- From: Herald Sun
- August 01, 2011
English backpacker Peter Falconio and girlfriend Joanne Lees were ambushed on the Stuart Highway in 2001 Source: Supplied
DISGRACED Melbourne lawyer Andrew Fraser has made the astonishing claim that British backpacker Peter Falconio is alive, 10 years after he disappeared in Alice Springs.
Bradley Murdoch was convicted of Falconio's murder in 2005, but Mr Fraser maintains he is innocent, and that he is "100 per cent" sure Falconio manufactured his own disappearance.Fraser did not provide proof of Falconio being alive and said he had not spoken directly to anyone who had seen him.
Fraser said four people had seen Falconio since the night he disappeared, but he could not explain why these witnesses had not come forward during Murdoch's trial.
"It's the greatest legal railroading in this country since Lindy Chamberlain," said Mr Fraser, who believes Murdoch - serving a 28-year jail term - should get a retrial, if not a pardon.
This is despite Murdoch's DNA being found on the T-shirt of Joanne Lees, Falconio's girlfriend who escaped the attack and whose testimony was later used to convict Murdoch.
The convicted murderer maintained his innocence, accusing Lees of being a liar who had "something to do with it".
After a career in which he represented gangland figures such as Lewis and Jason Moran, as well as Alan Bond and Jimmy Krakouer, Mr Fraser was jailed for seven years in 2001 for importing 5.5kg of cocaine, worth about $2.7 million.
In 2006, Mr Fraser was released from prison after telling authorities he had heard serial killer Peter Dupas confess to the murder of Mersina Halvagis.
