To be continued... To be continued... To be continued... To be continued...
To be continued... To be continued... To be continued... To be continued...
To be continued... To be continued... To be continued... Gary meticulously cared for the vehicle and enjoyed driving it around town, relishing the attention it generated.
Before Gary headed to the Mod Spectacular, he and Alan washed his beloved car, and as 7pm arrived, Gary prepared to leave, dressing in black trousers, a brown jumper with an orange checked shirt underneath, and desert boots. Alan begged to join him, but Gary gently denied his little brother's request. To be continued... Janice arrived.
The girls got in and Gary drove the group a short distance to Victoria Park Lake close to the heart of the city, arriving a little after 9pm. The parklands surrounding the water had been a grazing paddock before they were transformed into public gardens, with a swimming pool built into the lake itself. At night, the area was a popular lover's lane for local teens and young adults. When Gary pulled up, there was a station wagon with two couples inside, parked nearby with its lights on, and another car next to it.
Gary parked by the pool, and the boys drank beer and offered Abina and Janice cans of vodka with orange juice. Janice had one, and Abina drank a few, making her somewhat giddy and unsteady. The girls got out of the car to get some fresh air and to visit the public toilets close by. As the boys were becoming rowdy, Janice expressed the desire to walk back to the city center, concerned that Gary appeared the most affected by the alcohol.
Abina was reluctant to make the almost two-kilometer-long journey on foot, as she was wearing new shoes. They returned to the car, and within half an hour of arriving at the lake, Gary agreed to drive everyone back to the city center. He and Lindsay entered the building to watch the concert, while Abina, Janice, Victor and Paul went for a walk around the block. When they returned, they climbed back into the holden, where Gary was waiting.
Janice was growing increasingly frustrated, complaining to Abina several times that she wanted to leave as Paul was, quote, molesting her. At around 10.30pm, she exited the vehicle, leaving Abina in the back seat, and walked to the civic center alone. To her relief, she spotted her boyfriend, and after a short while, the couple decided to leave, driving past the location where Gary Haywood had last parked his F.J. Holden, only to notice it was now gone.
Ian Urquhart was eager to impress his girlfriend Abina, and wanted to be on time to pick her up before the Mod Spectacular ended at 11.20pm. After leaving work and freshening up at home, Ian walked over to the Taverna Coffee Lounge to join some friends. His friend and housemate Peter Hazelman then drove him to the civic center, where they spotted Abina's sister, Rosalyn. When she explained that Abina was out driving with Gary Haywood, Ian became noticeably angry.
He knew Gary worked with his girlfriend, and, struck with jealousy, he shouted that he would, quote, kill the bastard. I'll belt him. Ian and Peter took Rosalyn home, where they learned Abina was not back yet. The young man drove around town on the lookout for Gary's F.J.
Holden, and failing to spot the car, returned to Abina's house and waited out front for her return. Alma Medill had been visiting friends for the evening. When she arrived home after 1am, she was surprised to discover her daughter Abina hadn't yet returned from the concert. In a panic, she woke her husband Fred to express her concern.
When Abina failed to show up by 2am, Fred drove to Shepparton Police Station to alert them to his daughter's absence, but the building was deserted as the two night shift officers were out on patrol. He returned home to try calling the police instead, and managed to get through to night patrolman Constable Frank Eyre. In the three years Constable Eyre had worked in Shepparton, his job had been mostly routine. The evening of February 10 was shaping up to be another uneventful night, until he received a call from Fred Medill, expressing his concern for his daughter, Abina.
Constable Eyre and his partner Constable John Quirk arrived at the Medill house to get the particulars, then headed out to check popular haunts to see if Abina was at any. After a fruitless search, the policeman returned to the Medill house, where her family had since learned that Abina was in the company of Gary Haywood. Police drove to the Haywood residence and informed Gary's father Charlie of the situation. The bedroom Gary shared with his younger brother was checked, but his bed was empty.
Charlie and Alan Haywood joined Fred Medill and the constables in searching for the young pair, checking cars parked outside motels and other locations they thought the teenagers might be. They found no sign of them, and by 3am, Fred Medill headed back to the police station to formally report his daughter as missing. The link between Gary and Abina puzzled both families. Although Gary had worked with and befriended Abina, he never mentioned her to his father, nor had Abina spoken of Gary to her family.
Charlie returned home and started contacting his son's friends to see whether they could shed more light on the night's events. Witness reports revealed that as Abina sat in his car at the Civic Center, Gary asked his friends to get out so he could drive her back to the lake and park by the banks of the Goulton River, the spot known locally as a lover's lane. Gary promised his friends he would return later to take them home, and gave them a set of his keys and Abina's wristwatch as a guarantee of their intention to return. The pair were last seen driving off together in Gary's F.J.
Holden. Gary kept his word, returning to the Civic Center within half an hour, but his friends had since departed. When the concert ended shortly before 11.30pm, a witness saw Gary drive past the center, but didn't notice if there was anyone else in the car. Constable's Air and Quirk searched for hours with no results.
They suspected the teenagers had spent the night together, and there was no cause for alarm. Constable Quirk's shift ended at 5am, so Constable Air gave him a lift home before returning to the police station. As he drove back towards town, he sighted Gary's green F.J. Holden parked haphazardly in Wyndham Street, opposite Victoria Lake.
It was about five feet from the curb, its engine was cold, the tank was half empty, and its windows were down. A blue checkered rug Gary kept folded in the back seat was missing, as were the admission keys. Charlie Haywood knew his son loved the car, and would never abandon it in such a careless manner. The discovery of Gary's vehicle sparked a widespread police search, one of the largest in Victoria at the time.
They were assisted by the missing teens' families, with the Haywoods even taking their pet terrier along to see if she could detect Gary's scent. Friends, locals, and out-of-towners alike volunteered as well. Some speculated the couple had run off together, but those who knew them didn't believe this to be the case, describing Gary and Abina as casual acquaintances. Both were well-known and highly regarded in Shepparton, and neither had expressed a wants or need to leave.
Moreover, those who knew Gary was certain he would never abandon his beloved Holden. After the car was discovered, the Haywood family drove it home and parked it on their front lawn. Later that morning, Gary's brother Alan started his regular routine of washing the vehicle, spraying its boot with water from a hose. Realizing his son's actions could destroy valuable evidence, Charlie quickly stopped Alan before he progressed any further.
Ex-Homicide Squad Detective Peter Parkinson was considered Shepparton's toughest cop. He took charge of the investigation into the disappearance of Abina Madill and Gary Haywood. Described as old-school, aggressive, and at times excessive, Detective Parkinson was results-driven and uncompromising in his job. He was already familiar with Gary Haywood and knew how much he loved his car, as he lived around the corner from the family and regularly saw the young man washing it when he passed by.
Mindful that Gary would never ditch the Holden by choice, one of Detective Parkinson's first actions was to seize the vehicle and examine it for evidence. Two unidentified fingerprints pointing downward were detected on top of the driver's side door. An important discovery the police kept under wraps. On the morning of Saturday, February 12, an elderly man was cycling along a bridge spanning Castle Creek, located 22 kilometers south of Shepparton and adjacent to the Goulburn Valley Highway.
He spotted a woman's white leather shoulder bag lying in a dry creek bed below, and took it to the local police station. It contained a one-pound note, some change, a powder compact, keycase, a handkerchief and tissues, as well as a metal disc engraved with the word Billy. The name Abina Madill was printed on the bag's inside lining, alongside her Maxwell Street address. Suspecting this indicated the 16-year-old had met with foul play, police began piecing together their theory that Abina had been killed and her body wrapped in the rug missing from Gary's car.
Given this spotlighted Gary as a possible suspect, three detectives aggressively grilled his father Charlie, trying to find out whether he was concealing his son from authorities. Meanwhile, the Haywoods' home was undergoing a thorough search. Police also questioned Gary's girlfriend Gail, but she could offer nothing of value. By Monday, February 14, additional police resources arrived from Melbourne, including a search and rescue team, police divers, and a light aircraft.
More than 100 volunteers were now involved in the efforts to find the pair, including all the employees of the Haywoods' panel beaters. Although no bodies had been located, Melbourne's homicide squad also arrived in Shepparton to assist in the investigation. By now, the story had reached the front page of the Shepparton News and was even making headlines in Melbourne. Rumors spread that a fight at the Mod Spectacular might have something to do with Gary and Abina's disappearance.
Police appealed for a group of Melbourne rock and roll fans who had attended the show to come forward, but the lead went nowhere. On the sixth day of the search, the questioning of a local 16-year-old led detectives to the suburban strip of St. Andrews Road, where they found an undergarment under a rock that was initially believed to have belonged to Abena, but this was later disproved. After further questioning, the youth was released.
Although police had been able to quickly determine that the underwear did not belong to Abena, the story still went public, causing great pain to her family. The search continued for another two days, extending to the rough country along the Goulburn River and into the thick bushland around Shepparton. State Forest employees took the horseback as fixed-winged aircraft scoured from above, and police divers submerged themselves in the numerous waterholes throughout the region. Volunteers and officers trekked through wild six-foot-high grass, with one police officer remarking, If the two teenagers had been murdered and their bodies dumped in the long grass, searchers could pass within a few feet of them and did not know it.
Their efforts were hampered by the number of snakes in the area, with searchers killings thirteen in a single day. Saturday, February 19 marked nine days since the teenagers had vanished. The region's annual duck hunting season commenced, and shooters were asked to keep an eye out for clues, in particular, that checked the blue rug that was missing from Gary's car. Friends of the teenagers were summoned to the police station and underwent intense questioning, while a spate of alleged sightings were reported from all over Victoria and Australia, placing the couple in far-flung locations such as Mildura, Corain, Sale, Wadonga, and Sydney.
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By supporting our sponsors, you support Case File to continue to deliver quality content. 16 days after Abina Medill and Gary Haywood vanished, two 17-year-old high school students, Peter and Philip, set out from Melbourne to the small riverside town of Murchison East for a weekend of rabbit shooting. Peter's family originally hailed from the town, and he still visited his grandparents there regularly. At 11 a.m.
on Saturday, February 26, they arrived at Murchison East Railway Station, more than 30 kilometers southwest of Shepparton, and headed to Peter's grandparents' home for morning tea. Afterwards, they set off down the gravel-packed river road, cutting across a paddock and climbing over a barbed wire fence to enter the lightly timbered state forest along the Goulburn River. The land was leased from the government by a local farmer, and the teens regularly camped on the property during their shooting trips. Upon entering the bushland, the pair noticed the peculiar odor in the air which they presumed was emanating from a dead animal.
They carried on, and approximately an hour later returned the same way as they came. It was on their return track that Peter and Philip discovered the source of the odor. The severely decomposed body of a young woman was lying face up in the paddock, her legs apart, and her arms near her sides. She was naked from the waist down and had sustained severe head injuries.
Peter alerted the owner of the farmland, who contacted police. When they arrived, the owner informed them that he too had smelt something near a collection of trees in his paddock, about 300 meters from where the female body was found, but had also assumed it was a dead animal. When examining this area, the police discovered the clothed the body of a male under a 30-foot red gum tree. He had a single bullet wound at his left temple.
The bodies were those of Abinam Adil, who had been sexually assaulted then beaten to death, and Gary Haywood, whose skull contained a .22 caliber bullet. The area was immediately cordoned off, as members of the Forensic Science Division, the Search and Rescue Squad, the Homicide Squad, and Shepparton's Crime Investigation Division began the laborious task of searching the 90 acres of paddocks around the crime scene. 64 meters west of Abinam's body were two pairs of her stockings, each tied tightly in a loop of 50 centimeters. Matching fibers found on Gary's trousers indicated that his legs had been bound with the stockings.
His jumper was discovered near the stockings, and in addition to being covered in grass seeds, leaves, and bark, there were traces of blood on it. Abinam's skirt and girdle were found neatly folded nearby, with one white shoe next to the pile, and one on top. There was also a second fired .22 caliber cartridge case, indicating that the killer may have shot at Gary twice but only hit him once, and a black piece of plastic, which detectives believed might have been part of the murder weapon. The keys to Gary's holden were not at the scene, nor was the rug he kept in the car, and his other dentures were also missing.
Investigators ascertained that the assailant had abducted the pair at gunpoint near Victoria Lake. Dust on Gary's car matched samples taken from the paddock, meaning the killer had driven or ordered the teens to drive to the area where their bodies were later found. It appeared as though Gary struggled with his captor, before either running off into the thicket of trees, or was marched there, before being tied up and executed. The perpetrator then returned to Abinam, who was either restrained or unconscious, and proceeded to rape her before bludgeoning her to death.
The careless way in which Gary's car was left back in Shepparton suggested the killer had driven her back into town and abandoned it, before or after discarding Abinam's handbag near the Goulburn Valley Highway. Investigating police described the murders as beyond comprehension, and the most brutal killing they had ever encountered. The families of the two victims were extremely distraught. Gary Haywood's mother, Margaret, lost a great deal of weight and struggled to maintain the will to live.
His brother Alan was left terrified, thinking the killer would come after him next. Abinam Adil's father expressed his shock at her murder in his formal police statement, writing, I cannot think of any reason why any person would want to harm my daughter. An extra team of detectives arrived in Shepparton as officers worked upwards of 16 hours a day to hunt down those responsible. The double homicide had left the small and otherwise quiet city reeling, and pressure to find the culprits was intense.
A $10,000 reward for information was on offer, and a rug matching the one that was missing from Gary's car was displayed in the window of a major store in the middle of town. One individual came to police attention after a matching rug was spotted in his home. The man, Ian Stanley Loffel, was in his late thirties, and told police he had stolen the rug from a dark blue halton with South Australian registration plates parked outside a pub in Marootna, a town six kilometers west of Shepparton. Police spoke with local mechanics to see if they'd seen any vehicles similar to the one Loffel described, and found a match.
Convinced this was a promising lead, police tracked the vehicle down to a car yard in South Australia, only to find its drivers had airtight alibis for the night of February 10. Police suspected two or more people had committed the crimes. The region's fruit-picking season was at its peak, and they considered the possibility that the murderers could be among the thousands of workers temporarily in town for casual employment. When investigators asked local orchidists to report any suspicious workers, hundreds of tip-offs came in, but none led anywhere.
As such, police were inclined to believe the murders were committed by locals, as the remoteness of the crime scene indicated the killers were familiar with the area. They were soon concentrating on the town's teenagers in particular. There were reports of a party held near the Goulburn River, close to the west side of Victoria Lake, on the night of the murders. It involved a car race and ended in a fierce brawl between attendees when one vehicle hit another.
Police believed Gary may have been present and participated in the brawl, and was then killed by his opponents for revenge. One senior detective told the media, We feel some of the young people in Shepparton know something of the movements of Gary on the night he was murdered. Although many people have come forward and volunteered information, most of the youths we have interviewed have been those we have sought out ourselves. We believe they are not telling all they know.
No one raised as much suspicion as a Beena's boyfriend, Ian Urquhart. He was viewed as a prime suspect due to his jealous outburst after learning a Beena had left with Gary Haywood, whom he then threatened to kill over the matter. At the time, the Melbourne Homicide Squad had a reputation for being hard officers who were tough on criminals, often beating a confession out of a suspect if necessary. Ian was regularly summoned to the station for formal police interviews, during which he was verbally abused, slapped, and kicked by detectives.
They believed he was assisted by his friend and housemate Peter Hazelman, who drove him around on the night of the murders. Peter was also questioned and subjected to aggressive treatment at the hands of the police, as were several of their other friends. Despite these heavy-handed tactics, Ian did not admit any involvement in the crime. Detectives presumed he was too tough to crack, with one remarking to a uniformed officer that he had, quote, belted and belted Urquhart, but he will not confess.
When Ian's older sister Heather noticed how miserable he was, she asked what the police interviews involved, but he seemed ashamed and refused to answer. Ian confided in friends that he was very scared of the police and what might happen to him. He began borrowing a car from his father or a friend in order to camp out, instead of returning home where officers could find him. One day he arrived home and informed his family he was, quote, going to tell them he did it, to stop the police from hurting him, even though Victorian laws at the time meant a confession would have most likely resulted in his execution.
Heather convinced him not to confess. The funerals for Gary Haywood and Abena Mandil took place on Friday, March 4, 1966, marking the largest memorial services Shepperton had ever seen. Gary's was held at St. Brendan's Catholic Church at 1pm, while Abena's was at Scott's Presbyterian Church two hours later.
The city came to a standstill as shops closed for the day, and people gathered to watch while each procession passed by. Both churches were filled to capacity, with mourners spilling out onto the streets. During Abena's funeral, a grief-stricken Ian Urquhart was sighted standing at the rear of the church with his sister Heather. He had bought a dozen red roses and a card that read, With all my love, Ian.
The siblings kept their distance to avoid drawing attention to themselves, but once the congregation noticed their presence, suspicious glances and tense whispers were exchanged amongst them. Abena and Gary were both laid to rest at Shepperton Public Cemetery, their graves located just twenty meters from one another. Several months later, in mid-1966, having failed to obtain the confession they expected, police officially ruled Ian Urquhart out of their investigation. Two detectives visited the home of his sister Heather to inform the family, and reluctantly acknowledged that their questioning of Ian had been particularly tough due to the seriousness of the case.
Despite Ian being cleared, the media, community, and some police members still believed him to be guilty. Harassment remained a part of his daily life, leading him and his alleged accomplice, Peter Hazelman, to relocate interstate. Ian moved to Western Australia, picking up work on an oil rig before traveling to Singapore for further work. Peter worked on an oil rig off the Victorian coast for two years, but then returned to Shepperton.
The town's attitude towards him had not changed, prompting Peter to relocate again, eventually settling in the Northern Territory's capital city of Darwin. The black piece of plastic found at the crime scene was identified as the plug that screwed into the butt-end of an American Mossberg .22 self-loading rifle. Forensics confirmed the firearm was used to execute Gary Haywood and Bludgeon Abina Medill, though there were four semi-automatic models that the recovered shells could have come from. Mossbergs were obtainable from most Australian gun dealers, but it wasn't a particularly common weapon.
Anyone knowing the whereabouts of any Mossberg semi-automatic firearms were asked to contact the police. Some were confiscated, including a sawn-off version from a twenty-year-old who lived close to where the bodies were found. Manufacturers in the United States were asked to supply records of rifles imported to Australia, and police tracked down owners from local gunsellers' records. Once a rifle was found, police fired it to compare against the shell casings, with a total of 353 Mossbergs being tested throughout the investigation.
Inquiries began in Shepperton and its surrounds, later expanding to all parts of Victoria, and eventually, throughout Australia. During this time, a police constable attended a farm in Ardmona, a locality in the Goulburn Valley, ten kilometres west of Shepperton. He was looking to question a twenty-two-year-old man named Raymond Edmonds after his name came up in one of the investigation's many tip-offs, although the exact reason for the visit was never recorded. The property owner advised the constable that Edmonds, who had lived and worked on the land for the past two years as a share farmer, was no longer in the district as he had recently moved with his wife and their three young children to Mayrung, a small community in southern New South Wales.
The property owner provided a forwarding address for Edmonds, and the constable thanked him, adding, We'll get the boys up there to pick him up. After the constable left, the property owner recalled Edmonds owned a twenty-two semi-automatic Mossberg rifle which he used to go rabbit shooting and presumed this detail was the reason for the officer's visit an inquest into the unsolved murders of gary haywood and abena medill was held in june 1970 four years after the teenagers bodies were found it had been postponed by the case investigators and when asked why senior constable peter parkinson explained inquiries have been at many stages looking good and then come to utterly nothing at many stages we have had great hopes of solving it but without result by this stage inquiries had been made across the country in queensland new south wales and south australia as well as overseas in the united states accepting the breakthrough they were hoping for remained out of reach the inquest into the double homicide was finally scheduled to commence on tuesday june 9 frank mendill spoke at the inquest describing his daughter as a normal girl of her years who followed the modern teenage trend he couldn't think of a reason why anybody would want to harm her charlie haywood described his son as a regular boy who respected his parents and always did as he was asked when called to the stand senior constable peter parkinson told the coroner that 3478 individuals had been interviewed and investigations were still ongoing after hearing evidence from 16 witnesses the coroner was unable to offer new evidence or insight announcing that gary and abena were murdered by a person or persons unknown in the early hours of february 11 1966 despite being officially cleared ian urquhart's name was mentioned at the inquest with evidence put on the record that he was quote very annoyed upon learning abena had gone driving with gary ian was living in singapore at the time of the inquest and was not called to give evidence he had built a new life for himself overseas earning good money working as a maintenance specialist on offshore drilling rigs two years later on friday february 11 1972 almost six years to the day since his girlfriend was murdered ian urquhart and a colleague returned to singapore following a work trip to sumatra they disembarked their flight shortly after midnight and left the airport in ian's vehicle the cream-colored mg sports car while driving down a highway ian crashed the vehicle at high speed killing both himself and his passenger instantly his funeral was held at scott's presbyterian church the same place where abena had been farewelled one ex-homicide detective involved in the case commented that ian got his quote just desserts still believing he was guilty of the crimes case file will be back shortly thank you for supporting us by listening to this episode's sponsors thank you for listening to this episode's ads by supporting our sponsors you support case file to continue to deliver quality content located nearly 200 kilometers south of shepparton is the melbourne suburb of donvale in the 1960s donvale was characterized by dense bushland farms and orchards but by the early 70s the area was changing with clusters of residential homes cropping up in place of the large blocks of rural land on the evening of monday july 26 1971 25 year old suzanne was at her donvale home with her three children while her husband was out visiting france after putting the children to bed suzanne decided to mop the kitchen floor and at around 10 p.m she went to fetch some clean water from the laundry when she entered the hallway she was confronted by a man she initially took to be her husband until she noticed his face was covered in a mask made from a stocking he raised his right hand which held a long butcher's knife causing suzanne to scream the masked intruder told her to keep quiet and explained that he didn't want to hurt her before backing her into the kitchen and demanding money he then ordered her to undress anticipated what would happen next suzanne disclosed that she had recently given birth and still had stitches the assailant replied that he was just going to tie up her hands and feet then leave and ordered her to sit on the floor after he finished restraining suzanne's hands behind her back with a stocking he tied her ankles together then began rubbing her breasts she screamed loudly and the man fled suzanne managed to untie herself and immediately phoned the police two detectives arrived within minutes and soon realized that the assault shared a number of similarities with a rape committed in donvale 11 days earlier the suburb of greensbra lies roughly 17 kilometers northwest of donvale four years after the attack on suzanne 23 year old cathy was spending the night of friday january 31 1975 in her greensboro home with her two children while her fiance was away interstate cathy and her son were both sleeping in her bed while her infant daughter slept in a cot in the nursery at approximately 4 10 in the morning cathy was woken by a noise she thought was her daughter rattling the side of her cot she listened quietly for several minutes before hearing the sound again from the direction of the laundry she switched on her bedroom light and saw a man standing in the doorway of the bathroom brandishing a 12 inch knife up high in his right hand cathy screamed then told the intruder that a friend was staying over in the guest room and had likely heard her and called the police the man responded it's a lie no one will see you for a couple of days until your husband gets back he forced her back to her bed placed a blanket over her terrified son and raped her police collected small amounts of evidence from the scene including the perpetrator's fingerprints consisting of a small count loop on the right hand index finger and a scarred right hand pinky these matched fingerprints recovered from the 1971 donvale assault two years later on monday february 14 1977 another sexual assault was reported this time roughly 55 kilometers south in the suburb of chelsea heights the crime scene yielded the same distinctive fingerprints as the donvale and the greensboro attacks investigators were well aware they were dealing with a serial rapist between 1971 and 1979 there were 12 assaults attempted rapes and rapes throughout melbourne attributed to an unknown attacker police had dubbed the donvale rapist named after the location his spree had begun many of the victims were married women who were either home alone or with their young children when the donvale rapist struck he appeared to stalk his victims waiting until he knew they were alone or vulnerable before launching an attack police were certain he deliberately targeted young mothers in order to control his victims by threatening to harm their children descriptions provided by survivors allowed for the creation of a composite sketch of the rapist which was circulated widely among the police and public the suspect was between the ages of 34 and 44 had a pasty fair complexion stood between 5 foot 4 inches to 5 foot 10 inches tall and had sandy light brown or reddish blonde hair with long bushy sideburns as more details came to light police tasked a sculptor with creating a bust of the perpetrator the first time a three-dimensional likeness was made of a wanted man in australia eight survivors and two witnesses from the most recent crimes helped design the sculpture which took 45 hours to build a hairdresser colored and combed a wig and a makeup artist added skin tones to the bust which police nicknamed boris boris was used to gain the public's assistance in identifying its real-life counterpart who was described as having soft hands being well-spoken and often going barefoot a few survivors thought he had a slight accent that might have been scottish or northern english another descriptor that appeared in several survivor statements was that their attacker had an offensive odor described as a combination of strong cigarette smoke body odor bitumen or diesel as such a newspaper sub-editor dubbed the unknown rapist mr stinky in 1982 five individual sets of fingerprints associated with the state's most notorious unsolved crimes were prominently displayed in the office of the victoria police fingerprint bureau in the hope that staff would memorize and recognize them instantly among them were the fingerprints belonging to mr stinky the bureau had no computers so the team of 67 men and women would spend every day sitting through hundreds of polaroid photographs taken at crime scenes to find matching characteristics with prints on file on monday july 12 sergeant andrew wall decided to examine some fingerprints from cold case files and came across the ones lifted from the top of the driver's side door of gary haywood's fj holden sedan 16 years earlier the prints which were suspected to belong to gary haywood and have been a medill's killer showed impressions of an individual's right middle and ring fingers they immediately appeared familiar to sergeant wall who quickly realized they matched those belonging to mr stinky although this breakthrough didn't bring authorities any closer to identifying mr stinky it offered them a new suspect in the double homicide on january 4 1983 the development saw the reward for information about the crime increase from ten thousand to fifty thousand dollars in may the following year a new task force was formed to identify and apprehend mr stinky headquartered at the offices of the victorian police academy in the melbourne suburb of glen waverley the team comprised of four detectives who were led by detective senior sergeant dennis hannah within two weeks they added a 13th rape to the list of attacks attributed to mr stinky this most recent assault had occurred several weeks earlier and within a kilometer of the task force's base given the perpetrator was still active the team understood the urgency of their task people who had crossed paths with the 13 survivors were examined in an effort to find a connection between them a computer database was created of individuals who had been in shepperton in the 1960s and melbourne's eastern suburbs during the 1970s with investigators planning to cross-check the extensive lists to see if there was any overlap between the categories details from other cases were also studied to uncover more potential victims or perpetrators mr stinky's fingerprints were circulated to police stations throughout australia and in july 1984 two detectives were sent to the central fingerprint bureau in sydney to spend a week searching through their databases for a match though their efforts came up dry they left copies of mr stinky's prints for sydney detectives to keep on file with no significant progress achieved by the end of 1984 the task force was disbanded and its detectives were ordered to return to their normal duties the town of albury is nestled on the northern banks of the murray river which acts as a watery border between the states of new south wales and victoria to the south on saturday march 16 1985 local resident pat halton was operating a cash register in the electrical goods department at albury's walton's department store where she'd worked for 30 years in between serving customers pat would gaze out the large display windows nearby people watching and keeping an eye on passers-by as lunchtime drew near she noticed a beefy man with a pot belly and sandy colored hair sitting in a ford station wagon outside parked parallel to the curb he was wearing a blue singlet and had the driver's seat tilted back in a reclining position pat looked away but found her attention drawn back to the man several minutes later she noticed that he had a tense expression on his face before realizing he was masturbating pat alerted a number of other employees and the store's manager called the police two police cars containing three constables arrived at approximately 12 30 p.m and parked at the rear of the store to avoid alerting the man to their presence constable glenn taylor approached the vehicle and tapped on the window shocking the car's occupant the man initially denied any wrongdoing but grew quiet when he realized he had been caught when asked what his name was he replied raymond edmonds while the other two officers took statements from witnesses constable kevin savage took edmonds into custody and charged him with willful and obscene exposure he had his fingerprints taken in accordance with new south wales law which dictated that all offenders be fingerprinted on monday march 18 41 year old raymond edmonds pleaded guilty in an ordinary court and was fined 400 before being released as per standard procedure edmonds fingerprints were sent to the central fingerprint bureau in sydney for filing several days later at around 5 p.m on thursday march 21 raymond edmonds fingerprints were examined by a senior detective working late at sydney's central fingerprint bureau the index fingers were strongly defined while a scar cut across the little finger on the right hand he immediately recognized them as matching a set of prints that victorian detectives had left at the office eight months prior that belonged to a serial rapist and suspected killer known only as mr stinky raymond edmonds was born in melbourne on march 12 1944 as his birth mother was young and unwed edmonds was adopted by a married couple named harold and amavis edmonds though he wouldn't learn of his adoption until his teenage years he was the couple's only child and they doted on him leading some of the family's relatives to believe he was spoiled and undisciplined by the time edmonds was six years old he started exhibiting signs of being withdrawn and struggled to connect with others harold edmonds was a businessman who bought and sold farms and his family often relocated to various towns throughout victoria for his work in the mid-1950s when edmonds was 13 years old the family made their sixth move since his adoption around the same time his father purchased him a gift an automatic mossberg 22 rifle with a fold-down grip as a child edmonds had issues with bedwetting which continued through to his early teens on one occasion mavis took her son to see a doctor for a diagnosis the doctor found no physical cause for the problem but noticed that edmonds only had one testicle he prescribed a drug to treat the issue but later confessed to mavis that he had prescribed the incorrect medication one that was used to accelerate puberty mavis shared this information with friends but little else is known about the matter as the doctor's records were not retained as a teenager edmonds didn't form any close friendships with other boys his age and was almost exclusively fixated on sex and young women when he was 16 years old he impregnated a girl who gave the child up for adoption at 17 edmonds was seduced by an older woman who was a friend of his family they participated in experimental and violent sex and she encouraged him to watch sex acts between herself and her girlfriend years later edmonds admitted quote that was when my problem started in the mid-1960s the family resided in yarrowonga a township roughly 270 kilometers northeast of melbourne on the border of victoria and new south wales it was there that he met leslie crawford a tall blonde teenager two years his junior you The pair had an on and off relationship until Leslie broke up with Edmonds towards the end of the year. They reunited several weeks later, and on Leslie's 16th birthday, they conceived a child. Leslie's parents disliked Edmonds and offered to support their daughter and her baby themselves, but Leslie chose to stay with her child's father in the hopes they could have a happy life together.
The couple married in September of 1961 and moved to a dairy farm where Edmonds and his father worked. Edmonds was unfaithful to Leslie from the outset of their marriage, but was also extremely jealous of any attention she received. When their first child was born, he refused to visit his wife in hospital, and she briefly returned to live with her parents. The couple reconciled again, and soon had a second child.
Edmonds had a violent temper that could erupt at any time, and he often took his anger out on the animals he'd worked with. He earned a reputation for animal cruelty after he almost beat a cow to death with an iron chain, an incident that deeply disturbed to those who witnessed it. On another occasion, he killed a farm dog that had taken an instant dislike to him. In retaliation, a furious co-worker leapt on Edmonds and stabbed him in the arm with a knife.
Leslie was also a victim of Edmonds' violence. He beat and raped her often, and abused her emotionally and financially by humiliating her in front of other people and withholding money. By the time Leslie was nineteen, she was pregnant with the couple's third child. Around this time, she walked in on Edmonds molesting their three-year-old daughter.
Leslie began to scream, and her husband simply exited the room in silence. Like his father, Edmonds never stayed in one place for too long. By 1966, Edmonds and Leslie lived with their three young children on a dairy farm in Arkmona, a rural area ten kilometers west of Shepparton. On the evening of February 10, 1966, the night Gary Haywood and Abinam and Dill went missing, Edmonds went out for the evening, and didn't return.
The next morning, Leslie heard the news about the two missing teenagers on the radio and felt a twinge of suspicion, wondering where her husband had been the night before, but ultimately dismissed her concerns. During the investigation into the double homicide, a police officer visited the farm in Arkmona to question Edmonds, only to discover he and his family had since relocated to New South Wales. The officer indicated they would alert their interstate counterparts that Edmonds was wanted for questioning, but the lead wasn't pursued further. By 1968, Leslie had given up any hope that her husband would change.
She returned to live with her parents, and as punishment, Edmonds refused to let her have any contact with their children, and she didn't see them for four years. Several years later, Edmonds began a romantic relationship with his live-in housekeeper, Colleen, who had two children. By 1971, the couple had a child together and moved to the inner Melbourne suburb of Richmond, where Edmonds took a job as a tram conductor. He officially divorced Leslie and married Colleen.
By mid-1975, Edmonds was working as a night patrolman for a security firm in Melbourne's eastern suburbs, but was eager to relocate again. He moved to a farm in the Gitzland town of Officer, which was close enough to commute to Melbourne for work. At the end of 1976, he took another farm-share job at a property in Chelsea Heights, a bayside suburb in Melbourne's south. Police in Melbourne were notified as soon as the detectives in Sydney matched Edmonds' fingerprints to those of Mr.
Stinkey. Suspecting he was still in Aubrey, arrangements were immediately made for investigators to travel there, but before that could happen, he was tracked to a factory in the Melbourne suburb of Hyatt. At 7.50am on Friday, March 22, 1985, Detectives Dennis Hanna and Ken Mansell went to the factory, and instantly recognized the man behind the front desk in the foreman's office, as Raymond Edmonds. He remained calm as the detectives told him he was being taken into custody for questioning over the murders of a young Shepparton couple in 1966.
At the time, Victorian law only permitted police interviews to run for a maximum of six hours, so time was of the essence for the detectives. State laws also allowed people to decline having their fingerprints or footprints taken, but Edmonds consented to both. Although his fingerprints matched those taken from Gary Haywood's vehicle, he staunchly denied any connection to the double homicide. When asked if he had been in Shepparton at the time, he evasively replied, I might, and might not have been.
He also denied responsibility for any of the rapes that occurred throughout Melbourne in the 1970s, but as the interview progressed, his confidence began to fade. He refused to look the investigators in the eyes, averting his gaze and giving listless responses. Shortly after 10.30am, Edmonds finally cracked, stating, I've asked myself why many times. I don't want to hurt anyone anymore.
Although he wasn't religious, he asked the detectives to contact a priest whom he could confess his crimes to, who could then relay the information to police. A Catholic priest was summoned, and the pair spoke in privacy for 15 minutes before the detectives were called back into the room, with Edmonds agreeing to repeat his confession. On the night of February 10, 1966, Edmonds claimed he went to Shepparton and met a large group of people outside a hotel on the town's main street, who introduced him to Gary Haywood and Abena Medill. When the rest of the group left to attend the mod-spectacular concert at the Civic Center, Gary and Abena invited him to go for a drive in Gary's car.
During the course of the drive, Edmonds claimed that Abena climbed into the back seat and they engaged in consensual sex, which made Gary angry and jealous. As he drove, Gary revealed he was carrying a .22 caliber automatic sawn-off rifle, and started shooting out the driver's side window. They eventually arrived at the rural riverside village of Murchison, where Edmonds and Gary went for a walk. They got into an argument about Abena, and Edmonds shot Gary.
When he returned to the car and told Abena that Gary was dead, she tried to run away, but Edmonds chased her and beat her to death. He claimed he had ditched the murder weapon near her body, despite it never being recovered from the scene. Edmonds concluded his confession by saying, I'm fit and healthy, but I must be sick in the head. I think I need destroying.
The detectives showed Edmonds a film made in 1966 that recreated the movements of Gary Haywood's car on the night of February 10. He identified the teenager's F.J. Holden, as well as various local landmarks. While this confirmed he had knowledge of the crime, the detectives didn't believe his version of events in the slightest, as many key details didn't add up.
Physical evidence indicated the victims had been tied up, but Edmonds claimed he had no memory of doing this. In addition, several witness statements placed Gary and Abena away from the hotel during the period Edmonds claimed to have met them there. He also denied ever owning a firearm, and claimed the rifle belonged to Gary Haywood, but Gary's family established he had never owned a gun. Raymond Edmonds was formally charged with the double homicide.
He was also charged with three counts of rape and two counts of assault with intent to rape in relation to five attacks committed by the Donvale rapist. When his wife Colleen asked if he really murdered the two teenagers, he admitted, yes. Word of the arrest spread through Shepparton, providing both relief and sorrow to the families of the victims and to those wrongfully accused. At the time of Gary Haywood and Abena Medill's murders, Edmonds was twenty-one years old and worked at a dairy farm in Art Mona that belonged to the Gorn family.
He got along well with the family's sixteen-year-old son, Stuart, and the pair often went out shooting foxes and rabbits together. In 1985, Stuart was in his mid-thirties and still resided on the dairy farm. When he heard the news that Raymond Edmonds had been arrested for the infamous double homicide, he immediately recognized his name, and recalled that a detective had visited the farm following the murders looking for Edmonds. At the time, the Gorn family had assumed his name must have come up when police were looking for Mossberg rifle owners.
News of the arrest also prompted Stuart to remember that years earlier he had found a cut-off piece of a gunstock and a telescopic sight from a rifle in a shed that Edmonds had used during his time on the farm. He called the Shepparton police to report the discoveries. This information was hugely significant for investigators, as they had not retained records of the officer visiting the farm in 1966 to question Edmonds, and were unaware that he ever owned a Mossberg rifle. On Sunday March 24, detectives visited the Gorn's dairy farm to collect the items.
Stuart showed them a spot where he and Edmonds used to shoot targets, and the decision was made to dig for ballistics evidence. A large quantity of soil was excavated from the area, revealing nine .22 caliber cartridge cases that matched those found near the bodies of Abina Medill and Gary Haywood 20 years earlier. Forensic evidence also confirmed that the pieces of the gunstock and the telescopic sight would fit a .352K model Mossberg. Despite Edmonds' confession, he was yet to enter a plea, and was remanded in custody while detectives continued building a case against him.
They traced his movements over the years and discovered that unsolved sexual assaults had occurred in every area he had resided. Investigators believed Edmonds was responsible for 27 other rape and assault cases, but he had since retained a lawyer and refused to respond to any subsequent questioning. Without a formal interview, police were unable to press charges. They conducted extensive interviews with Edmonds' ex-wife Leslie and his current spouse Colleen, uncovering detailed information about his violent and sexually abusive tendencies.
Leslie admitted that she had intuitively believed Edmonds could be responsible for the murders of Gary Haywood and Abina Medill from the start, but refrained from going to the police because she didn't truly think he was capable of the crime. She had also been concerned that her suspicions would be dismissed as an unhappy wife trying to get her husband in trouble. Investigators compiled 260 pages of statements taken from 66 witnesses, and managed to debunk Edmonds' original confession, confirming that his father had given him a Mossberg rifle when he was a teenager. A 5,000-word summary of the case was prepared ahead of Edmonds' committal hearing, with detectives outlining their theory that the accused had kidnapped his victims when they were sitting in Gary's Holden near Lake Victoria.
He then held them at gunpoint, forcing Gary to drive to Murchison East, where he restrained him with stockings before raping Abina. Gary likely managed to break free, prompting Edmonds to shoot him, before finally killing Abina. On Monday, October 21, 1985, Edmonds' committal hearing commenced at the Melbourne Magistrates' Court, where he pleaded not guilty to all seven charges. Evidence was presented over five days, after which the magistrate concluded there was enough evidence for the case to proceed to trial.
While awaiting trial, Edmonds changed his plea to guilty of all charges. On Thursday, April 3, 1986, he appeared at the Melbourne Supreme Court to receive his sentencing. The state of Victoria abolished capital punishment in 1975, meaning had Edmonds been caught in 1966 when he carried out the murders, he would have faced the death penalty. Instead, for the murders of Gary Haywood and Abina Medill, he was sentenced to two terms of life imprisonment, with no minimum term.
Sentencing for the three rapes and two attempted sexual assaults took place on Tuesday, October 28, 1986. Justice Alastair Nicholson remarked, You chose women who were alone, or who were caring for young children, as your prey. You attacked them at night in what must have been horrifying circumstances. In four cases, you had a knife.
The fact that you raped these women with children and bent with them just didn't matter to you. You treated women as some sort of inferior species upon which you could inflict your desires. He then sentenced Edmonds to an additional 30 years. Following his older brother's murder, Alan Haywood had been consumed by thoughts of vengeance.
In a 1987 interview with journalist and author Andrew Rule, Alan revealed how his family had struggled to cope in the aftermath of the violent crime. Though his father was still alive, his mother's health deteriorated following Gary's death, and she passed away nine years later. For months after the murders, Alan carried a sawn-off rifle in his school bag, terrified that his brother's killer would pursue him next. He practiced shooting and became a crack shot, hoping the opportunity for revenge would one day present itself.
When Raymond Edmonds was arrested, Alan thought his chance had finally arrived, and considered attending the committal hearing to execute the murderer himself. His wife talked him out of it by pointing out that revenge was futile, as he would only be putting his family through more suffering and destroying his own life. In 1988, Andrew Rule published a book about Edmonds' crimes titled Cuckoo. In it, he described how a number of Edmonds' survivors experienced ongoing trauma and suffered personal losses as a result of his crimes, but found support in one another and the detectives who investigated their cases.
Since his capture, Raymond Edmonds has been considered a suspect in several other high-profile cult cases. During his first police interview on March 22, 1985, Edmonds became morose and began to make references towards the murders of two other young women, but the six-hour interview limit was reached before the detectives would question him further. The first was 17-year-old Bronwyn Richardson, who was abducted outside a supermarket in Aubrey in October 1973. Her semi-naked body was discovered in the Murray River two days later, with an autopsy revealing she had been raped and strangled.
Her clothes were folded neatly nearby, in a similar manner to the way Abina Medill's clothing had been found in 1966. Several men have been charged with Bronwyn's murder over the years, but the case has never preceded the trial. The second crime took place on Thursday, January 3, 1980. 39-year-old Elaine Jones was camping with her husband Alan and their two children in the riverside town of Tockemoor, near the New South Wales and Victorian border.
She walked to a shop two kilometers away to buy chocolates and cigarettes, but never returned. The following morning, Alan and their seven-year-old daughter discovered Elaine's naked body in the Murray River while out in their dinghy. She had been sexually assaulted, her skull was fractured, and her throat had been cut. As Alan attempted to pull her body into the boat, he suffered a heart attack and died, resulting in their daughter having to swim to shore alone to seek help.
Raymond Edmonds was reported to have been camping 17 kilometers away on a Lubner island at the time, leaving the campsite the same night that Elaine disappeared. Edmonds has also been linked to the unsolved disappearance of eight-year-old Eloise Wallidge, who was abducted from her home in the bayside suburb of Beaumaris on the night of Monday, January 12, 19th, 19th, 19th, 19th. Her home was 14 kilometers northwest from the Chelsea Heights farmhouse that Edmunds moved into later that same year. In 2003, an inquest into Eloise's disappearance mentioned that Edmunds had been investigated in relation to the case, but no conclusive evidence was uncovered proving his involvement.
He has also been listed as a person of interest in the slayings of six women in Tainong North, covered in episode 46 of Case File, but was ultimately dismissed as a suspect. Demandatory process in New South Wales of fingerprinting all offenders was crucial to the eventual apprehension of Edmunds. At the time, Victoria lacked a similar policy, and had Edmunds been arrested across the border, he may have gone undetected. Since then, Victoria has been an early adopter of forensic advancements, and was the first state in Australia to introduce widespread criminal DNA testing in the early 1990s.
In 2002, Victoria was also the first to introduce the requirement that all offenders of serious crimes provide DNA samples. In 2017, the pull case team of Victoria's sexual crime squad launched a review of the investigations into crimes suspected to have been committed by Raymond Edmunds. In January 2019, he was charged with 31 historical offenses relating to 11 different incidents that took place across six Melbourne suburbs beginning in 1971. The charges included eight counts of rape, three counts of indecent assault, one of abduction of a female by force, two counts of false imprisonment, one count of grievous bodily harm, and ten counts of burglary.
On Wednesday, September 11, 2019, the now 75-year-old Raymond Edmunds formally pleaded guilty to all of the new charges. Two weeks later, he was sentenced to an additional 23 years and five months on top of his existing life sentences. Following the announcement of these charges, Detective Inspector Steve Wilson of the Sexual Crime Squad told the media. I want victims to feel heartened that we are charging someone this week over incidents that occurred as much as 47 years ago.
It is never too late for you to speak to police, to come forward and tell your story, or make a report. I also want offenders to understand that police won't give up trying to provide these victims with the justice they deserve. Thank you.