Mysteries in the Dandenong Ranges: Black panthers, missing TV chef
From roaming black panthers to missing TV chefs, these are the mysteries that haunt Melbourne’s hills.
Outer East
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From elusive big cats to unsolved missing person cases, here are some of the biggest mysteries that still haunt the outer east.
Big cats
It has long been rumoured that black cats roam the Yarra Ranges. There have been many unexplained sightings over the years, including as recently as Marchi at Yarra Junction.
Canberra man Arvind Reddy spotted a big “jet black” cat at the Gawler Foundation Retreat Centre, a 16ha property in Yarra Junction, in March.
“I was strolling through the property … and suddenly spotted a giant black animal that looked like a very big cat,” he said.
“It ran away into the bushes within a second. I could see within that time frame it had a catlike face, big black body and a long black tale.”
Mr Reddy had his phone in his pocket so wasn’t unable to capture the creature on camera.
“I just stayed still and didn’t move — it was actually scary to see something like that,” he said.
Two big cats were also sighted by Tim Hurley and his girlfriend near the Maroondah Reservoir at Toolangi in 2016.
Kalorama couple Tim Hurley, 25, and his girlfriend were driving on a bush track near the Maroondah Reservoir, heading to Mt Saint Leonard lookout in Melbourne’s outer east, when they saw two huge black cats on Sunday, December 4.
Mr Hurley said he saw the back of an animal with a long shiny black tail slip into the bush.
Tim Hurley and his girlfriend spotted two big black cats while driving near Toolangi. Picture:
“It was the way it moved, fluid-like, not bounding like a wallaby or fast like a fox,” he said.
“It didn’t seem to be like anything else but a huge cat, the size of a german shepherd.”
Mr Hurley said his girlfriend saw more of the second animal, from its shoulders to its tail, before it also slid into the bush.
There have been hundreds of big cat sightings in Victoria over the years, in locations including Yarra Ranges, Gippsland, and Geelong, despite a 2012 state government report declaring the existence of big cats in the state was “highly unlikely”. The report found that sightings of animals thought to be pumas or similar large cats were more likely to be big feral cats.
But some believe the creatures were the offspring of black panthers brought out as mascots by US soldiers during World War II and released into the bush.
Another theory is that a Monbulk man who owned a miniature zoo about 30 years ago released his animals into the bush when the zoo was closed.
But many discount the big cat theory, claiming the creatures could be feral cats or black wallabies. Others think they might be unidentified Australian predatory cats.
BIG CAT SIGHTINGS
2000: Don Valley
January, 2001: Large paw prints in mud at Glenfern Rd, Upwey
June, 2004: Large paw prints at Warburton East
2005: Cockatoo, Lorne
January 28, 2008: Mt Dandenong
March 24, 2008: Warburton
August 15, 2008: Montrose
August 28, 2009: Warburton
November 27 2009: Healesville
2010: Don Valley, Otways
February, 2012: Seville
May, 2012: Warrandyte State Park
May, 2012: Seville
March, 2015: Grampians
December, 2016: Toolangi
Missing chef Willi Koeppen
For more than 44 years mystery has surrounded the disappearance of chef Wilhelm “Willi” Koeppen from Olinda restaurant The Cuckoo.
Karin and Willi Koeppen started The Cuckoo in 1958.
At the time, Willi was Australia’s most famous ‘MasterChef’ with regular TV and radio shows.
Willi disappeared in 1976 and the case remains an open investigation with the Victoria Police Missing Persons division.
The German-born chef was last seen by friend Dr Bernard Butler sometime between 3am and 4am on February 29, 1976.
Rebecca Johnston-Ryan, the counsel assisting Coroner Judge Sarah Hinchey, in 2018 presented the summary in Mr Koeppen’s suspected death and said it is believed Mr Koeppen was murdered, on or near the date of his disappearance.
Ms Johnston-Ryan said on the night the chef disappeared he was drunk and abusing the restaurant’s staff, including his wife, Karin.
Family friend and GP Dr Butler, rang Mrs Koeppen at midnight and said he was going to visit Mr Koeppen at the restaurant.
According to the summary, Dr Butler and Mr Koeppen drank until 2 or 3am at The Cuckoo, then got in separate cars and drove to the doctor’s house, also in Olinda.
An hour or so later, Dr Butler watched his friend drive away in his Volkswagen Kombi towards his Ferny Creek home sometime between 3 and 4am — the last known sighting of Mr Koeppen.
Only half an hour later, Nivelles Love — a cleaner at The Cuckoo — saw Mr Koeppen’s van in the lower carpark at the restaurant, with its side door open but no one around.
Ms Johnston-Ryan said in the days leading up to his disappearance the chef had been depressed and talked about going to Poole in Queensland with two women.
According to court documents Mr Koeppen, who was prone to mood swings and erratic behaviour, suffered from alcoholism and “appeared” to be suffering from depression.
Karin Koeppen died aged 87 earlier this year — never knowing what happened to her celebrity chef husband Willi.
Houses linked to The Family cult
The hills also have links to notorious cult The Family, lead by Anne Hamilton-Byrne. The Herald Sun previously reported the cult stole children through adoption scams and held them captive at a house at Lake Eildon, north east of Melbourne, in the 1970s and 1980s. The cult also had property at Ferny Creek and Olinda.
Hamilton-Byrne initiated at least 28 children into the cult, stealing some and getting others by brainwashing adult sect members. The children were dressed in identical outfits and had their hair bleached, and claim they were starved, beaten and given drugs including LSD.
Disturbing details of life inside the infamous Australian doomsday cult The Family were laid bare by survivors in a book in 2017.
The notorious religious sect, where leader Hamilton-Byrne proclaimed she was the female reincarnation of Jesus Christ, preached a combination of Buddhism, Hinduism and Christianity.
Under the influence of LSD, Hamilton-Byrne claimed she had a vision to collect children and raise them as her family to protect them from the coming global apocalypse.
Hamilton-Byrne, 97, died while in palliative care in a nursing home in Wantirna South in 2019.
Missing bushwalker case remains unsolved
Warren Meyer disappeared on Easter Sunday — March 23 — 2008, while on a Sunday morning bushwalk at the Dom Dom Saddle near Healesville.
Mystery surrounds the case, which encompasses suspicious factors of illegal drug activity in the area, witness reports of continuous shooting from an automatic weapon, and an escaped psychiatric patient with homicidal tendencies confirmed as being in the area at the time.
It has become one of Australia’s most curious and controversial missing persons’ cases.
Mr Meyer’s family doubled its reward money in 2017 as a last-ditch effort to find their husband and father.
An experienced bushwalker and a fit and healthy 57-year-old, Meyer was well prepared for his 10km walk on Easter Sunday in 2008. He parked his white Subaru Forester at Dom Dom Saddle car park just before 8am on March 23 and began his walk along the Monda Track carrying a bright yellow GPS, a fully charged mobile phone, water and food.
Neither Meyer nor any of his possessions have ever been found.
His family believe it is more likely that Warren came across illegal activity, probably drug-related.
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