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Northern Territory Police have hosed down claims human remains have been found in Alice Springs
Following reports in The Age that unidentified bones were set to be tested to see if they belong to murdered British backpacker Peter Falconio, who was killed in the Australian outback in 2001, the force released a statement on Friday night denying any such discovery.
"No human remains have been located by Northern Territory Police, and a search is not currently being conducted," a post on Facebook said.
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"NT Police would like to advise the public that speculating on the identity on any missing person causes unwarranted grief and trauma to the family and friends," Assistant Commissioner Michael White APM said.
The reports first surfaced on Friday evening with The Age reporting multiple sources suggesting human remains had been discovered and were being tested.
Bradley John Murdoch, the man convicted of Falconio's murder, has refused to say where Falconio's body is, leaving many to speculate on the case over the years.
It's understood the body was dumped near where the British backpacker was shot, along the Stuart Highway north of Alice Springs, while travelling with his girlfriend Joanne Lees on July 14, 2001.
One man in 2020 claimed he saw the killer shooting at Falconio and his girlfriend from under his Kombi Van.
He said he saw two men bundling a third, "jelly-like" man into a red car that same night.
"I'm pretty sure that bloke in the middle could very well have been Peter Falconio," Vince Millar told a British TV crew.
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Falconio was travelling with his girlfriend Joanne Lees on the Stuart Highway, near Barrow Creek, about 280km north of Alice Springs, when Murdoch got them to pull over.
Believing something might be wrong with the car, Falconio left the vehicle and Lees said she heard a loud bang shortly after. Then, saw the stranger brandishing a gun.
Lees allowed him to secure her hands, but said she fled while he was distracted, and hid from him in the bush for some time before flagging down a road train just after midnight.
Murdoch was arrested by police after his brother provided DNA that matched samples of evidence from the crime scene.
The trial was the longest in Australian Criminal History at the time, lasting 38 days before the jury handed a unanimous guilty verdict on December 13, 2005.
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Source: 9News
