Australia Samantha Murphy, 51, last seen leaving her property to go for a run in the Canadian State Forest, Ballarat 100km NW of Melbourne, 4 Feb 2024 #6

[SouthAussie]

New HS article ... briefly paraphrased

• Accused continues to not cooperate with police after being in custody for 4 days
• People living in, as well as businesses in. Elsworth, Joseph and Butt streets in the suburb of Canadian said police had requested CCTV from around the time Ms Murphy went missing.
• Police have also searched that area.
• Elsworth Street leads into thick bushland.
• The police had no planned searches this weekend, unless Sam's location was discovered through other means (as per Comm Patton).

https://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/victoria/location-of-samantha-murphys-body-remains-unknown-with-accused-killer-refusing-to-talk/news-story/228c9de5e4a976b7af28eab14713fdef?amp

 

[Cedars]

I wonder though, could it still be a vehicle accident at first, reckless driving leading to SM being struck, but in failing to render assistance, provide first aid, call paramedics, deliberately allowing SM to pass, then deliberate cover up and hiding the body, can this amount to a murder charge? Deliberate intent to let someone die.

I notice this keeps coming up.

No, hitting someone by accident and failing to render aid, will not lead to a murder charge anywhere that I know of. That is manslaughter: inadvertently causing death, no matter how carelessly or negligently.

Murder is not defined by statute, but by common law (tradition), so it is essentially the same throughout the English-speaking world, and the legalities were sorted out in courts hundreds of years ago in England.

The key to a murder charge is formally known as, in Latin, 'mens rea' - the guilty mind. Prosecution must prove the person knew what they were going to do was murder, before they did it. The murderer knew it was deeply wrong, but did it anyway, deliberately, with intent to murder. If the victim survived, it was by accident, because they meant to kill them dead.

Another way it has been described is 'with malice aforethought'

No 'whoops, I got distracted, I didn't mean to stab him in the heart', 'oops, the gun went off as I vigourously cleaned it, it just happened to be aimed directly at her head from 2 feet away,' etc.

Murder - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

It's really not that complicated. I don't understand how, before the arrest, everyone was quite happy to speculate that her husband was a murderer, but seem so sqeamish about it with regards to the real suspect.

JMO

 

[SouthAussie]

These are the streets from which police have specifically requested CCTV from homes and businesses, from around the time that Sam disappeared.
They are in between Eureka St and Mt Clear ... closer to Eureka St.

Google maps

 

[TootsieFootsie]

My opinion is if you accidentally hit someone with your car, they were still alive, you finished them off, that would be murder. In that case the person made the choice to kill someone, even if it did begin as an accident.

The law has areas of grey, it's not all set in stone and at times it has and does change.

 

[Chimera]

The Police have said this was a deliberate act .

Snipped for focus.
Hoping that whatever happened it was quick for Samantha, with no added tortures or indignities suffered.

Yes, agree has to be the most likely now, sadly.

The more I think about it anything directly involving the vehicle as the “weapon” is hard to reconcile.

It’s hard to see how a murder charge could be prosecuted if initially accidental hit, even with evidence of deliberate acts causing death after the accident. The driver could argue they were in shock from the accident. I can only see a manslaughter sticking in this circumstance.

If deliberately struck with intent to kill, I think it would be almost impossible to cover up so cleanly, apologies for being graphic but there would have been too much evidence to easily hide it all. MM and police were on the case within hours, and would have found signs of the accident. Maybe they did but I think a major crime scene would have been established and we’d have seen that in the MSM.

Agreed.
It's looking less like an accident and more like a crime of opportunity or even an abduction with intent to harm.
Samantha was apparently well concealed as the searches have been enormous in scope for her.
Also it's less looking like a swift, drug-induced haze as there was time to consider where best to hide her ?
This would have involved some driving around with her remains in the car ?
Horrible to think of.
Omo.

 

[TootsieFootsie]

There are more and more cases where if someone dies in a car accident, the driver is charged with murder.
Actually I don't think a car accident is thought of as an accident, the way they used to be.

These days there is a need to find someone to blame for everything that happens.

The days of something being just an accident seem to have vanished.

 

[Chimera]

I notice this keeps coming up.

No, hitting someone by accident and failing to render aid, will not lead to a murder charge anywhere that I know of. That is manslaughter: inadvertently causing death, no matter how carelessly or negligently.

Murder is not defined by statute, but by common law (tradition), so it is essentially the same throughout the English-speaking world, and the legalities were sorted out in courts hundreds of years ago in England.

The key to a murder charge is formally known as, in Latin, 'mens rea' - the guilty mind. Prosecution must prove the person knew what they were going to do was murder, before they did it. The murderer knew it was deeply wrong, but did it anyway, deliberately, with intent to murder. If the victim survived, it was by accident, because they meant to kill them dead.

Another way it has been described is 'with malice aforethought'

No 'whoops, I got distracted, I didn't mean to stab him in the heart', 'oops, the gun went off as I vigourously cleaned it, it just happened to be aimed directly at her head from 2 feet away,' etc.

Murder - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

It's really not that complicated. I don't understand how, before the arrest, everyone was quite happy to speculate that her husband was a murderer, but seem so sqeamish about it with regards to the real suspect.

JMO

Thanks for clarifying, @Cedars .
Fyi; I am not squeamish about the person LE have arrested .

Samantha had so much to live for , and is now robbed of all of that.
Her family still does not have her remains and as time passes, the cod will be harder to prove.
Omo.

 

[mondayschild]

Also it's less looking like a swift, drug-induced haze as there was time to consider where best to hide her ?
This would have involved some driving around with her remains in the car ?
Horrible to think of.
Omo.

Also, there is circulating footage of the alleged offender but I don't believe it is from the night before the alleged attack. I think it is from another evening.

Media articles linked earlier in this thread refer to associates of the alleged offender stating he was on a "bender". IMHO this could be seeding the idea he was not in right mind etc vs clear headed. If someone is a habitual user of substances & no mental health history (as per lawyer) then it would be highly suspicious to me that the first episode of psychosis coincides with an alleged murder that the alleged offender now refuses to discuss. Moo.

 

[Trooper]

Yes, I need another cuppa as well !

The exercise I am ( not very successfully ) referring to here is an actual thing, it was developed in the 1980's by a man called Stuart Kind, in the matter of the Yorkshire serial killer, .. ( this was before GPS and all that, but the maths and theory relate) ... called GeoProfiling.... it was originally used to pinpoint the location of the murderer, his starting point, so to speak. Where he left home from to go out and murder..

But it is also used to reckon up where crimes are perpetrated, where bodies are likely to be left, etc... .. this below is a small outline of the process...

As summarized in Rossmo (1999), key results of these studies include: Most crimes occur in relatively close proximity to the offender’s home, crime trips follow a distance-decay function, with the number of crime occurrences decreasing with distance from the offender’s home, juvenile offenders exhibit less mobility than adult offenders and patterns in crime trip distances vary by crime type.”

'At a theoretical level, these studies are based on a growing body of research that illustrates that people use simple cognitive judgements and experience to make precise conclusions (Gigerenzer & Selton (2001)). In a nutshell geographical profiling allows investigators to identify suspects by drawing a comparison between where they actually live and the forecasted location of the offenders abode. Limited research into the potential fallibility of such systems has nonetheless produced encouraging evidence, suggesting that the police search parameters can be reduced by a staggering ninety percent (Canter et al. 2000)."

( what this means, roughly, is, .. the killer followed a subconcious path to where he disposed of the body. In a state of elevated, probably not over high, but elevated stress, the subconscious makes the decisions, and the fall back is to go where he has been before. In other words, not forging a new path on this occasion. )

 

[HoneyBunOne]

Do you all think this was him alone or do you think there is someone else involved? I can see it being a lone attack if he was lying in wait, but if those partying on the Saturday night/Sunday morning are true, I can also see that a vehicle may be involved (perhaps travelling back from Ballarat). If a vehicle was involved, then I do not think he was alone in the vehicle and that is why he is not saying anything.

I do wonder if his silence is in part due to protecting other parties. If he was on his way home from partying, I feel it would be unlikely he was alone.

 

[mondayschild]

The exercise I am ( not very successfully ) referring to here is an actual thing, it was developed in the 1980's by a man called Stuart Kind, in the matter of the Yorkshire serial killer, .. ( this was before GPS and all that, but the maths and theory relate) ... called GeoProfiling.... it was originally used to pinpoint the location of the murderer, his starting point, so to speak. Where he left home from to go out and murder..

But it is also used to reckon up where crimes are perpetrated, where bodies are likely to be left, etc... .. this below is a small outline of the process...

As summarized in Rossmo (1999), key results of these studies include: Most crimes occur in relatively close proximity to the offender’s home, crime trips follow a distance-decay function, with the number of crime occurrences decreasing with distance from the offender’s home, juvenile offenders exhibit less mobility than adult offenders and patterns in crime trip distances vary by crime type.”

'At a theoretical level, these studies are based on a growing body of research that illustrates that people use simple cognitive judgements and experience to make precise conclusions (Gigerenzer & Selton (2001)). In a nutshell geographical profiling allows investigators to identify suspects by drawing a comparison between where they actually live and the forecasted location of the offenders abode. Limited research into the potential fallibility of such systems has nonetheless produced encouraging evidence, suggesting that the police search parameters can be reduced by a staggering ninety percent (Canter et al. 2000)."

( what this means, roughly, is, .. the killer followed a subconcious path to where he disposed of the body. In a state of elevated, probably not over high, but elevated stress, the subconscious makes the decisions, and the fall back is to go where he has been before. In other words, not forging a new path on this occasion. )

Makes great sense - thanks for sharing.

If I have it right, what you are saying is that even if the 2 weeks of movements they were tracking didn't involve moving or relocating items, the common movements & preferred routes would be highly valuable.

 

[Dotta]

I do wonder if his silence is in part due to protecting other parties. If he was on his way home from partying, I feel it would be unlikely he was alone.

But why would he protect possible co- perps if HIS life/freedom is in jeopardy?

Wouldn't it be better for a perp to spread guilt?

JMO

 

[SleutherGirl]

But why would he protect possible co- perps if HIS life/freedom is in jeopardy?

Wouldn't it be better for a perp to spread guilt?

JMO

If this is what actually happened, then it must have been someone he cares a lot about. Enough to keep them out of it, hypothetically.

 

[mondayschild]

But why would he protect possible co- perps if HIS life/freedom is in jeopardy?

Wouldn't it be better for a perp to spread guilt?

JMO

Depends on his relationship to the possible co-perp.

He knows the outcome for him. His silence (he thinks) can prevent bad outcome for someone he either fears or cares about. Moo

 

[Dotta]

Depends on his relationship to the possible co-perp.

He knows the outcome for him. His silence (he thinks) can prevent bad outcome for someone he either fears or cares about. Moo

Ummm....

Well,
Colour me doubtful.

JMO

 

[Cedars]

My opinion is if you accidentally hit someone with your car, they were still alive, you finished them off, that would be murder. In that case the person made the choice to kill someone, even if it did begin as an accident.

The law has areas of grey, it's not all set in stone and at times it has and does change.

Yes, I agree that could be the basis for a murder charge. Because, how could police know whether you hit them accidentally or not? Why would they even choose to believe that you hit them accidentally? And would a jury believe you? And would they care?

I know of confessed murderers who said they hit the person with their vehicle precisely in order to disable them, so as to then attack and murder them.

Even in this case, if driving a vehicle was really involved, possibly LE know the car could not have been travelling fast enough to kill someone, or that it must have swerved towards someone, or chased them around, or whatever.

JMO

ETA Perhaps they are going off SM's heart rate monitor, which might tell a revealing story, more complex than just brisk walking/instant death.

JMO

 

[Whatson]

Can anyone tell or do we know the year, model, brand of car the accused white ute is? I’d like to know if it’s fitted with any GPS or perhaps it’s an older model.

How long would it take LE to extract GPS data from mobile and car? I feel like this could be so telling as to where Samantha might be, but if he didn’t take his phone with him when ‘disposing’ of her, and if his car is not equipped with GPS perhaps there is not GPS record.

The other thought is he’s done this during a routine electrical job (eg at a job site, in a skip bin). Being an electrician, I’d imagine he’d be doing a bit of driving around the place.

IMO

Looked into it a bit more and the supplied picture matches up with a 2016 Isuzi D'max. Same headlights, same style wing mirrors, same flared wheel arches, and 4x4 sticker at the rear of the tray on the sides.

 

[BabeBlues]

It looks like a Mitsubishi Triton, maybe around 5 years old. Although it could also be a Isuzu D'Max

I am not sure the photo the media have used is actually his current car? My reasoning is @Dr Samoht mentioned the address and a quick google maps street view search (August '23) shows not only the bike trailer out the front but a white dual cab, and an enclosed canopy on the tray (very similar to the one in the media photo) but it is a much newer model Ford Ranger with ladders (typically used by sparkies) on the roof racks. @BGirl88 IMO the media photo could be an older vehicle he once owned, the newer Ranger would 100% have GPS.

MOO

 

[Deleted member 293720]

Snipped for focus.
Hoping that whatever happened it was quick for Samantha, with no added tortures or indignities suffered.



Agreed.
It's looking less like an accident and more like a crime of opportunity or even an abduction with intent to harm.
Samantha was apparently well concealed as the searches have been enormous in scope for her.
Also it's less looking like a swift, drug-induced haze as there was time to consider where best to hide her ?
This would have involved some driving around with her remains in the car ?
Horrible to think of.
Omo.

Yes, JMO but I also feel the ping was a diversion used to misdirect. I'm not sure if it then means that the phone/sim and body were/are together or that same person involved in both.

I think that ping happened not long after Samantha was murdered

with his phone and Samantha's

The police won't say what time the ping happened

But he must set upon her quickly, as she didn't have time to activate her smartwatch or phone for help

 

[Hestia's Fire]

Depends on his relationship to the possible co-perp.

He knows the outcome for him. His silence (he thinks) can prevent bad outcome for someone he either fears or cares about. Moo

The mythical and hypothetical other person could also have dirt on him about other offenses he's committed and gotten away with.
I don't necessarily think there is another person, but IMO there are definitely plenty of reasons to keep quiet about an accomplice if there is one.