Melbourne’s most terrifying random murders

These are Melbourne’s most shocking and senseless killings carried out against random targets.

The faces of the killers responsible for some of Melbourne’s most disturbing murders.

Crimes of passion, rage or malice are horrifying, but perhaps they are easier for us to process because they can be explained.

What motivates someone to commit the gravest of crimes against a person they’ve never met is the stuff of nightmares.

In part two of this series, here are more of the senseless, random murders that have become the darkest parts of Victoria’s criminal history.

Schoolgirl Yvonne Tuohy was murdered in 1969.

Yvonne Tuohy’s friend Shane Spiller.

YVONNE TUOHY

On the day Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin took their historic steps on the moon, sadistic paedophile killer Derek Percy abducted and murdered 12-year-old Yvonne Tuohy at Warneet.

Yvonne, a local girl, had befriended Shane Spiller, 11, on holiday from Melbourne.

The pair was walking towards Ski Beach when Percy, driving an orange Datsun wagon with a navy sticker on the rear window, grabbed Yvonne. Shane, who threatened Percy with a tomahawk he was carrying to chop wood, fended off Percy, but there was no escape for Yvonne.

Shane described Percy’s car to police. Percy, a sailor stationed at HMAS Cerberus, was arrested that night at the base trying to wash Yvonne’s blood from his clothing. He later took detectives to Yvonne’s mutilated body, hidden under bushes at Devon Meadows.

Derek Percy abducted and murdered 12-year-old Yvonne Tuohy.

Shane later came face-to-face with Percy at Russell St police headquarters to identify him. The ordeal haunted him until his own bizarre disappearance in 2002.

Percy was jailed for life with no parole in 1970.

He was suspected of a string of child murders in the 1960s including the Wanda Beach murders in Sydney, the disappearance of the Beaumont Children in Adelaide and the abduction of Linda Stillwell in St Kilda in 1968 but he died of cancer in prison in 2013, taking any secrets he had to the grave.

Eurydice Dixon was killed in 2018.

EURYDICE DIXON

Jaymes Todd snuffed out a promising comedian when he raped and murdered Eurydice Dixon in Princes Park.

Ms Dixon, 22, was studying childcare and lived in a Parkville share house as she worked to establish herself in the Melbourne comedy scene.

She had appeared in the Melbourne International Comedy Festival and left a gig at the Highlander Bar in the city about 10.30pm with a friend on June 12, 2018. The pair separated about 11pm when Ms Dixon decided to walk home.

When Ms Dixon cut across a darkened soccer pitch, Todd pounced. Police believe he had stalked her for 4.5km.

Shortly before the attack, Ms Dixon sent a text to her boyfriend: “I’m almost home safe HBU (how about you?)”

Her body was found about 2.40am.

Eurydice Dixon was stalked for several kilometres before she was murdered.

Police were criticised heavily for warning women to be aware of their surroundings and their safety.

Women responded savagely, saying the onus was on men not to rape and kill women.

A vigil attracting thousands was held at the spot where Ms Dixon’s body was found, and around Australia. A man, Andrew Nolch, desecrated floral tributes to Ms Dixon left at Princes Park by painting lewd images in what he described as a protest for men’s rights.

He was charged with criminal damage and initially escaped with a community corrections order, but was later jailed for five months after repeatedly breaching those orders.

Todd surrendered to police on June 20 when CCTV images showing him stalking Eurydice were released.

Todd, who has Asperger’s syndrome, pleaded guilty and in March 2019 was sentenced to life with a minimum 35 years’ jail. He later appealed for a lesser sentence given his Asperger’s and his guilty plea, but the appeal was dismissed.

High school student Masa Vukotic was murdered in 2015.

MASA VUKOTIC

Depraved killer Sean Christian Price stalked, raped and murdered aspiring lawyer Masa Vukotic as she walked 500m from her Doncaster home.

Price, then 31, attacked the 17-year-old VCE student on the evening of March 17, 2015. He confronted Masa on the path in the Koonung Creek Linear Reserve, dragged her into bushes, raped her and stabbed her 49 times.

She was listening to headphones as she walked and may not have heard Price approaching.

Price pleaded guilty to a string of offences including Masa’s murder committed in a two-day spree including robbery, rape and attempted theft before he handed himself into police.

Masa Vukotic’s killer Sean Price. Picture: Jake Nowakowski

In a December 2015 pre-sentence hearing, the Supreme Court heard Price told police that he decided to kill Masa because she was “dressed like a yuppie” and “started talking to a bird like … Snow White”.

He had the urge to kill someone, he said. “This one just ended up being the one.”

Price was under a supervision order when he went on his two-day rampage, the court heard.

He had a long criminal record. Price was jailed in 2004 for charges including rape and indecent assault. He was released in 2010, then jailed again for criminal damage and unlawful assault.

He threatened to kill a prison officer and the man’s family before his release in October 2014.

Price was on a 10-year supervision order when he attacked Masa, a situation Premier Daniel Andrews and trial judge Lex Lasry described as a “catastrophic” failure of the justice system.

The day before Masa died, Price’s corrections officer noted that Price was hostile and agitated, and had previously been paranoid, misogynistic and tending towards aggression.

Sensationally, Price sacked his defence counsel during the pre-sentence hearing, choosing to defend himself and asking the court for no leniency.

He was later sentenced to life with a minimum of 38 years’ jail for Masa’s rape and murder and 41 years in total for other offences including a breach of his supervision order. His sentenced was reduced to a minimum of 40 years on appeal in 2019.

Ivy McLeod was one of three women murdered by a serial killer in 1942.

BROWNOUT MURDERS

The crimes of American GI Edward Leonski shocked and horrified wartime Melbourne.

Leonski, a US Army Private, was stationed at Camp Pell in Royal Park along with thousands of other GIs in temporary digs in 1942.

He strangled and murdered three Melbourne women under cover of darkness in just 15 days. All three were found partially naked.

The body of Ivy McLeod, 40, was found in Albert Park on May 3, 1942. On May 9, 31-year-old Pauline Thompson was found dead outside her home in Spring St in the city after a night out with a man with an American accent. Then, on May 18, Gladys Hosking was killed in Parkville walking home from Melbourne University, where she worked.

One of the victims Pauline Thompson.

Victim Gladys Hosking.

That night, a woman described an American man – dishevelled, covered in mud and seeming out of breath – approached her asking for directions. Her description matched those of several others who survived attacks in the days before.

Leonski, 24, a man who was noted for his broad grin, was arrested at Camp Pell soon after. He admitted to all three murders.

Leonski faced a US military court martial rather than a criminal trial in July 1942. He was condemned to death and was hanged at Pentridge Prison on November 9, 1942.

Police tape at Beaumaris where Jason Stone’s body was found. Picture: Eugene Hyland

JASON STONE

In one of the most bizarre cases of its type, Jason Stone was murdered by a stranger on the direction of another man his killer had only just met.

Timothy Michael Bennison, 35, was introduced to Terry Mitchell on November 8, 2014, by another friend who Bennison had met only a week earlier.

Bennison agreed to rough up Mr Stone after Mitchell told him that Mr Stone owed him money, and that he would be “looked after” for doing the job.

The Supreme Court later heard Mr Stone died following a “sustained, protracted and brutal” attack inside his girlfriend’s Frankston North flat.

Mr Stone was still alive when Bennison and Mitchell bundled him in the boot of a car, bound and with a sock taped into his mouth.

They later dumped Mr Stone’s body in scrub at Ricketts Point in Beaumaris.

Bennison denied his role until pleading guilty on the first day of his trial. He was sentenced to 21 years’ jail with an 18-year minimum for the murder. Mitchell, 51 at the time of the offence, was later jailed for 10 years for manslaughter.