Breaking: Adelaide man charged with multiple child sex offences
A 73-year-old Adelaide man has been arrested over numerous historical child sexual abuse offences linked to the Magill Training Centre.
A 73-year-old western suburbs man has been arrested on Thursday morning on 55 historical child abuse charges.
The man has been charged over alleged offences committed between 1978 and 2003 at the now-closed Magill Training Centre.
SA Police’s Domestic, Family and Sexual Violence Service Assistant Commissioner Stuart McLean announced an arrest was made on Thursday morning, saying the man had access to the training centre but was not a government employee.
“We’ll be alleging today this man had access to the Magill Training Centre — however, he was not an employee of the centre nor was he a government employee,” McLean said.
“The nature of the accused’s work will be the subject of the matters before the court today and application for suppression orders, so I’m not in a position to elaborate.”
The charges include multiple counts of rape, unlawful sexual intercourse, sexual abuse of a child, gross indecency and indecent assault and relate to 29 known victim-survivors, many of whom were children at the time of the alleged offending.
McLean said there was “sufficient evidence” to bring the matter before the court.
“The passage of time does not diminish the seriousness with which SAPOL treats these allegations. They will be thoroughly investigated and, where the evidence supports it, offenders will be brought before the courts.’’
The investigation into the charges began in December 2023. The arrest made today comes after SA Police established Task Force Libero in March 2025 to investigate allegations of historical child sexual abuse linked to the now-closed Magill Training Centre and other government care facilities.
The Magill Training Centre was a state government care facility for girls and boys aged 10 to 18 on detention orders from 1993; before that, it was known as the South Australian Youth Training Centre.
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In 2004, a Children in State Care Commission Inquiry was established, run by Commissioner Ted Mullighan, investigating allegations of child sexual abuse in three state-run institutions, including the Magill Training Centre.
The final Mullighan report, handed down in 2008, found that 242 children in state care in South Australia had been abused, and detailed a decades-long “systemic failure”.
The Magill Training Centre was closed and demolished in 2012.
SA Police requested that anyone with information about child abuse connected to the Magill Training Centre contact Crime Stoppers on 1800 333 000, and can remain anonymous.
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