Julie Ann Garciacelay was not quite 20 when she vanished from her inner-city apartment in Melbourne 50 years ago.
Three men who were with her that night in July 1975 told police the young American left to make a phone call and didn’t return. One would be linked to the infamous Easey Street murders 18 months later.
Julie has never been seen since, nor has her body been found. Her disappearance is one of Australia’s oldest, most haunting ‘cold cases’. But investigative journalist Helen Thomas has unearthed new information about her vanishing - so far from home, almost lost in time…
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Publisher
Casefile Presents
Category
society & culture · society & culture · true crime
Not long after this podcast was released last year, Julie Garciacelay's mother, Ruth, died in California. She was 93. Yet, more than 50 years after her daughter vanished, Ruth's DNA could prove crucial in solving the case.
Casefile Presents also asks: Is there a chance that Julie has been 'lost' twice?
Helen Thomas reports...
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30 Jul 2025TRANSCRIPT
Episode 7: The Little Piano
When Julie and her two sisters were little, their mother bought them a toy piano to share. Julie took to it with passion and became a gifted pianist. Now, her legacy lives on through the piano scholarship Ruth Garciacelay set up, in her daughter’s name, in northern California.
She tells Helen Thomas about the importance of celebrating Julie’s life…
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30 Jul 2025TRANSCRIPT
Episode 6: It's in the File
Veteran detectives believe the crucial clue that can lead to an ancient ‘cold case’ like Julie Garciacelay’s being solved is usually found in the original file.
It could well be true in this case, as Casefile Presents discovers…
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30 Jul 2025TRANSCRIPT
Episode 5: The Deadly Decade
In the decade that followed Julie’s murder, 19 other women suffered violent deaths in Melbourne.
Helen Thomas traces this brutal trail…
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30 Jul 2025TRANSCRIPT
Episode 4: Go Higher
When Ruth Garciacelay realised her daughter really was missing, she flew to Australia from the US. A couple of years later, she returned to Melbourne and had an unnerving encounter with one of the men who’d been with Julie the night she disappeared.
For the first time, Ruth reveals what he told her...
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30 Jul 2025TRANSCRIPT
Episode 3: The Boxer, the Crim & the Journo
One of the most unusual aspects about Julie Garciacleay’s case is that, right from the start, detectives were aware of exactly who was with her the night she vanished. Two of the three men were already ‘known’ to them, the third a reporter working for the now-defunct Truth newspaper.
Helen Thomas focuses on this unholy trinity…
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30 Jul 2025TRANSCRIPT
Episode 2: God's Witnesses
It’s always been assumed there were no witnesses from the time Julie Garciacelay went missing. But police failed to talk to neighbours about what they saw the night she disappeared. So they missed vital information early in their investigation.
Nearly five decades later, Casefile Presents found two people who remember something frightening...
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30 Jul 2025TRANSCRIPT
Episode 1: That First Night in July
Julie Ann Garciacelay came to Australia to be with her sister, Gail. She vanished before they could go home for Christmas, 50 years ago.
The night the 19-year-old disappeared in July 1975, three men visited her at home. They have long been the only ‘persons of interest’ in her case.
Journalist Helen Thomas investigates….
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20 Jun 2025TRANSCRIPT
Julie's Gone trailer
Julie Ann Garciacelay was not quite 20 when she vanished from her inner-city apartment in Melbourne 50 years ago.
Three men who were with her that night in July 1975 told police the young American left to make a phone call and didn’t return. One would be linked to the infamous Easey Street murders 18 months later.
Julie has never been seen since, nor has her body been found. Her disappearance is one of Australia’s oldest, most haunting ‘cold cases’. But investigative journalist Helen Thomas has unearthed new information about her vanishing - so far from home, almost lost in time…
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy (https://acast.com/privacy) for more information.
Inside a recent episode
Episode 8: Lost Twice?
Published 13 Feb 2026 · Transcript excerpt
[…] There was no such thing as DNA profiling in 1975 so many bodies were buried without any DNA taken. Exuming a body is expensive so a coroner requires credible information before allowing an exhumation. And there's no likelihood that mass exhumations of unidentified bodies would take place. […]
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