POLICE have scaled down a search for a bushwalker missing and feared dead in Yarra Ranges National Park.

Warren Meyer, 57, disappeared after leaving on a 10km bushwalk on Easter Sunday.

Police could find no trace of Mr Meyer despite an expansive five-day search of dense bushland in Melbourne's outer east.

The search had been scaled down and local police were patrolling the area around Mt Dom Dom, where Mr Meyer was last seen.

Police hold little hope of finding Mr Meyer alive and have not ruled out foul play.

Foul play feared

By Melissa Meehan

1st April 2008 02:00:54 AM

POLICE are keeping an open mind on the possibility that missing bushwalker Warren Meyer has run into foul play.

The 57-year-old father of two was last seen leaving the Dom Dom Saddle car park on the Black Spur for a 10 kilometre bushwalk on Easter Sunday.

The search for the missing and now feared dead Beaumaris man was officially suspended on Friday afternoon.

The six day search of the National Park by more than 100 police, State Emergency Services (SES) members and volunteers failed to find any clues to his whereabouts.

The case was then handed over to the police Alexandra Criminal Investigation Unit (CIU).

Senior Detective Stuart Walls of the Alexandra CIU said that parallel to the search police had been conducting another investigation into the missing man, but did not believe Mr Meyer was involved in his own disappearance.

“We’ve looked at the family, at the structures and the possibility that Mr Meyer could have been involved in his own disappearance - all those sorts of things are always looked at,” Sen Det Walls said.

Police are now focusing on other avenues and want to rule out people who were known to be in the Mount Dom Dom area at the time.

When asked if police suspected foul play, Sen Det Walls said police had not ruled anything out.

He said to not find a backpack or any other item belonging to Mr Meyer seemed very strange.

“We have never eliminated that Mr Meyer may have run into foul play.

“We have found no body, have no witnesses so we have to keep an open mind,” Sen Det Walls said.

“His disappearance is baffling.”

Over the weekend police identified and located a man in his mid to late 30s who was seen at the Dom Dom Saddle Area of the park around the time Mr Meyer went missing.

Police say that the man approached campers and got a lift with them into Warburton.

Sen Det Walls said the man was still a person of interest to police.

Relatives and friends of Mr Meyer’s, a Canadian national, were at the search base every day of the search.

Sen Det Walls said that Mr Meyer’s family were obviously extremely distressed.

“They are accepting of what has transpired, in the sense that everything that could be done has been done,” Sen Det Walls said.

Healesville SES Controller and SES Commander of the search Karen Picone said volunteers from all over the state joined in the search for Mr Meyer.

SES members from Healesville, Marysville and Alexandra were at Mt Dom Dom every day during the search.

“Volunteers took part in the search in very difficult conditions.

“There was extremely difficult terrain as well as cold winds, rain and even hail on one day,” Ms Picone said.

Police are seeking assistance from members of the public regarding information relating to the movement of any person in the Mt Dom Dom region during the Easter weekend.

Anyone with information regarding the disappearance of Warren Meyer is asked to contact Alexandra police on 5772 1040 or Crime Stoppers on 1800 333 000.
 

Search widens for missing man

A NEW search will begin today for bushwalker Warren Meyer, missing in the Yarra Ranges National Park since Easter Sunday.

Police search-and-rescue officers and volunteers will comb a previously unsearched area of dense bushland next to the area around Mt Dom Dom, in Melbourne's outer-east, where Mr Meyer, 57, was last seen.

The renewed search comes as the homicide squad reveals it has cleared a man questioned last week after suggestions that Mr Meyer may have been murdered. Suspicions had been raised after a man in his early 30s was seen in the area around the same time.

A police spokesman said the man had come forward, as had a group of other men who had given him a lift, and he had been eliminated from the investigation. He said the man was simply another tourist to the park.

Inspector Phil Shepherd said this week: "We have found absolutely nothing to suggest foul play at this stage."

He said police were "absolutely mystified" by Canadian-born engineer Mr Meyer's disappearance. More than 100 police, State Emergency Service members and volunteers spent six days searching the national park but failed to find any clues.

Mr Meyer's wife, Zee, said she and her family were going through "a living hell" not knowing what had happened — and clairvoyants were not helping.

"Police have been inundated with so many false leads from clairvoyants, to sightings that go nowhere, and they have to chase every useless lead," Mrs Meyer said.

She said her family was having a difficult time coping with the situation because Mr Meyer was "a loving husband and father and this is an unbearable loss to us all". She believes her husband is dead.

Inspector Shepherd said Mr Meyer was a fastidious bushwalker who left nothing behind when he trekked.

"In one sense that hasn't helped him or us either because he's left no trace of where, and if, he might have left the track," he said.

As Australian authorities investigate how an experienced Canadian hiker could vanish while on a 10-kilometre trek last month, family members from Calgary have flown to Melbourne to attend a memorial for the man they fear may have been murdered.

Warren Meyer, 57, of Calgary, had been living in the small town of Beaumaris, about 22 kilometres south of Melbourne, with his Australian wife of 32 years, Zee Meyer. The civil engineer and father of two went for a hike on Easter Sunday in the rugged bushland in the Mount Dom Dom area near the family home, and hasn't been seen since.

Meyer's two sisters have travelled to Beaumaris, said Laurel Leversage, one of Meyer's cousins, who lives in Ladner, B.C., a suburb of Vancouver. Meyer's parents live in Calgary but are unable to attend the memorial.

"His mother isn't well and can't travel," said Leversage. "It's very, very sad."

Leversage described her cousin as a graduate of the University of Calgary who, like his wife, loved the outdoors. She recalled one visit to Canada when the pair spent a lot of time in the wilderness.

"He made a journal of all the trees and seeds and leaves," she said. "He was a great athlete and he just loved trees and hiking."

The family believes Meyer may have been shot accidentally by a deer hunter and his death covered up.

Australian police said that when Meyer left the house early on March 23, he had with him a cellphone, a GPS device and everything he needed to go "bush-bashing," or hiking off the track into the woods.

"His disappearance is baffling," said Senior Const. Stuart Walls with the Alexandra police detachment in Australia. Police at one point investigated whether Meyer was involved in his own disappearance, but have since ruled out the possibility.

"He had no reason to leave. He had a happy home and he is financially solid so there is nothing there."

Walls said, however, that police are not ruling out foul play.

"There is a bit of noise right now about whether it was a stray bullet (from a hunter) but it's all speculation at this point," he said, adding: "The family is distraught and because they don't have a body they come to all sorts of conclusions."

Police have interviewed one person of interest but have made no arrests.

Meyer's disappearance launched a massive air and ground search effort. For a week, more than 100 volunteers and search-and-rescue teams combed the densely wooded area.

"It's very strange not to find a backpack or any other sign of him," said Walls. He also noted that Meyer was an accomplished mountaineer who had been on treks around the world, including one in Nepal.

The family will hold a memorial ceremony on Thursday on the beach near their Beaumaris home.