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One of the strangest cases in Australian history gets even stranger

On August 17, 1980, a woman named Lindy Chamberlain reported to the police that her nine week old baby daughter Azaria had been taken by a dingo (ie a wild dog) from the tent where she and her family had been holidaying in a campsite near Ayers Rock (Uluru) in Australia’s Northern Territory.

The events of the resulting Azaria Chamberlain case, in which Chamberlain was ultimately convicted of the murder of her daughter, and the conviction was later quashed after the forensic evidence was completely discredited, are epochal and notorious in the country’s psyche. There are occasional media and news events when a whole nation is watching. What they are and will be is sometimes hard to predict, and it’s sometimes hard to tell just why everybody is watching, but this was one of those cases where people were watching because of the bizarre quality of the case and the luridness of the allegations. And as nothing has ever really been settled, the case has lingered on in the media in the 24 years since. Despite various claims, most people (including myself) have been of the belief that we would never see definite evidence as to exactly what happened.

At least, not until this week. As it happens, a story that has been told this week that may or may not be true (although once some excavations have taken place we will know), but which is almost as strange as the original events, and which would (if true) explain all the facts. Although maybe it will be true and we still won’t have any definite proor, because four of the five people involved are dead, including those who would know the location of the body. So perhaps an old man has just made up a story.

But first, the background. After Mrs Chamberlain reported the loss of her baby to the police, a huge search took place, but the body of baby Azaria was never found. However, some of the baby’s clothes, in particular the jump-suit that she had been wearing at the time of the attack, was found. At a subsequent inquest, it was determined that in the state it was in, the suit could not have been ripped off the baby by the dingo, and that it would have had to have been removed by a person. The inquest came to the curious conclusion that the baby had been taken and killed by a dingo, and that the body had been later disposed of “by person or persons unknown”.

This was a curious and unsatisfactory finding, and in the belief that additional evidence had been found, the relevant coroner’s office reopened the case later that year, and a second inquest took place. Evidence was presented that bloodstains had been found on the floor of the Chamberlain’s car, and that the car had been used to dispose of the body after Lindy Chamberlain had killed her own daughter. It was ultimatelly ruled that sufficient evidence had been found for a prosecution, and in 1982 Lindy Chamberlain was put on trial for murder.

At this point, all kinds of allegations flew around Australia. Michael Chamberlain was a pastor in the Seventh Day Adventist church, which was not a religion most Australians knew much about, and strange stories went around about blood rituals and other goings on in this in fact fairly inoffensive church. Lindy Chamberlain had been calm and collected after losing her baby, and had later sold her story to a women’s magazine, which somehow wasn’t “appropriate behaviour” in the circumstances. (Hysterics and crying would presumably have been better). In any event, the case went to trial, and Lindy Chamberlaiin was convicted of murder, and spent four years in prison.

However, as the years went on, it became clearer and clearer that the evidence against her (which had been mostly circumstantial in the first place) was weak. There was a question of motive, and there was no body, and there were obvious defences that were actually not used in the trial but one thinks would have been if the Chamberlains were lying. (“So what if there was blood in the car. Azaria had a nose bleed on the way to the camp site”). Eventually, the forensic lab that had supposedly identified the blood was demonstated to be completely incompetent and it seems now more likely that it was red paint (yes, really). Azaria Chamberlain was released from prison, and evntually her conviction was overturned and she was paid compensation. Her marriage to Michael Chamberlain collapsed at some point, but since then she has remarried and got on with her life.

And that is where the case has rested for the more than a decade. In Australia the story has come up in the media from time to time. Every now and then some suggestion as to what happens will come up, or there will be a report of a dingo attacking another child (but being fended of by the child’s parents) or similar, strengthening people’s beliefs that Lindy Chamberlain’s story of the dingo was true. That is certainly my own feeling. At the time of the trial (I was 13 at the time) I professed to not caring, as a reaction against the extent of the media coverage, and I didn’t pay enough attention. A few years later I came round to the view that I didn’t know what had happened but that Lindy Chamberlain had clearly been denied her presumption of innocence, and the case against her had not been proved beyond reasonable doubt. I few years after that I discovered that I in fact completely believed her, and that I believed that the baby had been taken by a dingo (as I still do).

In 1988 a film was made about the case, directed by an Australian but starring an American (Meryl Streep) and produced by a British company, and the case became well known around the world. Not in the all encompassing OJ sense it was known in Australia, but as one of those things that people might know about Australia. “Oh, there was that story about the baby and the dingo”. (For some reason, the even stranger story that Australia once lost a serving Prime Minister who went swimming and was never seen again is less well known). The story has sort of worked its way into global popular culture. There have been references to it in The Simpsons, Buffy the Vampire Slayer and various other places.

Which was where we were this week. Australia was going through one of its periods where it remembered the incident. A second dramatisation of the story has been made for Australian television, this one starring Miranda Otto (most famous internationally for playing Eowyn in The Lord of the Rings but very well known on Australian television in Australian movies prior to that). A television program had coaxed Lindy Chamberlain into doing an interview for what is believed to be a substanial sum of money. And then this week the extraordinary story came out. A 78 year old man from Melbourne named Frank Cole has stated that he and four friends were shooting for dogmeat at Uluru on August 17, 1980. One of them shot a dingo, and discovered the body of a human baby in its mouth. They were shocked by this, but were reluctant to go to the police, because shooting (and having a dog) in a National Park was illegal.

The friends separated, and drove back to Melbourne, and Mr Cole states that he does not know what happened to the body. One of his friends may have buried it anywhere between Uluru and Melbourne, which is a very long way. There is some thought that one of his friends may have buried it in his back yard in Melbourne. It may be that excavations will take place shortly to determine if Azaria’s remains are there. Certainly the rest of the story will be investigated, and Mr Cole and his late friends will no doubt be investigated to see if the rest of the story matches, if they were indeed at Uluru at that time, and if perhaps the location of the remains of the body can be determined.

If indeed the story is true. It could be a complete fabrication. In combination with the dingo story in the first place it is just so weird that one almost thinks it is true. And if it is true, Mr Cole and his friends allowed a tremendous injustice to take place, which they could have prevented at any time by coming clean about their story.

39 comments to One of the strangest cases in Australian history gets even stranger

  • Daveon

    Interesting, especially if true.

    My father knew Professor Cameron the home office “expert” who testified at the original trial. He (Cameron) was utterly convinced of her guilt.

    It wouldn’t surprise me that he had been wrong about it.

  • Michael Farris

    “A 78 year old man from Melbourne named Frank Cole has stated that he and four friends were shooting for dogmeat at Uluru on August 17, 1980”

    Dogmeat? Yikes! Remind me not to accept any dinner invitations from Australians ….

    I don’t know enough about the case to say anything sensible but this does sound possible (but did they undress the baby in the dingo’s jaws? why?)

  • Michael Farris

    Not knowing when to leave well enough alone, and having the tune run through my head, something possessed me to write the following (wiht apologies to Jed Clampett) I presume the melody will be clear to anyone with poor enough taste to read it:

    Come listen to a story
    ’bout a man named Frank.
    A poor Aussie feller
    and his armpits really stank.
    Then one day
    he was shootin’ at some food,
    Bagged himself a dingo
    and a baby it had chewed.

    Mess it was, baby wasn’t doing to good either, yechh

    Well, first thing you know,
    ole Frank’s too scared to think,
    His friends all say
    “They’re gonna throw us in the clink!
    If we try to do the right thing,
    then we’ll sure be in a bind,
    Let’s just dump the body
    then we’ll drink ourselves half-blind,”

    Like every Saturday, yeah, first round’s on me. Hooo doggies!

    I sure hope I’m right about this atheism thing, if not, I just purchased a first class ticket on the expressway to hell.

  • Whip

    Clever, Mr. Farris. Evil, but clever. I wonder how many Brits and Aussies are familiar with the theme song to “The Beverly Hillbillies” though. You prolly have a few people scratchin’ their noggins right about now.

  • Aussies are extremely familiar with it. It was shown ad nauseum on Australian television when I was a child.

    I think British people are probably less familiar with it, however. The bureaucrats controlling British TV considered it part of their duty to protect vulnerable British children from too much Americanism, I believe.

  • Michael, Whip

    Beverly Hill Billies was a regular fixture of British TV screens when I was growing up and very popular it was too.

  • Tex

    Hmmm. Pity the police involved aren’t allowed to tell their side of the story….

  • Farris, you’re awful.

    Very strange case indeed. I hope the police side of the story can come out eventually. And thanks for “change-of-pace” reading. I linked to it on my blog, where I really needed something more interesting than John Kerry or the Tour de France to talk about.

    Sam

  • Russell

    Note for Michael Farris,

    When Cole said that he had been shooting for “dog-meat” he meant that he was shooting for meat to feed to his dog – not that he wanted to eat dog-meat himself. The only people that eat dog-meat here are our Korean and Chinese immigrants (and they tend to disguise the fact because popular revulsion is such a big factor).

    Not that I personally object to dog-meat – I don’t like the taste but I don’t consider it taboo.

  • Daveon

    If I recall correctly wasn’t their an Aussie joke around at the time which went something like.

    /begin thick Auistralian accent:
    You know that we’ve got the smartest dogs in the world in the Dingo

    A.n.other: Why’s that?

    Only Dog in the world that can undress a baby…

    Or something like that.

  • Interesting. The Dingo baby case resurfaced when the Brit tourist Peter Falconio was supposedly killed (body never recovered) on an Australian highway, and his girlfriend Joanna Lees escaped. After a week or two of sympathy, the Aussie press turned on the accusations, and made several references to the conduct of Linda Chamberlain in the weeks following her kid’s disappearance. Both are interesting stories, not least because neither body has shown up.

    Now then, anyone have any ideas on what happened to the kids at hanging rock?

  • Michael Farris

    “When Cole said that he had been shooting for “dog-meat” he meant that he was shooting for meat to feed to his dog”

    Don’t they have Alpo down there?

    I guess the line could be changed to:

    “Then one day he was shootin’/huntin’ for dogfood”

    Doesn’t scan as well, but I do want to be accurate.

  • Giles

    you have to hope that the mystery isnt solved as it gives you something to talk and think about when you do visit Ayers rock

  • llamas

    Interesting case, I’ve watched it from the start. I was reading law in London in the early 80’s and this case was used more than once in criminal law class as a discussion topic.

    I don’t believe a word of the latest story to surface. He drove to Ayers Rock from Melbourne to shoot meat for his dog? Come, now.

    They found a human baby in the mouth of a dingo, but decided to ignore it because they were afraid of the law? Come, now. There’s a thousand ways around that excuse.

    And everyone is dead now except him. How convenient.

    I don’t know what the truth of the story is but I agree that Lindy Chamberlain should never have been convicted in the first place.

    llater,

    llamas

  • lucklucky

    The first question that arises from the old man is why they didnt warned the police with a anonymous call.

  • Formerly Dan

    It’s even referenced in Texas country music:

    But I came on an elderly woman
    Her child had been taken away
    She said by a pack of wild dingos

    Well what would you do in my place

    I followed the trail of the dingos
    One he put up a terrible fight
    But I finally retrieved back her baby
    And we drank to the end of the plight

    One In A Million by Charlie Robison

    I was headed straight home just to see you
    When I saw some old friends that I know
    So I stopped for a couple cervasas
    But I swear I was thinkin’ of you

    I put on my hat for my exit
    When who would walk through the door
    A man you might call a bandito
    And he told us to hit the floor

    Well he took what he could from the cash bar
    And he took all my pay from this week
    Just when I thought that it was all over
    He said, “Hey boy, you’re goin’ with me”

    Well you asked me to meet you at the movies
    I knew we’d have such a good time
    Meryl Streep in a part with an accent
    It sounds like a favorite of mine

    But I came on an elderly woman
    Her child had been taken away
    She said by a pack of wild dingos
    Well what would you do in my place

    I followed the trail of the dingos
    One he put up a terrible fight
    But I finally retrieved back her baby
    And we drank to the end of the plight

    Well you called me the very next mornin’
    And you said that we needed to talk
    But my car wouldn’t start on that
    So to your home I started to walk

    On a dark stretch of highway
    Something quite strange happened there
    For about all these lights started flashing
    Then it pulled me up in the air

    The aliens were not what I expected
    But their problem was perfectly clear
    Some dingos had stolen their babies
    I got ‘em back and we drank their spare beer

  • yes, david, whip….texas music? come on, give us a break. no need to sound pretentious and reel off lyrics you found on the internet that were written 10 years ago. quit spending all your time fussing over differences between brits, aussies and americans. focus on the important things…

  • robyn

    i think that the dingo took that baby and that mr cole and lindy are both telling the truth

  • sumgal

    i dont know whether to believe any of the stories…….i mean if you have a kid, why the heck would you leave the tent unzipped on holidays???? at home…maybe….but somewhere you dont know people???? what was she crazy? i do believe about the dingoes, but why didnt cole come up before now? why 2004? why not 1995? or earlier? i am sorry for azaria though, she never got to live life or experience anything that life holds!

  • Saphie

    People outside Australia wouldn’t be as familiar with this story, but I assure you, there’s no doubt now but that Lindy Chamberlain was innocent and the victim of a horrible ‘witch-hunt’ coz she irritated people.

    At the time, a lot of people didn’t even care what happened to the poor little girl – it was all just “Her mother looks like a hard-faced bitch, and why doesn’t she cry more on telly?”

    She was 34 and almost nine months pregnant again by the time the judge sentenced her to “life imprisonment, with hard labour” – as she sat recoiling in the dock, her mouth gasping, like someone who had been shot – there was thunderous applause in the courtroom. Some people even stood up to cheer.
    People whose reputations were even slightly and indirectly affected by the outcome joined the cheering. At the request of the media, Lindy was taken from the court to prison not in a police wagon but a car because, as one angry woman in the crowd outside the court told the press: “I want to see the look on her face.”

    Even years later, when Lindy Chamberlain was released from prison and there were very serious doubts about her guilty, people thought she was guilty.

    A prominent lawyer was asked on TV what his thoughts were about her guilt or innocence. He replied: “I wouldn’t care if Azaria walked into the courtroom now alive and well. I’d still say that bitch was guilty.”

    As for this man Frank Cole who says he found Azaria, police will file a report with the Northern Territory’s coroner over his claims.
    A territory police spokesman yesterday (22/8) confirmed that a report would be filed as a result of a police interview conducted early this month with Mr Cole about the 24-year-old case.

    “We’ve spoken to Mr Cole, a report on that situation is going to the Northern Territory Coroner’s Office,” said territory police media liaison manager Peter Cain.
    Role on, inquest four?

  • i think that the dingo took the baby. except its kinda kinky how the babys clothes came off. its a bit suss!

  • A.r.a

    i think there’s somthing missing from the case, a crucial part that is undiscovered to reveal the truth… but what?

  • Marc

    If the old guy & his buddies had been shooting for dogmeat, wouldn’t the search party have heard the shots? I don’t know much about dingoes, but don’t they consume their food on the spot? Surely they don’t walk around the Outback for days, carrying a severed head in their mouth. Isn’t it safe to assume that the hunt for dogmeat would have happened shortly after the dingo got the baby? According to the movie (I don’t know how it happened in real life), Lindy Chamberlain saw the dingo get out of the tent and the search party was organized immediately after.

  • molly

    There are many things to think about… The outback is a hell weird place.. heaps of weird stuff goes down there, ” picnic at hanging rock”, “Azaria Chamberlain”, “The British backpacker” are just a few that have made it to the national and international news……
    Basically “The Outback” is a massive massive space, you can get away with anything… there is so much sand, dirt rocks etc to bury anything under…
    Dingo’s can’t fold clothes and i doubt that any Aboriginals around that area at the time would have been folding clothes, especially bloody ones, and to have placed them nicely between two rocks….
    I think Lindy Chamberlain is happy in the knowledge that we will never find her 9 week old babies body…. maybe on her death bed she will confess??… IF she is guilty….
    But thinking about it… who in their right mind would take a 9 week old baby camping, let alone in the desert… .. all those creapy crawlies, all that dust, and not to mention the wild animals…. (what does one do in an emergency?..hang around the campsite for a bit THEN get help??)
    I was born in 1980 but have grown up with this story, alot of people have demonized the Dingo… they eat babies after all!!! (sarcasm). Dingo’s are beautifull and intelligent animals, maybe not intelligent enough to walk up to a camp site with people around, go into a tent through the “door” take a baby out of its sleeper carry it away without it or the dingo making any sound, undress it, fold it’s clothes then “eat” it ….and all this while no one saw… i don’t know the details that much, considering the fact that every detail you hear is always complimented by another, and sometimes they are in totall contrast to each other….
    Now that Lindy Chamberlain-Creighton has re-released her book (apparently for “the younger kids”) and now that she has her own website, all she has to do is sit back and watch her bank account fill up (again).. She kept the Chamberlain part in her name, so people will still know who she is.. she loves the attention. She hasn’t thought about her other children, alot of the interviews i have seen her do in the few weeks she mentions them, where they are and what they are doing, as if to say . ” Yeah they will love all this attention too”.. i got the feeling she was proud of her story and it was like an accomplishment for her.. it makes me feel like she is gloating in it, its creapy to watch her smile as she talks about the issue, it feels as though she has got away with it and she is snug in the fact that no one is going to catch her for it.. Well then again she might just be happy that she can share her story??..
    A friend of mine was telling me the other day that he can remember when the “Azaria and Dingo thing” first hapened, he was living in the same neighbourhood as Lindy’s parents and they were asking people to sign a petition to have all dingo’s slaughtered… When a shark attacks a person do we want to go out in the ocean and l
    kill them all??..
    Is there anything else that Lindy Camberlain-Creighton has done to show that she actually cares about the fact that a “dingo ate her baby” or is she just out there to show that she has everyone fooled and got away with it and wants to sell her story??…
    Why isnt there a national “slaughter a dingo, save a baby” day?…
    Obviously i dont know what i am talking about, its just that i had seen enough Lindy Chamberlain-Creighton for one week, playing the damn victim, she make me feel creeped out, people pussy foot around her, they don’t want to hurt her fellings??… thats just stupid, she is out there, has her own website now and is promoting herself and while at the same time, just for appearences demonizing one of our countries treasures, the Dingo…

  • molly

    think there’s somthing missing from the case, a crucial part that is undiscovered to reveal the truth… but what?

    Posted by A.r.a at August 25, 2004 02:58 AM

    Yes…Azaria’s remains… that would give forensic investigators of today ALL of the answers… but Lindy knows we will never find her.. she is happy…. GOD THAT WOMAN CREEPS ME OUT!!!.. the more i think about her ….

  • ali

    geez molly do u write enough – after writing an essay u go on to say u dont know what u r talking about… then why did u say it all?

  • Nicky

    I have just watched the first half of the mini series through my eyes and it was fascinating, the answer they offered to the folded clothes question was that some dingoes in the area “lived” witht he rangers and would often return their prey to their homes.

    They infer that this occurred, the ranger found the remains and disposed of the body and dumped the clothes hence explaining how the jumpsuit was removed from the body, again you could ask why not just bury the whole body, clothes and all, perhaps the ranger wanted to offer some closure, that the dingo really did take the baby. Nonetheless an ineresting interpretation.

    It will be interesting to watch the end tonight.

  • william

    frank cole, who said he shot the dingo later said he could solve other murders because he was there and saw them happen. The old guy is crazy
    Lindy didnt kill the baby, a dingo took her
    We (my family) was there that night, my mother still has night mares about Azaria be eaten by a dingo
    Poor Lindy her daughter taken by a wild animal, and she found guilty of the murder, and australia clapped as she was found gulty.
    Shame
    Shame
    shame

  • Bronwyn

    I think you should change this sentence cut and pasted from your article: “Azaria Chamberlain was released from prison, and evntually her conviction was overturned and she was paid compensation”.

  • Bianca O'Connell

    I don’t think that Frank Cole had anything to do with the dissapearance of baby Azaria, but things have definately been covered over.
    One of the traditional owners of Uluru tracked a big dog, carrying something in its mouth, back to the rangers house the night the baby disappeared.
    Having lived at a camp at Uluru, he even knew the dingos name,Dean to the ranger, as he used to feed and interact with this animal,or Scarface to others. Blacktrackers know what they’re looking at, 40,000 yrs of hunting gives you a pretty good idea.
    His testimony was dicredited, because the ranger claimed the dog had already been destroyed, due to an earlier attack on a young girl.
    Witnesses claim to have seen a ranger destroy a dog, that they identified as Dean, in the days following Azarias disappearance.
    Some of Azarias clothing were found years later near a dingo den, what a female had used to raise her pups.
    Most likely scenario in my opinion is that Dean brought a dead baby back to the rangers house on the night of August 17 1980 and that somebody there panicked and took the body to a site known to have a mother with pups.
    They undressed the baby,and let nature do the rest. Later they desroyed Dean, because according to Department records, he had already been shot months earlier.
    Lindy was left to take the fall for the death of her only girl because somebody didn’t destroy a dangerous animal due to personal attachment.
    The Australian Government spent nearly 15 million dollars trying to put Lindy in jail. They then had to pay her a multi million dollar sum in compensation for her false imprisonment.
    As an Australian, I’d like for Michael and Lindy to be able to bury their baby and put her to rest,so can the rest of the nation, but for that to happen, someone’s got to start telling the truth.

  • Saphie

    Dingo’s are beautiful and a national treasure? Maybe. But tell it to the parents of a little boy named CLINTON GAGE, who was killed by a dingo whilst on holiday in Australia in 2001. Sorry for typing in hysterical CAPS, but nobody seems to know his name or even remember him.

    I hope Azaria and Clinton both come back together as crocodiles with a particular penchant for eating dingo’s who prey on infants and children.

  • Joanne

    Its my personal belief that this case has always been, and will always remain to be a mystery. Its quite obvious from the lack of evidense that the sentence held down to Lindy was inaccurate and i feel only compassion for her having needed to spent unneccessary time away from her family. However if indeed azarias remains are eventually unearthed it will undoubtedly solve what has been Australias most talked about case.

  • betty

    lindys innocent.. clinton gages case was sad… so’s this one, very unfair. I live not even five minutes away from Michael Chamberlain’s currant house and I just feel so sorry for them both. They lost their child, their marriage, their reputations, their dignity. I also agree with Bianca O’Connell’s theory. When I saw Through my eyes, I assumed something similar.

  • Kim

    I’ve just read about this story on a true crime website and I must say it’s astounding. The prosecution’s evidence was flimsy to start with and was eventually picked apart by the defense. I just can’t comprehend how the judicial system in any country can allow such things to happen. This isn’t a career criminal they had on trial, she was a young mother with no record at all. You’d think a little care would be taken not to destroy an entire family based on purely circumstantial evidence. I read a description of the prosecuting attorney as the verdict was read. It said he said hunched over, read-faced and refused to look up. I got chills and though to myself “He KNEW she didn’t do it.” The state was found to have withheld evidence that would have supported the defense’s case, and they ignored eye-witness testimony. Mind-boggling…

  • Jenni

    I have always believed that Lindy Chamberlain was innocent. It seems obvious (and was obvious at the time) that the ranger who had the dog as a pet knows what happened. I think he buried the body. he knows that she didn’t do it and he has let this go on for so long. Why haven’t the media and the police gone after him? If he is now dead I hope he’s burning in hell somewhere!

  • Stephanie

    I have read through many of these post and still see that many are still not very educated on this matter. I am referring to the post from molly. Many experiments were done on dingos and it proved that a dingo can unwrap its prey without much saliva or damage to the packaging. It is also proved that dingos will eat their prey entirely and leave no traces. The experiments they did for purpose of trial was on dingos that reside in a zoo (way different from wild). It is explained on several sites that the clothes were not originally found folded. They were found a mess and then when reported they were folded because of the way that they originally were found it looked like part of the baby was still inside and it scared the discoverers daughter so they were repositioned. You have taken bits and pieces of reports some true some incomplete and some rumor and come to your own conclusion the same as they did in 1980 when they all persecuted her which resulted in a conviction. If she is guilty then why is she still trying to get the investigation opened to this day to prove what happened. You would think a guilty person would just want it dropped so they will never be found out. There are several sites out there and actual coroner reports on this incidence which should be read and understood before anyone makes a judgement. If that had happened in 1980 she probably would of never been convicted. All the evidence that was never heard and the witnesses who were never asked. It is the most ridiculous case I have ever seen and makes me realize we dont have a justice system. Guilty until proven innocent is the way our justice system works. Very sad.

  • Meags

    Get over yourself, Molly. Lindy Chamberlain is innocent. Why would she kill her own daughter? It’s been proven she didn’t, and the evidence they had against her was weak.

    Dingoes are killers, and beautiful or npt, they are dangerous. Have you ever heard of Faser Island? A dingo took a baby from there. People saw the baby being taken, and managed to get it back before anything happened to it.

    If that doesn’t prove it, nothing will, and you’ll be wrong for the rest of your life.

  • Louise

    Molly, you should research, and gest your facts straight before you accuse someone of something.

    A ranger found the clothes, and they were a mess. He removed them to look at them. When he put them back, he folded them. The photos of the clothes that were circulated were taken afterwards, by the police.

    Many people do go camping with young children. I know that, because my parents took me camping when I was young, and there were plenty of other young children, and guess where we went camping?

    Ayers Rock / Uluru…

    So you are wrong there too.

    Dingoes may be beautiful, but they are dangerous. They are not only dangerous because of their sharp teeth and claws, but also because of their strength and their ability to move silently.

    The digo probably didn’t go into the tent because there was a baby in there. They are not that smart. But Lindy Chamberlain had fed her youngest son in the tent earlier. He had baked beans… and that smell would attract dingoes.

    The dingo would have been unable to get any of the baked beans…obviously…but if there was a baby in there – unprotected – it would be a good meal for a dingo. Azaria Chamberlain had had a nose bleed earlier that day, and that smell could also have attracted the dingo, and brought it to her.

    Many people keep their first name if they remarry, because it takes less time in heaps of arrangements. You do not know for a fact that she kept the Chamberlain part because she wanted the attention, so you are jumping to conclusions and being pretty damn bitchy. By the way, if your child was taken by a dingo, would you keep away from the media, and not want others to know. Because of Lindy Chamberlain, many other young children and babies have been saved from certain death by dingoes, because their parents have known to watch out for the dangerous creatures.

    Think about this for a moment. If you were sent to jail for murdering your daughter – which you didn’t do – wouldn’t you want a chance to tell your story, and show everyone how wrong they were?

    As to the “kill all dingoes” thing, I believe that if your daughter/granddaughter was killed by a shark or a dingo, you would want them destroyed as well. People have Rottweilers and Pitbulls put down for attacking humans. Dingoes are wild dogs. Why should they get away with it, if other dogs can’t?????

    Maybe there should be a “slaughter a dingo, save a baby day” the world would be better off that way. But, maybe it’s people like you, who are biased by false “facts” who have stopped it from happening.

    And, just so you know, “one of our nation’s treasures,” the dingo, is a national pest. Just like the Thylacine used to be. But at least Thylacine’s looked nice.

  • gabriele radke

    I was overseas at the time that all of this was going on but have always felt that Lindy was a mother who had lost a baby to one of lifes naturally sad events, a dingo attack. Since then I have lived in Alice Springs for 7 years and now believe it even more firmly.
    How sad, poor suffering woman. Children should not die before their parents. How sad, poor tortrured woman, victim of the australian system of justice.