Searching For Sarah MacDiarmid - Episode 1

Summary

Casefile True Crime – “Searching For Sarah MacDiarmid” Episode 1

Date: December 27, 2025
Host: Casefile Presents
Featured: Vikki Petraitis (True Crime Author), Sheila & Peter McDermott (Sarah’s parents), Friends, Acquaintances, Witnesses

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Episode Overview

The first episode of “Searching for Sarah MacDiarmid” introduces the heartbreaking cold case of 23-year-old Sarah MacDiarmid, who disappeared from Kananook Railway Station, Melbourne, on July 11, 1990. Blending family recollections, witness testimony, and meticulous research, the episode foregrounds the story with warmth, compassion, and dogged pursuit of the truth. Through the lens of Sarah’s life, listeners experience the entirety of the person behind the headlines, while the context of local crime history and other women’s experiences set the stage for the investigation to come.

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Key Discussion Points and Insights

1. The Disappearance and Its Context

• Case Introduction:
  Host Casey shares the reasoning behind highlighting other “Casefile Presents” shows (03:29). The story of Sarah’s disappearance is introduced, including the chilling discoveries: blood near her car, eyewitness accounts of screams, her body never found.
• Setting and Serial Crime Backdrop:
  The area surrounding Frankston had a violent history even before the 1993 Frankston Serial Killer, Paul Denyer. The show draws parallels between Sarah’s case and other unsolved disappearances and murders in Melbourne’s south-east (04:08).

2. Who Was Sarah MacDiarmid?

• Early Life and Resilience:
  Sarah was a “fighter from the start,” surviving a difficult birth with Pierre Robin syndrome and a cleft palate (11:09). Her family describes her as warm, funny, generous, and “voraciously” fond of food—a family joke (15:00).
• Family Memories:
  Touching tales recount the family’s move from Scotland to Australia, Sarah’s loving relationship with her younger brother Alistair, and anecdotes of her determined spirit (16:15, 18:36).
• Musical Talent and Friendships:
  Sarah’s musicality, small yet strong presence, and direct personality shine in teacher and friends’ reminiscences (21:35, 22:31). Lifelong friendships, especially with “Noni” from Townsville, are highlighted for their depth and longevity (23:00).

3. Moves, Transitions, and Growing Up

• Recurring Relocation:
  The McDermott family’s moves—first to Australia (Townsville), then back to the UK, then again to Australia (Melbourne/Frankston)—fostered a unique sibling bond and helped shape Sarah’s resilience (26:44).
• Social Life and Work:
  Letters and stories from friends (e.g., Maria, Caroline) portray Sarah’s yearning for belonging, her humor, self-doubt, and gradual adjustment into adult life in a new country, including her excitement for future adventures (31:08, 36:38).

4. Sarah’s Life in Melbourne Before the Disappearance

• Forming a New Life:
  Sarah gradually integrates into Melbourne life, making friends, becoming close with her brother, and getting her first “grown-up” job, despite her jokey dislike for math (39:17, 40:03).
• Workplace Friendships:
  The special way she became friends with Anna Tarantino is recounted—their bond beginning from the job interview, and resulting in a constant friendship up until Sarah’s disappearance (40:47).
• Loneliness and Melancholy:
  Despite a strong family, Sarah sometimes struggled with homesickness and loneliness, as captured in moving letters home:
  • “I've got two best friends in this world, you and Noni, and unfortunately you are 12,000 miles away and she's 2,000 miles away. Oh, well, say la…” (47:00)

5. Community, Routine, and the Railway Station

• Moving to Frankston:
  Sarah’s excitement over her new car, the family’s settling in a new suburb, and advice to use Kananook (not Frankston) station due to safety concerns (54:18).
• The Train Station as a Liminal Space:
  Sarah regularly used Kananook Station, as did many local women—an important detail as the investigation roots itself in the geography and routine of women’s commutes at the time.

6. Chilling Parallels and Witness Testimony

• A Near-Miss Story:
  Carolyn McAllister recounts (at length) a harrowing experience in the same location a month before Sarah’s disappearance—being followed by a man at night, escaping to safety via a service station payphone (59:00).

  • “I was running because I thought if I get to Clow street, there’s lights all along there, there’s cars going along there… That was my aim—to get to the servo." (60:21)
  • This adds a layer of local fear and the reality of threat for women, even when ‘nothing happened’.

• Reflecting on the Pattern:
  The case draws comparisons with later crimes by Paul Denyer, the recurrence of violence against women in this area, and testimony that may encourage others to come forward (63:57, 64:51).

7. In the Days Before the Disappearance

• Sarah's Last Days:
  Family memories build an atmosphere of normality, love, and the everyday concerns of young adulthood. Sarah’s final musical moment with her mother is particularly poignant:

  • “Elton John’s...Sacrifice...when I hear that now, you know…” (69:11)

• Hints of Foreboding:

  • Anna, her close friend, describes a night when Sarah seemed preoccupied or emotionally unsettled shortly before vanishing (67:12).
    • “She was... seemed a bit, not sad, but she had something on her mind...maybe there was something on her mind and she wanted to tell me." (67:15)

8. Discovery and Aftermath (Preview for Episode 2)

• Initial Discovery:
  • Peter McDermott describes following a trail of blood at the scene—an emotional account foreshadowing the episode to come.
    • “I followed the trail of blood drips to a nearby bush area… and I could see it was still...there were drag marks…” (70:57)
  • Sheila McDermott shares the devastating realization that something horrific had happened to her daughter:
    • “The blood changes your whole perspective about what’s happening...” (71:28)

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On not knowing:

  • “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?”
    – Vikki Petraitis (08:18)

• Sarah’s childhood resilience:

  • “She was born at 2 o’clock in the morning...They had discovered she had what they called a Pierre Robin syndrome...”
    – Sheila McDermott (11:09)

• The family dynamic:

  • “All that would be left would be a pair of boots.”
    – Peter McDermott on Sarah’s eating as a child (15:23)

• Raw emotion from her brother:

  • “We were close anyway, but I think that added to the closeness…not in the form of hugging each other, it was just hanging out together.”
    – Alistair (26:44)

• The universal fear:

  • “For many, you are the fear that quickens their steps as they walk home.”
    – Quoted from the judge at Paul Denyer’s sentencing (61:16)

• A mother’s pain:

  • “She just looked at me and she just burst into tears and she said, you don’t know how unhappy I am…”
    – Sheila McDermott (45:40)

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Important Timestamps

• 03:29: Sheila McDermott on the night Sarah went missing
• 08:18: Vikki Petraitis introduces herself and the podcast’s purpose
• 11:09: Sheila details Sarah’s birth and medical challenges
• 15:23: Family jokes about Sarah’s appetite; reveals family warmth
• 21:35: Teachers and friends reflect on Sarah’s school years
• 26:44: Brother Alistair on their close sibling relationship
• 36:38: Sarah’s struggles with homesickness and her plan to return to Scotland
• 47:00: Letter excerpt—Sarah’s loneliness and stoicism
• 54:18: Advice to use Kananook rather than Frankston railway station for safety
• 59:00: Carolyn McAllister’s account of being followed (near-miss)
• 67:12: Sarah’s mysterious melancholy before her disappearance
• 70:57: Peter McDermott describes the discovery of blood and drag marks
• 71:28: Sheila’s perspective on the evidence found at the scene

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Summary Tone and Style

The podcast maintains a gentle, respectful, and honest tone—balancing the need for factual clarity with empathy for Sarah and her family. The host and guests candidly share memories, sometimes with humor and warmth, but always aware of the underlying tragedy. There’s a strong sense of community and a desire, even decades later, for answers and justice.

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For Listeners

Even if you come to this story without prior knowledge, Episode 1 of "Searching for Sarah MacDiarmid" offers a moving and detailed portrait of Sarah’s life, her family, and the ripple effects of her disappearance. It also sets the scene with the geography, social context, and evidence that will drive the investigation in coming episodes.

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“Searching for Sarah MacDiarmid” reminds us that victims are far more than their final moments; they were daughters, sisters, friends, and vibrant members of a loving community. This episode honors those memories while ushering listeners into a deep and unresolved mystery still in need of answers.

Transcript

[Narrator/Host]

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[Vicki Petradis (True Crime Author)]

Excludes restaurants.

[Narrator/Host]

Instacart we're here.

[Sheila McDermott (Sarah's Mother)]

Hey, it's Marc Maron from wtf here.

[Vicki Petradis (True Crime Author)]

To let you know that this podcast.

[Sheila McDermott (Sarah's Mother)]

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[Vicki Petradis (True Crime Author)]

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[Narrator/Host]

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[Sheila McDermott (Sarah's Mother)]

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[Vicki Petradis (True Crime Author)]

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[Sheila McDermott (Sarah's Mother)]

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[Narrator/Host]

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 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 Casefile Presents shows we've produced in the Casefile 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 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 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.

[Sheila McDermott (Sarah's Mother)]

She was always a very good daughter. If she was out somewhere going to be late, she would ring and let us know. He 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 older I think I'm spilling over.

[Narrator/Host]

When my podcast Casefile launched our Subomitr Case page, we were inundated by by thousands of suggestions. One case in particular came up over and over the disappearance of 23 year old Sarah McDermott from the Canonook railway station on 11 July 1990. Cannonook 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 Denyer 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 Denyer 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 scrub 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 Tainong North. The Frankston Tainong north serial killings were covered in episode 46 of Casefile. Then 10 years later, Sarah McDermott vanished too. But unlike the Frankston Tainong north victims, Sarah's body was never recovered. Vicky Petradis had just finished making the Vanishing of Vivien 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, Vicki 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 nint night in 1990, we are going to leave Vicki to piece together Sarah's final movements and look at the police theories about what might have happened to the 23 year old woman as she got off the train at the Canonook railway station.

[Vicki Petradis (True Crime Author)]

My name is Vicki Patratus and I'm a true crime author. I've been writing about real police cases for nearly three decades now and there are 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 11th 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 Cannonook railway station at 10.20pm 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 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.

[Sheila McDermott (Sarah's Mother)]

She was born on the 15th of November and I was just thrilled to 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 mucousy, so they would leave her in the nursery and bring her out at 9. I wasn't worried because I aware of babies being like that. But at 9 o' clock they came and the curtains were pulled round and a 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 had seen her and that she had a hair lip palate, well, the color 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 up 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 Pierrobin syndrome. She didn't have the hair lip, but she had the cleft 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 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 that all mums and dads have with children as they're growing up, but nothing bad. We were a very good family.

[Vicki Petradis (True Crime Author)]

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.

[Sheila McDermott (Sarah's Mother)]

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.

[Peter McDermott (Sarah's Father)]

Sarah could eat right.

[Sheila McDermott (Sarah's Mother)]

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

[Peter McDermott (Sarah's Father)]

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 go out for a meal with, with my parents. Let's say it was a standing joke. The pork chop bone would be there to be stripped and I used to say I'd never like to be stuck on a desert island with that one. All that would be left would be a pair of boots.

[Vicki Petradis (True Crime Author)]

Two years after Sarah was born, Peter and Sheila welcomed a son into their family. Like Sarah, Alistair too was born with Pierre Robin syndrome. And like Sarah, he had to spend a couple of months in 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.

[Sheila McDermott (Sarah's Mother)]

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 carrycot 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 Alistair. I was thinking about it. 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 who 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, you know, I'll be there in a minute, Alistair. And he stopped crying. I thought, that's fine. Next thing, huff, puff, huff, puff, puff. Here's herself coming through carrying this bit. Oh, and he's looking up at her, grinning, grinning, grinning. And oh, I didn't want to tell her off. She thought she was doing a good thing bringing to me and I ran. Oh, I said, sara, I'll take Alison, thank you very much. And I got, I got him. And she was so excited that she had carried him through.

[Vicki Petradis (True Crime Author)]

Yeah, she was 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.

[Peter McDermott (Sarah's Father)]

My earliest memory of Sarah was in Minton Magna at her Granny Bond's cottage when she was a babe in arms. Sarah as a child had a fine daughter accent, even after living in Scotland in the early 1970s for a couple of years. On one occasion, Granny McDiarmid and I had taken the two children down to Oban to see two old and much loved aunties 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 a broad Minton accent, we're in the bloody dark now. We were in no doubt that the swear word came from our daddy. She was a determined wee lass, some would say thrawn, a good Scottish word for obstinate. A characteristic to be admired, in my opinion.

[Vicki Petradis (True Crime Author)]

Half a world away From Scotland, the MacDermots moved to Australia. Townsville, to be exact. Townsville is In Queensland, around 1300 kilometres north of Brisbane. With its tropical climate, it was a very different place to the one the McDermotts had left.

[Sheila McDermott (Sarah's Mother)]

We came out originally in 1973.

[Peter McDermott (Sarah's Father)]

19, yes, 74, 75.

[Sheila McDermott (Sarah's Mother)]

And we lived in Townsville and we had a wonderful life there. It was really great.

[Vicki Petradis (True Crime Author)]

In Townsville, Sarah and Alistair 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 MacDermotts that they have remained lifelong friends, even though the McDermotts only stayed in Townsville for four years. Jenny Carr remembers the time well.

[Friends and Acquaintances of Sarah]

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 for where we always have been. And while they lived in Townsville, you know, we saw them daily, we socialized, we partied, we drank, we did all the things that you do when you're young. And they were just wonderful parents.

[Vicki Petradis (True Crime Author)]

So from Jenny's point of view, what was little Sarah McDermott like as a primary school student?

[Friends and Acquaintances of Sarah]

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 ear for music and she practiced really hard. She was quite small for her age. In fact, I don't think she was ever very tall. She was quite 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 too, but different types of sense of humour they've got. And she had to sort of blend.

[Vicki Petradis (True Crime Author)]

Of the two teaching at the same school. Donna McMahon taught Sarah the violin. Since the lessons were one to one, Donna got to know the strong willed little Scottish girl.

[Friends and Acquaintances of Sarah]

She was a person whose bucket was always full. You would never talk about Sarah's bucket being half empty or half full. It was full and she gave 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.

[Vicki Petradis (True Crime Author)]

Made a lifelong friend in Townsville, a neighbourhood girl nicknamed Noni.

[Friends and Acquaintances of Sarah]

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 Helter Skelter. I'm not sure whether Peter and Sheila want to know about those things, but it was just childhood fun. We went to the pool. We used to just do things together. We would be in her room and just listen to records.

[Vicki Petradis (True Crime Author)]

Noni recalled those days playing in the sun with her newfound friend.

[Friends and Acquaintances of Sarah]

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.

[Vicki Petradis (True Crime Author)]

For the McDermotts, the idyllic days in Townsville didn't last forever. A family business back in the UK beckoned them home.

[Sheila McDermott (Sarah's Mother)]

Peter's family back home had a 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.

[Vicki Petradis (True Crime Author)]

While Sarah was excited about going home to see her granny and Uncle Dougie, her friend Nonie was upset to lose her.

[Friends and Acquaintances of Sarah]

I was very devastated when they decided to return back to Scotland, but we kept in touch from them, just let us. And then when I started working, I would ring Sarah occasionally. It was very occasionally, obviously from Australia over to there.

[Vicki Petradis (True Crime Author)]

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 McDermotts decided they wouldn't move back till their children were older.

[Sheila McDermott (Sarah's Mother)]

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 till she left school, 18, she was in the Gaelic 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.

[Vicki Petradis (True Crime Author)]

Sarah's friend Nonie went over to visit the McDermotts.

[Friends and Acquaintances of Sarah]

I saved up enough money to go over and visit. That was A holiday that I will always remember as probably one of the best holidays of 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.

[Vicki Petradis (True Crime Author)]

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.

[Peter McDermott (Sarah's Father)]

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, in 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.

[Vicki Petradis (True Crime Author)]

The loss of Sarah has never dulled for any of the McDermotts. All they have now are memories, 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.

[Peter McDermott (Sarah's Father)]

Sarah could be relied on to see if Sheila was off to work in Scotland when they were in high school. No. Remember he was going to go out for a shark the second day running and Sarah says, you're not going to school in that shut. Get it off and put a clean one off. I was tickled pink. Off she. Off he goes up the stairs.

[Vicki Petradis (True Crime Author)]

What sort of sister was she? She sounds a bit motherly and a bit bossy.

[Sheila McDermott (Sarah's Mother)]

Yes, yes.

[Peter McDermott (Sarah's Father)]

Yeah, absolutely. Very motherly.

[Vicki Petradis (True Crime Author)]

Peter's younger brother Doug remembers an idyllic childhood for the McDermott children. Peter reads his memories.

[Peter McDermott (Sarah's Father)]

I bought a box of pup. Sarah and Alistair 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 nutting the new baby. That was typical. Sarah was just such a Loving and kind wee girl, all Hurley. A perfect example was when she was around 19 or 20. She and Granny McDiarmid were great pals, notwithstanding a 50 year age gap.

[Vicki Petradis (True Crime Author)]

When Sarah returned to the UK, she met a new friend called Maria Brolley. The two bonded as well schoolgirls over their shared love of music.

[Friends and Acquaintances of Sarah]

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 a Gaelic choir at 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.

[Vicki Petradis (True Crime Author)]

Sarah and Maria joined the Gaelic choir and toured around performing. But it wasn't just Gaelic music that set Sarah loved. She quickly became a connoisseur of the top 40 charts. She loved Wham and the Eurythmics most of all.

[Friends and Acquaintances of Sarah]

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.

[Vicki Petradis (True Crime Author)]

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.

[Friends and Acquaintances of Sarah]

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.

[Vicki Petradis (True Crime Author)]

At college in Aberdeen, Sarah met her new roommate, Caroline Lyons. The two went out a lot during that year. They went to sea desperately seeking Susan, and loved it and even tried to copy the fashion of the movie. The tights, the singlets, the rara skirts, which in the Aberdeen winter needed to be layered with warmer things on top. Caroline has come, kept a diary since she was about 6 or 7. She offered to look back through her diaries before we spoke.

[Friends and Acquaintances of Sarah]

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.

[Vicki Petradis (True Crime Author)]

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.

[Friends and Acquaintances of Sarah]

This past week is the first time I've gone back over every single day from the 2nd of September 1985 until June 10th, 1986, where we said goodbye. It's the first time I've gone through every day and very, very emotional experience.

[Vicki Petradis (True Crime Author)]

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 McDermotts in Scotland when she and Sarah were roommates. I asked her what she remembered of the family back then.

[Friends and Acquaintances of Sarah]

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 seemed to be so happy to meet me.

[Vicki Petradis (True Crime Author)]

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 MacDermott 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 St Sarah and her roommate Caroline, it's not surprising that when the McDermotts started talking about moving back to Australia, Caroline planned to visit them there.

[Friends and Acquaintances of Sarah]

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 tans, happy people, very attractive. I'm one of a generation of backpackers which 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 are now playing on the beach. Age about, I don't know, 6, 7, 8, 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.

[Vicki Petradis (True Crime Author)]

So when the McDermotts 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.

[Sheila McDermott (Sarah's Mother)]

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 Alistair, you come with me. And of course he was a uni student and he says, well, I can't afford it. And she said, don't worry about that, I'll pay your fare.

[Vicki Petradis (True Crime Author)]

Sarah's uncle Dougie remembered their trip fondly. Peter McDermott reads from the memory that Doug composed.

[Peter McDermott (Sarah's Father)]

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 blether into the wee small hours. They were a stick of Steve's and I never did find out what they discussed during these long, late night, giddy chats. But they loved each other to bits and had an exceptional bond.

[Vicki Petradis (True Crime Author)]

After the visit back to Scotland, Sarah seemed to settle down once she returned to Melbourne.

[Sheila McDermott (Sarah's Mother)]

Chris Douglas came at his time and then they went back. And from then on, Sarah started making lovely, lovely friends here.

[Vicki Petradis (True Crime Author)]

Once Sarah established a wider friendship group, she was determined to take her brother Alistair along with her.

[Sheila McDermott (Sarah's Mother)]

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. Cause he would say, no, I'm not going. She says, Anna says you're to come as well.

[Vicki Petradis (True Crime Author)]

As well as having the travel bug. The McDermott kids were sporty.

[Sheila McDermott (Sarah's Mother)]

They loved their hockey. When they were in primary, they played.

[Peter McDermott (Sarah's Father)]

She played, loved the sport.

[Sheila McDermott (Sarah's Mother)]

Hockey, yes. And then of course, she was playing. She liked playing tennis and that's what she'd been doing the day that it was after work. They always. Every Wednesday, not really.

[Vicki Petradis (True Crime Author)]

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 MacDermott settled in Melbourne, they first moved to Pasco Vale. Peter and Sheila remember when Sarah got her first grown up job.

[Sheila McDermott (Sarah's Mother)]

She never liked maths. The laugh was she ended up working.

[Peter McDermott (Sarah's Father)]

With, she worked with CE Heaths and then she ended up as finance clerk and we laughed and she hated arithmetic and maths, but she was fine. She was happy as Larry, happy as.

[Sheila McDermott (Sarah's Mother)]

Larry and she had a lovely lot of friends there.

[Vicki Petradis (True Crime Author)]

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.

[Friends and Acquaintances of Sarah]

Sarah and I first met, we were at the same job interview at CE Heath 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 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 eight. 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. She said, oh, I want to ask someone.

[Vicki Petradis (True Crime Author)]

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.

[Friends and Acquaintances of Sarah]

I remember that she had a very good wit. Just we got along really well because we started laughing, you know, 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 to the day that she disappeared, we were always together.

[Vicki Petradis (True Crime Author)]

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.

[Sheila McDermott (Sarah's Mother)]

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, oh, 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.

[Narrator/Host]

Hey, it's Adam Grant from Ted's Work.

[Peter McDermott (Sarah's Father)]

Life with Adam Grant.

[Narrator/Host]

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[Vicki Petradis (True Crime Author)]

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[Vicki Petradis (True Crime Author)]

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[Narrator/Host]

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[Advertiser/Promotional Voice]

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[Vicki Petradis (True Crime Author)]

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.

[Sheila McDermott (Sarah's Mother)]

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. It all started flowing out and 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, boy, 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.

[Vicki Petradis (True Crime Author)]

Sarah hinted at the way she was feeling in a letter to her friend back in Scotland, Maria Brolley. Maria has kept the letter and it's moving to hear these words that Sarah wrote.

[Friends and Acquaintances of Sarah]

The letter was written on 7th March, 1988.

[Advertiser/Promotional Voice]

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. Then I just felt 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 Noni, and Unfortunately you are 12,000 miles away and she's 2,000 miles away. Oh, well, say la. 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 traveling 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.

[Vicki Petradis (True Crime Author)]

And as the letter 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.

[Peter McDermott (Sarah's Father)]

She just wanted, like so many youngsters, she wanted a. She was at this stage for a happy life, just an easygoing life with the job and the money and the frame.

[Sheila McDermott (Sarah's Mother)]

She was just about to join the tennis down in Frankston because they had one in North Frankston.

[Vicki Petradis (True Crime Author)]

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.

[Sheila McDermott (Sarah's Mother)]

Sarah would say come into the city and we'll have a meal in the evening. She worked in little Colin's place and they were high rise. They were up on 37th floor, that's right. On the ground floor was Hugo's nice little pub.

[Vicki Petradis (True Crime Author)]

Sarah's workmates Angela, Con and Sonja remembered meeting Peter and Sheila at Hugo's bar for after work drinks. But they were lovely because it was.

[Friends and Acquaintances of Sarah]

Very, very friendly people.

[Vicki Petradis (True Crime Author)]

Very friendly people going down to Hugo's I 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 Sonja reminisced. Sarah always spoke highly of her mum and dad at that time because they were really close. Like it wasn't like a normal mother and daughter relationship. I'm sure she understood that they brought.

[Sheila McDermott (Sarah's Mother)]

Her here for a better life.

[Vicki Petradis (True Crime Author)]

So she understood that even though she.

[Friends and Acquaintances of Sarah]

Didn'T have her friends.

[Vicki Petradis (True Crime Author)]

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. 153cm or 5 foot tall in the old measure. Her friend Sonja remembers a nickname that she and Sarah got at the bar near their work.

[Sheila McDermott (Sarah's Mother)]

There's one story I do remember. So there was Sarah, 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 walked in one after the other and these guys at the bar just turned around and said, oh look, the munchkins are coming in. And that was a running joke with us.

[Vicki Petradis (True Crime Author)]

Sarah's friend Caroline Lyons was so excited about her visit to Australia. She and Sarah were going to travel around and go interstate. On Monday 22 January 1990, Sarah missed a train at the Flinders Street Railway station. She passed the time till the next one, writing a letter to Caroline. The letter is especially poignant because all the plans she had made for Caroline's visit were in October, wouldn't come to pass. By July, Sarah had vanished.

[Advertiser/Promotional Voice]

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 in and around Melbourne. When you come over, I'm so wrapped. You're 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 Steffi Graf 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 to her 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.

[Vicki Petradis (True Crime Author)]

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.

[Sheila McDermott (Sarah's Mother)]

She looked at Sarah, she said, well, Sarah, she said, all the time I've lived here I've always used Cannonook. 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 Canadanut and I find that a good station. So that's what we used was Canonook.

[Vicki Petradis (True Crime Author)]

And so the McDermotts settled into their new house in Frankston and Sarah took possession of her little red car and each day she parked it at the Canonook 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 morning 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.

[Peter McDermott (Sarah's Father)]

In May 1990, I visited Australia briefly en 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 assured young lady. She had bought a little red Nissan of which she was very proud. And for my visit she'd taken two days off 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. 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.

[Vicki Petradis (True Crime Author)]

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 Canonook 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 A 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 denyer, 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 Denyer. But whether it was Denyer 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 Kannanook Railway Station. Carolyn was at university on the other side of town in Bundoora 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.

[Carolyn McAllister (Witness)]

I'd get off at Kannanook 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 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 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 100, 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 were 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 of 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 you turn left and into Hadley street and. 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. And my aim was to get to the servo, which was at that stage it was Food plus on the corner of Clough street and Franks and Danielle Road.

[Vicki Petradis (True Crime Author)]

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 Denyer. 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 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.

[Carolyn McAllister (Witness)]

It seemed that he was looking for me after I went into the shop. I'm not sure that he saw me ducking there, but he was there looking around. He was still walking and looking in. He was still travelling along Frankston, Dandenong 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.

[Vicki Petradis (True Crime Author)]

The Christian church Carolyn is referring to was the New Life Christian Centre it was on the corner of Madden street and Frankston Dandenong Road. It was this exact location three years later that serial killer Paul Denyer would leave his second victim, Debbie Freem'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 here.

[Sheila McDermott (Sarah's Mother)]

To bank Madden street, why to Madden Street?

[Friends and Acquaintances of Sarah]

Wasn't too close, wasn't too far from home.

[Vicki Petradis (True Crime Author)]

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.

[Carolyn McAllister (Witness)]

Looking back, if it was Paul Denyer, 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 that close to that area. You had the houses further past Madden street and across the road on Franks and Dandenong Road, but certainly around there, there were no houses at all.

[Vicki Petradis (True Crime Author)]

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 Kannanook 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 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 wasn't high on her priority list.

[Friends and Acquaintances of Sarah]

I think she wouldn't have minded, but I don't think it was high on her priority list. She really just wanted to enjoy herself and have fun. I mean, she loved her tennis, loved her music.

[Vicki Petradis (True Crime Author)]

Sarah had been playing tennis on a Wednesday night 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.

[Friends and Acquaintances of Sarah]

I remember the night before I went on holiday, we went out to drink. It was in this place in the city and that night she was. Seemed a bit, not sad, but she had something on her, on her mind. And I'd say, you know, Sarah, what's, you know, what's the matter? And she'd say, 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 padding and he was in sort of like a suitcase in a package and had written on it, please look after me.

[Vicki Petradis (True Crime Author)]

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 Denyer's last victim, Natalie Russell, experienced something similar a couple of weeks ago. 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 McDermotts 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 while Sarah and her mum cleaned the house.

[Sheila McDermott (Sarah's Mother)]

And on Sunday, before she was abducted, on the Wednesday, we were busy. I always remember she loved music. We always had music on. And Alistair 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 she'd get a car. So even though she'd had a license, we were so near all the public transport before. She wasn't one that was dying to get a trip, 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.

[Vicki Petradis (True Crime Author)]

Of course, Sheila would have no inkling that a song about sacrifice and two hearts living in two 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.

[Peter McDermott (Sarah's Father)]

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 a 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.

[Sheila McDermott (Sarah's Mother)]

Well, I think it was the Obviously the blood changes your your whole perspective about what's happening. And it was quite obvious that where.

[Peter McDermott (Sarah's Father)]

The blood had been located there were drag marks. So it was suspected at that stage.

[Sheila McDermott (Sarah's Mother)]

That either a a lifeless or unconscious body had been dragged to an area near the car.

[Narrator/Host]

Thanks for listening. If you'd like to hear the rest of searching for Sarah McDermott, you can find it wherever you get your podcasts. AI is transforming customer service. It's real and it works. And with fin, we've built the number one AI agent for customer service. We're seeing lots of cases where it's solving up to 90% of real queries for real businesses. This includes the real world complex stuff like issuing a refund or canceling an order. And we also see it when FIN goes up against competitors. It's top of all the performance benchmarks, top of the G2 leaderboard, and if you're not happy, we'll refund you up to a million dollars, which I think says it all. Check it out for yourself at fin. AI parlo tu francais Hablas espanol, Parl italiano. If you've used Babbel, you would Babbel's.

[Friends and Acquaintances of Sarah]

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[Vicki Petradis (True Crime Author)]

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[Friends and Acquaintances of Sarah]

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[Carolyn McAllister (Witness)]

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[Friends and Acquaintances of Sarah]

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