IT WAS a crime so heinous, it sparked shockwaves of revulsion across the nation.
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
$0/
(min cost $0)
or signup to continue reading
In a fit of blind rage in 1989, John Raymond Holschier bludgeoned his partner to death with a house brick, an attack which also left his 13-month-old daughter with severe brain damage.
Holschier had form; he had faced 21 separate charges of violence before the grizzly murder.
His animalistic actions deserved a penalty fit for an animal – life locked in a cage without parole.
But the law can be an ass.
Holschier was instead released on parole on December 4, 2008.
Unsurprisingly, he re-offended and was sent back to prison.
He was released and locked back up another two times.
His shortest stretch of freedom was just over a month.
The longest stretch was 10 months, during which he assaulted the mother of the two children he claims to have conceived during visiting times while behind bars at Junee Correctional Centre.
The Department of Corrective Services has repeatedly said it was impossible for him to have had sex during jail visits but continue to refer to the children as Holschier’s.
Among his abhorrent acts while on parole was to threaten to kill his own mother, a registered foster carer who had been looking after his son and daughter, by slitting her throat and burning her house down.
In September 2014, the court had no option but to release him.
By 2015, and unbeknown to many living around him, Holschier had shacked up in an innocuous brick home in South Parade, Central Wagga, flanked by a childcare centre and one of Wagga’s major sports grounds.
Perversely, one of the proposed conditions of his 2014 release was not to allow him to reside anywhere near where children may frequent, but the Supreme Court denied it.
Holschier is now back in the home he has spent most of his life in – Junee jail.
Police claim while living in Wagga, he breached the conditions of an extended supervision order, including refusing to allow his supervising officer into his home or access to his mobile phone.
This is a man seemingly incapable of living in civilised society.
If the law is truly about protecting that society, then behind the bars of Junee jail should be Holschier’s last resting place.