Australian homicide detectives yesterday charged a 41-year-old man with the rape and murder of Irish woman Jill Meagher after her body was found in a bushland area north of Melbourne.Meagher, 29, who worked for the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC), was last seen at about 1:30 am on Saturday when she left friends at an inner-city bar to walk the short distance home.Police said Adrian Ernest Bayley, 41, from the Melbourne suburb of Coburg, was charged with rape and murder after a woman’s body was found early Friday in Gisborne South, about 50km northwest of central Melbourne.Detectives arrested Bayley at his home on Thursday, one day after police released closed-circuit TV footage which showed Meagher’s last known moments—including her pausing to talk to a man wearing a blue hoodie. Police have not yet formally identified the body but the ABC reported that it was that of Meagher.Meagher’s relatives in Ireland said the family was devastated. “We are heartbroken,” uncle Michael McKeon said. “She was the first grandchild my mother had, and her aunties, uncles and cousins are powerless to describe their loss.”Her uncle said the family had held out hope that the young woman would be found safe and well but admitted that “when the man in the CCTV footage was arrested we feared the worst”. AFP