Despite clear evidence to identify the perpetrators of the mid-February Venus Bay wombat slaughter, as yet only one arrest has been made and no charges have been laid.

In the days after the crime, CCTV was collected from the town depicting three vehicles and posted on Facebook. One was a dark 80 series Toyota Landcruiser, another a likely white Toyota HiLux and the other, an older Nissan Navara. This led to two young men presenting themselves to police the following day. 

Following that, a Prom Coast News source says Vic Police requested the images be removed from the internet because, “one of these kids comes from a really nice family and they’re upset about the negative publicity they’re getting”.

Concerned locals say that the images were in the public domain and if the cars depicted in them are owned by the perpetrators of this crime, then surely the police have a duty to share the images themselves to help apprehend the culprits, or at least exclude them from their investigations.

On 21 April, the Bass Coast Eyewatch Facebook page posted the message that “an 18-year-old male from Fish Creek has been interviewed in relation to the incident and released pending further enquiries”. 

In the month since then, the case has now been passed to the Department of Energy, Environment and Climate Action (DEECA), which has infuriated some environmentalists in the area who don’t believe the department has the ‘teeth’ to prosecute the perpetrators.

On Boxing Day 2024, five wombats were killed in a similar manner and bludgeoned to death, but the local community, in disbelief, put it down to a horrendous series of accidents or errant tourists on a one off night of carnage.

The two incidents are now widely linked as connected in the community, while the names of various individuals are being whispered along the grape vines of several Prom Coast towns as the possible perpetrators. But what exactly will DEECA”s next step be? As one commenter put it on Facebook, “It is scary knowing people who do this may live in the community”.

David Barrett