Father of murder victim supports proposed ‘no body, no parole’ law

The father of a murder victim has made an impassioned plea to approve a measure to encourage murderers to reveal the location of their victims.

The proposed law would deny parole to convicted murderers who refuse to help police find the body.

Ken Larcombe, whose 21-year-old daughter Jodie was murdered in 1987 but has never been found, told Neil Mitchell the law would help hundreds of victims’ families.

‘We are the ones doing a life sentence,’ Mr Larcombe said.

‘If a guy won’t say where the body is, he’s laughing at the families.

‘That’s the last power that these animals have over the families and the victims.

‘He’s putting every family member through torture.’

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Mr Larcombe called 3AW in response to an interview with Arie Freiberg, Chair of the Sentencing Advisory Council.

Mr Freiberg told Neil the law could be ‘counter-productive’.

‘My concern is the use of parole as a coercive mechanism,’ he said.

‘I don’t think that’s what it’s there for.’

Mr Freiberg said a person wrongly convicted of murder wouldn’t be able to provide a body.

‘A person who was not guilty could be kept in even longer for an offence they didn’t commit,’ he said.

He also said failure to cooperate is already taken into account in sentencing.

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