Road worker was convicted of murdering seven backpackers and burying their bodies in the Belanglo state forest in the early 1990s

This article is more than 10 months old

This article is more than 10 months old

Australia’s most notorious serial killer, Ivan Milat, has died in prison from terminal oesophagus and stomach cancer.

Milat, 74, died at Sydney’s Long Bay hospital at 4.07am on Sunday, Corrective Services NSW said. He had been undergoing chemotherapy since it was diagnosed in May.

The former road worker was sentenced in 1996 to seven consecutive life sentences for murdering seven backpackers whose bodies were found in makeshift graves in the Belanglo state forest of New South Wales in the 1990s.

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All were killed in horrific circumstances after Milat picked them up hitchhiking: Melbourne couple Deborah Everist, 19, and James Gibson, 19; German traveller Simone Schmidl, 21; German couple Anja Habschied, 20, and Gabor Neugebauer, 21; and British friends Joanne Walters, 22, and Caroline Clarke, 21.

Their bodies were found covered with branches and leaf litter in the forest between September 1992 and November 1993.

One victim was decapitated, another shot 10 times in the head. Many were stabbed so savagely their bones were chipped, some had been gagged or bound, and some were suspected of having been sexually assaulted.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Milat’s victims, clockwise from top left: Deborah Everest, Anja Habschied, Simone Schmidl, James Gibson, Caroline Clarke, Gabor Neugebauer and Joanne Walters. Photograph: Reuters

“These seven young persons were at the threshold of their lives, with everything to look forward to – travel, career, happiness, love, family, and even old age,” said Justice David Hunt, who jailed Milat for life in 1996.

“It is clear that they were subjected to behaviour which, for callous indifference to suffering and complete disregard of humanity, is almost beyond belief.

“They would obviously have been absolutely terrified, and death is unlikely to have been swiftly applied.”

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Milat also was found guilty of kidnapping the British backpacker Paul Onions, who escaped his clutches in January 1990, near the turn-off to the forest.

Onions said he had been so scared he bolted into oncoming traffic after Milat pointed a gun at him and reached for some rope.

The crimes made headlines around the world, shattering Australia’s standing as a safe haven for budget-conscious young travellers.

Over the years, Milat has also been linked to the disappearance of other young men and women in areas where he worked with a road gang.

In 1974 he was cleared of raping one of two young hitchhikers he picked up three years earlier near the same highway where the seven murdered backpackers were picked up.

At his trial in 1996, hundreds of pieces of information linked him to the murders including property of the victims: a jersey worn by Clarke resembled one Milat gave his girlfriend.

The prosecutor accused him of “incredible arrogance and unbelievable self-confidence”.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Milat laughs as he leaves court after representing himself in an appeal against his conviction. Photograph: The Sydney Morning Herald/Fairfax Media via Getty Images

Behind bars, Milat remained in the headlines. A decade ago, he ended a hunger strike days after cutting off his little finger and handing it to prison officers inside an envelope padded with newspaper.

He severed the finger with a serrated plastic knife and addressed the envelope to the chief justice of the high court.

In early 2001, Milat swallowed razor blades, paper staples and a tiny metal chain, and then later that year he swallowed part of the flushing mechanism from the toilet in his cell.

His terrible legacy continued in 2010 when his great-nephew, Matthew Milat, lured a 17-year-old friend into Belanglo and murdered him with an axe.

The next day, he boasted: “You know me, you know my family. You know the last name Milat. I did what they do.”