‘Hoddle Street killer Julian Knight takes Defence Force Ombudsman to court for reparation payment’
by Charles Miranda
November 25, 2023, Herald-Sun newspaper category: True Crime Australia, News Corp Australia Network, https://www.heraldsun.com.au/truecrimeaustralia/hoddle-street-killer-julian-knight-takes-defence-force-ombudsman-to-court-for-reparation-payment/news-story/cf6a16b99d27f377b651b17b74390284 (subscription access only)
Julian Knight, the man behind the 1987 Hoddle Street massacre, has revealed in a letter why he is launching legal action against the Australian Defence Force.
The man behind the Hoddle Street massacre is taking the Defence Force Ombudsman to court for the bastardisation he claims to have suffered at the Royal Military College Duntroon.
And he has a photo of himself taken prior to his atrocity that he says begs the question – did the elite Canberra college accept a psychopath into their ranks or turn him into one?
In August 1987 Julian Knight shot dead seven innocent civilians and wounded 19 others on Hoddle Street in Melbourne in what was then Australia’s first case of a US-style mass shooting.
He was sentenced to a minimum 27 years but when his parole came up in 2012, the Victorian government changed laws to ensure he remained ineligible unless deemed at risk of imminent death or incapacitated to the extent he posed no threat to the community.
Knight had vowed to pursue authorities through the courts in revenge for keeping him behind bars and reneging, he claims, on a plea deal he drop claims of bastardisation in exchange for a minimum sentence and a chance at parole.
He had been judicially silent for years after being declared a vexatious litigant and trying various legal manoeuvres. But he has now launched a push through the Federal Court for reparation from Defence, although he says he doesn’t need the money as he will die in jail and there is only “so many Mars bars I can buy at the prison canteen”.
After several brief adjournments, the matter is listed for hearing in March next year, set down for a single day hearing where Knight is expected to give evidence to the court in Melbourne from Port Phillip Prison via camera.
“We agreed not to explore my time at RMC (Royal Military College) and they agreed not to oppose the setting of a minimum non-parole term,” Knight says, in a lengthy letter sent to News Corp. If they want to renege on a deal 26 years after the event and keep me in prison for the rest of my life, they can pay for it. I am 55-years-old, I can expect to live for another 20 or 30 years … I am going to die in prison (the Victorian Government made sure of that) so I don’t have much else to turn my mind to.”
[Editor: READ MR KNIGHT’S COMPLETE LETTER (ABOVE) TO CHARLES MIRANDA]
Knight said he first applied for reparation in 2013 through the then newly established Defence Abuse Response Taskforce (DART).
In 2015 DART found his detailed 94-page account, including the identity of seven named alleged abusers who bullied him, as “plausible” but reparations but by 2016 a then Defence ministerial directive ruled payments could not be made to those charged with serious crimes. He is now pursuing the Defence Ombudsman on the grounds the office in March this year declined to investigate because the reparations matter had already been rejected by DART.
Queried why he was pursuing reparations, Knight responded because he could.
“If they recognised what happened to me and stopped denying me any and every benefit I would shut up,” he wrote. “To be clear, if they said (a) ‘sorry for what happened to you at Duntroon’; (b) provided me with a couple of counselling sessions and (c) gave me a reparation payment (but only after scrubbing any outstanding Commonwealth debts I may have – ie HECS debt – I would cease campaigning and litigating. Given what I lost – a chance of freedom on parole – this outcome is a poor second prize.”
Knight recently wrote to the Victorian RSL and Queensland RSL veteran groups for copies of their handbooks for protocols for conducting Anzac Day ceremonies, which are held in prisons.
The Commonwealth Ombudsman, acting for the Defence Force Ombudsman, and Department of Defence were approached for comment. Knight has long bemoaned what he sees as the Victorian government’s “he get’s nothing” attitude.
“If they think ruthlessness is a virtue they shouldn’t complain if I exhibit it,” he writes.
He also suggests if released his killing days were over. During his trial no clear reason was given for his mass shooting spree other than he was depressed about his military dream coming to an end. He didn’t know his victims and told police at the time he just wanted to kill anyone along the busy four-laned arterial Hoddle Street, a judge later remarking he had built a fantasy life around heroically killing in battle.
“I wish to make this clear: despite my experiences of bastardisation at Duntroon, I am proud of having been selected to go there,” he writes.
“Responsibility for my failure ultimately rests with me (one of the principles that I was taught and still remember is that of ‘command responsibility’). I am ashamed of my actions and frustrated that I cannot now do anything to make amends for them. As I indicated above, I am embarrassed that my name is associated with this in spite of various arrogant f******s who think they are acting out “Lord of the Flies’ in a collegiate setting, still a fine officer training institution.”
He said an academic once wrote whether it would be better a certain notorious criminal or Knight himself be released, and concluded it be better to release the criminal.
“My retort was that if released he would have gone back to dealing drugs and killing people. If I had been released with a clean slate I would have gone straight into the Defence Force Recruiting Centre and re-enlisted. The fact that a lot of people think like the academic should cause you to ponder whether their thinking has been corrupted.”
Duntroon, established in 1911, has been rocked by scandals over the years triggering several formal inquiries. In 1984 the class system, allowing senior classes to command a lower class even though they did not have rank over them, was abolished as it was found to be “open to abuse” and bastardisation.
KNIGHT’S NEW ATTEMPT TO PIN CRIME ON DUNTROON
Julian Knight has never truly shown remorse for his murder of seven innocent civilians and attempted murder of 46 others. But he now seeks to blame Duntroon for his actions and regrets not having continued his career in the college.
He cites a photograph of himself leaning on another junior staff cadet in the carpark of Duntroon in March 1987, two months after he joined. It was before he was discharged in July 1987, for stabbing his cadet company sergeant major, and before he enacted the Hoddle Street massacre.
“Look at the smiling youngster and ask yourself ‘what the hell happened?’” he has now written. “As a number of people have said … they either accepted a psychopath into Duntroon or Duntroon turned me into one. Which is it?
“By the way, I underwent both psychiatric and psychological examinations for the Adult Parole Board of Victoria in 2012. Both of them found that I was not a psychopath and did not have any personality disorders. Makes you wonder (or at least it should). Perhaps there really is such a thing as ‘temporary insanity’.”
Knight added despite his experiences at Duntroon he was proud to have gone there. He noted on Google under ‘Duntroon'(‘notable alumni ‘search) that he is shown listed (in a gallery photo gallery being second on “notable alumni”.
“The first person mentioned is Peter Cosgrove the second person is me. I find this embarrassing and so should the Army,” he wrote. “The best outcome for all concerned would be that I stopped being associated with Duntroon. I can expect to outlive General Cosgrove.”
Hoddle Street massacre gunman seeks veterans’ help
by Charles Miranda
May 1, 2023, True Crime Australia | News Corp Australia Network,
https://www.heraldsun.com.au/truecrimeaustralia/hoddle-street-massacre-gunman-seeks-veterans-help/news-story/3dc75d2641914b5f612d44d1212ea262 (subscription access only)
Mass murderer Julian Knight is writing personal letters to veteran groups and agencies seeking details of their policies as he appears again to want to build a case for compensation.
Knight is serving life in Victoria’s maximum security Port Phillip Prison for killing seven people and injuring 19 others in the August 1987 Hoddle Street massacre.
In 2016 he lost his bid to receive Commonwealth compensation for abuse he suffered while a cadet at Canberra’s Royal Military College Duntroon; he has alleged bullying at the college in the months leading to the massacre was culpable for his actions.
Knight, 55, has launched numerous legal challenges from his jail cell for things from his jailing conditions and treatment to “price gouging” for prison phone calls and had prompted law reviews to stop his vexatious claims and a nuisance to the community.
But the failed Army officer cadet had been quiet for years but is now again reaching out to RSL and other veteran groups for their handbooks and guidelines on services, benefits and welfare treatments available and has so far been refused.
“Late last year RSL Victoria received a letter from Julian Knight,” RSL Victoria boss Sue Cattermole said. “RSL Victoria replied, informing him that any further correspondence would not be responded to. No further correspondence has been received from Julian Knight.”
Speaking via his website and associates, Knight confirmed he wanted to get a copy of their handbook “for its historical information” but would not say why.
“I don’t know. Does it matter in the scheme of things about some handbook, or the RSL, or veterans groups?” an associate responded through the website.
He declined to say whether he was again attempting to get compensation.
Victoria’s Department of Justice and Community Safety said it did not comment on the mail and packages sent or received by individual prisoners.
A person can however request unwanted mail be blocked.
In 2020 he sought the UN’s help to get access to crime scene photos and at one stage lost his right to an in-cell computer from which he would make his numerous demands and claims including more than 30 legal cases.
He was deemed vexatious for his frequent “merit-less” claims and has to apply to the courts to mount any formal judicial action.
Criminal psychologist Tim Watson-Munro names Australia’s most evil man
by Charles Miranda
June 7, 2019, True Crime Australia, Police Tape,
https://www.heraldsun.com.au/truecrimeaustralia/policetape/criminal-psychologist-tim-watsonmunro-names-australias-most-evil-man/news-story/eadeebff3e7adb7b29ad64aa69c92758 (subscription access only)
Criminal psychologist Tim Watson-Munro gives his verdict on a rogues’ gallery of Australian criminals and reveals who is the nation’s most evil man.
On August 9, 1987, for seemingly no reason, former soldier Knight went on a shooting rampage, killing seven people and injuring 19, in Clifton Hill in Melbourne, in what became known as the Hoddle Street Massacre. Watson-Munro was asked to assess him days after his arrest and determined he was not insane. He also formally spoke with his wounded victims at the behest of authorities.
“No psychosis, no delusions, no hearing of voices, no seeing space ships, no messages from God or the devil. It took a while to really firm up on the non-psychotic argument. There was some suggestion he may have had what’s described as a catathymic crisis which in common parlance is temporary insanity. But he wasn’t crazy and that case ended up with a sentence hearing in the Supreme Court of Melbourne. There was very little evidence led, it was over in a day or a day and a half. I’ve been involved in pleas for people that steal cars and rob banks that go for longer than that.
So at the end of the day, he put his hand up because there was no defence and then it was really about mitigating factors. There were very few, beyond saying, and that’s no excuse of all, but he went to Duntroon.
He was bastardised, he came from the wrong side of the tracks, Clifton Hill back then, 32 years ago, was not the sort of gentrified, middle class suburb it is today. And you know, he was going to Duntroon, sharing bunks with boys from private schools and they picked on him, and prior to Hoddle Street he was grounded. He couldn’t leave the barracks, it was a form of punishment.
He went to the Private Bin nightclub in Canberra and he stabbed his mess sergeant, who by the way, was a year older than him. So you had little boys in uniforms thinking they were men, picking on other kids, and I would have thought at that time he should have been picked up and been seen by psychiatrists and properly treated. In fact that didn’t occur.
His father was a captain in the Australian Army. He was a linguist and it was organised that Julian would return to Melbourne awaiting a court martial, and it was in that intervening period that he committed the Hoddle Street atrocity.
“I know, with Julian, he does reflect on it, and … I spoke with him and he expressed that he was sorry for what he had done. It’s hard not to think about what you’ve done when you’ve spent the last 32 years now in custody, with no real prospects for release. And Julian’s a highly intelligent bloke, he’s done a degree in university, but he does menial tasks around the jail. I think he’s more reviled now than he was when it happened because back then he was a teenager. Now he’s a guy, you know, he’s 50, thereabouts, so it is a difficult one for him.”