Mayang Prasetyo: mother does not believe Volke was killer

The mother of the Indonesian woman apparently killed and cooked by her Australian partner in their Brisbane flat says she cannot believe that Marcus Volke was responsible for her death.

Nining Sukarni, 45, told the media that she does not think her daughter's partner would have been capable of the brutal murder.

"I don't believe it. I don't think it's possible," Sukarni said. "Marcus is very soft. He's not capable of hurting people. He's a kind person."

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Volke, 28, is believed to have killed his transgender partner in his home in Brisbane before attempting to dispose of her body by cooking it in chemicals.

Ballarat-raised Marcus Volke married Prasetyo in Denmark on 1 August 2013. Although the two referred to one another as husband and wife, the marriage was not legally recognised in Australia, reports the Sydney Morning Herald.

Since the crime occurred, Volke's final phone call has emerged. The suspected killer rang a 24-hour electrician on Saturday night to ask for emergency repairs. "I've got a bit of a problem. I was cooking on my stove, it's an electrical stove and the stock pot boiled over, dripped down and got into the oven and basically made this big bang and then all my power turned off. Does that sound like something you would be able to fix today?"

When an electrician arrived at the Teneriffe apartment, Volke told him to ignore the smell because he was cooking pig's broth. However, the tradesman raised the alarm with the building's management.

Prasetyo's mother confirmed that since her daughter left Indonesia, she had been sending money back home to help pay for the education of her two younger sisters, aged 15 and 18.

Prasetyo's Facebook profile says that she worked at Melbourne-based transgender cabaret show Le Femme Garcon but according to the owner she had never been an employee there. Her mother said that she did not know what kind of work her daughter had been doing in Australia to make money and only found out through the media that Prasetyo had worked on cruise ships.

Australian chef Marcus Volke kills and cooks girlfriend

6 October

An Australian chef killed his girlfriend and boiled parts of her dismembered body in pots before taking his own life, reports say.

Marcus Volke, 28, cut his own throat while fleeing police who had come to investigate after neighbours had reported a "bad smell" emerging from the man's Brisbane apartment.

Officers on the scene found body parts cooking in a pot filled with chemicals and other body parts in garbage bags outside the apartment block in the wealthy suburb of Teneriffe, the Brisbane Courier Mail reports.

According to the Brisbane Times, police are yet to officially identify Mayang Prasetyo as the victim. But friends have been mourning the young Indonesian, who had been employed at Melbourne transgender cabaret show Le Femme Garcon and had moved to Brisbane to live with Volke. The couple had met when they were both working aboard international cruise ships, Sky News reports.

Police were called to Volke's apartment after other residents of the complex reported the smell of "rotting meat".

Resident Courtney Reichart told the ABC that she had first noticed the smell last Wednesday, but it had become progressively worse throughout the week.

"On Saturday when I came out for a walk, it made your eyes water, it made you want to be sick," she said. "The smell it was like as if somebody had put out some dog food or red meat and left it out for a few days.

"It makes you feel sick that that poor girl sat there for however many days and we've been walking past, living our lives and thinking 'hmm what's that smell', but you don't put two and two together.

"You don't think that a bad smell equals a murder."

Earlier today, police were seen helping a commercial waste disposal team remove a large bin from the apartment labelled "toxic".