In 1947, the Honourable Thomas John Ley, former Minister for Justice and Minister for Education in the NSW Parliament, and the Member for Barton in Stanley Bruce's 1927 Federal government, was tried and convicted in London's Old Bailey for the murder of John McMain Mudie. Ley suspected Mudie of having an affair with his 66 year old former mistress, Maggie Brook, and arranged for him to be kidnapped, murdered and dumped in a chalk pit in Surrey.
 
Although convicted and sent to Broadmoor Asylum for the criminally insane for the murder, Ley was never charged in Australia for the strange disappearance of political opponent Frederick MacDonald or the fatal fall of political colleague, Hyman Goldstein, discovered at the bottom of a Coogee cliff after accusing Ley of fraud in a Prickly Pear Eradication scheme.
 
The Chalk Pit traces Ley's rise and fall from a young idealistic, aspiring politician in 1897 to his death in Broadmoor in 1947. It is a story of corrupted ambition, family betrayal, and murder, which tore a family apart and created a blot on Australian political history.
 
This is the only part of the sorry saga, and Thomas Ley always claimed his innocence. Audiences will be able to judge for themselves when The Chalk Pit opens in The Courtyard Studio of the Canberra Theatre Centre on March 15th.