Aust. fugitive hiding after getting liberty

Press, 8 February 1985, Page 6

Aust. fugitive hiding after getting liberty

NZPA-AAP Dublin Australia’s bid to extradite its most wanted man now hinges on Robert Trimbole’s own word to the Irish courts. The 53-year-old alleged crime figure was believed to be still in hiding in the Irish countryside after the Full Bench of the Supreme Court freed him yesterday. The Court emphasised that Trimbole must remain at large until it decided on an appeal by the State against a High Court order to release him. The authorities now hope that his assertions that he wants to spend the rest of his life in Ireland are serious. They discounted a British Press Association report that Trimbole had flown to the Continent, possibly headed for Spain, where several British fugitives are taking advantage of extradition problems. While police sources would not confirm that Trimbole was under constant surveillance they said they had no doubt he was still in Ireland. If Trimbole does flee, Australia must restart a manhunt that lasted more than three years until his arrest outside Dublin on October 25.

Warrants for Trimbole cover the murders of an anti-drugs campaigner, Donald Mackay, and a New Zealand couple, Douglas and Isobel Wilson, as well as heroin and passport crimes. He has said in sworn affidavits that before his arrest he was planning to settle on Ireland’s west coast and was buying property there. Trimbole’s son, Craig, is known to have rented a house in Dublin. His companion “on the run,” Ann Marie Presland, and Trimbole’s daughter, Glenda, were with him when first arrested and there has been no indication they have left Ireland. Trimbole has said in affidavits that he is suffering from incurable prostate cancer with several secondary growths but there are conflicting reports about the seriousness of his illness. Sources among Trimbole’s advisers say that the disease is advancing faster than expected and that he now has only months to live at the most. The Australian Embassy has been told that while he was receiving regular medical treatment in jail, Trimbole did not appear to be particularly ill.