‘Justice is sweet’ as killer finally caught
THE conviction of Family Court bomber Leonard Warwick is a sweet moment for award-winning Hobart journalist Debi Marshall.
The serial killer might still be a free man if it wasn’t for Marshall’s painstaking work.
In the NSW Supreme Court on Thursday, 73-yearold Warwick was found guilty of killing three people, including a Family Court judge, and injuring 50 others in a series of shootings and bomb blasts between February 1980 and July 1985.
Justice Peter Garling acquitted Warwick of the 1980 murder of his brother-in-law, Stephen Blanchard.
The case was unsolved until Marshall’s 2013 Sunday Night report — which she followed up with a book on the killings.
“The case was as cold as cold. Arctic cold,” she said. “I had a look at it and thought ‘there’s something wrong with this’.
“I thought the guy must be dead or in jail. I started researching it and thought ‘you have to be kidding me, he’s walking around like a freerange chook’.
“I started ringing around the victim’s families and they hadn’t heard from the police for decades.”
Marshall recalled the show went to air and “all hell broke loose”.
“The police have a cold case unit in place but my understanding is that it had stalled. They got it up and cracking then. Then in 2014 the book came out with another witness.”
The likely presence at one of the bombing sites of DNA evidence on a window frame, identified during Marshall’s investigations, played a key role in the prosecution. “The cold case police put it all together and it ended up being an incredibly strong case,” she said.
“I think everyone feels vindicated. It has been a hell of a long time coming. It’s been 40 years since the first murder. That’s a long time to wait for justice.
“I’m heartbroken for the family of Stephen Blanchard but apart from that I’m just elated. Justice is sweet.”
Marshall briefly met Warwick during the filming of her Sunday Night report when she doorknocked his semirural Sydney home.
“I thought ‘you can’t show fear’. He had his hands in his pockets and I thought ‘I hope he doesn’t have a weapon’.
“This is a bloke who was the prime suspect in four murders, five bombings and two shootings.
“I said, ‘hello, I’m looking for Lennie Warwick’ and he said get the f..k off my property. I had to turn my back on him and I was thinking please don’t shoot me in the back!”
Warwick will be sentenced in six weeks.
Marshall, who won a Walkley Award for journalism leadership in 2015, is working on her ninth book.