that casts a spell on visitors. And it was here that Milat preyed on his victims, finding a steady stream of trusting young travellers to pick up on the lonely highways. Between 1989 and 1992 seven people – that we know of – were abducted in the Belanglo State Forest, situated on the southern tablelands, approximately 10km (6 miles) west of Moss Vale, just South of Sydney. An exotic pine forest, Belanglo boasts some impressive bush walking along its numerous trails. Bird watching is a favoured pursuit at Belanglo.
But Milat had a different sort of pursuit in mind.
Until 1989 Australia enjoyed a reputation as one of the safest countries in the world. Some five million travellers journeyed to it each year. By tradition, these young backpackers would head for Sydney’s student and travellers’ district, King’s Cross, before setting off to explore the many natural wonders that Australia had to offer. Hitch-hiking was a popular way of travelling around the vast country, and for a dangerous individual such as Milat the prospect of so many young and vulnerable people wandering the roads and forests of his district was a temptation too far. Almost single-handedly, Ivan Milat would tarnish Australia’s reputation as a safe, welcoming place for independent travellers.
According to Commander Clive Small, a former Australian Police Superintendent: ‘He specifically targeted backpackers, because they were distant from relatives and friends. There was less likelihood of people knowing where they were, or what they were doing.’ The treatment he subjected his victims to almost beggars belief. As the forensic psychiatrist Dr Rod Milton puts it: ‘Why he killed was shocking. Some people were tortured. Some people were sexually assaulted and killed. Some people were used as target practice. He was a man who enjoyed killing. He was a man who enjoyed the power, and the sexual gratification that he got from his victims. I think it was violence, for the sake of violence, in someone who enjoyed the explosion of violence.’ Milat would sever his victims’ spines, in a deliberate effort to not only physically paralyse them but to put them completely at his mercy. He would also bind his victims as he raped and abused them, before engulfing them in a final flurry of bloodletting as they were beaten and strangled, then stabbed and shot repeatedly. No one in Australia had ever seen anything like it.
Following the discovery of a double murder in Belanglo Forest, with graphic details of the slayings revealed to the public, it quickly became apparent that a sadistic murderer was on the loose – and that he was unlikely to stop killing any time soon.
These first two victims were a pair of nineteen-year-olds, James Gibson and Deborah Everist, from Frankston, Victoria. They were last seen alive on Friday, 30 December 1989. This was at Surrey Hills in Sydney, from where they were planning to hitchhike the 140km (87 miles) to Albury.
The next victim followed soon after. Sunday, 20 January 1991, was the last day that twenty-year-old German backpacker Simone Schmidl was sighted in the town of Liverpool, west of Sydney. An intrepid girl known to her friends and family as ‘Simi’, she had been hitchhiking south to meet her mother in Melbourne.
Twenty-one-year-old Gabor Kurt Neugebauer and his twenty-year-old girlfriend Anja Habschied were two more German hitchhikers out on their own. They left Sydney’s King’s Cross district on 20 December 1991 to travel to Darwin. They never made it.
British pair, Joanne Walters and Caroline Clarke, left King’s Cross on 18 April 1992, a Friday. They had planned to travel around Australia, paying their way by picking fruit en route. Instead, like the rest of Milat’s victims, their remains were later discovered in Belanglo State Forest.
Caroline’s parents, Ian and Jacquie Clarke, remember being a little apprehensive before Caroline flew to Australia. Ian Clarke recalls: ‘Off she went, and she was having a wonderful time. You know, we always talked about hitchhiking as something that should not be encouraged. And we always said to Caroline, look whatever you do, never do this on your own. Always use public transport, even if it meant working for a bit longer to pay for the fare. Well, well, she didn’t.’ When Caroline went missing her family did everything they could to search for her. They created fly-posters with Caroline’s photograph and details on them and sent them to all the major backpacking hostels. Backpackers were asked to take bundles of posters with them and hand them out to other travellers. In this way, news of the missing girls quickly spread across the continent. However, despite Ian and Jacquie’s best efforts, news was slow in coming through. It was a terrible time, as Jacquie explains: ‘You can’t believe anything has gone wrong. But, of course you just can’t believe it. However, as the weeks turned into months, the realisation dawns. I was in a state of limbo, I must say.’ Her husband was equally traumatised, adding: ‘I don’t think we really, until quite late on, finally faced up to the fact that they weren’t coming back. Then a different kind of anguish comes in; when you know they are dead. Then you can start to mourn them.’
The Clarkes were able to begin to mourn their youngest daughter in September 1992. On the nineteenth, the remains of Joanne Walters were discovered under a rock in Belanglo. Her clothing, which lay nearby, had been carefully arranged, suggesting a sexual element to the crime. The following day, the body of Caroline Clarke was discovered by police just fifteen metres away. The body was also left in a ‘posed’ position, which clearly signified something to the killer. According to forensic psychiatrist Dr Rod Milton: ‘She was lying face down, with one arm up and her head on her hand, and she had been repeatedly shot through the head. The autopsy reports show several entry points to the skull, which suggests that the killer had moved the head in order to do what pleased him. This was a particularly cold-blooded murder, although it is not unknown for serial killers to arrange the bodies in a particular way. There was some similarity between Miss Walters and Miss Clarke, in that they were both laying face down, and both had their hands raised up somewhere near the vicinity of the head.’
Once the Clarkes knew that their daughter had been murdered they wanted to find out by whom. Ian Clarke says: ‘We knew the broad outline of what had happened to Caroline, and that was horrid because it was such an evil and disgusting event. You know, you start reliving it on their behalf, conjuring up what they’d gone through.’ Sadly for the Clarkes, it would be a while before the identity of their daughter’s killer would be revealed.
The Hume Highway is the major arterial link between Sydney and Melbourne. The road travels for much of the way along the Great Dividing Range and passes through the Murray River towns of Albury and Wodonga. The Hume Highway was developed when paddle steamer trade along the river was the only way of marketing the crops and produce of the surrounding countryside. It passes near the Snowy Mountains, through the Riverina, Bushranger Country, and the Southern Highlands of New South Wales. It was along this same road that Milat picked up all of his victims for their final ride.
Ivan Milat, a trawler and opportunist – like so many serial murderers – would cruise the Hume on a regular basis. He was a hunter and this was his turf, the place he was most familiar with and where he was most comfortable in selecting his prey. The only other area where Milat felt as secure was the Belanglo State Forest, where he would take his victims to act out the final agonised stages of their lives.
Ivan’s method of selecting his victims was very straightforward. When he spotted a likely victim or victims on the highway he would pull his blue, four-wheel drive vehicle over and start by offering a tried-and-tested cheery grin. He was adept at playing the role of the Good Samaritan, a friendly travelling companion. But once Ivan was sure his new travelling companions were safely in his control things would quickly change. By the time his victims realised they were being kidnapped it was too late. A gun would be pulled and his passengers would be tied up in quick order. Then it was off to the forest. Ivan’s special place.
Milat enjoyed the isolation that the bush afforded him. Taking his victims to such a lonely setting was the perfect place for him to abuse them without fear of being disturbed. He could work in private, uninterrupted, a cold and selfish killer who could take all the time he desired with his immobilised victims. Like other such
