By Gillian Lantouris and Wendy Tuohy
Mick Murphy spends hours every day looking for his wife, walking through pine plantations and the bushland around Ballarat where she went missing.
Police allege Samantha Murphy was murdered and have arrested and charged a suspect – 22-year-old Patrick Stephenson. But her body has not been found despite months of searching, so every day her husband goes walking in a bid to find her final resting place.
“I’ll get a coffee and go for a drive and it mightn’t necessarily be anywhere in particular, but mainly around Yendon ... over towards Buninyong,” he told Nine News on Friday. Yendon is located about 13 kilometres from Ballarat.
“Either a drive or I go for a walk and I might go for an hour, two hours– just randomly pull up and go for a walk,” Mick said.
“I spend a lot of time walking through pine plantations. [It’s] pretty eerie … and I make sure I don’t detour off, I follow each row.”
Hundreds of Ballarat residents have spent hours over the past two months scouring bushland for Samantha.
The 51-year-old mother of three left the family home on the morning of February 4 to go for a run in Woowookarung Regional Park – known locally as Canadian Forest – an expanse of dense scrub bordering her Eureka Street property in Ballarat’s east.
In late February, police revealed they doubted she was still alive and alleged someone else was involved in her disappearance.
Mick said getting out and searching helped him keep some sort of peace. “As far as mentally-wise goes, it’s very good for your mind,” he said.
“I think if you sat at home, you definitely wouldn’t do yourself any favours, I don’t think … I might go for an hour, I might go for two. I might go for four hours.”
Mick Murphy: “This whole scenario, you wouldn’t wish it on your worst enemy.”Credit: Nine News
He said he hoped his wife’s body would be found so that there was a place for the family to visit.
Initially after Samantha went missing, Victoria Police spoke to Mick as part of the investigation. He said it was a difficult time.
“I’m their first suspect, aren’t I?” he said.
“You start second-guessing yourself. I know I’ve done nothing wrong, but there’s these little voices in your head, you know, saying different things. It wasn’t a good time and I wouldn’t wish it on anybody.
“This whole scenario, you wouldn’t wish it on your worst enemy. I’ve just tried to be strong throughout it for the kids and family and community.”
In March, Stephenson, a local with no apparent connection to Murphy, was charged with her murder. Investigators allege Stephenson, the son of an ex-AFL player, attacked Murphy at Mount Clear on February 4.
Mick said it could save a lot of resources if his wife’s body was found. “A simple quick answer could change the day and bring a lot of relief and happiness to people,” he said.
Mick and Samantha were married for 26 years. Their anniversary was in late February, just weeks after she vanished. “Sam was a smart, incredibly smart woman,” he said.
A woman signs a condolence book for Samantha Murphy in March.Credit: Jason South
“She was process-driven. So she knew what she was doing. Hence, every morning when she got up, she was up at 5.30, or before 5.30, gone for a run.”
Mick remembers February 4 – the day she disappeared – very clearly.
“I was overwhelmed. You know that something’s not right,” he said. “You know, you know, in the back of your mind, something’s not right.”
Samantha’s usual run – through the surrounding bushland that she loved – was about an hour-and-a-half. It was a weekend, so she left a little later than usual, about 7am.
“I was outside … and I thought, ‘Oh, she’ll be coming back up the road now pretty soon’. And then … she didn’t,” he said.
After a while, Mick went inside and asked the kids if their mum had come home yet, but there was no sign of her. They called her phone and it went straight to message.
“And that’s what I thought, ‘That’s odd. That’s very odd because she has her phone and her watch fully charged before she leaves’,” he said.
“So that’s when … I went out in the bush, started looking around. And next thing I called triple zero and it just escalated from there.”
Police search for body of missing Ballarat mother Samantha Murphy in Buninyong Bushland Reserve in February.
Mick said Samantha loved to run through the bushland, much more than on the streets.
“She’s ... walked and walked and then she got fitter and started running and … running further and further. It was just, it was what she loved to do,” he said.
“With her disappearance, she has gone doing something that she really enjoyed. So that’s one positive, I suppose, that we can take out of it.”
An estimated 1000 people gathered in Ballarat on Friday evening to protest over violence against women. The city of about 120,000 is reeling from the deaths of three women this year, all allegedly killed by men.
Rally against violence against women in Ballarat.Credit: Eddie Jim
On Monday, the ex-boyfriend of Hannah McGuire, a 23-year-old woman from Clunes, was charged with her murder. The body of McGuire, a popular netballer and emerging teacher, was found in a burnt-out car last week in Scarsdale, about 25 kilometres south-west of Ballarat.
On February 16, Rebecca Young, a 42-year-old mother and grandmother, died in her home in Sebastopol in an apparent murder-suicide by her partner, Ian Butler, 55. Two of her teenage children were in the house when Young was stabbed to death.
Young’s mother and sisters addressed Friday’s candlelit rally – attended by Ballarat women, men and children – calling for more support for women at risk. Her sister, Jessica, said victims needed more services available to them.
City councillor Belinda Coates told women who were experiencing violence that “we see you, we hear you, we believe you”.
Hannah McGuire’s parents at the rally in Ballarat.Credit: Eddie Jim
Rally organiser, Djab Wurrung woman and violence survivor Sissy Austin told an applauding crowd that she believed the reason she survived a brutal attack by a rock-wielding man while jogging in forest near Ballarat a year ago was: “[To] stand up, fight and rise as we did tonight.”
Mick also addressed the crowd, thanking the community for being out searching daily for his wife’s body. He urged anyone who saw violence against women to say something and report it to authorities, and started a chant of “bring Sam home”.
Ahead of the rally, Mick said he hoped Samantha would be remembered just as she was: kind caring, loyal and always smiling. “A wonderful woman. You won’t hear bad word about her,” he said.
“A good mother, caring … always providing for everybody.”
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