When Thorburn first came into my life as a teenager living and partying hard in Bacchus Marsh my mother told me a story about him involving my father many years ago. My father had been called into the police station in the early sixties and questioned about spitting in somebodies face at the Myrniong Hotel by Thorburn, my father did not do it according to my mother, eventually things became heated and my father left, Thorburn had it in for my family from that point on.
Ironically Thorburn's wife was my school teacher in grade prep. I remember Rex coming to see his wife at school and he had his arm in plaster, I was four years old, I found out many years later that Rex had belted a suspect in the interview room and broken his thumb on the unfortunate victims head, Rex was demoted from detective for going too hard and sent to Bacchus Marsh as punishment, so the story goes.
But I don't have to make up stories when it comes to Sgt. Rex Thorburn as I can tell you what he was really like and what he used to do people from first hand accounts, I unfortunately had a bit to do with the low dog.
One Saturday night I was standing on the corner at Ted Steads shop with my brother Ashley and a group of Marsh youths. We had all been drinking and were just having a chat. We were about to head off home as it was about one in the morning and nothing was happening.
Suddenly the police pulled up in a police car and got out of their vehicle and approached us. It was Rex Thorburn and I think he was with Colin O’Hare. O’Hare gets his notebook out and Thorburn starts asking for names and addresses. When he got to my brother Ashley he asked, “What’s your name”? My brother replied “Ashley Dunen” and immediately Thorburn struck him a huge blow across the face with an open hand (so it leaves no marks) which sent him almost sprawling onto the footpath. My brother sobbing cried out “What was that for”? Thorburn replied “The name is good enough”. The cops then left. That was the start of Thorburn and his arrogant bullying behaviour. I could not believe that Police officers did that sort of stuff, I always wanted to be a policeman, but I was learning fast.
Thorburn was to outdo this particular episode in a big way though when I was eighteen. I had just got my licence and purchased a tan HG Holden from P. S. Carey Motors. It was a Saturday night and I was at the pizza parlour in Main Street across the road from the old Post office and ANA Hall. I was with a group of about twenty youths including my two brothers, Ashley and Martin Dunen. We weren’t doing anything wrong, just eating pizza after a few beers at the pub. I knew I was under the limit for alcohol which in them days was still .05 for P platers. The police had been cruising up and down the main street so despite the fact I was under the limit I decided to leave my car parked out the front of where the Pizza Parlour is now, just near the shopping centre where the new post office is, in them days it was Ian Reddrop’s Health food shop.
My brothers and I and a few mates decided to walk home, I would get my car the next day. We started walking through the car park of Tuckerbag shopping centre where the old milk factory used to be, none of it is there now, it is the new shopping centre. The police were watching us but we were doing nothing wrong. We had walked about 100 metres when my young brother Martin who was only about 13 decided he was cold and wanted to get his windcheater out of my car. My other brother Ashley had some beers in my car and he wanted to get them too. So we headed back to the car.
As we rounded the corner from the car park into Main Street we saw a police car parked parallel to my own car. Rex Thorburn was on his haunches beside my car and was letting the tyres down with a match stick. Fascinated with what he was doing and quite curious as to why this stupid copper was letting my tyres down me, my brothers and about five mates watched this strange behaviour, there was no shortage of witnesses but Thorburn was unaware we were watching.
After all my tyres were rendered flat Thorburn got up, pulled out his police regulation baton and smashed my side mirror off with it, no doubt to make my car unroadworthy. Not happy with that Thorburn stood back and started kicking my driver’s side door in. I was absolutely stunned. Thorburn may have been a policeman but by this time I had decided that even for a copper he had gone way too far. I ran towards him screaming, “Hey dick head, what the fuck do you think your doing”? My mates and brothers were all right behind me. I ran up to Thorburn and said you are fucked mate, I am going straight to your superior and reporting what you have just done. Thorburn just sneered at me and said “Go ahead, knock yourself out”.
Winston Perry was the officer in charge of Bacchus Marsh and he was easy to find, he lived in the house next to the police station with his wife. My brothers and all my mates motored on up to his residence, Thorburn slowly following us in his police car. We knocked on his door until he woke up. He asked me what the problem was by yelling out from his bed, he didn’t bother to come to the front door. I told him that Thorburn had just damaged my car and I wanted him charged. Perry told me that I had permission to sort the whole matter out myself. Thorburn was by now standing on the footpath with his partner. I walked straight up to him and stood with my nose about 1 cm from his. I yelled straight at him “You touch my car again cunt and I will knock you straight out”! Thorburn started shaking in fear, he knew I was angry and he knew I wouldn't hesitate to belt him, under the circumstances I feel I was justified in my actions. I told him I would send him a bill for the damage he had caused.
I then told Thorburn that I was sleeping in my car to prevent him from doing any more damage to it. My two brothers and I walked back to my car, the police car slowly driving along beside us, making no attempt to arrest us. Little did we realise that that is what they were eventually going to do. We didn’t realise that they were too scared to try without back-up. We eventually got back in the car and locked ourselves in with Thorburn again parked parallel to us in his police car. About 5 minutes later 2 police cars full of cops arrived from Melton. One car parked in front of us and one behind, with Thorburn parked beside us the effectively had us locked in, though we had no intentions of driving anywhere.
So the police surrounded the car and demanded that we come out as we were all under arrest. We just laughed and told them to fuck off. Thorburn got a jemmy bar from the boot of his car and broke the little triangular front window on the driver’s side and put his hand in to unlock the door, my brother Ashley sunk his teeth into his hand down to the bone, drawing blood. Thorburn was well pissed off now so he smashed the main drivers side window in and then walked around and smashed the passenger side window, all of the cops were reaching in and punching us and trying to unlock the door, there were about ten of them and we couldn’t hold them back. They dragged us out by the hair, made us lie on the footpath face down and handcuffed us. They let Martin go as he was too young to be arrested. They belted us all over the body with police batons leaving big bruises everywhere.
We were bundled into the divvy van our hands cuffed behind our backs, My brother Ashley and I made a pact to do something about this, we would lodge a complaint with the Police Internal Investigations Department. When the divvy pulled up at the Melton Police station they opened the rear doors and I thought they would just march us into the station but I didn’t realise what a vindictive and cruel sadist Rex Thorburn was. He ordered the other police to hold Ashley down on his back at the entrance to the van, he got the cops to hold Ashley’s legs apart and he smashed him in the testicles twice at full force. Ashley screamed in pain and rolled up in a ball crying. I was terrified, I thought I was next but Thorburn had a dislike for Ashley and left me alone thankfully.
Eventually we were charged with assaulting and threatening police and bailed. When I told my mother what happened she was furious. My brother Ash and I both went to the doctors and had all of our injuries checked and registered we then went and lodged a complaint with Police Internal investigations. What a big mistake that was. We were naive and didn’t realise how internal police investigations worked. We had many witnesses to what happened and stupidly we told the internal police investigator their names and addresses, so they could make statements.
The Investigator was a short, old, grey haired copper who had obviously been shuffled to a desk job long ago. He took statements off us, he took the doctor's reports and he took photographs of the damage to my car for evidence and we thought we had Thorburn on toast. Before you knew it, Detectives made a personal visit to all of our witnesses threatening them all to keep their mouths shut and to not dare give any evidence or they would be sorry. They didn’t all desert us though, three blokes made statements and eventually came to court to support us, originally we had 15 witnesses but the police warned them all off.
We rang the media, both TV and newspapers and told them when we would be in court, they all turned up for court but when the police realised what we had done they put us in a police car and drove us to Werribee courts without telling the press and we were tried there. When I got on the stand to give my evidence the Police Internal Investigator was sitting in the public gallery. I pointed him out to the Magistrate telling him that the internal investigator had plenty of evidence as to what Thorburn had done to us. The magistrate asked the investigator what he had to offer the court and the lying, deceptive prick claimed he had no evidence whatsoever, no doctors report, no photos of my damaged car and no statements, he had gone and collected all the evidence and destroyed it. That is what internal investigators did in those days and that is what they still do now in Victoria.
In court giving evidence Thorburn admitted letting all of my tyres down that night, and the excuse he gave was that I was blind drunk and he was so concerned for my safety- bollocks!!!
Our lawyer put up a good fight and it was obvious in court that the coppers were not telling the truth, they couldn’t explain why we had medical reports from the day after the incident that showed we had cuts and bruises all over us. The magistrate was going to send us both to jail but he said he didn’t because he didn’t believe the police version of events but he found us guilty and fined us $800 each instead.
In conclusion I will say to Rex Thorburn, mate you didn’t foresee the Internet did you dick head? In this modern world we are all free to post whatever we want, we may be sued for slander but I would welcome the chance to re-visit this case and call all of the witnesses you scared off all those years ago. To your wife, you should be ashamed of supporting this corrupt and vicious copper all these years. To your children and grandchildren, how would you like it if I hit you in the nuts with a baton, Rex Thorburn managed to hoodwink all of Bacchus Marsh and become mayor, this is not a reflection of his character rather an indication of what an evil devious cunt he was and still is. Rex you must live your life in fear, watching your back everywhere you go, because you assaulted a lot of people when you were a copper and one day when you least expect it, I am sure one of your victims will catch up with you.
As far as libel and slander goes, truth is a defence, I would love you to waste money trying to sue me because I would fight it and this time the press would have a field day because I would win.
As far as libel and slander goes, truth is a defence, I would love you to waste money trying to sue me because I would fight it and this time the press would have a field day because I would win.
