Roger Dean gets life in prison for nursing home fire

He murdered 11 people by setting fire to their nursing home while they slept in their beds.

Now aged-care nurse Roger Dean will spend the rest of his life in jail.

Justice Megan Latham delivered a life sentence to the 37-year-old for the November 2011 crime, which left the city in a state of shock. Dean made no reaction as the sentence was announced.


The judge described the murders as ''atrocious'' and ''greatly reprehensible'', saying "the pain and terror experienced by all of the victims must have been horrific".

''For those who were unable to move independently and who faced the prospect of being burnt alive or suffocated by smoke, a worse fate is hard to imagine.''

Around 4.50am on November 18, 2011, Dean set fire to beds in two rooms of the Quakers Hill nursing home where he was working as the night nursing manager.

Five of the residents perished in the fire, while a further six died later in hospital from the injuries they sustained.

The victims were: Dorothy Wu, 85; Alma Smith, 73; Reginald Green, 87; Lola Bennett, 86; Ella Wood, 97; Urbana Alipio, 79; Caesar Galea, 82; Doris Becke, 96; Verna Webeck, 83; Dorothy Sterling, 80; and Neeltje Valkay, 90.

Standing outside as the home as ambulance officers frantically tried to save the residents, Dean did a television interview with Channel 7.

"There was a fire and I did what I could to get the residents out," he said.

"It's a bit overwhelming ... but we got a lot of people out, that's the main thing."

After Dean pleaded guilty to the murders on what was to be the first day of his murder trial in May this year, it emerged that he had lit the fires to destroy evidence that he had stolen some 230 painkilling tablets prescribed to the residents.

The night before the fire, Dean repeatedly went into the room where the home kept its addictive medications and stole 237 tablets of the narcotic painkiller Endone and one capsule of the morphine drug Kapanol. These can be bought, with a prescription, for about $85.

He became extremely fearful when nursing home managers discovered the drugs had been stolen, and called police.

The next night, after trying unsuccessfully to get into the locked room where the drug registry books were kept, Dean told two junior nurses to take an unscheduled break and then walked into the A2 wing. Using a stolen cigarette lighter, he set fire to the sheets of an empty bed.

http://www.smh.com.au/nsw/roger-dean-gets-life-in-prison-for-nursing-home-fire-20130801-2r0i2.html

What the hell does the heading of this have to do with the actual issue? Roger Dean got a life sentence. Churchgoer is irrelevant. Why not;

'Homosexual gets life sentence'
'Asian gets life sentence'
'Drugy gets life sentence'

or are you just showing your true colours?

True Colours wrote on Aug 1^st, 2013 at 1:29pm:




His family didn't exactly come on the first feet now did it?

Your reply is idiotic. I was showing how stupid your title was. Whether he was a churchgoer or not is irrelevant. Hence why I asked why you didn't mention any other irrelevant details.   

True Colours wrote on Aug 1^st, 2013 at 12:31pm:



He didn't do it in his Allah's name, like all the allahu akhbaring jihadi crazies across the globe.
As if you didn't know full well that the point of jihad is religious motivation.

This Philippino bastard didn't burn down the nursing home to avenge some perceived disrespect of the Bible by the elderly residents whereas for the bearded jihadi monsters killing is always about some fvckn Koranic verse or other.

While it may be trendy to knock the churches (of which I belong to and follow none, BTW) - your heading should read 'Mass Killer Gets Life Sentence'.

His actions have no affiliations with any religious organisation in any way and are a total abrogation of their most basic tenets.

Dang - must be stressful being gay and thinking that people in a Bible group might be talking about you.... YTF would his defence team offer that puny excuse.  The guy was a thief, a liar, a user taking advantage of his position, (dare I say it in these PC times), 'odd', and ultimately a killer of totally innocent and helpless people.

In older times his church would have hung him... after a suitable dunking or two and perhaps an auto de fe` followed by a barbecue on the scaffold...

I think he figured he'd get off lightly on mental issues, gay 'victimhood', and being Asian....

He was wrong........ for life....

True Colours wrote on Aug 2^nd, 2013 at 6:51am:


No matter how much you try to spin shlt, nothing is going to cover up the fact that you made issue of this blokes religion despite it having no impact on his actions.

Why didn't you mention he is gay?
Why didn't you mention he either does or sells drugs?
Why didn't you mention he was Asian?

Because you wanted to focus on the fact that he was a "churchgoer". Something totally irrelevant to the case.

What is really showing your stupidity is this....

"How do you know? There were Asians on the First Fleet. Asians wet often part of British naval crews.

there were at least 15 West Indians and Negroes, there were Dutch, Portuguese, Swedes and one Indian from Bengal. Some Asians were included in the Fleet.

I have met people whose Chinese ancestors came to Australia during the Victorian gold rush in the 1850's. There are others whose Asian ancestors worked clearing jungles for canefields in QLD more than 100 years ago."

Notice the amount of times you use the word Asian?but if someone else did that they would be a racist, right?

You are another dumbshlt who hates whites and Christians. You have shown this on almost all of your posts, and this thread is no different. Again, no matter how much you try to spin this it doesn't cover the fact that you tried to make this thread an attack on Christians and failed big time.

A better head line….

“mass murdering piece of crap to be strung up in the morning”