‘He had no conscience at all’: The killing machine on the cusp of parole

Dangerous crooks often have nicknames that reflect their CVs, such as Christopher Dale “Rentakill” Flannery, Dennis “Mr Death” Allen, Stan “The Man” Smith and Roger “The Dodger” Rogerson.

Then there is Alistair Farquhar MacRae, known by friends, enemies, the detectives who arrested him and the prison officers who guarded him for decades – as Sandy.

This was due to the colour of his hair, most of which has long gone, rather than the soil he used to bury his murder victims.

No one (except him and he isn’t telling) knows how many people he has murdered, but many police believe it is in double figures.

“I would have to say that he would be Australia’s worst-known multiple murderer, and perhaps we will never know how many people he has killed,” retired homicide investigator Paul Hollowood once told me, and “Legs” is not one to exaggerate.

It has been reported that MacRae has been granted parole in South Australia, although the decision is now before the Parole Administrative Review Commission, which will consider the time he has served (plenty), his risk to the community (negligible) and the impact to the families of his victims (profound).

Certainly, the prosecutor who put him away for a double murder had no doubt MacRae should never be released, and back then even the killer agreed.

Paul Rofe, QC, told the Adelaide Supreme Court that MacRae should die in jail, and asked for a non-parole period of up to 50 years.

“This case comes into the worst category for several reasons,” Rofe said. “On each occasion he has come before sentencing court, the words ‘cold-blooded’, ‘planned’ and ‘execution’ have been used. At the end of the day, the public are certainly entitled to think this man should die in prison.”

MacRae told the judge: “To allow me leniency is a luxury I did not extend to my victims. The only way to show my remorse is to ask the court to show the same leniency that I showed my victims – absolutely none. I would ask the court to give me no possible chance of release before my death in custody.”

Justice Williams gave him two life sentences with a non-parole period of 36 years. The earliest he could have been released was in 2023, aged 74. Now Sandy wants out.

MacRae was good company on a good day, with a dry wit and a curious nature. On a bad day, he killed people.

He tried to play both sides, paying off police to stay out of jail and then informing on the same bent cops to anti-corruption detectives in a bid to keep out of jail.

Too smart for his own good, he shot himself in the foot while in witness protection (or more accurately admitted to injuring his hand while shooting someone else), which brought him undone.

Today we are overrun by Thai massage parlours that are, in reality, unregistered brothels. Back in the early 1980s, Geoff Lamb had the biggest slice of the illegal sex industry, running about 30 parlours, owning outright two luxury houses and driving a Lamborghini.

In 1978, Lamb avoided arrest by jumping a back fence during a raid. He decided not to rely on lucky breaks in the future but on corrupt police so it would never happen again.

Lamb went to Sydney to seek advice from the notorious Mr Sin, Abe Saffron, who had spent decades bribing his way out of trouble.

A retired senior NSW policeman who had spent years on the Saffron secret payroll linked Lamb with like-minded Melbourne detectives.

Lamb paid $3000 a month and provided free sex to detectives. In return, he expected a sneaky phone call before any raids.

And he wanted his main rival, Bob Slater, out of business. Slater was loaded up with explosives and detonators to link him to some unsolved bombings – explosions rumoured to have been set by police.

“Torchy” Lamb’s second in charge was MacRae, who had no problem eliminating any potential problem – particularly human ones.

A rival massage parlour owner and standover man Michael Ebert wasn’t frightened of MacRae. He should have been. After he bashed “Sandy”, MacRae vowed revenge. Two weeks later, on April 17, 1980, Ebert was leaving his Carlton brothel in Rathdowne Street when he was gunned down by two men – one almost certainly was MacRae.

Lamb thought he was untouchable, but was brought down by the product he sold in his parlours – heroin.

In the early 1980s, heroin was out of control, and it became a go-to for underworld killers. When a user died of an overdose, it was put down as an accident. But if the dealer deliberately provided the target with near-pure drugs, death would be inevitable.

One of the most notorious and controversial cases was Raymond John Denning, a career criminal and escapee who turned police informer.

He was found dead in Sydney on June 10, 1993, from a heroin overdose just a month after being booted out of witness protection.

Melbourne police who dealt with him are convinced it was a hotshot.

It may well be that a hotshot is the perfect murder because without witnesses it is impossible to prove.

In Melbourne, respected homicide detective Gary Landy investigated 15 suspicious cases. The common link was they all knew MacRae.

“Certainly, some of them well could have been murders, but there was not the evidence to justify charges,” Landy told me.

As Lamb’s vice empire collapsed, MacRae headed to Mildura, where he continued to kill for cash.

At the same time he was informing on former senior sergeant Paul William Higgins, who would be sentenced to seven years’ jail.

A witness who was not called was “Miss Jones”, a sex worker who ran guns and drugs in Melbourne before becoming a protected witness.

While she did not testify against Higgins, she became the star witness against corrupt Sydney detective Roger Rogerson.

Rogerson was jailed for conspiracy to pervert the course of justice over unexplained deposits of $110,000 into false bank accounts.

Miss Jones testified that she had travelled to Sydney with the cash from Melbourne drug dealer Dennis Allen to buy heroin from Rogerson.

In a secret meeting, she told me details of alleged payoffs to Higgins. With her permission, I passed the information on to senior police. That night, I ran into Paul at the Police Club. “How are you going?” I asked. He responded by gently patting me down and replying, “You know me, Johnny, just keeping honest.”

I took it as a message that he had been tipped off. The parlour was raided but not at the time of the alleged cash pick-up.

In 1984, MacRae moved to Mildura turning his 10-hectare property into a killing field.

We will never know how many bodies ended up at his Merbein property. He joked with friends that the small vineyard would never need fertiliser “because there’s plenty of blood and bone out there”.

He met Albert O’Hara, 59, and persuaded him to join him in the drug dealing business. On December 21, 1984, O’Hara arrived at MacRae’s property with $10,000 to buy drugs.

He would never leave. MacRae shot him in the back of the head and buried him there.

Domenic Marafiote arrived on July 18, 1985, to buy drugs. MacRae shot him and buried him in a grave he had already prepared under the chicken coop.

Not finished with the family, MacRae drove to Adelaide believing Marafiote’s parents, Carmelo, 69, and Rosa, 70, had a large amount of cash for the drug deal. He shot them both but didn’t find the money that was sewn into Rosa’s apron.

In witness protection, to testify against Higgins, MacRae bragged to another witness he had killed the Marafiotes, saying he used a doona to muffle the gun blasts.

This was particularly dumb because the witness (rumoured to be a woman he was trying to impress) was a police informer, who did precisely that – informed the police.

He said when he tried to fire a shot using the doona to muffle the noise, the trigger hammer caught the webbing between his thumb and forefinger. Sure enough a spider-web bloodstain on a doona matched MacRae’s story.

Hollowood had no doubt MacRae still knew more about killings than he would admit. “He is clever, articulate, and you would never know he was a killer by talking to him,” he said. “He was a conman killer who talked his victims into a position where he could move on them. He was prepared to try and manipulate the system while he went on killing. He had no conscience at all.”

On learning of MacRae’s claims to have seen the light and promises to have changed his ways, Hollowood remains unimpressed.

“We only ever scratched the surface of what he did. He is the type who would never have shed a tear for his victims,” he said. “He just didn’t give a rat’s about what he did. He was the sort who would send a chill down your spine. He was so smooth, but you knew if you turned your back he would have you.

“He would still be at it if he could.”

John Silvester lifts the lid on Australia’s criminal underworld. Subscribers can sign up to receive his Naked City newsletter every Thursday.