and wasworried that he was cracking. Okay.

(09:56):
John had come home one day tofind a man named Gavin Porter, one
of Jamie's who was also an addict, sitting on the couch. Jamie explained
that he needed a place to stay. John was like hospitable and charming to
Gavin letting him stay, but wasbasically just gritting his teeth through it just
to keep his relationship with Jamie.Okay. Yeah. His attitude changed though

(10:18):
when John sat on the couch andwas stabbed with a used hypodermic needle,
which I feel like that would throwanybody over the edge. Yeah, if
you're sit on your own couch andyou get stabbed with a used needle.
But I don't think I would goto the extreme that he did. I
guess we can all see where thisis going. He went to the driveway

(10:39):
where he found Gavin asleep in hispassenger side of his car. John snuck
him behind him with a tire ironand pinned him to the headrest and choked
him to death. He drove hisbody to Snowtown and put him in a
barrel. When John got back fromSnowtown, it was late and Jamie was
waiting for him. Knowing that somethinghappened to Gavin, John dodged Jamie's questions

(11:03):
and said they would just talk inthe morning. Jimmie lapped and stayed with
a few friends for a couple ofdays, and when he came back,
he saw that Gavin's car was gone, along with his belongings. John preached
to Jamie about drug usage and howit was just weakness, and this just
got Jamie a breakdown and tell himabout the past with his father and stepbrother
Troy abusing him. Okay, hisstepbrother Troy actually wanted to come and live

(11:28):
with them to escape their father aswell, and when he came to live
with them, Jamie felt betrayed andJohn told him quote this is your chance,
This is your chance to get himback end quote. On Troy's first
night, he woke up to Jamie, John, Robert, and Mark covering
over him. Jamie had beaten himto death and dismembered him and they also
put him in a barrel. Ohmy god, yeah, yeah this I'm

(11:52):
assuming he's around twenty because Jamie's aroundthat age. Both abused by the same
man. But and Troy also abusedJamie I think, I think also sexually
abused him, and just kind ofI don't know, just uses has his

(12:13):
chance to get back at him.Yeah, it's terrible. So after so
long, Elizabeth, Mark's wife startedasking questions about their finances, such as
where did the money come from andwhere did it go? And why was
John involved in their money. Markhad told John about the questioning, and
John made it clear he wanted herdead. Mark did not agree, and

(12:35):
they chose a different path to keepher quiet. They were going to go
after Fred to keep Elizabeth quiet,so Fred was seen as a loose end
who told Elizabeth everything he had donefor John. And Fred ended up dead
and in a barrel in Snowtown,and unsurprisingly, Mark collected his disability checks
and Jodi stopped talking to John.It's just nuts how they're just continuing,

(12:58):
Like I guess they're just less regulationon it in this time, but it's
just crazy to me how the constantlycashing other people's disability checks or benefit checks
or whatever. It's just not raisingany red flags. Yeah, I don't
know how they're managing to get awaywith it unless, like the system wasn't
as like as tight as it istoday. But no idea, I'm not

(13:22):
quite sure how that system works.Gary O'Dwyer was a man who lived alone,
had no family or friends, whowas mentally disabled from a car accident
he had in his twenties, andhe also received government checks. Jamie had
just started visiting him to gain informationabout him and his house until one night
he and John came to his housewhile he was sleeping. So they only

(13:45):
attacked and killed him for his checksand considered him an easy target. They
electrocuted and tortured him to death andplaced him in a barrel and took him
to Snowtown. So this was theirfirst victim that wasn't like in their eyes,
having a purpose to murdered, Okay, like everybody else was, like
they saw it was either gay ora pedophile or turning against them. Motive.

(14:07):
Yeah, and at this point they'rejust killing for money. Yeah,
they're killing for money. So Mark'swife, Elizabeth continued questioning him and looking
into their finances, and she managedto find everything to prove that fraud was
going on and that John was involved. She suspected all the murders but had
no proof of them. Her maingoal was to put John in prison,

(14:28):
and she wanted to convince Judy totestify against him. But she knew nothing
other than pretending to be Suzanne becauseshe didn't know anything about the murders either.
She just was kind of used thatone time to call and pretend to
be Suzanne to get the checks.Mark again told John about the questioning,
and again John debated on killing her. In November nineteen eighty eight, she

(14:52):
hinted to Mark about knowing about SnowtownBank building property and wanted to go visit
it, even if she went alone. So this actually kind of like signed
her death warrant because they were like, well, she's about to figure out
everything they've been doing, okay.One day, Mark and Jodi were out
and Elizabeth was home alone when Robertand John came to the house. She

(15:15):
was shocked to see them in broaddaylight, and John rushed her and strangled
her to death. They put herin a barrel and took her body to
Snowtown. Mark came home knowing Johnkilled her, and he was distraught.
He knew John was going to killhim, but I guess it didn't sink
in until he realized that she wasactually gone, Like he didn't really like

(15:37):
he couldn't exactly fight back because heknew how John was. John tried to
cheer him up by saying he wasa free man now, but nothing could
console him, and he just startedto kind of distance his sell from John
at this point. The next day, Elizabeth's sister, our brother Garians and
Clay reported her missing as she nevershowed up to meet him, and this

(16:00):
is when police started asking Mark andJody about it. Meanwhile, Mark gathered
all the evidence that Elizabeth had collectedabout their fraud and burned it. In
order to get Mark back to him, John went to find a victim so
they could bond over the murder,which like, again, they're just over
the murder, that is a sense, Yeah, yeah, yeah. He

(16:23):
was just trying to find anything toget Mark back to, like to his
inner circle, because you knew Markwas distancing himself, and he's like,
well, we both like to murder, so we might as well to find
an easy victim and continue on whatwe've been doing. Jamie had multiple step
siblings from his father's side, andJohn had asked him to reach out to
his brother David. So David wason a great track and making something of

(16:47):
his life, and John pitted thisagainst Jamie, angry Jamie making him resent
David. So from what I understandfrom the book, David and Jamie were
kind of like they weren't close close, but they had like a decent relationship
until John came along and started pittingthem against each other. Okay, David

(17:10):
was on the lookout for a secondhandcomputer and Jamie said he could help him
with that. David had a feelingthat it was a stolen computer, so
he had Jamie go with him tocheck it out so he wouldn't get mugged.
Because he kind of knew Jamie's background. It was like, well,
if you're gonna get me computer,I'm got to assume it's stolen. But
like yeah, they drove to theold bank building in Snowtown and when they

(17:33):
got there, they went inside andDavid saw the computer and three other men.
David went to try the go totry the computer and ended up grabbed
by one of the men and Jamieknocked him out. He woke up tied
to a chair and the mic fromthe computer was facing him. Jamie dropped
a script into his lap and hewas forced to stay in to the mic
that he was moving away, thathe molested little boys, and then he

(17:56):
was gay. Yeah. After thiswas done, they took his bank card
because they knew he had a largebank account. They wanted his pen,
so David gave them the wrong numberin the hopes that they would get caught
trying to use a stolen card andhe would be saved. John and Mark
stayed with David as Robert and Jamiewent to use a bank and while they

(18:17):
were gone, Jamie started torturing Davidor I'm sorry. John started torturing David
and help Mark helped him. WhenJamie and Robert came back without the money,
they were angry to see that Davidhad died. They were kind of
more upset that it screwed up eitherway. They weren't mad that he died
because they had the wrong pin andthe money. They were mad that John

(18:41):
killed without them. They felt betrayed. This is it's just getting so like,
it's getting so deep at this point. Yeah, they like have this
weird. Their whole relationship is justbased on John controlling them and doing and
making them do whatever he wants.See that, but yeah, yeah,
and whenever they see that he's doingthat without them, they feel like they're

(19:03):
not part of his inner circle.Mark and Jamie walked away and talked it
out, and when they came back, they found John cooking a piece of
David and serving it to Robert.Oh. Yeah, this I think is
the only time they did cannibalism,because yeah, the rest of David was

(19:27):
put into a barrel. All thistime, Garian was still pushing police to
try and find his sister. Policefelt like the whole situation was wrong since
Mark and Jody told similar stories,but there were significant differences which kept getting
more, which kept getting worse themore they were asked to tell their stories.
Okay, so things are starting tofall apart. Yeah, Garian pushed

(19:52):
police to look into their finances sinceMark didn't work yet. They had a
nice house in rental properties, which, like, that's kind of like something
for him to like, goodly goodlyfor him to go on. He's like,
Mark has never worked a day inhis life and yet they have all
these rental properties, they have adecent house, Like, it doesn't add
up. Yeah. Police pursued thefinancial records, and the more they looked,

(20:18):
the more they found that missing people'smoney was going into Mark's account.
They kept learning that people were eithermissing or dead. Okay, so now
it's finally, Now it's finally thered flags are here, Like, okay,
they'd be clashing all these checks.Now we finally know what's going on.
Yeah, four, five, likefive, yeah, about five or

(20:40):
six people. Yeah. With alltheir looking, they found the Snowtown Bank
building and they decided to go andcheck it out, and that is where
they found the computer with an uneditedrecording of David's recording, where they also
heard him being tortured into saying thesethings. They looked around and found the
vault that was full of barrels.One officer found a screwdriver and propped open

(21:02):
a barrel to a horrendous smell.They called in specialists and opened other barrels,
finding all the bodies of the peopleJohn and his gang had killed.
Witness statements pointed police to John,and they ended up getting a warrant to
check out his old property. Backyardwhere they found the bodies of Rainsho's hand.
They arrested John, Mark, Robert, and Jamie. John was convinced

(21:26):
they couldn't get him on any murdersas he was sure that there was no
body. There was no murder,but ironically, he thought that all the
bodies were being dissolved in the acidover the years. However, his chemistry
was wrong, and instead of dissolvingthe bodies, he ended up kind of
like pickling them and perfectly preserving themto the point that the coroner could tell

(21:48):
their time of death and see everymark of torture on their bodies. What
liked, Yeah, so bodies thathave been in there for years, perfectly
preserved that the coroner could tell theexact time of death, which plot twist,
which good plot twists, because Imean, yeah, like, thank
good you could tell who's Yeah wow, I was not expecting that. Yeah.

(22:11):
Oh, mixed feelings about that,Like, on the one hand,
wow, thank goodness. On theother hand, horrifying yep, yeah,
which like and even if I don'tknow, John thought, even though even
if they were dissolving, he wouldget off scott free because like, tactically

(22:33):
it's not a body. It's amelted body, but like you could still
I'm sure there's the ways to knowthat it's still a body. Exactly,
yeah, exactly. Police needed someoneto testify for the murders, so they
tried Jody, but again she onlyknew of the fraud. John's wife,
Elizabeth, had cancer while this wasgoing on and ended up dying. And

(22:53):
this affected Jamie because now he thoughtthat he had no one in his life
rather than John, and it wasall John's that he was isolated from anyone
else in his life, so hestarted to have remorse for what he had
done. Jamie had then cut adeal with the prosecution and he would give
full testimony, plead guilty in servicetime, and in return, no photos

(23:15):
or description would be in any media, which even to this day, like
the book, I read like there'sno description of him. Wow, soh
hair color, facial recognition, nothinglike that. And I can't find anything
online. So Jimmy had received fourlife sentences. John felt proud for what
he had done, saying he'd killedpedophiles and admitted to it. He was

(23:38):
convicted of ten murders in September oftwo thousand and three, and he was
sentenced eleven life terms with no parole. Robert was sentenced ten life sentences in
Mark was served twenty five years,all with no parole. And that is
a story of Snowtown murders. Thatis, that is a lot that did

(24:02):
not at all end how I wasexpecting it to. I Like, I
kept thinking, I'm like, oh, they're gonna get him on the security
checks and that's how it's gonna go, and like kind of, yeah,
we ended up there, But Ireally was not expecting that the bodies weren't
dissolved. They were perfectly preserved.Yeah. Even the book used the term
pickled like as how Like, Imean, it makes sense. Pickling is

(24:27):
a method of preserving for a verylong time. I mean, pickling something
makes it last a very long time. There's I don't know if anybody is
on cooking TikTok or Instagram or whatever, I've seen that lady who has a
traditional Chinese pickling recipe where she's herpickle jar is like her pickle Brian is
like sixteen years old. Oh mygod, because it's just it's like a

(24:52):
perpetual ferment, Like it's just it'sit's that good at preserving. So Yeah,
like it like you would think thatafter so many people, Like I'm
sure people the community were catching onto what he was doing, but like
it's like it's not someone you couldgo up against, like because he had
his hand and everyone's bucket, youknow what I'm saying. Like he it

(25:15):
seems like because Trevor and Barry wereclose, they had a relationship, and
out of nowhere, John had acontrol on him to the pot that he
helped kill Barry. That's crazy,It's so crazy. But yeah, so
that's why I wanted to put thatinto two parts. So other wise it

(25:36):
supposed to be like an hour longof just yeah, death, just death
and destruction and horribleness. That wasintense. I'm glad we got through it.
Yeah. I thought it was aninteresting story. Whenever I read it,
I put the link for it orthe title of it in the first
show notes. I could put itin the second show notes for you guys
too. Yeah. I think itwas pretty interesting and didn't wasn't this one
suggested it was? Yeah, butBye, I think she's from Australia as

(26:03):
well. She's nice, suggested itin the discord Nice. I have like
one or two I think Australian casesthat I was looking into too, that
were suggested. Actually I was talkingabout one of them at work not long
ago. Yeah you think you mentionedit, the Dingo case. Yeah,
yeah, I mean it's a famousone. It's not like I'm going to
be talking about a case that noone's heard of, like so many people

(26:23):
have heard of it. But Ido think it's genuinely a very interesting case
and probably Australia's most fame i'd say, most globally famous crime. M Yeah,
I'm interested to hear more about thatone. So I saw I think
she put it in the discord too, I think is where I saw you
guys talking about it. Yep,yeah, I did see it in the
discord. So yeah, you guysshould join the discord. We are always

(26:49):
checking it to see what you guyshave to say, always looking for recommendations
of what you like to hear,what you want to hear. If you
can go to the link on anyof our biographies, it's a link tree.
Just click it. There's a linkthat says come join a little weeks
discord and then you make a discordaccount and there we are ECPs. Yep.

(27:11):
You can also find us on anysocial media TikTok, Instagram, Facebook,
We are all there. We're onYouTube. You can find us in
a Little Good pod and find uson our Patreon. We have bonus episode
once a month, four dollars amonth. It's a fun little community.

(27:33):
It's only a handful of us,but you know, it's the Patreon.
It's a lot of fun. Itis. It's it's really inexpensive for you
know, for what you get.It's a lot of fun. You get
to vote on the episodes, exceptlast time where you all voted too late
after I had already had my episodewritten. So last week's Patreon episode was

(27:53):
pure chaos, but it was veryenjoyable chaos. I had a great time.
I hope you guys are just good. Have a time. Yeah,
I posted it today a couple ofdays late, but I didn't have time
to fully edit it and everything.And for some reason, like after we
got through the whole topic, yourat your audio cutout, so I had
to like, yeah, I hadto like chop it. I put a

(28:15):
little blurb in there saying sorry,I'm meant to get here, think you
come again. We were having agreat time, guys. Technical difficulties abound.
I think it's audacity, like it'sit just becides when it wants to
stop working. Right right, I'mstill thinking about the way that Riverside classifies

(28:36):
our stuff with discussion of roadkill discussion. Yeah, I cracked up for like
a solid ten minutes. We gotamazing. We need a blooper reel.
Honestly, I wish that was thething that we like kept because we should
do a blooper reel and we shouldput it on Patreon. That's another reason
you guys should subscribe to the Patreon. If we get enough, you guys
will do a blooper reel. Wehave plenty. Yeah, but yeah,

(29:03):
so thank you guys for listening.We appreciate every single one of you.
If you guys want to send inanything, you could also send an email
to a little Bit of Podcast atgmail dot com. But other than that,
I think I have nothing else sadfor today. Yeah, I definitely
don't have anything that was really interesting. I am glad it was a two
parter. I think it's really funwe did the two part episodes, but

(29:26):
also that it was intense. There'sa lot to that, but it is
really interesting and I love whenever weget to the suggested ones from our listeners.
Yeah, so I just think thatwas pretty wicked. Yeah, that
one was really wicked.