Carly Ryan lived in Stirling, a quaint South Australian town with her mother, Sonya. A single mom, Sonya shared a close bond with her only daughter and the two were best friends. Little did Sonya know that a predator was lurking in the shadows ready to destroy their lives —forever.
The Boy of Her Dreams
When she was nearly 14, Carly started chatting with a boy named Brandon Kane on MySpace. He told her that he was 17 and lived 5 hours away in Victoria with his father, Shane.
Brandon had all the same interests as Carly and even wanted to be a rock musician just like her. She told her mother that he made her feel special and was the boy of her dreams.
At first, Sonya was concerned about their age gap but she allowed their relationship to continue, believing that Brandon was a harmless teenager.
Over the next 18 months, Carly spent all of her free time chatting with Brandon online but their relationship quickly turned toxic. He isolated Carly from her friends and sent her abusive messages. One minute, Brandon was vicious and cold-hearted, the next he was luring Carly in with sweet compliments.
Carly often asked Brandon to visit her but he always came up with an excuse as to why he couldn’t. That was until she invited him to her 15th birthday party.
Sonya received a call from Brandon’s father Shane. He said he was going to be in town for work, and offered to drop Brandon off. Carly was overjoyed.
Everything Was Not As it Seemed
On January 26, 2007, Carly answered the door, expecting to meet Brandon. Instead, she found Shane standing on her front porch, holding a present.
Shane told Carly that Brandon couldn’t make it but had asked him to drop off a birthday gift. Inside was lingerie and a sexy nurse’s outfit. Carly kept the gifts a secret from her mother.
Sonya invited Shane inside. He introduced himself to Carly’s friends and appeared to be a nice man. Sonya allowed him to spend the night in the guest room but she soon learned that everything was not as it seemed.
The next morning, Sonya caught Shane sleeping in Carly’s bed with several of her underage friends. Shocked, she told him to get out. Shane grabbed his belongings and stormed out of the house in a rage. Once he was gone, Carly told her mother that he had touched her inappropriately.
Sonya sent Shane an email threatening to call the police if he ever came near her daughter again. In response, Shane denied the allegations, threatened to sue Sonya for defamation, and in the very last line wrote, “You lose bitch.”
Her Nail Polish Was Barely Dry
Three weeks later…
On February 19, 2007, Carly and Sonya spent the day together, shopping and painting their nails. At 4 pm, Carly told her that she was going to sleep over at a friend’s, gave her a hug, and took off.
Unbeknownst to Sonya, she would never see her daughter alive again.
The next morning, a man discovered the body of a young girl floating in Horseshoe Bay. While police divers were pulling her out of the water, Sonya was nervously pacing back and forth at her home 80 km away, wondering why Carly had not returned. She called her several times but there was no answer.
Frantic, Sonya called Carly’s friend only to learn that there was no sleepover.
Sonya immediately reported Carly missing and it didn’t take long for the authorities to put two and two together. She drove to Horseshoe Bay to identify the body and she knew it was Carly the moment she saw the bright pink nail polish they had applied together less than 24 hours earlier.
An autopsy determined that Carly had sustained 19 injuries. She had been bludgeoned over the head, suffocated with sand, and ultimately drowned.
The Real Brandon Kane Is Exposed
Surveillance footage captured Carly as she walked toward a beach with two strange men at 7 pm. Witnesses recalled that the men took off in a pale blue car a couple of hours later — without her. The only piece of evidence left behind was the fingertip of a latex glove torn off, lying in the sand.
Sonya told investigators about Brandon, Shane’s inappropriate behavior, and the threatening emails. Using Carly’s phone records, they were led to a home in Victoria where 48-year-old divorced father of three, Garry Francis Newman lived with his 17-year-old son whose name has not been revealed to the public due to his age.
As it turned out, Brandon Kane never even existed. He was a fictional character created by Garry Newman, a pedophile, and internet predator.
Unbeknownst to Carly, she had been chatting with Garry all that time. He groomed her for 18 months and she was not his only victim. In fact, when the police raided Garry’s home 11 days after the murder, they found him sitting at his computer desk, messaging a 14-year-old girl as Brandon Kane.
Inside Garry’s home, the authorities found over 200 pages of fake personas and multiple account usernames and passwords to fake online identities. They also found Carly’s camera which Garry had stolen from her home.
After Carly rejected Garry’s sexual advances at her birthday party, he angrily told his son that he was going to “fix her up” and make her look like a package of meat at the grocery store.
Garry messaged Carly as Brandon and offered to finally meet with her, as long as she kept it a secret from her mother. He then asked his teenage son to play the part of Brandon.
Garry was charged with first-degree murder. Prosecutors argued that the crime was premeditated considering that he had groomed Carly for more than a year online and that his DNA was found inside the tip of the glove.
Garry claimed that his son was behind the Brandon Kane account. The teen was detained but he denied the allegations and any charges against him were dropped once he agreed to testify against Garry.
Garry’s son told the court that he watched as his father professed his love to Carly on the isolated beach, took her phone, and attacked her from behind when she attempted to leave. He admitted that he helped Garry dispose of Carly’s body but denied taking any part in the actual murder itself.
Garry was convicted and sentenced to life in prison with the possibility of parole after 29 years. He currently remains incarcerated.
After Garry’s conviction, his ex-wife Christine alleged that he was physically abusive during their marriage and once plied their daughter with alcohol and tried to rape her, “All of these years I have been waiting for something like this to happen. He robbed my children of their mother and me of them and I hope he gets everything he deserves in jail.”
During closing statements, Justice Kelly scolded Garry as he sat in silence, “She was a beautiful and impressionable child. I say child because that is what she was, in love with the idea of the handsome, musically inclined, and rather exotic Brandon Kane…the real man, instead, was an overweight, balding, middle-aged pedophile with sex and murder on his mind.”
Carly Ryan’s Legacy Lives On
After Carly’s death, Sonya Ryan devoted her entire life to protecting children and became an advocate against online predators. In 2010, she created The Carly Ryan Foundation which educates children and their families regarding online safety, and in 2017, she successfully lobbied for Carly’s Law which allows the prosecution of those who misrepresent their age to minors before they are able to sexually exploit and harm them.
By all accounts, Carly Ryan was a compassionate, sensitive young girl with a heart of gold. Her death, although untimely, was not in vain as her legacy has saved countless lives and will continue to do so in the years to come.
“The significance of my daughter’s murder went beyond what I felt; Carly was the first victim of a violent crime that was perpetrated through the internet in Australia. It is now my duty to do whatever is necessary to help prevent such suffering for other innocent children.” — Sonya Ryan