The sister of one of the little girls abducted from Adelaide Oval has revealed how a personal health battle could prevent her from ever seeing the case solved.

Joanne Ratcliffe, 11, and Kirste Gordon, 4, were taken from Adelaide Oval in 1973 during an Australian rules game.

Fifty years later, the pair has never been found and whoever was responsible for their abduction has not been identified.

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Ratcliffe's sister Suzie met with cold case detectives on Wednesday who continue to investigate the disappearance of the little girls.

She has told police that she believed the abductor was the now-deceased Stanley Arthur Hart.

"In my heart of hearts, I believe it was Hart," she told 9News.

Hart was a known paedophile and a devoted supporter of the North Adelaide Football Club, which was one of the two teams that played at Adelaide Oval on the day of the abduction.

He's suspected of being at Adelaide Oval to watch his favourite team that day.

Key witness Tony Kilmartin told 9News earlier this week that Hart resembled the man he saw taking the girls when a commotion began under a grandstand at the end of the final quarter.

9News can reveal Hart fronted Adelaide's Supreme Court in 1966 – seven years before the little girls disappeared – charged with six sex offences against an 11-year-old girl.

Journalist Bryan Littlely claims a unique hat was found at Hart's former home which Kilmartin said looked identical to the one the offender was wearing at Adelaide Oval.

"They were made in 1953. Came out in this suede finish. Fairly unique," Littlely said.

"Everything witnesses have said, they've described this similar hat."

Major Crime Detectives have taken possession of the hat to investigate whether it has any relevance to the case.

Police are yet to rule out other suspects including Arthur Stanley Brown who was charged over the rape and murders of the Mackay sisters in Queensland in 1970.

The other suspect is Errol Radan who was interviewed four years ago but has since died.

"You know, mum always told me you keep an open mind because if you only focus on one, you let the other bugger get away," Suzie said.

Suzie will be the only member of her family to mark 50 years since the little girls disappeared after her father Les died in 1981, her mother Kathleen in 2019 and her brother David in 2020.

"It's going to be bloody difficult on Friday night, not having them there beside me," she said.

"I know in my heart mum and dad and my brother are here. You know, they're with me always."

Suzie said finding answers to her sister and Gordon's disappearance has become more urgent as she faced her own battle.

"I was diagnosed with triple-negative breast cancer in July last year," she said.

"And I'm still undergoing treatment at the present time.

"I don't want to leave behind this legacy to my daughter if I pass.

"I'm determined to bring the girls home at whatever cost."

Members of the public have been invited to attend the candlelight vigil to mark the 50-year anniversary of the disappearance outside Adelaide Oval from 5.30pm on Friday.

Suzie hopes it will keep the case in the spotlight.

She urged anyone who's been holding on to information about the abduction to finally come forward by contacting Crime Stoppers.

A teen killer has been jailed for 15 years over his role in the bashing murder of another teen over the false assumption he'd stolen a pair of headphones.

Jason Galleghan was lured to a Doonside home in 2021 and viciously bashed by a large group who suspected him of stealing a pair of headphones.

Eleven people aged between 13 and 29 were charged after parts of the "all-in" beating was filmed.

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One of the group, now 16, pleaded guilty to murder after delivering 57 of the 133 blows.

The teen had posted on social media hours before the assault that he was "bashing someone today, lmao".

The assault lasted for more than half an hour, however, only about seven minutes was recorded and available to the court.

One recording captured the teen saying: "Oi, stop … look at him".

Judge Robert Allan Hulme said the assault involved "prolonged, frenzied and extreme violence" inflicted by a "crazed rabble" who "gleefully carried it out in front of cameras".

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The teen told a psychologist he felt rejected by his father, who left him in the care of an alcoholic mother.

By the time the threat of her children entering state care became very real, her son's behaviour was "increasingly uncontrollable" and he began abusing alcohol and other drugs too.

He was getting into fights and bringing weapons to school before he stopped attending altogether, finding confidence and identity through gang association, and said he felt pressured to contribute to the attack.

The judge said Galleghan was targeted over "an unsubstantiated and trivial accusation (he) may have taken a pair of earphones" and the teen participated in the assault "as enthusiastically as anyone".

The young killer wrote a letter to Galleghan's family saying he was truly sorry for what he did.

He claimed he tried to stop the attack but the video showed otherwise.

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The 16-year-old was sentenced to 15-and-a-half years in jail.

With time already served, he will be eligible for parole in eight years.

Without his confession, the sentence would have been 26 years.

Hulme said Galleghan's mother had described the most terrible experience of losing her child in a victim impact statement, detailing "with considerable courage" the impact on his family and friends.

The judge lamented there's nothing the criminal courts can do to solve that.

– Reported with AAP.

Multiple people have been injured and an offender is on the run after a hockey stick attack south-east of Melbourne.

Police believe an offender assaulted a man and vehicle while armed with a hockey stick just after midday, on Casuarina Drive in Frankston South.

The man then assaulted three women walking near Sweetwater Creek Reserve, a short time later in "another unprovoked attack", police said.

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Paramedics treated a man and two women for minor injuries and a third woman was taken to hospital with non-life-threatening injuries for observation.

The offender remains on the run and is described as aged in his 30s, Caucasian and had acne scars on his face.

He was wearing a dark-coloured jacket and jeans and may be holding a hockey stick or metal pole.

Police believe the parties involved are not known to each other, and investigations are continuing.

The stepson of a man whose badly decomposed body was found in a Gold Coast home has been charged with murder.

Officers found the remains of 69-year-old Tomislav Nemes in a home at Edinburgh Street, Benowa, during a welfare check on April 17.

Bodyworn camera footage reveals the moment police arrived at Nemes' home after family interstate raised concerns that they couldn't get in touch with him.

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Inside the home police found Nemes' decomposing body.

A crime scene was declared, and Operation Victor Countryside set up to investigate his death.

Officers believe Nemes' body had been in the home for close to a year while his wife and stepson were living under the same roof.

Following investigations, Nemes' 48-year-old stepson Nikola Golem was yesterday arrested at Southport and charged with one count of murder.

His case was briefly mentioned in Southport Court today.

He will return to court in September.

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Police have also appealed for any information which could help the investigation.

Friends, family or associates of Nemes or the other occupants at the property, along with anyone who has visited his home in recent years, have been urged to come forward.

Investigations remain ongoing.

The victim was allegedly subjected to numerous assaults and forced to dig her own grave.

After Elly Warren's death, the Australian Federal Police did not send a senior official to Mozambique for almost seven years despite an early autopsy finding her death was a homicide.

Victoria's state coroner is investigating the cause of the 20-year-old Melbourne woman's death in Mozambique in November 2016, and the circumstances surrounding it.

The budding marine biologist, who was volunteering in the county, was found dead outside a toilet block in the beach town of Tofo.

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The AFP has never formally opened an investigation into Warren's death, and her killer has never been found.

AFP Commander of International Engagement Andrew Smith appeared before the three-day inquest on Wednesday, where he was grilled on the agency's role in investigating her death.

He said when an Australian died overseas in suspicious circumstances, the AFP's "starting position is always that where the crime has been committed is where it should be investigated".

"We can't just go into another country and start doing our own investigation," he told the court.

Smith said the AFP sent Mozambique authorities emails and letters offering their assistance with the criminal investigation, but they did not respond.

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"Without the full co-operation and support from law enforcement in the country, the role that we can play is very limited," he said.

He said he visited Mozambique for the first time in May this year, a few months after Judge John Cain told the AFP to "move heaven and earth" to find answers for Warren's family."

That's when a decision was made to have a senior-level presence," he said.

Previously a superintendent detective from AFP had been sent to Mozambique, he said.

Smith met with investigating police and high-level officials, including Mozambique's deputy director of prosecutions.

That is where he claimed he was told for the first time that police were investigating Warren's death as a homicide.

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But Paul Warren's barrister Daniel McGlone showed the court a timeline, which revealed AFP shared a copy of a Mozambique autopsy report with the Coroners Court in February 2017.

The doctor who conducted that report had ruled Warren's death as a homicide, he said.

Smith said the autopsy report was "a bit of a paper from a doctor" and would not have influenced the AFP's decision to pursue an investigation as much as police deciding it was a homicide.

The inquest continues.

Even the judge saw a glimpse of Tevita Hufanga’s temper during proceedings.

There was a surprise shout-out from one National member for a former Te Pāti Māori leader.

Superstar John Farnham has sent out a message of thanks to fans a year to the day after he underwent cancer surgery in Melbourne.

On August 23, 2022, the 74-year-old singer went through a 12-hour procedure to remove a cancerous tumour from his mouth.

It was followed by reconstructive plastic surgery and stints in rehabilitation, including eight weeks of radiation treatment, and further surgeries.

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Last month, Farnham was pronounced all clear of cancer.

In his first personal statement since the surgery, Farnham said "I am the luckiest man I know right now".

"It's been a year since my first surgery and to be honest I've lost count as to how many other procedures there's been since then. I'm sure someone's kept track of them all – let's just say, there's been a few.

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"But, I'm home now and I'm a very grateful and happy man. I'm sitting here in my living room lapping up the attention from my beautiful wife, Jill, my boys Rob and James and my mini Schnauzer, Edmund.

"It's only now that I can start to appreciate and comprehend, for myself, how many messages of love and support have been sent to me over the past year.

"I don't know what to say, other than thank you so very much.

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"It honestly means the world to me. Thank you to everyone who took the time to write and send a message.

"Today is a special day. And I'm going to mark it by having a pizza – because I can! I can't wait to see what might be next on the menu. Bring on 2024."

The Farnham family also issued thanks both to supporters around Australia and the world, as well as to the medical workers who took care of him.

Forensic retesting of a hammer at the centre of a Queensland murder case has revealed new evidence, a court has been told.

Andrew John Cobby is seeking to appeal his conviction after being found guilty in 2021 of murdering his estranged wife, receiving a life sentence.

Gaylene Cobby, known as Kym, was bashed with a hammer and strangled in 2017.

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Cobby admitted being present at the time of the attack but has always maintained his innocence, claiming the killer was an unknown assailant.

One of Cobby's grounds of appeal relates to purported fresh evidence provided by Queensland forensic services following a 2022 review.

The inquiry last year found Queensland's forensic lab failed to properly test samples for years.

The hammer in Cobby's murder case was ordered to be returned to the Crown for further forensic testing in March.

Overall 87 samples from the case were reviewed as a result of the inquiry, the Crown's barrister Philip McCarthy said.

In a Queensland Court of Appeal review on Wednesday, McCarthy told Justice Philip Morrison retesting had produced new DNA results on the hammer claw.

The hammer claw's shape matched the injury to Ms Cobby's skull but initial test results showed there was no DNA that could be analysed, the court heard.

However, the new report said the hammer claw contains Ms Cobby's DNA, McCarthy said.

The hammer's handle also underwent forensic retesting.

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Initially, there was no DNA detected but the new report said that it was too complex to analyse "in terms of the contributors".

"The Crown's argument will be the evidence is the same," McCarthy said of the new results.

"It doesn't indicate Mr Cobby held it (hammer), didn't hold it … it didn't indicate an unknown person did or did not hold it."

McCarthy said it was up to Cobby to argue how the new evidence potentially could have changed the jury's verdict.

"The hammer is an example now where the Crown previously suggested to the jury it had been used on Ms Cobby with circumstantial evidence that proved that – we now also have DNA on the claw of the hammer being Ms Cobby's," he said.

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Cobby – representing himself – said he had three new forensic reports as part of his appeal following retesting after the inquiry.

"It is those three reports whereby there are significant alterations to the forensic results that we are now learning of subject to retesting that was not known at trial," he said via video link.

"There are in excess of 21 forensic samples that the lab have identified that contain DNA profiles of contributors whose identity remains unknown.

"Also disturbingly and interestingly the latest forensic report (from July 2023) also has a number of forensic reports whereby DNA profiles have been removed."

Applications will be heard in September 14 with the appeal set for mid-October.