Health Minister Mark Butler was on ABC News Breakfast moments ago, where he was asked for his reaction to the death of Bradley John Murdoch, the notorious outback killer serving a life sentence for the murder of 28-year-old British backpacker Peter Falconio in 2001.
Murdoch died from throat cancer in the palliative care unit at Alice Springs Hospital, taking key details about the location of Falconio’s body to his grave.
Joanne Lees, 27, and Peter Falconio, 28, in their campervan in an undated picture.
Police say Falconio was shot on a remote stretch of the Stuart Highway near Barrow Creek, about 300 kilometres north of Alice Springs. Falconio’s blood was found where police believe he was murdered before his body was moved.
The British backpacker was travelling around the country with his girlfriend Joanne Lees, who survived Murdoch’s attack.
Butler said there was “not much reason” to mourn Murdoch’s death, though added that it presented an opportunity to grieve with Falconio’s family once more.
“It’s another opportunity to mourn the loss of a young life, Peter Falconio, and to grieve with a family that still doesn’t have that closure, still don’t know where the remains of their loved one has laid for so many years now,” Butler said.
“Just an awful tragedy, a young life snuffed out at that age.”
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