Home Page - Save Our Kids - Education Department covers up child sex abuse spree

The teacher in question was Gary Willis, a middle-aged man who transferred to Northern NSW in the late 1980s. Willis received a 3-year position at East Murwillumbah Primary School’s Special Education Unit.

Almost immediately Willis began working at the School, allegations of inappropriate behaviour emerged — even directly in front of parents.

For instance, one outraged mother related, in a written statement, that Gary Willis had allegedly exposed his penis and urinated directly in front of children, parents, and teachers during a school excursion:

Gary Willis made no attempt to be discrete [sic] or hide his penis from any of us and grinned the whole time he was urinating. I was horrified that a teacher would conduct himself in this manner in front of young children, so I reported the incident to the principal, Al Gudgeon.

Principal Gudgeon asked the parent to tell him specific times and dates of the incidents, apparently so that he could report them. The mother provided the requested information, but said the principal never followed through with the complaint:

I became very frustrated and angry with Al Gudgeon because I believed he was not taking any of these matters seriously and trying to cover up all complaints. I felt so strongly about the lack of protection and moral obligation to all children attending East Murwillumbah Primary School because of Al Gudgeon and Gary Willis, I transferred my children to another school.'

In the classroom, Gary Willis was responsible for the most vulnerable children imaginable — children who were intellectually disabled, autistic, unable to walk and unable to speak. Former students, parents, and teachers allege that Gary Willis sexually and physically assaulted these disabled children. Witnesses, including other teachers, also say they witnessed Gary Willis being violent toward students, including allegedly ramming a wheelchair bound child into a wall and thrusting another disabled boy’s head into a sink.

Arguably even more shocking, witnesses allege that Gary Willis taught mainstream schoolboys to sexually assault the disabled girls. Medical evidence, police interviews and local DOCS intervention appear to support this claim. Police, DOCS, and a paediatrician concluded that two girls had been sexually assaulted at East Murwillumbah Primary School; Gary Willis was named in both cases. Parents subsequently watched him being seized by police from the school for questioning.

A special needs teacher aide, Debra Edwards, submitted a hand-written complaint (dated 25 July 1991) to Education Department Cluster Director John Quill.

Debra Edwards never heard from the Education Department.

When parents further complained to Cluster Director John Quill that Gary Willis was sexually abusing their children, Quill concluded that the best outcome parents could hope for was to have the perpetrator transferred to another school.

In response to multiple child abuse complaints, witnesses say the NSW Education Department sent three investigators to East Murwillumbah Primary School to monitor the behaviour of Gary Willis for three weeks. Unfortunately, Gary Willis was allegedy warned that these investigators were coming and so behaved impeccably during the observation period. After concluding their watching brief, the investigators reported that they perceived no problem with Gary Willis. They reached these conclusions despite not having interviewed any parents or staff witnesses.

In 1991, the NSW Education Department transferred Gary Willis to South Tweed Primary School, where he was assigned to teach infants. Parents and teachers soon complained to the principal about how Gary Willis presented himself and acted around students.

For instance, a Grade One boy (“E”), told his mother that Gary Willis constantly locked himself with little girls in the class storeroom. Other former students recalled similar incidents:

I remember Mr Willis took one or two girls into the classroom storeroom alone and shut the door. He would stay in there for a while. The girls would go into the storeroom with neat hair, but would come out with messed up hair. Sometimes the girls would look upset and as though they were about to cry. Mr Willis chose the pretty girls to take into the storeroom.

Gary Willis supervised a school sleepover attended by infant children. During the sleepover, Gary Willis was believed to sexually assaulted six young girls. The following day, parents, teachers, and students witnessed the girls in a distressed state at school assembly.

A Tweed Heads South Public School teacher witnessed complaints about Gary Willis allegedly flood into the school, particularly from Grade Five and Six students. When she consulted the principal about these complaints, she was told that “photographic evidence” was needed before the allegations could be acted on.

In 1992-93, the parents of an 8-year-old child girl in Gary Willis’ class phoned their friend, South Tweed teacher “Ms X” and reported that Willis had just sexually assaulted their daughter "BB". Ms X immediately attended the family home and spoke with the victim. Gary Willis had asked BB and another little girl to stay behind after school that afternoon. He then took the girls into his classroom storeroom, fondled them, and digitally penetrated them. Consequently, BB suffered bed-wetting and screaming in her sleep. Despite Ms X’s pleading, the parents declined to have Gary Willis charged because they did not want to put their daughter through the corrupt police and the corrupt legal system.

Ms X complained to the District Inspector at Murwillumbah about Gary Willis.

The NSW Department of Education sent a counsellor to speak with South Tweed teaching staff. Without interviewing either the victim or her parents, the counsellor dismissed Ms X’s allegations of child sexual abuse against Gary Willis as being unfounded. The counsellor told Ms X that she was being irrational, to think of her unborn baby, and she advised the whistle-blower to "punch a pillow" to relieve her frustration and anger regarding Gary Willis and the principal.

Ms X subsequently suffered a nervous breakdown and resigned from the NSW Department of Education altogether. In 1998, when Ms X’s youngest child started school at Centaur Primary School she was appalled to see Gary Willis at the school, still teaching.

At a Centaur Primary School disco to celebrate Harmony Day in 2004, parents Steven and Victoria Boyce reportedly saw Gary Willis dancing with young girls in an inappropriate fashion. They said he was dressed in a toga and ‘dirty dancing’ with the girls, including pelvic thrusting towards them from behind.

During the disco, Gary Willis allegedly entered the girls’ toilet and peered underneath a locked door at Mrs Boyce’s daughter. Mrs Boyce said she witnessed the deputy principal chastise Gary Willis for being in the girls’ toilet.

In 2006, the NSW Department of Education finally determined that the rumours against Gary Willis were real— and they banned Gary Willis from teaching in the NSW public education system. However Gary Willis was free to seek child-related employment in the NSW private education sector and interstate. After leaving the NSW Education Department, Gary Willis found two years of employment as a bus driver at a private Tweed Shire school, Lakeside Christian College

Gary Willis was last seen living and working in Queensland.