True Crime Conversations

On the morning of June 20, 2001, Andrea Yates took the lives of her five children in her home in Houston, Texas.

After struggling with mental illness throughout her life, it was the birth of Andrea's children that saw her pushed to breaking point.

Today we explore how and why this unspeakable tragedy occurred...

After 34 years in the police and 25 years in homicide, it was former Detective Inspector Gary Jubelin’s job to catch killers. He worked on some of the biggest criminal cases in Australia, including the Lindt Cafe siege, the Bowraville murders, and the gruesome killing of drug dealer Terry Falconer.

But it was the case of William Tyrrell that would cost Gary his career...

In the late 1990s Brenden Abbott was notorious around Australia. 

Known as 'The Postcard Bandit', he was the most wanted man in the country after escaping prison not once but twice. While on the run it's estimated he robbed up to 30 banks, making off with $5 million.

Today Gemma Bath's joined by journalist Derek Pedley as well as Brenden's former lawyer Chris Nyst to discuss Abbott's life and crimes...

In 1977, retirees Vera Hays and Florice Bessire were offered a trip of a lifetime. All they had to do was drive a motorhome from Germany to India for Vera's nephew. What they didn't know was that there'd be two tonnes of hashish hidden in the vehicle. 

Journalist and author Sandi Logan joins Gemma this week to tell us how two American women who unwittingly became Australia's 'Drug Grannies'...

On March 27, 1986, Constable Angela Taylor was standing in front of the Russell Street Police Headquarters complex in Melbourne when a car bomb was detonated, injuring dozens of people. 

She was the sole fatality from the attack and the first female police officer to be murdered in Australia in the line of duty, at the age of just 21. 

It was a crime that terrified the country. An act of pure evil by a gang of criminals with a hatred for authority...

In the 1980s, up to $50 million of Argyle Pink Diamonds were smuggled out of one of the world’s most secure mines, seemingly without anyone noticing.

The gems were dispersed from Western Australia around the world to Hong Kong, New York and Switzerland with only a few ever recovered. 

Journalist Sinead Mangan joins Gemma Bath this week to discuss her investigation into this previously unsolved case...

After 74 years, Australia’s most baffling mystery has finally been solved.

When the body of a man was found slumped on Adelaide's Somerton Beach in 1948, with no clear identity and no clear cause of death, it set off an investigation that spawned curiosity, concern, and conspiracy theories.

But after decades of following leads, The University of Adelaide’s professor Derek Abbott and US forensic genealogist Colleen Fitzpatrick finally have a name...

From 1956 to 1959, Sydney's southern suburbs were terrorized by a knife-wielding menace known as The Kingsgrove Slasher.

He made 18 attacks over that three-year period, with his victims ranging from grown women to a little girl only two years old.

It's a case that over the decades has fallen through the cracks of history, until now...

On the night of January 26, 2009, Bob Chappell disappeared from his yacht in Tasmania's Derwent Estuary. Police were alerted to trouble when the boat was seen sinking the next morning.

When they examined the scene there were signs of foul play... but no sign of Bob.

His partner Sue Neill-Fraser would soon become the prime suspect in Chappell's disappearance...

In 1942, the streets of Melbourne were dim and eery. To assist with World War II efforts, the city was complying with a 'brownout' order, similar to a blackout but less severe.

This low lighting was the backdrop for a series of murders committed by Edward Joseph Leonski, a 'smiling psychopath' who became known as The Brownout Strangler...