On 4 May 1982,

Australian Army The Australian Army is the principal Army, land warfare force of Australia, 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 (Austral ...

personnel Robin Reid and Nicole Louise Pearce (birth name Paul Wayne Luckman) kidnapped teenage boys Peter Aston and Terry Ryan on the

Gold Coast, Queensland The Gold Coast is a coastal city in the state of Queensland, Australia, approximately south-southeast of the centre of the state capital Brisbane. With a population over 600,000, the Gold Coast is the sixth-largest city in Australia, the nati ...

. 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 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 of Chinderah and Fingal, it ...

, where they were beaten, tortured, and

sexually assaulted Sexual assault is an act in which one intentionally sexually touches another person without that person's consent, or coerces or physically forces a person to engage in a sexual act against their will. It is a form of sexual violence, which ...

before Aston was ultimately murdered.

Kidnapping and murder

Peter Aston and Terry Ryan were

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. Nomads hav ...

on the Gold Coast Highway and were picked up by Reid and Pearce, who offered to give the boys a lift down the coast. Not long on the road, the two boys were threatened at knife and gunpoint by the two perpetrators, who then drove the car over the Queensland/New South Wales border, into the beach-side town of Kingscliff, where they forced the two boys out of the car and down a secluded beach track. Reid and Pearce then bound, sexually assaulted, and savagely beat the two boys. Ryan was also forced by the two perpetrators to bash and assault his friend. Peter Aston was stabbed, tortured, and eventually buried alive. By this point, Terry Ryan had reasoned with his attackers and they agreed to drive him home.

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 state of New South Wales, and the most populous city in both Australia and Oceania. Located on Australia's east coast, the metropolis surrounds Sydney Harbour and extends about towards the Blue Mountain ...

Supreme Court. Reid and Pearce were convicted and sentenced to

life imprisonment Life imprisonment is any sentence of imprisonment for a crime under which convicted people are to remain in prison for the rest of their natural lives or indefinitely until pardoned, paroled, or otherwise commuted to a fixed term. Crimes for ...

Aftermath

Pearce underwent

gender transition Gender transition is the process of changing one's gender presentation or sex characteristics to accord with one's internal sense of gender identity – the idea of what it means to be a man or a woman,Brown, M. L. & Rounsley, C. A. (1996) ''True ...

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 events in Australia