Bondi Junction Australia
Member #57,240
December 24, 2007
1,102 Posts
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Quote: Originally posted by myturn on May 17, 2015
Reading those stories was Hungarian migrant and poker machine factory worker Stephen Leslie Bradley, 34.
He hatched a desperate plan to grab some of the winnings for himself.
Bradley spent the next five weeks watching the Thorne family’s Bondi flat, and following their movements.
On July 7, Bradley was waiting in his 1955 blue Ford for Graeme, at the spot where he was usually picked up and driven to school.
After tricking Graeme into the car, Bradley drove to a corner of Centennial Park, tied a scarf around Graeme’s mouth and locked him in the boot.
On the way back home, Bradley stopped at a public telephone.
The friend who usually took Graeme to school had contacted Mrs Thorne to ask where he was.
And Mrs Thorne, who had been anxious since the lottery win, immediately called police.
They were there waiting when the call came – believed to have been Australia’s first ransom demand. Mrs Thorne answered.
A detective took the phone from her and said: “This is Mr Thorne here.”
“I have your boy,” the heavily accented Bradley said. “I want 25,000 pounds by five o’clock this afternoon or I’ll feed him to the sharks. I’ll contact you later.”
Bradley drove home into his garage and opened the boot.
But Graeme was dead - or close to it.
The panicked kidnapper then strangled and bashed the boy before putting him back into the boot.
Bradley tied the child’s hands and feet, and wrapped his body in a checked rug.
He put the body back in the boot and drove to a vacant block of land he’d once thought of buying, and hid the body under a ledge of rock.
That weekend, police, the army, helicopters and dogs searched the Frenchs Forest bushland, finding Graeme’s school cap, raincoat, lunch box and books.
Meanwhile, an electrician told police he’d seen a boy fitting Graeme’s description getting into a blue Ford the morning of the abduction.
Police began checking records of blue Fords: one belonged to Bradley.
They questioned Bradley at the poker machine factory; he claimed he was moving house on the day and not in Bondi.
Bondi Junction Australia
Member #57,240
December 24, 2007
1,102 Posts
Offline
Quote: Originally posted by myturn on May 17, 2015
Bradley drove home into his garage and opened the boot.
But Graeme was dead - or close to it.
The panicked kidnapper then strangled and bashed the boy before putting him back into the boot.
Bradley tied the child’s hands and feet, and wrapped his body in a checked rug.
He put the body back in the boot and drove to a vacant block of land he’d once thought of buying, and hid the body under a ledge of rock.
That weekend, police, the army, helicopters and dogs searched the Frenchs Forest bushland, finding Graeme’s school cap, raincoat, lunch box and books.
Meanwhile, an electrician told police he’d seen a boy fitting Graeme’s description getting into a blue Ford the morning of the abduction.
Police began checking records of blue Fords: one belonged to Bradley.
They questioned Bradley at the poker machine factory; he claimed he was moving house on the day and not in Bondi.
In mid-August, about a month after the abduction, boys playing on the vacant land found Graeme’s body.
On hearing the news Bradley booked tickets for himself and his family on a ship, the Himalaya, to London, and set sail on September 23.
An examination of the rug found dog hairs and bleached human hairs.
There were also traces of pink mortar and cypress tree twigs: both clues could be connected back to the house Bradley had lived in before fleeing.
At the house, they found a roll of undeveloped film.
One photo showed a family picnic. There was a pekinese dog and it showed Mrs Bradley with dyed blonde hair, sitting on a rug that looked the same as the one used to wrap Graeme’s body.
Detectives flew to Sri Lanka, and were waiting to arrest Bradley when the Himalaya stopped on its way to London.
After five weeks of extradition hearings, he was sent back to Sydney.
The trial began on March 20, 1961.
There were so many spectators that people were willing to camp outside the court to secure a spot in the public gallery.
Bradley pleaded not guilty, but the evidence gathered through the use of early forensic techniques built a strong case against him.
He gave evidence in his own defence and denied kidnapping Graeme.
But the jury found him guilty, and on March 29 he was sentenced to life imprisonment.
When he was sentenced, the court erupted in cheers, and the cry: ‘Feed him to the sharks!”