Outback killer Bradley John Murdoch dies in custody
Murdoch, 67, was serving a life sentence for the murder of British backpacker Peter Falconio in 2001.
His death from throat cancer means Falconio's family may never know where the backpacker's body was dumped.
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
ABC News
9 hours ago
- ABC News
How Bradley Murdoch's murder of Peter Falconio changed Central Australia forever
Twenty-four years ago, the murder of British backpacker Peter Falconio and assault of his girlfriend Joanne Lees sent shockwaves through the Central Australian community of Alice Springs and its surrounds. The mystery left locals wondering "how something so evil could happen" on their doorstep — and almost a quarter of a century on, the event continues to haunt this remote part of Australia. Convicted killed Bradley John Murdoch died last week, at the age of 67, while serving a life sentence in prison for fatally shooting 28-year-old Mr Falconio in an attack near Barrow Creek in July 2001. He never revealed the location of the backpacker's body, taking the secret to his grave. Murdoch was also convicted for assaulting and attempting to kidnap Mr Falconio's girlfriend Ms Lees, whose wrists he tied with cable ties before she managed to escape into bushland. Mr Falconio's family in the UK still holds out hope the backpacker's remains will be found, and a $500,000 reward for information that could lead police to answers is still active to encourage members of the public to come forward. Three hours south of Barrow Creek, the town of Alice Springs felt some of the strongest impacts in the aftermath of the crime that made headlines across Australia and the world. Robyn Lambley, the MLA for the Alice Springs electorate of Araluen and a long-term resident, said the cold case "changed us forever". "It had an instant impact of just horror — how could something so evil happen on our doorstep?" she said. Consumed by "a lot of panic and fear", she said the killing sent a "dark veil" over the unsuspecting community. "It changed our psyche — we went from being fairly innocent, I guess, to having some sort of psychopath commit this terrible crime just up the road from Alice Springs," Ms Lambley said. She said she was an avid bushwalker before hearing about the case, but afterwards, like many others, her outdoor jogs became weighed down by "this feeling that Peter Falconio could be buried just over there and you wouldn't even know it". Ms Lambley said Murdoch's death last week had only "sent more tremors" through the region, reopening the wound and serving as a reminder of "the terrible nature of things that can happen in the middle of nowhere". "The whole chapter … hasn't gone away," she said. Ms Lambley said, with the young couple visiting Australia at the time of the attack, "a sort of frenzied media" from both Australia and abroad had descended on Alice Springs in search of answers. Locals were caught up along with the rest of Australia, she said. "There was so much speculation around what happened, who actually did it, what part did poor Joanne Lees play in it." She said Barrow Creek locals were also dragged into the saga, called to give evidence due to their proximity to the crime. Speculation quickly fell onto Mr Falconio's girlfriend, who had escaped Murdoch and flagged down a truck driver for help, and Ms Lambley recalled her being "put under the microscope" because Ms Lees hadn't grieved how some believed a victim should. Ms Lambley said the fact it was "so difficult to find any sort of body in Central Australia", and that authorities believe Mr Falconio's remains could be anywhere between Alice Springs and Broome, had only fuelled speculation. Former NT parks ranger Shane Bloomfield met Ms Lees on a 2003 tour around Alice Springs Telegraph Station, when he taught her about the region's history. He said at first he did not know who she was, but after learning she was back in the area as part of Murdoch's trial, he told her it was a privilege to meet her and that he was sorry for her loss. "It was very hard to pinpoint any sort of feeling or understanding of who this person was — she had sort of grown this rockstar status overnight — but then the feeling in Alice Springs, the territory in general, was just this eerie sort of feeling," he said. "I didn't really feel she was enjoying her time there … it just looked like she wanted to get in, do what she had to do, and get out of the place." Mr Bloomfield said he guessed the British tourist was consumed by the unknown, having lost "someone special to her". An NT Supreme Court jury found Murdoch guilty in 2005, with enough evidence to convict him beyond reasonable doubt, and Chief Justice Brian Martin sentenced him to life behind bars. Ms Lambley said the crime had put everyone in Alice Springs — locals and tourists alike — "on alert" in the years following Mr Falconio's death. Mr Bloomfield reflected on his own experience camping on a swag at Barrow Creek a year before the murder, and said he couldn't believe he'd been so trusting in the open outback. He said locals locked their doors, people on the road resolved to never pull over for anyone, businesses suffered a drop in customers, and the region was clouded by a surreal sense of "unknowing". He said Alice Springs, the town where "everyone knows everyone", was left with a lingering sense of eeriness. Mr Bloomfield doesn't think the remote town will ever totally return to normal, but hopes it will bounce back eventually. Tourism Central Australia chief executive Danial Rochford said the news of Mr Falconio's murder had "sent a chill through the whole of outback Australia", stretching into western Queensland where he'd been working at the time. He recalled the mass media coverage across television and radio, with rumours about Murdoch's whereabouts heightening concerns on his side of the border. After a vehicle breakdown during a trip to Mount Isa with colleagues, he remembered being suspicious of the first car that approached the group — a LandCruiser with a canopy, similar to the vehicle police were looking for at the time. "That was kind of the sense that a lot of people had in outback Australia at the time, [that] there was a killer on the loose — 'Where are they and who could they be?'" Mr Rochford said. He said backpackers became fearful of travelling in the outback, resulting in a decline in overseas tourists hitting the road in Central Australia for the next few years. Even now, visitors still ask Mr Rochford about the Falconio case and travellers continue to stop on the side of the Stuart Highway to pay respects to the cross marking the spot where he died. Mr Rochford said the attack had polarised the nation in 2001, but the immediate scare was followed by an outpouring of love for the victims. "Our hearts are with the family … The tourism impact is completely insignificant compared to the other impacts," he said. "Ultimately, we've grown stronger. We're starting to see that international drive market rebound, [though] it's taken a good decade or so."
Herald Sun
14 hours ago
- Herald Sun
New clashes outside London hotel housing migrants
Don't miss out on the headlines from Breaking News. Followed categories will be added to My News. Anti-migrant protests degenerated again late Sunday outside a London hotel housing asylum seekers, as rioters threw bottles and smoke bombs at the police. Police said they had arrested five people for "violent disorder" at the rally outside the Bell Hotel in the north-east London district of Epping. "Disappointingly we have seen yet another protest, which had begun peacefully, escalate into mindless thuggery with individuals again hurting one of our officers and damaging a police vehicle," Chief Superintendent Simon Anslow said in a statement. Police vans guarded the entrance to the hotel as several hundred people rallied outside, according to the British news agency PA. The protestors shouted "save our children" and "send them home", while banners called for the expulsion of "foreign criminals". Tensions have been simmering for days after a 38-year-old asylum seeker was charged with sexual assault. He allegedly tried to kiss a 14-year-old girl, which he denied when brought to court on Thursday. On Thursday evening, eight police officers were wounded in clashes. Anti-immigration riots shook the UK last summer after three girls were stabbed to death by a teenager in the north-western town of Southport, even though the suspect turned out to be British-born. Rioters had attacked hotels housing asylum seekers in several towns, including an attempt to set fire to an establishment in Rotherham, in north-east England. ctx/gv/jj Originally published as New clashes outside London hotel housing migrants
9 News
14 hours ago
- 9 News
Request to unseal Epstein grand jury files 'likely to disappoint'
Your web browser is no longer supported. To improve your experience update it here A US Justice Department request to unseal grand jury transcripts in the prosecution of chronic sexual abuser Jeffrey Epstein and his former girlfriend is unlikely to produce much, if anything, to satisfy the public's appetite for new revelations about the financier's crimes, former federal prosecutors say. Attorney Sarah Krissoff, an assistant US attorney in Manhattan from 2008 to 2021, called the request in the prosecutions of Epstein and imprisoned British socialite Ghislaine Maxwell 'a distraction'. "The president is trying to present himself as if he's doing something here and it really is nothing," Krissoff told The Associated Press in a weekend interview. Jeffrey Epstein died while in custody in August 2019. (AP) Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche made the request on Friday, asking judges to unseal transcripts from grand jury proceedings that resulted in indictments against Epstein and Maxwell, saying 'transparency to the American public is of the utmost importance to this Administration'. The request came as the administration sought to contain the firestorm that followed its announcement that it would not be releasing additional files from the Epstein probe despite previously promising that it would. Epstein killed himself at age 66 in his federal jail cell in August 2019, a month after his arrest on sex trafficking charges, while Maxwell, 63, is serving a 20-year prison sentence imposed after her December 2021 sex trafficking conviction for luring girls to be sexually abused by Epstein. Krissoff and Joshua Naftalis, a Manhattan federal prosecutor for 11 years before entering private practice in 2023, said grand jury presentations are purposely brief. Naftalis said Southern District prosecutors present just enough to a grand jury to get an indictment but 'it's not going to be everything the FBI and investigators have figured out about Maxwell and Epstein'. 'People want the entire file from however long. That's just not what this is,' he said, estimating that the transcripts, at most, probably amount to a few hundred pages. 'It's not going to be much,' Krissoff said, estimating the length at as little as 60 pages 'because the Southern District of New York's practice is to put as little information as possible into the grand jury'. 'They basically spoon feed the indictment to the grand jury. That's what we're going to see,' she said. 'I just think it's not going to be that interesting. ... I don't think it's going to be anything new.' Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell. (Nine) Both ex-prosecutors said that grand jury witnesses in Manhattan are usually federal agents summarising their witness interviews. That practice might conflict with the public perception of some state and federal grand jury proceedings, where witnesses likely to testify at a trial are brought before grand juries during lengthy proceedings prior to indictments or when grand juries are used as an investigatory tool. In Manhattan, federal prosecutors 'are trying to get a particular result so they present the case very narrowly and inform the grand jury what they want them to do,' Krissoff said. Krissoff predicted that judges who presided over the Epstein and Maxwell cases will reject the government's request. With Maxwell, a petition is before the US Supreme Court so appeals have not been exhausted. With Epstein, the charges are related to the Maxwell case and the anonymity of scores of victims who have not gone public is at stake, although Blanche requested that victim identities be protected. 'This is not a 50-, 60-, 80-year-old case,' Krissoff noted. 'There's still someone in custody.' She said citing 'public intrigue, interest and excitement' about a case was likely not enough to convince a judge to release the transcripts despite a 1997 ruling by the 2nd US Circuit Court of Appeals that said judges have wide discretion and that public interest alone can justify releasing grand jury information. Krissoff called it 'mind-blowingly strange' that Washington Justice Department officials are increasingly directly filing requests and arguments in the Southern District of New York, where the prosecutor's office has long been labelled the "Sovereign District of New York" for its independence from outside influence. 'To have the attorney general and deputy attorney general meddling in an SDNY case is unheard of,' she said. Cheryl Bader, a former federal prosecutor and Fordham Law School criminal law professor, said judges who presided over the Epstein and Maxwell cases may take weeks or months to rule. 'Especially here where the case involved witnesses or victims of sexual abuse, many of which are underage, the judge is going to be very cautious about what the judge releases,' she said. Donald Trump is under pressure over his long friendship with Jeffrey Epstein. (AP) Bader said she didn't see the government's quest aimed at satisfying the public's desire to explore conspiracy theories 'trumping – pardon the pun – the well-established notions of protecting the secrecy of the grand jury process'. 'I'm sure that all the line prosecutors who really sort of appreciate the secrecy and special relationship they have with the grand jury are not happy that DOJ is asking the court to release these transcripts,' she added. Mitchell Epner, a former federal prosecutor now in private practice, called Trump's comments and influence in the Epstein matter 'unprecedented' and 'extraordinarily unusual' because he is a sitting president. He said it was not surprising that some former prosecutors are alarmed that the request to unseal the grand jury materials came two days after the firing of Manhattan Assistant US Attorney Maurene Comey, who worked on the Epstein and Maxwell cases. 'If federal prosecutors have to worry about the professional consequences of refusing to go along with the political or personal agenda of powerful people, then we are in a very different place than I've understood the federal Department of Justice to be in over the last 30 years of my career,' he said. Krissoff said the uncertain environment that has current prosecutors feeling unsettled is shared by government employees she speaks with at other agencies as part of her work in private practice. 'The thing I hear most often is this is a strange time. Things aren't working the way we're used to them working,' she said. Readers seeking support can contact Lifeline on 13 11 14 or beyond blue on 1300 22 4636. World Jeffrey Epstein USA Donald Trump CONTACT US
