QLD:Cult leader defends killer

AAP General News (Australia)
02-18-2011
QLD:Cult leader defends killer

BRISBANE, Feb 18 AAP - The leader of a north Queensland cult which harboured convicted
murderer Luke Hunter says he was not aware of the killer's past.

Hunter was recaptured at Herberton, west of Cairns, on Sunday after 15 years on the run.

The 42-year-old had served only five years of a 21-year sentence for murdering his
lover's husband when he escaped by cutting through a fence at a Queensland prison.

Hunter had sheltered with a secretive north Queensland religious sect called the Jesus
Group for many years after his escape.

The cult's leader Dawid Landy-Ariel told Network Seven on Friday he was not aware of
the killer's past despite him being, at the time, number four on Australia's most wanted
list.

Mr Landy-Ariel said he probably would not have taken Hunter in if he had known he had
murdered someone.

But he said he believed Hunter was a genuine person.

"We met him out on the street and he seemed like a genuine person and I really believe
he is," he said.

"I'm not going to condemn somebody to hell just because they lied about their past
to protect themselves.

"What happens when someone confesses their sins to a priest is up to the church, (as
to whether) to dob him in.

From 1997 until his capture, Hunter had worked for Queensland Health at Herberton Hospital
under the false name of Ashban Kadmiel.

He was employed the year after he escaped from Borallon Correctional Centre, near Ipswich.

AAP peb/dep

KEYWORD: HUNTER

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