Snowtown locals consider name change to remove the ‘Bodies in the Barrels’ stigma 25-years on

Snowtown locals are seriously considering a formal request to rename their town as the infamous farming community grapples with the “Bodies in the Barrels” stigma 25 years on.

Local leaders from the infamous farming community of Snowtown have “seriously” discussed renaming the town to squash the “Bodies in the Barrels” stigma they have been living with for the past 25-years.

The serial killings which were dubbed, the ‘Snowtown Murders’ or ‘Bodies in the Barrels’, has been a “stain on the community” who have been trying to move away from the troubling moniker.

In the main street of Snowtown lies the empty bank building where police found eight bodies decomposing in barrels in May 1999, with a further three bodies also discovered buried at homes in Adelaide’s north.

Police stand guard outside the abandoned State Bank building in Snowtown following discovery of eight bodies in acid-filled drums in the bank's vault. Picture: Neon Martin

Snowtown Progress Association Chair, Derryn Stringer said there had been a serious discussion among local leaders recently about changing the name of the town for future generations.

“We discussed it quite seriously and it was more about the generations behind us who will have to deal with this,” he said.

“They won’t even know about this or remember, but they’ll keep getting reminded of it.

“We’re a town like any other and we’re trying to keep ourselves relevant and grow our population.”

The Snowtown Murders were committed by John Justin Bunting, Robert Joe Wagner and James Spyridon Vlassakis between August 1992 and May 1999, in and around Adelaide, with each killer given multiple life sentences.

Accomplice, Mark Haydon was convicted for 25-years for helping to dispose of the bodies, and is set to be released into the community this month.

Mark Haydon walks from the Adelaide Pre Release Centre at Northfield. Picture: 7NEWS

Haydon, right, with Robert Joe Wagner, left, and John Justin Bunting, centre.

Despite only one victim being killed in Snowtown, the town has been “branded”, Mr Stringer said, which often attracts tourists for the wrong reasons.

“It’s dark tourism so, people come in to gawk and take a photo, then have a bit of a cold shiver then drive out again and there’s nothing positive in that,” he said.

“Like, it’s just been branded and if people had done the right thing from the beginning and called it the Bunting-Murders then I think this issue wouldn’t be apparent.”

Local member for Narungga, Fraser Ellis, told the Advertiser that locals had approached him regarding the name being changed, with suggestions to give it a traditional Indigenous name, or “Rosetown”, which has also been thrown in the mix.

“I have been approached by a couple members of the community, just raising the prospect of whether a name change would help alleviate some of that adverse reputation,” he said.

“The crimes have come to be known as the Snowtown Murders, when in actual fact, they weren’t committed in Snowtown.

“It’s like they (locals) are almost the secondary character in the story and they’ve been lumped with the entity of the adverse reputation.”

Mr Ellis said it had been “unfair” on the community for the past 25-years and that there were no immediate plans to act on changing the name soon unless there was a consensus among locals.