Bill Wallace (Australian Prisoner)
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Bill Wallace (Australian Prisoner)
William Richard Wallace (August 1881 – 17 July 1989) was an Australian convicted murderer who spent most of his life in the J Ward facility for the criminally insane in Ararat, Victoria. At his death, shortly before he was to turn 108, he was the oldest prisoner in Australian history, and oldest recorded prisoner in the world. Biography Bill Wallace was born in Young, New South Wales in 1881, to Alexander and Walterina (née Young) Wallace. In 1926, he was arrested in connection for the shooting death of an American man named William Ernest Williams at the Waterloo Café in King Street, Melbourne. It was alleged that Wallace had been angry at the man for refusing to stop smoking inside the café, and waiting outside for him to leave before fatally shooting him. Whilst a number of customers in the cafe had seen Wallace and Williams arguing about the cigarette smoke while eating lunch, there were no witnesses to the actual shooting, and Wallace refused to cooperate with question ...
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J Ward
J Ward originally the Ararat County Gaol, was an Australian prison, of the latter a psychiatric facility to house the criminally insane, located in Ararat, Victoria, Australia. Construction of the gaol commenced in 1859 and the facility was opened in October 1861. In 1887, it was converted for use as a maximum security psychiatric ward for the criminally insane. J Ward officially closed in January 1991, and in 1993, it was re-opened as a museum providing tours. History Construction of original building commenced in 1859, as a goldfields prison, based on the Pentonville concept, by the Public Works Department. They were built out of blue stone. On 10 October 1861, the gaol was opened, with a total of 21 prisoners incarcerated. The first Governor was Samuel Walker (previously the Governor of Portland Gaol). In 1864, the gaol housed 40 prisoners, and in 1867, John Gray became the gaol's second Governor, a position that he held for ten years. On 15 August 1870, the first executio ...
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Criminally Insane
The insanity defense, also known as the mental disorder defense, is an affirmative defense by excuse in a criminal case, arguing that the defendant is not responsible for their actions due to a psychiatric disease at the time of the criminal act. This is contrasted with an excuse of provocation, in which the defendant is responsible, but the responsibility is lessened due to a temporary mental state.''Criminal Law - Cases and Materials'', 7th ed. 2012, Wolters Kluwer Law & Business; John Kaplan, Robert Weisberg, Guyora Binder, , It is also contrasted with the justification of self defense or with the mitigation of imperfect self-defense. The insanity defense is also contrasted with a finding that a defendant cannot stand trial in a criminal case because a mental disease prevents them from effectively assisting counsel, from a civil finding in trusts and estates where a will is nullified because it was made when a mental disorder prevented a testator from recognizing the ...
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Ararat, Victoria
Ararat () is a town in the Central Highlands (Victoria), Central Highlands region in Victoria (Australia), Victoria, Australia, about west of Melbourne, on the Western Highway, Victoria, Western Highway on the eastern slopes of the Ararat Hills and Cemetery Creek valley between Victoria's Western District (Victoria), Western District and the Wimmera. The source of the Hopkins River is a few kilometres to the east below Telegraph Hill. Its urban population according to 2021 census is 8,500 and services the region of 11,880 residents across the Rural City's boundaries. It is also the home of the 2018/19 GMGA Golf Championship Final. It is the largest Human settlement, settlement in the Rural City of Ararat local government area and is the administrative centre. The discovery of gold in 1857 during the Victorian gold rush transformed it into a boomtown which continued to prosper until the turn of the 20th century, after which it has steadily declined in population. It was procl ...
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Young, New South Wales
Young is a town in the South Western Slopes region of New South Wales, Australia, and the largest town in the Hilltops Region. The "Lambing Flat" Post Office opened on 1 March 1861 and was renamed "Young" in 1863. Young is marketed as the Cherry Capital of Australia and every year hosts the National Cherry Festival. Young is situated on the Olympic Highway and is approximately two hours' drive from the Canberra area. It is in a valley, with surrounding hills. The town is named after Sir John Young, the governor of NSW from 1861 to 1867. History Before European settlers arrived in Young, members of the Burrowmunditory tribe, a family group of the indigenous Wiradjuri Nation, lived in the region. Descendants of the Burrowmunditory clan still live in Young. James White was the first European settler in the district and established 'Burrangong' station in 1826 with a squatting claim of . His story is told in the novel ''Brothers in Exile''. In late June 1860 Michael Sheedy ...
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Melbourne, Victoria
Melbourne ( , ; Boonwurrung language, Boonwurrung/ or ) is the List of Australian capital cities, capital and List of cities in Australia by population, most populous city of the States and territories of Australia, Australian state of Victoria (state), Victoria, and the second most-populous city in Australia, after Sydney. The city's name generally refers to a metropolitan area also known as Greater Melbourne, comprising an urban agglomeration of Local Government Areas of Victoria#Municipalities of Greater Melbourne, 31 local government areas. The name is also used to specifically refer to the local government area named City of Melbourne, whose area is centred on the Melbourne central business district and some immediate surrounds. The metropolis occupies much of the northern and eastern coastlines of Port Phillip Bay and spreads into the Mornington Peninsula, part of West Gippsland, as well as the hinterlands towards the Yarra Valley, the Dandenong Ranges, and the Macedon R ...
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At Her Majesty's Pleasure
At His Majesty's pleasure (when the reigning monarch is female, at Her Majesty's pleasure), sometimes abbreviated to the King's pleasure (or the Queen's pleasure), is a term of art in public law and in penal law. In public law, it refers to the indeterminate or undetermined length of service of certain appointed officials. This is based on the proposition that certain government officials are appointed by the Crown and can be removed for policy reasons, unlike employees. Originating in the United Kingdom, the phrase is now used throughout the Commonwealth realms, Lesotho, Eswatini, Brunei, and other monarchies, such as Spain, the Netherlands, and Oman. In realms where the monarch is represented by a governor-general, governor, lieutenant governor, or administrator, the phrase may be modified to be ''at the governor's pleasure'' or variations thereof, since the governor-general, governor, lieutenant governor, or administrator is the monarch's personal representative in the country ...
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Aradale Mental Hospital
Aradale Mental Hospital was an Australian psychiatric hospital, located in Ararat, Victoria, Ararat, a rural city in south-west Victoria (Australia), Victoria, Australia. Originally known as Ararat Lunatic Asylum, Aradale and its two sister asylums at Kew Asylum, Kew and Beechworth Asylum, Beechworth were commissioned to accommodate the growing number of 'lunatics' in the History of Victoria, colony of Victoria. Construction began in 1864, and the guardhouses are listed as being built in 1866 though the list of patients extends as far back as the year before (1865). It was closed as an asylum in 1998 and in 2001 became a campus of the Melbourne Polytechnic (Previously known as NMIT) administered ''Melbourne Polytechnic's Ararat Training Centre''. Construction The asylum was designed by G. W. Vivian and John James Clark (at this time Vivian's assistant), adapting Vivian's initial designs for a similar buildings in Kew, Victoria, Kew and Beechworth. Building commenced at Kew (Kew ...
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