Cold case secrets taken to the grave — and the one suspect’s death that may provide answers
A BABY missing after his dad snatched him then died in a head-on crash; a sex monster’s sick trophies from unknown victims. Too many offenders have taken their secrets to the grave — but one prime suspect’s death is delivering new clues.
Cold Cases
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WE hear it so often in police appeals, a family’s desperate need for answers after a loved one is murdered or disappears.
When a key suspect dies, the fear is those answers will never be forthcoming, the secrets that could offer some closure taken to the grave.
True Crime Australia: Cold cases, behind the scenes and more
In so many Australian mysteries the perpetrator — or suspected perpetrator — is no longer alive.
But in at least one case, there is a fresh hope for answers, as the death of the key person of interest delivers new clues.
DARREN ‘JASON’ SHANNON
While the unanswered questions left by any cold case are devastating for all involved, the circumstances surrounding the disappearance of baby Jason Shannon in South Australia are utterly heartbreaking.
Jason was almost 11 months old when he was snatched from his grandparents’ Elizabeth West home and driven off by his mentally-ill father during an access visit in June 1973.
Two hours later dad John ‘Barry’ Shannon died in a head-on collision, but when the wreckage from the crash was searched there was no sign of the baby.
Police have two theories — that Jason was murdered by his father and the body disposed of or that he was given to someone else to raise, someone who has never come forward in all the years that have passed.
Jason is listed on the Crime Stoppers site as “missing, presumed murdered”.
In 2016, Jason’s mother Michelle told The Advertiser that she still clung to a faint hope that her son was alive.
“I think any human being would have that hope,’’ she said. “I say a prayer every night and I talk to him during the day.”
A $1 million reward is on offer for information leading to anyone involved in Jason’s disappearance or the recovery of his remains.
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LEONARD JOHN FRASER
Serial rapist-turned-killer Leonard Fraser was serving life sentences over the deaths of three women and a schoolgirl when he died, aged 55, on New Year’s Day, 2007.
He had been investigated over up to five other murders, in both Queensland and NSW, but police could not find enough evidence — and a bigger mystery remains.
When Queensland police searched his Rockhampton home after his arrest for the murder of nine-year-old Keyra Steinhardt, they found trophies he’d kept from women he’d attacked.
Among them were ponytails from three different women that had been cut off at the base, with hair bands still attached.
Forensic testing could not determine who they belonged to — but they definitely weren’t from any of Fraser’s known victims.
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Keyra was the last of those, killed in April 1999 as she crossed a vacant lot on her way home from school.
Sylvia Benedetti, 19, had been killed just four days earlier, and Beverley Leggo, 36, the previous month.
Fraser’s fourth conviction was over the death of 39-year-old Julie Turner, strangled with her own bra, in December 1998.
How many more he killed may never been known.
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WANDA BEACH MURDERS
The disappearance and murder of 15-year-old friends Marianne Schmidt and Christine Sharrock at Cronulla, Sydney, in January 1965 is one of Australia’s most infamous unsolved crimes.
The key suspects include not one, but two, notorious killers who’ve died leaving questions over the true extent of their vile crimes: Christopher Bernard Wilder, known as the Beauty Queen Killer, and child killer Derek Percy.
Percy’s name has been linked to nine child disappearances and murders in the 1960s, and he was jailed indefinitely over the 1969 killing of 12-year-old Yvonne Tuohy in Victoria, having been found criminally insane.
In October 2014, more than a year after his death, a coroner ruled Percy caused the death of Linda Stilwell, who was just seven when she disappeared from Melbourne’s Luna Park 50 years ago.
As well as the Wanda Beach murders, his name has been connected to the 1966 disappearance of the three Beaumont children — Jane, nine, Arnna, seven, and Grant, four — in Adelaide, the 1966 murder of six-year-old Allen Redston in Canberra and the 1968 murder of three-year-old Simon Brook in Sydney.
Percy’s movements — he was staying with relatives in Sydney, near where Marianne and Christine lived in Ryde, at the time they were killed — descriptions of suspects at the crime scenes and his own evil writings variously suggest Percy’s involvement in the tragic cases. But even when he was dying from cancer in 2013, Percy never confessed.
Detective Wayne Newman visited him daily, looking for answers, but says Percy “didn’t let his guard down”.
“We are confident he was the offender for Linda, Simon Brook and I think for Christine Sharrock and Marianne Schmidt at Wanda Beach,” he was quoted as saying in 2014.
However retired Wanda Beach cold case detective Ian Waterson thinks differently, firmly pointing the finger at Christopher Wilder, who was living in Ryde at the time of the killings, was a known sex offender, and went on to attack multiple women in America in a 1984 cross-country abduction, rape and murder spree.
Wilder moved to the US in 1969 — the same year he had been named to police by his wife as a suspect in the Wanda Beach murders, Sunday Night reported this year.
He is thought to have killed at least eight women in the US, and attacked and possibly killed many more, and is known to have lured victims with the promise of modelling work.
“In my mind, it would have to be Christopher Wilder because there are so many signs to this guy that point to his sexual deviancy, his propensity for violence and (he) was around in Sydney at the time, hung around the beaches,” Waterson told Channel 7.
Writing in The Australian , earlier this year, Alan Whiticker, author of Wanda: The Untold Story of the Wanda Beach Murders, also addressed the main suspects in the case, noting Percy “preyed on children, not girls his own age”.
“When I asked a serving homicide detective why they thought Wilder was their man, they simply said to look at his MO — he was able to sweet-talk young women into going with him to have their photos taken,” he wrote. “‘That’s what we think he did to Christine and Marianne to lure them into the dunes in 1965,’ the detective said.”
Wilder was on the FBI’s most wanted list when his deadly road trip ended in a confrontation with police in New Hampshire. In a struggle with a state trooper, he was fatally shot through the heart.
Despite the theories, more than 50 years on, the Wanda Beach murders remain as mysterious as when they were first committed.
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MEGAN MULQUINEY
In sharp contrast, the death of a suspect has brought new information for investigators seeking answers over the 1984 disappearance of Canberra teenager Megan Mulquiney.
There has been no trace of the 17-year-old since she was last seen outside Woden Plaza at 12.30pm on Saturday 28 July, 34 years ago, after leaving work at Big W.
But the death of suspect Paul Vincent Phillips in April this year has prompted a number of people to come forward with information — and importantly police now believe Phillips did not act alone.
“Paul Phillips spent the majority of his adult life incarcerated for a series of violent sexual offences against young women,” said Detective Senior Constable Emma-Lea Beere.
“The investigation into Megan’s disappearance did not die with Paul Phillips and we continue in our search for answers.”
Police said Phillips was acknowledged as the prime suspect at a 2009 inquest into Megan’s disappearance that determined she was likely murdered.
Megan’s appearance — young looking, petite and with shoulder-length hair worn loose — matched his other victims, and Phillips was known to prey on women in car parks.
Calling for further assistance in the wake of the new information provided after Phillips death, Senior Constable Patrick O’Brien said police were motivated “on a daily basis” to get answers for Megan’s family.
”We believe there are people in the community that do know the circumstances of Megan’s disappearance or may be able to assist us at least in our investigation,” he said.
“It may be that those people carry a significant burden, whether they know the whereabouts of Megan or the circumstances, we implore them to come speak with us.”
The two officers can be contacted directly via a dedicated mobile number — 0457 844 917 — with information on the case.
Originally published as Cold case secrets taken to the grave — and the one suspect’s death that may provide answers