New details have emerged about notorious ‘Granny Killer’ John Wayne Glover with experts fearing there were far more victims than authorities knew.
Glover was sentenced to six life sentences over the murders of six elderly women between 1989 and 1990.
He eventually died in prison in September, 2005 at the age of 72 after hanging himself in his Lithgow cell.
His victims ranged in ages from 60 to 92-years-old. Glover was known for attacking the women with either a hammer, fists or strangling them with their pantyhose.
Retired homicide detective Brian Collis appeared on Nine’s Under Investigation program on Wednesday night where he claimed it is highly likely Glover got away with killing at least six more women.
He said he has ‘no doubt’ Glover was responsible for the deaths of two elderly women on the NSW Central Coast in 1984 and 1986.
Their grisly deaths would come years before the serial killer exclusively targeted pensioners in the leafy suburbs of Sydney’s Lower North Shore.
John Glover (pictured) was sentenced to six life sentences over the murders of six elderly women between 1989 and 1990
Glover would often travel to the Central Coast to visit his half-sister and his mother Frida, who the murderer is said to have had a complicated relationship with.
In 1984, Josephine McDonald, 73, was sexually assaulted and strangled in her Ettalong apartment with Wanda Amundsen, 80, beaten with a hammer just a few kilometres away in Umina two years later.
‘The killer of those people in my view was John Wayne Glover,’ Detective Collis said. ‘I have no doubt that was the case’.
‘The M.O, the placing of the bodies, the method of death, all fitted in perfectly’.
However, by the time police suspected Glover of the additional deaths he was already serving a life sentence for the slaying of six elderly women in Sydney.
The travelling pie salesman was 58-years-old when he began his serial rampage in the capital city, however experts believe he was a killer long before this.
From 1957 to 1968, four elderly women were bashed and strangled to death in Victoria.
Glover was high on the list of suspects as he had been living in Melbourne at the time but he was never formally charged.
His first confirmed victim was Gwendoline Mitchelhill, 82, in 1989.
He had followed her back to her apartment in Neutral Bay and hit multiple times in the head with a hammer in broad daylight.
The snowy-haired killer would commit his second murder months later, by bashing Lady Ashton, 84, with a hammer before dragging her to a rubbish bin alcove where he repeatedly hit her head on the concrete floor.
The travelling pie salesman (pictured) was 58-years-old when he began his serial rampage in Sydney’s Lower North Shore however experts believe he was a killer long before this
He then removed her pantyhose and strangled her with it, positioned her shoes and walking stick near her lifeless body and stole $100 from her purse.
Lindsay Simpson, who interviewed the killer while he was detained inside Lithgow Supermax, speculated Glover may have been motivated to kill elderly women by the rage and hatred he felt for his own mother, Frida.
The journalist told host Liz Hayes he had hated how ‘promiscuous’ his mother had been when he was a young boy, and disapproved of her dating several men.
Ms Simpson said Glover had also stumbled across pornographic images of his mother, with the bodies of his victims later arranged just like the photographs.
Following the death of his second victim was a string of attacks on elderly women in nursing homes and hospitals across the state.
Traumatised women, who believed they had been molested, struggled to identify Glover, who was subsequently allowed to continue his cruel killing spree.
His third victim was Margaret Pahud, 85, who was killed on November 3, 1989.
The widow was struck on the back of the head with a blunt object, with Glover rearranging her clothing, walking stick and shoes.
Lindsay Simpson, who interviewed Glover (left) while he was detained in Lithgow Supermax, speculated he may have been motivated to kill by the rage and hatred he felt for his own mother, Frida, (right) who he had a complicated relationship with
Less than 24-hours later the established ‘Granny killer’ struck again and murdered Olive Cleveland, 81, who he bashed and strangled with her pantyhose.
With the $60 he took from Ms Cleveland’s purse he paid a visit to the Mosman RSL, where he used the stolen money to gamble on pokie machines.
Three weeks later, his fourth victim Muriel Falconer, who was partially deaf and blind from a recent stroke was killed inside her home on November 23, 1989.
He struck the elderly woman with a hammer and strangled her with her undergarments, the now recognisable M.O of the killer who was still unidentified.
It was his final kill, that of his his close friend Joan Sinclair, that finally led police to their man.
Glover had been under 24-hour surveillance for some time after witnesses described a portly, grey-haired man turning up at crime scenes and being spotted in nursing homes where female residents had been molested.
Tragically, officers watched as the practiced killer entered Ms Sinclair’s home where he would just moments later end her life.
The 60-year-old had recently installed security gates over widespread fears of the ‘Granny killer’ but had inadvertently locked herself in with the murderer.
After he killed his friend, Glover ran himself a bath, washed down a handful of valium with alcohol and slit his wrists.
Police became suspicious when the pair failed to leave the home and were confronted with the grisly scene. Glover would survive the suicide attempt.
He had attempted to take his own life twice before, with his wife Gay Glover describing a chilling moment when barely conscious he told her half of him was ‘good’ while the other half was ‘bad’.
He was sentenced to life in prison for the slaying of his six Sydney victims and hanged himself in Lithgow Supermax on September 10, 2005 at the age of 72.
Experts speculate it was Glover’s underlying hatred for his mother that spurred him to commit such atrocities on his helpless elderly victims.
Journalist Lindsay Simpson told the program in his final days she never saw the murderer show any remorse for his victims, instead only feeling sorry for himself.
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