ABOUT 1900 PEOPLE were executed in the Australian colonies between 1788 and 1901. Capital punishment declined after Federation, with 114 people executed between 1901 and 1967, when Ronald Ryan was the last.
Ryan was born in the Melbourne suburb of Carlton in 1925 to alcoholic, abusive parents. At 11, he was sent to a school for wayward and neglected boys after stealing a watch, but escaped three years later and began working
