Case of missing mum Samantha Murphy evokes memories of Ballarat’s dark past
The mysterious disappearance of Samantha Murphy is the latest in a twisted list of unsolved cold cases from the gold rush region, with many heartbroken families still waiting for closure decades later.
Police & Courts
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The mysterious disappearance of Ballarat mum Samantha Murphy sits atop a list of dark, cruel and twisted unsolved cases that continue to haunt the regional city.
With the search for the 51-year-old jogger approaching its fourth week, several other cold and baffling cases have remained unsolved for several decades.
Police remain tight-lipped about any evidence they have gathered in Ms Murphy’s complex case.
While we know the force have fiercely examined the events leading up to her disappearance, her relationships with family and work colleagues and crucial mobile phone data, the force have been keen to keep those details to themselves.
Speculation continues to run rampant across Ballarat, a town no stranger to puzzling and complex investigations that have provided little answers or closure.
Terry Floyd
Terry Floyd’s grief stricken brother has been campaigning to have old mine shafts in Victoria’s golden triangle searched for decades.
Daryl Floyd suspects his brother’s remains are hidden inside the Morning Star mine shaft at Bung Bong Hill but red tape has so far prohibited investigators from searching it completely.
A state coroner found Terry, 12, had been abducted and murdered in 1975 after he vanished while waiting for a lift on the side of the Pyrenees Highway in Avoca.
Vital funds are needed to excavate the rest of the old shaft after the state government in 2017 pledged $110,000 to the search.
Mr Floyd has donated thousands of his dollars to the cause but about 20 per cent of the shaft remains unexplored.
Police believe he was abducted and murdered but his remains have not been found and no charges have been laid, almost 50 years on from the alleged crime.
Kathleen Severino
The 70-year-old Ballarat grandmother was last seen alive outside her Drummond St property on New Year’s Eve in 1987.
Horrified family members made the grim discovery of her body in her bedroom, where she was found to have suffered fatal injuries to her head after a violent assault.
A witness later told police they had noticed a man and a woman in the vicinity of Kathleen’s home between 10.30pm and 11.30pm — the time detectives suspect she was killed.
In July of 1990, a 19-year-old man was charged with Kathleen’s murder but the charges were later withdrawn before it went to trial as the witness revoked their evidence.
That man died in 2017 but his former associates have remained persons of interest.
In 2021, police announced a $1m reward for any key information that leads to a conviction.
But for now, the case remains unsolved.
Nina Nicholson
Police never established a motive for why someone would murder Nina Nicholson on the veranda of her home just north of Ballarat.
The 22-year-old nurse worked at Ballarat’s St John of God Hospital before she was set upon by an unknown offender at her Clunes home in September 1991.
Nina was due to start a 9.30pm shift at the hospital but concerned colleagues called her parents to say she’d not arrived to work.
Her father, Spike, and brother, Andrew, went to check out her Clunes home where they found her lying in a pool of blood on the veranda.
Investigators said it appeared she had locked her home and was heading for her Nissan when she was attacked.
A $1m reward was later offered for any information but, more than 30 years on, it remains unsolved.
Anthony Prebble
Anthony Prebble, then 37, was at home with his partner and his six-month-old daughter on March 19 in 1992 when three men, all wearing balaclavas, stormed into his Peel St North home in Ballarat.
The masked men bludgeoned Mr Prebble with a baseball bat before forcing him into the back of a white Holden Commodore at gunpoint about 11.45pm.
Mr Prebble was reportedly bleeding profusely and almost unconscious when he was dragged from his home, prompting rescue crews to scour the nearby area in the following hours.
Two people gathering firewood discovered his badly battered body in the Creswick State Forest the following day.
The Holden Commodore at the centre of the attack was not believed to be stolen, but was found dumped in Brunswick the day after his body was discovered and it had been thoroughly cleaned of any traces of blood.
It was understood police knew of Mr Prebble in the lead up to his death due to his involvement in drugs.
An accused person at the time was charged over his murder but was not convicted.
The investigation into Mr Prebble’s death continues.
Tracey Howard
The friendly 33-year-old Ballarat woman had enjoyed a night out at the Cheers nightclub and was seen as she was leaving about 3am on November 22, 1998.
Tracey Howard was with her friend, Sue Slater, before Ms Howard suddenly left Cheers and walked out onto the street.
About 37 hours later, her naked body was found dumped on a quiet back road in Pootilla, about 20km east of Ballarat.
Her clothes had been left scattered over a 500m stretch of the single-lane road.
Dozens of taxi drivers working on the night of her disappearance were quizzed and Ms Howard’s friends could not understand why anyone would want to hurt her.
“She was fun-loving, adored life and shared this with everyone,” friend Robyn Dalgleish later said.
Her killing remains unsolved after more than 25 years but police remain hopeful someone will come forward.
Belinda Williams
Detectives believe someone close to Belinda Williams snatched her in the dead of night before her body was found discarded at Mt Buninyong in 1999.
The then 36-year old had hosted a minor gathering of friends at her Buninyong home when her six-year-old daughter asked her mum to lie with her, afraid of the dark.
Ms Williams did that, but that night, on June 25, would be the last time her daughter would see her mother.
Much like the community response surrounding Samantha Murphy’s disappearance, locals, police, family and friends scoured dense bushland and old mine shafts around Ballarat.
Eleven days after Ms Williams disappeared, a pair of local bushwalkers discovered her body, dressed only in a nightshirt, dumped in scrub on Mt Buninyong.
“You just think about her dying in terror and fear. It’s been hell on earth,’’ her mother Shirley Macey told the Herald Sun nearly 24 years ago.
This case also remains unsolved.
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