UPDATE: Beaumont Children

Jane, Arnna, and Grant Beaumont disappeared nearly 60 years ago without a trace. On February 22, 2025, a third and final dig at a location of interest might give answers to a family who’s been waiting for over half a century.

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Speaker 00

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• 0:30Ashley Flowers?

  When you're out in nature, you learn to trust your instincts. You pay attention to the trail, your surroundings, and you stay alert to protect yourself from harm. But what if the biggest threat isn't the environment at all? On Park Predators, host Delia Diambra explores true crime cases that happen in national parks and remote wildernesses, the places we usually think of as safe and peaceful. Each episode reveals what happened and how much more there is beneath the surface. Listen to Park Predators now, wherever you get your podcasts. Hi, crime junkies. I'm Ashley Flowers.

• 1:04Speaker 02

  And I'm Brett.

• 1:04Ashley Flowers?

  And I've got news. I want to try to bring you guys more case updates when they happen. So we're going to try something new here.

• 1:11Speaker 02

  Yep. Tell us if you like it, if you want more.

• 1:13Ashley Flowers?

  Yes, so five years ago, when we were just baby podcasters, we covered the 1966 disappearance of the Beaumont children. And almost 60 years later, something is happening. But the thing is, you need to know the story to understand the importance of this update. So if you need a refresher, keep listening to our OG episode on the Beaumont children.

• 1:38Speaker 02

  But let's take a moment to appreciate how far we've come as podcasters.

• 1:42Ashley Flowers?

  Please be nice, like truly be kind. But listen, we got to where we are for a reason. The story is still a good one. So please enjoy this blast from the past. And at the end, we're going to jump back in and tell you the big news that is happening this week.

• 2:00Speaker 03

  Hi Crime Junkies. I'm your host, Ashley Flowers. And I'm Brett. And since yesterday was Australia Day for our wonderful listeners down under. Oh, let's not do that. We, I think we did that in the fan club once where we tried to do Australian accents. It's really bad, you guys. But anyways, we wanted to celebrate by telling you about one of the most infamous and enduring mysteries in Australian history. But before we tell you our story, though, we want to send our thoughts to everyone in Australia during this horrific brush fire season. The Australian Red Cross is on the front lines of disaster relief, and we encourage everyone to donate and support their efforts like we are doing.

• 2:40Speaker 03

  You can find a link on our website, or you can go to redcross.org.au. Now, today's story is one of those cases that never really lets go of a country's national imagination, kind of like JonBenet Ramsey for us here in the US, or Madeleine McCann for those in the UK. In 1966, three young children left their home to go swimming at the beach on Australia Day and were never seen again. Their disappearance changed Australian life forever and thrust caution into the forefront of parents' minds all over the country. This is the story of the Beaumont Children.

• 3:51Speaker 03

  January 26, 1966, is a scorching hot day in Adelaide. Despite the weather, the city is brimming with excitement because not only is it Australia Day with this long weekend coming up, but there's also an upcoming Ashes Cricket Test match. So the city is teeming with sports fan from all across The country. The South Australian state capital Adelaide is this coastal city on the St Vincent Gulf. And since the temperature is due to get up to 40 degrees Celsius, which is like 104 degrees Fahrenheit, the local beaches are packed on this day. Everybody has the same idea to beat the heat by heading to the ocean, maybe stopping at one of the local restaurants to pick up some lunch, doing just like the usual stuff to enjoy the day without just hiding inside until the sun goes down.

• 4:35Speaker 03

  All in all, it is a good peaceful Wednesday in the city. But then sometime between 5 and 6 p.m. that evening, everything changes. A middle aged married couple comes into the station. Grant, usually known as Jim, and Nancy Beaumont are worried sick because their three young children left home to go to Glenel Beach that morning a little bit before 10 o'clock and they never came back. Now, they were expected to be home first around like noon, but they never showed. And at first, their mom Nancy just kind of assumed that maybe they've lost track of time, maybe they missed the first bus and then they're going to be on the second. So she waits for the next bus to come, but they're not on the 2 o'clock bus either.

• 5:19Speaker 03

  So the parents try searching on their own at first, but after hours with no sign of the kids, Jim and Nancy knew that they had to go straight to police. According to Alan Whitaker and Stuart Mullins' book called Searching for the Beaumont Children and their follow up, The Satin Man, the police spring into action right away. When they get a description from their parents, they learn that Jane is the oldest at nine years old and she's super responsible and excellent caretaker for her younger siblings. There's seven year old Arna and four year old Grant. And they learn that she left the house in a pink bathing suit with a little white purse to keep her money in. Now Jane is also the swimmer of the three, so Jim and Nancy were confident that she would keep an eye on Arna and Grant and make sure that they didn't go too far out into the surf.

• 6:05Speaker 03

  At the very start of this investigation, police don't want to believe the worst. The initial thought is that maybe the kids lost track of time, kind of like what their mom thought. And when they realize like actually how late that they were, maybe that made them freak out more and things kind of like escalated.

• 6:20Speaker 02

  Right, like maybe they're hiding out somewhere because maybe their parents are angry with them because they didn't come home on time.

• 6:25Speaker 03

  Right, that's what they're thinking. So with that in mind, police actually start their search at the Beaumonts' home in hope that the little ones like kind of snuck back in to hide somewhere and wait for mom and dad and wait for them to not be so upset. Now, to be clear, at first investigators aren't suspicious of Jim or Nancy. They just want to cover all their bases to see if this can be resolved quickly. But unfortunately, it can't since a long and thorough search of the house doesn't turn up any sign of the children. And by now, it's getting dark outside and Jim and Nancy keep reiterating to police that their kids would not willingly be outside after dark. So investigators start mobilizing more local resources to widen the search. In order to do that, the Adelaide Police send five boats from the Sea and Rescue Squadron

• 7:10Speaker 03

  out to the St. Vincent Gulf to shine their bright lights across the dark waters in hopes of spotting something. But over and over again, their light just flashes on still dark water. They come up with nothing. With more people getting involved in all this activity, the local media now starts noticing what's going on. They're thinking like, hey, something is happening. And a bulletin goes out at about 10 o'clock that evening. Now, mind you, this is like a full 12 hours since the kids got on that bus that morning.

• 7:40Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 7:41Speaker 03

  And they push this bulletin out to the evening, you know, TV, radio, asking anyone if they've seen the missing kids. While the news of the missing children is being broadcast, police are still hard at work at Glenelg. The Sydney Morning Herald reported in 1966 that police even had aqua lung divers go into the Glenelg Boat Marina to search underwater. But the water was like super murky and there was like almost little to no visibility. But despite the set facts, they continue all through the night on land, in sea, even checking storm drains that flush out into the ocean. And they also even have people traversing up and down the rocky coastline looking for caverns and landslides, anywhere that the kids could possibly be.

• 8:26Speaker 03

  At this point, their thinking is starting to change. They no longer think the kids are hiding. But now they start to wonder if maybe the kids got into some kind of accident. You like, you know, with kid logic, when, you know, you're doing something, you're going, you know, on a strange adventure. So you go into a cave or someone will bury you in sand and it seems like-

• 8:44Speaker 02

  Everything seems like a good idea.

• 8:46Speaker 03

  Yeah, so they're thinking like if Jane, Arna and Grant are maybe stuck somewhere and they can't get out, like time is of the essence. Plus, Arna and Grant aren't great swimmers and so they're thinking, gosh, they could have gotten carried out. Maybe Jane went, she was a strong swimmer to try and like rescue them, but she failed and they like have all the more reason to find them quickly.

• 9:05Speaker 02

  I mean, not to go like too dark, too fast, but was kidnapping an option at this point like, or are police really just trying to find them in some sort of freak accident on the beach?

• 9:16Speaker 03

  Yeah, so according to the book, The Satin Man, police start off the investigation with three main scenarios in mind about what could have happened. Either A, the kids drown, B, they ran away, or C, that they've been kidnapped. Now drowning gets ruled out pretty fast because the sea had been calm the day before when the kids disappeared and the beach had plenty of lifeguards who everyone assumed would have noticed if three children like went in the water and were getting swept away. Plus, none of the Beaumont's belongings were found left on shore, which is what you would expect to see if they had like gone into the ocean and then never come out. So drowning gets ruled out pretty quickly and so does the idea of the three kids just running away, like they're happy kids, there's nothing in their past behavior to suggest

• 10:00Speaker 03

  that they would leave home like that. So police have to quickly set that idea aside as well. And since the kids aren't thought to have run away and they aren't thought to have drowned, that leaves investigators with the most frightening prospect of all, that someone was able to take not one, but all three young children from a crowded area in broad daylight.

• 10:21Speaker 02

  Okay, but if someone snatched them, like someone had to have seen it. You said it was one of the busiest days on the beach, right?

• 10:27Speaker 03

  Yeah, I mean, it was, yeah, super packed.

• 10:29Speaker 02

  Even if they didn't realize right away that it was a kidnapping? Something would have been off. These three kids just randomly go off with a stranger? Someone would have had to have witnessed something. There had to be witnesses.

• 10:40Speaker 03

  So, yes, and this is where all of the media attention really comes in handy. Because not only does that media attention lead to the biggest volunteer mobilization in Australian history, like Sarah Garcia reported for the Australian Broadcasting Corporation in 2018, but it also means that information starts flooding into police stations. Now, while some of these so-called tips are hoaxes, some of them are from credible witnesses. And coupled with what police know from Jim and Nancy, a picture of the kids' last movements really starts to appear, including some information about a person who may hold the key to the entire investigation.

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• 12:37Speaker 03

  Numerous witnesses who were on or near Glenelg Beach on the day that the kids disappeared tell investigators about seeing the Beaumont children playing with an unidentified man. Now, these statements and the South Australian's Police Incident Report place the children and their mysterious companion at a place called Colley Reserve Park, right near the beach before they disappeared. There are also people who just saw the children alone. So in that book, Searching for the Beaumont Children, it said that the bus driver who picked them up remembered them getting on the bus at about 10 o'clock. Now, there's this guy named Tom, who's the local postman, and he remembered saying hello to Little Grant, who greeted him back and seemed totally happy and fine.

• 13:19Speaker 03

  And initially, Tom couldn't remember if he saw them in the morning or the afternoon, but police ended up checking his shift schedule and like his records and determined that he had to have seen them in the morning, based on when Tom was working. And they put that sighting at around 10:15, right when he starts his shift. Then, one of Jane's classmates reports seeing the siblings that morning at about 11:15. Now, all of those sightings so far are just of the kids. After this, though, other witnesses come forward who say they saw the children with this unidentified man. Now, there are three separate witnesses who saw them together. There is a man who was in town to watch the cricket match. There was a middle-aged woman, and then there was this 74-year-old woman.

• 14:02Speaker 03

  And together, they help police like piece together the activities of the kids later in the day. Now, as far as police can put together, it seems that the 74-year-old woman likely was the first to see the kids together with this man. She says that she saw them sometime between 11 and 11:30 in the morning. And then, all three of the witnesses give police a description of what this stranger looks like. According to this article I found called "The Disappearance of the Beaumont Children: Murder or Misadventure," and it's on the Crime Traveler's website, all three witnesses described the man as being in his mid to late 30s, tall and tanned with a long, thin

• 14:43Speaker 03

  face and light brown hair that was neat and parted to one side. But interestingly, the middle-aged woman tells police that she did more than just see the man, she actually spoke to him. Melbourne's The Age newspaper reported in early February of 66 that this man approached her at Glenelg Beach a little bit before noon, and he was with the three kids. And he approached her, telling her that their money had been stolen, and asking her if she'd seen anyone, like, rummaging through their things. Because she was, like, sitting right near their stuff, so if anything had happened, she would have likely seen it. Now, she didn't see anything, she doesn't remember anything, they didn't talk anymore beyond this, but she was able to tell police that, based on his accent, he was definitely Australian.

• 15:27Speaker 03

  They have this 74-year-old woman actually sit down with a sketch artist from a local newspaper and describe the man, resulting in this portrait of a strange man that police are now desperate to locate. And here, Brett, I am actually going to send you a picture of the sketch that they came up with.

• 15:43Speaker 02

  Okay, so it means a pretty normal-looking guy. He's got kind of a longish face, a big forehead. I guess my next question is, if they saw him well enough to describe him for this sketch, like, what else did the witness, like, pick up on? Like, how was he acting with the kids? What was his demeanor? How were the kids with him? Stuff like that.

• 16:03Speaker 03

  So, it's interesting. So, according to The Age newspaper, people described seeing this man, quote, "frolicking with the kids before noon," which sounds to me like he was kind of, like, playing with them. Everyone was having a good time. Not, you know, I think it's completely different from what we might imagine of him just, like, shoving them in a car or forcibly taking them. And what we have from this lady, too, about him, like, coming up and asking about the money, it sounds like the kids were interacting with him and, and probably felt safe, like, they could trust him.

• 16:31Speaker 02

  Right.

• 16:32Speaker 03

  Now, what's super interesting is that since they appear to be enjoying themselves with this stranger, I find it strange that the last credible sighting of the children actually doesn't include him. So there was a staff member at a bakery in Glenelg, and this bakery was in very easy walking distance from both the beach and the Colli Reserve. And this person tells police that the three kids came in to buy themselves some lunch around midday. And this in itself isn't unusual, since Jane, Arna, and Grant had been to this very shop before, and they were recognized by the staff. What is weird is how they bought their food, because the shopkeeper tells police that the three kids paid with a one-pound note.

• 17:14Speaker 02

  Okay, what's so special about that?

• 17:17Speaker 03

  Well, a one-pound note was a lot of money back in 66, especially for young kids to have. But not only that, police knew from Nancy that she only gave Jane eight shillings and a sixpence to cover their lunches and bus fare. All of that was in coins.

• 17:34Speaker 02

  So the police are thinking, maybe the strange man gave them this one-pound note?

• 17:39Speaker 03

  Exactly. Plus, remember how this man said that their money had just been stolen? Like, police have to consider, what if that was a lie? What if he stole Jane's money and then gave her this money?

• 17:53Speaker 02

  Okay, but why would he steal less money and give them more back?

• 17:59Speaker 03

  So possibly to earn their confidence? Like, this is a widely-used tactic for manipulators, like getting a victim to rely on you for something, or making them feel like you helped them, and that maybe they owe you, or it puts them at ease.

• 18:13Speaker 02

  Right.

• 18:13Speaker 03

  So, learning about the sighting of this man, and even the last sighting without him, but this one-pound note, is making police more sure than ever that the children have been kidnapped. And likely, the three kids went away with this man willingly, unknowing of his true intentions. So, once they have this sketch from that woman, this goes out to all of the newspapers all over Australia, while police in Adelaide search for their records of sex offenders in the area to see if maybe any of them match witness descriptions. But here's the thing, of all of the sex offenders in the area, and listen, there's- Always more than you expect. I would encourage people to just take a look at their own neighborhood. Like, I think you would be surprised. But of all of the sex offenders

• 18:57Speaker 03

  listed in the area, they don't come up with anyone that's a good match or makes for a good lead. Now, in the meantime, while all of this is going on, the searches are still going on as well. They haven't given up on finding the kids, but it's getting harder to hold out hope because every search is turning up nothing. Days turn into weeks, weeks into months, and in September, eight months after the Beaumont children went missing, a police officer in town, and this is about like 200 miles east of Adelaide, overhears an interesting conversation on his phone line. Now, this town is a really small one located like right between Adelaide and Melbourne. So what's happening is this

• 19:39Speaker 03

  local officer is basically trying to call the head office of Melbourne when, according to the book Searching for the Beaumont Children, he hears a woman mention bringing the Beaumont kids back from Hobart on the island of Tasmania.

• 19:54Speaker 02

  Wait, if he's trying to make a call out, I guess I don't understand how he's overhearing this conversation.

• 20:00Speaker 03

  So, from what I understand, he's able to hear because somehow some wires got crossed. And I actually had to look up what this means for myself, and it kind of goes back to really old phone technology. So I looked up on Astro Telecoms about crossed wires, and apparently it's like a pretty common problem in the old Australian phone systems infrastructure. So basically, if you got on the line and you had a crossed wire, you could hear part of someone else's conversation. So the fact that he heard this is totally legit, but here's the problem. The officer who hears this thinks that it's a hoax, and everyone he talks to, the police in Adelaide, the police in Melbourne, like they all think it's a hoax too. Except for one man, Detective Sergeant Stan Swain. And he's with the South

• 20:44Speaker 03

  Australian Police in Adelaide. He is so convinced that the call is real, that he actually calls Jim and Nancy to tell them that he believes that their children are still alive. Now, while he's informing the family of what he believed to be true, other members of the South Australian police were tracking down the woman who actually made the call, you know, ahead of telling the family member. And they learned the real truth, that the officer who heard the call only heard parts of the conversation. And I guess, once they heard the whole thing in context, they come to believe that there is no real connection to the kids. They don't even think it was a hoax, just some crossed wires and honestly, like a painful coincidence that gave the Beaumonts false hope.

• 21:26Speaker 03

  So, that incident, obviously, was a little bit embarrassing, having raised the family's hope. But, as if that's not embarrassing enough, just two months later, in November, police find themselves up against a Dutch psychic, who is just adamant that he knows where the kids are buried. Now, this man flies all the way to Adelaide from the Netherlands, 10 months after the Beaumont kids disappeared, and it gets a whirlwind of media attention. Like, this guy's basically made a name for himself by claiming to be able to use his powers to solve missing person cases back in Europe. And, like, while he had some luck, and some, maybe, pretty basic guesswork, according to the satin man, I guess in some cases, he also got access to some confidential police

• 22:09Speaker 03

  files that I'm sure helped his, quote, "powers" along. So, basically, he's already famous when he rolls in. And so, the local papers make a huge deal of his coming down. Word gets out, to the point that there's a crowd of Adelaide citizens at the airport waiting when he arrives, hoping that after almost a year, he's gonna be the one to, like, swoop in, solve the case, and finally give the family answers. Now, to be super clear, police didn't pay him to come in. His trip was funded by a wealthy Adelaide citizen, who actually paid all of his travel expenses. So, he gets to Australia, and claims that the Beaumonts are buried in a warehouse in Purring Park.

• 22:50Speaker 03

  So, this is a spot that he's seen in his visions, or whatever, and it's where he says they need to look in order to find the kids. Now, keep in mind, he has no actual evidence to back this up. So, ultimately, police won't go and excavate anything based on his, like, visions, or gut instincts, or whatever, alone. According to Crime Travelers article, which we talked about before, the psychic claimed that the kids weren't murdered, actually. He says that they died as a result of some kind of accident and that this mystery man, described by witnesses, had nothing to do with their disappearance. And the police, as I'm sure you can imagine, are initially pretty skeptical. Right. And so he can't get them to dig right away. And this is my favorite part.

• 23:33Speaker 03

  He basically only stays in Australia for three days before telling the public, like, yeah, I'm done. Like, I'm going back to Europe. Like, kind of washed his hands of it. Like, they won't do what I say, so peace out. Now, despite him leaving, like, you would kind of think police are like, no, we're not going to do this. He leaves, everyone drops it. But because it got so much media attention and because the authorities were refusing to excavate where this psychic said, the locals in Adelaide actually raised money to finance the dig themselves. Like, they were crowdfunding back in, like, 67. Oh, my god. And do you know what this kind of reminds me a little bit of? It kind of reminds me of the most recent development in the Maura Murray case. Yes.

• 24:16Speaker 03

  Like, remember, there was, like, that house that everyone, everyone was like, you have to look, you have to look. And police are like, no, like, we're pretty sure nothing's there. Like, we've been through this. And then they finally did. Because there was so much, like, public attention that I think they were finally like, okay, we're going to do this. But then after we do this, can we just do our jobs and can everyone calm down? Right. Plus, it didn't help that the place that he wanted them to, like, dig up was this warehouse. And someone, like, owned it. It's not like they were digging in the middle of the field. So there was a lot of stuff that police, like, had to, like, try and work around. Okay, but like, how did the public work around it? Like, I can't imagine that they could just show up and be like, we're going to dig here. Oh, you're absolutely right. The owners are not happy about it.

• 24:59Speaker 03

  But after four months of media attention and basically demands from the public, they kind of finally just bowed to the pressure and agree. Like, okay, you can dig up this one specific area where the psychic said the kids are buried. But what the warehouse owners say is police have to be there to make sure that everything is in order. And so what happens is a few months later, after the psychic goes back to Europe, with police present, they actually start a dig on March 1 of 1967, 14 months after Jane, Arna and Grant had gone missing. Now, the dig takes nine days, but when it concludes, no evidence whatsoever is found.

• 25:42Speaker 03

  And the case goes back to being cold again. Now, by this time, over a year has passed since the children disappeared. So, police attention has to shift to other cases. There are new cases popping up every single day. Right. And this gets farther and farther from their minds. And though the public never forgets the case, it gets further and further from the forefront of the public's mind as well. That is, until Jim and Nancy receive a mysterious letter.

• 26:13Ashley Flowers?

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• 27:34Speaker 03

  In mid-February of 1968, this is now two years since the kids went missing, a letter written in very childlike style arrives at the Beaumonts' home. It's postmarked from the Melbourne suburb of Dandenong, over 400 miles east of Adelaide, and it claims to be from Jane. And this is what it says, as published in the Satin Man book. Britt, I'm actually gonna have you read this.

• 28:00Speaker 02

  Dear Mum and Dad, we are safe. There's no need to worry about us. Oh, we really missed you in the past two years. At the beach on that day, we were walking to the bus stop when a man in a car stopped us and asked us if we wanted a ride. I said that we did, and that is how it all started. The man would not let us write before. He is letting us write tonight because he saw the story in the Herald tonight and felt sorry for you both. He watched us a lot for about six weeks, and then he did not watch us so much. Arna and I talk about you often, but Grant does not remember you at all after more than two years. We have been well-fed all the time. I, as well as Arna and Grant, hope that you are both well. The man said to me just now that he will willingly let us go

• 28:42Speaker 02

  if you come over to Victoria to get us, as long as you do not call the police. He said that if you do, the deal is off. You have to pick us up in front of the Dandenong Post Office at 10 minutes to 9 o'clock next Monday, the 26th of February. You, Dad, have to wear a dark coat and white pants, so the man will know you. The man told me to tell you that the police must not know at all. He said that if you do tell them, you may as well not come, so please do not tell them. The Dandenong Post Office is in Victoria, in case you did not know. Please do not tell the police. The man did not mean to harm us. We still love you both. Love, Jane, Arna, and Grant. This is Jane who is writing.

• 29:23Speaker 03

  Now Jim does what any sensible parent would do, and he hands the letter immediately over to investigators. And he does this because right away, there are some inconsistencies that stand out to police. Like Britt, I don't know if you noticed, but the letter writer actually misspells Arna's name. Her name is actually spelt A-R-N-N-A, and the letter writer only spelt it with one N. And apparently, the handwriting doesn't match any of Jane's school papers. Because of these pretty important inconsistencies, police are confident that this is another mean spirited hoax designed to toy with grieving parents. But Detective Sergeant Stan Swain, the same guy who was so sure that the crossed wires call was a clue,

• 30:08Speaker 03

  is totally convinced that the letter is real. And he's so sure of it that he manages to persuade Jim and Nancy to make a secret trip to Dandenong.

• 30:18Speaker 02

  Okay, but this guy's been kind of embarrassed before in front of his colleagues by believing something that ended up being nothing. What makes him think this one is like a for sure real deal?

• 30:30Speaker 03

  So here's the thing. Stan tells the Beaumonts that he himself compared the handwriting in the letter to the samples in Jane's school books, and he decided that it was a match, which feels like maybe he's going a bit rogue because the department already said that that they weren't a match and that these were a fake. And according to Searching for the Beaumont Children, Stan's boss told him, like, dude, you've got to let this go. But he just couldn't. So going over his superior's heads and getting Jim and Nancy's hopes up once again is bad enough. But it just boggles my mind that this guy is willing to do it a second time when it seems just as unlikely to pan out into something real. Like, to me, that's just borderline cruel.

• 31:14Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 31:14Speaker 03

  But cruel or not, a desperate Jim guided by Stan follows the letter's instructions exactly. He gets the right clothes, stands outside the Dandenong post office while Stan keeps watch. And a phone call actually comes into the post office saying that, quote, "The man has been delayed, but he'll be there soon."

• 31:35Speaker 02

  Wait, is this actually legit?

• 31:37Speaker 03

  Well, it kind of seems that way, right? So they wait and wait and wait. And day fades into evening, and neither the children nor this mystery man ever show up.

• 31:51Speaker 03

  Now, the next day, the same thing happens. Jim stays in front of the post office while Stan does surveillance, eager for any sign of the children or their abductor. And this goes on for three days. Then, the media gets their hands on the story. Because get this, Stan actually booked a hotel room under his real name. And reporters find out that he's there with Jim and Nancy. So, the whole thing blows up in the press. The operation is essentially busted. And because of all this attention to this lead in the press, it actually results in more letters from the same town arriving at the Beaumonts' home back in Adelaide. Someone claiming to be, quote, "the man", actually writes to Jim and Nancy himself this time, taunting them for involving police

• 32:35Speaker 03

  and even blaming them for not being able to get their children back. But is this one real? I mean, the general belief is that this is yet another hoax. Even the call? Even the call. So, does this Stan guy let go of it now? Well, so in that book, Searching for the Beaumont Children, it actually kind of talks about this. By the time all of this goes down in Dandenong in 68, Stan is obsessed with the case. And he almost views this as just a little setback instead of the disaster that it really is. Like, his ability to separate himself from the investigation is just totally gone. And unfortunately, it's Jim and Nancy who suffer the most because of it. Right, he keeps getting their hopes up. Right, and treating this obvious red herring

• 33:19Speaker 03

  as a credible lead effectively ends Stan's career in law enforcement. So, he's kind of done. The Beaumonts return to their hometown. They kind of swear off talking to the media once and for all. And once again, the case goes cold. Now, five years go by with no developments, no new leads, until August 25th of 1973, when something terrible and all too familiar happens. Two young children go missing in an eerily similar fashion to the Beaumonts. Now, it's two young girls, 11-year-old Joanne Radcliffe and 4-year-old Kirsty Gordon. Now, they go missing from a highly public Again, in broad daylight.

• 34:03Speaker 03

  They're at the Adelaide Oval Stadium to watch an Australian Rules football match with their families. Now, Joanne is there with her parents, Les and Kathleen, and their family friends Frank, while Kirsty is there with her grandmother Rita. Now, since Rita knows Joanne's parents, she lets Joanne take Kirsty to the bathroom around 3:50 PM during the match's third quarter. She expects that the two girls are going to come right back, except after about 15 minutes, there's still no sign of them. So Les and Kathleen start searching around the stadium, but they're unable to find any trace of either Kirsty or Joanne. So they go to the Oval's head office and ask for basically an announcement to be made about the missing children. But since play is in progress, the announcement isn't made until after the quarter ends,

• 34:48Speaker 03

  which costs investigators and the family a lot of valuable time. Oh, my gosh. Forget about the game. There are two missing kids. Well, yet you'd think the office staff basically kind of rationalized it by saying, "Look, if we made this announcement while the game's going on, no one's really going to hear it. No one's going to pay attention. There's really no point." Which, maybe, but can we at least try is like my feeling. Like, as a parent, I wouldn't care. Like, let's do it now. Let's do it later. I want you to keep doing it until you find my kid. But anyway, so police get involved and they start their search efforts. And right away, similarities between Joanne and Kirsty's disappearance and the Beaumont children's disappearance start to appear. Like, think about it. Both of these abductions happen in very public locations.

• 35:32Speaker 03

  With the Beaumonts, you have a crowded beach and a reserve, and now you have a packed stadium with over 12,000 people when Kirsty and Joanne vanish. Also, just like in the case of the missing Beaumont kids, witnesses in this new case put the two girls in the company of an unidentified man. One of Oval's employees, this guy named Ken, tells police that he saw a man with the two girls, two girls who matched the girl's description, trying to lure some kittens out from underneath a car that was parked in one of the equipment sheds on the grounds near the stadium. And Ken didn't think this was weird at the time, because I guess a lot of stray cats kind of hung out in, around, or near the stadium, and kids were always wanting to play with them.

• 36:16Speaker 03

  But he describes this man as being about five foot, eight inches tall, middle-aged, and said he was wearing this kind of distinctive gray checkered sport jacket with brown pants and a brown hat.

• 36:30Speaker 03

  They find another witness as well. This time it was a teenage boy who corroborates Ken's account. And they don't get to talk to this guy till like a week later. The Canberra Times reported back on August 31st of 73 that the teenager witnessed a man forcibly maneuvering the two girls toward one of the exits and into the public parking lot. And the teenager said that the man was actually carrying Kirsty under one arm and dragging a struggling Joanne away with the other. And his description of the man matched Ken's down to the man's gray coat and brown hat. So armed with these two matching descriptions, a local Adelaide art teacher actually paints a portrait of the unidentified man. And when the depiction is shown to the public,

• 37:15Speaker 03

  it shocks everyone.

• 37:19Ashley Flowers?

  My favorite time of the year for clothing is hands down fall. Sweaters, sweatshirts, I am all about layering. And when it comes to layering, no matter the outfit, you are probably going to find me in two things. Crime Junkie merch and Quince. Last year, Brit and I both got the same oversized blazer in textured brown. It looks good with everything and on every one, which means it makes for the perfect gift. Actually, anything at Quince would make for a good gift because Quince has a lot more than clothing. I have multiple friends who have the Quince sling bag. Or if you're really trying to impress, go with one of their 100% Mongolian cashmere sweaters. It'll look like you broke the bank, but really, they start at just 50 bucks. My personal style, I like pairing the black cashmere sweater with the black midi silk skirt, black tights and boots. I look super sharp and expensive.

• 38:04Ashley Flowers?

  You would think that I had lost my Midwest sensibility when it came to price, but no, ma'am. Everything at Quince is priced 50 to 80% less than similar brands. And that's because they work directly with ethical factories and cut out the middlemen. So you can give luxury quality pieces without the luxury price tag. Give the gift of quality this holiday season. Download the Quince app for app exclusive offers or go to quince.com. Get free shipping on your order and 365 day returns. Now available in Canada and the UK too. And when Quince asks where you heard about them, let them know it was here on Crime Junkie. It's the best way to support the show.

• 38:40Speaker 03

  The portrait of the unidentified man from the Adelaide Oval disappearances resembles the sketch of the stranger who was last seen with Jane, Arna, and Grant Beaumont. And here, I want you to check this out for yourself, Brett. This is the same guy? This is exactly the same guy. I mean, the long face- It's the same guy with a hat on. That's the only difference. Yeah, the long face, the forehead. I mean, granted, you can't see his hair because of the hat, but everything else is exactly the same. Yeah. Like, to me, the only difference is, you know, the guy at the Oval Stadium, we'll call him Oval Guy, he's described as around 5'8", and Beaumont Guy is described as over 6 feet tall. But that height discrepancy is kind of negligible in my mind. Like, witnesses

• 39:23Speaker 03

  can be off, and depending on their stature, I think that's something that can easily be misjudged. Oh, definitely. I'm, we're 5'2". Everybody's tall to me. Everyone's so tall. But more than anything, they consider the cases as possibly connected because the MO is so similar. Like, the victims are similar, both the crimes are so brazen, and yet, police have to look at the odds of having a dangerously skilled serial abductor in their midst now. Whoever snatched Joanne and Kirsty seems to be just as good at hiding them as whoever took Jane, Arna, and Grant. Again, days turn into weeks and months with no break in the case and no clue about what might have happened to them. And just like in the Beaumont case,

• 40:06Speaker 03

  Joanne and Kirsty's case goes cold. Years go by with no definitive links outside of basically conspiracy theories. But in 1990, 17 years after the Adelaide Oval disappearances, and this is now 24 years after the Beaumonts went missing, the Adelaide media learns that the South Australian police are diving in this place called Maipunga Reservoir, which is 34 miles south of Adelaide. Now, ordinarily, this could easily be brushed off as like a training exercise, or, you know, just something police won't confirm or deny, whatever. But their dive just so happened to take place after a witness in another murder case testifies

• 40:48Speaker 03

  that the Beaumonts are buried in that reservoir. Wait, go back. What other murder case? So it's actually multiple murder cases. So when this is going on, there are actually some really horrific killings in and around Adelaide in the, you know, late seventies and early eighties. And they were known as the family murders. And I'm only going to touch on them briefly here, but we're actually going to do like a more in-depth audio extra over in our fan club. So if you're interested, you can go there on our website. If you're already in the fan club, you can check that out after the episode. But let me tell you, these murders are pretty gruesome. From 1979 to 1983, five young men named Alan, Neil, Mark, Peter, and Richard go missing and are later found dead.

• 41:32Speaker 03

  Now, four of the five were drugged and sexually tortured, and autopsies determined that they all died from blood loss stemming from severe anal injuries caused by insertion of a blunt object. Neil, Mark, and Peter's bodies are found in pieces, and Mark had been cut from his navel to his pubic bone and then re-sown up with parts of his small intestine, missing. Do we know how the fifth person died? Well, not really. So Peter went missing during the same time period as the others, but his body was accidentally burned by a farmer who obviously had no idea there was a corpse on his property and he was doing some like controlled burns. So it's not known for sure how he died. All that was found was his skeleton cut into pieces like Neil and Mark.

• 42:17Speaker 03

  And the connection is on how he'd been mutilated after he died. Now, despite the connections and that they all seem super similar, only one of these murders is ever officially solved. Several of the victims were drugged with the same two prescription sedatives. So police use pharmacy records to kind of like narrow down their suspect list. And it pays off when they find this Adelaide man named Bevan. Police get a warrant for his house where, according to the book Searching for the Beaumont Children, they find both drugs as well as hair and fibers linking him to Richard, who was the fifth victim. Now Bevan is charged and convicted for Richard's death in 1984 and sentenced to life in prison. Then, five years later, in 1989, he's charged with killing Alan and Mark.

• 43:02Speaker 02

  This story is bananas, but I'm getting super lost. What's the connection to the Beaumonts again?

• 43:07Speaker 03

  So, in Bevan's second trial is where this mysterious witness, who we only know as Mr. B. due to confidentiality, testifies that Bevan was the one that snatched the Beaumont children. And he also says that he's the one that took Kirsty and Joanne from the Adelaide Oval Stadium as well. And it's because of his testimony that he's the one that says that the kids are buried at the reservoir. And so, the police are doing this dig, then these records come out, and the public is kind of putting this together. And so now, all of a sudden, Bevan's name is linked to the Beaumont kids. And as you can imagine, the media goes nuts. Like, this is not one, not two, but three of the most infamous crimes in South Australia

• 43:50Speaker 03

  history tied possibly together and potentially committed by the same person who's already like in jail and off the streets. Like, it seems like it could be a wonderful success story, like, almost too good to be true. And realistically, it might be. Especially since in the book, Searching for the Beaumont Children, Mr. B.'s credibility as a witness is seriously shaky. And they basically bring that up in court as well. Like, he admits to participating in one of the rapes, and he only agreed to testify after being granted full immunity. And he insists that he deserves the full financial reward for, quote-unquote, "solving the crime," which

• 44:27Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 44:27Speaker 03

  makes no sense to me if you're also participated in

• 44:30Speaker 02

  Right.

• 44:31Speaker 03

  raping some of the victims. Now, I couldn't find if he actually got the award, but, I mean, since none of his testimony about the Beaumonts or Adelaide Oval was ever proven to be remotely true, I would be shocked if he actually got anything. Now, the additional murder charges that Bevan went to court for are eventually dropped. And during the trial, he's not convicted, but thankfully, he is still in jail for killing Richard. And in my opinion, and this is just my opinion, I don't think he's the one responsible for the Beaumonts. For the family murders, absolutely, but the Beaumonts and the Adelaide Oval kidnappings don't match the family pattern to me at all. Like, four of the five missing children that we're talking about are girls, and the oldest girl that we're talking about is 11, whereas in the family victims, those victims are

• 45:16Speaker 03

  boys that range from 14 to 25.

• 45:20Speaker 02

  Right, the victim profiles don't match at all.

• 45:22Speaker 03

  Yeah, and I was doing some reading in the California Department of Justice website, kind of about sexual predators, and while some do exhibit more variety in their victims, like different ages or genders, other keep like a specific preference, and that seems to be what Bevan does. And since the other killings that he did, the family murders, are so consistent, I don't really see him deviating. Plus, he would have been in his early 20s at the time that the kids went missing in 66, which is really too young to match the description of the man seen at the beach. But again, it's worth mentioning, because if you would do any research on this case, like, his name is going to come up.

• 45:55Speaker 02

  Okay, and if he was responsible, like, even the way the boys' bodies were found, but the kids weren't, doesn't really add up.

• 46:02Speaker 03

  Exactly, but there's a lot that doesn't add up to me, and Bevan's never been charged with anything related to the Beaumonts or the Adelaide Oval disappearances. So after the trial in 1990, the Beaumont case goes cold yet again. And in 1992, the Dandenong letters are proven, once and for all, to be a fake, when fingerprint analysis directs police to a man who had been a teenager back in the late 60s. And, listen, he's never been named publicly, but according to authorities, he's actually admitted to writing all of the letters as a hoax. Now, time keeps passing, and while new theories often connect new suspects to the Beaumonts case, like, including some other pretty notorious child killers across Australia, none of them are ever proven.

• 46:47Speaker 03

  Like, in 1998, eight years after that whole, like, reservoir dig, there was this 86-year-old Man named Arthur, who was arrested for the unsolved 1970 rape and murder of a five year old and seven year old pair of sisters. Now, he's charged with the other, like, whole host of offenses for sexually assaulting a young woman and other girls and in his own family. And the reason he even got tied to it initially was that Andrew Rule actually reported for Son Harold in 2001 that a witness saw Arthur on TV after his arrest. And he placed him at Adelaide Oval with the two girls matching Joanne and Kirsty's description. And then they're thinking, well, whoever took those girls are thought to have taken the Beaumonts. And that's kind of where that connection is made.

• 47:31Speaker 03

  But eventually, police completely clear him of any suspicion in the Beaumont and the Adelaide Oval cases. And he's like totally ruled out by like 2001. Now, five years later, in 2007, the Harold's son reported that convicted child murderer Derek Percy had been questioned by police like back in 2005 in relation to the Beaumonts. And although he's thought to be responsible for at least eight other child's deaths, South Australian police told the Australian Broadcasting Corporation in 2014 that he was definitely not a significant person of interest for the Beaumonts. Like, he was already in prison when Joanne and Kirsty were snatched up. So if the theory of, you know, the two cases being connected was real, like, he couldn't have done both. And he doesn't really match the description from the beach.

• 48:15Speaker 03

  Now, despite these possibilities and, you know, the case getting renewed over and over, no, like, real credible links ever emerged. And eventually, public fascination dims, though it never fully dies. And eventually, a book is published a full 40 years after Jane, Arna and Grant disappeared. And this is when writer Alan Whitaker and his research partner Stuart Mullins published the book Searching for the Beaumont Children, which is considered one of the most definitive and comprehensive accounts of this mystery. And it's a book that we've referenced a couple of times throughout this episode. I highly recommend it. But when they published this book, it's 2006 now, mind you, and despite the 40-year lapse

• 48:57Speaker 03

  in time, everyone was about to be shocked to find out that there was still secrets out there waiting to be uncovered. And people who held those secrets were finally ready to talk. Because that's when Alan and Stuart get a phone call that changes everything that they and the police thought that they knew about this case.

• 49:23Ashley Flowers?

  My favorite time of the year for clothing is hands down fall. Sweaters, sweatshirts, I am all about layering. And when it comes to layering, no matter the outfit, you are probably going to find me in two things. Crime Junkie merch and Quince. Last year, Brit and I both got the same oversized blazer in textured brown. It looks good with everything and on everyone, which means it makes for the perfect gift. Actually, anything at Quince would make for a good gift because Quince has a lot more than clothing. I have multiple friends who have the Quince sling bag. Or if you're really trying to impress, go with one of their 100% Mongolian cashmere sweaters. It'll look like you broke the bank, but really, they start at just 50 bucks. My personal style, I like pairing the black cashmere sweater with the black midi silk skirt, black tights and boots. I look super sharp and expensive.

• 50:07Ashley Flowers?

  You would think that I had lost my Midwest sensibility when it came to price, but no, ma'am. Everything at Quince is priced 50 to 80% less than similar brands. And that's because they work directly with ethical factories and cut out the middlemen. So you can give luxury quality pieces without the luxury price tag. Give the gift of quality this holiday season. Download the Quince app for app exclusive offers or go to quince.com. Get free shipping on your order and 365 day returns, now available in Canada and the UK too. And when Quince asks where you heard about them, let them know it was here on Crime Junkie. It's the best way to support the show.

• 50:43Speaker 03

  The person who called Alan and Stuart is a woman named Angela who believes that her former father-in-law had something to do with the Beaumont children's disappearance. She says that her ex-husband, a man named Hayden, confided that he saw his father with the Beaumonts on the day that they disappeared. Now, at first, Alan doesn't take Angela too seriously. He's gotten calls like this before and he's had his fair share of run-ins with wannabe sleuths from all walks of life. But as the conversation continues, Alan realizes that not only is Angela's story fascinating, it's also really believable. So he and Stuart do some investigation basically into Angela and her background.

• 51:28Speaker 03

  Basically, they're trying to collect references to see, you know... If she can be considered trustworthy.

• 51:34Speaker 02

  Yeah, like to make sure that she's legit.

• 51:36Speaker 03

  Yeah, and all of her references come back glowing. So Stuart reaches out and he arranges a meeting. And this one meeting turns into a years-long investigation by authors, experts, private investigators, retired detectives and others with dozens of interviews all around Australia in their meticulous hunt for the truth. And their findings become another book, which they titled The Satin Man, which we've also referenced throughout this episode.

• 52:04Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 52:04Speaker 03

  Now, the title of the book refers to a brand-new suspect, the satin man. And the satin man is Angela's ex-father-in-law. Now, the authors in their book use pseudonyms for their subjects, but police and numerous news outlets like the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, the New Daily and CNN have all confirmed the satin man's true identity.

• 52:29Speaker 02

  So who is it?

• 52:31Speaker 03

  His name was Harry Phipps, and he actually died back in 2004 without ever being on police's radar. Now, he was never investigated in his lifetime for any connection to the Beaumont children, but according to those who knew him best, the Harry seen in private was a far different man from the one presented to the public. The first and best-known sign of Harry's, we'll call it a double life, is right there in the book's title, His Obsession with Satin. Harry was infamous within his family and their inner circle for having a satin fetish. Like, not a healthy fetish or interest, but one that was so consuming that, literally,

• 53:13Speaker 03

  no one was allowed to even wear satin near him because just the sight and sound of the fabric caused an instant uncontrollable arousal. And according to the book, Harry made his own satin pajamas and dresses for sexual gratification, and he kept them in a private room in the house that the rest of the family was forbidden from entering.

• 53:35Speaker 02

  Oh, I'm sorry, wait. What?

• 53:38Speaker 03

  Satin man.

• 53:39Speaker 02

  We have heard some dark stories about people who have dark, twisted fantasies and turn-ons. But honestly, I did not see this one coming.

• 53:53Speaker 03

  It's weird, right?

• 53:54Speaker 02

  What? Satin?

• 53:56Speaker 03

  Satin.

• 53:56Speaker 02

  And like, he can't see it, he can't hear it rustle.

• 54:00Speaker 03

  Can't be around it.

• 54:01Speaker 02

  He can't go to weddings, obviously. Like,

• 54:03Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 54:03Speaker 02

  I'm so floored by this entire thing. But as weird as it is, because it is.

• 54:12Speaker 03

  Totally.

• 54:12Speaker 02

  It doesn't make you a child abductor.

• 54:16Speaker 03

  Well, no, that's true. Like, the obsession with satin doesn't. Except according to Harry's son, Hayden, there's more, like, a lot more. Harry was a violent alcoholic who loved firearms. And his son says that he kept guns all over the house. And he also said that he had frequent outbursts against his immediate family and threatened them many times with his weapons. But it gets even worse beyond that. Hayden confided in Angela that he had been violently raped by his father multiple times a week for many years growing up. And the abuse only stopped when he got big enough to defend himself. And basically, his dad's fetish of satin kind of ended up haunting him

• 54:59Speaker 03

  because he said he was haunted by the swish of the satin fabric coming down the hallway. So he, where his dad like couldn't be around it because it was, it was too much and he was too aroused. Like, I don't even think he could be around it later because it brought back so many awful traumatic memories.

• 55:14Speaker 02

  Right, it was too traumatic and triggering for him.

• 55:16Speaker 03

  Now, obviously, because Harry was never on anyone's radar, none of this was reported to the South Australian police at the time. And Harry was never charged with a crime. But by the time Harry comes into law enforcement's attention through Alan and Stuart, they've collected a whole laundry list of circumstantial evidence that casts a ton of suspicion on him. Now, first, there's his status and his wealth. Harry was a very successful businessman and he owned the Castaway Factory in Plimpton, which is like a suburb of the area. Now, being rich and well-connected and prominent in Adelaide's social circles was

• 55:55Speaker 03

  a great cover in the 1960s. Like, Harry didn't fit anyone's idea of what they thought a pedophile was. And so, police never even looked in his direction. Plus, remember how the Beaumont kids bought their lunch at that bakery with that one-pound note?

• 56:12Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 56:13Speaker 03

  So, apparently, Harry was big on flaunting his wealth by handing out one-pound notes to Hayden and his friends to like, get them out of the house on Saturday so he could be alone with his satin.

• 56:24Speaker 02

  It would be like, our $10 bill from our parents.

• 56:27Speaker 03

  Yeah, so it's like, here, here's some money, now, go away. And it's a habit that kind of continued into the next generation when Hayden's son Nick, who apparently like, lived with Harry for a time after his parents' divorce, like, he would give him money as well. So, although he's never publicly said that his grandfather did anything to him, Nick also alleges that sexually inappropriate experiences like, occurred with Harry as a child, though we don't know what that is explicitly. Now, in the book, Nick tells Stuart about how Harry would rub up against him when they went swimming together, and that's kind of like, the most that we got.

• 57:06Speaker 02

  Okay, but didn't Hayden say that he saw the Beaumont kids with Harry?

• 57:10Speaker 03

  Yes. So, this is like, our biggest piece of circumstantial evidence. Australia 7 News did a documentary about Harry in 2018, and they have audio of an interview that Hayden did with one of the satin man's investigators, where he recalls seeing the Beaumont children on the day that they disappeared at his family house on Australia Day 1966. Here, I'll play it for you.

• 58:01Speaker 04

  Only long enough until he took him inside, or he took them inside. And then after that, I came out of the company house and went inside to see if it was going on. And the front door was open. So I just assumed I left at the front door. Did you hear any noises, any screaming, or any shouting, or nothing? Any gunshots? Yeah, we had some gunshots go off, but shit, Harry's always letting on gunshots, that's enough. You think it was all with the kids in the house, or was gunshots going on? No, not in that house. How many shots did you hear? Four.

• 58:45Speaker 03

  Now, I know that audio is a little rough to hear, so just to summarize, Hayden said that basically he saw three kids at his family's house on the day that the Beaumont kids disappear. And one was drastically shorter than the other two, and that would match because Jane and Arna were kind of close in height-ish, and Grant was much shorter, being the youngest. Then, he says they were gone, the front door is wide open, and he hears later that day, or at some point that day, four gunshots. Okay, but that doesn't mean anything, because he said he heard gunshots all the time, right? Right, no, that's totally accurate. But later in that same interview, Hayden says that he saw Harry putting some big PVC bags

• 59:28Speaker 03

  in the trunk of his car, which, again, at the time, didn't seem weird to him, because it's how Harry would transport his satin dresses to other properties he owned. And he said, you know, to be very clear, like, "I never saw the children leave the house." Which, by the way, I haven't mentioned this yet, his house just happens to be within a very easy walking distance of Colley Reserve and Glenel Beach. Now, Hayden believes that the kids were buried at Harry's factory in what he calls a sandpit. Now, Harry's factory, again, very close to everything we're talking about. It was just a short drive from the beach. Does Harry have any resemblance to the sketch? Brett.

• 1:00:09Speaker 03

  The resemblance is uncanny. I want to send you this gif. So we took a video that Australia Seven News made and we made it into a gif. And it is the sketch image and then it kind of morphs into Harry's picture. Hang on, hang on just a second. You're gonna, you're gonna flip.

• 1:00:31Speaker 02

  Oh my God, that is

• 1:00:34Speaker 03

  Right?

• 1:00:35Speaker 02

  eerie. Like, obviously, he's older than the sketch, but he would be.

• 1:00:39Speaker 03

  Well, so here's the thing. So Harry was 48 in 1966, so it's a little bit older, but he kept himself in really good shape. And so he actually always looked much younger than he was.

• 1:00:50Speaker 02

  Honestly, the eeriest thing for me is the hairline is

• 1:00:54Speaker 03

  Yeah, he's got that like

• 1:00:55Speaker 02

  Identical.

• 1:00:56Speaker 03

  High forehead, the hairline's spot on. He does have kind of a long face.

• 1:01:01Speaker 02

  Yeah, and like the ear shapes, the nose shape. This is

• 1:01:05Speaker 03

  Creepy.

• 1:01:06Speaker 02

  We talked about it a lot, where sketches look really, really, really similar to suspects. But honestly, I think this is the most, like, accurate one I've ever seen.

• 1:01:18Speaker 03

  Especially for, to me, you know, the sketch has like some prominent features, like that forehead and the long face, but it also, it can be kind of vague. But my goodness, is it close. So we're gonna, I'll put this gif on our Instagram. If you guys need to see it, you need to see it, a Crime Junkie Podcast on Instagram. But despite all of the coincidences so far, the South Australia police declined to get too involved when Alan and Stuart first get in touch. And this is back in like 2007. I mean, Harry's been dead for years at this point. So it's not like they can really arrest him. And they kind of are like, you know, we've got a ton of active cases to work on. So according to the Satin Man book, police say that they've already reviewed their evidence and talked

• 1:02:02Speaker 03

  to Harry's widow, which was his second wife, and found that she's a dead end. But Alan and Stuart decide to talk to her anyways. Now, she was Harry's housekeeper before they got married and also took care of him after his health started to really decline. So she had a front row Seat into his weird fetishes. Now, I wasn't able to verify her real name like I could with the other people. So I'll just call her Norma like they do in the book. So Stuart arranges a meeting with Norma, who still lives at the same house in Glenelg. And he goes to talk to her. Now, right away, Norma does two things that he finds odd. First, she denies ever talking to the South Australia police.

• 1:02:45Speaker 03

  And she brings up the Adelaide Oval disappearances completely unprovoked in relation to the Beaumonts. Now, she's really friendly and welcoming, though, like happy to talk about Harry, happy to show Stuart all over the house. And she takes him in the basement as part of like their tour. And he catches sight of something really strange down there. A little white children's purse. A purse very much like the one Jane Beaumont had the day that she vanished. So Stuart asked her about the purse without necessarily like mentioning why he's interested or that it's connected to Jane.

• 1:03:28Speaker 03

  And Norma gets like kind of upset and says that, oh, you know, I just bought it at a thrift store, which is kind of weird for a woman her age. Like, they kind of point out that she's got like a lot of means. She's pretty wealthy. Like, why is she buying a child's purse at a thrift store? So they tell police about this, but by the time police are alerted and they get to the house.

• 1:03:50Speaker 02

  It's not there.

• 1:03:51Speaker 03

  Exactly. Norma claims to have thrown the purse away and it is never seen again.

• 1:03:58Speaker 02

  OK, that's so shady, though. Like, if you just bought it or bought it in general and it was just hanging around your house, like, why all of a sudden would you just pitch it?

• 1:04:07Speaker 03

  Mm hmm. I mean, that's exactly what I thought, too. But without the purse, though, police are forced to return to seeing Norma as a dead end. Yet again, years pass. Allen and Stewart continue their research. And once the satin man is published in 2013, even more people come forward. And once again, this kind of stirs like all of the public interest. It's completely renewed. And this time, all the renewed interest, like they actually have a person of interest in their sites. And they can maybe now use new technology to try and locate the children. And this new technology reveals something that may finally thaw this cold case.

• 1:04:50Speaker 03

  The South Australian police use ground penetrating radar technology to search around Harry's old factory in Adelaide, the one that Hayden thought that he had buried the kids at. The search, according to Nigel Hunt for the advertiser newspaper, turns up an anomaly in the soil, which can indicate that it's moved or that something or someone is buried there. So armed with that precise location, police now get involved and they excavate a one square meter space in search of anything to definitively tie Harry to the Beaumont children. But like so many times before, this dig turns up nothing.

• 1:05:32Speaker 02

  I feel like the families of these kids have just seen so much like hope that's dashed and then hope that's dashed. Like, do they have any family members that are still around? Like their parents, like this is 50 years out.

• 1:05:46Speaker 03

  Oh, yeah. So they're actually, at the time that this happened, they're still alive and still in Adelaide. And in fact, that's actually one of the reasons that police really start looking into Harry as a suspect, because they want to give Jim and Nancy some closure after all of these years of waiting for the truth. And truth is kind of an odd thing, though, because even when it's hidden in the darkest family secrets, like those of a man like Harry, it begins to come out eventually. So the allegations of his horrific sexual deviancy take on a new life in January 2018, when Australian TV premieres a new feature called Seven News Investigates: The Beaumont children, what really happened?

• 1:06:29Speaker 03

  And a woman who chooses to remain anonymous identifies Harry as the man who brutally raped her in 1979 when she was just 14 years old. At the time, she was living with her family right near Harry's factory and she kept quiet for the same reason as Hayden and so many other sexual assault victims. She was shameful about what happened. She had a fear of him, maybe a fear that no one would believe her. But again, since Harry's dead and all of the physical evidence of sexual assault is, you know, long gone, there's nothing for police to investigate. Really, her story just kind of corroborates that he wasn't a good guy.

• 1:07:10Speaker 03

  But this same Seven News documentary does bring forward something that they can look into. Because a man named David, who was a teenager back in 66 when the Beaumonts disappeared, comes forward and tells the investigators or producers of this show that once he did a unique job for Harry. David says Harry hired him and his older brother, Robin, to dig a hole at the castaway grounds behind the factory during that long Australia Day weekend, just days after Jane, Arna and Grant Beaumont had vanished. Now, according to David, the hole was about seven yards long, about one yard wide, and

• 1:07:55Speaker 03

  about as deep as a young boy is tall. And he said it was located away from where that 2013 dig had taken place. Now, they didn't think anything weird of this job at the time because they had no reason to doubt Harry's, like, you know, again, he's this nice upstanding citizen. He was paying them good money for their labor. Right. But David said it wasn't until decades later, when he saw that Harry was on the news, that he finally made the connection to the Beaumont children. So armed with this fresh information, as well as a fresh location to search, police, archaeologists and forensic experts returned to the old castaway factory.

• 1:08:33Speaker 03

  Melinda McMillan wrote for Newcastle Star in 2018 about the search team who had basically, what they found was more soil anomalies right near where David said he and Robin had dug back in 66, which makes sense because, you know, anomalies can show anything, even digging, and we know they dug there.

• 1:08:51Speaker 02

  Right.

• 1:08:51Speaker 03

  So it's not a lot up front, but it's at least enough to spark yet another excavation. And before the dig, police officially named Harry as a suspect in the disappearance of the Beaumont children. So on February 2nd, 2018, the second dig at Castaway begins, but it's called off after less than 12 hours when investigators turn up nothing but some old animal bones.

• 1:09:20Speaker 02

  Okay, but that doesn't clear Harry. Like, they've only dug a couple of places on his property.

• 1:09:26Speaker 03

  Yeah, exactly. And especially with this, like, mountain, or at least a hill of circumstantial evidence. I think Harry is still a fantastic suspect, and I don't think that they've removed him from their suspect list. I have no doubt that he absolutely was a sadistic pedophile during his lifetime, and the scars that he left on his victims are clear. But who knows if we'll ever get a 100% clear answer about his possible involvement with the Beaumonts. Like, like, police still believe that the Adelaide Oval disappearances are connected to the Beaumont kids. So if Harry's responsible for one, it's totally possible that he's connected to the other.

• 1:10:08Speaker 03

  But so much time has passed, memories fade, and many of the people who encountered him, including Hayden and Angela, are now deceased. Nancy Beaumont herself passed away just a little bit ago, on September 16th of 2019, in Adelaide at age 92. And her husband, the Beaumont's father, Jim, he's actually still alive, presumably still carrying the hope that however unlikely it might be after all this time, he might still learn the truth about what really happened to Jane, Arna, and Grant on that fateful day.

• 1:10:46Ashley Flowers?

  Okay, so since the release of that episode in January of 2020, Jim Beaumont has passed away. He died in April of 2023 at the age of 97, never knowing what happened to his three kids. But just because he's gone doesn't mean that Jane, Arna, or Grant don't have advocates. And when those advocates recently heard that the property where the person of interest, Harry Phipps factory, used to be was gonna get developed, they were quick to jump on this and tell the government, like, now is the time to do a renewed search of this area.

• 1:11:20Speaker 03

  Not only the best time, but possibly the last time they even can.

• 1:11:24Ashley Flowers?

  Truly, like, whatever is gonna go in there will probably make it hard, if not impossible, to ever search this area again. But it is a good news, bad news situation. Like, so bad news, never again. Good news is that the demolition they're having to do to prepare, to put this land up for sale, also makes this, like, the best chance that they've ever gotten to search this place really thoroughly. So this is all happening quick. Like, this search was just announced at the top of February 2025, and it is gonna be happening February 22nd. And the dig is focused on three areas, two of which were the subjects of the previous searches back in 2013, and then again in 2018.

• 1:12:06Ashley Flowers?

  And the location of the third area isn't exactly clear at this point, but it's stemming from an investigation by this TV show called The Hunters that documents high-profile Australian crimes. I guess they have a docu-series about the Beaumonts coming out, actually, just the day after the dig, on February 23rd, so keep an eye out for that. And I guess this third dig location is coming out of the investigation that they did. So it sounds like maybe they're unearthing something new. Now, this dig, importantly, is also going to go deeper and wider than the previous digs have. According to an article from the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, a member of parliament named Frank Pangello is organizing the search.

• 1:12:49Ashley Flowers?

  And he says that the ground is like one to two meters or like three to six and a half feet higher than it was back in 1966, just to like the amount of fill that's been added over the years.

• 1:13:00Speaker 02

  So wait, are the police involved in this? Or is this being run through like another government agency? Like you said, he was from parliament.

• 1:13:07Ashley Flowers?

  Neither. So it's being done by a private firm with a couple of forensic archaeologists and some university students. But I will say the police are aware of the search. They're going to be supervising it just in case they do find anything. We don't like lose chain of custody. And in the event that they find something, the search will then stop. And then like the official investigators will pick it up.

• 1:13:27Speaker 02

  It'll be transferred over to the police.

• 1:13:29Ashley Flowers?

  Right. Now, it's worth noting that the police don't think that this area that they're digging is supported by the evidence that they have. So I don't know what that means. I don't know what it is they have that they're saying like, no, definitely not. I'm going to be really curious to watch this new docu-series, figure out what has made them so confident in this area again, but particularly in this like new place there.

• 1:13:52Speaker 02

  Yeah, especially since again, like this really is like the last opportunity for a search, especially of this size, like three different places. That's like an extensive search.

• 1:14:02Ashley Flowers?

  And I'm going to be all over the news outlets over the next few days, seeing if anything turns up. Now, you guys, is the time to like set your Google alerts? Like I know Brett does. So that's the fast and dirty, you guys. I hope you enjoyed this update. Please make sure to reach out to us on social to tell us if you want more like this. And we'll be back Monday with your regularly scheduled programming.

• 1:14:35Ashley Flowers?

  You can find all the source material for this episode on our website, crimejunkiepodcast.com.

• 1:14:41Speaker 02

  You can also follow us on Instagram at @crimejunkiepodcast.

• 1:15:21Ashley Flowers?

  Crime Junkie is an AudioChuck production. So, what do you think Chuck? Do you approve?

• 1:15:31Speaker 05

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• 1:15:59Speaker 06

  When the nights grow longer, the shadows start to stir. And that can only mean one thing. Full Body Chills is back. This season, step inside original tales where every doorway leads somewhere darker, every stranger carries a secret, and nothing is ever quite what it seems. Each story takes you somewhere new, but be careful. You never know what might follow you home. So gather round, listen close, and stream Full Body Chills wherever you get your podcasts.