The disappearance of Bung Siriboon
Navigating to Safety
Bung Siriboon. Image: Victoria Police
Where is Bung Siriboon?
On the morning of 2 June 2011, 13-year-old Siriyakorn Siriboon (known by her nickname, Bung) disappeared while walking to school in Boronia, Melbourne.
She has not been seen since that day.
Continue scrolling to learn more about this case and explore the interactive maps.
Navigating Bung’s path to school
Each morning, Bung walked 10 minutes to school from her home on Elsie Street in Boronia. She usually met up with friends along the way but on 2 June 2011, she was walking alone.
She left home around 8:30am. Her usual path was to cross Elsie Street and follow it East to Albert Avenue. Bung would cross the busy main road and then turn left into Harcourt Road. A little way along Harcourt Road, Bung would turn left again into Moncoe Street. At the end of the cul-de-sac was the back gate of her school.
That morning, a neighbour confirmed they saw her walking along Elsie Street and there was also a possible sighting on Harcourt Road – about 130 metres from the school gate.
Bung never showed up for school that day.
Her mother Vanidda and stepfather Fred only realised she was missing around 4pm when she had not returned home and one of her friends called to speak to her. The friend told them Bung hadn’t been at school that day.
By 4:20pm, Bung’s parents had quickly searched the school and headed to the police station. Police urged them to phone all family and friends to see if Bung had visited them that day, but no one had seen her.
Police investigation
In the days following Bung’s disappearance, police, SES and volunteers extensively searched areas around Boronia.
They scoured shops, parks, backyards, and vacant blocks, door-knocked hundreds of homes, tracked tradesmen, delivery drivers and other outsiders who had passed through Boronia that day, combed through CCTV footage from trains, service stations and shopping centres, questioned sex offenders and followed up over 1,000 pieces of information from the public.
Police also investigated Bung’s stepfather Fred and other men close to her but did not find evidence that any of them were involved in Bung’s disappearance.
Police soon came to the grim conclusion that Bung must have been abducted – lured or forced into a car in broad daylight – in a busy area. What was particularly perplexing, is no one saw anything.
In November 2011, police set up a taskforce called Taskforce Puma which was dedicated to investigating Bung’s disappearance.
Taskforce detectives door-knocked 1,000 Boronia homes, interviewed over 250 registered sex offenders and investigated 1,100 pieces of information from the public.
Despite their efforts, the taskforce was shut down two years later with no sign of Bung.
Notable suspects
In 2013, police revealed they had arrested a man on two occasions who claimed he accidentally killed Bung in a road accident, panicked and buried her body in a local reserve.
Police seized and examined his vehicle and conducted a search of the reserve. The man was released when they couldn’t find anything linking him to Bung’s disappearance aside from his story – many parts of which did not add up.
Robert Keith Knight, a sexual predator that lived in the Boronia area and was out of jail at the time was also interviewed but eventually ruled out as a suspect.
Mr Cruel was also considered given he’d been active in Melbourne during the 1980’s and 90’s but the abduction did not fit his M.O.
Possible sightings revealed
In 2014 and 2016, police released information to the public about unconfirmed sightings of Bung that were reported back in the earlier days of the investigation.
In both reports, a teenage girl fitting Bung’s description was seen in a white car.
The first possible sighting occurred around 15 minutes after Bung had left for school. An Asian girl in her teens was seen in the back seat of a white Ford Falcon driving along Boronia Road and Floriston Road.
The driver was described by police as a male Caucasian in his late 50s to early 60s.
The other possible sighting occurred roughly 12 kilometres away on Napoleon Road near the suburb of Rowville.
Between 8:45am and 9:00am a witness saw a girl they believed to be Bung in the front seat of a white Holden Kingswood station wagon.
The driver was described as in his late 30’s or early 40’s with slicked back or bald hair and tattoos covering his neck and arms.
Police were hesitant to place weight on these sightings during the initial investigation, given they could not be confirmed and also contradicted an earlier report that Bung was seen on Harcourt Road at 8:45am.
Regardless of this, they believed releasing the information could help to verify the sightings or generate new leads from the public.
There have been no further updates in the case since.
The first 72 hours
The first 72 hours are crucial in any missing persons case. Law enforcement will typically follow up several lines of enquiry during this time and most people are located safe and well.
Mapping out these lines of enquiry can help police to act quickly and accurately in their initial search by feeding live information to a centralised data source to refer to and 'tick off' as they go.
Usually, a search begins at the location where a missing person was last seen. In Bung’s case, this would be around her home and on her route to school.
Shown on the map is the 5-kilometre radius around her path to school.
Concurrently, police can begin checking CCTV footage from local transport stops, service stations and supermarkets for any sign of the missing person – each of these locations can be marked on the map.
The time and date of any sightings or other clues can be linked together to create an interactive timeline of the movements of a victim – or potential suspect.
Additional data layers can be added to the map as the search widens – identifying the locations of parks and playgrounds in the area and highlighting common traffic routes.
Traffic routes in the vicinity of where Bung went missing and main roads leading away from Boronia are marked on the map in black.
The ability to visualise this critical location data helps law enforcement make informed decisions during searches and investigations.
The paths of victim and predator
Once it’s been confirmed that a person is missing, police will appeal to the media and the public for information and begin logging and following up tips.
AMBER alerts are also sent out through text messages, traditional and social media, although at the time Bung went missing, these were not yet used in Australia.
GIS technology is valuable in tracking, recording and managing real-time crowdsourced information – such as possible sightings and tips from the public.
This map shows the possible sightings of Bung and likely routes the predator would've taken in red.
As police continue to investigate missing persons cases around the country, information reported by members of the public combined with advancements in technology will hopefully lead to cases – including the disappearance of Bung Siriboon – eventually being solved.
Note: Crime scene locations are estimates based on publicly available information and may not be exact.
Case status
In 2014, police announced a $1 million reward for information into Bung’s disappearance which is still in place today.
If you have any information about this case, or any other, then you can share what you know with Crime Stoppers without saying who you are or getting involved. Rewards are available. Call 1800 333 000 or go to www.crimestoppers.com.au
More information
To learn more about how geographic thinking can shed new light on this and other cold cases, listen to the Mapping Evil with Mike King podcast .
About Mike King
Mike is considered a pioneer in the global law enforcement sector for his ability to use geospatial analysis to solve crimes worldwide.
Mike's contribution to law enforcement has spanned four decades. He's served in every division of policing and his career appointments have included: Sergeant, Lieutenant, Division Chief and Chief.
- Board member of the Cold Case Foundation
- Global Director of Emergency Communications and Fraud, Esri
- Former Director of UTAP, the Utah criminal Tracking and Analysis Project
Mike has been awarded:
