The Poisoning of Rosslyn McQueen
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Who was Roslyn McQueen and what were the circumstances of her death?
These days, if you have a case of a woman, a loving mother, five and a half months pregnant, murdered with strychnine at the time that her husband is infatuated with a teenager, he's got a number of very inconsistent features of his story. I don't know. I think that would probably be put before a jury to say, well, these are the circumstances. Can you get to beyond reasonable doubt and leave it up to them?
This is Australian True Crime with Michelle Laurie. In April 1986, 30-year-old Roslyn McQueen was found dead inside her Lockwood home near Bendigo. Roslyn was five months pregnant and her two-year-old daughter was at home when she died. A toxicology report found that she had died from a massive dose of the highly toxic compound strychnine. Roslyn's husband, Ray McQueen, told police he believed their neighbour was responsible. But as investigators began looking more closely at the circumstances surrounding Roslyn's death, suspicion turned towards Ray himself. He was eventually charged with her murder, although the case never went to trial and Ray has always maintained his innocence. For almost 40 years, Roslyn's death has remained unsolved.
Hedley Thomas is the investigative journalist behind some of Australia's biggest true crime podcasts, including The Teacher's Pet and Shandy's Story. Now he's gone back through the evidence, interviewed people connected with the case and begun asking whether Rosalind's murder was ever properly investigated. His new podcast is called The Poisoned Wife and he joins us to talk about it. This is Australian True Crime. We acknowledge the traditional owners of the land on which this podcast is created, the Wurundjeri Woi Wurrung people of the Kulin Nation. And a warning, this episode of the podcast contains graphic descriptions of violence.
We have an absolute infatuation, Michelle. The husband of the victim, Ros McQueen, is besotted with this girl who's 16 at the time. And his infatuation with her has been recognized by a number of people Close to the family, a number of Roslyn McQueen's friends and her mother. It's also been noted by members of the local tennis club where Ray and the girl, Donna, play a couple of times a week in both fixtures and in training. Roslyn, she's pregnant at the time, so she's never there herself. So we can see from the witnesses that we've interviewed, we can see from the statements that were taken 40 years ago by police, that the connection between Ray McQueen and Donna Manalik was intense. And we can also see that she believed that
as a vulnerable groom, 16-year-old, that she was in love with him. She had a very heavy crush and affection for him.
Yeah. When we talk about Chris Dawson, the subject of The Teacher's Pet, one of the subjects, you identified that he was a charismatic guy. He was a very attractive man in almost every aspect, or he would have seemed so to the young woman in that story. He was... physically attractive, fit. He was a teacher, so he was in that position of power. He and his twin brother were kind of guys about town. They played footy. Was Ray a similarly attractive man, do you think, from her perspective?
Well, it's probably for others to judge.
Yeah, fair
enough.
But did he have all that going for him, I guess, is the question, because I think 16-year-old girls, and I was one once, we can very easily romanticise people and men. So I wonder, I thought Chris Dawson was a sort of traditionally attractive guy. Did Ray have all of that going for him?
The Dawson brothers had star appeal. They were kind of like Hollywood style, pin-up personalities and footballers. And they had standing and reputation as athletes, as male models. And as high school teachers, you know, there was a sort of almost like a magnetic field that surrounded them. And of course, they're on the northern beaches. They're close to the sand and the surf. Everyone's getting their kid off to go for a swim. You know, guys in board shorts, girls in bikinis, students, teenage students being taken away. on PE lessons to the beach by Chris and Paul Dawson and, naturally enough, you know, wearing bathing suits.
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Chapters
8 chapters
1
Who was Roslyn McQueen and what were the circumstances of her death?
0:00–6:16
2
How did Ray McQueen’s relationship with teenager Donna Manalik raise suspicion?
6:16–13:33
3
What evidence linked strychnine poisoning to Roslyn’s murder?
13:33–19:41
4
Why did the initial police investigation fail to treat the case as a homicide?
19:41–26:01
5
What did the 1987 inquest reveal about the murder charge against Ray McQueen?
26:01–31:19
6
Why was a trial never held and how did the ‘nolle prosequi’ decision affect the case?
31:19–38:31
7
How could new evidence or testimony from Donna change the outcome today?
38:31–44:42
8
What role did private investigator Rex Bakes play in reviving the case?
44:42–51:47