Scotland Yards blasts Aussie cops

[Trumplestiltskin 5,791]

BRITISH police yesterday criticised their Australian counterparts for deporting a violent sex offender who went on to kill an 18-year-old model.

Mark Dixie, 36, was yesterday jailed for life for the brutal rape and stabbing murder of Sally Anne Bowman, but British police believe he is responsible for more deaths, including some in Australia.

Bowman's brutal murder two years ago sparked outrage in the UK press and Dixie's conviction yesterday dominated front pages. The Sun called for Dixie to be executed.

But Scotland Yard went a step further, blaming Australian police for taking "the easy option'' and not prosecuting Dixie for a string of offences committed in the six years that he travelled the country before being deported in 1999.

Investigators singled out the NSW Police for a lack of co-operation in their prosecution of Dixie, describing as "poor'' the assistance provided.

Detective Superintendent Stuart Cundy said he had no doubt Dixie, who worked as a chef and was known by different aliases here, was responsible for unsolved assaults or even murders.

``I am sure Dixie killed someone while he was in Australia," he said.

"The problem is pinning it down. There are a lot of people who go missing; there are a lot of travellers out there. The injuries Sally Anne sustained were so off the scale that I am convinced it was not his first killing.''

"The answer lies somewhere in Australia.''

Supt Cundy also said he was mystified as to how Western Australian authorities had dismissed Dixie's possible link to three killings in the Perth suburb of Claremont in 1996 and 1997.

Speaking outside the Old Bailey after Dixie was sentenced, Supt Cundy appealed for women in Australia who may have known the "homicidal maniac'' to contact them.

He said most states had some record of Dixie getting into trouble.

NSW Police confirmed yesterday there was a warrant for Dixie's arrest for stealing money in February, 1995, while working at a Manly restaurant. A spokesman said he was "not linked'' to any sex attacks.

Dixie travelled between several states but lived mostly in Perth. He overstayed his visa and fathered two children to a British girlfriend before calling himself Shane Turner and moving to Western Australia.

It's not clear what other crimes Dixie may have committed but in June, 1998, he raped and repeatedly stabbed a 20-year-old university student in Perth. He left her for dead but the woman survived.

Last week she gave evidence in his London trial, in which she described an assault remarkably similar to the one on Ms Bowman.

In January, 1999, a naked Dixie leapt out of bushes in a Perth suburb at another woman, who thought she was about to be raped.

She escaped and gave police a description of her attacker. Dixie was arrested four months later on a separate offence.

He was deported on April 23, 1999, but Australian authorities never mentioned any of his offences or suspicions to their counterparts.

Australian police only told their British colleagues about him nine months after he was deported.

Dixie had denied killing Ms Bowman, claiming instead he found her dead and thought he would take advantage of the situation and have sex with her body.

He was caught by chance when he was arrested nine months later after getting into a minor fight over a World Cup football match at a Surrey pub. His DNA was taken and matched to the murder scene when it was put on the police national computer 12 days later.

It was only after British police made inquiries following Dixie's arrest that his DNA was matched to the June, 1998, attempted murder and rape of a student in Perth.

http://www.news.com.au/dailytelegraph/stor...5005941,00.html