The rookie teacher at the tiny country school was startled during morning recess when some of the kids ran into the single weatherboard classroom, yelling: "There's a man outside with a gun."
Rob Hunter had been the sole teacher at the Gippsland town of Wooreen for just nine days - his first posting after three years at teachers' college. He was 20 years old. Maree Young was his student, she was just 11 years old.
The man with the revolver and wearing a Collingwood beanie as a balaclava was Geelong Prison escapee Edwin John "Ted" Eastwood, 26, who five years earlier pulled the same crime 270 kilometres away, kidnapping a teacher and six students from Faraday. It was February 14, 1977. In the next 21 hours they would experience a car crash, a night imprisoned at a remote campsite, an escape, police pursuit, a shootout and a wounding before final rescue.
In this episode of Naked City, Rob Hunter and Maree Young tell their story, first hand. 

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By early 1985 hitman Chris Flannery was running out of friends. This was hardly surprising, as he’d killed most of them.

Flannery had built a fearsome reputation for killing on command but when an attack dog begins to snarl at its master it is time for the big sleep.

Flannery’s boss Sydney gangster George Freeman had lost patience with him and was a little frightened of the unpredictable gunman.

Flannery had threatened police and had shot one – undercover detective Mick Drury. Even in corrupt Sydney that was a crime that couldn’t go unanswered.

He killed gangsters, shot dead a law-abiding Melbourne businessman, stabbed a major banking figure and orchestrated the murder of a teenage girl who could have given evidence against him.

The man they called Rent-a-Kill made sure most of his victims were never found and that proved to be his fate when he was ambushed and murdered.

He was no great loss.

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Abraham Gilbert Saffron was a successful Sydney businessman who hated his nickname and spent a fortune trying to have it expunged from the record by threatening anyone who used it publicly.

The name was Mr Sin and it was well deserved. He built a vice empire on a triangular business model – the three points were bribery, blackmail and arson.

He organised sex, often with under-age boys and girls, secretly photographing patrons to use against them. 

He paid bribes to police - $750 per club for local police and $5000 a week for senior police and was so brazen he repeatedly visited the bent Deputy Commissioner Bill Allen at headquarters.

Six of Saffron’s many properties caught fire between 1980 and 1982 - all deliberately lit. 

On June 9, 1979, the ghost train at Sydney’s Luna Park was engulfed in flames, killing six children and the father of one of them. It was a property Saffron wanted to own.

The police investigation was a disgrace, not because of incompetence but corruption.

Saffron said he wasn’t involved but he would, wouldn’t he?

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Robbo' Robertson was a natural undercover cop. A Vietnam veteran with the gift of the gab, he slipped seamlessly into the role of Brian Wilson, an underworld heavy from Sydney.

In 1978 Robertson was given a new mission. He was to go deep undercover to infiltrate Australia’s best armed robbery crew, the men behind the 1976 multi-million Great Bookie Robbery.

He was to pretend to be a corrupt armoured van driver who would tip the team about a lucrative payroll. But this time police would be waiting to make the arrest.

What they didn’t know at the time was that one of the gang was the notorious NSW prison escapee Russell “Mad Dog” Cox.

In the final meeting before the armed robbery Cox and Robbo were stopped by three uniformed police, unaware of the sting operation.

Cox pulled a gun and only the quick thinking and quick talking Robbo saved them all.

In 2021 Robbo finally received a Valour Award for his heroism.

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It was a Friday night when Federal Police contacted their Victorian counterparts with an urgent message. A shooting had been ordered by an overseas bikie boss to be carried at a Melbourne fight night.

The planning was so detailed police moved in to seize two stolen cars to be used by the hit team, cloned plates, and guns. Someone is walking around today unaware they are alive because cops unscrambled the encrypted message.

What the arresting officers didn’t know is the original tip didn’t come from an informer but something much more reliable.

As part of an international police sting over three years police had monitored 27 million encrypted messages from crooks from 300 cartels using a purpose-built app called ANoM.

The app had been built with a trap door for police and spread through the world enabling police to monitor criminals in Australia, US, Europe, Asia and South America,  

In the end police made more than 1000 arrests with more than 200 in Australia alone.

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In 1984 policeman Ron Fenton was nearly given up for dead. Shot in the head and slumped unconscious next to his police car. That is until a cop in an unmarked car took it upon himself to charge do drag Ron to safety. They thought Ron wouldn’t make it to hospital, then that he would not regain consciousness and finally that
he would never return to work. They didn’t know Ron. He battled back and eventually was back on the road. But it came at a cost – he would suffer PTSD and leave the Force to battle his demons alone. Depression, flash backs, mood swings and vicious night terrors had led him to attempt to take his own life. That is, until he met Yogi, a companion dog trained by an inmate in Bathurst prison. The dog and the prisoner saved Ron’s life.

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The first episode of series four will drop Wednesday 7 July, with a new episode published every Wednesday. Make sure to subscribe now and get all the episodes straight to your device. 

John Silvester, Australia’s longest-serving crime reporter, will take you on a journey through his 40 years of dealing with the nation’s most dangerous criminals. 

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Arthur James Nelson was a third rate crook who had convictions for burglary, theft, assault, false pretences and drugs. In July 1988 his path fatally crossed police officers, Lachlan McCulloch and Syd Hadley. We hear the police re-enactment tapes conducted the day after the shooting as McCulloch and Hadley describe blow by blow the one hour chase and reenact the split second moment they shot dead Nelson. 

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He was the best defence lawyer representing murder defendants in around 200 cases. He went on to be a respected Supreme Court Judge presiding over the most difficult homicide trials, including the Walsh Street police killings, the Russell Street bombing that killed police constable Angela Taylor; the Bega double murder trial of Leslie Camilleri, one of two men who tortured and killed NSW schoolgirls Lauren Margaret Barry, and Nichole Emma Collins in Victoria in 1997; and the trial of serial killer Paul Charles Denyer, who killed three women and stalked hundreds in the Frankston area.

Frank Vincent was the long-time head of the Parole Board who often had to decide who should be freed and who would remain in jail. Frank takes us through a journey into the criminal justice system and reveals the secrets of the Supreme Court.

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He has represented Mick Gatto and Mark 'Chopper' Reid among other Melbourne gangland characters, but even as a school-kid, lawyer Bernie Balmer had an aversion to bullies.  As a year 11 student he had a difference of opinion with a Brother at Assumption College who responded by punching the young Balmer in the face. Bernie, who would go on to be a more than handy heavyweight boxer, dropped the bully.

While he was only defending himself, he was forced to leave under threat of expulsion. It still burns that some who knew the truth failed to stand up for him and perhaps that is one of the reasons he became a seven-day-a-week defence lawyer, often giving a voice to those who desperately need one.

Balmer is respected on both sides of the law and has a unique insight into the criminal justice system.

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