I BANISHED MY DEMON
For 38 years award-winning singer Lynn Rogers has never spoken of the night the Coast's most notorious criminal woke her up at knife point. Until today, her 77th birthday
DAYS after a retired tradie claimed to know the identity of the balaclava rapist who terrorised the city nearly 40 years ago, a well-known entertainer has revealed she was the woman raped in her own home in an attack police believe may have been the killer’s last. For the first time, singer Lynn Rogers has told how her soft-voiced attacker held a knife to her throat and dislocated her shoulder as she was bound. After seeing a hypnotist and reliving the attack, Ms Rogers, who turns 77 today, vowed the assault would not ruin her life. “It was like I banished a demon when I was in that doctor’s office. It struck me that I just wanted to throw it out of my mind.”
NEARLY 40 years ago, a wellknown Gold Coast entertainer woke to find the city’s most notorious criminal holding a knife to her neck.
The incredible story of how award-winning entertainer Lynn Rogers triumphed after being what police believe was the balaclava rapist’s final victim, can now be told.
For the first time, Ms Rogers has detailed her memories on that spring night in October 1980 when a man with a “whisper-quiet voice” and auburn hair broke into her Burleigh Waters home, bound her hands and raped her.
She also told of how, after two months of hopelessness, she was able to “banish the demon”.
Ms Rogers told her story days after a retired tradie told the Bulletin he knew the identity of the balaclava killer.
The criminal who shot dead Jeffery Parkinson and raped six women in 1979-80 has never been caught.
Ms Rogers was aged 39, living alone and loving life at the time of the attack.
She had just returned from performing in South Africa and was expected to fly to Sydney to appear on The Mike Walsh Show the morning the monster broke into her home.
“I went to see two friends in Surfers Paradise that night,” Ms Rogers remembered.
“One was a comedian and the other two were entertainers, a brother and sister act, who played at Iluka Quality Inn.
“I left there about 1am to come home and I was going to go and stay with my mum in Miami but for some reason I didn’t.
“In fact, the cab stopped outside Mum’s place and I changed my mind and went home.”
Ms Rogers packed up and was ready to fly to Sydney for the show in the morning before she hopped into bed.
She’d been an entertainer since moving from Mt Isa at age 16 and had her system for travelling interstate down pat, leaving the money by her bed for the cab to the airport.
“I always did a crossword puzzle before I went to sleep, so I was lying in the bed doing that and then I went to sleep.
“The next thing I knew, I was woken up with this cold metal on my neck and then it all happened.”
He had white hands that felt softer than most men’s hands, Ms Rogers remembered.
“I remember the really quite voice, like a whisper, which was scarier.”
He wanted money, but all Ms Rogers had was the cash for the morning cab.
“Things stick in your mind,” she said. “He said something like: ‘What do you mean you have no money? I’ve never seen so many clothes’.
“After that, the act happened.
“I was praying and he said: ‘You might as well pray because it will be the last thing you do’.”
Ms Rogers would later recount she wasn’t a religious woman but thought if she kept talking and made the man feel sorry for her, he might change his mind.
He eventually left, but returned to the bedroom first to call out to Ms Rogers.
“He might have been in the doorway or something and he said: ‘Next time be more careful’ and then he left,” she said.
“My nightdress was all ripped and I couldn’t get my hands get loose, so I sort of slid the door open with one hand, went next door to a neighbour, who happened to be a federal police man.”
Police thought the balaclava rapist had walked up from Herron Lake behind Ms Rogers’ home in the dark of night after waiting for her lights to go out.
“They reckoned he came up from the water because they found a whole heap of cigarette butts (on the shore),” Ms Rogers said. After the attack, the now 77-year-old was interviewed countless times and played tapes of men’s voices to see if she could identify the attacker.
“They interviewed every young man of that age,” she said.
“No stone was unturned, I don’t think. They did they best they could.”
It wasn’t until Ms Rogers was taken to a hypnotist by police months after the incident in an attempt to bring back untapped memories of the event that she decided the serial rapist would not ruin her life.
“I was ready to shoot him early on,” she said.
“I was in a terrible place for about two months. I was just completely lost. I couldn't believe it. I couldn’t believe it happened and I was going down and down and physically I had this terrible shoulder because it had been dislocated in the incident.
“I said: ‘Wait a minute this is going to stop now’ and within five minutes it was all over. It wasn’t a gradual thing it was just bang. Finished.
“I just stopped everything and I said this is stopping now. This man is not going to continue to rape me in my mind. It’s all over.
“I walked out of that office and it was like a big weight lifted off my shoulders.
“This was about one or two months later and let me tell you, within a very short time I was back in the business and I won my first (Australian Variety Artists) Mo Award just after that.
“I threw myself into my career again. I’m still singing.”
Ms Rogers had sung all over the world in her 60-year-long career including New York, Jamaica, Africa and Europe.
She has decided to tell her story because reports of the rape have never accurately described what happened.
Ms Rogers said she could “only hope” other women who have been through a traumatic experiences can learn from her experience.
“It’s all about the power of the mind,” she said.
“It was like I banished a demon when I was in that doctor’s office. It struck me that I just wanted to throw it out of my mind.
“Ever since that second, when I speak about it or people ask me about it I don’t get upset and it’s as though I’m talking about someone else.
“That’s the only way to cope with it, I suppose.”
I JUST STOPPED EVERYTHING AND I SAID THIS IS STOPPING NOW. THIS MAN IS NOT GOING TO CONTINUE TO RAPE ME IN MY MIND ... IT WAS LIKE I BANISHED A DEMON WHEN I WAS IN THAT DOCTOR’S OFFICE GOLD COAST SINGER LYNN ROGERS