Talk:David and Catherine Birnie

A fact from David and Catherine Birnie appeared on Wikipedia's Main Page in the Did you know column on 17 February 2007. The text of the entry was as follows:

Did you know... that the insanity of Australian serial killer Catherine Birnie is believed to have been caused by the death of her son?

A record of the entry may be seen at Wikipedia:Recent additions/2007/February.

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Discrepancy

Also born in 1951, Catherine’s mother died when she was just 10 months old.

How could Catherine's mother have died when she was 10 months old? Even if she died in childbirth, it would mean that Catherine was conceived when her mother was a month old!

I'd edit it to what I think it means, but I have to go to work. Respectfully, SamBlob 11:46, 13 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

There are quite a few inaccuracies in this article :( Grrrrl (talk) 04:02, 10 November 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Willagee

What sort of place is Willagee? I've seen it in CrimeLibrary and several books as it is expressed in this article; that Willagee is somehow semi rural or on the outskirts of Perth in 1985. This is completely ridiculous. It's not even particularly southern and only around 5 kilometers from the river. Twenty years ago it would have seemed a tad more rustic thanks to adjacent Winthrop probably still being developed and containing much of its old pine plantation. No one who's actually been there could say it's on the outskirts of anything and the description is surely based on photographs showing the large (huge by today's standards), rangey blocks of land Perth suburbs were historically made from. I don't really know how to compete with the literature, however (even with, you know, the truth). Have a look at this map [1] start at Fremantle and go right just a little bit. See what I mean. How do you cite that? Maybe it doesn't matter and I can just change it. MuJoCh (talk) 10:15, 8 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]

"last West Australia Attorney General"?

What does this mean?

However, the last West Australia Attorney General Jim McGinty has said that her release is unlikely while he remains in office.

"Last" is the word that's confusing me here, as it implies that McGinty is a former AG... in which case he isn't any longer in office. If he's now doing another relevant job, that should be stated explicitly. Loganberry (Talk) 20:11, 25 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Agree, it was poorly worded. I've hopefully fixed it. –Moondyne 02:31, 26 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

crimes section is crap!

the crimes section starts - their final victim... wtf?! what about the rest of the victims? there's nothing about what happened to them. starting a crimes section with 'their final victim' is just plain stupid. or am i the only one with enough common sense to realise this?! 194.221.133.211 (talk) 14:16, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

biased article

"Her time in prison throughout her adolescent years offered Catherine the chance to break away from David Birnie." "[David] had tracked her down in hospital after she had had a hysterectomy." "[Catherine] was emotionally dependent on him."

The writer of this article takes at face value Catherine's claims of emotional dependency and manipulation at the hands of David, and yet notice how this sentence is phrased: "Catherine Birnie reportedly got great pleasure in throwing sand in Patterson's face."

I am changing "emotionally dependent" to reflect the same sense of distance. Dmacewen —Preceding undated comment added 02:33, 9 June 2009 (UTC).[reply]

Biographies

Some of the language here is confusing, yes? I'm thinking about going through and changing up the syntax a bit -- nothing substantial, except I'm going to change the bit about David being weeks away from committing his first horrific crime. I personally think rape, in general, is fairly horrific. Omgitsmonica (talk) 20:01, 4 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Removed uncited accusations of other victims.

Have removed this; "However, the Birnies only revealed their four latest victims and concealed that David Birnie murdered Lisa Mott in 1983 and then murdered Sharon Mason in 1984, and that both he and Catherine murdered Cheryl Renwick and Barbara Western prior to the four women they admitted to. The Birnies were reportedly very excited, even proud, to show the police the locations of the graves of their four victims that they admitted to. {source: survivor}" As not properly cited. Doesn't seem accurate from a cursory look online.219.88.68.195 (talk) 04:26, 12 November 2014 (UTC)[reply]

The police periodically took David Birnie out for drives trying to get him to admit to the murders other women, but he didn't confessed to more before killing himself. Grrrrl (talk) 04:01, 10 November 2016 (UTC)[reply]

This article gives some more information about other possible victims: http://www.watoday.com.au/entertainment/tv-and-radio/murder-uncovered-reveals-more-possible-victims-of-david-and-catherine-birnie-20170209-gu91h0.html 115.64.142.162 (talk) 22:47, 9 February 2017 (UTC)[reply]