Murder in Australia
Who is Bradley Robert Edwards? Murderer responsible for Claremont Killings
Edwards managed to avoid suspicion for decades
BRADLEY Robert Edwards is a serial killer who committed a series of horrifying murders in Western Australia.
His violent murder spree will be examined in Channel 5’s The Girls Who Disappeared: Murder in a Small Town.
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Criminal past
Edwards was born on December 7, 1968, in Merredin, Western Australia.
In 1990, he pleaded guilty to the aggravated assault of a social worker at Hollywood Private Hospital and was later charged with more violent crimes.
After breaking into a house and holding an 18-year-old woman hostage in 1988, he attacked another woman named Liz Kirkby.
Liz had hired Edwards to install a new phone line for her and thought he had left the home when she discovered him in the toilet.
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When she saw him, Edwards was wearing one of her bathrobes with her underwear on his head.
He then attacked her, but she was able to fight him off and forced him to leave her home.
Afterwards, Liz was left with two black eyes and, initially, didn't recognise herself in the mirror because of her injuries.
She felt that the police didn’t put much effort into catching her killer because she lived in Huntingdale.
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Liz believed that more would have been done to help her, if she lived in a wealthier suburb.
Edward's famous crime spree began shortly after he assaulted a 17-year-old in February 1995, though he would only be caught decades later.
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Horrifying crime spree
On January 27, 1996, the 18-year-old Sarah Spiers disappeared in Claremont.
Her disappearance became a hotly debated topic in , but her body was never found.
Just months later, on June 9, Jane Rimmer vanished in the same area of Claremont.
Like Sarah, she disappeared after a night out drinking with her friends.
Fifty-five days later, Jane’s body was found naked and lying in bush-land near Woolcoot Road by a family picking flowers.
Nine months later, on March 15, 1997, Ciara Glennon disappeared from the same area.
The 27-year-old had been working as a lawyer at the time of her disappearance.
Like Jane, her body was found weeks later by a bush walker.
False starts
The Western Australia Police launched a taskforce called Macro which was focused on catching the serial killer at large in Claremont.
The investigation initially focused on a public servant named Lance Williams, who was identified as the prime suspect in 1998.
However, he maintained his innocence and was declared as “no longer a person of interest” in 2008.
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Edward faces justice
Edwards was arrested decades after his crime on December 22, 2016, in relation to Ciara and Jane’s murders.
The killer had worked at Telstra, an Australian electrical company, at the time and used work vehicles after hours to move about undetected.
When a witness spotted a Telecom van in the area for “no apparent” reason, during the murders, the police grew suspicious.
Fibres in the vehicle matched those found on the bodies of Jane and Ciara, which allowed the police to finally charge Edwards.
The trial concluded on June 25, 2020, after seven months of hearings.
On December 23, 2020, Edwards was sentenced to life imprisonment with the possibility of parole after 40 years.
He was not convicted of Sarah’s killing however, though the judge noted that it was “more likely” that Edwards was involved in her appearance than not.
Murder in a small town
A Channel 5 documentary named The Girls Who Disappeared: Murder in a Small Town will dive into the murky details of the horrifying case.
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True crime fans can catch the series when it airs on December 10, 2024, at 10pm.
The special is 125 minutes long and includes interviews with the people who helped catch Edwards.
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