August 4, 2025 • 50 mins
Sally and Joni hit the road to northern New South Wales, knocking on doors, and coming face to face with people who just might hold missing pieces of the puzzle. Along the way, Sally unveils the next chapter for The Missing Matter — an ambitious new direction that will open up the podcast to other families of the missing, giving their stories a voice and their loved ones a platform.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:05):
Appoche production.
Speaker 2 (00:14):
Hi everyone, and welcome back to a bonus episode of
The Missing Matter. We've had a lot of people asking
us if episode ten was going to be the last,
and well, we really thought that it might be for
a little while until we had something else to really
chat about. But we have been working pretty hard in
the background, and we thought we'd jump in today and
(00:37):
tell you a little bit about what has been happening,
because it's been rather crazy, no surprise to most of you,
I am flying solo today. Jonie was supposed to be
chipping in with me, but unfortunately her little boys not
very well, so she's looking after him and I'm taking
the reins and hopefully we'll be able to tell you
(00:59):
together what we've been doing with some of the things
we've captured.
Speaker 3 (01:02):
Along the way.
Speaker 2 (01:04):
So if I ride back to October twenty fourth, twenty
twenty four, Johnny and I arrived super early at six
twenty am into Brisbane Airport after not much sleep. We
gave each other a massive hug and I had to
run as Darcy was going into surgery that day.
Speaker 1 (01:25):
You know what I hate about flying, especially these long
wall flights. You fall asleep and you think you've had
a really good sleep. You've wake up and you go, right,
we must be nearly there.
Speaker 4 (01:38):
You go, oh, we've actually got eight hours to go.
Speaker 1 (01:42):
It's that is quite horrendous. It's not a very fun,
fun part of traveling.
Speaker 5 (01:49):
Darcy has surgery tomorrow, nothing too serious, but she's never
had a surgery before, so.
Speaker 6 (01:59):
Can you this story. I, on the other hand, had
decided to book my flat back to Melbourne later in
the day just in case there were any delays, so
we were.
Speaker 3 (02:10):
On time arriving.
Speaker 6 (02:11):
But my flight to Melbourne was actually delayed, so I
had to spend most of the day at the airport
waiting for my flight back home.
Speaker 2 (02:19):
So months prior to us going overseas, I had been
chatting with my friend Kim Marshall about what we could
do in the missing space to bring about the necessary
changes that we feel are super important. You might recognize
Kim's name. Kim is Bromin Winfield's sister, and we have
become quite close. Anyway, Kim and I had decided to
(02:41):
set up a group of good humans to see what
we could do, and we invited Chris and Adell, Darcy
from Search Dog Sydney, and some other family members who
have l which we referred to as lived experience, to
join us. From there, symposium was created, and with the
team busily working behind the scenes for many many months,
(03:05):
Chris Darcy took on the lead on making this happen.
Speaker 7 (03:11):
I went a whole.
Speaker 1 (03:12):
Little bag, it's my books from the bird even speak, head.
Speaker 4 (03:22):
Down the Sydney very early thirty in the morning, up
at four thirty, get down there for a symposium.
Speaker 2 (03:33):
This was November last year, and just shrive a month
after I'd returned with Joanie. And every time we go
to Sydney, we always planned an extra day so I
could go and visit my dad. He lives up in
the Blue Mountains in a huge two story house he
built himself. So Chris and I once again hired a
(03:54):
car and dumped straight in and headed up the mountains.
I always stop and grab some groceries for him so
we can make some meals to freeze and easy and nutritious,
so he's getting some good, healthy meals. We arrive and
it's mid morning on the friday. The symposium was being
held over the weekend. But we got to Dad's and
(04:14):
we noticed something just wasn't quite right. I spent the day,
cooking and cleaning the house for him and doing some washing.
Before I went away, Dad had told me that he'd
lost his wallet, and every time we'd chat he'd tell
me that he'd organized his new bank cards, his new
driver's license, his pension card, et cetera, et cetera, and
so I actually just thought everything was being done. And
(04:37):
I was pretty impressed actually that my eighty one year
old father was still managing. Okay, that was until it wasn't.
I was putting a load of washing on for him,
and I noticed there were clothes already in the washing machine.
They clearly had not been washed for a long time. Anyway,
I did the washing, disinfected the everything that I needed
(04:57):
to do, hung his pants out on the line, and
I felt something. It was his wallet, remembering he lost
his well in September, so now it was November or
the end of November, and this had told me that
he hadn't done any washing for two months, and this
was not a good sign. Chris and I left Dads
because we had to get back down to our accommodation
(05:18):
in Liverpool in Sydney, which is about a forty five
minute drive, and that would be the start of my
dad's journey with vascular dementia and our journey to help him.
Speaker 1 (05:30):
Called two sheets Tippers often owns a month. I don't know.
Speaker 2 (05:49):
The symposium was a great display of families with missing
loved ones coming together and sharing their stories heartache campaign
with local members and AFP representatives amongst those who attended.
It was a really great show of unity amongst those
of us living with a missing person and the help
(06:10):
as I said of Chris Darcy and Adele from Search
Dog Sydney, who have a real passion and want to
help in this space and know the hurdles and we
face and what we deal with on a daily basis.
So the new year rolls around and I had to
end up having surgery myself on my mouth, which had
(06:31):
its own challenges and saw me out of action for
a few weeks actually while I was trying to recover
with a minor complication.
Speaker 8 (06:38):
But on the upside, I couldn't speak for a few days,
so probably everyone was happy about that.
Speaker 2 (06:43):
Then a month later, nineteenth of February, we talk about
finding my dad a permanent place up here in Queensland
and get ready to bring him up. It was one
of our last trips down to the mountain, and I
said to Chris, let's go and take a look at
this Floribella Pass at Warramoo. So many of you have
mentioned to me over the years that this potentially is
(07:05):
where my mum saw the name Flora Bella and potentially
why she changed her name to it. So we just
did a bit of a detour and went.
Speaker 3 (07:14):
To have a look.
Speaker 7 (07:19):
It's that turns this is a dead end. Okay, hang on,
let's just do a loop de loop. So we're just
making our way up to the mountain today, technically the
(07:44):
last time coming up here for a long time.
Speaker 1 (07:48):
He that street name, chrisin Flora Bella Street, So we thought.
Speaker 4 (07:53):
We've had so many people comment and send us messages
about this place that they found in Warrimoo in the
Blue Mountains called Flora Bella Pass. And I'm always in
such a hurry and such a rush to get up
to Dad's that I never ever stopped to get a
chance to do these sorts of things. And we're on
(08:16):
our way to Springwood. We do there in about thirty
five minutes for lunch, catching up with some of my
mum's close friends and her students.
Speaker 1 (08:25):
That she taught at Springwood Primary School.
Speaker 2 (08:28):
When about twenty five of us catching up today, which
I'm really looking forward to. But on the way, I
thought we might just go down Florabella Street.
Speaker 4 (08:39):
Road down to Florabella Pass. You have to kind of
think Chris and I were just talking. Is this how
she found out about the name Florabella? Because I don't
know about you guys, but I've never heard that name before.
Speaker 1 (08:57):
Okay, well I think we're I don't think we're going
to go down that road because parking down parking. I
want to go down there at tire to walk down today.
But anyway, this is Florabella.
Speaker 9 (09:16):
Road, which is interesting because that's warm Public School, war.
Speaker 1 (09:22):
Remove Public School, Florabella.
Speaker 4 (09:24):
Do you think she's Do you think she's been to
that school maybe one day and saw the name, No doubt.
Speaker 1 (09:30):
See, I've never driven anyhow.
Speaker 4 (09:32):
I've lived on the Blue Mountains for a very long
time when I was a kid. I can't say we
ever came off the highway to turn into Warrior Moon.
Speaker 1 (09:41):
But anyway, we'll keep heading.
Speaker 2 (09:44):
Up to spring Wood now to go and go and
see mum's friends. So something I have learned in this
journey is you've got to grab every single opportunity you can,
and I safely can say I do do this. So
being that I was going back and forth to Sydney
(10:05):
pretty much every single weekend from the beginning of January
to the middle of March, helping my dad with his
house and putting him into respite, trying to find him
permanent accommodation up in Brisbane, et cetera, et cetera, it
was quite challenging and I really had to put anything
(10:25):
I was doing for Mum on hold while I went
and sort of dad out and helped him out as
best I could. But I did have an opportunity and
reached out to the Attorney general It's office in Sydney
and ended up speaking with his chief of staff and
I told him I was coming to Sydney and I
(10:45):
would like to meet with them.
Speaker 5 (10:47):
Okay, so I've just met with the Attorney.
Speaker 1 (10:51):
General's chief of staff.
Speaker 8 (10:53):
What a lovely man.
Speaker 1 (10:55):
Thank goodness.
Speaker 5 (10:57):
He has already started the ball rolling. He has spoken
to the Police Commissioner asking for a push to be
done on this. He's also spoken to the DPP and
he's also asking for them.
Speaker 8 (11:11):
They have said to him that they're not.
Speaker 5 (11:12):
An investigative unit, so it has to come from the police,
but they are going to push for that as well,
and I'm so happy that that is happening. I've just
given him a massive bundle for those documents.
Speaker 1 (11:30):
Told him I.
Speaker 5 (11:30):
Didn't want to overwhelm him, but he's like, no, thank
you for giving me all of that. He seemed really
interested with every single article out of the Australian I
printed off in big A three and he was very
happy to have all of that as well. Because the
information is documented there, they can read it.
Speaker 1 (11:48):
It's been legal.
Speaker 5 (11:49):
I wouldn't get into the papers unless that had all
taken place, and thankfully the Australian has such a good
reputation for that it does make a difference.
Speaker 2 (11:59):
Yeah, okay, So it's now the sixth of March and
Chris and I fly my dad up to Brisbane.
Speaker 3 (12:08):
We had to do it by ourselves.
Speaker 2 (12:09):
We asked for or the place that Dad had been
staying in for respite in Lua had requested that we
get some help in transport getting him down to the airport,
but he was declined. Very challenging and very sad for
me to watch my dad, just the simple things like
not remembering what the tray table was in the seat.
(12:29):
He kept playing with it and he kept telling me
he wanted it out, and he didn't understand. He could
not work out how to open the flap to pull
out the tray table. Yeah, it was just, yeah, very sad,
very sad time. But you know where he is now.
He's settled. It's a beautiful facility. They're lovely people and
they care about him, and you know, he's in the
(12:52):
best possible care that he can have. And good news
is he's up here in Brisbane so I can actually
go and visit him a few times a week, which
is nice, and he can see the kids a lot
more than he was when he was down in the mountains.
Speaker 6 (13:11):
So after so many people messaging us both and posting
on socials asking when we were going to tell everyone
what we had found when we were overseas, we did
start seriously looking at how we could share it with everyone,
because there was so much and we just weren't quite
sure how to share that and the best way of
(13:32):
doing so.
Speaker 8 (13:34):
I am very lucky.
Speaker 2 (13:35):
I work with an amazing human who has quietly stood
by my side for some years now, maybe three. I
think we met around May of twenty twenty two. Her
name is Lauren, and I asked her what she thought
about all this, and she put me in contact with
the very talented Jay Orkarden from pod Shape here in Brisbane,
(13:58):
and the idea of doing the Missing Matter podcast was born.
Speaker 6 (14:06):
It really struck me, as I was saying to Sala,
I'd always thought of Marian as quite a mature person,
but then when I actually looked at sal and thought, wow,
so Marian was actually the same age you were when
she went missing.
Speaker 3 (14:21):
So to me, that really.
Speaker 6 (14:23):
Struck me as to how young Marin actually was. She
was not someone ready to retire. She was in the
middle of her career. She just won the award the
previous year, so that was quite striking actually to have
that realization about how actually.
Speaker 3 (14:42):
Young she was at the time that she did disappear.
Speaker 2 (14:47):
I wonder if any of you have that same sort
of mindset, because we're talking about my mum. Sure we've
got lots of photos of her online, but yeah, I
guess for me too, it's been quite a weird time
in life at this point. I've talked about it quite
a few times because I think it's I find it
quite are in my own head to think that I'm
the same age my mum was when she disappeared, and
(15:09):
now I'm fifty two, and that's when the coroner sage,
that's how odd she was when she passed away.
Speaker 3 (15:14):
I don't know it.
Speaker 2 (15:15):
It does play with your head a little bit, and
I do feel like it's done a full circle. But
you know, here we are and we're still chipping away
trying to find the answers. So Johnie had flown up
a couple of times in April so we could start recording.
We were recording a couple of episodes per visit to
try and get it all happening and writing, pulling it
(15:36):
together with all our footage that we'd captured that were
technically just for ourselves. So there's some funny moments amongst
that as well that we've just captured along the way
when we were completely losing our minds.
Speaker 10 (15:53):
So I will like it in a different way or whatever.
Speaker 11 (16:01):
What's super important is that because it were really just natural.
Speaker 1 (16:08):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (16:10):
So then on the twenty third of May, Johny flew
up again.
Speaker 8 (16:14):
It was a.
Speaker 2 (16:15):
Friday, and we're trying to between her. I work full time,
Johnie works as well. She's in Melbourne. I'm in Brisbane.
The studio happens to be in Brisbane, so we were
trying to always work out when suited everybody the best
and we could take some time to do our recordings.
So Johnny comes up. It's May twenty third. It is
a Friday, and we were planned to record all day
(16:37):
Friday and all day Monday, so that meant that we
had the weekend free, but not for long. Johnny and
I start early, We jump in the car and we
head down to Bayer and Bay this same time.
Speaker 1 (16:54):
This is the dead end.
Speaker 2 (16:56):
So on the Saturday, we had planned to go and
tick off quite a few boxes. We wanted to go
to antique places, we wanted to go to coin locations.
Speaker 8 (17:08):
We wanted to go and knock.
Speaker 2 (17:10):
On doors of neighbors and talk to them and see
if people remembered anything from nineteen ninety seven, people that
we hadn't been able to contact prior, even though we
had emails and we had phone numbers and we have tried,
we just haven't been able to get through to some
of these people. So we just took it as an
advantage of time that we don't often get together to
(17:33):
do all these things and we set about and went
on our Mary Waite. The first place we went was
Burly to meet up with a person who had some
really close interaction with the to head of every family
on the Gold Coast. It was such an interesting and
quite emotional conversation. Surprisingly, so it did fill in a
(17:55):
lot of gaps. It confirmed some aspects that we hadn't
heard before. It also confirmed things that we had heard
before but didn't know for sure. And yeah, it just
added a few more pieces to the puzzles.
Speaker 3 (18:08):
So thank you very much to that person.
Speaker 6 (18:11):
You know who you are, and we really appreciate you
meeting up with us on that day. And our first
stop was a little place called Eurelba, So we went
and visited a person there who may actually hold records
of interest in relation to where Marian's money went in
nineteen ninety seven.
Speaker 2 (18:32):
Yeah, some of it was quite interesting because we had
information about where people were living at the time in
nineteen ninety seven nineteen ninety eight, and we wanted to
just go and ask some questions to those people and
see if people were still living there, what they saw,
if they saw anything, what they could tell us about that.
(18:56):
I actually remember driving there's a space in Ballina that
you drive between one part of Balaner and another, and
he's probably why they call it East Balano and whatnot.
But it's just on either side of the road, it's
just bushland. And I remember Jeroni looking at me and
she just said to me, God, it gives me quivers
(19:16):
driving through here. I just have a bad feeling, bad feeling. Unfortunately,
we were met with the same problem that we seemingly
have the whole way through this journey, where we turned
up to places that said they were open and they
(19:37):
were just bolted shut.
Speaker 10 (19:39):
So I just I.
Speaker 2 (19:41):
Find it quite baffling actually to think that something can
be advertised online as open and active and.
Speaker 3 (19:48):
It just isn't.
Speaker 2 (19:50):
So one place we went to was out the back
of Woop Boop. My car wasn't coping so well on
the dirt roads, but we went out there nonetheless, and
there was a big orchard out there and this massive,
big old shed that had.
Speaker 8 (20:07):
All these antiques in it.
Speaker 2 (20:08):
We really wanted to speak to that man, but yeah,
it just was shut up, like you know. We were
literally there one minute after closing time at midday and
it was closed up, like no one had been there
for the whole day. So yeah, it was a bit
frustrating once again because we wanted to talk to people
and they just weren't there. Another area, there is a
(20:31):
gentleman who we asked quite a bit for him to
be called as a witness to the inquest, and we
were declined multiple times, and I don't really understand why
that was the case. But anyway, we know his business
and we actually know where he lives, and a business
(20:52):
address is linked to his home address, and so we
decided to go for a drive up to his house.
It's scary doing this stuff right like this is not comfortable,
and we're not trying to invade people's privacy or do
(21:15):
the wrong thing. We just wanted to go and ask
some questions, see if they were aware of the situation
and what they knew. But unfortunately, rocking up to their
front door, no one was home. The dogs were nipping
at our feet telling us to get off the property.
So we just popped a flyer in the mailbox and left.
Speaker 12 (21:37):
Like you do realize that this is like all part
of it, right with you visiting these sites, even if
we don't get any kind of information. I think it's
kind of good even for both of us.
Speaker 1 (21:50):
To be honest, you know, we've been researching it.
Speaker 2 (21:54):
Any who, In true Joanie and Sally fashion, we just
kept on going on. That particular day was tricky because
there was a couple of things and places we went
where either I didn't feel comfortable going or Joney wasn't
one hundred percent sure we should go, and the.
Speaker 8 (22:13):
Two of us have to sit there.
Speaker 2 (22:14):
We're like sisters, really, we just sort of sit there
and go back and forth on I don't know about this,
and what do you think? Well, I don't know, we
think we should do this, and there is a bit
of banter between us as to what the right decision
is and what we should be doing, because at the
end of the day, we shouldn't be doing this. It's
not our job. I don't get paid to do this,
neither does Joni. This is actually something that the police
(22:36):
should be doing. And I find it really frustrating that
we continue to give them all this information and everything
we have. They ask us for the information, or you've
got more information, can you send it to us. We
put it in a very detailed email, It gets sent
to them and we don't get a response, so we
don't know what they're doing. We don't know what they're
following up with, and I find that very very very
(22:59):
hard to manage in my head, not even a care
and concern pay just letting you know we're still chipping
at this, or we're doing this on this side, or
they tell me something is they're doing something, and then nothing,
I don't hear anything about it, So it is quite
tricky to manage.
Speaker 8 (23:17):
Anyway.
Speaker 2 (23:17):
That night, we stayed in Byron and we've become both
Jonie and I actually have become really good friends with
We refer to them as the THEO Girls, but they
do have their own identities as well. So Sherry, Renee
and Jackie. Jacki and Renee are the beautiful twins, and
the three of them together collectively have worked tirelessly on
(23:40):
THEO Hayes's case. They were the team who came together
to support the family. Help the family. They did searches,
they found his hat. When police had already done a
search and didn't find the hat, they went back and
did another search afterwards and found it in the bush.
These guys are amazing humans, and you know, I just
(24:01):
want to take time out to say thank you to them,
because good people like that who actually make a massive
difference in this space. We went out for dinner and
we had a lovely dinner with them on the Saturday night. Yeah,
and then we headed back to our hotel, had a sleep,
not a very good one, and work up the next
day and had some breakfast. And then that's when Journey
(24:24):
and I went, what are we going to do today?
It's raining. What's the plan? She wanted to go to
this place called Wooden Bong. It's like, I don't know,
two hours and ten minutes drive from Byron West so
Inland and then from there to get back to Brisbane,
it's about the same time again, so it's about like
a five hour journey for us to go from Byron
(24:44):
to Wooden Bong and then back into Brisbane, not taking
into consideration all the stops that we wanted to do
along the way. But there were quite a few art dealers,
antique dealers and who were current today. And Joanie had
done all her homework to work out that these people
who were running these places in these locations which were
in the middle of nowhere, some of them, we're still
(25:06):
the same people who owned and operate them today.
Speaker 1 (25:19):
Hello, here are you going?
Speaker 3 (25:22):
Is your name fred.
Speaker 13 (25:25):
My name is Stony Condos is a Sally Lady.
Speaker 3 (25:30):
We've come, we're.
Speaker 13 (25:31):
Coming through the wooden bowl, but we've come to short
we catch it on the way.
Speaker 3 (25:36):
Okay, so get ready, ready, come out.
Speaker 14 (25:43):
So you've been suggested to come and talk to about
antiques around here in the nineteen nineties.
Speaker 3 (25:53):
Were you in were you doing anything like that? Or
have I got the wrong play?
Speaker 2 (25:59):
Yeah?
Speaker 3 (25:59):
All right, that's.
Speaker 11 (26:01):
How long ago?
Speaker 14 (26:02):
Do your jantique shirt? Was it like two thousands? I'm
going to show you.
Speaker 3 (26:14):
I'm going to show you a photo. Do you know
this bloke? This man, his name is Rick Frederick, the
head of ary.
Speaker 6 (26:25):
H.
Speaker 11 (26:26):
So is that him?
Speaker 14 (26:29):
Well, everyone says it, So I'll show you. It's interesting
to you because I can talk to you and I'll
just I'll find another photo that will help the name
to it.
Speaker 11 (26:42):
But in the same business he would have gone to
auctions and stuff and.
Speaker 3 (26:48):
Coins.
Speaker 11 (26:51):
I didn't deal with them. I had plenty. I just
sold a coin collection to go and Lismore. But no,
it wasn't that. I've got heaps of coins, but never
dealt in him. That's interesting. Let me make your coffee,
let me let my brain to go. Yeah, yeah, you
drink coffee.
Speaker 7 (27:10):
Hello, Hello, hello there looking for I.
Speaker 2 (27:17):
Just saw a picture of you on the back of
the mother was going out with this fella six ninety seven,
after ninety seven.
Speaker 1 (27:26):
Yeah, yeah, him in ninety seven and disappeared.
Speaker 11 (27:33):
We talked to how do you to her?
Speaker 3 (27:37):
No, but he's on our list.
Speaker 5 (27:39):
Through my journey and telling my mom's story, we've actually
found a number of other women who have had dealings
with this guy of similar nature.
Speaker 8 (27:47):
So he's still married to the same woman, which is
the woman in.
Speaker 1 (27:50):
That picture there. Yeah, they've been together.
Speaker 13 (27:53):
So she was nine, remember, so she went as Anne
when they're in wooden bunks winners Anne or Diane the
head of very m Yeah, tea something sounds horrible.
Speaker 4 (28:11):
Huh wouldn't go into a pretty small area and everyone seems.
Speaker 8 (28:14):
Tonio everybody maybe they might remember something.
Speaker 1 (28:18):
Well, how about the other remember might remember something?
Speaker 11 (28:22):
Huh yeah, look uh yeah, look he's a p Yeah, okay,
bad he's the eighties now, Oh.
Speaker 14 (28:32):
Alright, who else would make the open to us having
a cha to ay or do you reckon?
Speaker 1 (28:36):
They think?
Speaker 5 (28:37):
Have yeah?
Speaker 11 (28:38):
Thstup? Black? Yeah and fine, she was there all the time,
what she Hey, I don't remember any of 'em fans
love a shock.
Speaker 9 (28:49):
Ah, yes, yeah, you should be one to hit Yeah.
Speaker 7 (28:55):
Hello, yeah, it's good clad like we look in say hooray.
Speaker 4 (29:02):
Oh yeah.
Speaker 1 (29:04):
Oh but he looks very familiar. So he's a tall
belly like six foot four.
Speaker 15 (29:12):
Just picks too.
Speaker 6 (29:17):
That's my world.
Speaker 8 (29:19):
So the other thing is like, I don't think my
mum came out here, but.
Speaker 6 (29:25):
It was.
Speaker 8 (29:25):
The timeline was at matchup with when they lived here.
Speaker 1 (29:28):
And when we moved in.
Speaker 3 (29:29):
But so we were told to go and see.
Speaker 9 (29:39):
Yeah, it's a weird next saw me he got a
house or something or well, it's quite just go down
this show, turn right on Derek Road and it's see only.
Speaker 11 (29:54):
All right.
Speaker 3 (29:54):
So I'm going down, just walking down the main street
of Wooden Bong.
Speaker 1 (30:00):
Looking for the house of.
Speaker 4 (30:07):
So.
Speaker 15 (30:07):
Interestingly enough, his house is pretty much adjacent to where
Rick Bloom's house was, opposite the pool. So if he
doesn't know him, then I don't know who else would
actually know him. So let's just see how we go.
Speaker 3 (30:34):
You weren't here in the late eighties, were you.
Speaker 1 (30:38):
With my wife? Are you serious? Well?
Speaker 3 (30:43):
Did you know that the head of very family?
Speaker 1 (30:46):
The head of Very?
Speaker 6 (30:50):
So there was Rick and Diane and they had two
kids and they lived at Number two in the eighties.
Speaker 14 (30:58):
Right opposite their pool there opposite Oh yeah, yeah it.
Speaker 3 (31:05):
Doesn't see how community too, yeah, like te.
Speaker 1 (31:11):
And so after a.
Speaker 2 (31:12):
Massive day, I think we ended up driving for about
I don't know, seven and a half hours, eight hours.
Speaker 3 (31:18):
It was a big day.
Speaker 8 (31:19):
We didn't eat any lunch.
Speaker 2 (31:21):
We were just on the go, going, bouncing from one
place to the next, trying to get as much information
as we possibly could, just to put it on file.
Speaker 8 (31:30):
We've done it.
Speaker 2 (31:30):
It's something we wanted to do for a while, and
we ticked those boxes. Monday, we recorded the final episodes
for the podcast, and then came the editing and making
sure that you know, everything was in there that.
Speaker 8 (31:49):
We needed to have in there for you guys.
Speaker 2 (31:51):
And you know, I just want to take this opportunity
to say a massive thanks firstly to Joonie for being
here standing with me. Doing this takes bravery, it takes courage,
It takes strength, It takes knowledge and time and effort
to put all these things together and be constantly working
on it. It is a labor of love, I would say,
(32:13):
because it is quite challenging at times and you know,
I wouldn't be able to do that without her, And
I'm so sorry that you've only heard my voice mostly
today in this episode, but it's important that we keep
letting you know that we are still working. There are
still things to being behind the scenes, and I am
still writing to the AFP, I am still talking to
(32:36):
New South Wales Police. I am still making sure that
people are understanding what the situation is and knowing that,
you know, we need to do better in this space,
and this should never happen to anybody, particularly if they
have a missing person. People should not have to fight
this hard to get the answers and to be heard.
Speaker 8 (32:56):
So you know, without you guys here.
Speaker 2 (32:58):
Listening and supporting and sharing and caring about not just
me but all the missing, that's what counts.
Speaker 3 (33:07):
There's much going on behind the scenes.
Speaker 6 (33:10):
I just thought i'd give you a little snippet of
things that we've been working on thus far as a
result of our overseas trip, the trip to northern New
South Wales, and just what we're going to be doing
going forward. So in Japan, we're pursuing getting the movement
records for Marying going in and out of Japan. This
also includes the South Korean records, because of course it's
(33:32):
not just the movement into Japan, but if we can
get the South Korean records, then that would also show
us with Marian leaving South Korea where her ultimate destination
was from South Korea. So that is what is happening
in Japan at the moment. In the UK, we are
still actively talking with SPINK about offering records to police
(33:55):
here in Australia if there's anything relevant in that nineteen
ninety seven time period. Unfortunately with the catalog there was
no matches, but sales records that's been called would show
if there was anything relevant purchased over that time Belgium. Look,
I'm really determined to locate Nicole, who was Rick Bloom's
(34:17):
second wife, so I've written actually written letters to all
the families with the same surname in that area seeking
help in attempting to locate her. We'll definitely keep you
posted on that. The KBR are willing to provide information
to the New South Wales Police. I've also written to
the family accountant's family members to seek further information, and
(34:42):
also to the man's family who Blam apparently traveled with
to the French Riviera in June July nineteen ninety seven,
just to see whether they be willing to engage about
the legitimacy. Just remembering that Rick Blooms stated that Jean
Pierre Coppernole his cousin, that he went and interacted with him,
(35:05):
and Jean Pierre actually gave him money to fund the
trip in nineteen ninety seven. Now Jean Pierre has provided
a documentation that disapproves this and that has been submitted
to New South Wales Police in Luxembourg. Tom and I
continue to work together strongly to push forward that element
(35:25):
of the story. There is actually a new development there
and hopefully we will be able to hear you know,
everyone will be able to hear about this soon. This
new information does shed light on another aspect of Blum's life.
There's a few things that I do want to specifically
call out for, and that was anyone who attended line
(35:46):
dancing events or classes with the instructor Liz Collette on
the Gold Coast in the nineteen nineties, I would love
to hear from you. And also if anyone from the
Southport school community knew anybody living in Anne or Miles
Street Marian might have known that's in Ashmore. If you
(36:09):
can please get in touch with me. I wish to
assure everybody that we are not going away. We are
not giving up. Work remains absolutely ongoing. It may run
a little bit slower these days because I've returned to
work almost full time, but it remains very active, very
(36:31):
much alive, very much the front of mind, and we're
not giving up.
Speaker 3 (36:37):
We just need that one piece.
Speaker 6 (36:40):
This is a massive, huge thanks to everyone who's helped
along the way. We could not have gotten this far
without you all. A huge shout out to the Balan,
a retiree who continues to push and explore in detailed
areas that need that intense exploration that only he does best.
Speaker 2 (37:00):
So thank you, and thank you to Podshape Productions here
in Brisbane Jay for you know, supporting me and helping
me share my mum's story with you all. So what's
the next phase here in this journey. It's twenty eight
years mum's been missing and Joanie is still working very
(37:25):
much behind the scenes. She's still very very busy. She's
she does a lot of stuff that I don't do,
so we're not doubling up on things, so Joanie's going
to be working hard in that background, and I am
actually going to be working on the side here on
a few other projects. So most of you following along
(37:46):
with know we released some tickets on Sunday for a
memorial high tee that I'm hosting here in Brisbane on
the twenty eighth of September for my mum. It would
be her eightieth birthday that week, and I wanted to
do something. I've never been able to do anything to
celebrate my mum. It's hard when you don't have a
body and you don't know what's happened to your missing
(38:08):
person to be able to decide what are you going
to do? And I mean I just was watching I
think it was Insight on SBS and a lady was
talking about with their family they've got a missing person
and she was saying, I think she's the auntie and
she was saying she wanted to suggest it to the
(38:28):
mother of the missing daughter, you know, what, should we
do a memorial? And she said, oh, you know, the
mom doesn't want to do that because she feels like
she's giving up on her daughter by holding a memorial.
And it kind of broke my heart because for me,
I haven't. I've got nowhere to go, I've got nowhere
to sit and think about my mum. I just don't
(38:50):
know what to do, and I guess I did feel
a bit like I didn't want to do anything until
such time as had been to an inquest and the
coroner had made her decisions and we could grapple with
what those decisions were and move forward, and I got
a death certificate. I have a better understanding now, after
(39:11):
everything I've been through going public and hating to share
my story with everyone, I have a better understanding now
of what's happened to my mum than I did say
seven years ago. And I am really grateful for that
because there's an element of peace that I can put
in my heart, and I am at peace with Mum.
Being a missing person doesn't mean that I don't miss her,
(39:32):
doesn't mean that I don't want to find her, or
that I don't want to keep pushing for justice to
be served, because I I one hundred percent you all
know I will do that. But there's an element of
peace for me, and I need that so that I
can actually be a good human and not be stressed
and not be coping with anxiety all the time and
(39:53):
worry all the time, and I can just be present
in my own life and with my children and my
husband and my friends, and you know it doesn't consume me,
because it has done that at times, as you can
probably appreciate. So the memorial high Tea will be a
wonderful celebration of Mum's life. We're doing a high tea
(40:14):
because my mum loved to drink tea anybody that knows
her in the fine bone china cup with lots of yummyfoods,
so we've got pretty little tea parties is actually helping
me with all the gorgeous delicacies that we're having.
Speaker 8 (40:28):
Will have champagne.
Speaker 2 (40:30):
We've invited Headley Thomas to come along as our special guest,
So Headley's coming and I just think it's going to
be a wonderful day of celebration. Everyone can wear some
high tea floral afternoon tea party vibes with the touch
of green, and I think we still have about thirty
tickets left. So you can jump on our website which
(40:51):
is www dot the Missingmatter dot com and go to
the link for Marion's High Tea.
Speaker 8 (40:57):
Scroll down you'll see the.
Speaker 2 (40:58):
Tickets available there, and I hope to see everyone there
who can make it.
Speaker 8 (41:05):
To say a big shout out to Sarah and Julie.
Speaker 2 (41:08):
They have been queens in the background trying to source
fundraising raffle prizes.
Speaker 8 (41:15):
I couldn't do this without them.
Speaker 2 (41:17):
There is a team sitting behind me who are helping
me with all of this, and I want to shout
out to all of them as well. I'm totally toughed
that so many people want to be there and help
me celebrate and remember Mum and just give me somewhere
where I can. I drive past the location where we're
having the venue for when we're having the high tea
every day, so I think it's.
Speaker 3 (41:36):
A really pretty place.
Speaker 2 (41:37):
I always look up at it every time I drive past,
and I think my Mum would really love.
Speaker 8 (41:42):
Love us doing that for her.
Speaker 2 (41:44):
Now, when it comes to the fundraising side of things,
there's another little project I've got going on in the
side because I know I just like to give myself
something else to do. It's called the Green Seat Project,
and what we're doing is any money's made from the
fundraising raffle which will be drawn at the event, and
any donation we manage to get from people will be
(42:08):
going into the Green Seat project and I'm currently working
with Brisbane City Council to see if we can get
approval for these bench seats to go in.
Speaker 8 (42:19):
I'm starting small. I'm starting with one and then we'll
build on it from there.
Speaker 2 (42:24):
But the idea is it's a green seat, it's in
a prominent position somewhere in Brisbane. I've sort of nominated
Kangaroo Point Cliffs because there's a beautiful look out there
looking up the river and for me, I want to
have somewhere where you can look out because I don't
know where my mum is, so I want to be
able to look out to the view and the idea of.
Speaker 8 (42:42):
Thinking about my mum.
Speaker 2 (42:43):
And on the chairs, we'll have the Missing Matter written
and there'll be a QR code, and that QR code
you can scan. It will take you to the website
and we're going to start building the website, the missingmatter
dot com, with profiles of missing persons with their photographs
and a little blob from their families so that when
people scan it they can actually read stories about people
(43:04):
who are missing. And this is simply to bring awareness
to this space because the Missing Matter, as I say,
and they should not be forgotten.
Speaker 8 (43:12):
So if you would like to donate to this cause,
please let me know.
Speaker 2 (43:16):
You can reach me via my email which is Sally
at sally laden dot com, and you can also reach
me via the website or on my socials. And lastly,
I have some exciting news to tell you that we
are going to be continuing the Missing Matter podcast to
help others in this space. So if I can introduce
(43:38):
the idea that the TMMT Moving Forward is inviting families
with missing persons to come on in a special episode
just about their missing loved one. I figured that we
have this platform that has been established and I would
(44:00):
really love the opportunity to help other people who potentially
haven't had a lot of meat, or people haven't heard
about their missing person and they might have that key
piece of information, so super important in my heart that
we give those people.
Speaker 3 (44:14):
A voice as well.
Speaker 2 (44:16):
So something some of you might not know, but Jay,
who owns pod Shape, he has a missing person as well.
Speaker 8 (44:22):
His uncle is a missing person.
Speaker 10 (44:24):
The moment we met, and obviously I knew your story
from the media like most people, I think the moment
I met you and Chris I thought exactly what most
people think, like how can I help, which I think
is where you sit now, right. It's like, your mum's missing,
you don't have any answers. You want to find the answers,
(44:47):
but you are living still with this ambiguous loss. So
when we caught up for the first time, I was like, Okay,
there's more to this story. And it's not just a
missing person. It's the story of the loss that everyone suffers.
And I know that, like you, it wasn't my mum,
(45:08):
but it was my uncle who went missing. And why
it was important for me is because I was only
little when he went missing. I was like four. I
don't really remember him, but I do remember Mum, and
I remember how it affected Mum, and then my Grandpap
how it affected him. Mum said to me when I
was much older, that she reckons losing her brother and
(45:34):
her dad. Losing her son ended her dad's life because
he just was fighting for an answer.
Speaker 2 (45:43):
Just listening to you say that, it's the flow on effect. Right,
It's not just that someone's missing, but who is that
missingness touched and who has it affected and how did
it affect them? It's an important conversation I think to
have and too often, I guess for me in my situation,
(46:03):
I remember when the Lady was at its peak and
it was just everywhere I turned, My mum was everywhere,
and you know, my kids had to deal with that,
you know, they had to go to school and UNI
and people going, oh my god, I didn't realize your
grandmother is a missing person. So there's been lots of
challenges which haven't really been exposed or talked about in
an open public forum. But you know, there is that
(46:26):
back end that families are coping with. And you know,
I was just talking with Zee Maya yesterday. Zee and
I have become friends. You know, I think her and
I from the same ink. You know, it was similar people,
and we're just keep fighting for the truth and fighting
for ances. And you know, she was telling me yesterday
that she hasn't heard from the police who have Warren's
(46:48):
case for thirteen years. And I mean, my god, what
is wrong with the world when the people who have
a missing person are just left there to work it
out themselves. And I guess if I think back, there
was a couple of people who came in to MySpace
when things were up and running with mum's story. Finally,
(47:10):
Oh my gosh, how come your mum gets all the
media attention? How come your mum's in all the newspapers
and everyone's talking about Mary and my dad?
Speaker 3 (47:19):
You know, matters he.
Speaker 1 (47:20):
Where is he?
Speaker 15 (47:21):
Like?
Speaker 2 (47:21):
He's not getting any attention. I felt really confronted by that,
to be honest. So I mean, for me, it had
taken me twenty two years for anybody to actually listen
to me in the media to help, Like I'd been
knocking on doors and asking questions. I also had the
problem where Mum's family didn't want me to do it,
so they sort of door stopped me, and I felt
(47:43):
I was doing the wrong thing if I did that,
and I had to really just put myself in a
box and go just I don't want to do anything
while my grandmother was still alive because I didn't want
to hurt her. I didn't want to upset her, and
she was living by herself in her nineties, and so
it wasn't until after she passed away that I actually
started going down that route. I just really want to help,
(48:04):
like this, it's not just about my mum. My mum
is one of many who are missing in this universe.
And you know, I think they all deserve a voice,
and they all deserve to be heard, and the families
deserve to have an opportunity to share their story, not
for you know, three minutes or one minute on a
TV show amongst many give them a platform to actually
(48:27):
do it.
Speaker 10 (48:28):
The new show, it's called The Missing Matter. Still it's
going to be in this feed, but it's going to
be a weekly show.
Speaker 2 (48:34):
Well, yes, in between me working full time, as Jaye's
laughing at me, I am going to do my absolute
best to I'll hold you account script and put it
a really good quality podcast together for people with absolute
respect and understanding and empathy for what we're telling, because
(48:55):
I think that's really important too. We've got to remember,
these people tell their stories and then they go back
home to their reality of they still don't know where
their missing person is. So I'm really hoping that we
can shine some light on a different audience for the people,
like some of the people who have actually worked really
hard and they do have quite good audiences who are
listening and following along, but that might be in Tasmania.
(49:18):
So let's open that up to helping spread the word everywhere, don't.
There's no limits as to who can hear it, and
someone might just know or have seen something or can
offer some assistance. The way I'd like to see it
happen is the episodes we've just been doing for Mum
was the Missing Matter, Marian matters. This will now become
(49:39):
the Missing Matter, Warren Matters, Jawn Jasper.
Speaker 8 (49:43):
Matters, and I think it's important that we bring them into.
Speaker 3 (49:47):
This space and help them where we can.
Speaker 6 (49:49):
I'm wishing Seal every success in the next iteration of
the Missing Matter podcast. It's a totally exciting space, and I,
for one, will be listening keenly as the new episodes
are released.
Appoche production.
Speaker 2 (00:14):
Hi everyone, and welcome back to a bonus episode of
The Missing Matter. We've had a lot of people asking
us if episode ten was going to be the last,
and well, we really thought that it might be for
a little while until we had something else to really
chat about. But we have been working pretty hard in
the background, and we thought we'd jump in today and
(00:37):
tell you a little bit about what has been happening,
because it's been rather crazy, no surprise to most of you,
I am flying solo today. Jonie was supposed to be
chipping in with me, but unfortunately her little boys not
very well, so she's looking after him and I'm taking
the reins and hopefully we'll be able to tell you
(00:59):
together what we've been doing with some of the things
we've captured.
Speaker 3 (01:02):
Along the way.
Speaker 2 (01:04):
So if I ride back to October twenty fourth, twenty
twenty four, Johnny and I arrived super early at six
twenty am into Brisbane Airport after not much sleep. We
gave each other a massive hug and I had to
run as Darcy was going into surgery that day.
Speaker 1 (01:25):
You know what I hate about flying, especially these long
wall flights. You fall asleep and you think you've had
a really good sleep. You've wake up and you go, right,
we must be nearly there.
Speaker 4 (01:38):
You go, oh, we've actually got eight hours to go.
Speaker 1 (01:42):
It's that is quite horrendous. It's not a very fun,
fun part of traveling.
Speaker 5 (01:49):
Darcy has surgery tomorrow, nothing too serious, but she's never
had a surgery before, so.
Speaker 6 (01:59):
Can you this story. I, on the other hand, had
decided to book my flat back to Melbourne later in
the day just in case there were any delays, so
we were.
Speaker 3 (02:10):
On time arriving.
Speaker 6 (02:11):
But my flight to Melbourne was actually delayed, so I
had to spend most of the day at the airport
waiting for my flight back home.
Speaker 2 (02:19):
So months prior to us going overseas, I had been
chatting with my friend Kim Marshall about what we could
do in the missing space to bring about the necessary
changes that we feel are super important. You might recognize
Kim's name. Kim is Bromin Winfield's sister, and we have
become quite close. Anyway, Kim and I had decided to
(02:41):
set up a group of good humans to see what
we could do, and we invited Chris and Adell, Darcy
from Search Dog Sydney, and some other family members who
have l which we referred to as lived experience, to
join us. From there, symposium was created, and with the
team busily working behind the scenes for many many months,
(03:05):
Chris Darcy took on the lead on making this happen.
Speaker 7 (03:11):
I went a whole.
Speaker 1 (03:12):
Little bag, it's my books from the bird even speak, head.
Speaker 4 (03:22):
Down the Sydney very early thirty in the morning, up
at four thirty, get down there for a symposium.
Speaker 2 (03:33):
This was November last year, and just shrive a month
after I'd returned with Joanie. And every time we go
to Sydney, we always planned an extra day so I
could go and visit my dad. He lives up in
the Blue Mountains in a huge two story house he
built himself. So Chris and I once again hired a
(03:54):
car and dumped straight in and headed up the mountains.
I always stop and grab some groceries for him so
we can make some meals to freeze and easy and nutritious,
so he's getting some good, healthy meals. We arrive and
it's mid morning on the friday. The symposium was being
held over the weekend. But we got to Dad's and
(04:14):
we noticed something just wasn't quite right. I spent the day,
cooking and cleaning the house for him and doing some washing.
Before I went away, Dad had told me that he'd
lost his wallet, and every time we'd chat he'd tell
me that he'd organized his new bank cards, his new
driver's license, his pension card, et cetera, et cetera, and
so I actually just thought everything was being done. And
(04:37):
I was pretty impressed actually that my eighty one year
old father was still managing. Okay, that was until it wasn't.
I was putting a load of washing on for him,
and I noticed there were clothes already in the washing machine.
They clearly had not been washed for a long time. Anyway,
I did the washing, disinfected the everything that I needed
(04:57):
to do, hung his pants out on the line, and
I felt something. It was his wallet, remembering he lost
his well in September, so now it was November or
the end of November, and this had told me that
he hadn't done any washing for two months, and this
was not a good sign. Chris and I left Dads
because we had to get back down to our accommodation
(05:18):
in Liverpool in Sydney, which is about a forty five
minute drive, and that would be the start of my
dad's journey with vascular dementia and our journey to help him.
Speaker 1 (05:30):
Called two sheets Tippers often owns a month. I don't know.
Speaker 2 (05:49):
The symposium was a great display of families with missing
loved ones coming together and sharing their stories heartache campaign
with local members and AFP representatives amongst those who attended.
It was a really great show of unity amongst those
of us living with a missing person and the help
(06:10):
as I said of Chris Darcy and Adele from Search
Dog Sydney, who have a real passion and want to
help in this space and know the hurdles and we
face and what we deal with on a daily basis.
So the new year rolls around and I had to
end up having surgery myself on my mouth, which had
(06:31):
its own challenges and saw me out of action for
a few weeks actually while I was trying to recover
with a minor complication.
Speaker 8 (06:38):
But on the upside, I couldn't speak for a few days,
so probably everyone was happy about that.
Speaker 2 (06:43):
Then a month later, nineteenth of February, we talk about
finding my dad a permanent place up here in Queensland
and get ready to bring him up. It was one
of our last trips down to the mountain, and I
said to Chris, let's go and take a look at
this Floribella Pass at Warramoo. So many of you have
mentioned to me over the years that this potentially is
(07:05):
where my mum saw the name Flora Bella and potentially
why she changed her name to it. So we just
did a bit of a detour and went.
Speaker 3 (07:14):
To have a look.
Speaker 7 (07:19):
It's that turns this is a dead end. Okay, hang on,
let's just do a loop de loop. So we're just
making our way up to the mountain today, technically the
(07:44):
last time coming up here for a long time.
Speaker 1 (07:48):
He that street name, chrisin Flora Bella Street, So we thought.
Speaker 4 (07:53):
We've had so many people comment and send us messages
about this place that they found in Warrimoo in the
Blue Mountains called Flora Bella Pass. And I'm always in
such a hurry and such a rush to get up
to Dad's that I never ever stopped to get a
chance to do these sorts of things. And we're on
(08:16):
our way to Springwood. We do there in about thirty
five minutes for lunch, catching up with some of my
mum's close friends and her students.
Speaker 1 (08:25):
That she taught at Springwood Primary School.
Speaker 2 (08:28):
When about twenty five of us catching up today, which
I'm really looking forward to. But on the way, I
thought we might just go down Florabella Street.
Speaker 4 (08:39):
Road down to Florabella Pass. You have to kind of
think Chris and I were just talking. Is this how
she found out about the name Florabella? Because I don't
know about you guys, but I've never heard that name before.
Speaker 1 (08:57):
Okay, well I think we're I don't think we're going
to go down that road because parking down parking. I
want to go down there at tire to walk down today.
But anyway, this is Florabella.
Speaker 9 (09:16):
Road, which is interesting because that's warm Public School, war.
Speaker 1 (09:22):
Remove Public School, Florabella.
Speaker 4 (09:24):
Do you think she's Do you think she's been to
that school maybe one day and saw the name, No doubt.
Speaker 1 (09:30):
See, I've never driven anyhow.
Speaker 4 (09:32):
I've lived on the Blue Mountains for a very long
time when I was a kid. I can't say we
ever came off the highway to turn into Warrior Moon.
Speaker 1 (09:41):
But anyway, we'll keep heading.
Speaker 2 (09:44):
Up to spring Wood now to go and go and
see mum's friends. So something I have learned in this
journey is you've got to grab every single opportunity you can,
and I safely can say I do do this. So
being that I was going back and forth to Sydney
(10:05):
pretty much every single weekend from the beginning of January
to the middle of March, helping my dad with his
house and putting him into respite, trying to find him
permanent accommodation up in Brisbane, et cetera, et cetera, it
was quite challenging and I really had to put anything
(10:25):
I was doing for Mum on hold while I went
and sort of dad out and helped him out as
best I could. But I did have an opportunity and
reached out to the Attorney general It's office in Sydney
and ended up speaking with his chief of staff and
I told him I was coming to Sydney and I
(10:45):
would like to meet with them.
Speaker 5 (10:47):
Okay, so I've just met with the Attorney.
Speaker 1 (10:51):
General's chief of staff.
Speaker 8 (10:53):
What a lovely man.
Speaker 1 (10:55):
Thank goodness.
Speaker 5 (10:57):
He has already started the ball rolling. He has spoken
to the Police Commissioner asking for a push to be
done on this. He's also spoken to the DPP and
he's also asking for them.
Speaker 8 (11:11):
They have said to him that they're not.
Speaker 5 (11:12):
An investigative unit, so it has to come from the police,
but they are going to push for that as well,
and I'm so happy that that is happening. I've just
given him a massive bundle for those documents.
Speaker 1 (11:30):
Told him I.
Speaker 5 (11:30):
Didn't want to overwhelm him, but he's like, no, thank
you for giving me all of that. He seemed really
interested with every single article out of the Australian I
printed off in big A three and he was very
happy to have all of that as well. Because the
information is documented there, they can read it.
Speaker 1 (11:48):
It's been legal.
Speaker 5 (11:49):
I wouldn't get into the papers unless that had all
taken place, and thankfully the Australian has such a good
reputation for that it does make a difference.
Speaker 2 (11:59):
Yeah, okay, So it's now the sixth of March and
Chris and I fly my dad up to Brisbane.
Speaker 3 (12:08):
We had to do it by ourselves.
Speaker 2 (12:09):
We asked for or the place that Dad had been
staying in for respite in Lua had requested that we
get some help in transport getting him down to the airport,
but he was declined. Very challenging and very sad for
me to watch my dad, just the simple things like
not remembering what the tray table was in the seat.
(12:29):
He kept playing with it and he kept telling me
he wanted it out, and he didn't understand. He could
not work out how to open the flap to pull
out the tray table. Yeah, it was just, yeah, very sad,
very sad time. But you know where he is now.
He's settled. It's a beautiful facility. They're lovely people and
they care about him, and you know, he's in the
(12:52):
best possible care that he can have. And good news
is he's up here in Brisbane so I can actually
go and visit him a few times a week, which
is nice, and he can see the kids a lot
more than he was when he was down in the mountains.
Speaker 6 (13:11):
So after so many people messaging us both and posting
on socials asking when we were going to tell everyone
what we had found when we were overseas, we did
start seriously looking at how we could share it with everyone,
because there was so much and we just weren't quite
sure how to share that and the best way of
(13:32):
doing so.
Speaker 8 (13:34):
I am very lucky.
Speaker 2 (13:35):
I work with an amazing human who has quietly stood
by my side for some years now, maybe three. I
think we met around May of twenty twenty two. Her
name is Lauren, and I asked her what she thought
about all this, and she put me in contact with
the very talented Jay Orkarden from pod Shape here in Brisbane,
(13:58):
and the idea of doing the Missing Matter podcast was born.
Speaker 6 (14:06):
It really struck me, as I was saying to Sala,
I'd always thought of Marian as quite a mature person,
but then when I actually looked at sal and thought, wow,
so Marian was actually the same age you were when
she went missing.
Speaker 3 (14:21):
So to me, that really.
Speaker 6 (14:23):
Struck me as to how young Marin actually was. She
was not someone ready to retire. She was in the
middle of her career. She just won the award the
previous year, so that was quite striking actually to have
that realization about how actually.
Speaker 3 (14:42):
Young she was at the time that she did disappear.
Speaker 2 (14:47):
I wonder if any of you have that same sort
of mindset, because we're talking about my mum. Sure we've
got lots of photos of her online, but yeah, I
guess for me too, it's been quite a weird time
in life at this point. I've talked about it quite
a few times because I think it's I find it
quite are in my own head to think that I'm
the same age my mum was when she disappeared, and
(15:09):
now I'm fifty two, and that's when the coroner sage,
that's how odd she was when she passed away.
Speaker 3 (15:14):
I don't know it.
Speaker 2 (15:15):
It does play with your head a little bit, and
I do feel like it's done a full circle. But
you know, here we are and we're still chipping away
trying to find the answers. So Johnie had flown up
a couple of times in April so we could start recording.
We were recording a couple of episodes per visit to
try and get it all happening and writing, pulling it
(15:36):
together with all our footage that we'd captured that were
technically just for ourselves. So there's some funny moments amongst
that as well that we've just captured along the way
when we were completely losing our minds.
Speaker 10 (15:53):
So I will like it in a different way or whatever.
Speaker 11 (16:01):
What's super important is that because it were really just natural.
Speaker 1 (16:08):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (16:10):
So then on the twenty third of May, Johny flew
up again.
Speaker 8 (16:14):
It was a.
Speaker 2 (16:15):
Friday, and we're trying to between her. I work full time,
Johnie works as well. She's in Melbourne. I'm in Brisbane.
The studio happens to be in Brisbane, so we were
trying to always work out when suited everybody the best
and we could take some time to do our recordings.
So Johnny comes up. It's May twenty third. It is
a Friday, and we were planned to record all day
(16:37):
Friday and all day Monday, so that meant that we
had the weekend free, but not for long. Johnny and
I start early, We jump in the car and we
head down to Bayer and Bay this same time.
Speaker 1 (16:54):
This is the dead end.
Speaker 2 (16:56):
So on the Saturday, we had planned to go and
tick off quite a few boxes. We wanted to go
to antique places, we wanted to go to coin locations.
Speaker 8 (17:08):
We wanted to go and knock.
Speaker 2 (17:10):
On doors of neighbors and talk to them and see
if people remembered anything from nineteen ninety seven, people that
we hadn't been able to contact prior, even though we
had emails and we had phone numbers and we have tried,
we just haven't been able to get through to some
of these people. So we just took it as an
advantage of time that we don't often get together to
(17:33):
do all these things and we set about and went
on our Mary Waite. The first place we went was
Burly to meet up with a person who had some
really close interaction with the to head of every family
on the Gold Coast. It was such an interesting and
quite emotional conversation. Surprisingly, so it did fill in a
(17:55):
lot of gaps. It confirmed some aspects that we hadn't
heard before. It also confirmed things that we had heard
before but didn't know for sure. And yeah, it just
added a few more pieces to the puzzles.
Speaker 3 (18:08):
So thank you very much to that person.
Speaker 6 (18:11):
You know who you are, and we really appreciate you
meeting up with us on that day. And our first
stop was a little place called Eurelba, So we went
and visited a person there who may actually hold records
of interest in relation to where Marian's money went in
nineteen ninety seven.
Speaker 2 (18:32):
Yeah, some of it was quite interesting because we had
information about where people were living at the time in
nineteen ninety seven nineteen ninety eight, and we wanted to
just go and ask some questions to those people and
see if people were still living there, what they saw,
if they saw anything, what they could tell us about that.
(18:56):
I actually remember driving there's a space in Ballina that
you drive between one part of Balaner and another, and
he's probably why they call it East Balano and whatnot.
But it's just on either side of the road, it's
just bushland. And I remember Jeroni looking at me and
she just said to me, God, it gives me quivers
(19:16):
driving through here. I just have a bad feeling, bad feeling. Unfortunately,
we were met with the same problem that we seemingly
have the whole way through this journey, where we turned
up to places that said they were open and they
(19:37):
were just bolted shut.
Speaker 10 (19:39):
So I just I.
Speaker 2 (19:41):
Find it quite baffling actually to think that something can
be advertised online as open and active and.
Speaker 3 (19:48):
It just isn't.
Speaker 2 (19:50):
So one place we went to was out the back
of Woop Boop. My car wasn't coping so well on
the dirt roads, but we went out there nonetheless, and
there was a big orchard out there and this massive,
big old shed that had.
Speaker 8 (20:07):
All these antiques in it.
Speaker 2 (20:08):
We really wanted to speak to that man, but yeah,
it just was shut up, like you know. We were
literally there one minute after closing time at midday and
it was closed up, like no one had been there
for the whole day. So yeah, it was a bit
frustrating once again because we wanted to talk to people
and they just weren't there. Another area, there is a
(20:31):
gentleman who we asked quite a bit for him to
be called as a witness to the inquest, and we
were declined multiple times, and I don't really understand why
that was the case. But anyway, we know his business
and we actually know where he lives, and a business
(20:52):
address is linked to his home address, and so we
decided to go for a drive up to his house.
It's scary doing this stuff right like this is not comfortable,
and we're not trying to invade people's privacy or do
(21:15):
the wrong thing. We just wanted to go and ask
some questions, see if they were aware of the situation
and what they knew. But unfortunately, rocking up to their
front door, no one was home. The dogs were nipping
at our feet telling us to get off the property.
So we just popped a flyer in the mailbox and left.
Speaker 12 (21:37):
Like you do realize that this is like all part
of it, right with you visiting these sites, even if
we don't get any kind of information. I think it's
kind of good even for both of us.
Speaker 1 (21:50):
To be honest, you know, we've been researching it.
Speaker 2 (21:54):
Any who, In true Joanie and Sally fashion, we just
kept on going on. That particular day was tricky because
there was a couple of things and places we went
where either I didn't feel comfortable going or Joney wasn't
one hundred percent sure we should go, and the.
Speaker 8 (22:13):
Two of us have to sit there.
Speaker 2 (22:14):
We're like sisters, really, we just sort of sit there
and go back and forth on I don't know about this,
and what do you think? Well, I don't know, we
think we should do this, and there is a bit
of banter between us as to what the right decision
is and what we should be doing, because at the
end of the day, we shouldn't be doing this. It's
not our job. I don't get paid to do this,
neither does Joni. This is actually something that the police
(22:36):
should be doing. And I find it really frustrating that
we continue to give them all this information and everything
we have. They ask us for the information, or you've
got more information, can you send it to us. We
put it in a very detailed email, It gets sent
to them and we don't get a response, so we
don't know what they're doing. We don't know what they're
following up with, and I find that very very very
(22:59):
hard to manage in my head, not even a care
and concern pay just letting you know we're still chipping
at this, or we're doing this on this side, or
they tell me something is they're doing something, and then nothing,
I don't hear anything about it, So it is quite
tricky to manage.
Speaker 8 (23:17):
Anyway.
Speaker 2 (23:17):
That night, we stayed in Byron and we've become both
Jonie and I actually have become really good friends with
We refer to them as the THEO Girls, but they
do have their own identities as well. So Sherry, Renee
and Jackie. Jacki and Renee are the beautiful twins, and
the three of them together collectively have worked tirelessly on
(23:40):
THEO Hayes's case. They were the team who came together
to support the family. Help the family. They did searches,
they found his hat. When police had already done a
search and didn't find the hat, they went back and
did another search afterwards and found it in the bush.
These guys are amazing humans, and you know, I just
(24:01):
want to take time out to say thank you to them,
because good people like that who actually make a massive
difference in this space. We went out for dinner and
we had a lovely dinner with them on the Saturday night. Yeah,
and then we headed back to our hotel, had a sleep,
not a very good one, and work up the next
day and had some breakfast. And then that's when Journey
(24:24):
and I went, what are we going to do today?
It's raining. What's the plan? She wanted to go to
this place called Wooden Bong. It's like, I don't know,
two hours and ten minutes drive from Byron West so
Inland and then from there to get back to Brisbane,
it's about the same time again, so it's about like
a five hour journey for us to go from Byron
(24:44):
to Wooden Bong and then back into Brisbane, not taking
into consideration all the stops that we wanted to do
along the way. But there were quite a few art dealers,
antique dealers and who were current today. And Joanie had
done all her homework to work out that these people
who were running these places in these locations which were
in the middle of nowhere, some of them, we're still
(25:06):
the same people who owned and operate them today.
Speaker 1 (25:19):
Hello, here are you going?
Speaker 3 (25:22):
Is your name fred.
Speaker 13 (25:25):
My name is Stony Condos is a Sally Lady.
Speaker 3 (25:30):
We've come, we're.
Speaker 13 (25:31):
Coming through the wooden bowl, but we've come to short
we catch it on the way.
Speaker 3 (25:36):
Okay, so get ready, ready, come out.
Speaker 14 (25:43):
So you've been suggested to come and talk to about
antiques around here in the nineteen nineties.
Speaker 3 (25:53):
Were you in were you doing anything like that? Or
have I got the wrong play?
Speaker 2 (25:59):
Yeah?
Speaker 3 (25:59):
All right, that's.
Speaker 11 (26:01):
How long ago?
Speaker 14 (26:02):
Do your jantique shirt? Was it like two thousands? I'm
going to show you.
Speaker 3 (26:14):
I'm going to show you a photo. Do you know
this bloke? This man, his name is Rick Frederick, the
head of ary.
Speaker 6 (26:25):
H.
Speaker 11 (26:26):
So is that him?
Speaker 14 (26:29):
Well, everyone says it, So I'll show you. It's interesting
to you because I can talk to you and I'll
just I'll find another photo that will help the name
to it.
Speaker 11 (26:42):
But in the same business he would have gone to
auctions and stuff and.
Speaker 3 (26:48):
Coins.
Speaker 11 (26:51):
I didn't deal with them. I had plenty. I just
sold a coin collection to go and Lismore. But no,
it wasn't that. I've got heaps of coins, but never
dealt in him. That's interesting. Let me make your coffee,
let me let my brain to go. Yeah, yeah, you
drink coffee.
Speaker 7 (27:10):
Hello, Hello, hello there looking for I.
Speaker 2 (27:17):
Just saw a picture of you on the back of
the mother was going out with this fella six ninety seven,
after ninety seven.
Speaker 1 (27:26):
Yeah, yeah, him in ninety seven and disappeared.
Speaker 11 (27:33):
We talked to how do you to her?
Speaker 3 (27:37):
No, but he's on our list.
Speaker 5 (27:39):
Through my journey and telling my mom's story, we've actually
found a number of other women who have had dealings
with this guy of similar nature.
Speaker 8 (27:47):
So he's still married to the same woman, which is
the woman in.
Speaker 1 (27:50):
That picture there. Yeah, they've been together.
Speaker 13 (27:53):
So she was nine, remember, so she went as Anne
when they're in wooden bunks winners Anne or Diane the
head of very m Yeah, tea something sounds horrible.
Speaker 4 (28:11):
Huh wouldn't go into a pretty small area and everyone seems.
Speaker 8 (28:14):
Tonio everybody maybe they might remember something.
Speaker 1 (28:18):
Well, how about the other remember might remember something?
Speaker 11 (28:22):
Huh yeah, look uh yeah, look he's a p Yeah, okay,
bad he's the eighties now, Oh.
Speaker 14 (28:32):
Alright, who else would make the open to us having
a cha to ay or do you reckon?
Speaker 1 (28:36):
They think?
Speaker 5 (28:37):
Have yeah?
Speaker 11 (28:38):
Thstup? Black? Yeah and fine, she was there all the time,
what she Hey, I don't remember any of 'em fans
love a shock.
Speaker 9 (28:49):
Ah, yes, yeah, you should be one to hit Yeah.
Speaker 7 (28:55):
Hello, yeah, it's good clad like we look in say hooray.
Speaker 4 (29:02):
Oh yeah.
Speaker 1 (29:04):
Oh but he looks very familiar. So he's a tall
belly like six foot four.
Speaker 15 (29:12):
Just picks too.
Speaker 6 (29:17):
That's my world.
Speaker 8 (29:19):
So the other thing is like, I don't think my
mum came out here, but.
Speaker 6 (29:25):
It was.
Speaker 8 (29:25):
The timeline was at matchup with when they lived here.
Speaker 1 (29:28):
And when we moved in.
Speaker 3 (29:29):
But so we were told to go and see.
Speaker 9 (29:39):
Yeah, it's a weird next saw me he got a
house or something or well, it's quite just go down
this show, turn right on Derek Road and it's see only.
Speaker 11 (29:54):
All right.
Speaker 3 (29:54):
So I'm going down, just walking down the main street
of Wooden Bong.
Speaker 1 (30:00):
Looking for the house of.
Speaker 4 (30:07):
So.
Speaker 15 (30:07):
Interestingly enough, his house is pretty much adjacent to where
Rick Bloom's house was, opposite the pool. So if he
doesn't know him, then I don't know who else would
actually know him. So let's just see how we go.
Speaker 3 (30:34):
You weren't here in the late eighties, were you.
Speaker 1 (30:38):
With my wife? Are you serious? Well?
Speaker 3 (30:43):
Did you know that the head of very family?
Speaker 1 (30:46):
The head of Very?
Speaker 6 (30:50):
So there was Rick and Diane and they had two
kids and they lived at Number two in the eighties.
Speaker 14 (30:58):
Right opposite their pool there opposite Oh yeah, yeah it.
Speaker 3 (31:05):
Doesn't see how community too, yeah, like te.
Speaker 1 (31:11):
And so after a.
Speaker 2 (31:12):
Massive day, I think we ended up driving for about
I don't know, seven and a half hours, eight hours.
Speaker 3 (31:18):
It was a big day.
Speaker 8 (31:19):
We didn't eat any lunch.
Speaker 2 (31:21):
We were just on the go, going, bouncing from one
place to the next, trying to get as much information
as we possibly could, just to put it on file.
Speaker 8 (31:30):
We've done it.
Speaker 2 (31:30):
It's something we wanted to do for a while, and
we ticked those boxes. Monday, we recorded the final episodes
for the podcast, and then came the editing and making
sure that you know, everything was in there that.
Speaker 8 (31:49):
We needed to have in there for you guys.
Speaker 2 (31:51):
And you know, I just want to take this opportunity
to say a massive thanks firstly to Joonie for being
here standing with me. Doing this takes bravery, it takes courage,
It takes strength, It takes knowledge and time and effort
to put all these things together and be constantly working
on it. It is a labor of love, I would say,
(32:13):
because it is quite challenging at times and you know,
I wouldn't be able to do that without her, And
I'm so sorry that you've only heard my voice mostly
today in this episode, but it's important that we keep
letting you know that we are still working. There are
still things to being behind the scenes, and I am
still writing to the AFP, I am still talking to
(32:36):
New South Wales Police. I am still making sure that
people are understanding what the situation is and knowing that,
you know, we need to do better in this space,
and this should never happen to anybody, particularly if they
have a missing person. People should not have to fight
this hard to get the answers and to be heard.
Speaker 8 (32:56):
So you know, without you guys here.
Speaker 2 (32:58):
Listening and supporting and sharing and caring about not just
me but all the missing, that's what counts.
Speaker 3 (33:07):
There's much going on behind the scenes.
Speaker 6 (33:10):
I just thought i'd give you a little snippet of
things that we've been working on thus far as a
result of our overseas trip, the trip to northern New
South Wales, and just what we're going to be doing
going forward. So in Japan, we're pursuing getting the movement
records for Marying going in and out of Japan. This
also includes the South Korean records, because of course it's
(33:32):
not just the movement into Japan, but if we can
get the South Korean records, then that would also show
us with Marian leaving South Korea where her ultimate destination
was from South Korea. So that is what is happening
in Japan at the moment. In the UK, we are
still actively talking with SPINK about offering records to police
(33:55):
here in Australia if there's anything relevant in that nineteen
ninety seven time period. Unfortunately with the catalog there was
no matches, but sales records that's been called would show
if there was anything relevant purchased over that time Belgium. Look,
I'm really determined to locate Nicole, who was Rick Bloom's
(34:17):
second wife, so I've written actually written letters to all
the families with the same surname in that area seeking
help in attempting to locate her. We'll definitely keep you
posted on that. The KBR are willing to provide information
to the New South Wales Police. I've also written to
the family accountant's family members to seek further information, and
(34:42):
also to the man's family who Blam apparently traveled with
to the French Riviera in June July nineteen ninety seven,
just to see whether they be willing to engage about
the legitimacy. Just remembering that Rick Blooms stated that Jean
Pierre Coppernole his cousin, that he went and interacted with him,
(35:05):
and Jean Pierre actually gave him money to fund the
trip in nineteen ninety seven. Now Jean Pierre has provided
a documentation that disapproves this and that has been submitted
to New South Wales Police in Luxembourg. Tom and I
continue to work together strongly to push forward that element
(35:25):
of the story. There is actually a new development there
and hopefully we will be able to hear you know,
everyone will be able to hear about this soon. This
new information does shed light on another aspect of Blum's life.
There's a few things that I do want to specifically
call out for, and that was anyone who attended line
(35:46):
dancing events or classes with the instructor Liz Collette on
the Gold Coast in the nineteen nineties, I would love
to hear from you. And also if anyone from the
Southport school community knew anybody living in Anne or Miles
Street Marian might have known that's in Ashmore. If you
(36:09):
can please get in touch with me. I wish to
assure everybody that we are not going away. We are
not giving up. Work remains absolutely ongoing. It may run
a little bit slower these days because I've returned to
work almost full time, but it remains very active, very
(36:31):
much alive, very much the front of mind, and we're
not giving up.
Speaker 3 (36:37):
We just need that one piece.
Speaker 6 (36:40):
This is a massive, huge thanks to everyone who's helped
along the way. We could not have gotten this far
without you all. A huge shout out to the Balan,
a retiree who continues to push and explore in detailed
areas that need that intense exploration that only he does best.
Speaker 2 (37:00):
So thank you, and thank you to Podshape Productions here
in Brisbane Jay for you know, supporting me and helping
me share my mum's story with you all. So what's
the next phase here in this journey. It's twenty eight
years mum's been missing and Joanie is still working very
(37:25):
much behind the scenes. She's still very very busy. She's
she does a lot of stuff that I don't do,
so we're not doubling up on things, so Joanie's going
to be working hard in that background, and I am
actually going to be working on the side here on
a few other projects. So most of you following along
(37:46):
with know we released some tickets on Sunday for a
memorial high tee that I'm hosting here in Brisbane on
the twenty eighth of September for my mum. It would
be her eightieth birthday that week, and I wanted to
do something. I've never been able to do anything to
celebrate my mum. It's hard when you don't have a
body and you don't know what's happened to your missing
(38:08):
person to be able to decide what are you going
to do? And I mean I just was watching I
think it was Insight on SBS and a lady was
talking about with their family they've got a missing person
and she was saying, I think she's the auntie and
she was saying she wanted to suggest it to the
(38:28):
mother of the missing daughter, you know, what, should we
do a memorial? And she said, oh, you know, the
mom doesn't want to do that because she feels like
she's giving up on her daughter by holding a memorial.
And it kind of broke my heart because for me,
I haven't. I've got nowhere to go, I've got nowhere
to sit and think about my mum. I just don't
(38:50):
know what to do, and I guess I did feel
a bit like I didn't want to do anything until
such time as had been to an inquest and the
coroner had made her decisions and we could grapple with
what those decisions were and move forward, and I got
a death certificate. I have a better understanding now, after
(39:11):
everything I've been through going public and hating to share
my story with everyone, I have a better understanding now
of what's happened to my mum than I did say
seven years ago. And I am really grateful for that
because there's an element of peace that I can put
in my heart, and I am at peace with Mum.
Being a missing person doesn't mean that I don't miss her,
(39:32):
doesn't mean that I don't want to find her, or
that I don't want to keep pushing for justice to
be served, because I I one hundred percent you all
know I will do that. But there's an element of
peace for me, and I need that so that I
can actually be a good human and not be stressed
and not be coping with anxiety all the time and
(39:53):
worry all the time, and I can just be present
in my own life and with my children and my
husband and my friends, and you know it doesn't consume me,
because it has done that at times, as you can
probably appreciate. So the memorial high Tea will be a
wonderful celebration of Mum's life. We're doing a high tea
(40:14):
because my mum loved to drink tea anybody that knows
her in the fine bone china cup with lots of yummyfoods,
so we've got pretty little tea parties is actually helping
me with all the gorgeous delicacies that we're having.
Speaker 8 (40:28):
Will have champagne.
Speaker 2 (40:30):
We've invited Headley Thomas to come along as our special guest,
So Headley's coming and I just think it's going to
be a wonderful day of celebration. Everyone can wear some
high tea floral afternoon tea party vibes with the touch
of green, and I think we still have about thirty
tickets left. So you can jump on our website which
(40:51):
is www dot the Missingmatter dot com and go to
the link for Marion's High Tea.
Speaker 8 (40:57):
Scroll down you'll see the.
Speaker 2 (40:58):
Tickets available there, and I hope to see everyone there
who can make it.
Speaker 8 (41:05):
To say a big shout out to Sarah and Julie.
Speaker 2 (41:08):
They have been queens in the background trying to source
fundraising raffle prizes.
Speaker 8 (41:15):
I couldn't do this without them.
Speaker 2 (41:17):
There is a team sitting behind me who are helping
me with all of this, and I want to shout
out to all of them as well. I'm totally toughed
that so many people want to be there and help
me celebrate and remember Mum and just give me somewhere
where I can. I drive past the location where we're
having the venue for when we're having the high tea
every day, so I think it's.
Speaker 3 (41:36):
A really pretty place.
Speaker 2 (41:37):
I always look up at it every time I drive past,
and I think my Mum would really love.
Speaker 8 (41:42):
Love us doing that for her.
Speaker 2 (41:44):
Now, when it comes to the fundraising side of things,
there's another little project I've got going on in the
side because I know I just like to give myself
something else to do. It's called the Green Seat Project,
and what we're doing is any money's made from the
fundraising raffle which will be drawn at the event, and
any donation we manage to get from people will be
(42:08):
going into the Green Seat project and I'm currently working
with Brisbane City Council to see if we can get
approval for these bench seats to go in.
Speaker 8 (42:19):
I'm starting small. I'm starting with one and then we'll
build on it from there.
Speaker 2 (42:24):
But the idea is it's a green seat, it's in
a prominent position somewhere in Brisbane. I've sort of nominated
Kangaroo Point Cliffs because there's a beautiful look out there
looking up the river and for me, I want to
have somewhere where you can look out because I don't
know where my mum is, so I want to be
able to look out to the view and the idea of.
Speaker 8 (42:42):
Thinking about my mum.
Speaker 2 (42:43):
And on the chairs, we'll have the Missing Matter written
and there'll be a QR code, and that QR code
you can scan. It will take you to the website
and we're going to start building the website, the missingmatter
dot com, with profiles of missing persons with their photographs
and a little blob from their families so that when
people scan it they can actually read stories about people
(43:04):
who are missing. And this is simply to bring awareness
to this space because the Missing Matter, as I say,
and they should not be forgotten.
Speaker 8 (43:12):
So if you would like to donate to this cause,
please let me know.
Speaker 2 (43:16):
You can reach me via my email which is Sally
at sally laden dot com, and you can also reach
me via the website or on my socials. And lastly,
I have some exciting news to tell you that we
are going to be continuing the Missing Matter podcast to
help others in this space. So if I can introduce
(43:38):
the idea that the TMMT Moving Forward is inviting families
with missing persons to come on in a special episode
just about their missing loved one. I figured that we
have this platform that has been established and I would
(44:00):
really love the opportunity to help other people who potentially
haven't had a lot of meat, or people haven't heard
about their missing person and they might have that key
piece of information, so super important in my heart that
we give those people.
Speaker 3 (44:14):
A voice as well.
Speaker 2 (44:16):
So something some of you might not know, but Jay,
who owns pod Shape, he has a missing person as well.
Speaker 8 (44:22):
His uncle is a missing person.
Speaker 10 (44:24):
The moment we met, and obviously I knew your story
from the media like most people, I think the moment
I met you and Chris I thought exactly what most
people think, like how can I help, which I think
is where you sit now, right. It's like, your mum's missing,
you don't have any answers. You want to find the answers,
(44:47):
but you are living still with this ambiguous loss. So
when we caught up for the first time, I was like, Okay,
there's more to this story. And it's not just a
missing person. It's the story of the loss that everyone suffers.
And I know that, like you, it wasn't my mum,
(45:08):
but it was my uncle who went missing. And why
it was important for me is because I was only
little when he went missing. I was like four. I
don't really remember him, but I do remember Mum, and
I remember how it affected Mum, and then my Grandpap
how it affected him. Mum said to me when I
was much older, that she reckons losing her brother and
(45:34):
her dad. Losing her son ended her dad's life because
he just was fighting for an answer.
Speaker 2 (45:43):
Just listening to you say that, it's the flow on effect. Right,
It's not just that someone's missing, but who is that
missingness touched and who has it affected and how did
it affect them? It's an important conversation I think to
have and too often, I guess for me in my situation,
(46:03):
I remember when the Lady was at its peak and
it was just everywhere I turned, My mum was everywhere,
and you know, my kids had to deal with that,
you know, they had to go to school and UNI
and people going, oh my god, I didn't realize your
grandmother is a missing person. So there's been lots of
challenges which haven't really been exposed or talked about in
an open public forum. But you know, there is that
(46:26):
back end that families are coping with. And you know,
I was just talking with Zee Maya yesterday. Zee and
I have become friends. You know, I think her and
I from the same ink. You know, it was similar people,
and we're just keep fighting for the truth and fighting
for ances. And you know, she was telling me yesterday
that she hasn't heard from the police who have Warren's
(46:48):
case for thirteen years. And I mean, my god, what
is wrong with the world when the people who have
a missing person are just left there to work it
out themselves. And I guess if I think back, there
was a couple of people who came in to MySpace
when things were up and running with mum's story. Finally,
(47:10):
Oh my gosh, how come your mum gets all the
media attention? How come your mum's in all the newspapers
and everyone's talking about Mary and my dad?
Speaker 3 (47:19):
You know, matters he.
Speaker 1 (47:20):
Where is he?
Speaker 15 (47:21):
Like?
Speaker 2 (47:21):
He's not getting any attention. I felt really confronted by that,
to be honest. So I mean, for me, it had
taken me twenty two years for anybody to actually listen
to me in the media to help, Like I'd been
knocking on doors and asking questions. I also had the
problem where Mum's family didn't want me to do it,
so they sort of door stopped me, and I felt
(47:43):
I was doing the wrong thing if I did that,
and I had to really just put myself in a
box and go just I don't want to do anything
while my grandmother was still alive because I didn't want
to hurt her. I didn't want to upset her, and
she was living by herself in her nineties, and so
it wasn't until after she passed away that I actually
started going down that route. I just really want to help,
(48:04):
like this, it's not just about my mum. My mum
is one of many who are missing in this universe.
And you know, I think they all deserve a voice,
and they all deserve to be heard, and the families
deserve to have an opportunity to share their story, not
for you know, three minutes or one minute on a
TV show amongst many give them a platform to actually
(48:27):
do it.
Speaker 10 (48:28):
The new show, it's called The Missing Matter. Still it's
going to be in this feed, but it's going to
be a weekly show.
Speaker 2 (48:34):
Well, yes, in between me working full time, as Jaye's
laughing at me, I am going to do my absolute
best to I'll hold you account script and put it
a really good quality podcast together for people with absolute
respect and understanding and empathy for what we're telling, because
(48:55):
I think that's really important too. We've got to remember,
these people tell their stories and then they go back
home to their reality of they still don't know where
their missing person is. So I'm really hoping that we
can shine some light on a different audience for the people,
like some of the people who have actually worked really
hard and they do have quite good audiences who are
listening and following along, but that might be in Tasmania.
(49:18):
So let's open that up to helping spread the word everywhere, don't.
There's no limits as to who can hear it, and
someone might just know or have seen something or can
offer some assistance. The way I'd like to see it
happen is the episodes we've just been doing for Mum
was the Missing Matter, Marian matters. This will now become
(49:39):
the Missing Matter, Warren Matters, Jawn Jasper.
Speaker 8 (49:43):
Matters, and I think it's important that we bring them into.
Speaker 3 (49:47):
This space and help them where we can.
Speaker 6 (49:49):
I'm wishing Seal every success in the next iteration of
the Missing Matter podcast. It's a totally exciting space, and I,
for one, will be listening keenly as the new episodes
are released.
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