Part 6 of 6.Police offered a $5000 reward on January 30, 1976, for information about Terry Floyd’s disappearance.
The figure of the reward remained the same for more than 34 years.
Police launched a new appeal for information in December 2010, lifting the reward to $100,000 for information that would solve the mystery case.
Detectives spoke with more than 200 people before a Coronial inquest in 2001.
Coroner Francis Hender found on November 29, 2001, that Terry had died from unknown causes at an unknown place and an unknown time.
Two men have been central in the police investigation.
The first was Francis Robert Drake, a trainer with the Maryborough Rovers and also known as the “Unc”.
Drake, a convicted paedophile who detailed other incidents with young boys in a police interview, was initially thought to have abducted, abused and killed Terry.
Investigators believe Terry told people the Unc was going to pick him up at 4.30pm and drive him back to Maryborough.
Further investigations later found Drake was at his sister’s place when Terry is believed to have disappeared.
“If it wasn’t for Terry being 10 minutes late to the pick-up point, none of this would have happened,” Daryl Floyd said.
A second convicted paedophile, Raymond Kenneth Jones, is another person police believe might have played a role in Terry’s disappearance.
Jones, who now lives near Mildura, served time for indecently assaulting a boy in a Ballarat toilet block.
Investigation records show renowned forensic psychiatrist Alan Bartholomew identified Jones had issues with young boys and potential murderer characteristics in 1975.
Dr Bartholomew twice interviewed Jones in prison after he was charged for the Ballarat incident.
His report, which went to the County Court a month after Terry’s disappearance, stated “the fact must remain that the prisoner is potentially dangerous and likely to remain so for some time”.
Jones was on bail, staying at Maryborough and drove a 1969 fawn-coloured Holden panel van at the time of Terry’s disappearance.
He would later serve two years in prison for the Ballarat incident.
Jones wasn’t the main suspect in the case until after Drake’s alibi surfaced.
He told police he was travelling along the Pyrenees Highway between Avoca and Maryborough about the time Terry disappeared.
Homicide Squad Detective Senior Sergeant Ron Iddles was a key investigator in Terry’s case.
Police have been unable to prove Jones was responsible for Terry’s disappearance.
But Senior Sergeant Iddles interviewed Jones in 2001 and documents show he accused him of Terry’s disappearance.
He said in the interview a friend of Jones had given him information that Jones was “responsible for the actual death of Terry Floyd”.
“That you placed him in a mine shaft somewhere near Bung Bong Hill. What do you say to that?” Senior Sergeant Iddles asked Jones.
Jones denied the accusation and said “nothing, it’s a lie”.
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