Theresa’s family has spent 20 years looking for answers. Now police are offering $1m to find her killer

Warning: graphic content

Daylene Barlow can’t remember exactly what she and her mother, Theresa Binge, talked about the last time they spoke in early 2003.

They talked about everything, and nothing at all; little things and big things, she says. More than two decades later, she wishes the conversation had never ended, and that she had told her mother how much she meant to her.

Had Barlow known what would come in the months after, she would have bundled her mother into her car and taken her to Coffs Harbour, where she was living at the time, without a second thought.

“It’s like they say – one minute you’re there, and the next minute you’re gone,” Barlow, 45, told the Herald.

“We were real close.”

Around three months after that conversation, on July 29, Binge’s body was found in a stormwater culvert underneath what was then known as Boomi Road, about 12 kilometres south of the Queensland border. The 43-year-old Boggabilla mother, who had been missing for almost two weeks, had been beaten and then dragged into the concrete tunnel that runs under the rural road, probably after she had been killed.

Binge was bruised and naked, wearing only a pair of silver tracksuit pants bunched around her right ankle, and one white running shoe on her right foot. Neither the black and yellow striped football jersey she was wearing when she was last seen, nor her left shoe, were with her. Forensic evidence indicated Binge had been killed elsewhere, and her body dumped in the culvert.

Binge was last seen alive leaving O’Shea’s Royal Hotel in Goondiwindi, a Queensland border town on the banks of the Macintyre River, around midday on July 18. Her family reported her missing to Queensland police three days later. When Binge’s body was found, police in Moree launched a murder investigation.

In 2009, then-deputy state coroner Jacqueline Milledge found Binge had died near Goondiwindi on or around July 18. While the cause of death could not be determined, Milledge found Binge had been murdered by a “person or persons unknown”.

Milledge’s limited recommendations included that the investigation into Binge’s death be referred for reinvestigation under NSW Police’s Cold Case Justice Project.

“She was a lovely woman,” Barlow said.

“She loved everyone, and everyone loved her. She was happy-go-lucky.”

Barlow has never given up her pursuit for answers. The years since her mother’s death have been littered with “ups and downs”. Anxiety, depression and grief have loomed large while she has struggled to come to terms with the loss of her mother. No one has been charged over her death.

But now, a glimmer of hope.

Detectives from NSW Police’s unsolved homicide unit are renewing their efforts to bring Binge’s killer or killers to justice. A $1 million reward for information on Binge’s murder is now on offer. Police will on Tuesday announce the cash incentive as part of a push to solve the case that will also include the use of a mobile billboard travelling around Moree, Goondiwindi and surrounds.

Police previously offered a $100,000 reward for information leading to an arrest and conviction for Binge’s murder. After extensive inquiries in the years since her death, investigators had not been able to gather sufficient evidence to launch a prosecution, police said at the time.

Detectives believed someone in the Goondiwindi or Boggabilla communities had information about the killing, and urged them to come forward. The reward, they hoped, would help find new leads. No arrests were made.

Since then, Binge’s family has continued its search for the truth. To mark the 20th anniversary of Binge’s death, relatives, many of whom were critical of the police investigation into her death, gathered outside Sydney’s Law Courts Building, covering the windows and footpaths with red hand prints and a plea for answers: “Justice for Theresa B”.

Binge’s family have previously criticised NSW Police’s handling of her mother’s murder.

In its infancy, the investigation was complicated by the involvement of two jurisdictions; Binge was a NSW woman, missing in Queensland, found dead in her home state. Over the years, important details have been confused. At times, police said Binge was believed to have last been seen leaving Goondiwindi’s Victoria Hotel, not O’Shea’s. Appealing for information previously, police said she had left the pub at midnight on July 17 in the company of a man, not at midday on July 18.

Barlow believes the inconsistencies may have stalled progress on finding her mother’s killer, but she has welcomed the renewed campaign.

“She’s got grandchildren here that she’s never met,” Barlow said.

“She’s a great-grandmother. They always ask me what she was like. She was a beautiful woman.”

Speaking in Moree on Tuesday, homicide squad commander, Detective Superintendent Joe Doueihi, urged members of the local community who may have information about Binge’s murder to come forward.

“I’m confident that there are people in the local community here that have information about what happened,” Doueihi said.

“This is a solvable crime. We just need someone in the community to come forward, step forward, be brave, take that step and give us that information that we require.”

Rumours of who may have killed Binge have circulated around the communities she spent time in. Several names have been passed on to investigators over the years and Binge’s family have long held their own suspicions about who was responsible for her death.

Several weeks ago, those names were again raised when a friend of Barlow told her she had been travelling through Moree in 2016 and that she had spent the night in the company of several locals. Eventually, the conversation turned to Binge’s murder, and who may have been involved. Barlow’s No.1 suspect, and the names of several other people, were mentioned.

“These names have been there since day dot,” Barlow said.

After a heated exchange between several people in the room at the time, the friend decided to keep the interaction to herself until recently. Gravely ill and desperate to get the information off her chest, she confided in Barlow, who immediately contacted police.

Officers working under the second iteration of Strike Force Flairs, established to investigate Binge’s murder, now hope the increased reward will encourage someone with information to come forward. The local community, they believe, still holds the key to solving the case.

“I’m not going to stop until I find something,” Barlow said.

“I want justice.”

Anyone with information about Binge’s murder is urged to contact Crime Stoppers on 1800 333 000.

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