48-year-old Bradley Robert Edwards has been charged with the murder of two women in connection to the Claremont killings from 1996 and 1997; one of Australia's biggest mysteries that has sparked a manhunt lasting more than twenty years. He has also been charged with the assault of two other women.
Edwards is accused of being the notorious 'Claremont Serial Killer' who has been on the loose for more than 20 years. Police arrested Edwards in the eastern suburb of Kewdale on Thursday morning and he made a brief court appearance this afternoon.
He is due to appear in the Magistrates court again on January 11.
According to Fairfax Media, Edwards has also been charged with the indecent assault of an 18 year old woman in 1988, as well as the rape of a 17 yearold girl in Claremont in 1995.
Ciara Glennon, aged 27, Jane Rimmer, 23 and Sarah Spiers, 18 disappeared from Claremont in 1996 and 1997. The bodies of Ciara and Jane were later found but Sarah's body has never been recovered.
Locals report a cloud of fear extended across the the city when the three young women were killed, in the supposedly 'safe' suburb of Claremont. WA's Task Force Macro is Australia's longest-running and most expensive murder investigation in history. More than 3,000 people have been investigated over the years.
The arrest of a suspect, for the people of Perth, has been a long time coming. Bret Christian, the editor of the Post Newspapers, told The Huffington Post Australia that there had been some unfortunate blunders, early in the investigation.
"The Perth cops hired a man who said he was an FBI profiler, who told the public to let them know if you see anybody behaving oddly, such as washing their car frantically, or any suspicious behaviour. All that achieved was thousands of people called the police hotline, dobbing in ex-husbands, or neighbours they were feuding with... and they just swamped the cops with useless information," Christian said.
"It's so easy to be an armchair expert and it seems everybody has a theory. But the good news is that Macro Taskforce has never given up."
Timeline:
18-year-old Sarah Spiers went missing from outside a Claremont bar in January 1996. Her body has never been found.
Jane Rimmer, aged 23, was abducted from Claremont in June 1996 and her body found in bushland south of Perth that August.
Ciara Glennon, aged 27, disappeared in March 1997. Her body was found in bushland north of Perth, 19 days after she was last seen in Claremont.