His Mother Believed He Was Born Evil and He Proved Her Right : Daniel Holdom

April 6, 2026·44 min·2 clips

Deleted photos show Carly beside a log, with an alcohol bottle, and a body pose matching the scene.

1. This Is Monsters focuses on the Belanglo State Forest remains and the Winarka suitcase case in Australia. 2. Host Kate Winkler Dawson narrates the investigation and names detectives, forensic staff, and family members who matter to the identifications. 3. The episode asks how two sets of remains, five years apart, led investigators to Daniel Holdom. 4. In Belanglo State Forest, riders found bones on August 29, 2010, and police first had to confirm the remains were human. 5. Detective Senior Constable Bill Doughton recognized the forest from 1992, when two earlier bodies were found there among Ivan Milat’s seven victims. 6. Forensic technicians recovered a woman’s shirt with “ANGELIC,” a small sock, and a silver earring from the scene. 7. The medical examiner and forensic anthropologist estimated the victim was a female aged 13 to 25 and that she had been outside for up to 10 years. 8. DNA from a tibia went into the National DNA Database, but the first searches produced no match. 9. Investigators then used missing-person reports and a digital facial approximation released in December 2011. 10. On July 15, 2015, three men on the Corunda Highway near Winarka found a suitcase with a child’s jawbone inside. 11. Police found a pink jacket, a black ballerina skirt, shorts with a Holden logo, a handmade quilt, duct tape, and cloth in the child’s mouth. 12. The remains were identified as Candelise Pierce, a female aged one to five, after Tanya Weber called Crimestoppers and pointed investigators to Carly Pierce-Stevenson. 13. A quilt from Candelise’s family matched the quilt in the suitcase, and DNA from Candelise’s records confirmed the match. 14. Candelise’s DNA then produced a familial link to Angel, showing the two victims were mother and daughter. 15. Carly Pierce-Stevenson was born on August 7, 1988 in Alice Springs, and she later had Candelise with Robbie Frampton. 16. Carly became involved with Daniel Marshall, later identified as Daniel James Holdom, after he arrived in Alice Springs with Hazel Passmore and three children. 17. Daniel’s history included drug dealing, stolen property, false identities, and prior protective-order breaches in relationships with Kylie and another girlfriend. 18. After a 2008 car crash on the Stewart Highway, Hazel was badly injured, Willow and Ryan died, and Carly and Candelise later disappeared from contact. 19. Detectives later tied Daniel to fraudulent bank activity, cell-phone locations in Belanglo, and deleted photos from a memory card that matched the wooded crime scene. 20. Viewers who follow Australian true-crime cases, forensic identification, and long investigations will get the most from this episode; listeners wanting a short, light story probably will not.

As heard by us

A forest bone find opens a case built on texts, a missing-person report, and a hard return to the scene.

Blanglow State Forest sets a bleak tone for This Is Monsters, where dirt-bike riders stumble across bones scattered along the fire-trail network and a skull quickly turns an ordinary ride into a search for human remains.

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Follow a forest bone find into a case that keeps circling Daniel Holdham.

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