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Ric Blum and Marion Barter: everything we know about the case
The cold case of missing Queensland mum Marion Barter and her secret ties to the convicted conman Ric Blum has made headlines around the globe and is sending amateur sleuths into overdrive. Here’s what we know about the case so far.
Who is Ric Blum?
Belgium-born
Ric Blum, 83, has been based in Australia for more than 40 years with his fourth and current wife,
Diane De Hedervary. Previously jailed in France for fraud, he has
at least 50 aliases and a long history of deceiving and exploiting women. Blum’s other names include
Willy Wouters,
Richard Lloyd Westbury,
Richard West,
Willy David-Coppenolle and
Rich Richard.
Who is Marion Barter?
Marion Barter is a Queensland maths teacher and the
former wife of Australian football legend Johnny Warren. She was 51 years old in 1997 when she quit her job at
The Southport School on the Gold Coast, sold her house and travelled overseas on a holiday.
Ric Blum has confirmed to NSW State Coroner
Teresa O’Sullivan at an ongoing inquest that he had been in a secret relationship with Barter for about four months before she vanished, but he denies any knowledge of her fate and maintains his innocence in all allegations against him.
Who is Florabella Remakel?
Florabella Remakel is the name
Barter gave herself when she went overseas. A man with the same unusual surname had placed an ad in French-language newspaper Le Courrier Australien in 1994, seeking a relationship and potential marriage.
Where is Barter now?
Barter’s whereabouts are unknown and her disappearance has been the subject of an inquest and police investigation in NSW. Authorities assume that Barter is dead.
What is known is that after leaving the country in 1997, she returned the same year without contacting family or friends, used her Medicare card at an optometrist’s appointment, made a series of large cash withdrawals, then dropped off the face of the earth. Among the few clues are that Barter’s daughter
Sally Leydonfleetingly saw her mother, single and looking for love, in a car with a mystery man at a petrol station shortly before her big overseas trip. Barter appeared startled to be spotted, and hurriedly drove off.
Five days before Barter departed to the UK, Blum also left Australia for Europe. Two days before she came back, Blum returned.
Barter or someone posing as her was subsequently in the Byron Bay area, making daily cash withdrawals, with Blum living just down the road in Wollongbar with his wife and teenage children.
On October 14, 1997, Blum opened a safety deposit envelope with the Commonwealth Bank. The next day, $80,000 was taken out of Barter’s Colonial State Bank account in Byron, the biggest single withdrawal. Soon after that, Barter’s trail goes stone cold.
Why the sudden interest in this 1997 cold case?
There are several reasons: a podcast, an explosive Belgian media report, and fresh revelations by The Australian’s national crime correspondent David Murray involving
Ric Blum’s dark backstory.
In February this year, in a joint investigation between the Luxemburger Wort, Luxembourg Times and Nieuwsblad newspapers, it was reported that Blum had swindled a Belgian woman out of €100,000 in 2012 following her husband’s death the previous year. Blum was the cousin of the woman’s late husband and is said to have convinced her to travel with him to Bali to jointly purchase a house. Then, after booking her in for a massage and hairdressing appointment, he disappeared with her cash.
Back home, valuable and sentimental jewellery was missing, including her wedding ring.
Late last year, he was accused of stealing about €70,000 from another Belgian widow,
Ghislaine Danlois, in 2006 after she placed a personal ad in a newspaper. Blum’s long and eloquent handwritten letter in French responding to the ad had perfect spelling and stood out from the other replies.
Her abrupt plans to sell her home and car before moving to Australia with Blum was a red flag for relatives. So too was the discovery that Blum, who claimed to travel the world collecting rare coins, was slumming it in student accommodation in Brussels when he claimed he usually bedded down in luxury at the five-star Astoria Hotel.
Danlois’s daughter-in-law,
Alexandra Peereboom, has
prepared a statement about what happened for NSW Coroner.
Blum’s daughter
Evelyn Reid this week told The Australian her father had previously spoken to her in
horrifying detail about how to kill people with homemade poison.
“He wanted to teach me how to poison people. I ended up being terrified,” Ms Reid said.
Police have contacted her only once, during the ongoing inquest into Barter’s disappearance, and had not taken a formal statement, she said.
Blum denies dabbling in poisons and says he met Reid only once, as a baby, and had never seen or spoken to her since.
Meanwhile, amateur sleuths have joined the search for Barter on the back of a popular true-crime podcast,
The Lady Vanishes, about her disappearance.
What has the investigation and inquest found so far?
A NSW inquest into Barter’s disappearance and suspected death remains ongoing.
When asked outright by homicide detectives whether he murdered Barter Blum emphatically denied it. He did the same at the inquest and strenuously maintains his innocence in all allegations against him.
Blum told the inquest he had changed his name “as a fantasy”. But
Adam Casselden SC, counsel assisting the coroner, said in his closing submissions that Mr Blum had a pattern of exploiting vulnerable women. “He has led an extraordinary life of deceit and duplicity,” Mr Casselden said.
Forty-eight hours before NSW State Coroner
Teresa O’Sullivan was due to hand down findings last November into Barter’s disappearance, the case was unexpectedly put on hold to allow homicide squad detectives to
conduct further investigations.
Joni Condos, who has been on the trail for the podcast
The Lady Vanishes discovered Barter underwent a full liver function test in mid-May, just before leaving, despite having no known health issues. Belgian widow Danlois spoke of Blum also insisting she undergo liver tests.
“There are so many threads in this case, it goes in so many different directions,” Condos told The Australian.
