Family and community in limbo two months on from violent death

It's 5pm on a Thursday evening in the small farming community of Ouyen in Victoria's north-west.

The main street is quiet, shops are shut, road trains pass through the town of 1,170 residents, with a few locals circulating around town — most heading home or to the local football-netball centre for training.

While the community, about 100km south of Mildura, goes about its day, a homicide investigation into the death of a local farmer remains active and ongoing in the background.

Today marks two months since Richard Wills left his Hughes Street home in Ouyen about 8am on Easter Sunday to go to work on his 650-hectare farm on the Mallee Highway, only a few kilometres from his home.

After he did not come home for lunch that afternoon, family members went to the farm to find him.

Their search was unsuccessful, with Mr Wills reported as missing the next day.

Two days later, on April 7, the 65-year-old father of five was found buried in a shallow grave on the property.

In the week of Mr Wills's death, Detective Senior Sergeant Steve Trewavas, from the Missing Persons Squad, said there was evidence Mr Wills had been dragged behind a vehicle on the farm before he was fatally shot.

Police also said they suspected that a person who knew Mr Wills was responsible.

Two months on from Mr Wills's death, his family, and the wider Ouyen community, remain in limbo, with no further updates from police other than the investigation remains active and ongoing.

A family's unanswered questions

Mr Wills's family told the ABC police had not provided any information about the investigation to his family since a public appeal, alongside Mr Wills's wife, Donna Wills, a week after his death.

Other than written responses to media inquiries, that was the first and last time police had spoken publicly about the case.

The family said any questions they had asked police since then had been responded to with "we can't say".

"It's very frustrating and all we can do is hope that they're making progress,"

a family member said.

In response to those statements, Victoria Police this week told the ABC: "Families are briefed by investigators as and where appropriate during the course of an investigation so as not to compromise an ongoing investigation in any way."

'We haven't heard a lot'

Local fuel delivery driver Paul Dean said it appeared the police investigation had been "pretty quiet" in the last few weeks.

"The police were pretty present when it first happened, but the last probably three or four weeks, we haven't heard a lot and haven't had any real updates or anything like that from the police," he said.

"We'd like a bit of an update from the police.

"Obviously, they can't tell us everything but just some sort of an update of what they can tell us, we'd like to hear it."

Mr Dean said the community was finding a new normal following Mr Wills's death.

Hoping for information

Local op-shop volunteer Marion Marshall said she too hadn't heard anything in recent weeks about the Wills case.

"Initially, there was quite a bit of talk around town about it,"

she said.

Ms Marshall said the small town was "flabbergasted" when it all unfolded.

Community members also raised concerns about their safety, with the perpetrator potentially still around Ouyen.

"To my knowledge, nothing like this has happened around here before or certainly not in the 40-plus years I've been here," Ms Marshall said.

"We were just absolutely astonished that it could happen in our little community where everyone knows everyone, and you know most people are related … and we always thought of [Ouyen] as a very safe community."

She hoped the case wasn't forgotten just because it was a small town.

"We're just wondering perhaps if it had happened in the city it might be maybe getting more attention — well that's just my personal view,"

Ms Marshall said.

"We've all known each other for many, many years, our children all went to school together, played together… his wife, Donna, she's a friend of mine.

"We just hope that soon we will get some sort of update of what's happening and maybe come to a final resolution and especially let the family know."

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