Toowong death: Hunt for remains of Brisbane retired teacher Lesley Trotter
Retired teacher’s body was dumped in a bin and picked up by a garbage truck – now look for a corpse that turns into a dump
The remains of a retired teacher who went missing two weeks ago were retrieved by a garbage truck from a rubbish bin outside her home, police have revealed.
Queensland Police believe Lesley Trotter, 78, died sometime between midnight on March 27 and noon the following day after finding blood near her dumpsters in the west Brisbane suburb of Toowong last Friday.
Detective Andrew Massingham said on Tuesday afternoon that a garbage truck had collected Ms Trotter’s body two weeks earlier on March 28 from a bin outside her home during its weekly collection.
The body has yet to be found and police will now launch a large-scale search at a rubbish dump.
Police are now launching a large-scale search for Lesley Trotter’s remains at a rubbish dump
“Ongoing investigations may indicate that on the morning of Tuesday, March 28 this year, the body of a woman we believe was Lesley Trotter was found in a rubbish bin,” Det Supt Massingham told reporters.
It was clear she was dead. Due to the positioning of the body, we cannot rule out foul play.
“Later that morning, that bin was picked up by a garbage truck.”
The truck drove to the Nudgee Waste Transfer Station, where the waste was dropped into a pit.
“Another 22 trucks visited the site that Tuesday,” said Det Supt Massingham.
“The loads from each of those trucks were compressed and then transported away from the facility in six B-twin trailers.”
The waste was then transported to two landfills in Rosedale and Swanbank, which have since been quarantined as police launched the extensive search to recover Trotter’s remains in what is expected to be a difficult ‘piece by piece’ operation.
“These types of searches are not uncommon, but I think the scale of this search will make it quite complex for us,
“It requires a combination of resources… to make sure we leave no stone unturned.”
Once found, Ms. Trotter’s remains will be forensically examined to determine her cause of death.
Ms. Trotter’s family has been notified of the new development.
The breakthrough comes just days after police revealed blood was found near rubbish bins that Ms Trotter regularly rummaged through to sort recyclables.
Police said Ms Trotter’s habit of leaving rubbish on the ground and in the driveway as she rummaged through the bins to find and sort recyclables had caused “some anxiety in some people” on her street.
More to come