Australia Australia - Marion Barter, 51, missing after trip to UK, Jun 1997 #2

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Hi people... First time posting here as well. I have followed the podcast for awhile, did some sleuthing myself and have a few queries that I want to throw around.

Without having the time to re-listen to the whole podcast again - do we know if Marion changed her Name with QLD or NSW ? (it would depend on what state she was born in). Was the name change filed in May 1997 or was it completed and legal as of May 1997?

This would have a big influence on her next steps. I know back in the 1990's it was a slow process to have your name changed in NSW, and I am fairly confident that it would have taken longer than 4 weeks to be finalised and legally approved. Also laws and processes around how and where to change your name changed in NSW 1996, so it would't have been a common knowledge process and she probably would have had some jumping through hoops to make it happen so quickly to leave the country under a new name with a new passport and bank details and anything else that would have needed changing before leaving on 6 weeks later.

Therefore everything would have been in Marion Barter when she left Australia in June 1997. The money held by Barclay was obviously in the name of Marion Barter (as it still is with the unclaimed moneys) and I think transferring a sum of $20,000 for her trip was solid and viable and makes sense to me.
Surely it must have actually been held in the UK? If it was simply just made available to her via the CBA, then it would have still been considered to be at the CBA in Australia and would not have been considered unclaimed money in the UK that needed to be returned to CBA in Australia.

Did she come back to Australia on a Florabella passport or did she come back when the name change documents were finally legally approved and available for her to collect? If so, how was she notified of this? Who knew how to contact her in the UK? and I can't remember how Sally came across the information that there was something going on with her Mother's bank account in the first place? What was it that triggered Sally to start the searching and questioning in October 1997?
 
Itsapuzzle said:
View attachment 206923 Monday morning spontaneous thoughts ......wondering if Fernand knows about The Lady Vanishes podcast, and if so has he been listening to it. H'mm, starting to wonder too why he won't/doesn't want to clear his name, it is only adding to the suspicion that he knows something .... he may just be very stubborn and cranky about the situation, but I reckon the time has passed for all that .... it's time. Or maybe he is enjoying the notoriety - a quick look at the graph above shows a flatline of interest till the podcast came along. Fernand, if you're following along on the websleuths page we'd love to hear what you've got to say, drop in anytime, that'd be just great. Back from holidays, will catch up on the posts today.
Click to expand...

Luxembourg has differing cultural characteristics to Australia. I hope it's ok to include this link. It's a (societal) cultural comparison of Aust & Luxembourg from Gert Hofstede (researcherof intercultural interaction)
Country Comparison - Hofstede Insights

Luxembourg highlights:
Reluctant to explore unknown territory.
New techniques must be proven to be accepted.
Threatened by ambiguity of the future. When change is required no need to make revolution, communication and common sense will prevail.
Respectful of authority structure. Expect societal inequalities to be minimalised.

No one person is an exact reflection of their countries culture (and I'm not sure if I am interpreting the information correctly) but if I try to view the situation from Ferdinands cultural lens I dont think he would follow the podcast or want anything to do with it. He probably feels very threatened and insulted by Brians approach but I doubt he would consider there to be any need to clear his name because to him this is rediculous and those asking questions are not of authority.
 
NesssaP said:
The money held by Barclay was obviously in the name of Marion Barter (as it still is with the unclaimed moneys) and I think transferring a sum of $20,000 for her trip was solid and viable and makes sense to me.
Surely it must have actually been held in the UK? If it was simply just made available to her via the CBA, then it would have still been considered to be at the CBA in Australia and would not have been considered unclaimed money in the UK that needed to be returned to CBA in Australia.
Click to expand...

Hi NessaP.
Marion left and returned to Australia on the Florabella passport. Which is why I think the UK money wasnt touched - because she couldnt adequately identify herself as Marion.

The 20k was held in the UK. It was a international transaction from her Australian CBA account. International transactions can have many forms (i.e telegraphic transfer, draft, travellers cheque or physical cash) we don't know which one Marion opted for.

What I was saying is that Marion probably wasnt a customer of Barclays. Barclays were involved is because they were the agent for CBA (and probably other Aust banks) in the UK at that time (Marion wasnt the Barclays customer CBA were). For example if you purchased a bank draft (bank cheque in foreign currency) in pounds from the CBA it would be drawn on Barclays bank, that doesnt make you a customer of Barclays it just means that that's where your bank sourced the funds from. When Marion's UK money became dormant/uncollected it was returned to the CBA (who sent it on to unclaimed monies). This tell us that Marion wasnt a customer of Barclays bank (not an account holder) which also means Barclays would have no information about Marion other than the receipt of the money from CBA and the return of the money to CBA.
 
NesssaP said:
Hi people... First time posting here as well. I have followed the podcast for awhile, did some sleuthing myself and have a few queries that I want to throw around.

Without having the time to re-listen to the whole podcast again - do we know if Marion changed her Name with QLD or NSW ? (it would depend on what state she was born in). Was the name change filed in May 1997 or was it completed and legal as of May 1997?

This would have a big influence on her next steps. I know back in the 1990's it was a slow process to have your name changed in NSW, and I am fairly confident that it would have taken longer than 4 weeks to be finalised and legally approved. Also laws and processes around how and where to change your name changed in NSW 1996, so it would't have been a common knowledge process and she probably would have had some jumping through hoops to make it happen so quickly to leave the country under a new name with a new passport and bank details and anything else that would have needed changing before leaving on 6 weeks later.

Therefore everything would have been in Marion Barter when she left Australia in June 1997. The money held by Barclay was obviously in the name of Marion Barter (as it still is with the unclaimed moneys) and I think transferring a sum of $20,000 for her trip was solid and viable and makes sense to me.
Surely it must have actually been held in the UK? If it was simply just made available to her via the CBA, then it would have still been considered to be at the CBA in Australia and would not have been considered unclaimed money in the UK that needed to be returned to CBA in Australia.

Did she come back to Australia on a Florabella passport or did she come back when the name change documents were finally legally approved and available for her to collect? If so, how was she notified of this? Who knew how to contact her in the UK? and I can't remember how Sally came across the information that there was something going on with her Mother's bank account in the first place? What was it that triggered Sally to start the searching and questioning in October 1997?
Click to expand...
Welcome nessap. Great points about the name change process lead in time. I don’t have any answers but it’s intete to consider at what point in time she started the process and what may have triggered that.
 
Intriguedbyintrigue said:
Luxembourg has differing cultural characteristics to Australia. I hope it's ok to include this link. It's a (societal) cultural comparison of Aust & Luxembourg from Gert Hofstede (researcherof intercultural interaction)
Country Comparison - Hofstede Insights

Luxembourg highlights:
Reluctant to explore unknown territory.
New techniques must be proven to be accepted.
Threatened by ambiguity of the future. When change is required no need to make revolution, communication and common sense will prevail.
Respectful of authority structure. Expect societal inequalities to be minimalised.

No one person is an exact reflection of their countries culture (and I'm not sure if I am interpreting the information correctly) but if I try to view the situation from Ferdinands cultural lens I dont think he would follow the podcast or want anything to do with it. He probably feels very threatened and insulted by Brians approach but I doubt he would consider there to be any need to clear his name because to him this is rediculous and those asking questions are not of authority.
Click to expand...
Yes, good point Intrigued, it might all just be ridiculous nonsense to him, quite possible. Graph is interesting, thanks for putting it up.
As an aside, what is ridiculous is that we're all still speculating and coming up with theories when the answers probably lie with the dentist and the phone number in the Le Courrier ad .... it's beyond stupid that this hasn't been investigated and revealed yet. It's nuts! Like Charlie Brown, I can't stand it!!
 
Itsapuzzle said:
Yes, good point Intrigued, it might all just be ridiculous nonsense to him, quite possible. Graph is interesting, thanks for putting it up.
As an aside, what is ridiculous is that we're all still speculating and coming up with theories when the answers probably lie with the dentist and the phone number in the Le Courrier ad .... it's beyond stupid that this hasn't been investigated and revealed yet. It's nuts! Like Charlie Brown, I can't stand it!!
Click to expand...

Yes!!! And automobile-man (I really want him to turn out to be the dentist!!)
 
Itsapuzzle said:
Yes, good point Intrigued, it might all just be ridiculous nonsense to him, quite possible. Graph is interesting, thanks for putting it up.
As an aside, what is ridiculous is that we're all still speculating and coming up with theories when the answers probably lie with the dentist and the phone number in the Le Courrier ad .... it's beyond stupid that this hasn't been investigated and revealed yet. It's nuts! Like Charlie Brown, I can't stand it!!
Click to expand...
Agree with this 100 times over... if only the NSW police would investigate this information!!!!!!!!!
 
sunnynz said:
We don’t know that they’re not.
Click to expand...
Yes sunnynz, one would hope they're looking into these matters now .... last episode (19 September) Bryan mentions they're still waiting, and you would think they'd be in the loop, who knows, ah well, they have had the advertisement since early May at the very least and it's now October .... and they've known about the dentist for a long time and have spoken to him .... 23 years unsolved case ..... h'mm ...
Conversations 14 - 19 September 2019 At 8.19:
"... we've also passed all the information we have .... we've handed that all over to the police investigating the case and it's our hope with the renewed enthusiasm in the NSW police to get to the bottom of this that he will be a person whom they would like to speak to, so we are following that up for all our listeners ..... "
 
Last edited:
NesssaP said:
Hi people... First time posting here as well. I have followed the podcast for awhile, did some sleuthing myself and have a few queries that I want to throw around.

Without having the time to re-listen to the whole podcast again - do we know if Marion changed her Name with QLD or NSW ? (it would depend on what state she was born in). Was the name change filed in May 1997 or was it completed and legal as of May 1997?

This would have a big influence on her next steps. I know back in the 1990's it was a slow process to have your name changed in NSW, and I am fairly confident that it would have taken longer than 4 weeks to be finalised and legally approved. Also laws and processes around how and where to change your name changed in NSW 1996, so it would't have been a common knowledge process and she probably would have had some jumping through hoops to make it happen so quickly to leave the country under a new name with a new passport and bank details and anything else that would have needed changing before leaving on 6 weeks later.

Therefore everything would have been in Marion Barter when she left Australia in June 1997. The money held by Barclay was obviously in the name of Marion Barter (as it still is with the unclaimed moneys) and I think transferring a sum of $20,000 for her trip was solid and viable and makes sense to me.
Surely it must have actually been held in the UK? If it was simply just made available to her via the CBA, then it would have still been considered to be at the CBA in Australia and would not have been considered unclaimed money in the UK that needed to be returned to CBA in Australia.

Did she come back to Australia on a Florabella passport or did she come back when the name change documents were finally legally approved and available for her to collect? If so, how was she notified of this? Who knew how to contact her in the UK? and I can't remember how Sally came across the information that there was something going on with her Mother's bank account in the first place? What was it that triggered Sally to start the searching and questioning in October 1997?
Click to expand...
Just picking up on your last question NesssaP, what triggered Sally to start the searching and questioning in October 1997, it was because Marion didn't phone Owen on his birthday, which was very out of character for her as birthdays were a big thing for her and she always contacted Owen on his birthday. There was no call from her, so Sally started to worry, then realised she didn't even know where her mother was staying in the UK, so decided to phone the bank to see if she was okay and using her account, and that's when she found out about the withdrawals from Byron Bay. Hope I've got that right, going from memory. Cheers
 
The Barclay's account- it is reported very inconsistently. From episode one, it is called untouched, but at other times it is unsure how much is left. If the 20K in the Barclays account was untouched, what did she spend when in England? Apparently she hired a car, how did she pay for that? Her food, accommodation etc- must have come from the Barclays account, unless she had another one.
 
Mel 1303 said:
The Barclay's account- it is reported very inconsistently. From episode one, it is called untouched, but at other times it is unsure how much is left. If the 20K in the Barclays account was untouched, what did she spend when in England? Apparently she hired a car, how did she pay for that? Her food, accommodation etc- must have come from the Barclays account, unless she had another one.
Click to expand...

People travelling overseas generally take travelers cheques and cash in the currency of the country they are visiting with them when they go. CBA would have had held travellers cheques in pounds at the branch.
Travellers cheques can be exchanged for cash at banks, cash exchange places and even large businesses while you're away. They're safer than carrying cash (serial numbers recorded). People usually also take some cash for convenience.
Marion probably carried money (likely travellers cheques and some pounds) with her when she left Australia, but as a safety measure (avoid carrying too much at once) she also arranged the extra 20k to be a available for her in the UK. This is unlikely to have been in a transaction account (Marion didnt have a residential address in the UK) and far more likely to be in the form of travellers cheques/cash held by Barclays (via in an internal holding account).
I think Marion had identification problems accessing her 20k, (because her travel documents werent in the name of Marion Barter) and this is why it wasnt used. It could also be why she returned to Australia earlier than expected.
 
Itsapuzzle said:
Yes sunnynz, one would hope they're looking into these matters now .... last episode (19 September) Bryan mentions they're still waiting, and you would think they'd be in the loop, who knows, ah well, they have had the advertisement since early May at the very least and it's now October .... and they've known about the dentist for a long time and have spoken to him .... 23 years unsolved case ..... h'mm ...
Conversations 14 - 19 September 2019 At 8.19:
"... we've also passed all the information we have .... we've handed that all over to the police investigating the case and it's our hope with the renewed enthusiasm in the NSW police to get to the bottom of this that he will be a person whom they would like to speak to, so we are following that up for all our listeners ..... "
Click to expand...

I dont think the police will be keeping Bryan/podcast in the loop, even if they think the Ferdinand angle has merit. They will be super careful what they tell Sally too. They wont risk their investigation and any possible future court proceedings by having information broadcast.
 
Today I'm wondering about FR ..... as per Episode 14 no-one with the name Remakel has entered or left the country since 1990. So, if Marion came back on her passport she was going to the banks and withdrawing all the cash by herself, and then disappeared somewhere in Australia without a Remakel in sight .... how on earth could FR be involved? That's a puzzle. H'mm, need to think about this ....
 
Theres something like 25 hours of podcast now. Is it just me? I find it so hard to find the bits of information I want to hear again. Wouldnt it be great if the team did a recap episode?

I'd like them to go back sequentially over the timeline, review what they know, update their leads, what they've found and are waiting for.
 
Yes, recap episode good idea Intrigued, as a lot of details have changed along the way as new information has come to hand.
As an aside, there's a most excellent podcast that reminds me quite a bit of The Lady Vanishes in many ways (how the case was handled in the early days, etc) it is most excellent but unfortunately remains unsolved at this point, it's called Unconcluded (Jennifer Kesse) - Season 1 - they have episodes called Sidebars where they play voicemail questions from listeners and also read out questions sent to them, that's good too.
 
Itsapuzzle said:
Just picking up on your last question NesssaP, what triggered Sally to start the searching and questioning in October 1997, it was because Marion didn't phone Owen on his birthday, which was very out of character for her as birthdays were a big thing for her and she always contacted Owen on his birthday. There was no call from her, so Sally started to worry, then realised she didn't even know where her mother was staying in the UK, so decided to phone the bank to see if she was okay and using her account, and that's when she found out about the withdrawals from Byron Bay. Hope I've got that right, going from memory. Cheers
Click to expand...

Thanks Itsapuzzle... I ended up looking it up again today... for some reason I just couldn't remember what kicked it all off...

So today's thoughts are more along the lines of the Barclay's money... I have taken a screenshot of the unclaimed money search site that says it is a total $14,890 or there abouts... so if the originally amount was$20,000 - then it stands to reason that she must have accessed some of it during her stay in the UK... she surely would not have kept enough cash on her person to pay for her hotels and travels for those first 6-8 weeks... and $5,000 seems adequate for back then - maybe she took $5k out n the other $110 was in transfer and banking fees?

That then led me to looking at her last known address on that unclaimed money note - "Barclays Bank Mint St Rye London United United Kingdom"... I cant find anything that makes sense of that address... all the postal addresses I see for Rye say East Sussex UK - they are not addressed as London United UK... which had me pondering maybe it was a Post Office banking setup? As Barclays had set up personal banking at the Post Office by then...

Or maybe just a big mistake - maybe it was meant to be Mint St London United and someone misheard and wrote/typed it down wrong and mistakenly added in Rye?
 
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