Friend of murdered sex worker reveals hostile environment in run-up to attack

[Ulquiorra]

IT HAS been almost five years since Tracy Connelly’s life was tragically cut short at the hands of a savage murderer who beat her to death — but the killer is still on the loose.

The sickening attack on the 40-year-old sex worker in St Kilda left her family and friends devastated, but it also left some women in Melbourne — especially those working on the streets with her — terrified to walk alone at night.

One of those women who worked alongside Ms Connelly warned that the city’s streets were no safer now than they were in 2013 when the horrific attack took place. And, she said if it could happen to her, it could happen to anyone.

“People have an image in their head when someone says ‘sex worker’ and they think of someone who is at risk or vulnerable, but I knew Tracy and she was a strong, intelligent girl who could handle anything,” former sex worker Renee* told news.com.au.

“She was a good girl who came from a good family. Her only issue was that she struggled with addiction.”

The pair met in the back of a police car in the mid-1990s when they were both charged with prostitution. They would bump into each other on the streets in the years that followed, often working on the same corner.

Renee described the terrifying moments random strangers would attack them, which now feel like chilling precursors to the beating that left Ms Connelly dead in the van she called home.

“A lot of girls just used to go missing and you would never see them again,” Renee said. “You didn’t know if they had been murdered or if they had just fled the city.”

Once, when Ms Connelly and Renee were working the same corner, a crazed man drove up on to the footpath and tried to mow them down in a fit of rage.

Another time Renee said she was followed down a dark street towards her car at the end of her shift and was jumped on by a drunk punter, who she managed to fight off.

Other girls didn’t get away as easily.

“I remember a girl we used to work with came up to us one time and you could see her eyes were red and bulging, she had just been strangled and she was lucky to survive,” Renee said.

Despite the constant attacks, near misses and scares the girls endured over the years, it still came as a shock to Renee when she turned on the television on July 21, 2013, and saw that Ms Connelly had been beaten to death.

Renee had been out of the industry for a few years but had still seen Ms Connelly on the streets as she drove past.

Ms Connelly had a client with her in the white Ford Econovan when she was subject to an assault so vicious she didn’t stand a chance of survival.

“I was just in shock, because Tracy was a smart girl and she could handle herself. If it could happen to her, it could happen to anyone,” Renee said. “I thought: ‘If someone has killed her in the manner that whoever did it did, they would have had to have been very strong’.”

Ms Connelly’s severely beaten body was found by her partner Tony Melissovas and the devastation for him, and for all those who knew her, began.

Almost five years on, and the manhunt for the killer is still under way. However, investigators couldn’t provide any new details on the case.

“Investigators have done a considerable amount of work on the homicide investigation, which remains ongoing,” a Victoria Police spokeswoman told news.com.au.

Renee says she is now living a “normal life” in the outer suburbs of Melbourne, but she says the cases of Jill Meagher — who was raped and murdered while walking home from a pub in Brunswick in 2012 — and the more recent murders of Melbourne comedian Eurydice Dixon and Sydney’s Qi Yu show that Australian women are still living in fear of random attacks.

Fed up of being “treated like dirt”, she left the sex industry several years ago, but to this day she won’t walk though parks at night or wear headphones when she’s walking alone.

“When you’ve worked on the streets and seen some of the people who are out there at night, it makes you aware of what is out there,” she said. “That is just the nature of the beast. If you are walking down a dark street, whether you are male or female, there is a chance you might be in trouble.

“No amount of rallies or education is going to change that. It’s no use saying: ‘We need to tell men that rape is wrong.’ We already tell men that and the vast majority of them would never even consider it, but there’s always going to be a few bad people out there.”

She said a potential solution to stopping attacks was using technology such as CCTV.

“We need to do whatever it takes to keep women safe on the streets,” Renee added. “If you can save even one life then it’s worth it.”

* Name has been changed