When Dr. Millhouse's trial eventually commenced in the latter half of 1980 - more than a year after Neil Muir's murder - the prosecution continued to rely heavily upon their circumstantial evidence and witness statements, failing to establish any motive for the crime or provide any definitive evidence. 17-year-old Alan Barnes, 25-year-old Neil Muir, 14-year-old Peter Stogneff, 18-year-old Mark Langley and 15-year-old Richard Kelvin were later found dumped in the Adelaide Hills and surrounds. Shockingly, police found an insane combination of sedatives in his system, which included the drugs Noctec, Mandrax, valium, Rohypnol, and amytal. He is 50 metres from his beautiful family home. Players - The Family Murders Players Five murdered young men, over 150 violent abduction drug-rapes, two people arrested, one person found guilty. When they finally got around to doing this, after the discovery of Richard Kelvin's body, one name popped out at them. Examiners discovered that just a few inches above his groin - just below his navel - Mark had a small surgical scar that had been sealed shut with staples and a specific type of Johnson & Johnson surgical tape. Police were called out to the scene, and an extensive search of the area commenced. The body count had essentially doubled within a couple of months, and police were still unsure whether or not the cases were related. Unfortunately, from there, the trail would go cold for over a year at which point, another victim had already become ensnared in this tragic saga. He then moved away from Adelaide and the murders continued. Neil Muir was last seen in Hindley St, Adelaide in the company of Dr Peter Leslie Millhouse at 3pm on the day he was murdered. [8] Little more could be determined as the remains had been accidentally burnt by the farmer while clearing his property of scrub.[11][19]. The son of popular local Nine Network news presenter Rob Kelvin, he was abducted a short distance from his North Adelaide home on 5 June. [18] His skeletal remains were found in October 1982 later by a local farmer at Middle Beach, 50km north of Adelaide. He was last seen stumbling down the street, supposedly wandering off to parts unknown. They tried to hitch a ride on Grand Junction Road, a busy thoroughfare in Adelaide, before realizing that they were going to have no luck hitchhiking together. However, when Neil Muir's body was discovered, his internal organs had been removed and were gone entirely, leading to police being unable to test his blood levels. He never made it home. Peter Stogneff. Neil had several drug debts throughout Adelaide, and that is where police started their investigation. Mark Langley was an 18-year-old with the entire world in front of him: an athletic and good-looking young man, who quickly endeared himself to others. His mother, Judy, would later describe him as being incredibly witty; "cheeky," as she describes in a 2006 documentary, going on to say that Alan was always quick on his feet, and would respond to any type of comment with something sarcastic and bitterly funny. This section explores his social network. 's had discovered the chemical compound chloral hydrate in the system of Alan Barnes, who also had an above-average level of alcohol in his system: roughly four times the legal limit, which was unusually high for a teenager. If you recall, M.E. Like most of the victims targeted by this unknown subject, Richard Kelvin was a young and athletic young man, who seemed destined to have a long and rewarding life. In June of 1983, Richard Kelvin was approaching sixteen years of age. This is an analysis of the information provided by Wendy Roles and Greg McInerney in the book The Family Murders: Dissected The Timeline 25 Aug (Sat) Michael B sees band-aid on Neil's leg at the methadone clinic during the day. The other two men thrown into the river with him managed to escape with their lives, but they did not escape unscathed. These people have no such bond, only an association that with time probably no longer exists". So the police began reaching out to people that worked or had otherwise been in the area. Major Crimes was primarily responsible for serial killings, mass killings, and any other high-profile crimes that the local government wanted to be handled by a specialized task force. Some of the employees that worked at the area's bars recalled seeing the two together multiple times that weekend, and other character witnesses described Dr. Millhouse and Neil as being very close friends (intimate, even). But he then set off again, likely headed towards the distant Rundle Mall, where he was due to meet up with his friend, Daniel, that day. While the men in the river struggled to make it back to the shore, the group that had thrown them into the water made their escape before camera crews or onlookers could begin to gather. When this young man woke up the next day, he was surprised to find himself both at home and in significant pain. Young Blood refers to the age of the victims who were brutally murdered. The head was tied to the torso with rope passed through the mouth and out through the neck. Was Dr Millhouse involved in Neil Muirs murder. The emergence of this drug would prove to be very interesting in the years to come, but at this point in the investigation, police were still struggling to connect all of the dots. [7] Suspect 1, an Eastern Suburbs businessman, is believed to have been with von Einem when Kelvin was abducted. This section explores the people who at this stage are thought to have been on the periphery. In May of 1972, three gay men - George Duncan, Roger James, and another man (whose identity has been withheld in the decades since) - were picked up by members of South Australia's police force. His friend likely just assumed that Peter had bailed on their plan, and likely gone to school that day. Add onto that abductions, drug-lacing, mutilations, victims held in captivity for weeks, and death by sado-masochism. He then explained to the investigator that he was a former lover of Neil's, from roughly four years beforehand, and had run into the man just days before his eventual murder. Eventually, Peter's parents discovered the plot among Peter and his friend to skip school, and conveyed this information to the police - who were just as alarmed as they were. Bevan Spencer von Einem was jailed for life for the murder of 15-year-old Richard Kelvin. During the 1970s von Einem started developing strategies to lure victims into his car. While searching, they ended up discovering the body of Richard Kelvin, who had been missing for just shy of two months. This was cancelled the night before. It was speculated that a foreign object had caused the internal perforations, leading to the belief that the killer had been a sexual sadist whose only intent was to cause physical pain. Following the decriminalization of homosexuality in 1975, Adelaide began to be known as one of the more progressive cities in all of Australia. The Family Murders is the name given to a series of five sadistic murders committed by a loosely connected group of individuals who came to be known as The Family. Now twenty-five years old, Neil had spent the better part of the last few years struggling with addictions and vices that left him moving from place-to-place pretty regularly. [15] A post-mortem examination revealed that Muir had died of massive blood loss from an anal injury, likely caused by the insertion of a large blunt object[16] and Noctec was found in his blood. Millhouse was charged and went to trial but was acquitted. The Family Murders is one of Australia's most captivating true crime stories. He was also found to be wearing clothing that did not belong to him, and his original clothing was missing entirely. Trace evidence, including hair and fibres from von Einem's home, was found on Kelvin's body and clothing. However, police would reach out to all of Mark's known friends, and learned that the night prior - February 27th - he had simply wandered off into the night and had not been seen since. [20] His mutilated body was found in scrub in the Adelaide foothills nine days after his disappearance. A thrash metal band singer and members of his family were killed in an apparent murder-suicide late last month, according to police. Stogneff still skipped school but never made it home. Allegations would even surface that indicated Dr. Millhouse had been one of the people in the area that supplied Neil with prescription drugs, but that would remain an allegation for the foreseeable future. Some of the victims were brutally tortured, or horrifically mutilated or cut up. In a word, no. Bevan von Einem was an apex predator. Bevan von Einem had a network of around 25-30 people. by enjin | Feb 12, 2021 | victim. The night before he went missing he stayed at Darko Kastelan's house in Cheltenham. So prosecutors and the police began to build their case around Millhouse without his cooperation, including witness statements that alleged the two had been together the weekend before Neil's violent death. Regardless, this information was incredibly helpful to police, who began to expand their interests to finding people in the area that drove similar vehicles. The evidence is contained in a detailed diary kept by a man who was a close associate of several key players in the so-called Family murders. Noctec was found in his blood, suggesting he had been drugged. It shows the facts and most likely scenarios, but is fluid so when new information comes to light changes can easily be made. Neil Muir had been missing for less than 24 hours by the time his body was discovered, and because he was an adult that lived alone, police were already at a disadvantage when it came to trying to figure out what happened to him. It wasn't until the next day, Sunday (February 28th), that Mark's parents began to grow concerned. Subsequent efforts to reach Alan through his friends had failed, and none of them had seen him since the weekend. Hours would begin to pass, and Alan would fail to return home at all that Sunday. Description. The name of the group stems from an interview a police detective gave on 60 Minutes, claiming the police were taking action to break up the happy family. He was the son of Channel 9 News host Rob Kelvin, who had just recently taken over the hosting gig after more than a decade of field reporting through the station and a radio affiliate. The final two - Mark Langley and Richard Kelvin - had disappeared just blocks away from one another. Gino Gambardella regularly scouted Rundle Mall and video game arcades for runaways, homeless teenagers, and youths who he was able to exploit. Mark's remains had also clearly been thoroughly washed before being dumped, just like Alan Barnes. Their psychological profile indicated that Neil's body had been carved up due to either a psychotic killer that derived pleasure from inflicting pain on others or someone that wanted to hide his/her identity. Because of this lack of clarity, police were unable to press forward with any charges for the offenders, and George's story would become buried by more pressing police concerns in the coming weeks and months. He was seen in the presence of individuals who would become relevant later on, but - at the time - were simply believed to have been his friends. On Saturday, February 27th, 1982, Mark attended a friend's 18th birthday party in Windsor Gardens, a neighborhood in northeastern Adelaide. After being arrested, Dr. Millhouse had denied ever knowing Neil, and continued stating so over the next year, openly defying the dozens of witness statements that claimed they were acquaintances at the least, intimate friends at the most. Over a span of several years starting in 1979 and into the 80s five young men, aged from 14 to 25, went missing in different areas of Adelaide. In Adelaides gay community in the 1970s and 1980s, young men were coveted for sex. Murdered victims were kept in captivity by the Family for up to five weeks. The man that had driven George there offered him a couple of pills called "No-Doz," which - he promised - would help him stay awake to enjoy the party. Mark had driven there with his family, as they were attending the party alongside him, but he would leave with a couple of friends afterward to hang out and cruise around the city with the young adults trying to squeeze out every bit of the Adelaide summer that they could. The older driver not only offered to give George a ride but offered to show him a good time with some ladies he knew. Some were involved in the abduction of victims who were murdered, some were involved in the rape of murdered victims, and some were involved in murder. At the time of the murder, Dr. Millhouse - a gay man in his mid-forties - lived alone in northern Adelaide, and drove a ten-year-old Holden sedan. Of only one victim. Once it became clear that something had happened to Peter, his family launched a frantic search for him, starting in the family's home. [citation needed]. Richard Dallas Kelvin, (born 4 December 1967) aged 15,[23] murdered in July 1983. While in rehab, Dr. Millhouse refused to speak to police about Neil Muir (or his alleged relationship with the man). While police began to investigate who might be responsible for this heinous crime, medical examiners testing the body made a pretty shocking discovery: the presence of drugs in his blood. The "Family Murders" *Warning: graphic content and mentions of sexual abuse ahead. What the two got up to that evening is anyone's guess, but rumors and theories have propagated this story in the decades since. Medical examiners and investigators began to theorize about the rationale for the surgical scar, and the most plausible one to-date is perhaps one of the worst to imagine. It's 1983, and a 15-year-old boy named Richard Kelvin is in a laneway in North Adelaide. Neil Muir was someone that you could describe as a transient. POLICE are investigating new information linking convicted killer Bevan Spencer von Einem to the abduction and murder of teenager Alan Barnes. (What a lovely country, Australia!) His body had been dissected into parts, with his internal organs carved out and missing, replaced by his lower legs and arms, which had been sawed off and placed inside of his hollowed-out chest cavity. Police believe this murder is associated with other high profile murders commonly referred to in the media as the 'Family Murders'. Due to changes in the Forensic Procedures Act, which later allowed DNA samples to be taken from suspects in major indictable offences, all the suspects voluntarily submitted to DNA testing. This website was built on publicly available information contributed by many people who have an interest in this case. According to some witnesses in the area, screams had been heard at around the time that Richard had disappeared, some time between 5:30 and 6:30 PM that Sunday. While police pounded the pavement to find out what had happened to Richard Kelvin, the young man's life was slowly coming to an end. A cold case review was opened in March 2008 with a $1,000,000 reward available for anyone who provided information leading to a conviction. This group was believed to be involved in the kidnapping and sexual abuse of approximately 150 teenage boys and young men, as well as the torture and murder of 5 young men aged between 14 and 25, in the city of Adelaide, South Australia, in the 1970s and 1980s. The next day was a Sunday, they both planned to hitchhike to Alan's home in Salisbury. He had been killed elsewhere and then transported to this location postmortem, implying that the killer had a base of operations for his or her dark deeds. Millhouse would have. He remembered going to a back room of the house to have sex with one of the older women, only to discover - during the act itself - that she was transgender. His head had also been removed from the rest of his body, but was placed in its own separate black trash bag and connected with a rope tie to the rest of the remains. Alan was supposed to find a ride back home and was taking his luck hitchhiking, hoping that someone willing to pick him up would be heading north towards his family's neighborhood of Salisbury. We know that on the morning of Sunday, June 17th, Alan and his friend woke up, and tried their luck hitchhiking back to Alan's family's house (a practice that wasn't that uncommon in the late 1970s). That evening, as Mark drove around with his friend Ian and Ian's girlfriend, Paula, an argument broke out. They phoned police that evening, hoping that their son's whereabouts could be chalked up to a simple miscommunication. This meant that his remains had likely been sitting out in the wilderness for about a week. At the same time he was developing a network of people who made it possible for him to carry out his sexually sadistic fantasies. Detective O'Brien was the unfortunate one tasked with notifying the Kelvins that Richard's body had been found; which he describes in his book as one of the most heartbreaking duties he's ever had to endure. Rumours of high-society involvement and cover-ups. The victims were all young men, who had gone missing in or near the northern section of town. Do you think the Family Murders case will ever be solved? It wasn't until Monday morning that Alan's parents decided to contact the police, having not seen him for several days. Needing to get away from his friends and clear his head, Mark decided to get out and walk away. This witness would also recall hearing this supposed argument on the street come to a sudden end, punctuated with the sound of a loud exhaust system as a car sped down the street. He has spent that Sunday, June the 5th, playing footy, until the afternoon when his best friend Karl came over. This meant doing away with large plots of dried-out farmland in a prescribed burn to prepare for the upcoming spring bloom. The bodies were found from 24th June 1979 and the fifth and last body on 24th July 1983. The skeletal remains of one victim bore marks to reasonably indicate a similar experience and outcome. Eventually, Peter returned home with his backpack, stowing it in his family's garage while his parents were at work. Richard walked him down the road to the nearby O'Connell Street bus stop, arriving without incident, and waited there for his friend's bus to arrive. In October of 1982 - in the very midst of this crime spree - a teenage hitchhiker named George had been picked up by a passing car. The periphery of The Family is a grey area. Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | RSS. Suspect 3, an Eastern Suburbs doctor. Sadly, almost all of the evidence that may have been left behind was now gone, burned away to ash along with all of Peter's remaining soft tissue. Ten years von Einem's junior, Mr B helped von Einem pick up, drug, and rape several young men. At this point, the idea of a random killer hadn't even crossed investigators' minds. [21] Among the mutilations was a wound that appeared to have been cut with a surgical instrument that went from his navel to the pubic region and part of his small bowel was missing. He loved music - both playing it and listening to it - and had a good rapport with his friends, whom he hung around constantly. But now, they needed to find a suspect. They began probing those that knew Alan and might have taken issue with something he did or said in the weeks before his death; in particular, those that drove a white sedan. The very next day - August 28th, 1979 - a couple of fishermen were heading out to the Port Adelaide River, on what was supposed to be a regular workday for them. From the outside looking in, von Einem was incredibly average. However, what wasn't up for debate was the fact that Alan had been violently tortured for hours before his death, with his death ultimately coming from blood loss due to an anal injury. There's a conviction in the last murder in the series, but I will include it due to the similarity and due to the man convicted being suspected in the other murders as well. Things then came full circle when he began using heroin again, and shortly thereafter, followed that up with a dependence on Rohypnol ("roofies", commonly known as the date-rape drug). Rather than have to read the whole site, or miss updates in the case because you dont know they exist, this section will show time-stamped updates so you can keep up to date with developments. The news was heartbreaking for those that had known Alan. After all, three of the victims (Alan Barnes, Neil Muir, and Mark Langley) had all died of similar injuries, and at least three (Alan Barnes, Mark Langley, and now Richard Kelvin) had all gone missing on Sundays. A witness says she saw Stogneff at Tea Tree Plaza with someone matching Noel Brook's appearance. Mark Langley attended party in Windsor Gardens but left with a male and female. It was at around this time - the end of August - that Investigator Rod Hunter finally got around to interviewing Bevan Spencer von Einem, the man implicated by an anonymous caller in the murder of Alan Barnes. And at least one witness - a security guard that lived just down the street from the Kelvins - recalled some more details succinctly. Nine days after Mark Langley went missing, his body was discovered in the Adelaide Foothills, close to Mount Lofty in the area known as Summertown. He vividly remembered hearing a young voice shout out (which we can assume was Richard) and a group of voices screaming in protest, almost in unison.

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