Australia Australia - Marion Barter, 51, missing after trip to UK, Jun 1997 #4

[TootsieFootsie]

Maybe there was another reason for the Le Courier ads.

Perhaps the two ads was a way of contacting their other partner in crime.

Seems a bit of a coincidence that there were only two ads that day and that they seemed like a good match for each other.

 

[Mjjj14]

Here is some more information from Episode 4. Taken.

This excerpt discusses the date of the last known postcard.

Alison: Unhappy with the way police were handling the matter, Marion's father Jack approached the Salvation Army's family tracing service to try to track her down. This is an excerpt from the notes he gave them.

Voice Actor reading Jack's notes: Some details of Marion's disappearance.

Alison: Pay particular attention to the dates.

Voice Actor reading Jack's notes: Departed Brisbane 23 June 1997, re-entry 2 August 1997. The last card posted from Tunbridge England was dated 30 August 1997.

Alison: So Marion's last postcard was sent 4 weeks after she apparently arrived back in Australia. This had Jack raising questions.

Voice Actor reading Jack's notes: Did she leave the card for someone else to post? Was it Marion who arrived back on the 2nd of August 1997? There's been no unpleasantness in the family and the behaviour is foreign to Marion. Did Marion come back from England?

 

[JLZ]

I find the Grafton stopover to be an interesting one. I am from Grafton, and my father used to work on the trains and buses in Grafton around this time. After speaking to my father, travelling from Sydney to Grafton back in 1997 could have been an 8-hour drive or the XPT train trip, which would have been a whole day trip from Sydney to Grafton. This train trip on the XPT would have ended at Grafton as this is where this route stopped. The train does not go to Byron Bay either, so passengers then had to book to go on the bus from Grafton to Byron Bay.

Maybe the person either decided to stay in Grafton at this point or had to because the bus was full. To get into Grafton, the person would have had to get a taxi or walk across the bridge as the train would have stopped in South Grafton. Grafton Shopping World is about 2km from the train station. If they stayed in Grafton, there are a couple of places across from Grafton Shopping World that could have been convenient places to stay, particularly if they were on the train/bus network and using a taxi to get from South Grafton to Grafton.

Was there any activity between Sydney and Grafton or just at Grafton?

If "the person" wasn't Marion and was an Australian woman, she probably drove between the locations. If "the person" was Marion, it's possible she was driven by the scammer and he demanded she make the withdrawals.

 

[sunnybree]

Here is some more information from Episode 4. Taken.

This excerpt discusses the date of the last known postcard.

Alison: Unhappy with the way police were handling the matter, Marion's father Jack approached the Salvation Army's family tracing service to try to track her down. This is an excerpt from the notes he gave them.

Voice Actor reading Jack's notes: Some details of Marion's disappearance.

Alison: Pay particular attention to the dates.

Voice Actor reading Jack's notes: Departed Brisbane 23 June 1997, re-entry 2 August 1997. The last card posted from Tunbridge England was dated 30 August 1997.

Alison: So Marion's last postcard was sent 4 weeks after she apparently arrived back in Australia. This had Jack raising questions.

Voice Actor reading Jack's notes: Did she leave the card for someone else to post? Was it Marion who arrived back on the 2nd of August 1997? There's been no unpleasantness in the family and the behaviour is foreign to Marion. Did Marion come back from England?

Thanks Mjjj14. So definitely not new information.

I could be wrong but I think the Salvation Army helped to facilitate information sharing eg having contacts with the police, and running simple checks. I don’t think they were working like private detectives. It was likely outside their scope to cross check what the police were doing or unearthing new evidence. Regarding the evidence of Ms Brown, she is 90 years old being asked to provide information about a piece of work completed over 20 years ago. If there had been a more robust enquiry by the police in the first few years there would likely be minimal confusion.

 

[Loxoli]

@Peralta I hope you don’t mind but please let me know if you do. I’ve just merged your fantastic timelines together and added two extra entries (in italics). Please feel free to correct, rewrite, make additions or ask me to delete. I find your timeframes of events very helpful and it’s interesting to see the connections between the events.


22 June 1997

• Marion tells family and friends she is going to England for possibly a year.
• Passenger card states she's permanently leaving for Luxembourg and her flight departs from Australia and arrives in England, which is crossed out and replaced with South Korea.

(Did she even know she was going to South Korea? If she bought her own ticket, she would know, surely!)

30 June 1997

• Sally receives letter postmarked Tunbridge Wells, on stationery from Narita, Japan

July 1997

• Sally/relative receives postcards postmarked Brighton, Kent, Sussex Coast and London.
• Sally receives postcard postmarked 7 July from Hastings.
• Also sent letters/postcards to some of her students during this period.
• Sent early gift to sister for her 7 August birthday.

15 July 1997

• Original date Marion’s was going to travel on Orient Express.

1 August 1997 (late afternoon/early evening AEST)

Marion calls Sally from payphone. She says she’s in Tunbridge Wells having tea and scones with ladies she just met. Says she won't be calling or sending postcards for a while in order to enjoy vacation. However, it’s likely she was already in transit to Australia.

2 August 1997 (AEST)

Marion arrives in Australia on Florabella passport. Not sure if she entered through Sydney or Brisbane airport. There’s some mention of her possibly staying at the Novotel hotel in Brisbane.

August 1997

• Postcards arrive in Australia from Marion in England.

7 August 1997

Canceled RACQ membership and policy (roadside assistance and vehicle insurance).

13 August 1997

Medicare card is used at optometrist at Grafton Shoppingworld.

30 August 1997

Date (unknown if that is the postmark or written date) on the last known postcard from Marion in Tunbridge England to Deirdre in Australia.

August to September 1997

$5000 withdrawn every day for 3.5 weeks at Commonwealth Bank Byron Bay and 3 days in middle at Burleigh Heads, totalling between $85k to $120k.

5 October 1997

$80000 withdrawal from Ashmore branch.

18 October 1997

Owen’s birthday. He did not hear from Marion.

22 October 1997

Sally visits Byron Bay bank and police, and reports Marion as missing.

 

[Loxoli]

If it hasn’t already been done by the police, then I think that an interesting line of enquiry would be to find and interview all dentists practicing in and around Tunbridge Wells in August 1997. If the dentist could be found and could describe Marion, then this could shed light on the timeframe that she was in Tunbridge Wells. It could still have been an imposter, but I believe Marion could be reasonably accurately identified from her photo.

If Marion did know a dentist at this time that was important enough to mention to her sister, I think it’s likely they would remember her too, in addition to the fact she was an Australian traveller who possibly went by the name of Florabella, which is memorable IMO. They might be able to say they met her a few times in July 1997 but didn’t meet her ever again, or they might be able to say they sighted her in August or even later in 1997, which would be an amazing help to the investigation. It’s a long shot, but they don’t have much else to work with right now!

 

[TootsieFootsie]

The dentist and Mazz may have just been tourists staying at the same hotel as Marion.

Perhaps a long shot is an appeal to find a dentist and his friend, companion, wife ? named Mazz whatever , that were in the area and met an Australian woman around about the time Marion was there.

If it hasn’t already been done by the police, then I think that an interesting line of enquiry would be to find and interview all dentists practicing in and around Tunbridge Wells in August 1997. If the dentist could be found and could describe Marion, then this could shed light on the timeframe that she was in Tunbridge Wells. It could still have been an imposter, but I believe Marion could be reasonably accurately identified from her photo.

 

[JLZ]

Here is some more information from Episode 4. Taken.

This excerpt discusses the date of the last known postcard.

Alison: Unhappy with the way police were handling the matter, Marion's father Jack approached the Salvation Army's family tracing service to try to track her down. This is an excerpt from the notes he gave them.

Voice Actor reading Jack's notes: Some details of Marion's disappearance.

Alison: Pay particular attention to the dates.

Voice Actor reading Jack's notes: Departed Brisbane 23 June 1997, re-entry 2 August 1997. The last card posted from Tunbridge England was dated 30 August 1997.

Alison: So Marion's last postcard was sent 4 weeks after she apparently arrived back in Australia. This had Jack raising questions.

Voice Actor reading Jack's notes: Did she leave the card for someone else to post? Was it Marion who arrived back on the 2nd of August 1997? There's been no unpleasantness in the family and the behaviour is foreign to Marion. Did Marion come back from England?

If Marion was intending to return to Europe within a matter of days as her travel card said, she might have left some of her things at the hotel. Perhaps she was paying by the week and while they wouldn't want the paid-for room empty, they'd have some obligation to mind her stuff. Weeks passed, she didn't return, what to do with the things? Addressed postcards even if incomplete were an easy decision--post them. Speculation only.

 

[TootsieFootsie]

Re the dentist here who signed the deed poll.
When the name was revealed recently, it didn't sound to me like the name mentioned in an earlier podcast.

 

[vivienbee]

If Marion was intending to return to Europe within a matter of days as her travel card said, she might have left some of her things at the hotel. Perhaps she was paying by the week and while they wouldn't want the paid-for room empty, they'd have some obligation to mind her stuff. Weeks passed, she didn't return, what to do with the things? Addressed postcards even if incomplete were an easy decision--post them. Speculation only.

I'm pretty sure that they would have reported this to the authorities, even just as a liability issue, so there would be a record of this on file.

 

[Loxoli]

The dentist and Mazz may have just been tourists staying at the same hotel as Marion.

Perhaps a long shot is an appeal to find a dentist and his friend, companion, wife ? named Mazz whatever , that were in the area and met an Australian woman around about the time Marion was there.

I agree, they could have been tourists. However, I do think that all dentists practicing in the area in 1997 need to be checked and eliminated from being the one Marion was referring to. I also agree that it would be useful to ask them about their connections to someone named Maz. I haven’t sighted the postcard, so this is just a guess, but I think it’s a possibility that the dentist and Maz were separate people that Marion knew at the time and they might not have known each other, IMO. This inquiry would likely lead to nothing, but I think it is something that needs to be exhausted if it hasn’t already.

 

[Mjjj14]

Re the dentist here who signed the deed poll.
When the name was revealed recently, it didn't sound to me like the name mentioned in an earlier podcast.

I need to go back to the start of the podcast again and re-listen to the interview that Deirdre gave way back in episode 1 or 2. I’m just interested to see if she said anything about the postcard at all. Since I’m in a lockdown area, I have the time haha

 

[Loxoli]

I need to go back to the start of the podcast again and re-listen to the interview that Deirdre gave way back in episode 1 or 2. I’m just interested to see if she said anything about the postcard at all. Since I’m in a lockdown area, I have the time haha

Let us know if you hear anything interesting!

 

[vivienbee]

One thing that I cannot get my head around re: the conman theory is, why even have Marion travel to the UK at all? If the plan all along was to isolate Marion, and/or marry her, and then return to Australia to obtain the money, it would have been much, MUCH easier to lead her family to believe that she was going to England, say that she wasn't going to be able to be in contact for a while, and then kill her/have her withdraw money under duress whilst she was still IN Australia.

I feel like I'm not articulating my thoughts very well, but throwing another country into the mix just seems risky and unnecessary. Sure, it provides the possibility of sending a few postcards confirming her whereabouts as abroad which maybe bought some time, but it also adds so much HASSLE that makes very little sense to me in terms of a professional job.

Even if the plan was to get her out of the country and marry her there so that records would be harder to trace, why go through the process of marrying her at all? As far as we can tell, that angle provided no actual help for a third party. It's not as if they wanted to collect life insurance that they wouldn't be able to obtain otherwise, or have her assets transferred into their name. It makes no sense. Even if it was just to lure Marion into a false sense of security, that could have been achieved by other means with fewer stakes WITHIN Australia.

Cleaner. Less mess. Less of a paper trail. Less hopping about across international borders praying no one's identity gets flagged.

I have no idea what my actual point is. I just can't see the makings of an overarching scheme that makes sense.
(I'm not dismissing the conman theory, in fact it seems like one of the most plausible imho, but the whole England trip seems BIZARRE to me).

If anyone has any thought that might help my confusion, feel free to let me know.

 

[vivienbee]

One thing that I cannot get my head around re: the conman theory is, why even have Marion travel to the UK at all? If the plan all along was to isolate Marion, and/or marry her, and then return to Australia to obtain the money, it would have been much, MUCH easier to lead her family to believe that she was going to England, say that she wasn't going to be able to be in contact for a while, and then kill her/have her withdraw money under duress whilst she was still IN Australia.

I feel like I'm not articulating my thoughts very well, but throwing another country into the mix just seems risky and unnecessary. Sure, it provides the possibility of sending a few postcards confirming her whereabouts as abroad which maybe bought some time, but it also adds so much HASSLE that makes very little sense to me in terms of a professional job.

Even if the plan was to get her out of the country and marry her there so that records would be harder to trace, why go through the process of marrying her at all? As far as we can tell, that angle provided no actual help for a third party. It's not as if they wanted to collect life insurance that they wouldn't be able to obtain otherwise, or have her assets transferred into their name. It makes no sense. Even if it was just to lure Marion into a false sense of security, that could have been achieved by other means with fewer stakes WITHIN Australia.

Cleaner. Less mess. Less of a paper trail. Less hopping about across international borders praying no one's identity gets flagged.

I have no idea what my actual point is. I just can't see the makings of an overarching scheme that makes sense.
(I'm not dismissing the conman theory, in fact it seems like one of the most plausible imho, but the whole England trip seems BIZARRE to me).

If anyone has any thought that might help my confusion, feel free to let me know.

The only thing I can think that makes sense in this scenario is if she went across to England with someone whose intention was to commit the fraud/foul play that side of ocean, assuming Marion would have transferred all her liquid assets to her international bank account, and then got there only to discover that she'd left the majority in her Australian bank account and was like, "you did what, now?", and thus had to think on his feet and flit them back across to Aus.
Even this has a lot of problems, however, when it comes to the redundancy of her possible marriage/changing her name at all.

 

[Loxoli]

Just throwing out a theory that fits this scenario. Let’s say that Marion was madly in love and coerced into doing the name change and moving overseas. She could have been suspicious after arriving overseas, or was asked to do something she didn’t want to, like hand over her money. She could have escaped her scammer, flew back to Australia, and withdrew her money to buy a house or to keep it safe. She might not have told anyone because she was embarrassed and thought she could manage it on her own. The scammer or an Australian associate could have then tracked her down and that’s when she met with foul play. They could have then walked away with her cash and remained silent all this time.

JMO, but I think a similar theory might have been discussed on here before and that’s where I got it from.

One thing that I cannot get my head around re: the conman theory is, why even have Marion travel to the UK at all? If the plan all along was to isolate Marion, and/or marry her, and then return to Australia to obtain the money, it would have been much, MUCH easier to lead her family to believe that she was going to England, say that she wasn't going to be able to be in contact for a while, and then kill her/have her withdraw money under duress whilst she was still IN Australia.

I feel like I'm not articulating my thoughts very well, but throwing another country into the mix just seems risky and unnecessary. Sure, it provides the possibility of sending a few postcards confirming her whereabouts as abroad which maybe bought some time, but it also adds so much HASSLE that makes very little sense to me in terms of a professional job.

Even if the plan was to get her out of the country and marry her there so that records would be harder to trace, why go through the process of marrying her at all? As far as we can tell, that angle provided no actual help for a third party. It's not as if they wanted to collect life insurance that they wouldn't be able to obtain otherwise, or have her assets transferred into their name. It makes no sense. Even if it was just to lure Marion into a false sense of security, that could have been achieved by other means with fewer stakes WITHIN Australia.

Cleaner. Less mess. Less of a paper trail. Less hopping about across international borders praying no one's identity gets flagged.

I have no idea what my actual point is. I just can't see the makings of an overarching scheme that makes sense.
(I'm not dismissing the conman theory, in fact it seems like one of the most plausible imho, but the whole England trip seems BIZARRE to me).

If anyone has any thought that might help my confusion, feel free to let me know.

I agree, it’s so difficult to make all the pieces fit in one clear narrative.

I posted the above theory a few days ago and I think it’s been discussed here before by others. I think that this theory could potentially explain the overseas trip and return. The possible conman could have been planning to do all the conning while she was in Europe, unaware that she did not have access to all her money. This then became complicated when Marion became frightened and returned to Australia. So then the conman had to finish his job so returned to Australia or enlisted someone to help make Marion disappear for good.

 

[Itsapuzzle]

It's interesting the number of dentists mentioned in this case ..... we have the dentist witnessing her passport application, another dentist Marion was very fond of at the school, and now we've got a dentist on a mystery postcard. It's all a bit curious .... coincidental no doubt, but strangely interesting.

 

[TootsieFootsie]

I really don't get changing your name by deed poll IF you are planning to marry someone by that name.

Though someone way back, a member here, gave a reason why she may have done it that way.

 

[Loxoli]

The only thing I can think that makes sense in this scenario is if she went across to England with someone whose intention was to commit the fraud/foul play that side of ocean, assuming Marion would have transferred all her liquid assets to her international bank account, and then got there only to discover that she'd left the majority in her Australian bank account and was like, "you did what, now?", and thus had to think on his feet and flit them back across to Aus.
Even this has a lot of problems, however, when it comes to the redundancy of her possible marriage/changing her name at all.

That’s a good theory that seems to fit what we know. There are so many variables, I think that’s what makes it so hard to make the pieces fit.

 

[Loxoli]

I really don't get changing your name by deed poll IF you are planning to marry someone by that name.

Though someone way back, a member here, gave a reason why she may have done it that way.

That’s interesting. I don’t remember that, what did they think? I totally agree, the name change is such a bizarre aspect of this case.