Police are offering up a $1 million to anyone who can offer up clues that help solve the 46-year mystery of a Melbourne mum’s killing.
Mary Anne Fagan, 41, was found bound, gagged and lifeless inside the bedroom of her Armadale home on February 17, 1978.
On Friday, police raised the reward to $1 million in exchange for information that leads to the conviction of the principal offender or offenders in her alleged murder.
Ms Fagan’s children came home from school to find her body – stabbed multiple times -and their one-year-old sibling crying in the next room.
Some personal items were reported missing from the home and bizarrely, all the doors were locked to the home, with the children forced to smash a window to get inside.
Despite a significant investigation over the last almost five decades, a motive for her killing has never been established and no charges have been laid.
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Detectives believe it is possible there are still people in the community who know what happened to Ms Fagan and who was responsible.
Homicide squad Detective Inspector Dean Thomas said the “smallest piece of information can make the biggest difference when it comes to solving a crime.”
“It might be someone who has never felt ready to provide detectives with particular information and for them, the time is now right,” he said.
He said it is a tragedy that each of her children has had to grow up without a mother.
“I know they have thought about that almost every day,” he said.
“Mary Anne was brutally murdered for no apparent reason in the place she should have felt safest, and with her 17-month-old baby nearby.”
The mother-of-five lived with her husband and five children aged under 15 years at a house on Dandenong Road.
On the morning of her alleged murder, she dropped her children off to school before returning home about 9.15am.
Her husband was away working and was not expected home until later that afternoon.
Shortly after parking her car in the driveway, she was seen by a neighbour speaking to council workmen repairing the road outside tof the family’s home.
She was last seen by a passing driver about 10.30am, who said she was standing in her front yard.
At 11am, her husband said they spoke on the phone, completely unaware it would be his final conversation with his wife.
This is the last known contact anyone had with Mary Anne.
Sometime in the next five hours, before her children arrived home from school, Ms Fagan was allegedly murdered in a ferocious stabbing attack.
Her children, who are aged in their late 40s to early 60s, remain hopeful they will get answers about what happened to their mother.
The reward, which was last offered at $50,000 in June 1978, has increased twenty-fold since then.
It will be awarded at the discretion of the Chief Commissioner of Police to anyone with information leading to the apprehension and subsequent conviction of the person or persons responsible for the death of Mary Anne Fagan.
The Director of Public Prosecutions will consider granting security against legal liability to a person who identifies an offender involved in the alleged murder.
Investigators are hopeful this new reward will encourage someone to come forward with information.
Police urge anyone with information about Mary Anne death to contact Crime Stoppers on 1800 333 000 or submit a confidential report online at www.crimestoppersvic.com.au