Casefile True Crime - Searching For Sarah MacDiarmid - Episode 1

Episode Date: December 27, 2025

With Casefile on a short break, we thought this would be a great time to shine a light on some of the shows that may have flown under the radar for many of you. These are shows we've put our hearts into and are really proud of. Today, we’re sharing another one of those shows — Searching for Sarah MacDiarmid.On 11 July 1990, 23-year-old Sarah MacDiarmid went missing from the Kananook railway station. Blood found beside her car suggested a violent attack — but Sarah was gone, and her body has never been found.Across nine episodes, the series follows Sarah’s last known movements, investigates the witness accounts and leads, revisits the searches, and examines the possible connection to serial killer Paul Denyer.Decades on, Sarah’s family still believe someone knows the truth — and hopes this series will reach the person holding that missing piece.We’re releasing the first episode here on the Casefile feed. You can find the full nine-part series by looking up Searching for Sarah MacDiarmid, wherever you get your podcasts.I hope you enjoy the series. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Hi, it's Casey here. As you probably know by now, CaseFile will be back with all new episodes in March 2026 for what will be our 10th year. We will also be releasing some bonus content and other things to mark the occasion, so keep an eye out for that. But earlier this year, you might have noticed that we released the first episodes of some of the Case File Present shows we've produced in the Case File feed. The decision to do so came after I learnt something surprising while talking with people at our live events. Many CaseFile listeners had no idea that we produce other shows outside of CaseFile, and some had never even heard of CaseFile Presents.

It dawned on me that if someone is a big enough supporter of our show to come to a live event, but hasn't heard of our production company, then clearly we need to do a better job of highlighting the other stories we've put so much care and work into. For those who don't know, CaseFile Presents is our broader production platform. While CaseFile is our flagship show, we've also created a number of other podcasts under the CaseFile Presents banner. Our level of involvement differs from project to project, but we've played a direct role in all of them. Today, we're sharing another one of those shows, searching for Sarah McDermott. On the 11th of July 1990, 23-year-old Sarah McDermott went missing from the Caninook Railway Station.

Blood found beside her car suggested a violent attack, but Sarah was gone and her body has never been found. Across nine episodes, the series follows Sarah's last known movements, investigates the witness accounts and leads, revisits the searches, and examines the possible connection to series. serial killer Paul Danya. Decades on, Sarah's family still believe someone knows the truth, and hope this series will reach the person holding that missing piece. We're releasing the first episode here on the case file feed. You can find the full nine-part series by looking up searching for Sarah McDermott wherever you get your podcasts.

Now, here's episode one. She was always a very good daughter. If she was out, someone going to be late, she would ring and let us know. We never, ever, until that night, on the 11th of July, in 1990, was the night we didn't know. And what really plays on my mind now is that poor soul with whatever happened to her that night at the railway station. I wasn't there for it then. So that, as a mother, has been a big thing. I don't go on about it, but now that I'm old or I think I'm spilling over.

When my podcast Case File launched our Submitter Case page, we were inundated by thousands of suggestions. One case in particular came up over and over. The disappearance of 23-year-old Sarah McDermott from the Canonogorailway Station on the 11th of July, 1990. Canaanook train station is a little over 41 kilometres from Melbourne's CBD. The station is the last stop on the Frankston train line before the train reaches Frankston proper,

two and a half kilometres further down. Three years after Sarah disappeared, this whole area would become infamous when the Frankston serial killer, Paul Denier, murdered three women in a seven-week killing spree. These crimes were covered on episode 23 of Case File, and will be explored in further detail throughout this series. It is worth noting that Paul Dena spent a number of years identifying as a woman,

during which he was known as Paula. Several sources have since advised that he no longer identifies as a woman and uses the name Paul again. Therefore, we will refer to him as Paul and use male pronouns. Back when Sarah McDermott went missing in 1990, Frankston hadn't been tainted by the serial killings, but it did have a history of murdered women long before Sarah vanished. A decade earlier, a woman disappeared in 1980

and another the following year. Both women vanished while waiting for buses on the Frankston Dandenong Road. One was later found murdered in Scrab off McClelland Drive in Frankston and the other in Scrub along Sky Road. There were 17 months between these two murders, but in the intervening time, four other women vanished from around Melbourne. Their bodies would later be found buried in scrubland in Tynong North. The Frankston-Tinong-North serial killings were covered in episode 46 of Case File. Then, 10 years later, Sarah McDermott vanished too. But unlike the Frankston-Tinong-North victims, Sarah's body was never recovered. Vicky Petratus had just

finished making the vanishing of Vivian Cameron, and I thought, who better to tackle this case than Vicky? Her book, The Frankston Murders, about serial killer Paul Denier, had touched on the disappearance of Sarah McDermott, as well as another unsolved murder in 1992 in Frankston, that of Michelle Brown. In this podcast, Vicky explores Sarah McDermott's case in detail, She interviews Sarah's family and friends, and the detectives who deeply regret that they couldn't return Sarah to her family. 2020 marked the 30th anniversary of Sarah McDermott's disappearance on that cold July night in 1990. We are going to leave Vicky to piece together Sarah's final movement and look at the police theories about what might have happened to the 23-year-old world. as she got off the train at the cannonel railway station.

Vicky Petratus, and I'm a true crime author. I've been writing about real police cases for nearly three decades now, and there are a few more tragic than the case of Sarah McDermott. For her family left behind, there is nothing worse than not knowing. There is no relief from the constant wondering. Where is she? What happened to her? Did she suffer? It is our greatest hope that this podcast will bring a renewed focus onto Sarah's case and that someone listening will have a piece of the puzzle that will help return Sarah to her parents, Peter and Sheila, and her brother Alistair. Even though she was 23 years old, Sarah McDermott was the kind of daughter

who always told her parents what time she'd be home. She always took the time to ring, so they wouldn't worry. On Wednesday, the 11th of July, 1990, Sarah played tennis with friends after work. Her parents expected her home around 10.30pm. Sarah got off the train when it stopped at the Canaanook Railway Station at 10.20 p.m. She was seen by several witnesses walking toward the car park, and several people later reported. hearing screams coming from that direction.

And then Sarah McDermott was gone. It's easy for history to cast Sarah McDermott as the missing girl, but we are not the sum total of our final moments. Before we die, we live. And so before we examine the time following the disappearance of Sarah McDermott, we must look at the time before, her time, because if we don't, we do Sarah an injustice. She lived, she disappeared, she was mourned, and she lives on in the memories of those who love her. And when we tell stories of the missing, for a moment in time, we bring them back.

To begin this journey, Sarah's mum, Sheila McDermott, wanted to take. tell me the story of Sarah's birth in 1966. She hadn't spoken about it widely before, but she felt like it was time to share it. While Sheila tells the story calmly now, over half a century later, one can only imagine the anxiety of giving birth to your first child only to be told there was something wrong. She was born on the 15th of November. and I was just thrilled the bits. She looked just like any newborn baby and everything went well.

She was born at 2 o'clock in the morning. 6 o'clock in the morning they told me that Sarah was a little mucusy so they would leave her in the nursery and bring her out at 9. I wasn't worried because I'm aware of babies being like that. But at 9 o'clock they came and the curtains were pulled round and the doctor came in to see me

and they told me that Sarah wasn't well and that they didn't know what the problem was but that they were going to have to take her to another hospital because it was a small hospital I had her in and about half an hour later the ambulance men came with an incubator and my little baby in it. and she was lying on her side looking at me and I'd had a dream about her

when I was expecting her and everyone laughed when I said that I was worried I'd seen her and that she had a hair lip and cleft palate. Well, the colour of her hair, the way she was lying was just how I'd seen her in my dream. They went off and in those days, We had to stay six days in bed before we could get out and leave hospital.

And so she was six days old before I went to this other hospital to see her. And I had a shock. She was in an incubator, tipped up tubes in every place. They had discovered that she had what they called a peer-robin syndrome. She didn't have the hair lip. but she had the cliff palate. She also had a heart condition and they just kept telling me

she was holding her own. She stopped breathing. They had to intubate her and she was intubated for three months and when it came to the fourth month they told me everything was going good and that was fine. So I got her home at four months

and the reason I'm telling that little bit of a story is that as a mother, and with, well, I don't know what's happened to Sarah, but over the years, and now I'm older myself, it has become, why did that we saw have to suffer when she was born? She gets over everything. She comes off heart medicine when she's five.

She's a happy girl that grows up, loves her friends, always loves friends around her. The usual ups and downs are all moms and dads have with children as a growing up, but nothing bad. We were a very good family. Sarah suffered, but she fought back and overcame each setback, marking her as a fighter right from the start. After having faced such difficulties with feeding when she was born,

as Sarah grew into a little girl, she developed a voracious appetite. It became a family joke. Funnily enough, although she was a problem feeder because of her problem, she loved food, she loved her food, and I can remember she would eat until she... Sarah could eat by... And one day I said, well, Sarah,

I don't think you could eat any more of that. You've had enough. She took another bit. It was pizza, I think. And then the next thing, she said to me, Mom, I'm feeling awfully sick. And I wasn't surprised, but, you know, she did go off and she was sick and she came back and she was fine.

It was a standing joke in the family. Yeah. You used to watch her. She loved her food and I'm talking about when she was 7, 8, 9, 10. You'd go out for a meal with my parents, let's say. I'd just say it was a standing joke, the pork chop bone would be there and it'd be stripped and I used to say I'd never like to be stuck in a desert island with that one

all that would be left would be a pair of boots Two years after Sarah was born Peter and Sheila welcomed a son into their family Like Sarah Alistair too was born with Pierre Robyn's syndrome And like Sarah, he had to spend a couple of months in hospital hospital after he was born. When it was finally time to bring him home, Peter and Sheila remember taking little Sarah to the hospital to collect him. It was the same baby unit and they remembered Sarah from when she was there and she came running in. Peter was coming behind with

the carricot to collect Alistair and myself to take him home. And one of the nurses said to her, hello Sarah, who have you come to collect today? My brother. My brother. And I can honestly, this is not put on because she's missing or anything. I never, ever had to worry about her being jealous. She was never jealous of him. She just loved him. And one day she gave me a fright. I had a house.

We had a lounge in the front. You were in the police force at that time, and it was a police house, and it was really a lovely one. And I had a lounge that I could keep if anyone came and wanted to sit. without toys and everything and then I used what they'd have like a family room at the back but I had him in the front room in the pram asleep

and he woke up and I heard him and I was just in the middle of wet hands or something and I'm shouting to this little baby as though he could answer me I'll be there in a minute Alistair I'll be there in a minute Alastair you know I'll be there in a minute Alston

and he stopped crying I thought that's fine next thing huff paff half half here's herself coming through carrying this bit oh and he's gradually slipping and he's looking up at her grinning grinning and oh i didn't want to tell her off she thought she was doing a good thing bringing it to me and i ran oh i said sarah i'll take alison thank you very much and i got i got him and she was so excited that she is carried him through. Yeah, she would. Peter McDermott's brother, Sarah's uncle Doug, said that he would be thrilled to write something for Sarah for the podcast,

but he wouldn't be able to read it, because even after 30 years, it would be beyond difficult to speak those words out loud. Instead, I asked Peter McDermott if he would read the letter. I'm not sure if it was any easier for Peter to do it. but he did it anyway. My earliest memory of Sarah was in Minter and Magna at her Granny Bond's cottage

when she was a babe in arms. Sarah as a child had a fine dorset accent even after living in Scotland in the early 1970s for a couple of years. On one occasion, Granny McDermott and I had taken the two children down to Oben to see too old and much-loved danties. On the way back home late in the day, Sarah stood up in the back of the car between

the two front seats, watching the headlights play in the road ahead, and announced in her broad minton accent, we're in the bloody dark now. We were in no doubt that the swear word came from her daddy. She was a determined way, lass. Some would say Thrawn, a good Scottish word for obstinate. A characteristic to be admired in my opinion. Half a world away from Scotland, the McDermott's moved to Australia, Townsville to be exact. Townsville is in Queensland, around 1,300 kilometres north of Brisbane. With its tropical climate, it was a very different place to the one the McDermott's had left.

We came out originally in 1973. 19, yes, 74, 75. And we lived in Tainesville and we had a wonderful life there. It was really great. In Townsville, Sarah and Alastair were enrolled in the local school and the McDermott family met Jenny Carr and Donna McMahon who were teachers there. Like so many people I spoke to for this podcast, Jenny and Donna were so taken by the McDermots

that they have remained lifelong friends, even though the McDermots only stayed in Townsville for four years. Jenny Carr remembers the time well. It was the mid-70s. I was teaching at primary school in Townsville. I was a music teacher. Sarah's class teacher brought her to me and introduced her as a little Scottish girl.

and then she brought her parents when they came up to school one day she brought them and introduced them and from that day on we were really very close friends where we always have been and while they lived in Townsville we saw them daily, we socialised

we partied, we drank we did all the things that you do when you're young and they were just wonderful parents So, from Jenny's point of view, what was little Sarah McDermott like as a primary school student? Oh, she was just delightful. She was musical. She had a very pretty voice.

And she was learning the violin. And she had a great year for music. And she practiced really hard. She was quite small for age. In fact, I don't think she was ever very tall. She was quite small, but very small. but very strong personality and not subtle in any way.

She was all very straight, very truthful. And she had an amazing sense of humour, like both her mum and dad's too, but different types of sense of humour they've got and she had to sort of blend of the two. Teaching at the same school, Donna McMahon taught Sarah the violin. Since the lessons were one-to-one, Dono got to know the strong-willed little Scottish girl.

She was a person who's bucket was always full. You would never talk about Sarah's bucket being half-empty or half-full. It was full. And she gave her or win whatever she was doing, whether it was sport, whether it was music, you know, whether it was in social interaction or whatever. She was an amazing young woman. Sarah made a lifelong friend in Townsville, a neighbourhood girl nicknamed Noni.

I met Sarah when I think I would have been about 11 and Sarah was 9 and they moved into the house diagonally behind us and we just seemed to click as friends. We spent a lot of time on our bikes just riding around the streets. This was 30 years ago when you could do that quite safely. We would ride up to the top of one of the hills

and ride down health a skilter. I'm not sure whether Peter and she all want to know about those things, but it was just childhood something. We went to the pool. We used to just do things together. We would be in her room and just listen to records. Noni recalled those days playing in the sun with her newfound friend. She was very feisty.

I can remember we always, like we always got on very well, but often we would play, she used to like to play rugby in the backyard. and always inevitably ended up with her tackling Alistair, her brother. And then she wasn't the best of sports, I don't think, in that regard. For the McDermott's, the idyllic days in Townsville didn't last forever. A family business back in the UK beckoned them home. Peter's family back home had a yacht-chartering business and his dad wanted to go out of it.

So Peter decided he would go back. and take over from his dad. So we went back to Britain. While Sarah was excited about going home to see her granny and Uncle Dougie, her friend Noni was upset to lose her. I was very devastated when they decided to return back to Scotland. But we kept in touch from them just met us.

And then when I started working, I would ring Sarah occasionally. It was very occasionally, obviously, from Australia. over to there. Unfortunately, the family business Peter had gone to work in wasn't the success he'd hoped for. While they wanted to move back to Australia, the McDermott's decided they wouldn't move back till their children were older.

And we couldn't come back straight away because both the children then were in high school and you can't move them when they're in high school. That's so important. And so that was fine. And all the time Sarah was in right from year one until she left school 18, she was in the Gallic Choir. And she just loved that. And she also had started learning the violin in Townsville before we went back.

So that continued on. She enjoyed that. Sarah's friend Noney went over to visit the McDermott's. I saved off enough money to go home and visit. That was a holiday that I will always remember as probably one of the best holidays in my lifetime. Yeah, I stayed with them and Sarah and I hired some push bikes and used to ride around close by or just go up to the shop there or just go down to the river that was not far from where they were living and just spend time together.

Because of the move to Queensland in 1974, then the move back to the UK, in 1978, then back to Australia in 1987, Sarah's brother Alistair thinks, perhaps this is why he and Sarah developed the closeness they did. Moving overseas removed access to long-term friends, so the only long-term friends Sarah and Alistair had were each other. When we were kids, Sarah and I were close as a brother and a sister, but that closeness was represented in doing things together. So I think, and I don't know for sure,

but I'm guessing partly because we moved around a bit as kids from the UK to Australia. And I think that shifting around probably, I think we were close anyway, but I think that added to the closeness and not in the form of always hugging each other or whatever. It was more just hanging out together. When we were young, we would play games in the house together

and do different things as well as playing our own games. And then when we were older and sort of teenage years, we would go and play tennis together. And we did that back in the UK, and we did it when we arrived back in Australia. The loss of Sarah has never dulled for any of the McDermott's. All they have now a memory. perhaps sharpened by that loss.

When Sarah's parents were at work, she easily stepped into the role of boss of the house where her brother Alistair was concerned. Sarah could be relied on to see if Sheila was off to work in Scotland in one of them in high school. I remember he was going to go out for a shirt for the second day running and Sarah says, you're not going to school in that chart. Get it off and put a clean one off.

I was tickled pink Off he goes out of the stage What sort of sister was she She sounds a bit motherly And a bit bossy Yes Yes Yeah absolutely

Very motherly Peter's younger brother Doug remembers an idyllic childhood For the McDermott children Peter reads his memories I bought a box of pup Sarah and Alist came with me down to Glasgow

to collect the wee dog from the kennels. They spent a very happy two hours on the way home in the back seat of the car, nothing the new baby. That was typical. Sarah was just such a loving and kind wee girl. Oh, hardly.

A perfect example was when she was around 19 or 20. She and Granny McDermid were great pals, notwithstanding a 50-year-age gap. When Sarah returned to the UK, she met a new friend called Maria Brolly. The two bonded as schoolgirls over their shared love of music. I first met Sarah at high school in about 1980. We had very similar interests in music and we performed together in a school choir. We used to have great fun going away on trips.

with the Gallic Choir at the school to different parts of Scotland and that's when Sarah's personality really came out because she was quite a fun-loving giggly girl. Always giggling, always full of fun never took herself too seriously and we were best friends

right through high school and I know if circumstances were different we'd probably still be best friends today. Sarah and Maria joined the Gaelic Choir and toured around performing. But it wasn't just Gaelic music that Sarah loved. She quickly became a connoisseur

of the top 40 charts. She loved Wham and the Eurythmics most of all. There was a disco she loved to go to in Fort William where we grew up called McTavish's Kitchens. And she loved dancing, particularly to the Eurythmics. And she was a big wham fan. Sarah finished high school at 18 and enrolled in college While she and Maria went off in different career directions They still kept in touch When we left school at 18 Sarah and I still kept in touch

She went off to college in Aberdeen to study travel and tourism And we used to phone each other But in those days it was lots of letter writing At college in Aberdeen Sarah met her new roommate, Caroline Lyons. The two went out a lot during that year. They went to see desperately seeking Susan and loved it and even tried to copy the fashion of the movie,

the tights, the singlets, the rah-rah skirts, which in the Aberdeen winter needed to be layered with warmer things on top. Caroline has kept a diary since she was about six or seven. She offered to look back through her diaries before we speak. Going back through the diary, I pinpointed the day when I first met Sarah and I wrote down everything that we did. It's been quite an emotional experience. Like a lot of Sarah's friends, Caroline embraced the opportunity to take that trip down memory lane. To move forward after such a tragedy means that we sometimes have to put our memories in a box and close the lid. It's how we

survive. When we do look back after years pass, we can see our memories in a different light. As we grow older, the lens we look through changes. This past week is the first time I've gone back over every single day from the 2nd of September 9 in 85 until June the 10th, night in 86, where we said goodbye. It's the first time I've gone through every day and very very emotional experience. Peter and Sheila McDermott are lovely people. I suspect that part of the reason police took Sarah's disappearance so seriously was that she clearly came from a really nice family.

When the family unit is strong, it is less likely someone might take flight from it. Caroline spent time with the McDermott's in Scotland when she and Sarah were roommates. I asked her what she remembered of the family back then. Funny, kind. Sheila's got a beautiful accent, and then Pete was so different with his very broad, Scottish accent. Always cracking jokes. Sarah was just like him.

Funny, warm, loving, kind. They took us out for dinner, paid for everything. They cooked dinner in their home. Just such lovely people. And they seem to be so happy to meet me. Peter and Sheila loved spending time with Sarah's friends as much as they loved spending time with the McDermott family. Their small family extended open arms to everyone.

The McDermots didn't want to move while their kids were in high school, and the minute Alistair finished, they made plans to return to Australia, not Queensland in the north this time, but Victoria in the south. Given the friendship that developed between Sarah and her roommate Caroline, it's not surprising that when the McDermott's started talking about moving back to Australia, Caroline planned to visit them there. Towards the end of my time with Sarah, her parents were starting to talk about going back to Australia. And I can pinpoint almost exactly the first time I heard about Australia as a country,

And this was in the few months before neighbours took Britain by storm because then everybody loved Australia. And you can imagine, I always tell people, imagine sitting at 4 o'clock in the afternoon, it's dark, it's snowing. You turn on the telly and there's sunshine, beaches, blonde, tan, happy people, very attractive. I'm one of a generation of backpackers, which is what I originally was, who saw Australia like that for the first time. And that's what made me come here. I'd seen that with Sarah. She pulled out the photos.

They became very clear to me when I look back through my diaries. Her and Al, bang on the beach, age about, I don't know, six, seven, eight, that kind of age. Blonde, tanned, swimmers, big blue sky. It just looked great. And I think that probably triggered my first introduction to Australia as a place as a country that I might like to visit one day. So when the McDermott's left for Australia, Caroline had a firm plan to visit.

The two friends settled on a date for her to come over, October 1990. The girls could have no way of knowing that by then, Sarah would be gone. But as much as Sarah was looking forward to coming back to Australia, the childhood memories she had from Townsville were very different to arriving in Melbourne as an adult. She hit a bit of a funk and her family noticed her normally happy disposition fade. Sheila had a talk to Sarah about her dark mood and Sarah broke down.

It was like a well overflowing. She was missing her friends in Scotland. But then one day she came in and she said, I've got an idea and I said, what's that? I think she says, if I go back over to Scotland for a holiday at Christmas time, she said, I can bring Grandma back with me. And Douglas Peter's brother, he always went to Japan on business. And then he used to come to Melbourne to have a holiday with us

and then fly back to the UK. So, oh, we said that would be lovely. And then she said to Alice, you come with me. And, of course, he was a uni student. He says, well, I can't afford it. And she said, don't worry about that. I'll pay your fare. Sarah's Uncle Dougie remembered their trip fondly.

Peter McDermott reads from the memory that Doug composed. Having returned to Australia two years earlier, Sarah hatched a plan with her wee brother that the two of them would come out to Scotland, stay with Gran for a few weeks over Christmas and New Year, and then escort her back to Australia for a holiday. Sarah stayed with Gran in her small retirement cottage. Out partying with her old school friends almost every night, Gran would wait up for her, and the two of them, I'm told, would blow. later into the wee small hours.

They were as thick as thieves and I never did find out what they discussed during these long late night giddly chats. But they loved each other to bits and had an exceptional bond. After the visit back to Scotland,

Sarah seemed to settle down once she returned to Melbourne. Of course, Douglas came at his time and then they went back. And from then, from then on, Sarah started making lovely, lovely friends here. Once Sarah established a wider friendship group, she was determined to take her brother Alistair along with her. Sarah would drag him everywhere.

She would be going to Anna's on a Saturday night, and she would say, Anna says that you're to come as well, Alistair, because he would say, no, I'm not going. She says, Anna says, you're to come as well. As well as having the travel bug, the McDermott kids were sporty. They loved their hockey when they were in primary. She played hockey, yes. And then, of course, she liked playing tennis, and that's what she'd been doing the day that it was after work.

They always, every Wednesday. And like every decision made in a convergence of things, that come together when someone disappears, Sarah McDermott's decision to play tennis every Wednesday night with her workmates would put her in the path of someone who would take her from her family forever. Once the McDermott settled in Melbourne,

they first moved to Pascovale. Peter and Sheila remember when Sarah got her first grown-up job. She never liked maths and the laugh was she ended up working with... She worked with C.E. Heaths and then she ended up as finance clerk. And we laughed. And she hated arithmetic and math. But she was fine. She was happy as Larry. Happy as Larry and she had a lovely lot of friends there. C.E. Heath would play an important part in Sarah's life.

She met lots of new friends there and started to establish her life as a working adult. Her friend Anna Tarantino remembers meeting Sarah at the same job interview. They hit it off immediately. Sarah and I first met and we were at the same job interview at C Heath's underwriting and insurance.

It was a really poshy place because I think it was at the Hyatt Hotel on Collins Street, I think, their office on the 37th floor. So that was a really beautiful because it had a fantastic view of the city. And we were both sitting in the same waiting office. And I remember that we started looking at each other

and we were waiting for ages. Well, it seemed like ages because probably we were both very nervous. I could immediately tell that she was very shy. I was too, I guess, but not as much as she was. We started talking and I think because she said, oh my God, I need a cigarette because she had this bad habit of smoking.

I said, oh, I don't know if you can smoke. here and she said I want to ask someone. Anna was a little shocked about the smoking. In her Italian family, smoking was frowned upon. Sarah and Anna both had their interviews for the job. I remember that she had a very good wit. We got along really well because we started laughing for no reasons and all that sort of stuff. So at the start we were a bit looking at each other saying, oh, I hope I'll get the job. And she was probably thinking the same thing. But in the end, we started saying, oh, hopefully they take us both on. And she said, oh, girls, I've got some good news.

Maybe they want to take the both of you on because they like the both of you. And so we were really happy because we just started our friendship from that day on until the day that she disappeared. We were always together. Peter and Sheila remember when Sarah confessed her bad habit to them. Sheila was sorry for her daughter. Peter, on the other hand, was just relieved that the bad habit wasn't anything worse than cigarettes.

I was in the kitchen, and Sarah came out to me, and she says, Mum, I've got something to tell you, and I thought, oh, my grief, what, what? She says, I've got a bad habit. And I said, bad habit, what? She said, I'm smoking. And I said to her, or Sarah, I said, I feel so sorry for you that you started up

but I said I can't say anything to you because we were smokers then you see Friends from our childhood are a cherished and irreplaceable commodity we knew each other when we were awkward teens and we formed as people in front of each other's eyes our values our hopes and our dreams meld together in a connection stronger than steel.

It is why when we can't see each other for ages, we pick up where we left off when we meet again. Sarah was no different, but sometimes the distance between her and her old friends bothered her and got her down. Her parents noticed, and finally, Sheila sat her down and asked her what was wrong. She just looked at me

and she just burst into tears and she said you don't know how unhappy I am and I sat on the bed we both sat down on the bed and I said what do you mean you're not happy well then of course it all started flowing out and it was the best thing that

although it was not nice It was the best thing I did because once she had broken that and burst into tears and we sat there I said, why didn't you tell me you know that we can talk about things and it all came out then

and what it was I think she'd had these memories from Townsville and then she had come back and you forget that places change and this was Melbourne. She was now an adult, she was working. It wasn't all the fun that you have as a kid. Sarah hinted at the way she was feeling

in a letter to her friend back in Scotland, Maria Brolly. Maria has kept the letter, and it's moving to hear these words that Sarah wrote. The letter was written on the 7th of March, 1988. Hi, how's it going? So much for me saying that I'll write more letters this year. So better late than never. Thanks for the little cheering-up letter from yourself and Marie.

I think I pulled myself together a bit since then. I just got really depressed at that stage because it had been almost a year since we left and I miss you a lot like hell sometimes, especially you. It's just that all my friends are from work and they've obviously got all their own friends from school and that's when I feel totally lost. I've got two best friends in this world

you and Loney and unfortunately you are 12,000 miles away and she's 2,000 miles away oh well say lovey anyway I must stop moaning every time I write to you you'll be getting quite sick of it

I'm suffering slightly today as I was sunbathing yesterday and my face got a little burnt I'm trying to get my tan up as I'm going off to Townsville on holiday on the 18th I don't want to look any whiter than I have to coming from Melbourne I'm really looking forward to it as I haven't been there since the day we started travelling back to Britain nearly 10 years ago.

They've just had a cyclone in Townsville so it will be absolutely hot. I'm staying with Noni and Paul for the week and then Jenny and Donna, my music teachers who are now family friends. The best part about this trip is that I'm flying on my own for the first time in my life. If I'm lucky, I'll have some gorgeous hunks sitting next to me. Guess who I'm going to see on Friday night? Cliff Richard. Anything to keep my mum happy, so it'll be good for a laugh if nothing else. Needless to say, my love life is non-existent, as usual.

Although George is trying to pair me up with a guy from work just because he gave me a bunch of red roses for my birthday, she'll be the death of me. As you can see, I've remembered the photos this time, so have a good laugh at them. Take care. Say good day to your mum and dad for me, plus everyone else. Lots of love, Sarah.

And as the letters suggests, Sarah was stoic about her situation. Once she relaxed into her new adult life, her parents could see that she just wanted to be settled and happy. She just wanted, like so many youngsters, she wanted her, she was at this stage for a happy life, just an easygoing life with the job and the money and the friends. She was just about to join the tenets. down in Frankston because they had one in North Frankston. Peter and Sheila have always been close to Sarah's friends and many of those friendships continue to this day.

If they had a day off work, they would often go into town to meet their daughter at the pub or the cafe downstairs at her work. Sarah would say, come into the city and we'll have a meal in the evening. She worked in Little Collins Place, and they were high-rise. They were up on 37th floor, but on the ground floor was Hugo's. Nice little pub.

Sarah's workmates, Angela, Conn and Sonia, remembered meeting Peter and Sheila at Hugo's bar for after-work drinks. But they were lovely because it was very, very friendly people, very friends. and living people. Going down to Hugo, so remember Peter and Sheila would come and have coffee or they'd meet up with them after work or maybe at lunch. So what were the McDermott family like in those carefree days before their daughter was taken? Angela Conn and Sonia reminisce. Sarah always spoke highly of her mum and dad at her because they were really close. Like it wasn't like a normal mother and daughter relationship. No, but she was mates. I'm sure she understood.

that they brought her here for a better life. So she understood that, even though she didn't have her friends. I'm not sure why, but before I started researching this podcast, I always thought that Sarah McDermott was tall. Maybe she looks tall in pictures. So it was a surprise to me when people started to talk about how little she was, 153 centimetres or five foot tall in the old measure. Her friend Sonia remembers the nickname

that she and Sarah got at the bar near their work. There was one story I do remember. So there was Sarah and myself, and I'm not a very tall person, sort of like five, one and a half. And we were all sort of the same height. So there was myself and Sarah, and was it Anna?

And the three of us were all doing one after the other and these guys at the bar just turned her and said, oh, look, the munchons are coming in, and that was a running joke with us. Sarah's friend Caroline Lyons was so excited about her visit to Australia. She and Sarah were going to travel around and go into state. On Monday the 22nd of January, 1990, Sarah missed a train at the Flinders Street Railway Station.

She passed the time until the next day. one, writing a letter to Caroline. The letter is especially poignant because all the plans she had made for Caroline's visit in October wouldn't come to pass. By July, Sarah had vanished. Dear Caroline, sorry I took so long to write. Anyway, what's new and how are you? At the moment, I'm sitting in North Melbourne Railway Station, waiting for my train home after work. I'm decidedly cranky as the one I was supposed to get has been cancelled and I have to wait half an hour for the next one. At least sun shining. By the end of this week, I will be the proud owner of a little red Honda Civic,

provided I don't have to spend too much extra to get a few mechanic jobs done to it. All being well, I will be zipping around in that and around Melbourne when you come over. I'm so rapture coming over. I'm planning to take about a month's leave while you're here, so we can travel interstate. Sydney, Brisbane or whatever you want. Sydney is fantastic. I've been there twice briefly since I saw you. I would also love to see Townsville again, but we'll see.

Mum and Dad have just bought a house, hence the new address, on the other side of the city near the beach. It looks like a little Spanish villa. I met Steffie Graff a couple of weeks ago. She was sitting in this Italian restaurant down where we work, so I went up to her and asked for a couple of autographs. The girls at work reckoned I would chicken out, but I didn't. and I went straight up there as I thought it would be my first and probably my only opportunity.

I'll be writing in the near future, I know it's your birthday soon. I'll try and send some photos too, so until then, take care. Lots of love, Sarah. The new house that Sarah referred to in her letter was in Sky Road in Frankston. The woman they had bought the house from gave Sarah some advice about which railway station to catch the train from. She looked at Sarah. She said, well, Sarah, she said,

all the time I've lived here, I've always used Canaanook. She says, don't use Frankston, because Frankston's got an underpass, and sometimes it's not always the best place to be. So she said, that's why I've always used Canaanot, and I find that a good station. So that's what we used, was Cananook.

And so, the McDermott's settled, into their new house in Frankston, and Sarah took possession of her little red car, and each day she parked it at the Caninoc Railway Station and caught the train to work. Her brother Alistair was enrolled in uni in the city, and she often drove him to the station with her in the mornings, but work days are longer than uni days, and they made their way home separately. Two months before Sarah disappeared, her beloved Uncle Douglas came from Scotland for a visit.

Douglas wrote about the memory, which Peter McDermott reads for him. In May 1990, I visited Australia briefly on route to business in Japan. I'm so glad that I did. Little did I know that it was the last time I was to see Sarah. The shy wee girl had blossomed into a beautiful, mature and self-atured young lady. She had bought a little red nissen of which she was very proud, and for my visit she'd taken two days of work to tour me around places of interest near Melbourne,

a great honour for me because it was something she wouldn't normally have done otherwise. I cannot tell you now where we went, but they are cherished days for me. me. The morning of my departure on that last visit, Sarah came into my room before going to work to give me a farewell kiss and to say goodbye. She was in tears as she left the very last time I saw her. It's beyond difficult for me to speak about Sarah, even after all these years. Her memory and her love will stay with me evermore. Podcast makers are creators of story. We weave the threads that people share into a pattern that makes the best sense.

People come to us and tell us things that they've kept largely to themselves for years. They are not provable and rarely satisfy the laws of evidence or burden of proof, but some threads are worth mentioning because they add a layer to the story that may not have been considered. And if one woman tells a story of being followed after she got off the train at Canaanook in 1990, perhaps other women will come forward with similar stories that will help us weave closer to the truth. Around May or June in 1990, something happened to a local woman called Carolyn McAllister that may or may not be related to what happened to Sarah in the July. Carolyn contacted me on a different matter entirely.

I'd mentioned a relative of hers in my book Once the Copper about legendary Melbourne cop Brian the Skull Murphy. We got chatting over Messenger and in one message she wrote that she had come close to being a victim of the Frankston serial killer, Paul Denier, who killed three women in 1993. I asked her what happened

and she told me her story. Now, there is no evidence, beyond a gut feeling, that the man in this story was Paul Denya. But whether it was Denya or not, her experience does show that there was a man in the area at the time, possibly targeting young women on their own at night who got off the train at Kananuk Railway Station. Carolyn was at university on the other side of town in Bandura

and lived near the campus during the week. Each Thursday, she would return to her parents' house for the weekend. She would catch the train home. As you listen to Carolyn, remember, this is about a month before Sarah disappeared. I'd get off at Kananoke Station. It would have been after seven and it was winter. so it was definitely dark. I would have still been 18, and so I got off the train

and walked across the platform and over the walkway down to the other side, and I'd walk along through the back streets there, up to Bruce Street, which was off Claude Street. As you walk along Bruce Street, it then becomes Lorna Street, and there's a reserve there. And I was walking on that side of the road where the reserve was. I was carrying my backpack that had all my university books,

in it. And I'd also had a small suitcase because I'd bring home clothes and wash them on the weekend. So I was walking along there and I could hear footsteps behind me. I looked back and I could see a guy in the distance and he was maybe 150 metres away, maybe more, but definitely I could see it was the outline of a male figure. I was quite aware that I was hearing the footsteps. They I was sort of quickening, and they were getting closer, so I quickened as I was walking past the reserve, because I just didn't feel at all safe then. As I quickened my pace, I was hearing the footsteps getting closer, and that was when I started to feel really quite scared.

So I swung my bag with my clothes in front of me, so I could hold them closer, and I pretty much started running as quickly as I could with the backpack on my back. and also carrying the suitcase in front of me. And so I was running to the end of that, and then it turned left and into Hadley Street. And I knew I wanted to get up to Clow Street, which was at the end of Hadley Street. And so I just kept moving.

It would have been, I guess, about 100 metres or so. And I was running by this stage. I wasn't normally a runner, but I certainly ran that night. And I ran because I thought if I get to Clow Street, there's lights all along there, there's cars going along there, it's just busier. And my aim was to get to the servo, which was at that stage. It was Food Plus on the corner of Clow Street and Frankston-Danyong Road. As Carolyn told me about being followed, hearing the man get closer and making her run from him,

it was a chilling reminder of the words the judge said as he sentenced. Paul Dena. He said, for many, you are the fear that quickens their steps as they walk home. After a desperate sprint, Carolyn made it to the service station and dashed inside. She moved through the service station's shop to the payphone at the back. As she called her dad and tried to catch her breath and ask him to come and get her, she saw the man. It seemed that he was looking for me after I went into the shop. I'm not sure that he saw me duck in there, but he was there looking around. He was still walking and looking in.

He was still travelling along Frankston-Danningon Road. He was going north and quite determinedly as he was walking. So I stayed there and I knew there was a public phone there. And I rang my dad and said, look, I think somebody's following me. Can you come and pick me up? So he came round and he picked me up and we drove along the service road, which was in front of the Nilex factory. And the Nilex factory in those days,

there was only a short fence. It would have only been waist high that was pipes, sort of a pipe fence. And it was all bushes along that area right up until you hit Madden Street. So we couldn't see him, even though we were looking for him. And I would have thought that I would have seen him there

or even further along as we got to Madden Street and turned in, but he wasn't there either. And he wasn't in Madden Street. There was just nobody walking around. I often wondered where he was, you know, where did he go? And I do wonder whether or not maybe he was in the back of that Christian church that was on the corner there. He could have been in behind the building because there was a car park through there that you could walk and there was bush behind there, but I guess I just don't know.

The Christian church, Carolyn is referring to, was the New Life Christian Centre. It was on the corner of Madden Street and Frankston Daninong Road. It was this exact location, three years later, that serial killer Paul Denya would leave his second victim, Debbie Fram's abandoned car, parked right in front of it. Denier was quite casual when he mentioned Madden Street in his interview. He doesn't say that the Christian Centre is, in fact, his place of worship. And he had it back Madden Street.

Why was the Madden Street? Wasn't too close, wasn't too far from home. It's worth mentioning another coincidence here. The Food Plus service station Carolyn ran to was the same place where murder victim Michelle Brown was last seen in March 1992. It was perhaps even the same phone that Carolyn used to call her dad from

that two years later Michelle would call her mum to ask to be picked up not from the service station but from the Frankston railway station but by the time Michelle's mum arrived Michelle wasn't at the train station although people later reported

hearing screams near there Michelle's mum then drove to the Food Plus but her daughter was gone looking back if it was Paul Denia I think that might have been his plan was actually to get me into that area because it's quite isolated. There were no houses close to that area.

You had the houses further past Madden Street and across the road on Frankston-Danong Road. But certainly around there, there were no houses at all. After this terrifying experience, Carolyn didn't call the police. Most women don't. Nothing had actually happened, but despite her, strong gut feeling and the terror of having to take flight from a man following her down dark streets matching his pace to hers, what would she have to say? I heard footsteps and a guy was following me. And if she did, there was very little the police could do. They might drive

around the area and take a look, but without a proper description of the man, what was the point. Carolyn just put the experience behind her and stopped getting off the train at Kananoke Railway Station. Instead, she got off at Seaford and her parents picked her up. Now, back to Sarah. Before that fateful night in July 1990, Sarah was living her best life. She planned to travel, she was independent, she was earning her own money, and while she was living her own money, and while she joked to friends about finding a boyfriend, it wasn't something she wanted to rush into. Despite the matchmaking attempts from friends at work, this is the way her friend Maria saw it. It wasn't high on her priority list. I think she wouldn't have minded, but I don't think it was high

in her priority list. She really just wanted to enjoy herself and have fun. I mean, she loved her tennis, loved her music. Sarah had been playing tennis on a Wednesday night after after work for around four or five months. She rarely missed a session, but at the end of June and early July, she missed two weeks in a row. The first Wednesday she met her friend Anna for drinks. Anna was heading overseas on an extended holiday and Sarah wanted to say goodbye. I remember the night before I went on holiday, we went out for drinks.

It was in the place in the city. and that night she was seemed a bit and not sad but she had something on her on her mind and I'd say you know Sarah what's the matter and she said no nothing nothing and I don't know if she was upset because I was going on holiday but I don't think so maybe there was something on her mind and she wanted to tell me

and I remember she gave me a little Paddington there and he was in a like a sort of like a suitcase in the package and had written on it please look after me When Anna described Sarah's melancholy mood that night, it reminded me of a story I'd heard when I was writing the Frankston Murders book. Serial killer Paul Denia's last victim, Natalie Russell, experienced something similar a couple of weeks before she died. She had gone around to visit her boyfriend and sat down in his lounge room and suddenly

burst into tears. After crying and shaking uncontrollably, Natalie was later at a loss to explain why she'd cried. There was no reason. Afterwards, Natalie's mother Carmel told me that she wondered whether Natalie somehow knew she didn't have long. I don't mean to sound melodramatic, but maybe this kind of thing has an echo or a foreboding. The week before the final night was a busy one. On Wednesday the 4th of July, Sarah's brother Alistair turned 21. The McDermott's celebrated with a family dinner.

And on that final weekend, the family did what families did back in the 1990s, when gender roles were more clearly defined. The boys did a bit of tinkering on Sarah's car, or Sarah and her mum cleaned the house. And on Sunday before she was abducted on the Wednesday, we were busy. I always remember she loved music. We always had music home.

And Alastair and Peter were working on her car because she had never bothered with a car until we moved to Frankston in the January into our own home. And she then said, you'd get a car. So even though she'd had a license, we were so near all the public transport before, she never, she wasn't one that was dying to get a car. But she said, I'll get a car, which was not the best thing as it turned out. But anyway, she got the car.

And that afternoon we had music going. And Elton John's, I always remember. Sacrifice. Sacrifice. and I loved that tune and that was played and then I said to Sarah they're outside Sarah

they won't hear you I said would you play that one again for me because I just love that one so when I hear that one that one really is just you know of course Sheila would have no inkling

that a song about sacrifice and two hearts living into separate worlds would come to have such devastating meaning for her in just a few short days. For the McDermott family, the minutes were ticking slowly by until they ran out completely.

Coming up in the next episode of searching for Sarah McDermott. And then I followed the trail of blood drips to a nearby bush area. I found some blood on concrete curving and I could see it was still, it was in the bush area to the western side of the car park. And I could see what appeared to be heel drag marks across the grass verge that led to a little bush area. I followed that in there and I found more blood that was still fairly fresh. Well, I think it was the, obviously the blood changes your whole perspective about what's happening and there was. obvious that where the blood had been located there were drag marks. So it was suspected at that stage that either a lifeless or unconscious body had been dragged to an area near the car.

Thank you.