COFFEE AND CRIME AU PODCAST
Explore Our Captivating Australian True Crime Case Archive

Subscriber Companion Episode Sef Gonzales didn’t create just one false story. He built an entire life out of them. To the people around him, he could be the successful university student, the future lawyer, the singer on the edge of a breakthrough, the young businessman and, eventually, the devastated son left behind after an unthinkable crime. But those identities couldn’t all survive contact with the truth.

4:04pm. 5:30pm. 6:23pm. 7:45pm. The phone records and alibi window that became crucial to the prosecution case against Sef Gonzales.

Before the murders, Sef Gonzales was already trying to keep parts of his life hidden. University failure, alleged poisoning, false trails and the lies prosecutors said were closing in on him.

There is a temptation, when telling the story of Katherine Knight, to begin at the end. With John Price. With Aberdeen. With the crime that made her name infamous. But by the time Price entered Knight's life, there was already a long history behind her. Three men, in particular, occupied important places in that history. David Kellett. David Saunders. John Chillingworth.

On 28 February 2000, John Price went to court. He wasn't there because a crime had already happened. He was there because he was frightened that one might.

In this subscriber deep dive, we go beyond the story of Kerrie Palmer and into the evidence that shaped one of Queensland’s most difficult criminal cases. Four men were ultimately convicted of manslaughter, but none were convicted of murder. So why? This episode follows the evidence piece by piece — the money dispute, the search for Kerrie, Coral Tree Court, the vehicles, telephone records, DNA, blood evidence, the movements between locations, the statements given by t

On 27 January 2003, 20-year-old Kerrie Palmer disappeared on Queensland’s Sunshine Coast. Three days later, his body was discovered in sand dunes at Mudjimba. What followed was a police investigation that eventually resulted in five men being charged in connection with Kerrie’s death. But the story that emerged in court was considerably more complicated than the simple description of a murder case. The investigation would eventually lead to a Supreme Court trial, ye

In many criminal investigations, the evidence eventually leads investigators to one moment. A discovery. A location. A piece of information that changes everything. But some cases never reach that point. Instead, they remain suspended between what is suspected and what can be proven.

Every disappearance leaves behind a timeline. A sequence of moments that begins before someone is gone and continues after the world realises something has changed. In some cases, that timeline is clear. There are cameras. There are witnesses. There are physical clues that show investigators exactly where to look. But the disappearance of Bronwyn Winfield has always been different. Her case has been built from fragments. A family home. A locksmith visit. Witness

This exclusive subscriber episode goes beyond the main case episode and examines the investigation itself. From the eleven-day delay before Bronwyn was reported missing to the witness accounts, timeline reconstruction, and the significance of the Sandstone Crescent house, this episode explores the evidence detectives were forced to piece together years after the events of May 1993.

When two Australian women disappear without a trace, the similarities can seem striking. Lynette Simms vanished from Sydney’s northern beaches in 1982. Bronwyn Winfield disappeared from Lennox Head in 1993. Neither woman has ever been found. Both cases involved marital breakdown, a family home, and decades of unanswered questions.

What happened to Bronwyn Winfield? Bronwyn was 31 years old when she vanished in May 1993. She was a mother of two young daughters, a daughter, a friend, and a woman whose life was much more than the mystery that would later surround her disappearance.

On a winter night in June 2014, police were called to a rural property in Western Australia. What began as an emergency response would later become the subject of a coronial inquest, forensic debate, and years of unanswered questions.

Twelve years ago, Amy Lee Wensley died at a rural property in Western Australia. Despite extensive investigations and a coronial inquest, questions about the circumstances surrounding her death remain. Amy was a daughter, a mother, and a loved member of her family. Behind every investigation is a person whose life mattered, and whose family continues to live with loss and unanswered questions.

There is a sentence that appears repeatedly in discussions about Amy Wensley’s death: 'The scene had already changed.” Those six words sit at the centre of the controversy surrounding the investigation. They do not tell us how Amy died. They tell us something equally important: that later investigators were forced to examine a scene that was no longer preserved exactly as it had been at the critical moment.

On a cold winter afternoon in June 2014, two little girls waited in a running car while their mother walked back inside their home. She told them she’d only be a moment. She never came back.

Many people assume there must have been obvious warning signs that were overlooked, but the reality is far more complicated. Tiahleigh's death prompted widespread reviews of Queensland's child protection system, the foster carer approval process, and the Blue Card system. Those reviews weren't just about understanding what had happened—they were about determining whether the system itself could be strengthened to better protect vulnerable children.

Most Australians know Rick Thorburn as the foster father who murdered 12-year-old Tiahleigh Palmer.

In October 2015, twelve-year-old Tiahleigh Alyssa-Rose Palmer disappeared from her foster home in Queensland. For six days, her community searched for answers. But behind the scenes, a much darker truth was unfolding. This episode explores the life of Tiahleigh Palmer — a child who spent years moving between homes, carers and court orders, searching for the one thing every child deserves: stability, safety and a place to belong. From her earliest days in the child protection

In 2015, Australia was shocked by the disappearance and murder of 12-year-old Tiahleigh Palmer. But before she became a headline, Tiahleigh was a child who spent her life searching for stability. She loved dancing. She loved horses. She loved animals. She was described by those who knew her as kind, gentle and a child people fell in love with. This episode tells Tiahleigh’s story from the beginning — her childhood, her years in the child protection system, the many