Backpacker’s Body Was Found Naked Under Palm Fronds — 20 Years Later, No One Knows Who Killed Her

Nearly two decades after 25-year-old German backpacker Simone Strobel vanished during a night out in New South Wales, Australia, a coroner has formally ruled that she was murdered. Despite the ruling, her killer has never been identified.

This week, New South Wales state coroner Teresa O’Sullivan concluded that Strobel “died as a result of homicide by a person or persons unknown,” and called for renewed testing of two key DNA samples — a hair found on a fence and male DNA discovered on Strobel’s black shirt, The Guardian reported.

Strobel, a kindergarten teacher from Bavaria, had been traveling along Australia’s east coast with her then-boyfriend Tobias Suckfuell (who now goes by Tobias Moran), his sister, and a friend. The group spent the evening drinking at a local hotel before returning to the Lismore caravan park where they were staying, according to the outlet.

Witnesses recalled hearing an argument before Strobel left the campsite “alone and upset.” She was last seen shortly before midnight on Feb. 11, 2005, crossing a nearby roundabout, as multiple witnesses reported hearing screams, per The Guardian.

Moran reported her missing the following morning. After a large-scale search involving multiple agencies, a police dog handler discovered Strobel’s naked body six days later. It was hidden under palm fronds at a sports ground just beyond a wire fence near the caravan park, according to reports.

Coroner O’Sullivan rejected a 2007 inquest’s “very strong suspicion” that someone in Strobel’s travel group was involved. Current law prevents coroners from naming an offender, and O’Sullivan said that while Moran had allegedly lied to police, those inconsistencies did not amount to proof of guilt, The Guardian noted.

The coroner did not establish a specific cause of death, differing from the earlier suggestion of suffocation. Neither Australian nor German pathologists were able to determine one. O’Sullivan found it more likely than not that Strobel’s killer had a sexual motive, concluding she was sexually assaulted before being killed — likely outside the caravan park, according to the outlet.

Moran, who now lives in Western Australia, was charged with murder in 2022, but prosecutors dropped the charges the following year. He has consistently maintained his innocence and was later awarded roughly $190,000 in legal costs, the Associated Press reported.

O’Sullivan recommended that the case be referred to the NSW Police Unsolved Homicide Team and urged investigators to re-examine the DNA evidence using modern forensic techniques. A A$1 million reward for information, first announced in 2020, remains active, per The Guardian.

Speaking to Strobel’s relatives, who attended the hearing remotely from Germany, O’Sullivan acknowledged that the family’s ordeal had been “extremely difficult” and expressed hope that they would one day learn the truth about what happened to Simone.

Her sister Christina, who testified at the inquest last year, said the tragedy had transformed their family “in the most radical ways,” explaining that their parents have “become mere shadows of themselves… sinking deeper and deeper into despair,” according to the Australian Broadcasting Corporation.