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Template:Infobox Killer

Caroline Grills, born Caroline Mickelson (1890 – October 1960), was an Australian multiple murderer.

Grills became a suspect in 1947 after the deaths of three family members: her 87-year-old stepmother Christine Mickelson; relatives by marriage Angelina Thomas and John Lundberg; and close family friend Mary Anne Mickelson. Authorities tested tea she had given to two additional family members (Christine Downey and John Downey) on April 13, 1953, and detected the poison thallium.

Grills appeared in court charged with four murders and three attempted murders (the third being Eveline Lundberg, Christine Downey's mother) in October 1953. She was convicted on October 15, 1953, ^[1] and sentenced to life in prison. She became affectionately known as "Auntie Thally" to other inmates of Sydney's Long Bay prison. In October 1960, she was rushed to the hospital where she died from peritonitis from a ruptured gastric ulcer.

References

• Book, Hidden Evidence: Forty true crimes and how forensic science helped solve them by David Owen (Firefly Books, September 2000).

• Book, Murder! 25 True Australian Crimes by Vivien Encel & Alan Sharpe