Ex-AFL player Jimmy Anderson received the body of a dead baby in the mail from a mysterious sender in Melbourne in 1965
Ex-AFL player Jimmy Anderson received the body of a dead baby in the mail from a mysterious sender in Melbourne in 1965
- Strangled baby mailed to Darwin in 1965
- Daughter reveals it was meant for her father
It’s a heinous crime that has baffled police and intrigued Australia for nearly 60 years: the corpse of a newborn baby boy is sent to a post office in Darwin.
But now the cold case has been blown wide open with the revelation that the package was intended for a former champion AFL player.
Amelia Anderson, whose father Jimmy Anderson was named in the Australian Football League’s Northern Territory Team of the Century, has offered to provide DNA samples after True Crime Australia’s The Missing Podcast reported again that the dead baby was addressed to a “J Anderson” last month.
“We knew it was our father,” said Ms Anderson, who came forward after reading about the case on the podcast.
The ‘J Anderson’ who mailed a dead baby in 1965 has been revealed as AFL player and ‘ladies man’ Jimmy Anderson (pictured)
The unnamed child was found with a stocking wrapped tightly around his neck, ruling out the possibility that he was stillborn (pictured)
During his sports career, Jimmy Anderson played for the Darwin Buffaloes and also played two seasons for WAFL Club West Perth. He passed away in April 2017.
The case unfolded on May 3, 1965, when Postmaster John Polishuk noticed a foul odor coming from a package sent from ‘JF Barnes’ in Mentone, Victoria.
He opened the uncollected package sent to ‘J Anderson’ and was horrified to find a dead baby boy with part of his umbilical cord still attached.
The nameless child was found with a stocking wrapped tightly around his neck, ruling out the possibility that he was stillborn.
Mrs. Anderson is convinced that the baby was her brother.
You get that feeling in your stomach. I just knew. I just know. I feel like it’s my big brother,” she said.
Amelia Anderson (pictured with her father in his later years, left) claims her father was a ‘ladies man’ who was ‘always unfaithful’ to their mother
Mrs. Anderson, the youngest of Jimmy and her mother’s six children, said her father was a ‘ladies man’.
“My mom put up with dad a lot,” said Mrs. Anderson.
“She forgave him because she ended up having more kids. Even during marriage, we started to pick up on daddy’s infidelity. We know we have siblings that we haven’t met yet.
“This sounds like our father. He did this behind our mother’s back’.
Ms Anderson said she was initially shocked to learn the man who sent the dead baby could be her father, but now she wants closure for herself and the dead baby.
“Dad was always unfaithful to our mother, unfortunately this is something that is not a surprise. But the way the baby was sent to Darwin is of course a big surprise and shocking,” she said.
“I am 53 years old and to hear a cold case that… and if that has anything to do with our father, I want that detective who has been on the case for so long to be shut down.
“And also for that little baby, that little baby needs closure,” Ms. Anderson said.
“Our main goal is that we should put this little baby to rest with a loving environment and people around him, even though we never knew this little baby.
“I think it’s just the right thing to do as people.”
Former Detective Denver Marchant – the officer sent to the Post Office to investigate – revealed in the podcast that he also believed the J Anderson was a well-known sportsman in the Northern Territory.
In 2014, Mr Marchant told Daily Mail Australia that he never got over the unsolved case.
“I’ve seen hundreds of post-mortems over the years,” he said.
“But for some reason that one stuck with me, because it was so bizarre.
“I think it shocked us and something like that I think is unparalleled in Australia.”