Max Stuart

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Rupert Maxwell (Max) Stuart (c. 1932 - ) is an Australian Aborigine who was convicted of murder in 1959. His conviction was controversial, subject to several unsuccessful appeals and a Royal Commission, which upheld the verdict. Newspapers campaigned successfully against the death penalty being imposed. After serving his sentence, Stuart became an Arrernte elder and from 1998 - 2001 was the chairman of the Central Land Council. In 2002, a film was made about the Stuart case.

Early life

Jay Creek in 1947

Stuart was born in 1932 at Jay Creek in the MacDonnell Ranges, 45 kilometres west of Alice Springs in the Northern Territory. It was a government settlement which for a time in the late 1920s and early 1930s included 45 children from a home named 'The Bungalow' (37 of whom were under the age of 12) temporarily housed in a corrugated shed with a superintendent and matron housed separately in two tents. Jay Creek was home to the Western Arrernte people. In 1937, Jay Creek was declared as one of three permanent camps or reserves for the Alice Springs Aboriginal population. It was intended a buffer between the semi-nomadic people living in far western regions and the more sophisticated inhabitants of Alice Springs and environs, in particular for the non-working, aged and infirm around Alice.

As a teenager Stuart had worked as a bare-knuckle boxer and for Jimmy Sharman's boxing tents. In late 1958, he was working on the sideshows of a travelling fun fair. He was mostly illiterate and had problems with alcohol.

In the late 1950s, Stuart had been convicted of indecently assaulting a nine-year-old girl in Cloncurry, Queensland. In that case, he confessed to police that he “knew this was wrong” but he did not “know any big women” and that when he had liquor he could not control himself.

The Stuart Case

O'Sullivan advocated that police had forced Stuart into the confession, due to Stuart's poor command of the English language. However, the jury was unconvinced by the argument and Stuart was deemed guilty. In line with the law, Judge Reed sentenced Stuart to death on April 24 1959. Two appeals were filed and neither were successful, an appeal to the Privy Council in London failed.

A prison chaplain, Catholic priest Father Thomas Dixon was suspicious about the sophisticated language used in the alleged confession. Stuart could hardly speak or write English; his native language was Arrernte. The anthropologist Ted Strehlow, who had studied the Arrernte people of central Australia, also had doubts and was called as a witness in the case. Ken Inglis, then a lecturer at Adelaide University, wrote in July 1959 of the doubts of Father Dixon and Ted Strehlow in the Nation, a fortnightly magazine. There was further reporting on the case in the Sydney Morning Herald and then Adelaide afternoon newspaper, the News, took up the issue.

Royal Commission

In late 1959 a Royal Commission, the Royal Commission in Regard to Rupert Max Stuart, was convened by the South Australian government. The Commission was appointed to enquire into matters raised in statutory declarations regarding Stuart's movements, actions and intentions, Stuart's movements on 20 December 1958, why the information in the declarations was not raised to the Supreme Court or another authority before the declarations were made and the circumstances in which the declarations were obtained and made. The Commission concluded that Stuart's conviction was justified. However, the Playford Government commuted his sentence to life imprisonment.

Newspaper campaigns against death sentence

The News, edited by Rohan Rivett and owned by Rupert Murdoch, campaigned heavily against Stuart's death sentence. Because of the campaign through the News, Rivett, as editor, and the News were charged in 1960 with seditious and malicious libel, but were acquitted. A few weeks later Murdoch dismissed Rivett. Rivett had been Editor-in-Chief of the News since 1951. It has been suggested that in the 2002 film of the case, the role of Murdoch was magnified, and the part of his editor, Rivett, was minimalised. However, it was noted in the Royal Commission that Murdoch wrote editorials, headlines and posters for the campaign. Stuart says of Murdoch that "He done a good one in my case" and also "He wanted the truth, you know. I could see him out in the court. I was with the policemen; my lawyer told me it was him."

Imprisonment

Yatala Labour Prison

Stuart was released on parole in 1973. He was in and out of gaol until 1984, when he was paroled for the sixth and final time from Adelaide's Yatala Labour Prison. During his time at Yatala prison Stuart learned proper English, became literate, began painting in watercolours and acquired other work skills. In between being returned to prison a number of times for breaches of his parole between 1974 and 1984, he married and settled at Santa Teresa, a Catholic mission south-east of Alice Springs.

Publications on the case

Film: Black and White

Image from the film

The 2002 feature film Black and White was made about his case. The main cast was:

Stuart's lawyer, David O'Sullivan played by Robert Carlyle

Crown Prosecutor, Roderic Chamberlain played by Charles Dance

O'Sullivan's partner, Helen Devaney played by Kerry Fox

Father Tom Dixon played by Colin Friels

Newspaper publisher, Rupert Murdoch played by Ben Mendelsohn

Max Stuart played by David Ngoombujarra

Part of the series on Crime in Australia