The head of the NSW Homicide Squad has told a parliamentary committee that 11 cold cases have been assessed as potentially linked to serial killer Ivan Milat.
While giving evidence to a parliamentary inquiry into unsolved murders and long-term missing persons cases, Detective Superintendent Joseph Doueihi was asked whether Milat may have committed murders other than the seven he was convicted of.
Superintendent Doueihi said Task Force Air, which was established in 1993 to investigate the backpacker murders, carried out “a whole national review of a whole number of long-term missing person and unsolved homicides” linked to Milat.
Joseph Doueihi said the taskforce established to investigate Milat’s crimes looked into scores of cases. (Supplied: NSW Parliament)
Superintendent Doueihi said investigators “categorised what they believed Milat was involved in as impossible, unlikely, highly possible”.
He said the work involved examining “50 or so other matters” as part of efforts to assess possible links to the Belanglo backpacker murders and other unresolved cases.
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Superintendent Doueihi confirmed that 11 cases had been identified.
“Yes, so we have supplied those names to our counsel, who I believe are going to supply them to the committee,” he said.
During questing about Milat’s prosecution, Superintendent Doueihi said it was possible other homicides were part of the criminal investigation.
“I think — I’m not absolutely certain — that the DPP may have looked at other matters and there wasn’t sufficient evidence to continue with the prosecution,” he said.
Behavioural profile
Criminologist Xanthe Weston told the inquiry she used publicly available information on Milat’s offending to build a behavioural profile.
Xanthe Weston created a behavioural profile framework used to assess cold cases potentially linked to Ivan Milat. (Supplied: NSW Parliament)
She and criminal psychologist Tim Watson-Munro used that framework to review the 18 cold cases before the inquiry and identified six as closely aligned.
“We determined a number are potentially consistent with the profile or warranting of comparative review,” Dr Weston said.
Mr Watson-Munro described Milat as a “marauding serial killer” and said the “Hume Highway was his hunting ground”.
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Mr Watson-Munro said he found it difficult to believe Milat committed no offences from when he was accused of rape in 1971 until the first of the backpacker murders in 1989.
He argued it was “quite likely” Milat continued offending during that period but escaped detection.
“It beggars belief for me that there was this huge temporal gap where nothing occurred,” Mr Watson-Munro said.
Dr Weston agreed.
“He didn’t go from zero to seven backpackers,” she said.
“There was a long trajectory building up to that, and so we have some evidence that began as early ago as 1971.”
Dr Weston said the cases on their list that required comparative review covered the missing years.
“So they would fill, in essence, some of those those gaps, if we accept that they could potentially be additional victims,” she said.
‘Alarming’ revelation
Legalise Cannabis MP Jeremy Buckingham said the inquiry’s evidence regarding possible links to other cases was “vindicating and also alarming”.
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He said it was the first time a serving police officer had indicated Milat may be connected to additional murders.
“It’s staggering because there are 11 human beings that probably fell foul of the worst serial killer in Australian history,” Mr Buckingham said.
He said he would seek full disclosure of the documents unless they were deemed confidential, and would also seek explanations from the Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions about earlier decisions not to proceed with additional matters.