The disappearance of Sarah Spiers is part of Australia's longest running murder investigation into what is known as the Claremont serial murders.
The Claremont Murders involve the abduction and murder of atleast three young women (one of whom has never been recovered), who disappeared from the same location, under similiar circumstances, in the 1990s from the wealthy suburb of Claremont in Perth, Western Australia. The case began with the disappearance of Sarah Spiers (18) on 27 January 1996.
SARAH ELLEN SPIERS
MISSING: 27 January 1996
LAST SEEN: Claremont, Perth, Western Australia
DOB: 12/09/1977
HAIR: Blond
BUILD: Medium
EYES: Green
CLOTHING: Tailored Portman's beige shorts; Light coloured T-Shirt; Black denim jacket; Beige suede shoes
OTHER ITEMS: Yellow metal sunflower key-ring; National Australia bank card
CIRCUMSTANCES:
Sarah Spiers, an 18 year-old secretary, disappeared on Saturday, 27 January 1996, after leaving a nightclub in the wealthy suburb of Claremont, Perth, Western Australia.
On the night she vanished, Sarah Spiers had been celebrating Australia Day with friends at the Ocean Beach Hotel in Cottesloe. At 12:15AM, Sarah's older sister and flatmate, Amanda Spiers (20), dropped the group at the Club Bayview, on St Quentin's Avenue, in Claremont.
When Sarah Spiers left the Club Bayview, her friends were not ready to leave. Sarah Spiers was last seen at approximately 2AM, leaving the club alone, with the intention of catching a taxi.
Phone records show Sarah called a taxi from a payphone in the immediate area. However, when the taxi arrived at the pick-up location on the corner of Stirling Highway and Stirling Road at 2:06AM (six minutes after the appointment was made), there was no signs of Sarah.
When Sarah Spiers failed to return home to the unit she shared with her sister, the initial alarm bells were raised. By the Sunday evening, when she had still failed to make contact, her concerned family reported Sarah Spiers as a missing person to the W.A Police.
Initially, for the first fortnight, W.A Police treated her disappearance as a missing person case. However, due to the unusual circumstances surrounding her disappearance, those close to Sarah knew this was not possible, as she would never fail to communicate with her friends and family, and there was nothing in her background to indicate that she would voluntarily vanish.
Sarah Spiers has not been seen or heard from since this date, and despite extensive inquiries by the W.A Police, her whereabouts remain unknown.
Although Sarah Spier’s body has not been recovered, it is now presumed that she was almost certainly abducted and murdered. Police theorise she was abducted within two minutes of making the phone call to the taxi company – the amount of the time it takes for a cab to travel from nearby Eric Street, Cottesloe, where the taxi logged the job-call.
It is also believed that she is a victim of the so-called Claremont Serial Killer, who was operating in Claremont between 1996 and 1997.
***
A few months after Sarah Spiers disappeared, on 9 June 1996, Jane Rimmer (23) disappeared from the same part of Claremont. In August 1996, her naked body was discovered in a roadside verge, on Woolcoot Road, in Wellard.
Jane Rimmer
Ciara Glennon (27) disappeared from the Claremont area on 14 March 1997. On 3 April 2007, her body was found in scrub on Pipidinny Road, in the northern Perth suburb of Eglinton.
Ciara Glennon
Speculation is rife that these were not the first victims of an unidentified serial killer. Western Australia has a number of missing person cases spanning back many years, many of whom are young women, who have vanished, never to be seen or heard from again. Julie Cutler (22), who disappeared on 20 June 1988 after leaving a staff function at the Parmelia Hilton Hotel after a staff function, is one case that has been allegedly linked to the Claremont cases ( http://www.missingpersons.gov.au/profile.aspx?Id=1338)
The police investigation into the Claremont cases (headed under the Macro taskforce) has been surrounded by absolute secrecy and has been heavily criticised over the course of the investigation by the public and media alike. They have identified dozens of potential suspects, including a few high-profile persons of interest, but to date there have been no arrests made.
The case is on-going.
LINKS:
Wiki article on the Claremont Serial Murders: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Claremont_serial_murders
2004 program transcript of the ABC's 'Australian Story', which explores the Claremont Murders : http://www.abc.net.au/austory/content/2003/s1042100.htm
'Closing in on a killer' article (2004):
' http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2004/09/24/1095961862193.html
Here is 2 articles about the CCTV footage the police released a few months ago in regard to Jane Rimmer's disappearance. To this day the "mystery man" has not been identified by the police.Murder suspect drove Holden wagon
A young man warned murder victim Ciara Glennon not to get into a white Holden station wagon the night she disappeared from Claremont.
The man and two others waiting at a bus stop near Christ Church on Stirling Highway saw her talking to the occupants of the car.
She had her knees bent and the palms of her hands resting on her knees to bring her down to the car's passenger window level.
One of the men called out to her that she was stupid to hitch-hike.
Ms Glennon looked up and waved him off with a middle finger sign, and continued talking to the car occupants.
The young men at the bus-stop looked away. When they looked back, both Ms Glennon and the car had disappeared.
Ms Glennon's body was found in coastal scrub 40km north of Perth two weeks later.
She was the last of three young women who disappeared from central Claremont after leaving local nightspots.
The 27-year-old Mosman Park lawyer was seen standing on the footpath in Stirling Highway talking through the window to the occupants of the Holden.
Police have never released a description of the car.
So far no witnesses have come forward to say they saw her get into that car or any other.
Police have not been able to trace the Holden, its occupants or the occupants of the five other cars known to have been passing at the time.
They are very anxious to do so.
At a press conference on Thursday, Major Crime detective superintendent Jeff Byleveld said it was not clear whether or not the wagon was a taxi, and said witness accounts of it could not be confirmed.
But at least one of the young men is positive it was a white Holden station wagon without taxi markings.
It is a mark of honour among many young men to instantly distinguish Holdens from their similar-looking rival Fords.
Ms Glennon disappeared around midnight on March 17, 1997. She had been drinking at the Continental Hotel, now the Claremont,
Young men in a car in Stirling Highway also feature in newly released information about the sighting of a car seen next to Sarah Spiers in Stirling Road more than a year earlier.
Ms Spiers (18) was the first of the three young women to disappear.
On Australia Day 1996, she vanished after calling a taxi from a phone box in Stirling Road, Claremont, diagonally opposite Christ Church.
The new information is that the young men in a car in Stirling Highway saw her cross Stirling Road to wait by the kerb.
They discussed offering her a lift as good samaritans, but decided against it. They then saw the headlights of a car arrive from the direction of the subway, and stop.
No trace of Ms Spiers has been seen since. Police have been unable to obtain a description of the car or had contact with its driver.
Link: http://www.postnewspapers.com.au/20080830/news/001.shtml
http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2008/08/15/2337123.htm
http://www.postnewspapers.com.au/20080830/news/005.shtml.
edited to fix link - NQ
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It's one of those things that you don't think will ever happen to you but by the time you realize you should've done something, it's too late. Long story short, I was almost abducted at a park when I was 5. My mom did not report it (I have no clue why? It was just a different time then? :? ) The man killed 6 little girls and was not caught until many years later 
another person on here from bumfuckville nowhere (ie. Perth)!? that is amazing 
