Bradley Murdoch may take truth of Peter Falconio's murder to grave

Times

3 days ago

Police have offered a half-million Australian dollar reward for information leading to the discovery of the remains of a British backpacker whose murder 24 years ago on a remote highway chilled Australians and sparked a wave of outback crime thrillers.
The A$500,000 (£239,000) reward for information on Peter Falconio's body is among the largest offered by police in Australia and comes as the rogue desert wanderer convicted of his murder, Bradley Murdoch, 67, nears death from cancer in a Northern Territory prison.
The outback killer, who was found guilty of the murder in December 2005, was diagnosed with terminal throat cancer in 2019.
Despite continued efforts by police, Falconio's remains have never been found, leading to fears that Murdoch will take the location of the body to his grave.
Mark Grieve, the Northern Territory police commander, announced the reward on Wednesday, adding that officers 'still hold out hope that someone will be able to provide some vital information to assist in this search'.
Murdoch has always refused to say where in the outback he hid Falconio's remains.
'We've made numerous approaches to Mr Murdoch over the years that have been passed up —including very recently, this week,' Grieve told reporters. 'Unfortunately, the outcome of those conversations rests with Mr Murdoch. On all occasions, he has chosen not to positively engage with police.'
It was reported on Tuesday that Murdoch was near death and had been transferred to a prison palliative care unit.
Police have repeatedly conducted searches for Falconio's remains around the scene of his murder near the desert hamlet of Barrow Creek, 174 miles north of Alice Springs in central Australia.
Falconio, 28, from West Yorkshire, was driving his orange Volkswagen campervan at night along the 1,690-mile Stuart Highway in the remote Northern Territory with his girlfriend, Joanne Lees, 27. They were followed by a pick-up truck, driven by Murdoch, who trafficked drugs across the outback.
Falconio pulled over after Murdoch signalled that the campervan was faulty. Murdoch shot him dead on the roadside then climbed into the vehicle.
He tied Lees's hands and attempted to bind her feet and tape her mouth but she fought him off. Murdoch dragged her into the back of his Toyota four-wheel-drive but she managed to flee into the bush while he was moving Falconio's body.
Murdoch searched for Lees before leaving, passing nearby three times, but she stayed hidden before finally flagging down a passing lorry in the early hours of the next day.
Murdoch was found guilty of Falconio's murder by a jury in a unanimous verdict. He was sentenced to life imprisonment with a non-parole period of 28 years. He was also convicted of other assault-related charges on Lees. Only after the sentencing was it revealed that Murdoch had previously been acquitted of aggravated sexual assault on a mother and daughter in South Australia years earlier.
Falconio's murder partly inspired the Australian crime thriller, Wolf Creek, in which three backpackers, two British and one Australian, are hunted down and captured by an outback serial killer.
Falconio's father, Luciano, speaking from his home in Huddersfield, West Yorkshire, told MailOnline he had only found out about his son's killer's poor health from media reports.
'We don't know anything about him receiving end of life care, we have not been told,' he said.
His wife, Joan, was too distressed to speak, fearing that the killer's potentially imminent death would prevent the couple from ever finding out the truth of their son's fate.
Now aged in her early fifties, Lees still lives Huddersfield.
Joan Falconio has previously told how she and her husband, who have three other sons, have remained in contact with Lees, who was once a suspect in his murder case.