Andrew L. Urban
Splashed headlines, double page spreads in newspapers, podcasts at length … the pursuit of cold cases is big in mass media. Wrongful convictions … not so much (with notable exceptions). It’s as if innocents in jail don’t matter to society. Yet the friends and families of unsolved murders suffer no more than the friends and families of the wrongfully convicted – and they themselves.
Explaining wrongful convictions to the public is a hard challenge. Takes too much space and time for mass media. No simple headlines … For one thing, a conviction lays down the law: the media is limited in how it can claim innocence in the face of a conviction. For example, the grounds of appeal in the case of Frank Valentine, run to over 100 pages. (That alone points to a trial with many troubling elements.)
Valentine, who died in August 2024 at age 84, was convicted in 2019 of several indecent assaults, rapes and other assaults allegedly committed 45-50 years prior. I say allegedly despite the convictions, partly because the grounds for appeal are compelling, notwithstanding they were dismissed by the Court of Appeal, and partly because a detailed examination of the case doesn’t provide proof beyond reasonable doubt. These two reasons are intertwined, of course.
Valentine was sentenced to 22 years in prison, with a non parole period of 13 years. His alleged offending took place at Parramatta Girls Training School in the 70s and were first raised at the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sex Abuse set up by Julia Gillard.
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There was no dispute at trial that none of the complainants sought to or made contemporaneous complaints about Valentine, except EK recollecting that she told a resident of Parramatta, who was deceased at the time of trial, about the appellant having sexually assaulted her, but she could not be sure when this was said.
the trial judge patently erred
There were five male officers employed within the institution at Parramatta during the relevant time. Valentine, Percy Mayhew, Dennis Monaghan, Gordon Gilford and their relieving officer Brian Greenham. Gilford was deceased at the time of trial and the Crown did not call the other officers. Mayhew was the Superintendent when Valentine commenced his placement at Parramatta, replaced within weeks by Monaghan.
It was Valentine’s case that the crown could not exclude the reasonable possibility that the attribution of misconduct to him arose from contamination, displacement or fabrication arising from a financial motive. In this respect, it was an aspect of the defence case that the coincidence in the timing of the complaints and the availability of government compensation for institutional abuse raised the prospect of financial motivation on part of the complainants to make false allegations against him.
The appeal document also noted that “introductory remarks in the trial judge’s Reasons disclosed the trial judge warned herself globally that a special caution was to be exercised before accepting identification or recognition evidence. However, it is contended that the generality of the warning was inadequate. It is contended the trial judge patently erred by not having proper regard to specific dangers which arose in respect of certain complainants which was capable of raising a doubt and did raise a doubt as to the Appellant as perpetrator.”
Perhaps most notably, “appellant gave evidence trial denying the offences. It is contended that the trial judge erred in rejecting the entirety of his evidence. A critical matter on which determination of guilt must have depended.”
Another damning ground (par 51) states: “This was not a case where simply accepting the complainant’s appearing to be honest or doing their best overcame the presumption of innocence and contradictions with other evidence. These contradictions and the application of appropriate warnings were simply too complex to permit that approach to be open.”
Readers may also find it damning of the trial judge that her Reasons show a preference for the accuser over the accused in ways that foreclosed an analysis of the critical factual issues. DW’s account, set against the unchallenged evidence, was unreliable. The appellants case, just by way of example in respect of DW, was entirely to the contrary effect, namely, corroborated by documentary materials and other evidence, the accuracy of which was not challenged by the Crown. Yet her honour was satisfied of guilt, including because DW possessed “the ring of truth”.
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The Appeal document contains much, much more, supporting the belief that Frank Valentine suffered a miscarriage of justice from a combination of unreliable and uncorroborated testimony plus a trial judge who seems to have easily fallen into error … errors. Such a series of errors can be said to have watered down the validity of the judge’s verdict.
Frank Valentine’s case is the subject of Andrew L. Urban’s next book, Presumption of Evil 2 – Truth Be Told, to be published later in 2025. It is the sequel to Presumption of Evil, covering the case of Noel Greenaway, who also worked at the Parramatta Girls Training School, a few years prior to Valentine.