Mr Cruel is the moniker for an unidentified Australian serial child rapist who attacked three girls in the northern and eastern suburbs of Melbourne in the late s and early s. He is also the prime suspect in the abduction and murder of a fourth girl, Karmein Chan.
His moniker came from a headline in the Melbourne newspaper The Sun. Mr Cruel has never been identified, and his three confirmed attacks and the suspected murder remain unsolved cold cases.
Police describe Mr Cruel as highly intelligent. He was soft-spoken, and his behaviour was unhurried; during one attack he took a break in a victim's house to eat a meal. He threatened to injure his victims or their family members with a knife or a handgun. On 22 August in Lower Plenty , a man wearing a balaclava broke into a family home at am, armed with a knife and a handgun.
He then tied the son to a bed, and raped the year-old daughter. He had cut the phone lines. On 27 December in Ringwood , he broke into a family home via the back door at about am, wearing a balaclava and armed with a handgun. He then grabbed their year-old daughter, put tape over her eyes and a ball gag in her mouth, and abducted her. She was released eighteen hours later on the grounds of Bayswater High School.
On 3 July in Canterbury , he broke into a family home at pm, armed with a knife and a gun, and wearing a balaclava. He then drove her to another house and molested her for fifty hours before releasing her at a power sub-station in the suburb of Kew.
