Notorious serial killer / waste of oxygen Ivan Milat finally died in the early hours of Sunday morning, after a battle with terminal oesophagus and stomach cancer.
The 74-year-old had been locked up since 1996, when he was convicted of the seven “Backpacker Murders”, after the bodies of Australian couple Deborah Everist and James Gibson, German tourists Simone Schmidl,
Anja Habschied and Gabor Neugebauer and British backpackers Caroline Clarke and Joanne Walters were found buried in shallow graves in in NSW’s Belanglo State Forest between 1992 and 1993.
Milat had protested his innocence for those crimes ever since his 1994 arrest, as well as the numerous other crimes he’d been linked to — mostly mysterious disappearances and abductions that took place up and down the coast, mirroring the movements of the former road worker at the time.
He was even brought before a 2002 inquest into the disappearances of still-missing Newcastle residents Leanne Goodall, 20, who was last seen in 1978 as well as 18-year-old Robyn Hickie and 14-year-old Amanda Robinson, both of whom were abducted in 1979. At the inquest Milat refused to answer any questions and even blamed the girls’ parents with the Newcastle Herald quoting him as saying: “I could ask how could they let a 14-year-old [Amanda Robinson] run around to midnight?”
When Milat’s terminal illness was first made public, many hoped he’d make a deathbed confession for not only the 7 backpacker murders but perhaps also clear up some unsolved cases like the one above, but despite NSW Police’s best efforts, he refused.
The Nine Network aired footage from NSW Police interviews on A Current Affair last night, with several outlets including the Sydney Morning Herald claiming that police attempted to get a confession out of him on eight separate occasions, attempting to appeal to his conscience by showing video of the victims’ families.
You can see the Milat Tapes right here:
[jwplayer iJv5UauD]
9 News quoted him as saying:
You could bore me eyes out with a blowtorch and I can’t help ya. I still could not tell you one word about any of them missing people in that Newcastle area. Whether you believe me or not, that’s up to youse. I don’t count, immaterial to me. But I know in my heart, in front of God or wherever, I’m quite, quite happy when I say this.
The publication also reports that police spoke of “grief for the victims” and Milat responded with “I don’t care, that’s it”, with 9 News adding that police told him he could reach out at any time, to which he responded: “Don’t hold your breath waiting for me to call.”
In other (more welcome news), NSW Corrective Services Minister Anthony Roberts today told 2GB radio: “Hell will freeze over before Corrections NSW pays a cent for this man’s funeral.”
