Dear Rachelle podcast dominates Apple, Spotify charts

A podcast about the murder of young woman Rachelle Childs has had more than 2 million downloads. Listen to the hit podcast.

More than two million people have now downloaded the multimedia investigation into the murder of Rachelle Childs, 24 years ago.

The Dear Rachelle podcast is the number one series on Apple in Australia, and is also performing well in the UK and New Zealand, as it reinvestigates evidence from the cold case with the help of Rachelle’s family and ex-detectives.

Rachelle Childs, 23, was murdered, set on fire and left on the side of a lonely highway near Gerroa, on the NSW south coast, in June 2001.

There was a lengthy police investigation at the time, but it was marred with incompetence and ultimately failed to identify the killer. As a result, Rachelle’s case ended up languishing at the back of police unsolved homicide files.

Murdered Bargo woman Rachelle Childs’ burning body was found at Gerroa on June 8, 2001. Dear Rachelle, the multimedia investigation into her cold case, is a hit on Spotify and Apple.

The podcast team at News Corp has been working with Rachelle’s family and ex-detectives to reinvestigate long-forgotten evidence, along with the alibi of the chief suspect – her former boss Kevin Steven Correll, who has consistently denied murdering Rachelle and has never been charged.

Mr Correll and Rachelle sold used cars at Camden Holden when she died. What Rachelle and the rest of the community probably didn’t know was that he was previously acquitted of four sexual assaults under his birth name, Kevin Cornwall.

LISTEN TO THE PODCAST BELOW:

Past allegations aside, it’s possible Mr Correll was one of the last people to see Rachelle alive when she left work for the last time on June 7, before she died.

Later that night, a number of motorists saw a car that matched the description of Rachelle’s prized Commodore along the highway between her home in Bargo and Gerroa, where her body was uncovered.

A coronial inquest into Rachelle’s death in 2006 delivered an open finding, but ex-detectives working with the podcast say the case is “solvable”.

For more information about our investigation, visit dearachelle.com.au

If you have any tips or confidential information, please contact investigative journalist Ashlea Hansen at [e-mail].

You can also join our Dear Rachelle podcast Facebook group.