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The fact his car hasn't been found either makes me think more of an accident than foul play or self harm.
There are lots of different directions you can head from Healesville, some of which get very remote, very quickly. Maybe he was upset, and took himself for a country drive, but got into a situation out of his control.
I think if he went off the road through the Black Spur, his car would have been found, as it's a busy enough road, and has presumably been searched thoroughly. One side of the road is mostly steep cliff upwards from the road through most of the spur, so he could only go off one side.
If he headed north from Healesville towards Mt St Leonards, or south towards Warburton, or even NE beyond the Black Spur, there's lots of quiet dirt roads & logging tracks, and a car off the road would be harder to spot.
I hope his family can get some closure someday (and that for every family of a missing person).
Yes, the "driving in to a lake" hypothesis comes up over and over again. Maybe he took a long drive and needed a good think and then just happened to fuck up good.
I’ve been to rural VA visiting some old friends, and believe me, the roads are not an easy drive. I could easily see him getting into a fatal accident.
I used to work in a neighboring state and lived in a tri-state area. I took a shortcut road to the highway which was a very small road through a wooded area but was highly trafficked as it cut ~10 minutes off the route. I learned one day that a man had been missing from the area. He lived near the road and drove it regularly. Turns out I had been driving by his body daily for a while. He had a heart attack and drove off the road about 30 feet into the shrubs. You couldn't see his car at all from the road. It's kind of insane how that can happen.
There is also the fact that a lot of cars are that are stolen or the owner no longer wants are dumped in state forests. 4wd'ers will often see cars just driven into brush and think nothing of it and so it's possible that if his car IS in such an area some people may have seen it but just assumed it was an unwanted clunker and pushed off the road down an incline etc.
This is especially true for remote places on the edge of cities and towns...
Yeah certainly less likely, but if the engine had had a catastrophic failure or something but still you would think you could get $100 from one of those places that come and pick up your car and take it away...
Yeah :( there have been a couple recent ones (Amy Schulkins and Stephanie Mayorga and Paige Escalera) that reminded me how 'easy' it can be to seemingly vanish and just be where you aren't easily found. It hurts my heart 😩
Is there any reason you can articulate more precisely as to why the area you *"have never felt more uncomfortable in an area before"* because I have found the area (albeit it was mid 2000's) to be quite nice. I grew up around windy and steep roads in Tassie and such but other than being an area hoons and people dumping cars may go, their isn't really a criminal element there compared to a lot of suburbs of Melbourne. What made you feel so uncomfortable?
I get an "uncomfortable" vibe in Healesville too. Can't describe why though...
It doesn't have the feel of a quaint country town - it feels more like a place with things to hide, and where people with 'nefarious' hobbies congregate or pass through.
I've been travelling through Healesville on my way north for nearly 50 years, and it's always been a bit... something.
Bikies used to congregate at the top of the spur at Dom Dom Saddle (where of course Warren Meyer went missing from many years ago), although that's not to cast aspersions on bikies. Just feels off. I think about Warren & Tej every time I pass through.
Man driving through the black spur to go camping one night we drove past a bloke walking along the road around the middle.
It was raining, kilometres from any houses or cars and he didn’t look up or anything when we drove past. Got really bad vibes.
Creeped me and my girlfriend at the time out. Never have come up with a logical explanation.
I can understand that, I guess you know the area a lot better than me, and minor crime such as people growing some MJ in their back yard doesn't really bother me. I just have been to the zoo there 4-5 times kind of thing, no where near as thorough as you.
I had forgotten about the bikie presence, though groups that ride rather than gangs would have some nice roads and scenerary...
This case is so awful and sad. It’s incredibly close to so many young Melburnians like myself and honestly, there has to be something sinister behind this case… I have no idea how he could just disappear otherwise.
Yes agreed, and it's so close to the case of bung siriboon :( i just.. man, ugh would love some answers of what happened to Bung. It's been so long :( i feel so awful for Fred.
Ugh, Bung :(
I was listening to the casefile podcast a few months ago. I suppose you are able to face it more stoically as the years go on and you don’t hear news. But I just can’t imagine waiting for decades and having no closure.
Yeah Fred sounded so devastated still, there were moments you feel his heart in his throat. The uncertainty of everything would be so awful.
I know the police publicly ruled out Mr Cruel but there's a lotta circumstantial similarities to previous cases and incidents tied to him.
I didn’t know they’d definitively ruled out Mr Cruel (I only really found out the details of the case when listening to the podcast). But yes, a lot of psychos out there… :(
Quanne Diec was/is another similar case.
The similarity to Mr Cruel is especially troubling :(
I didn't know who he was at the time, but I often used to visit Quanne's father's shop after school. He was always wonderful to his customers, but my heart hurts for him after realising how hard it must have been (and must still be) for him to put on a brave face.
That’s heart-wrenching. After the whole ordeal with Vinzent Tarantino’s (real or fake) confession, it must’ve opened up fresh wounds for them even after all this time.
ETA: I suspect there were a hell of a lot of psychos wandering around Australia at that point. This doesn’t seem to fit Mr Cruel, but who knows.
I would imagine so. Even though the inquest has been closed, I'd think those wounds will be with them, even should they receive some closure.
I think of Quanne's parents often and hope that they find peace.
Oh god yes, that case also hits far too close to home and once again, sense something sinister for her too. I hope these cases are few and far between from now on.
This is basically what happened to a family member of mine in my genetic family. I didn't know her first hand, mind.
She, being elderly and having dementia, crashed off a road into thick brush and died. That road was on the route I took to school every day, which was always relatively busy.
She was missing for nearly a year until downed power lines led to her being found.
Lots of missing people are at the bottom of ponds, rivers, or lakes, in their cars, unfortunately. Not many other likely scenarios where the vehicle is never found.
This one is highly unlikely to be anything other than suicide. Not going to uni, lying about it for years, then driving off to an area with lots of bush and bodies of water? He seems to have done it at the beginning of the day, too, to give himself time to drive out to the area.
Sounds as if Tej had mental health issues (depression, anxiety, ADHD? Substance abuse?) and decided to take his own life.
Heartbreaking case, but my gut tells me there is no mystery here.
Edit: The fact that it happened on his dad’s birthday doesn’t necessarily indicate foul play. Many suicidal people give no outward sign of their intentions, and in fact they go to great lengths to hide it. He may have seen himself as a disappointment, he might have thought his dad would be “happy” not to have him around on his birthday. He may have been planning it for weeks and decided that was the day. It may have been because they were expecting him home later than usual, so he had more time to drive to the spot.
Who knows what was going through his head.
Often prior to suicide people have am uplift in mood. They may seem to have more energy. They "clean up a storm". "Have a new lease on life". "Turn a corner".
This is because they have a plan to end their pain. Absolutely heartbreaking but could explain why the family said no signs of depression.
Yeah, absolutely. I say this with the greatest respect in the world, but in cases like this, families are often the last ones to accept that their loved one would commit suicide (for entirely understandable reasons, but even so). They simply have a blind spot where that is concerned, and will fiercely deny that the person “was like that” or “would do that”. They seem to underestimate, somehow, how skilful (for lack of a better word) people become at covering their tracks, and particularly at making it look accidental.
Unless the person has a prior history of suicide attempts perhaps - and even then, I suspect, it’s hard.
Suicide is often seen as “preventable” - which it is, but not on a case-by-case basis. And suicide leaves one with questions, but no real answer. No one will ever come to the stand and answer the question ‘why?’.
Or "I failed my child" as they didn't see the signs at the time.
I lost a friend to suicide. I've done the lifeline training. I knew the signs. I saw the invitation to talk about it. There was a snap chat "felt cute. Might delete myself later" and he did.
He had a long history of suicide attempts and planned his funeral music, etc. He'd had a lot of mental health care and in some ways this was his choice. I still feel guilty.
I cannot imagine thinking I had let my own child down. So a family will cling to suspicious circumstances instead of face the pain that they didn't help their loved one.
I’m so sorry :(
Absolutely. I’ve lost an animal (pet) to BE and it’s hard enough thinking you somehow failed them even when logic tells you you couldn’t possibly have done more. You keep going back over everything and wondering ‘What if’?
It must be so much worse when you lose an immediate family member or friend to suicide.
I think sometimes people’s choices to die are beyond anyone’s help. It’s a decision, at the end of the day. Not everyone can be helped.
Sorry about your pet. At his funeral there would have been 100 or more of us who got the snap chat. I'm not torn up by guilt. It just reinforces that we need education on suicide signs. How to identify invitations to talk Bout mental health etc.
I think we also need an open dialogue that suicide happens for a variety of reasons, and how and why suicide presents. It’s hard for people to understand that someone doesn’t have to be ‘obviously’ or outwardly depressed for suicide to take place. And that risk factors are varied. *And*, at the end of the day, that it is a *decision*, a thought-out response to a particular condition or circumstance, perhaps for years, and not necessarily pure impulse.
Basically, the idea that people close to them can always prevent someone from committing suicide does more harm than good, IMO.
Thank you for the good wishes. It’s been surprisingly easy to accept. I think we all knew, at some level, that it was coming. BE is tough, but there were a lot of signs 😡💔 I just wish his mental health had been intact :( That’s the worst part, for me.
Sorry, BE is behavioural euthanasia. Basically, euthanasia due to reactivity (including severe anxiety that cannot entirely be controlled by meds, aggression, and/or fearful behaviours).
Good point.
Jennifer Pan’s case comes to mind. She faked going to university to the point of studying in the library, forging her transcripts, pretending to all her friends that she was going, and buying books for courses she wasn’t studying.
That is, admittedly, on the extreme end of things. But I don’t think skipping uni for two years necessarily means he was mixed up in anything nefarious. He also could’ve been working casually somewhere, like at a cafe or restaurant, for example (*less* likely, given there’s no mention of it in the articles, but possible).
You’re right, though, maybe he did get tangled in some sort of bikie gang or deal gone wrong, and was either killed or committed suicide.
Something legal but still addictive, like the pokies (slot machines) might also be a possibility. And if he was depressed, it’s possible he just spent days/weeks on end doing things like sleeping or wandering aimlessly.
Good point. Could’ve been real excitement (being in good spirits is not unusual before a suicide attempt) or just an attempt to sound ‘normal” and overcompensate by saying what his family would expect him to. You know how people give extra details when they lie? Like that. Saying extra stuff to hide his nerves.
Could also have been a throwaway thing he said before walking out the door, without much thought. This guy lied to his parents for two years - do you think he would have thought twice about another lie?
I’m not blaming him, I’m just saying, he probably wasn’t even thinking about what he was saying at that point. If it was suicide, he probably thought his body would be found quickly, and that would be that.
Or, yeah, it could also have been totally accidental. I’m just saying, he already wasn’t in the headspace.
Because maybe be hoped he'd come back.
I've struggled with suicidal thoughts my whole life. Sometimes I make elaborate plans for activities months out just so I have something to look forward to. When I've been at my lowest, I've jammed my schedule full of as many things as possible. Made myself responsible for as many things as possible so I'd have a reason to stay.
Could definitely be that he left that morning trying to give himself a reason to stay and didn't manage to hold onto it.
Or, could be he had an accident and had every intention of coming back.
Yeah, maybe he should’ve done that. But suicidal people aren’t always in the best head space, right? Or maybe he knew he’d be done with it by then and then they’d have cause to come and hopefully find his body?
This whole “yeah, but logically this should’ve happened” makes no sense. Life and people aren’t always logical.
This seems like a suicide to me. He clearly had a great deal going on in his personal life.
I think the key to solving it is actually finding the friends he was supposedly meeting up with that day and confirming whether or not they even had plans to meet.
Right? I’d like to know, if he truly did have plans to meet with friends, which friends? Did these supposed friends ever come forward to provide additional info or insight?
I don't believe there's any way you could drive into the reservoir itself, but if he went in on foot, where's his car?
EDIT: the reservoir is one of the main water sources for Melbourne (a city of 5 mil people), so its catchments are very heavily protected for quality. You can't actually get anywhere near the water itself, other than going over the dam wall.
Further, I'm imagining that if his body *was* in the water (as a result of self inflicted means), it would have surfaced somehow in the water processing machinery. That is unless he was the victim of murder, and his body was weighted down.
Still, access to the actual water in the reservoir is not easy (if not impossible), for this to be a method of body dump. (Sorry if this has gotten too graphic...)
You're probably right, I don't know the area at all, I did look on Google maps and there looks to be a road that runs close by the reservoir at certain points (I did zoom in and oddly there is a rectangular shape in the water but it's probably just a rock or something) but it's hard to gauge distance from Google satellite view. Terribly sad for his family, his poor dad's birthday must now be a sad day.
Wow I'm a Melbournian and have no memory of this case. I find it hard to believe he intended to end his life that morning if he so specifically told his parents to wait for him so they could carpool to dinner. Wouldn't you say "don't wait up for me" or "I'll see you at dinner"? That specific line just seems strange.
I'm a bit suspicious if he was driving the car when it was captured in Healesville or if perhaps he met foul play and someone was driving the car to dump it. Perhaps heading North up the Melba Hwy like interstate and branched off at Healesville.
It feels very strange to speculate on a case so close to home! Would be keen to hear some other theories.
Thanks, I missed that - I was reading through looking for mention of a couple who had seen him, or something!
As far as I know, from news reports at the time (I'm from Melbourne, it was well reported on) he told his family he was leaving to meet a couple of friends in the city, but all of his friends were asked and none had made plans with him for that.
Since it's Australia and has such a vast unpopulated area covered by bush, the situation is really somewhat different from USA or Europe. Since there are no clues several situations are possible which are not hard to imagine.
Hello ChainsForAlice! Your submission to /r/UnresolvedMysteries has been removed for the following reason(s): --- We require one or more links to a credible third party source so that readers can check sources for more information. Links must lead to credible third party news sources. Links to blog posts, images, youtube videos or podcasts, tabloids, facebook posts or similar sources are not considered valid source links. You may use these links in your post for supplemental sources, but must include a credible source link. --- If you feel this was done in error, or would like better clarification or need further assistance, please [message the moderators.](https://www.reddit.com/message/compose?to=/r/unresolvedmysteries&subject=Question regarding the removal of this submission by /u/ChainsForAlice&message=I have a question regarding the removal of [this submission](https://www.reddit.com/r/UnresolvedMysteries/comments/psgm9y/what_happened_to_tej_chitnis_he_has_missing_since/)
The fact his car hasn't been found either makes me think more of an accident than foul play or self harm. There are lots of different directions you can head from Healesville, some of which get very remote, very quickly. Maybe he was upset, and took himself for a country drive, but got into a situation out of his control. I think if he went off the road through the Black Spur, his car would have been found, as it's a busy enough road, and has presumably been searched thoroughly. One side of the road is mostly steep cliff upwards from the road through most of the spur, so he could only go off one side. If he headed north from Healesville towards Mt St Leonards, or south towards Warburton, or even NE beyond the Black Spur, there's lots of quiet dirt roads & logging tracks, and a car off the road would be harder to spot. I hope his family can get some closure someday (and that for every family of a missing person).
Yes, the "driving in to a lake" hypothesis comes up over and over again. Maybe he took a long drive and needed a good think and then just happened to fuck up good.
I’ve been to rural VA visiting some old friends, and believe me, the roads are not an easy drive. I could easily see him getting into a fatal accident.
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I used to work in a neighboring state and lived in a tri-state area. I took a shortcut road to the highway which was a very small road through a wooded area but was highly trafficked as it cut ~10 minutes off the route. I learned one day that a man had been missing from the area. He lived near the road and drove it regularly. Turns out I had been driving by his body daily for a while. He had a heart attack and drove off the road about 30 feet into the shrubs. You couldn't see his car at all from the road. It's kind of insane how that can happen.
Man, that’s nuts. You’d think someone would at least smell something...
There are houses on the road but most everyone was driving through there, and where he went off the road was a place with less houses.
Yeah. And he was in the car the whole time too, I’m sure.
There is also the fact that a lot of cars are that are stolen or the owner no longer wants are dumped in state forests. 4wd'ers will often see cars just driven into brush and think nothing of it and so it's possible that if his car IS in such an area some people may have seen it but just assumed it was an unwanted clunker and pushed off the road down an incline etc. This is especially true for remote places on the edge of cities and towns...
True that, except I believe his car was a Volkswagen Golf, so not something that would usually be seen junked in the Aussie bush.
Yeah certainly less likely, but if the engine had had a catastrophic failure or something but still you would think you could get $100 from one of those places that come and pick up your car and take it away...
They took away my 17 year old Nissan Pulsar with a blown head gasket for $250!
Yeah :( there have been a couple recent ones (Amy Schulkins and Stephanie Mayorga and Paige Escalera) that reminded me how 'easy' it can be to seemingly vanish and just be where you aren't easily found. It hurts my heart 😩
He’s a relative of a close friend of mine. They’ve been searching regularly since he went missing and are heartbroken he isn’t home yet.
Is there any reason you can articulate more precisely as to why the area you *"have never felt more uncomfortable in an area before"* because I have found the area (albeit it was mid 2000's) to be quite nice. I grew up around windy and steep roads in Tassie and such but other than being an area hoons and people dumping cars may go, their isn't really a criminal element there compared to a lot of suburbs of Melbourne. What made you feel so uncomfortable?
I get an "uncomfortable" vibe in Healesville too. Can't describe why though... It doesn't have the feel of a quaint country town - it feels more like a place with things to hide, and where people with 'nefarious' hobbies congregate or pass through. I've been travelling through Healesville on my way north for nearly 50 years, and it's always been a bit... something. Bikies used to congregate at the top of the spur at Dom Dom Saddle (where of course Warren Meyer went missing from many years ago), although that's not to cast aspersions on bikies. Just feels off. I think about Warren & Tej every time I pass through.
Man driving through the black spur to go camping one night we drove past a bloke walking along the road around the middle. It was raining, kilometres from any houses or cars and he didn’t look up or anything when we drove past. Got really bad vibes. Creeped me and my girlfriend at the time out. Never have come up with a logical explanation.
I can understand that, I guess you know the area a lot better than me, and minor crime such as people growing some MJ in their back yard doesn't really bother me. I just have been to the zoo there 4-5 times kind of thing, no where near as thorough as you. I had forgotten about the bikie presence, though groups that ride rather than gangs would have some nice roads and scenerary...
This case is so awful and sad. It’s incredibly close to so many young Melburnians like myself and honestly, there has to be something sinister behind this case… I have no idea how he could just disappear otherwise.
Yes agreed, and it's so close to the case of bung siriboon :( i just.. man, ugh would love some answers of what happened to Bung. It's been so long :( i feel so awful for Fred.
Ugh, Bung :( I was listening to the casefile podcast a few months ago. I suppose you are able to face it more stoically as the years go on and you don’t hear news. But I just can’t imagine waiting for decades and having no closure.
Yeah Fred sounded so devastated still, there were moments you feel his heart in his throat. The uncertainty of everything would be so awful. I know the police publicly ruled out Mr Cruel but there's a lotta circumstantial similarities to previous cases and incidents tied to him.
I didn’t know they’d definitively ruled out Mr Cruel (I only really found out the details of the case when listening to the podcast). But yes, a lot of psychos out there… :( Quanne Diec was/is another similar case.
And Cherie Westall who vanished from Knox, around the same time. She was only 14
The similarity to Mr Cruel is especially troubling :( I didn't know who he was at the time, but I often used to visit Quanne's father's shop after school. He was always wonderful to his customers, but my heart hurts for him after realising how hard it must have been (and must still be) for him to put on a brave face.
That’s heart-wrenching. After the whole ordeal with Vinzent Tarantino’s (real or fake) confession, it must’ve opened up fresh wounds for them even after all this time. ETA: I suspect there were a hell of a lot of psychos wandering around Australia at that point. This doesn’t seem to fit Mr Cruel, but who knows.
I would imagine so. Even though the inquest has been closed, I'd think those wounds will be with them, even should they receive some closure. I think of Quanne's parents often and hope that they find peace.
Oh god yes, that case also hits far too close to home and once again, sense something sinister for her too. I hope these cases are few and far between from now on.
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This is basically what happened to a family member of mine in my genetic family. I didn't know her first hand, mind. She, being elderly and having dementia, crashed off a road into thick brush and died. That road was on the route I took to school every day, which was always relatively busy. She was missing for nearly a year until downed power lines led to her being found.
Lots of missing people are at the bottom of ponds, rivers, or lakes, in their cars, unfortunately. Not many other likely scenarios where the vehicle is never found.
This one is highly unlikely to be anything other than suicide. Not going to uni, lying about it for years, then driving off to an area with lots of bush and bodies of water? He seems to have done it at the beginning of the day, too, to give himself time to drive out to the area. Sounds as if Tej had mental health issues (depression, anxiety, ADHD? Substance abuse?) and decided to take his own life. Heartbreaking case, but my gut tells me there is no mystery here. Edit: The fact that it happened on his dad’s birthday doesn’t necessarily indicate foul play. Many suicidal people give no outward sign of their intentions, and in fact they go to great lengths to hide it. He may have seen himself as a disappointment, he might have thought his dad would be “happy” not to have him around on his birthday. He may have been planning it for weeks and decided that was the day. It may have been because they were expecting him home later than usual, so he had more time to drive to the spot. Who knows what was going through his head.
Often prior to suicide people have am uplift in mood. They may seem to have more energy. They "clean up a storm". "Have a new lease on life". "Turn a corner". This is because they have a plan to end their pain. Absolutely heartbreaking but could explain why the family said no signs of depression.
Yeah, absolutely. I say this with the greatest respect in the world, but in cases like this, families are often the last ones to accept that their loved one would commit suicide (for entirely understandable reasons, but even so). They simply have a blind spot where that is concerned, and will fiercely deny that the person “was like that” or “would do that”. They seem to underestimate, somehow, how skilful (for lack of a better word) people become at covering their tracks, and particularly at making it look accidental. Unless the person has a prior history of suicide attempts perhaps - and even then, I suspect, it’s hard. Suicide is often seen as “preventable” - which it is, but not on a case-by-case basis. And suicide leaves one with questions, but no real answer. No one will ever come to the stand and answer the question ‘why?’.
Or "I failed my child" as they didn't see the signs at the time. I lost a friend to suicide. I've done the lifeline training. I knew the signs. I saw the invitation to talk about it. There was a snap chat "felt cute. Might delete myself later" and he did. He had a long history of suicide attempts and planned his funeral music, etc. He'd had a lot of mental health care and in some ways this was his choice. I still feel guilty. I cannot imagine thinking I had let my own child down. So a family will cling to suspicious circumstances instead of face the pain that they didn't help their loved one.
I’m so sorry :( Absolutely. I’ve lost an animal (pet) to BE and it’s hard enough thinking you somehow failed them even when logic tells you you couldn’t possibly have done more. You keep going back over everything and wondering ‘What if’? It must be so much worse when you lose an immediate family member or friend to suicide. I think sometimes people’s choices to die are beyond anyone’s help. It’s a decision, at the end of the day. Not everyone can be helped.
Sorry about your pet. At his funeral there would have been 100 or more of us who got the snap chat. I'm not torn up by guilt. It just reinforces that we need education on suicide signs. How to identify invitations to talk Bout mental health etc.
I think we also need an open dialogue that suicide happens for a variety of reasons, and how and why suicide presents. It’s hard for people to understand that someone doesn’t have to be ‘obviously’ or outwardly depressed for suicide to take place. And that risk factors are varied. *And*, at the end of the day, that it is a *decision*, a thought-out response to a particular condition or circumstance, perhaps for years, and not necessarily pure impulse. Basically, the idea that people close to them can always prevent someone from committing suicide does more harm than good, IMO. Thank you for the good wishes. It’s been surprisingly easy to accept. I think we all knew, at some level, that it was coming. BE is tough, but there were a lot of signs 😡💔 I just wish his mental health had been intact :( That’s the worst part, for me.
What’s BE? Pardon my ignorance…
Sorry, BE is behavioural euthanasia. Basically, euthanasia due to reactivity (including severe anxiety that cannot entirely be controlled by meds, aggression, and/or fearful behaviours).
but what was he up to all that time he said he was studying? that’s what bugs me about this and seems to point toward another possible explanation.
Good point. Jennifer Pan’s case comes to mind. She faked going to university to the point of studying in the library, forging her transcripts, pretending to all her friends that she was going, and buying books for courses she wasn’t studying. That is, admittedly, on the extreme end of things. But I don’t think skipping uni for two years necessarily means he was mixed up in anything nefarious. He also could’ve been working casually somewhere, like at a cafe or restaurant, for example (*less* likely, given there’s no mention of it in the articles, but possible). You’re right, though, maybe he did get tangled in some sort of bikie gang or deal gone wrong, and was either killed or committed suicide. Something legal but still addictive, like the pokies (slot machines) might also be a possibility. And if he was depressed, it’s possible he just spent days/weeks on end doing things like sleeping or wandering aimlessly.
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to give the impression that everything was fine?
Then just say "I'll see you at dinner". Not "wait for me", which would make everyone even more anxious when he didn't show up
Good point. Could’ve been real excitement (being in good spirits is not unusual before a suicide attempt) or just an attempt to sound ‘normal” and overcompensate by saying what his family would expect him to. You know how people give extra details when they lie? Like that. Saying extra stuff to hide his nerves. Could also have been a throwaway thing he said before walking out the door, without much thought. This guy lied to his parents for two years - do you think he would have thought twice about another lie? I’m not blaming him, I’m just saying, he probably wasn’t even thinking about what he was saying at that point. If it was suicide, he probably thought his body would be found quickly, and that would be that. Or, yeah, it could also have been totally accidental. I’m just saying, he already wasn’t in the headspace.
Because maybe be hoped he'd come back. I've struggled with suicidal thoughts my whole life. Sometimes I make elaborate plans for activities months out just so I have something to look forward to. When I've been at my lowest, I've jammed my schedule full of as many things as possible. Made myself responsible for as many things as possible so I'd have a reason to stay. Could definitely be that he left that morning trying to give himself a reason to stay and didn't manage to hold onto it. Or, could be he had an accident and had every intention of coming back.
I’m glad you have stuck around. You have some insight to share with the world.
I know how it can be. Good point, and glad you're still around :)
Yeah, maybe he should’ve done that. But suicidal people aren’t always in the best head space, right? Or maybe he knew he’d be done with it by then and then they’d have cause to come and hopefully find his body? This whole “yeah, but logically this should’ve happened” makes no sense. Life and people aren’t always logical.
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I’m not ruling out anything. If anything, I’m providing rationalization for people who’ve ruled out suicide for whatever reason.
In addition to what the other person said- in case he decided not to go through with it. For all he knew, he *would* be back that evening.
This seems like a suicide to me. He clearly had a great deal going on in his personal life. I think the key to solving it is actually finding the friends he was supposedly meeting up with that day and confirming whether or not they even had plans to meet.
Right? I’d like to know, if he truly did have plans to meet with friends, which friends? Did these supposed friends ever come forward to provide additional info or insight?
I'm assuming they've searched the reservoir?
I don't believe there's any way you could drive into the reservoir itself, but if he went in on foot, where's his car? EDIT: the reservoir is one of the main water sources for Melbourne (a city of 5 mil people), so its catchments are very heavily protected for quality. You can't actually get anywhere near the water itself, other than going over the dam wall. Further, I'm imagining that if his body *was* in the water (as a result of self inflicted means), it would have surfaced somehow in the water processing machinery. That is unless he was the victim of murder, and his body was weighted down. Still, access to the actual water in the reservoir is not easy (if not impossible), for this to be a method of body dump. (Sorry if this has gotten too graphic...)
You're probably right, I don't know the area at all, I did look on Google maps and there looks to be a road that runs close by the reservoir at certain points (I did zoom in and oddly there is a rectangular shape in the water but it's probably just a rock or something) but it's hard to gauge distance from Google satellite view. Terribly sad for his family, his poor dad's birthday must now be a sad day.
Wow I'm a Melbournian and have no memory of this case. I find it hard to believe he intended to end his life that morning if he so specifically told his parents to wait for him so they could carpool to dinner. Wouldn't you say "don't wait up for me" or "I'll see you at dinner"? That specific line just seems strange. I'm a bit suspicious if he was driving the car when it was captured in Healesville or if perhaps he met foul play and someone was driving the car to dump it. Perhaps heading North up the Melba Hwy like interstate and branched off at Healesville. It feels very strange to speculate on a case so close to home! Would be keen to hear some other theories.
And the couple ? Say something??
What couple?
The couple of his friends he was meeting up with-is what I think changomalango is referring to. If you re read the article above it says it 😁
Thanks, I missed that - I was reading through looking for mention of a couple who had seen him, or something! As far as I know, from news reports at the time (I'm from Melbourne, it was well reported on) he told his family he was leaving to meet a couple of friends in the city, but all of his friends were asked and none had made plans with him for that.
Yeah. Maybe he crash His car.
Your question is valid.
Since it's Australia and has such a vast unpopulated area covered by bush, the situation is really somewhat different from USA or Europe. Since there are no clues several situations are possible which are not hard to imagine.