Australian fugitive caught after 12-year manhunt

Australian police have arrested one of the country’s most wanted fugitives following a 12-year manhunt.

Graham Potter, 64, had been on the run since 2010 after he failed to show up in court to face conspiracy to murder charges in the state of Victoria.

Police arrested him on Monday morning after they were told he was thousands of kilometres away in Queensland.

Footage of the arrest shows him standing in a dilapidated room before being handcuffed and taken away.

A convicted killer, Potter had earlier been sentenced to life imprisonment in 1981 for the decapitation and murder of a teenage girl. He was released after serving 15 years of his sentence.

On Monday, he was arrested at 08:45 local time (23:45GMT Sunday) at a house in Ravenshoe, in the far north of Queensland.

There had been several unconfirmed sightings of him across the country since, but police had reached a dead end in their search for Potter in 2017, according to Australian outlet The Age.

A reward of A$100,000 had been offered for information leading to his arrest.

Potter had experimented with changing his appearance and demeanour to evade detection, and he was discovered with items that could disguise him, such as hair dye, according to Victoria Police.

“This certainly puts a long and protracted end to a hunt for a very high-end fugitive that is wanted for very serious criminal charges,” said Mick Frewen, Acting Assistant Commissioner of Crime Command in Victoria.

Potter will be extradited to Victoria, where he will face court on Tuesday.