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Melissa Cunningham

Melissa Cunningham

Melissa Cunningham is a health reporter for The Age. She has previously covered crime and justice.

Lee Johnson, pictured with her child Bellamy Nieto’s dog Bluey. The mother has been left devastated by her child’s death.

After a series of deaths, traumatised families are left asking the same question at the Swanston Centre

Soaring episodes of violence and assaults have been reported inside the Geelong psychiatric unit.

  • Grant McArthur and Melissa Cunningham

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Emergency services were called to the intersection of Myers and Swanston streets, the site of a mental health, drug and alcohol treatment centre.

Slain psychiatric ward patient shared bathroom, unlockable door with alleged killer

The patient from the neighbouring room was found over the body, with broken glass nearby. There were no locked doors between their rooms.

  • Grant McArthur and Melissa Cunningham
Family members of victims: Maxine Tsihlakis, Spiros Vasilakis and Steve Samaras outside the County Court of Victoria after the fine and conviction were handed down.

Families devastated by nursing home’s $150,000 fine after 50 deaths during COVID

Tearful families slammed the decision as “a joke” and demanded the home be held responsible for the deaths of their loved ones.

  • Melissa Cunningham
Victoria Police Detective Sergeant Jason Regan was part of a major undercover operation.

‘Some of the worst’: Dozens charged as police bust online paedophile ring

Men across Victoria and NSW have been arrested in a major police operation that uncovered some of the most depraved child abuse material investigators have ever seen.

  • Melissa Cunningham
James Tsindos.

‘He had the world at his feet’: Coroner finds ‘missed opportunities’ in teen’s anaphylactic death

As details of his teenage son’s final moments were read out in the Victorian Coroner’s Court, Harry Tsindos hunched over in his chair, put his head in his hands and wept.

  • Melissa Cunningham
Ravenhall Prison just before its opening in 2017.

Victorians pay $600 a day for every prisoner and rehabilitation is still failing

A prison purpose-built for slashing reoffending is failing to live up to its promise, with four out of 10 inmates back in jail within two years, a report has found.

  • Melissa Cunningham
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Police have laid more than 2000 charges of intentional choking, suffocating or strangling under landmark new offences, which were introduced in Victoria last year.

More than 1000 people charged in first year of domestic violence choking laws

Police have laid more than 1300 charges of intentional choking, suffocating or strangling under a landmark new offence introduced in Victoria last year. 

  • Melissa Cunningham and Craig Butt
Professor Dimitri Gerostamoulos

‘Flooded with cocaine’: One in four injured drivers is high on drugs

Victorian drivers are increasingly using cocaine and highly potent synthetic drugs, a world-first study has found, prompting warnings that Australia has become a “honey pot” for drug trafficking.

  • Melissa Cunningham
Max McKenzie who died in August 2021 after accidentally consuming walnuts. 

‘Max should still be with us’: Teenager who died of anaphylaxis should have been treated sooner, coroner finds

When experienced emergency doctor Ben McKenzie arrived at Box Hill Hospital he found himself having to intervene and try to resuscitate his own dying son. 

  • Melissa Cunningham
Four years before he tragically took his own life, AFL star Troy Selwood made a selfless decision to donate his brain to concussion research.

Troy Selwood’s final wish was to donate his brain for concussion research

The former AFL star wrote in his will that he wanted to help those studying the long-term effects of head knocks.

  • Melissa Cunningham