What is the episode about?
Daniel Morcombe disappeared without a trace on Sunday, December 7, 2003, marking the beginning of one of the most extensive police investigations in Australian history. In this first episode of the podcast Where Is Daniel Morcombe? titled 'Bus 1a', hosts Matt Angel and Josh Dean reconstruct the events that led to the disappearance of the 13-year-old boy. Daniel was standing at an unofficial bus stop under the Kiel Mountain Road overpass on the Woombye stretch of Bruce Highway. He was on his way to a local shopping center to get a haircut and buy Christmas gifts for his family, but he never returned home. The episode focuses on the witness statements that placed Daniel by the road in his distinctive red t-shirt, and the critical minutes when the scheduled bus passed him by due to a mechanical breakdown.
The case behind the episode
The case of Daniel Morcombe became known in Australia as the case of 'The Boy in the Red Shirt'. When Daniel's scheduled bus broke down, he attempted to hail a replacement bus, but the driver did not stop as he was already behind schedule. Shortly after, Daniel was seen by witnesses in the company of an unknown man. It took police over a decade to solve the mystery. Through an extremely complex and controversial undercover operation known as a 'Mr. Big' sting, investigators managed to elicit a confession from Brett Peter Cowan . Cowan was found guilty in 2014 of the abduction and murder of Daniel Morcombe. The case transformed Australian child safety and led to the establishment of the Daniel Morcombe Foundation by parents Denise and Bruce Morcombe.