Bonnie Doon Bandit's records released

Known as the Bonnie Doon Bandit, Julie Baldwin became notorious when at 23-years-old she was convicted of robbery in company for the 1939 Bonnie Doon Post Office hold-up.

Alongside male companions John Jackson and Leslie Malone, Baldwin stole a car, obtained a gun, and accompanied the men in the robbery. A police car made chase with the three quickly caught.

That Baldwin wore a men's suit to court captured public and media attention.

The 1934 to 1948 female prison register containing Julie's record has been released as part of Public Record Office Victoria's annual Section 9 openings.

Photos and details of another notorious Victorian criminal - Kenneth William Korrington-Willis, alias Kid Stranger, including the 1948 criminal trial brief for the notorious conman, have also been revealed.

Through the 1930s and 40s Korrington Willis posed as an American boxer and showman scamming people out of money for fake investments. In Melbourne in 1944, he claimed to be a parachuter with a factory looking for investors. Many fell for his trick, handing over life savings, while 50,000 people attended Essendon Aerodrome to watch him jump out of a plane only to leave disappointed. He was sent to gaol, but his frauds continued after his release.

In the 1948 brief the conman was convicted of defrauding Edwin George Douglas out of a £300 car deposit while posing as an American Captain in the Department of Justice.

The male register, spanning 1947 to 1948 in the final one as in 1948 the justice system moved to a card-based recordkeeping system which remains closed.

Other records recently opened include Ballarat Asylum Clinical Notes, 1920s Register of Patients Admitted to the Labour Ward of the Royal Women's Hospital, the 1948 Capital Sentence File of Eric Stanley Jacobi, and Tramway Employee Record Cards.

Director and Keeper of Public Records, Justine Heazlewood, said such records provided a snapshot in time.

"The Victorian public records being released span from the 1880s through to the early 1990s, providing valuable insight into Victoria's social history. These fascinating files will be of particular interest to family researchers, as well as historians with mysteries from Victoria's history to uncover."