Peter Dupas - Murder of Mersina Halvagis

Murder of Mersina Halvagis

Mersina Halvagis was a 25-year-old Melbourne woman murdered in an attack on 1 November 1997, while visiting her grandmother's grave in the Greek Orthodox section of Fawkner Cemetery in Fawkner, a northern suburb of Melbourne. The alarm was raised by Halvagis' fiancé when she failed to meet with him later that day as the couple had planned.

Halvagis' body was discovered at 4.35 a.m. on 5 November 1997, by Halvagis' fiancé in an empty plot, three graves from where her grandmother was buried. Mersina herself would later be laid to rest in the Cheltenham Memorial Park, Melbourne where her grieving parents regularly attend her grave. Police believe Halvagis was attacked from behind while kneeling to attend to a flower arrangement, and that she died from massive injuries, including 87 stab wounds about her knees, neck, with most wounds concentrated around her breasts. Her upper clothing had been pulled over her head towards her chest.

Dupas' home in Coane Street, Pascoe Vale was near the cemetery. Halvagis' murder had remained unsolved since 1997, with the Victorian state government, together with police offering a A$1 million reward for information leading to an arrest. The large reward was the fourth such reward of A$1 million in Victoria's history.

Frank Cole, an elderly resident of Pascoe Vale, claims he saw Dupas leaving the Fawkner Cemetery on the day of the murder. Cole had earlier claimed he shot a dingo he suspected had killed two-month-old Azaria Chamberlain who went missing at an Ayers Rock camping ground on 17 August 1980.

An anonymous female who was visiting her parents' grave on the day of the murder had seen Dupas wearing sunglasses casually jogging throughout the cemetery.