Azaria’s tale gripped world
A look back at significant moments in the North’s history
SHE entered national folklore for tragic reasons, and today Azaria Chamberlain would have been 40 years old.
Her name is known worldwide as the baby who was snatched from her family’s tent by a dingo near Uluru on the night of August 17, 1980.
Born on June 11 in Mount Isa, Azaria lived for two months with her parents Michael and Lindy and brothers Aidan and Reagan in their north western Queensland home before her life was extinguished during the family’s fateful camping trip to Australia’s Red Centre.
The trial generated a level of media attention never before seen in Australia, and anyone who lived through the media circus surrounding Azaria’s disappearance will never forget the experience.
The wildfire started as soon as the family drove home to Mount Isa from their horrific trip to Uluru, with outrageous rumours spreading about their membership to the SeventhDay Adventist Church being a cult.
There was even a bizarre tip-off by a man who falsely claimed the name Azaria meant “sacrifice in the wilderness”.
More ludicrous claims followed, including that Lindy Chamberlain was a witch and the family was part of a cult that killed infants as part of religious ceremonies.
Despite a coronial inquest in 1980-81 ruling Azaria was likely killed by a dingo, a second inquest featuring sloppy and fraudulent forensic evidence led to the arrest of the Chamberlains in 1982 for the murder of their infant daughter.
Lindy was convicted of murder and sentenced to life imprisonment, and Michael was found guilty as an accessory after the fact and given an n 18-month suspended sentence.
But a chance discovery of Azaria’s s missing jacket at Uluru in 1986 resulted in Lindy and Michael having all convictions against them overturned, and Lindy being released from jail after serving three years behind bars.
In 2012 a fourth coronial inquest into the disappearance of Azaria ruled that a dingo was responsible for her death, shutting the door on the case once and for all.
The immediate aftermath of the tragedy and its trial by media has now faded from popular memory, and it has even been used as a punchline on American comedies such as The Simpsons, Seinfeld and The Office.
But the raw pain of little Azaria’s tragic death is felt still half a century later by people involved in the case – not least her mother. “You can’t turn it off,” Lindy said last year.
“You dwell on different memories over time, and there are aspects of it that soften – little insignificant parts of it.
“But others, I can just close my eyes and re-roll the film. I can see her in my arms.
“I can still clearly see expressions on her face when I was feeding her and talking to her, and the way she’d respond.”
Lindy recently revealed she had to forgive, focus on positives and let the past go to find happiness after the devastating loss of Azaria and the shocking miscarriage of justice that saw her wrongly convicted of killing her little girl.
“It’s not what happens that counts, it’s how you choose to deal with what happens,” she said.
“You can choose if you’re going to live with anger, regret and revenge and miserably think yourself a victim.
“Or you can choose to be a hero in your own life and forgive the past and move on.
“It doesn’t happen immediately. Sometimes I go back and have to remind myself to start all over again. It isn’t easy.”
Those who once doubted the Chamberlains and added fire to the rumour mill were no doubt humbled by the rise of dingo attacks on infants and young children in Australia during recent times.
A number of attacks were reported on Fraser Island in particular, and it was those attacks that helped lead to a final inquest in 2012.
Coroner Elizabeth Morris apologised to the Chamberlain family, and made the ruling that a dingo dog took Azaria and caused her death.
“No longer will Australia be able to say that dingoes are not dangerous and will only attack if provoked … we live in a beautiful country but it is dangerous,” Lindy said.