Australian police said yesterday they had recovered nine bodies from drums and rubbish bags full of decomposing human remains in a disused bank vault and suburban backyard, making the murders the nation's worst serial killings.
Police said they expected the murder toll could rise to 11, as they had yet to account for two missing people who had been expected to have been among the victims.
"This is one of the most challenging [murder cases] in our history," South Australian acting police commissioner Mr Neil McKenzie told a packed news conference.
Police said they had recovered eight bodies in six plastic drums found on Friday in a disused bank vault in Snowtown, a small farming town 150 km north of Adelaide.
Another body was found on Sunday in plastic bags buried in a backyard in suburban Adelaide after police used radar equipment to locate the human remains two metres below ground.
Acid was found in one of the drums and some of the bodies were dismembered, but police had not established how the victims had been killed or found any murder weapons.
Police have not revealed what led them to the old Snowtown bank vault or the Adelaide backyard.
Three men, Mr John Bunning (32), Mr Robert Wagner (28), and Mr Mark Haydon (40), appeared in an Adelaide court on Friday and were charged with murder. Police said further arrests were possible and that they were investigating possible links between the murders and social security fraud.
They ruled out paedophilia, drugs, organised crimes, and neo-Nazi activity as motives.
"We do not believe these are random killings," said Det Supt Paul Schramm, who is heading a special task force set up to investigate the serial murders.
He said that although police had not been able yet to identify the bodies officially, due to the advanced decomposition of some, they believed they knew who they were.
All the victims were adults, most of them male, although the exact breakdown will not be known until forensic examinations are complete, he said.
Police uncovered the serial killings after a year-long investigation into unsolved missing persons cases, one going back as far as 1993, which unearthed several links which they have declined to identify publicly.
Supt Schramm said police had expected to find bodies when they opened the old bank vault in Snowtown but had been surprised by the number. However, he believed the toll would not go beyond 11.