Mr Cruel’s victims never saw his face. He always wore a distinctive black balaclava
New details about the masked child killer known only as Mr Cruel could lead to a breakthrough in the unsolved case that sparked terror in the homes of Melbourne families.
Mr Cruel, whose identity is still unknown, assaulted at least four young girls in Melbourne in the late 1980s and early 1990s, abducting three and killing one.
Karmein Chan, a 13-year-old private schoolgirl snatched from her home after her sisters were forced into a wardrobe, was shot three times in the head.
The mystery clean freak’s brazen attacks were so meticulously planned and committed in such a calculated fashion he was initially known as ‘Mr Cool’.
None of his surviving victims ever saw Mr Cruel’s face, which was hidden by a chilling black balaclava with white stitching around the eyes and mouth.
Now cutting edge technology has created a possible link between the attacker and the electricity industry in Melbourne.
During Channel Nine’s Under Investigation on Wednesday night, a world-first software system known as GIS was used by experts to create a map linking similarities between the three abductions.
Mr Cruel’s first victim was not removed from her house and was instead assaulted just metres away from her parents, who’d been bound and gagged.
But the next three were all abducted, two would return home but Karmein would never be seen again.
His second victim was dropped off near the Bayswater electrical substation 18 hours after being abducted.
Pictured is a sketch of what Mr Cruel may look like as experts weigh in on the case
His third victim was released near a substation in Kew, just ten minutes from her house.
Both victims also lived near substations just 20 minutes apart in East Camberwell and Ringwood, while the first victim lived near one in Lower Plenty.
His fourth victim, Karmein’s remains were found near a substation known as the Thomastown Terminal Station, also in close proximity to the other electrical substations.
Karmein and one of Mr Cruel’s other victims also both attended the Presbyterian Ladies College – which was across the road from a substation.
The connections suggest Mr Cruel may have worked or posed as a substation employee, or lived closeby.
‘The fact that it’s all in about a 20 minute drive from each other, in that area the offender has to feel comfortable in order to function,’ senior law enforcement investigator, Mike King told presenter Liz Hayes.
‘From a geographic perspective we just have to keep thinking, why is he comfortable in this area? Why is he selecting the victims where he is? And why is he disposing of them where he is?’.
Mr King said he didn’t believe in coincidences and that there was a definite reason behind Mr Cruel’s movements.
‘There are reasons why he selected those locations to drop off those victims, there are absolute reasons why he selected the victims he did,’ he said.
Shockingly, a witness told the program that in 1988 her brothers saw a strange man filming one of his victim’s homes six weeks before she was taken.
The house backed onto a block of electrical towers.
Cutting edge technology has revealed Mr Cruel’s victims were abducted or released near electrical substations, suggesting he may have worked or pretended to work in the electrical industry
The woman, who was friends and neighbours with the victim said someone would have had to know the area to be there.
‘He didn’t come across this by accident,’ she said.
“Only someone who knew those power lines and the access it had to the houses on the back fence, because you can see over the fence without anyone noticing what you’re doing.’
She said she expected Mr Cruel worked so hard to hide his identity because he knew he had been seen by the two boys.
The witness too believes he may have worked in the electrical industry.
During his reign of terror, Mr Cruel broke into suburban Melbourne homes at night armed with a knife and handgun, tied up parents and siblings then abducted girls as young as 11 who he held for up to 50 hours.
He forced the girls he assaulted to wash and carefully brush their teeth and fed some of them meals even while they were being abused.
No useful forensic evidence was recovered from any of his crime scenes. There were no fingerprints to compare or any trace of DNA.
The child killer dubbed Mr Cruel who terrified Australia three decades ago previously committed sex crimes against adults, including raping an elderly nun. Mr Cruel abducted at least three girls in Melbourne and is believed to have murdered Karmein Chan (pictured)
Karmein Chan’s mother visited the site where her daughter Karmein’s body was found a year after she was abducted from her home. Mrs Chan and her husband had made tearful public appeals for Karmein’s safe return. Police believe the girl may have seen her abductor’s face
Forensic anthropologist and criminologist Dr Xanthe Millett had earlier given her perspective on Mr Cruel’s offending in her book, Cold Case Investigations.
Mallett, who is also a television presenter and social commentator, uses her own expertise and the assistance of other experts to revisit and analyse these infamous crimes.
She concluded Mr Cruel was an ‘intelligent, meticulous and callous’ offender likely to have been actively involved in his community and considered by his neighbours as a ‘nice guy’.
Mallett revealed in an exclusive extract of Cold Case Investigations seen by Daily Mail Australia that Mr Cruel had a more complicated pattern of offending than previously supposed.
Forensic psychologist Tim Watson-Munro, who worked on the Mr Cruel case, told Mallett he did not believe the offender had a specific attraction to prepubescent children.
Watson-Munro said investigators had asked him to profile Mr Cruel’s offending, which included previous sexual assaults of adult women not known to the public.
In one of those attacks Mr Cruel had raped an elderly nun then driven her car to a bank where he used her ATM card to steal her savings.
‘There were a number of other crimes involving the detention and rape of adult women,’ Watson-Munro told Mallett.
This sketch of Mr Cruel’s bedroom was made with the help of one of his child victims. Mr Cruel kept the first child he abducted for 18 hours and the second for 50. The last child he snatched, Karmein Chan, was found dead a year after her disappearance. She had been shot in the head
The 10-year old (left) was the second girl abducted by Mr Cruel. The 13-year-old (right) was the third
He suggested Mr Cruel had become desensitised to the ‘extreme sadism and brutality’ he inflicted upon those adult victims and turned to children to satisfy his perverted desires.
Mr Cruel came to the attention of police on August 22, 1987 when he broke into a family home at Lower Plenty, in Melbourne’s north-eastern suburbs.
Once inside he tied up the parents in their bedroom, covered their eyes with surgical tape and forced them into a wardrobe.
He then blindfolded and gagged their six-year-old son, tied him to his bed and went after his 11-year-old sister.
After making the girl brush her teeth he assaulted her. He cut the phone lines and told the girl she could free her parents after she counted slowly to 100.
All up he spent about two hours in the house, even making himself a meal.
Mr Cruel next struck on December 27, 1988 when he broke into a family home where he found four girls at Ringwood.
This map from Cold Case Investigations shows the sites where Mr Cruel attacked and abducted children, where he released them and where Karmein Chan’s body was dumped
Having threatened the parents with a gun and tying them up with copper wire he bound their ten-year-old daughter, covered her mouth and eyes with tape and abducted her.
The next night, 18 hours after she had been snatched, the firl was dropped from a car at nearby Bayswater High School wearing a man’s shirt and green garbage bags.
She told police her attacker had made her shower and brush and floss her teeth. He had kept her blindfolded throughout the ordeal and given her food while she was being assaulted.
‘We can only dread what the man would have done if the girl had pulled off the blindfold and seen his face,’ Detective Chief Inspector Des Johnson said at the time.
‘It is that close to being a homicide.’
The next attack came 18 months later on July 3, 1990 at Canterbury. Both parents were out for dinner with friends but their daughters a 13-year-old and 15-year-old were home.
Mr Cruel broke into the house armed with a gun and a knife and threatened the sisters before bundling 13-year-old into a stolen rental car. He made her bring her Presbyterian Ladies College uniform.
Fifty hours after her abduction Mr Cruel dropped her, blindfolded and wrapped in a blanket, at a power substation in Kew.
She reported she had been made to brush her teeth and wash herself thoroughly. She had been given food and water regularly while held captive.
Her abductor had watched a press conference in which her father pleaded for the return of his daughter and had spoken to the girl about it.
By now police had this description of the offender: Caucasian, aged between 30 and 50, from 173 to 180 centimetres tall, of medium build with a small pot belly.
Nine months after Nicola’s abduction Mr Cruel appeared again on April 13, 1991 at Templestowe.
John and Phyllis Chan were at work in their Chinese restaurant leaving daughters Karmein, 13, Karlie, nine, and Karen, seven, at home.
Armed with a knife Mr Cruel forced Karlie and Karen into a wardrobe and disappeared into the night with Karmein. This time there would be no family reunion.
A year later, on April 9, 1992 a dog walker found Karmein’s decomposing remains near a landfill site at Thomastown. She had been shot three times in the head.
Detectives believe Karmein may have seen Mr Cruel’s face or recognised him in some other way, leading to him killing her.
Karmein Chan’s parents John and Phyllis Chan (pictured) appeared on national television appealing for their daughter to be returned. They had been working at their Chinese restaurant when the 13-year-old girl was abducted while babysitting her younger sisters Karlie and Karen
The body of Karmein Chan (left) was found a year after she was abducted from her parents’ home. She had been shot three times in the head. One of the girls who was released from Mr Cruel’s clutches helped police draw this sketch (right) of the inside of her abductor’s car
Karmein’s murder, 28 years ago, was the last attack attributed to Mr Cruel.
Over the next couple of years Taskforce Spectrum would examine 30,000 houses and eliminate 27,000 persons of interest from their inquiries.
A poster featuring the faces of Sharon, Nicola and Karmein and the details of their abductions was distributed to 1.4million homes. The FBI also provided a profile.
From 2010 to 2013 police brought together under Taskforce Apollo re-examined the crimes attributed to Mr Cruel but still the identity of the offender eluded them.
Not all investigators were convinced Karmein’s murder was committed by Mr Cruel.
Even the name given to the offender by a Melbourne newspaper has caused police problems – they say he is unlikely to seem cruel to those around him.
It is possible Mr Cruel stopped abducting children after Karmein’s murder. He may also be dead, in prison or have moved onto a new killing field.
Anyone with information is urged to call crime stoppers on 1800 333 000.
