Australia Australia - Marion Barter, 51, missing after trip to UK, Jun 1997 #3

[Loobyloo2]

Wow, so this is presumably someone who met the same man as Marion may have- calling himself Remakel at least, or this may be another sleuth trying to get some info as you say. I noticed Michele is just with the one L which makes it seem more of a European name- of course that could also be to throw someone off and get them to think that. But if it is genuinely a lady who met him, with no awareness of the podcast- well it is very coincidental she starts looking for him NOW - but it may be an old ad- it doesn't seem to have a date on it. So we don't know if that is 23 years long time ago.. but what an amazing find- well done. I really hope you hear back from her.

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It looks like a more recent posting. Thanks for pointing out that Michele is spelt with the one (l) as that rules out the person in Tunbridge Wells.

 

[Loobyloo2]

Wow, so this is presumably someone who met the same man as Marion may have- calling himself Remakel at least, or this may be another sleuth trying to get some info as you say. I noticed Michele is just with the one L which makes it seem more of a European name- of course that could also be to throw someone off and get them to think that. But if it is genuinely a lady who met him, with no awareness of the podcast- well it is very coincidental she starts looking for him NOW - but it may be an old ad- it doesn't seem to have a date on it. So we don't know if that is 23 years long time ago.. but what an amazing find- well done. I really hope you hear back from her.

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It looks like a more recent posting. Could it in fact be the person himself who calls himself F Remakel playing a game.

 

[Sophie-Renee]

I know that homicide has always been mentioned as a possibility either in Byron bay area or elsewhere. The answers may still be in the UK at Tunbridge Wells if Marion never came back to Australia and someone took on her identity.

They could be in Tunbridge Wells still, yes. I have searched Sussex and Kent marriage records for 1997 with Marions, Natalias and Florabellas (certainly nothing for Florabella) and definitely no Remakel marriages at all in the UK are coming back..so am wondering (maybe Luxembourg, South Korea, Hong Kong)..probably much harder to get hold of marriage information. It is still possible Marion could have returned to Australia ticking the married box, but she still planned to get married, seeing herself as married in all but putting pen to paper.

 

[Loobyloo2]

F.M Remakel from Richardson Tx aged 69

Frances M Remakel from Merriville aged 72

 

[Loobyloo2]

Yes, the problem is sometimes finding a birth record. There is a man who was born in Illinois- birth year 1951 from Illinois- whose yearbook and a picture comes up on Ancestry. This is also a midwestern state , like Indiana..not sure if they are neighbouring states though? But same US region. Interestingly there is a Frances M Remakel also Chicago, Illinois- born 1921 and died 1994....I am guessing his father? This would be same year the F. Remakel posted the ad in Le Courier...maybe this man lost his father and felt lost, bereaved? Idk...but all things to muse over.

Yes the Remakel who died in 1994 even has a photo of a very elderly gentleman I saw somewhere.

 

[Sophie-Renee]

I think it said he was 47 years, but yes this would also make a birth year of 1947...who knows why someone may want to age themselves up- unless of course he wanted to meet a slightly older woman- as Marion would have been at the time and thought making himself a bit older for the ad , would help. It is difficult then to rule out Remakels born into the 1950s....as people can easily get away usually aging themselves up or down at least by a few years and seems to be common practice !

 

[Loobyloo2]

Well for me the issue is also, there will only be a death certificate if there was a death FOUND. If she remained in Australia and died- it seems to me there is no body or Jane Does that have been identified as Marion- just as Sallys dna has uncovered no matches. The reason for no body would be either suicide or homicide. It is sad to have to say that if she is dead, I don't think it has been natural. I think she would have been found and identified by now if she had passed in her home. Unless of course for whatever reason, someone had agreed to with her to keep her natural death a secret and to carry on her wishes of nothing being known about her- but this is bordering on extremely bizarre, which granted, this case already is!

There are a few death certificates on ancestory.com with the same date of birth as Marion but the names are completely different from any of the names she has used and locations don't seem to fit her profile.

 

[Loobyloo2]

Of course there is the possibility Marion remarried in Tunbridge Wells. The Registry Office is a stone’s throw from where she was probably staying. This could explain the delay in arriving in the UK and finally disappearing on the 31 July 1997? Is it possible to go through the marriage records searching for Australian or Western European’s marrying in Tunbridge Wells in June to August 1997 under other names?

2,704 marriages in Tunbridge Wells in June 1997

 

[Sophie-Renee]

I very much doubt her death will have been recorded- if it has been it could have been under Florabella or if Marion,

2,704 marriages in Tunbridge Wells in June 1997

Yes, and no Florabellas or Remakels found! Certainly in the UK now , when you register to marry ahead of time you have to show your passport. I don't know if you then have to go by those exact names but I would certainly think they would question why the principal first name was asked to be left off the registration. It would certainly have needed a surname and to make it anything other than Remakel would raise questions. Here when there is a marriage it gets registered as searchable under both the woman's maiden name and their married name. So the Remakel name would have to come up if she did in fact marry before she returned to Australia. So, I can only deduce either she never married like she stated on her return passport OR she married in Luxembourg or one of the stopover countries.

 

[KiwiNZ]

in

Yeah I reckon you are right about the $5k per day money transfer.
What do you think about the reason she came back to Australia was to get her money out as she couldn’t withdrawal it overseas because her bank account name was different to her passport name?

If the "scammer" needed the transfer of money to go via western union rather than a bank to bank transfer she would have had to physical do the transaction in person from Aus, she would not have been able to ask her bank to make that transfer while she was overseas or even in Aus as that is not how those money transferring companies work. Physically removing money from an account and then transferring it via a money transfer company is almost untraceable, unless the police could figure what company was used to make the transfer and trace it that way. The transfer is collected in person by someone showing ID at the other end (fake ID) the only way you would catch them in on camera collecting it. Western Union know their service is the preferred scammer choice for transferring money, even if you go on their facebook page today it full of how to avoid getting scammed.

If she was merely wanting to transfer money from her Aus account to a UK one then she probably could have done that by phone from the UK, her issue may have been her passport name but she would have had other forms of ID in the name Barter. But even if she had to come back to Aus to sort that out she could have just transferred all of the money to a new bank account or someone else bank account in Aus or overseas, there was no reason to remove $5K per day in cash, other than someone wanting there to be no paper trail.

You cant carry more than $10K into the UK or any other country so I doubt she was planning on carrying cash out of the country.

That's my thinking anyways lol

 

[Sillybilly]

Hey everyone,

Do NOT post social media of random people. Unless you are 110% certain it is the correct person, do not bring their information to Websleuths.

If you wish to discuss behind the scenes, you can add up to 20 members to the private conversation.

Thank you.

 

[Sophie-Renee]

Definitely same woman- strange though it is advertised for the attention of a French town and the P.O Box is in Australia. The 2 locations in Australia, would also suggest this is someone who travels a lot and has no fixed abode as such. Cheminon is coming up with nothing even on Ancestry. I wonder if this is a pseudonym last name. I suppose it is something you might consider if you did not want people you knew who might read the local paper to know you were turning to the personals to find someone. Back then it carried a bit of a taboo I think and people felt embarrassed for others to know they turned to advertising to find someone.

 

[Loobyloo2]

Hi Sophie-Renee. I am a member of ancestory so can do searches. 192.com is also very useful over here in the UK. I found the original small ads both yourself and a previous sleuth mentioned that a Michelle placed and it is certainly interesting. The other one which I found for her is a Month apart.

 

[Loobyloo2]

Hi Sophie-Renee. I am a member of ancestory so can do searches. 192.com is also very useful over here in the UK. I found the original small ads both yourself and a previous sleuth mentioned that a Michelle placed and it is certainly interesting. The other one which I found for her is a Month apart.

Michele may be a man rather than a woman I have just found out. Michele (pronounced [miˈkɛːle]), is an Italian male given name, akin to the English male name Michael. ... It is a variant spelling of the more common (and identically pronounced) name Michelle.

 

[Sophie-Renee]

Hi Sophie-Renee. I am a member of ancestory so can do searches. 192.com is also very useful over here in the UK. I found the original small ads both yourself and a previous sleuth mentioned that a Michelle placed and it is certainly interesting. The other one which I found for her is a Month apart.

Hi,

I am a bit of a sleuther myself and into family trees- I got the 192 and Ancestry I use, although ancestry I been on it ages but still find it sometimes difficult to keep the search results specific to a country- it has a bad habit of clearing fields you enter I find.

It is just a shame it seems a lot of records depending on country are only historical so sometimes marriages for certain places for example can't be accessed unless they are very old. Definitely if this Michele could be gotten a hold of would be very interesting.

 

[TootsieFootsie]

I don't believe this woman had met Remakel. I think it's just someone who became interested in the case, as we are here and thought they might get further and get information by suggesting that Remakel was a friend they'd lost contact with

Wow, so this is presumably someone who met the same man as Marion may have- calling himself Remakel at least, or this may be another sleuth trying to get some info as you say. I noticed Michele is just with the one L which makes it seem more of a European name- of course that could also be to throw someone off and get them to think that. But if it is genuinely a lady who met him, with no awareness of the podcast- well it is very coincidental she starts looking for him NOW - but it may be an old ad- it doesn't seem to have a date on it. So we don't know if that is 23 years long time ago.. but what an amazing find- well done. I really hope you hear back from her.

 

[TootsieFootsie]

I don't believe for a second that Marion did anything wrong at the school.
I do think that possibly something or someone frightened her into leaving.
And I do think it's possible that she may have had some sort of a breakdown.

 

[Estelle]

I don't believe for a second that Marion did anything wrong at the school.
I do think that possibly something or someone frightened her into leaving.
And I do think it's possible that she may have had some sort of a breakdown.

The head of the school may have put pressure on Marion to resign or Marion could have suffered from Workplace bullying due to jealousy even.

 

[Housemartyn]

So we have this appearing at a later date. Either a sleuth or journalist or really someone looking for Remakel. À la recherche de M. Fernand Remakel. So I looked up here in the UK people with the name Michelle Burnett and up pops Michelle Burnett (but has two l's in her name so may be a red herring) from no other than Tunbridge Wells area. The lady in question is approx 48 year's old and lives in a wealthy household. Throwing it out there but if it is the same Michelle then her mother would be the same age as Marion and maybe something happened so her daughter is trying to gather some information. I have messaged the lady who placed the advert looking for Remakel but no reply as yet.

It appears that this Michele from Tunbridge Wells joined that group in May 2019 which ties in with the approx time of the podcast episode where details of Marion's name change had been released and they knocked on the door of Ferdinand in Luxembourg. More likely a person who listened to the podcast methinks.

 

[Garyb]

If Marion did get married overseas, came back alone to sort out the money and shipping container wouldnt the new husband have contacted the police that his wife was missing?
I think this means he came back to Australia with her and something nasty happened once the money was withdrawn.