Dogged police work leads to fresh arrests in cold cases of McCulkin family and Gerhard Wagner
THIS week’s dramatic arrests over decades-old murders reveal how Queensland detectives never give up in the tireless pursuit of justice.
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THEY’RE Queensland’s greatest mysteries – more than 170 cold-case murders dating back to the 1950s that have baffled generations of police.
Detectives this week made dramatic inroads into their number, laying charges over the murders of five people in a series of breakthroughs.
And the charges are expected to continue, with The Courier-Mail told that police will seek to use new double jeopardy laws for the first time on a cold-case murder from the 1990s.
The State Government this year overhauled laws to allow police to recharge suspects in historic cases when compelling new evidence emerges.
Before this week there were 178 cold case murders on the Queensland Police Service books, but following the spate of charges the number has been slashed.
Other cases remain under investigation and further arrests were a matter of time, said the head of the homicide squad, Detective Superintendent Steve Holahan.
“We’re going through all of them and reviewing them,” he said. “Numerous people have worked on these investigations over the years, and some of them have been revisited several times.
“It’s very challenging.
“The people that can do these sorts of protracted investigations – sometimes just one or two officers going through the evidence methodically – it is a skill.
“These officers are very committed and certainly when you’re dealing with families and you see the impact, how distasteful some of these crimes are, these investigators are very intent on getting the right outcome.”
For 40 years, mystery has cloaked the disappearance of Barbara McCulkin and her daughters Vicki, 13, and Leanne, 11, from their home at Highgate Hill.
But last weekend police charged Vincent O’Dempsey, 76, and Gary “Shorty” Reginald DuBois, 67, with the 1974 triple-murder, deprivation of liberty and other offences.
On Wednesday, detectives made a separate arrest over the disappearance of wealthy bachelor Gerhard Wagner, who was last seen leaving a friend’s Brisbane boat shed in 1999.
Mr Wagner’s nephew, Robert James Wagner, 53, was charged with his murder, interfering with a corpse and stealing.
And Terry James Freeman, 41, was this week charged over the prison murder of 20-year-old inmate Jason Evans at Sir David Longland prison in 1995.
Freeman was charged this year with the separate cold-case murder of 22-year-old Clayton McFazdean at the same prison in 1998.
The homicide squad’s Cold Case Investigation Unit investigates crimes dating back to the murder of Betty Shanks, 22, as she walked to her Grange home in 1952.
While colleagues respond to new murders – there are about 50 a year in Queensland – the cold-case detectives work in the background on investigations that have stumped police.
Under a formal process, a committee made up of detectives, scientific officers and a representative of the Coroner assesses whether cold cases can be progressed.
“We review all the material. With a fresh set of eyes, sometimes there are things that someone might not have been picked up,” Supt Holahan said.
“There may be new investigative strategies that are available now that weren’t available back then, or new forensic techniques.
“We’ve got forensic reviews happening on quite a lot of them at the moment.
“That’s not something that’s a quick process. That’s a matter of going through each of the exhibits … having them sent off and DNA profiles being identified and run against databases.”
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MYSTERIES THAT CONTINUE TO HAUNT US …
MARILYN WALLMAN: WHEN former students of North Mackay High School’s Class 9C of 1972 held a reunion in July, there was a gaping absence from their ranks.
Marilyn Wallman was 14 when she vanished on her way to the school that year, with her brothers finding her abandoned bicycle with its wheels still spinning.
She has never been found and her classmates – men and women now in their fifties – thought of the life she missed as they gathered together.
“We want to bring Marilyn home. Talk to your family. Talk to your friends,” reunion organiser Kay Jenner wrote on Facebook.
“Somewhere, someone knows something. The Wallman family deserve to know what happened.
“One conversation, one memory may make help solve the mystery and change the lives of Marilyn’s family.”
In February police excavated a Mackay backyard in search of Marilyn’s remains, but no discovery was made.
Her brother David said then: “For the last 42 years, we’ve never known where she is and we’ve never had a gravesite to go and visit her on her birthday.”
To pass on information on cold cases, contact Crime Stoppers on 1800 333 000.
GARY VENAMORE: The well-known socialite was found dead in the Brisbane River at New Farm in 1968 after last being seen leaving a nightclub. The 35-year-old had been bashed and drowned after being thrown in the water. Mr Venamore had been badly beaten to the head and body. Police suspect two people were involved in the murder. Reward: $250,000
BETTY SHANKS: The 22-year-old was murdered walking to her Grange home in 1952. She had been brutally assaulted. It is the state’s oldest official cold case.
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ANITA CUNNINGHAM & ROBIN HOINVILLE-BARTRAM: The teenagers vanished while hitchhiking from Melbourne to Bowen along the Flinders Highway in 1972. Robin was shot twice in the head and her skeletal remains were found under a bridge near Charters Towers in July 1972. Anita’s body has never been found. Reward: $250,000
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