Unsolved cases: Tasmania’s bizarre missing persons mysteries
A New Year’s Day hit-and-run, a search for a body after a highly suspicious house fire and a brutal stabbing are among the unsolved cases still baffling police and tormenting loved ones. SEE THE LIST >>
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The holiday season where family matters most is one of the most challenging times of year for the loved ones of Gary Hayes.
The 30-year-old man died while walking along the side of the Midland Highway at Brighton in the early hours of New Year’s Day 2019.
Nearly three years later no one has owned up to driving the truck that hit Mr Hayes.
Mr Hayes’ father-in-law Brian Free said this festive season would be tough for him, his daughter and Gary’s wife Danielle.
“New Year’s Day is particularly difficult,” he said.
“It’s meant to be a day of celebration.”
Mr Free regularly travelled for work along the section of the highway where Mr Hayes lost his life, with the tragedy haunting him every time he drove past.
He hoped a coronial inquest expected to begin next month would provide answers and closure, but so far he wasn’t aware of any significant new information from the public.
“We believe other people probably would have seen Gary walking along the highway,” Mr Free said.
“We also believe that he was potentially picked up by somebody and given a lift.
“It’ll be nice to put it to bed, have someone come forward and speak about it, or the other alternative is we just keep going forever and a day not knowing.”
For the Hayes and Free families, the tragic loss of their loved one is a certainty, but many families of missing Tasmanians are left with even less clarity.
Tasmania Police Sergeant John Delpero said on average 125 people were reported missing in Tasmania every year.
“While over 97 per cent of missing persons are located, sadly a small number of those people are not located safe and well,” Sergeant Delpero said.
“Even in instances where the disappearance of a person is reported to the Coroner, the case remains open.”
A coronial inquest into the disappearance of mother-of-six Darlene Avis Geertsema was held from December 13 to 15 with hopes of resolving a mystery that began on October 23, 1978.
Police announced on November 2 a $500,000 was available for anyone with credible information into her death.
These are some of Tasmania’s most bizarre unsolved deaths and disappearances.
DARLENE AVIS GEERTSEMA
A mother-of-six who disappeared on October 23, 1978, is the subject of a coronial inquest.
Darlene Avis Geertsema was 31 when she went missing in Devonport. She was last seen driving from her home in Best St. Her red Holden Sunbird was found near the Devonport Oval in a car park two days after she drove away from her house.
The coronial inquest was held from December 13 to 15.
The Coroner’s Court recently heard that Ms Geertsema’s former partner, a Westbury man in his 70s named John Shepherd, could be a person of interest. No charges have been laid.
Coroner Simon Cooper was told the woman had planned to move interstate with her two young children, who were at home at the time she went missing.
Police are seeking information on what happened to Ms Geertsema’s car, registration AS4119, which was believed to have been sold from a Launceston car yard in 1984 and deregistered in 1987.
PAUL WINSTON BYRNE
A man in his early 30s disappeared after his North-East Tasmania home was torched.
Foul play is strongly suspected in this case, after which Paul Winston Byrne was reported missing.
The New Zealand-born man had been in the company of people known to police on September 20, 1996, when he travelled with two men from the Rossarden Club, in the Fingal Valley, to a house.
Mr Byrne has not been seen since, with his home and the house he travelled to that night both being burnt down.
A former detective told the Mercury in 2015 he believed there was enough evidence to put at least one suspect on trial for murder.
A reward for information on his case was originally $100,000, but the value was bumped up this year to $500,000.
SIMON CRISP
A man was helping his partner close up at a pub with plans to take a family holiday to Western Australia the next day when he was gunned down and killed.
Simon Crisp was a dog catcher for local councils and was 44 years old when he was shot outside the Marrawah Tavern on the West Coast in July 2013.
Mr Crisp’s killer has not been found.
Police at the time said they believed the shooter had been waiting to attack Mr Crisp.
The man’s partner Ally Nicholls told the Mercury in 2015 she believed his killer was still a part of the Marrawah community.
A reward for information about his murder jumped from $50,000 to $500,000 in March in an attempt to solve the case.
HELEN KAREL MUNNINGS
A woman who met with her son’s father on the last day she was seen alive has been missing since 2008, with a coroner ruling her dead in 2012.
Helen Munnings was 20 years old when she told family she was heading to a doctor’s appointment, but she was really meeting Adam Taylor who fathered her two-year-old.
Mr Taylor dropped Ms Munnings near the former Burnie pulp mill on July 23, 2008.
He said he drove home afterwards.
Coroner Robert Pearce said in his coronial findings in 2012 Ms Munnings was likely to have been pregnant at the time of her disappearance.
“Mr Taylor gave different versions to the police of the route he says he took after he picked Helen up and before he dropped her off and there is some question about whether the journey he described would have occupied all the time he was with her,” Mr Pearce said in his findings.
Mr Pearce concluded there was “no scientific or forensic evidence that supports a finding that Mr Taylor contributed to the death of Helen Munnings”.
The reward for information on Ms Munnings’ disappearance doubled from $250,000 to $500,000 this year.
GEOFFREY ROBERT HAY
The “weirdest house fire” one firefighter has ever attended was the catalyst for an investigation into the suspicious disappearance of Geoffrey Robert Hay.
The blaze at the Devonport man’s house proved tricky to quell in the early hours of August 28, 2013.
The Mercury reported at the time that Launceston Fire Station officer Craig Burrows said the windows of the Nixon St home had been boarded up and reinforced with steel plates.
Fire hydrants that firefighters would typically use were freshly coated with concrete.
Mr Burrows said at the time the investigation was paused when a drum of chemicals was found inside, with more drums found in the backyard.
“This is definitely the weirdest house fire I have ever been to,” he said.
It is unknown whether then 66-year-old Mr Hay perished in the fire or escaped.
Police have said the case remains open and has been reported to the coroner, though no findings have yet been made.
EVE ASKEW
Eve Askew was only 14 when she went missing after her parents grounded her for smoking.
The girl left a note saying she was leaving the family home in Fitzgerald, in the Derwent Valley, on November 16, 1991.
Eve, whose parents have since died, has never been found.
Police believed the shy young girl met with foul play.
Police upped the reward for information on Eve’s disappearance from $100,000 to $500,000 in March.
Sergeant Adam Weeding told the Mercury last year he believed people in the local community knew what happened to Eve.
The case remains open.
NAZRAWI SAMSON WOLDEMICHAEL
The North Hobart man was almost 20 when he left his home and never returned.
Nazrawi “Naz” Woldemichael was living in a Trinity Hill youth unit.
He was last seen October 9, 2016, at an Eastern Shore shopping centre.
The refugee from Kenya was invited to dinner with his mother on September 22, 2016, but Mr Woldemichael cancelled the event and never contacted her again.
The young artist was affected by a car crash in 2014 where he sustained a significant head injury.
Police said the open case has been reported to the coroner, with findings yet to be made.
LUCILLE GAYE BUTTERWORTH
One of the most famous and long-running missing persons cases resulted from a suspected homicide, but no charges have been laid.
Twenty-year-old model Lucille Butterworth was last seen at a Claremont bus stop in August 1969.
Coroner Simon Cooper said in his findings following an inquest in 2016 key suspect Geoffrey Charles Hunt was deemed to have strangled Ms Butterworth.
Mr Cooper said in his findings Mr Hunt dumped Ms Butterworth’s body on the River Derwent’s south bank between New Norfolk and Granton.
Despite Mr Hunt being said by Mr Cooper to have confessed his crime to police officers in the 1970s and several prison inmates, Mr Hunt has not been charged and the case remains open.
CHRISTOPHER DEAN WATKINS
Christopher Dean Watkins received a visit from two men with whom he had a checkered past at his share house in Mayfield before he disappeared.
Police at the time said he called a member of his family in strife soon after.
The man disappeared from the Box Street unit on August 7, 2013, under suspicious circumstances.
Police believe Mr Watkins was abducted and killed.
Detective Inspector Craig Fox said in March the case was “very close to being solvable”.
A $500,000 reward is on offer for people with information about his disappearance.
GILBERT ARTHUR MIDSON
A young bus driver remains missing after he clocked off from a shift on November 4, 1964.
According to findings from Coroner Simon Cooper, Gilbert Arthur Midson headed to the Hobart bus depot that day, left his cash tin, wallet and personal items in his work locker, and clocked off about 3pm.
“There is no evidence of him being seen alive after that time,” Mr Cooper said in his findings.
Mr Cooper said a portion of Tasmania Police records on the incident were destroyed for an unknown reason in 2004.
He concluded on the balance of probabilities the man, who was 23 years old when he went missing, had died.
Evidence was brought forth during the coronial investigation suggesting Mr Midson’s body had been dumped in a waterhole at a property he grew up on at Turnip Fields Rd, South Hobart.
Tasmania Police excavated the waterhole but found nothing.
“Mr Midson may have taken his own life, been the victim of homicide, died of natural causes or as the result of misadventure, but the evidence simply does not enable me to determine with any degree of certainty why and how he died,” Mr Cooper said.
“I cannot rule out that Mr Midson was the victim of foul play.”
GONE GIRLS: VICTORIA ANNE ELIZABETH CAFASSO AND NANCY GRUNWALDT
Two East Coast cold cases have mystified locals for years, with the Mercury last year releasing a five-episode podcast analysing the cases of Victoria Cafasso and Nancy Grunwaldt.
Ms Cafasso died after she was brutally and repeatedly stabbed on Beaumaris Beach on October 11, 1995.
A coroner concluded in 2005 Ms Cafasso was stabbed and struck with a blunt object, but it could not be determined whether one person or multiple people were involved.
The 20-year-old woman had travelled from Italy to Tasmania for a holiday before her death.
German tourist Ms Grunwaldt, then 26, had been backpacking in Tasmania and riding her red push bike when she disappeared from neighbouring East Coast town Scamander on March 12, 1993.
In 2004 a coroner declared Ms Grunwaldt dead and suspected the cause of her death was homicide.
The cases remain open for both of the young women.
Listen to episode one of the Mercury podcast Gone Girls here.
Anyone with information about a missing or dead person should contact police on 131 444 or anonymously contact Crime Stoppers on 1800 333 000.
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