Shirley Finn, Dirty Girl - #135
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Perth Brothel owner Shirley Finn's 1975 unsolved murder looms large over the city, with men at the highest levels of government and policing suspected of involvement. Journalist Juliet Wills, author of Dirty Girl: The State Sanctioned Murder of Brothel Madam Shirley Finn, joins us.
Show notes for Episode 135:
Your hosts are Meshel Laurie and Emily Webb
With thanks to Juliet Wills
For more about the campaign to get the palace letters released: https://chuffed.org/project/release-the-palace-letters
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Before we begin today's episode of Australian True Crime, I want to tell you about a new project we've been working on behind the scenes. It's called She Matters. It's a new podcast from award-winning journalist and femicide researcher Shirel Moody. Each week, Shirel speaks with families of women and children killed in Australia, sharing who they were, the joy they brought, and the love they left behind. She Matters isn't a true crime podcast. It's about lives lived, lives loved, and lives lost. She Matters is produced by Dash made podcasts in association with broadcasting media. She Matters is available wherever you get your podcasts. We acknowledge the traditional owners of the land on which this podcast is recorded. We pay our respects to their elders past and present and to Aboriginal elders emerging. Hello friends, we are getting very quickly to the end of the year, aren't we? After today's episode, we have two more on our main podcast stream and they are really big episodes, I think. I think you'll enjoy them very much. And then after that, we'll take five weeks off during which only our patrons will receive brand new episodes. And that's just a big thank you to all of you patreon.com/osttruecrimepod is where you can sign up to become a patron. And let me tell you that the very first episode our patrons only will receive as their Christmas gift involves Norelle Fraser and her favourite boss Lorraine. Isn't that exciting? Yes, it's gorgeous. Lorraine is everything we hope she'd be and even more. It's wonderful. I can't wait for you to hear it. Okay, on with the show. The following podcast contains content of a graphic, violent nature and is not suitable for children. Shirley was made out to be bad and dirty and that stuck with her for the rest of her life. That's why I chose to call the book Dirty Girl because I think that over everything else was pivotal, life-changing moment. And from there on in, she was used. She was used as a 14-year-old. She was used by pedophiles of such an institution. When she came along in the containment system, she had to not only pay for it, but also there was three sex that went on to corrupt officers. Shirley Finn's life and death have cast a long shadow over Western Australia for over 40 years. She first came to prominence as a larger-than-life Perth brothel owner during the heady first days of the mining boom. But then she was murdered in 1975, shot four times in her own car, while dressed to impress in her famous flamboyant style. As though she'd believed, she was heading out for a night of glamour, rather than an ambush by the side of a highway. The crime remains unsolved to this day, but in the intervening years, men at the highest levels of policing and government have come in for close scrutiny as to their relationships, both business and personal, with Shirley Finn. At the very least, Western Australia's prostitution policy, known as the containment system, was unorthodox. At worst, it was murderously corrupt. This is Australian true crime with Michelle Lowery and Emily Webb. Come with us as we go beyond the news cycle to find out how people become killers, how people become victims, and what happens next. Journalist Juliet Wills started asking questions about Shirley Finn's murder in 2003, and she's never stopped. Her book "Dirty Girl" is a detailed account of Shirley's hard life and callous murder. Emily spoke to Juliet about Shirley Finn's story, and I have to tell you without a word of exaggeration, it brought tears to my eyes as I was listening to it. I think this is a very special episode of Australian true crime. I hope you're as moved by it as I was. Shirley Finn was a brothel madam. She'd grown up in quite a lengthy suburb, and top of her class doing really, really well, but discovered boys at quite a young age, and she was caught out with a much older boy, so she was 14, and her father reported that she snuck out at night, and he was worried about her, and the police went looking for her and found her, and she was with a boy in his 20s, and this happened on two occasions, so the police dragged her before a magistrate because she was considered away without a control girl, and her parents were chastised but failing to keep her in, and she was put into Catholic laundry in leader bill in Perth, and she was forced to wash sheets, to wash her dirty solar way,
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Perth Brothel owner Shirley Finn's 1975 unsolved murder looms large over the city, with men at the highest levels of government and pol...