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On 4 May 1982,
Australian Army The Australian Army is the principal Army, land warfare force of Australia. It is a part of the Australian Defence Force (ADF), along with the Royal Australian Navy and the Royal Australian Air Force. The Army is commanded by the Chief of Army ...
personnel Robin Reid, then aged 34, and Nicole Louise Pearce (birth name Paul Wayne Luckman), 17, kidnapped two 13-year-old boys, Peter Aston and Terry Ryan, on the
Gold Coast, Queensland The Gold Coast, also known by its initials, GC, is a coastal city and region in the state of Queensland, Australia, located approximately south-southeast of the centre of the list of Australian capital cities, state capital, Brisbane. It is ...
. Reid and Pearce then drove the boys at gun and knife point to
Kingscliff, New South Wales Kingscliff is a coastal town just south of Tweed Heads, New South Wales, Tweed Heads in the Northern Rivers region of New South Wales, Australia, and is a beach community offering a variety of holiday accommodations. Together with the villages ...
, where they were beaten, tortured, and sexually assaulted, before Aston was ultimately murdered.


Kidnapping and murder

Teenage friends Peter Aston and Terry Ryan were out exploring and wandering, and decided to try
hitchhiking Hitchhiking (also known as thumbing, autostop or hitching) is a means of transportation that is gained by asking individuals, usually strangers, for a ride in their car or other vehicle. The ride is usually, but not always, free. Signaling ...
their way down the Gold Coast Highway. They observed two males, one clearly younger (Pearce) and one slightly older (Reid), apparently working on their parked vehicle, as the hood was open and the two appeared to be looking inside. Aston and Ryan approached the vehicle and introduced themselves, before asking where the strangers were headed, and if they could possibly hitch a ride further down the road. Reid is said to have agreed "immediately", promptly closing the hood of the car and requesting for one of the boys "sit in the front" passenger seat while the other sat with Pearce, in the back. Ryan would later recount that this request seemed very strange, to both Aston and himself, at the time; the boys simply did what they were told, thinking nothing major of it. Not long down the road, the two boys realised Reid was not taking the agreed-upon route. When they eventually questioned his driving, Ryan immediately "had a shotgun" aimed at his head by Pearce, who told him to be quiet. At the front of the car, Reid held a knife to Aston, ordering him to do as he was told, as well. Reid continued driving with one hand, holding the knife to Aston in the other, while both boys were repeatedly beaten and roughed-up; Ryan later said he was struck with the butt of the shotgun a couple of times, causing him to nearly lose consciousness. Reid continued driving further, eventually crossing the Queensland-New South Wales border, into the beachside town of Kingscliff, where they forced the two boys out of the car and down a secluded beach track. Reid and Pearce then reportedly placed painful toe clamps on the boys' feet to immobilise them and restrict their movements. The two men are said to have laughed and mocked at the struggling boys throughout the ordeal. Their hands were also tied behind their backs. Apparently, the men focused the majority of their energy on Aston while Ryan was forced to watch, though he was repeatedly beaten and kicked as well. Aston, however, was violently beaten, kicked, punched, sexually assaulted, struck with a shovel, had his ear lobes "pierced" a number of times with a leather punch, and had lit cigarettes pressed onto his skin before being stabbed in the head and partially scalped, according to Ryan's own testimony. The more the boys yelled for them to stop, the more angry the men would become; Reid and Pearce are said to have grown so tired of Aston's screaming that they ripped all of his clothes off and essentially "stuffed what would fit" into his mouth and throat, to silence him. However, he did not suffocate. Ryan, fearing his own torture and death was imminent, admitted to feeling as if joining the deranged men would be his only ticket to safety. Feigning a sick interest in the sadistic attack, Ryan was told by Pearce and Reid to begin beating his friend with the shovel. Regrettably, Ryan complied out of fear, though he reportedly did not deliver the killing blow. In spite of all of his injuries sustained during the attack, Aston was still clinging to life; he was eventually covered in sand by Pearce and Reid, essentially buried alive in a shallow grave, as the medical examiner would later find sand in the boy's airways. By this point, Ryan had reasoned with the attackers enough that they eventually drove him home, dropping him a few blocks from the actual house and leaving.


Arrest and trial

Reid and Pearce's committal hearing was held at Tweed Heads Court on 4 August. The case was transferred to the
Sydney Sydney is the capital city of the States and territories of Australia, state of New South Wales and the List of cities in Australia by population, most populous city in Australia. Located on Australia's east coast, the metropolis surrounds Syd ...
Supreme Court. Reid and Pearce were convicted and sentenced to
life imprisonment Life imprisonment is any sentence (law), sentence of imprisonment under which the convicted individual is to remain incarcerated for the rest of their natural life (or until pardoned or commuted to a fixed term). Crimes that result in life impr ...
.


Aftermath

Pearce underwent
gender transition Gender transition is the process of affirming and expressing one's internal sense of gender, rather than the sex assigned to them at birth. It is a recommended course of treatment for individuals experiencing gender dysphoria, providing impro ...
in 1990. Pearce was released in 1998. Reid has been refused parole six times.


References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Aston, Peter Murder in New South Wales Murder in Queensland Child sexual abuse in Australia Crimes involving Satanism or the occult 1980s in Queensland 1980s in New South Wales 1982 murders in Australia May 1982 in Australia Child murder in Australia Murder committed by minors