It’s a quarter past seven in the evening on Friday, June 11, 1993. 

18-year-old Elizabeth Stevens is freezing. She’s soaking wet from the rain, her short hair clinging to her neck. 

She steps off the bus which she caught from Frankston to Cranbourne Road, Langwarrin, and hurries towards her aunt and uncle's house where she lives. She doesn’t know she’s being watched.

She had spent her Friday evening at Frankston Library on an English assignment. Her goal is to one day join the army and she knows she has to complete this TAFE course in order to get there.

That particular June night, the rain is so heavy it’s difficult to see. As Elizabeth turns into Paterson Avenue a man jumps at her out of the darkness, dressed in a green army jacket and navy baseball cap. The sound of the rain and the roaring wind drowns out her screams. 

She feels what she can only assume is a gun to her head as he drags her along someone’s front lawn. 

Threatening Elizabeth, the man holds her hand, directing her down Paterson Avenue. Passersby think their interaction looks innocent, not knowing that if Elizabeth doesn’t comply the man has threatened to “blow her head off”. 

He leads her to Lloyd Park into a clump of bushes. 

These would be the last moments of Elizabeth Stevens’ life. 

Less than an hour afterwards the man responsible for her murder would be sitting inside his warm home, enjoying a roast dinner, waiting for his girlfriend to return home from work.

CREDITS

Guest: Vikki Petraitis, author of The Frankston Murders: 25 Years On

Host: Jessie Stephens

Producer: Gia Moylan

Audio Producer: Ian Camileri

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Mamamia acknowledges the Traditional Owners of the Land we have recorded this podcast on, the Gadigal people of the Eora Nation. We pay our respects to their Elders past and present and extend that respect to all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander cultures.