I know that we have seen some truly  egregious examples of the female sentencing discount recently, but the case i am about to detail is by far, bar none, the worst case of the female sentencing discount i have ever come across – the case  of Australian serial killer Helen Patricia Moore.

In May of 1979, in the Western Suburbs of Sydney, 17 year old Helen Patricia Moore suffocated Suzanne McIntosh, a 16 month old cousin whom she was babysitting – the child’s death was at the time put down to cot death.

In January of 1980 Moore attempted to suffocate yet another of her babysitting charges, 12 month old Nicholas Vaughan. Having thought her latest attempt at murder a success, Helen Moore went back to calmly watching TV. A while later the baby boy started crying, she called the ambulance and the boy made a full recovery.

Despite this latest suspicious incident, the babysitting jobs kept coming and on February 1st 1980 Helen suffocated two year old Aaron Crocker with a pillow, again failing to finish the job properly. Little Aaron survived but was left blind and crippled and died several years later as a result of Moore’s attack.

A few weeks later on February 24th 1980, two year old Rachel Hay died while in the care of Helen Moore.

In march of 1980, Helen’s  seven year old brother Peter was found dead at the bottom of the stairs in the family home, only then did Helen’s mother Jesse realize something was up. She called the police and the whole story came out, with Helen quickly confessing first to the murder of Peter then to the other crimes.

Now here’s the thing, when Helen Moore was sentenced in 1980 the judge gave her life, but a dozen years later she sought a sentence review and that original  sentence was reduced to 13 years and nine months, and in 1993 Helen Moore was  given parole! Think about it, this is a serial killer who preyed on children and they let her out of jail after just 13 years. Could someone please find me a case wherein a male serial killer, especially one who preys on small children, is allowed to go free after only thirteen years in jail, even if he was 17 at the time of the murders? I seriously doubt that such a case can be found, as i am something of a true crime fan and i’ve never even heard of such a thing.

And just to underline how pro-woman and disregarding of children’s safety our western patriarchies are, a year or two into her parole she got pregnant, and even though they took the baby away from her for a very brief period, it was soon handed back to her, despite the fact that she was a killer of small children. Now if that doesn’t show the precedence that women’s rights take over the safety of children, nothing does. Helen Moore’s parole period ran out in 2005, and even though i haven’t been able to confirm it, it is highly likely that she was set free, and that right now, out there in Australia somewhere, a serial killer is living free and easy, and why? Because our society places such a high value on women and such a low value on men and children, that’s why.

By the way, don’t bother googling Helen Moore’s name – all i could find was an article about how they briefly took the daughter away from her when she was born, all else i got from a book called “Australia’s Serial Killers” by an Australian crime writer called Paul B. Kidd. The book was published in 2001, hence my not being able to confirm that she did make it through the parole period.