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Matthew Wales and the Society Murders | Morbid | Podcast

March 14, 2024 / 01:25:57

This episode covers the Society Murders in Australia, focusing on the lives and deaths of Margaret Wales King and Paul King. Ash and Elena discuss the complex family dynamics, including Matthew Wales, who murdered his mother and stepfather over inheritance disputes.

The episode begins with Ash and Elena discussing their sleep patterns and favorite comfort movies. They then transition to the case of Margaret Wales King, who was born in 1933 and lived a privileged life due to her father's successful road construction business.

Margaret's marriage to Brian Wales deteriorated after he became friends with Paul King, leading to an affair between Margaret and Paul. The episode details the impact of their divorce on their children, particularly Matthew, who struggled with behavioral issues and animal cruelty.

Matthew's relationship with his mother soured over financial disputes, culminating in the brutal murders of Margaret and Paul after a dinner at Matthew's home. The episode describes the discovery of their bodies and the subsequent investigation that led to Matthew's arrest.

Matthew ultimately confessed to the murders, citing resentment towards his mother and claiming Paul had abused him as a child. The episode concludes with a discussion of Matthew's sentencing and the implications of his actions on the family.

TLDR

Matthew Wales murdered his mother and stepfather over inheritance disputes, leading to a shocking confession and complex family dynamics.

Episode

1:25:57
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hey weirdos I'm Ash and I'm Elena and this is [Music] mid it is small bed what's up bro me out
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it's so gloomy it's been gloomy this whole week it is very gloomy which I I like but when I didn't sleep well the
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night before I don't like it cuz it makes me tired see I actually slept totally fine let's just talk about our
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sleep patterns I slept totally fine last night but then I woke up this morning and I felt so tired immediately because
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of the gluin outside because of the glum mination the gumin it's a rumination of
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Gloom it is absolutely out here yeah which again normally I really like it I like rain I like the Gloom I feel like
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this be would be good writing weather for you it is very good writing weather I'm I always get like super super um
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motivated and inspired in this kind of weather this weather makes me want to curl up on my couch and watch mermaids
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with Sher wow I didn't see that that's what it makes me want to do particular film I
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didn't know have you ever seen mermaids no Sher whenona Rider I've seen I know what it is but I've never seen it I
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don't know that you'd like it who knows you know I still I got to keep giving you credit for making me watch salurn
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that's true give me all the credit I'll give you the credit for that give me your your credit card I'll keep it
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giving you credit give me give me everything give me everything you have cuz of salberg Cu of
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salber no I you know what I like to watch like um this is when I want to watch like urban legend oh yeah that's
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my comfort one of my comfort movies or or scream yep scream definitely scream is a comfort movie oh scream make it ah
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that that makes me want popcorn but I packed it in my lunch today so I'm excited about that there you go yeah I
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didn't pack my current hyperfixation snack though I finally have one I think when we were talking to kurur and
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Sabrina I don't know if that episode came out yet um it did not it did not it will though it will and you'll hear me
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say I don't really think I have a hyperfixation snack I think we were recording When I said that it also might
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have just been in conversation all say fake all of it it's not a true story but all that to say I think I found my
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hyperfixation snack and I should figure out the Tik Tok early I'm going to do that later who recommended it but it's
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popcorn dark chocolate like chocolate chips and then maple glazed peans mixed together s great it's so good welcome to
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the world of hyperfixation snacks where you will hate that eventually and you'll
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have to take a long break from it oh you have to you get you end up hating it it's part of the hyperfixation process
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I'm also hyper fixating on this oatmeal yeah you you will you wear it out you wear out until it becomes thing where
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you're like I don't even want to look at that anymore that's terrible then you loop back around eventually you just got
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to give some time to breathe okay yeah that's happened to me uh many times oh cool yeah I'm also making this oatmeal
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that I'm fixating on look at you yeah I'm not pregnant I feel like I feel like this is like giving the vibe of like I
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love these snacks all the sudden so oh no yeah I think everybody likes a weird SN yeah but well then I've also been
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posting that my cat Franklin has been really snuggly with me lately and people are messaging me asking me if I'm
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pregnant yeah she's not pregnant everybody so I just got married that' be a lot but but yeah Frankle is just being
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sweet he is so there's that I know did you see the thing I posted of him last night I did I love
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him cats she's such a cat lady I love it I am she's that lady that will be like do you guys want to see photos of my
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cats no I am she'll show you through like I am that lady and I will show you pictures of my cats and you better want
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to see them and she wants and she's going to want a reaction yeah you better re give the proper reaction don't [ __ ]
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around tell me how cute he is cry cry right now cry at how beautiful these kitties are no I did have a moment
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last night where I was like what if we got like one more cat and then I was like no I didn't say that because Drew
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will say yes he's also a crazy cat go with it but no three is the limit yeah I don't want to push it don't push that
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limit no no no you gave me a Mikey just gave me a look like do what you want no don't let me do
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what I want don't do what you want cuz eventually I'll be like why do I have so many
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cats but yeah yeah that's where we are that's our banter for the intro so there you go I have a case from Australia
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Today Australia Australia and for all those out there who don't like the old timey cases this one's for you because
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it's not that old hey there you go it's in the 2000s I think you know old timey cases are making a comeback I
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they are personally I think but this one is also not old well there you go I don't know why I said also I was going
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to say I I love that it's just not old um but yeah not old and also not old it's not old but I guess to some people
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it might be old because I don't think of the early 2000s as that long ago but it
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really is that long ago it is but I feel like the 2000s are that's current pretty
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modern to me agreed well this is the society murders which took place in Australia
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and one of the victims there are two is Margaret whales King so let's start with
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her yeah Margaret whales King was born uh Margaret Mary Lord in melbour Australia on June 16th 1933 she was the
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oldest of two children born to Robert and dorine Lord I really like the name Dorene yeah it's cute it is cute now
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initially this family was like a really working class family Margaret's dad Robert worked as a commercial truck
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driver and in her younger years or like during during her younger years and then
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eventually he started a road construction company of his own in the like 1940s is throughout the 1940s and
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50s he was really doing steady business and by the 60s his company had actually become one of the largest road
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construction companies in the entire region wow which made him and his family hella wealthy hell yeah they had a lot
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of money this is the society murders so it is knew that was coming exactly now as the daughters of what was now one of
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Victoria's wealthiest families at this point Margaret and her sister Diana grew up with everything they could ever want
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ever want they wanted for nothing they went to private boarding schools for their primary education a private girl
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school for secondary education goodbye education and after graduating from high school Margaret herself went on to
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pursue a degree in Business by then it was the early 1950s and that was when she met Brian bigles whales an airline
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pilot bigles Biggles what an adorable name I know right they hit it off immediately and they dated for 4 years
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before eventually getting married on Jude's 17th just one day after Margaret turned 24 a so once they got back from
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their honeymoon Margaret and Brian moved into Margaret's parents home in camberwell and that was after her
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parents had moved into a smaller home so like Brian and Margaret took over that house they didn't live with the parents
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a year later Margaret got pregnant with their first child Sally uh Sally was born in 1958 and then four other
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children quickly followed uh Damian in 1960 Emma in 63 Prudence which I love Prudence I love that name right she was
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born in' 65 and finally Matthew in 1968 so Margaret and Brian they were able to raise their children how they
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had both grown up because Brian was from a pretty well-off family too and they both together wanted to make sure that
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their kids had every privilege every opportunity also available to them at the time yeah of course so as a family
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they split their time between their home in camberwell a vacation home in sarento
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and they just bopped around to like lots of expensive and exclusive locations around Australia they were living like
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this beautiful family life the high life like everything was pretty perfect yeah
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sounds it now the first Decades of their marriage they were really like ideal you
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know but like I always say by 1968 the crack started to show in the relationship as a commercial p
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Brian was away from home for long periods of time quite often which left Margaret responsible for all five
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children on her own and a that's a lot like it's one thing to stay home with like two kids even that is a lot I can't
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picture that but with five yeah I'm like that is so many children so Not only was
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she like overwhelmed but she's also starting to feel really lonely cuz like you put all the kids to bed and you're
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just sitting at at night by yourself yeah and she's just I'm sure all day she's just kind attending to everyone
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else's needs and it's like exhausted that wears a lot out of you yeah so in 1968 while on vacation in Bramton Island
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in Queensland Brian actually struck up a friendship with fellow vacationer Paul King both men were around the same age
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they shared a lot of interests and they also so they met on vacation but they also lived pretty close to one another
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like in their homes in melbin so when the vacation on Bramton Island ended they they were like why should our
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friendship end like we live so close to each other we met by happen let's hang out when we best friends what the [ __ ]
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they were like did we just become best friends yep for now uhoh over time they started including Margaret in their
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plans and quickly all three of them became best friends wow this sounds so nice at first it does and I've never
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heard of this case so I don't know what's going to happen but I know it's not going to be great I'll let you know
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okay yeah as we go on awesome so the friendship between Margaret Brian and Paul continued actually for several
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years like this friendship went on for years however unbeknownst to Brian Margaret and Paul had been carrying on
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an affair while Brian was away working oh no yes so they were best friends but also like not at all not at all not at
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all foe mhm and by the mid1 1970s their relationship Margaret and Paul's had become
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serious so and at that point Margaret and Brian's marriage had effectively ended like it was all done according to
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author Hillary Bonnie when Margaret's father died in 74 thus securing her vast inheritance Margaret and Paul decided to
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go ahead and make their relationship public Bonnie wrote within days of Rob Lord's Funeral Brian Wales moved out of
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the family home in camberwell to the serrento beach house and Paul King moved in with Margaret and the five children
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oh so Brian just like he Brian met this guy became friends with him and then Brian has to move out of his home and
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this man his best friend or was supposedly his best friend swoops in and literally
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lives with his children yeah holy [ __ ] it's a it's a big traumatic event for everyone involved that's very gnarly it
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is and not surprisingly the end of Brian and Margaret's relationship came as a shock to almost everybody who knew them
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especially their kids who found this transition really difficult like yeah this is intense Margaret and Brian
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officially got divorced in 197 and they did share custody of the children but Brian's poor ability to cope with the
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divorce took a toll on the rest of the family like I don't think he was really able to get over this and it did affect
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his parenting to a it was such a betrayal absolutely on both sides yeah according to that same author Hillary
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Bonnie the older whales children bore the brunt of their father's depression and endured long conversations with him
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about the loss of his adored wife oh so it's like because you have remember he didn't lose just his wife he also lost
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his best friend yeah that's like all at and like his his family his home his he lost everything in an instant I can't
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even fathom that so do I think it's right to like confide in your kids and make them like your closest Confidant
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maybe not when it's no unfortunately not because it's like your kids unfortunately your kids should not you
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know have to bear any of the weight of what's going on in your life they just shouldn't in my opinion that's how I
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parent never have to shoulder any of my personal issues right or what's going on
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in my personal life yeah but at the same time I understand that this man is human
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right and that he's alone and you can see how this would happen because the kids are like older teenagers at this
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point I know cuz that's the other thing when they I don't have older teenagers so I don't know how that Dynamic changes
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and I'm not going to pretend that I do and it does change you're right that's like a great change in the dynamic so
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it's like maybe he just felt like he could like you know what I mean cuz you want to like you know you want to have
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like an open relationship with your children and you want to be able to talk to them about things you just it's you I
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I personally I never want to cross the line of like burdening them with my problems you know what I mean like I
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want to talk to them and be open to them but I never want them to feel like they
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have to shoulder any of my the weight of what I have going on you know what I mean once again I've never been through
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that kind of trauma that he went through and I don't have older kids so I don't know what the dynamic is and this wasn't
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necessarily a time where like men specifically were seeking out therapy you know like seeking out nobody really
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was seeking therapy in general like it wasn't very talked about at this time period and you know he's not intending
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to burden them with the weight of what's going on you know like he's not going into this being like let me let me [ __ ]
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my kids up by telling them you like nobody intends to do that with they're good parents it's probably starting off
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as like discussions of like how it's affecting them too they're all going through this together and then he's
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probably just oversharing a little too much of personal feeling so it's just sad all
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around CU you understand there's a lot of human emotions happening here yeah exactly well Brian had what Bonnie
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describes as unlimited access to most of his children for some reason Margaret did choose to restrict his access to
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their youngest son Matthew Brian later recalled I did not have much to do with Matthew I felt like this was mainly
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because Margaret and Paul wanted to it to look like Matthew was their child because Matthew I think he was like
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seven when this all happened and she they just stopped him from being able to see him or like restrict see him but it
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was very restricted apparently just after their divorce Margaret told Brian that Paul would be a better father and
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because Matthew was still so young she didn't want Brian to quote exercise any fatherly influence over their
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son oh my yeah it was it was messy traumatic divorce for everybody involved it sounds like jeez yeah the divorce
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itself was definitely traumatic and it was a very dislocating experience for all the whales children but the specific
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treatment of Matthew with regard to his relationship with Brian really only made
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things worse for him in particular yeah I think that's a that's a poor choice it
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I that's a poor choice like that is that's opinion based but I agree totally opinion based and and very you know I
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don't know the all the details and ins and outs of what's going on but like it doesn't sound like it just doesn't sound
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like to keep him away from his real you know his real parent yeah who's been his
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dad for seven years of his life and then to replace him too a little bit with this new guy that was your dad's best
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friend yeah it's just it's that's that can be a little messy here and well it did prove itself to be messy because
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within a few months of all of this Matthew started showing signs of behavioral problems yeah now with
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Margaret's inheritance having been fully dispensed or dispersed excuse me and Paul's wealth already stable the newly
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married couple lived in even more privileged life than they ever had before which is really saying something
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cuz they were already living like very wealthy people now they're like even wealthier the children SP uh split their
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time between their home time with their father weekends at Paul's cattle ranch prudent said during this period of Our
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Lives mother was really generous and we were all very spoiled we had a beach house we had a unit at the snow we had
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several Farms with animals horses and had some pretty amazing trips overseas wow so there were good times and the
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older children were called life after their parents' divorce as mostly positive but at the same time they did
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have a hard time embracing Paul as any kind of father figure like the older ones cuz like I said they they're maybe
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like like 12 to 18 at this point you know what I mean yeah I mean that's tough and again he he's been in their
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lives as both of your best friends yeah that's the thing and so it's not like this is a new guy or something you know
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mean that like they just are having trouble getting used to it's like the Dynam like the whole relationship was
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different before and now I understand having a trouble figuring that out it's not like their parents just got divorced
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and this guy came out of nowhere like you just said they know who this guy is and I'm sure they were pretty aware of
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the situation that ended everything up here you know well that's the thing it's like you guys were all best friends they
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know their dad was away a lot they're going to put two and two together especially the older ones and it's like
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going to understand what's going on and they're going to have a little resentment they're going to have resent
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and really for that reason they like like I said they didn't see Paul as a father figure whatsoever and they didn't
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really respect him at all no and I you can't I mean that's that's trauma man it is they actually used to refer to him as
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the butler or the shadow because he was said to be really subservient to Margaret oh wow Matthew's experience
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Matthew's the youngest one on the other hand seemed to be pretty different like I said he was still young when his
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parents split and I was right that he was seven years old okay and because he was deprived of a relationship with his
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own dad he did start to see Paul as more of a father figure because he's young he's young and now Paul is really the
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main man in his life so he did develop a pretty healthy relationship with Paul well that's good the vast difference in
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their experiences though created a rift between Matthew and the rest of his siblings who kind of looked at his
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ostensible Allegiance with Paul as a betrayal to their father oh see this is so hard he's seven that's the thing cuz
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he's so he's a child but then it's like you're also young like I don't know exactly how old everyone is yeah you're
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siblings so it's like there's a whole different Dynamic here and it's like oh I just feel like this is so hard like I
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hate that these kids had to deal with all this it's a it's a lot of just tumultuous like family politics that
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they shouldn't have to deal with yet that's exactly what it is family politics you shouldn't have to deal with
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it until you're older and you can just be like shut up everybody for what it is well and it's it's so they also they see
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that Paul and Matthew have this like good relationship and they're like [ __ ] that like we hate this guy not hate him
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but like we don't like this guy we don't respect him and then also some of them did feel that Margaret the mom favored
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Matthew oh okay so his uh Matthew's sister Emma later told police mom adored Matthew to the stage where we used to
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call him golden boy oh boy so there's a lot of different Dynamics going on here a lot of different Dynamics now while
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some of their resentment of Matthew was rooted in how Margaret prioritized him over her other children there were other
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things about Matthew that the rest of the whales children found irritating and off-putting one of them was that he
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struggled considerably with his schoolwork I think that probably like they resented that maybe because it took
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Margaret's time away from the rest of them yeah cuz I was going to say why is that really that's when I looked at that
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I was like I don't understand that's his life like I don't understand why that would bother you that's what I thought
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too but I'm like maybe it just took a lot of I could see that he also had a very hard
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time developing healthy social skills they felt he lied constantly and by the time he reached his teenage years his
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behavior was getting way worse and he was having more frequent violent outbursts that made him really difficult
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to be around yeah um and just a trigger warning here for animal cruelty oh no Emma recalled he was very cruel to
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animals I used to tell Mom but Matthew would lie and get out of it now this included among other things quote Cru
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ifying flies when he was four impaling eels when he was eight and at 10 he tied mice by their tails to the back of his
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motorbike and drove around the farm with them okay he was Disturbed from a young
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age that should be the biggest of red flags yeah like that should be the biggest of red flags it absolutely
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should be and this started and if you did skip over that I won't go into detail anymore but the animal cruelty
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started when he was four which I feel like is worth noting he was seven when the divorce was finalized so
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this was already happening this was already happening who's to say that it like the relationship between Brian and
00:21:08
Margaret wasn't already tumultuous I'm sure it probably was yeah but he's four years old and he's displaying this
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Behavior already like I feel like that's an innate behavior oh you got to nip that you got to do something like I'm
00:21:20
telling you the cruelty to animals thing that's scary is such a red flly and I don't know if you guys can hear blanch
00:21:26
she pissed she's like hell yeah she's like [ __ ] deal and it is but yeah cruelty to animals I feel like is it's
00:21:34
always something to be concerned about because it can turn into a lot of scary things and in this case it does yeah so
00:21:41
Emma you know she told us like everything in detail uh Matt's brother Matthew's brother Damen put it more
00:21:47
bluntly and just told police Matthew was a prick of a kid we were never close wow
00:21:51
all right like yeah I hated him always he was an [ __ ] you guys are siblings can't fa you for having feelings no and
00:21:57
I mean Ian if that's what he's running around doing I would also call him a prick of a kid yeah so the older whales
00:22:02
children they have some more memories of their childhood now but but between their inability to accept their mother's
00:22:09
new relationship and Matthew's increasingly violent Behavior life in the whales home was definitely an
00:22:14
ongoing struggle for everybody it was highlighted by lots and lots of good times but that's there were also really
00:22:20
shitty times yeah there was some dark [ __ ] happen a lot yeah dark [ __ ] happening and a lot going on so the rift
00:22:26
continued to grow between all of them as one by one they moved out of the house and by the time Margaret and Paul were
00:22:32
finally married in 1995 none of the children were invited to the wedding whoa which like that goes to
00:22:41
show you that obviously I've named some instances here there was a lot more going on they weren't even invited to
00:22:48
the wedding none of the children were invited to the wedding zip that's Bleak that's really
00:22:55
Bleak so now going back a little a little more in depth to Matthew without the animal cruelty don't worry uh he
00:23:01
really struggled to make it through high school one teacher put it pretty much as
00:23:05
bluntly as you possibly could she said Matthew is wasting his and everyone else's time both in class and out of it
00:23:11
wow yeah okay but despite those struggles he finished high school in ' 85 and attempted to enter the Working
00:23:16
World but he was fired from his first job at a hardware store after just four months of being employed there wow yes
00:23:23
rather than look for another job he decided that he was going to study at the John Mor School of hairdressing and
00:23:29
after completing the 20-month apprenticeship which that is a long apprenticeship in comparison to what you
00:23:34
do over here oh really I was like damn that's a long apprenticeship uh he took out a job at one of the John Mor schools
00:23:41
or salons in Melbourne after he was done with his education so look at that he found a job for himself he would spend
00:23:48
the next decade working for the Mory Salon chain and then ended up opening his own franchise in the Knox uh in Knox
00:23:55
City Shopping Center in 1997 and he did build a a small but loyal following so who's doing pretty well for himself he
00:24:02
might not have had the mind for academics in some people's words but he was good at hairdressing and he didn't
00:24:08
seem to struggle managing his small staff he took care of administrative responsibilities like which that's all
00:24:14
not easy stuff to do no running running your own business is hard running a salon like it doesn't I'm sure to some
00:24:20
people it doesn't sound like much but there's a lot that goes into it oh yeah admin alone would [ __ ] ruin me hate
00:24:28
yeah I'm not good at admin not at all like either of us I wasn't saying like she's not good at all at the salon Peak
00:24:35
success though Matthew was earning between 1,500 to 3,000 bucks a week and remember that's back in the '90s so
00:24:41
that's pretty good and he was consistently busy the professional success did a lot to prop up his ego
00:24:47
after a lifetime of low expectations and disdain from his teachers and his family
00:24:52
yeah it seems like in this little period of his life he was like proving himself
00:24:57
to to himself yeah he was flourishing a little bit and finding himself yeah so when he wasn't working he spent his time
00:25:03
partying going to bars clubs looking for ladies he's in his early 20s yeah this all came to an end though in the late
00:25:09
90s when he met U Marita pizaro a sales assistant at Myers's department store which was actually in the same shopping
00:25:16
center as his Salon oh okay they initially met when she was going to the salon for regular appointments and after
00:25:22
a few months their relationship just grew and became romantic and after a few months they ended up moving in together
00:25:28
to Matthew's home and malvin which had been purchased for him by a trust set up by Margaret Wales after he turned 18 ah
00:25:35
so it was his house but like Margaret bought it yeah so while Matthew was completely in love with Marita he was
00:25:43
nonetheless cognizant of how her workingclass immigrant background might be received by his wealthy family oh
00:25:49
jeez so marit was born in Santiago Chile in 1963 and her family actually fled Chile in 1976 after and during 3 years
00:25:59
of austo P's dictatorship so they literally lived through a dictatorship but they were able to
00:26:05
escape and establish themselves in um a Melbourne suburb where they worked really hard to build a solidly
00:26:11
middleclass lifestyle like she came from a great family yeah and despite coming from a thoroughly respectable family
00:26:18
Matthew insisted that his family thought of Marita's family as just a bun bunch of w slurs I'm not going to say this
00:26:27
this word I don't actually I've never heard of it before but it's a derogatory term used in Australian slang to
00:26:32
describe people of Indian Mediterranean or middle eastern descent oh okay so I don't want to say a word that like I
00:26:37
don't know the weight of it um but that's how he said his family thought of maritus
00:26:44
so racist Vibes going on right now great not awesome it's unclear whether or not
00:26:51
Matthew was exaggerating so that he could just keep some distance between his family and his new relationship but
00:26:57
later his sister Emma did describe Mar to reporters as a common vulgar little gutter snipe and she said that Mar quote
00:27:04
would say shocking things and everything seemed to have a sexual connotation so they did not like her she sounds awesome
00:27:13
yeah like she sounds hilarious she does person a vulgar little gutter snipe like
00:27:19
get it girl you she's like I don't like you I don't like you it seemed that Matthew's siblings perceived his
00:27:26
relationship with Mar as similar to the relationship between Paul and their mother and remember they saw Paul as
00:27:32
being very subservient to their mother and they felt like their mother made the rules Emma also said that Marita quote
00:27:39
totally dominated him from the moment they met talking about Matthew yeah and she wasn't the only one who felt that
00:27:44
way according to Matthew's other sister Sally she said Matthew actually calls Marita Mama as if she's his mother he
00:27:51
does everything she tells him to what to eat what he wears I believe he's frightened of
00:27:56
her oh huh now he calls her mama he calls her mama which I don't know if that's like a cultural thing because I
00:28:04
know In some cultures like men do call women like I have heard that I've seen that happen so it's like and it's not in
00:28:12
reference to like mother way um no yeah I know what you mean that like I wouldn't want a guy calling me
00:28:21
mom cuz no probably cuz I'm just used to Children calling me Mama yeah you're like Jesus Christ at one more person
00:28:27
so honestly I'd like absolutely not not adding another one but I do wonder if maybe that was a cultural thing that
00:28:33
they didn't understand because they hadn't previously been exposed to it yeah because I've heard men call their
00:28:39
significant others Mama right and not in a way that would be off pudding you know
00:28:44
what I mean that in a way that is like now all I can think of is Hyo mama let me whisper that's what I'm
00:28:51
thinking that's what I'm thinking so it's like I've heard this happen and it's like so I
00:28:58
it's like it absolutely this could be taken two different ways for sure I can see their siblings being like he
00:29:04
referred to her cuz who knows I don't know how he said it I don't know what the in was I don't know if it was mama
00:29:11
let me whisper in your ear I think or if it was like Mama and there was something
00:29:15
happening here that we are unaware of yeah or if it's just very innocuous and it's like Hey little mama let me whisper
00:29:22
in year we don't know either way yeah cuz then I think about it and also like in the gay community like that's a bit
00:29:27
like Mama like yeah and also if it's that here's the thing like obviously this something bad is going to happen
00:29:34
here I know this 100% I'm waiting for it all to drop I don't know what's going to
00:29:37
happen here but so I know something's a Miss yeah and I'm assuming Matthew is at
00:29:43
the heart of it I don't know why maybe it's the animal cruelty but I think that's why so I don't want to be like
00:29:49
defending anyone here too much but I'm just when it comes to like relationships it's like everything so different
00:29:55
they're to consenting adults if they want to call each other something like go off but obviously something is going
00:30:01
to come out of this so it's like well I think that's you that's perfectly said because then like Sally's looking back
00:30:08
on this and she like in the context that she's looking back on it she probably in
00:30:13
the moment was like huh that's weird like I've never heard him call anybody that but like whatever but then she
00:30:18
looks back on what exactly happens and she's like well that was weirder now that I look back on that that's
00:30:23
precisely exactly what I'm saying it's like it's Hinds when something bad happens you look back and see the the
00:30:30
strange things that are occurring right but in the moment you're kind of just like whatever like if they want to call
00:30:35
each other something whatever exactly you know but anyways regardless of how everybody felt about Marita she and
00:30:41
Matthew did end up marrying in May of 1998 in a $25,000 wedding that they could not afford but took out a loan to
00:30:47
pay for and they spent years repaying that uh that would be little a little more than $447,000 today so a pretty
00:30:55
expensive one wow now a little l a little less than two years later in March of 2000 Marita gave birth birth to
00:31:04
their first child and with the addition of a new baby into the family Matthew reasoned that they should find a new
00:31:09
home and he tried to convince Margaret to sell the house because I think technically because like she bought it
00:31:16
via the trust for him she owns it and he just lives there kind of the that makes
00:31:21
sense the gist that I got so he's trying to convince Margaret to sell this house
00:31:25
and give him and Mar $140,000 profit that would be made from the sale okay but she was hesitant to do
00:31:32
so and she was like let me think on this I don't want to make any hasty decisions
00:31:37
here so while things seemed to be going well for Matthew and Marita as 2000 came
00:31:41
to a close they were dealt a difficult blow in the last few months of the year when Matthew started developing a pain
00:31:47
in his hand that eventually was diagnosed as a repetitive strain injury and that effectively ended his career as
00:31:54
a stylist oh no yeah so unable to continue in his line of work he closed the salon at the end of the year and
00:32:01
submitted an insurance claim the insurance payments definitely kept them afloat for a few months but they weren't
00:32:08
going to support them for the rest of forever and things were getting pretty dodgy at this point oh no both Matthew
00:32:15
and Marita being unemployed and living on meager insurance payments was a compelling case though for Margaret to
00:32:21
release Matthew that $140,000 from the sale of the house and after several argument she did
00:32:28
reluctantly go ahead sell the house and hand over the profit money and that was in the early months of 2001 so now flush
00:32:35
with cash Matthew and mariss said about developing plans for a new business and they decided that they wanted to open a
00:32:42
woman's clothing boutique in mid2 2001 okay so in order to buy themselves some leeway while the business got off the
00:32:49
ground they paid the landlord a year's rent in advance and they bought about $25,000 in stock furniture and fixtures
00:32:57
so they're starting to spend like a lot of money on a new business which of course it costs a lot of money to set up
00:33:03
a business but they're spending extra money that they don't necessarily have to in
00:33:09
addition to that yeah now as the more knowledgeable one in clothing Marita she spent her days running the store while
00:33:15
Matthew remained at home taking care of the baby and by early 2002 they actually
00:33:19
were making enough to move into a small townhouse of their own so to celebrate their new home and their son's second
00:33:25
birthday matth and Marita invited Paul and Margaret to their home for dinner on the evening of April 4th 2002 okay
00:33:33
shockingly that would be the last time anybody saw Margaret Wales king or Paul King alive
00:33:39
oh on the morning of April 4th 2002 the last day that they were ever seen alive Margaret and Paul woke up early as usual
00:33:47
they spent the morning relaxing having coffee the housekeeper came over as she usually did and tidied up the house by
00:33:53
9:00 a.m. Margaret's bookkeeper had arrived and they spent 2 hours going over her portfolio until about noon and
00:34:00
then their friends Fred and Janet Ro arrived for a little lunchtime visit the Roes had driven more than an hour from
00:34:06
Melbourne and stayed most of the afternoon actually until about like 6:30 so they just had they were having a good
00:34:10
time together yeah but around 6:30 Margaret excused herself and said they were going to get ready to have dinner
00:34:16
at I think she told Janet that she was having dinner at her daughter's house okay or Janet may have misheard she
00:34:22
might have said daughter-in-law I was going to say maybe daughter-in-law right but on the evening of Sunday April 7th
00:34:27
Margaret's daughter Emma had started to get concerned that she hadn't heard from
00:34:31
her mom in several days this wasn't like Margaret to go several days without talking to Emma and they actually had
00:34:38
breakfast plans the the next day which would be Monday the 8th and Margaret had a tendency to call her daughter a day
00:34:45
before to remind her anytime they had plans like you know we still on for tomorrow so since they were traveling
00:34:50
back from their vacation home Emma and her husband stopped along the way so that she could call Margaret from a pay
00:34:56
phone but nobody picked up at Margaret and Paul's house later when they got home
00:35:02
Emma got a call from her friend Sandra who said that she had actually been trying to reach Margaret for 3 days and
00:35:08
she had been unsuccessful oh no so still unable to reach her mother Emma decided
00:35:13
I'm going to drive over there and like check on them like this is weird so when she got to the house she knocked on the
00:35:18
door several times but nobody answered but she was able to like let herself in I think she had a key and she looked
00:35:24
around and confirmed that they were nowhere to be seen they weren't home but she looked around the house and nothing
00:35:29
seemed out of place nothing seemed suspicious the only thing that was weird was that when she went into the master
00:35:35
bedroom she was surprised to find that the bed had been turned down but it didn't look like anybody had slept in it
00:35:41
so she was like that's weird but if you think about it maybe they had turned down the bed thinking like we'll get
00:35:46
home a little late tonight and we can just get right into bed get right into bed that was my thought that makes sense
00:35:50
in the bathroom Margaret's night cream her toothbrush her toiletries were all where they should be so it didn't seem
00:35:56
like they had gone G away for the weekend either yeah so Emma was like this is weird but like I don't know if I
00:36:02
should call the police yet like yeah I don't cuz you don't want to believe that something's wrong you know so she went
00:36:07
home and the next day she was like hey she said to her husband Damian I think we should go over to the house again
00:36:13
like something's just weird about this so her and Damen her husband she also has a brother named Damian um went to
00:36:19
the house to search again but it didn't appear that Margaret or Paul had returned since she was last there last
00:36:25
night and still nobody had heard anything from them so initially just concerned Emma was now very unnerved
00:36:31
she's like this is beyond weird yeah now it's getting weird she's like they seemingly just like disappeared Into
00:36:36
Thin Air so she and Daman went to the melin police to report her parents missing her mom and her stepdad after
00:36:43
reporting her mom and her stepdad missing Emma went back to the house and she and Daman put together a list of
00:36:48
family friends and acquaintances who could have had any contact with Margaret or Paul yeah and they started reaching
00:36:55
out to these people one by one on and it was at this time that Emma noticed a note on the calendar that they had plans
00:37:01
with the roaches the night that they went missing so she called them immediately and they explained how they
00:37:07
had lunch with Margaret and Paul on the afternoon of the 4th but they had parted
00:37:10
ways around 6:30 because they they were like oh your mom and Paul had dinner plans and they said unfortunately I
00:37:18
don't think they said with who like they couldn't remember at that very moment yeah so based on the report from the
00:37:23
roaches and the fact that none of their regular contacts had heard or seen Margaret and Paul heard from or seen
00:37:28
them the Malin police they actually took the case very seriously like right away
00:37:33
and they pursued it as a missing person's case so the rest of the whale siblings arrived at Margaret and Paul's
00:37:38
house that evening and they waited while investigators searched after a cursory search of the home and interviews with
00:37:45
most of the whales children detectives determined that nothing appeared to be missing from the house so if Margaret or
00:37:51
Paul had been taken from the home by force it wasn't for any obvious financial reasons like Ransom
00:37:57
you might in a Cas like remember these are very well people so then while one of the detectives was interviewing Janet
00:38:05
Ro Emma heard Janet tell the detective that Margaret told her she was going to have to end their evening early because
00:38:12
she said quote I'm expected at my daughter's home for dinner Janet said that's what she said okay now the
00:38:17
comment seemed really strange to Emma because neither she or any of her sisters had plans with their mom for
00:38:22
dinner but then it occurred to her that she might have met mariss y so she called Matthew's house to say like hey
00:38:29
have you seen Paul or Mom since leaving their parents home as young adults the will siblings had maintained pretty
00:38:35
minimal contact with Matthew like they didn't really talk to him that much yeah and nobody had even thought to call him
00:38:41
when when Margaret and Paul had gone missing damn but now on the phone with Matthew that seemed to Emma like one of
00:38:47
the first places they should have started yeah Matthew confirmed that Margaret and Paul had been at their
00:38:53
house on the evening of the 4th at which time Emma told Matthew he needed to come
00:38:57
to Margaret's house right away and then just hung up on him and she immediately was like what like this isir like what
00:39:03
the [ __ ] later in a statement to the police Emma would describe Matthew's very strange Behavior immediately when
00:39:11
he arrived at the house she said he burst into the front room his head looked like it was going to explode and
00:39:17
I could see the veins in his neck he looked very emotional and asked what's going on he then walked into a corner of
00:39:23
the room and held his eyes with his fingers and let out a distraught cry and moan he seemed overwhelmed by the whole
00:39:29
situation which I thought was an absolute overreaction the police had not even had the chance to introduce
00:39:34
themselves to Matthew for all he knew Mom and Paul could have been away for the weekend Sally and I were not crying
00:39:40
we didn't look distraught and we didn't alarm him in any way that's strange so he has really he should have no idea
00:39:48
what he's walking into nobody's even told him anything massive reaction and he's like loing in the corner like
00:39:54
they're dead like crying wailing like losing it and they're like we haven't even told you anything yet like you
00:40:00
don't even know who these two people are like these detectives like you could be
00:40:03
walking in here and the police could be like hey like this has all been a misunderstanding your parents have were
00:40:07
way for the weekend and blah blah like you have no idea what they're about to say yeah exactly so to Emma and US
00:40:14
Matthew's reaction seemed fake and Incredibly performative but it only got stranger from there as the sisters
00:40:22
questioned Matthew about the last time he saw their mother and Paul he only gave super vague answers about the
00:40:28
dinner they had and each answer seemingly was interrupted by these like wild emotional outbursts and very
00:40:34
theatrical displays of emotion yeah he literally at one point had his head between his knees and was moaning and
00:40:40
wailing and crying where's my mama what happened to my mama okay and they were like this is
00:40:47
just a lot like no one which like you it's you know people are going to react different ways to different things but
00:40:53
they're like yeah I mean we try not because that's like one of the things we're always saying saying is like we
00:40:56
try not to judge somebody's reaction because it's like if I haven't been in that situation I don't know who's to
00:41:02
[ __ ] say but they're like we're all remaining calm and like it would be super awesome if you would remain calm
00:41:07
so we can all figure this out just get the information together you know what I mean like there does need to be some
00:41:12
semblance of like we got to get control here because we need to know what's going on we need to share the
00:41:17
information together and like figure out the next in a row yes figure out the next step so I can understand why they
00:41:23
were like dude you really got to keep it together like we're all adults here got
00:41:26
to keep this together we got to try to figure out what's going on and they're asking him for information and like
00:41:31
answers to these questions and when they ask him for specific information all he
00:41:36
would say is and he like through Tears like crying out he'd say it's all a blank I can't do this right now like
00:41:41
being very over the top like no you got to get it together so you can help like you know like you might be where she was
00:41:49
like and they're thinking like your house might have been the place they were going right so like yeah we do need
00:41:53
you to be a part of this whole thing exactly so frustrated Emma called Mar in hopes that she could provide any more
00:42:00
concrete answers but when she asked what time Margaret and Paul had left the house she's like so they got to your
00:42:06
house and Mar and Matthew were like yeah we had dinner so Emma's like okay what time did they leave Mar was super vague
00:42:14
and told Emma she couldn't remember and Emma's like do you have like any kind of
00:42:18
time frame like 9 10 11 Mar's like yeah I don't know and then before Emma could ask anything else she said Mar said is
00:42:26
Maddie there tell him to come home I have a headache and then just hung up are you kidding me nope so Emma was like
00:42:34
what the [ __ ] okay no so the detectives at the scene were really only slightly
00:42:40
more successful in getting any kind of information from Matthew he explained to them that yep he did have Margaret and
00:42:46
Paul at the house for dinner he's at around 9:45 he walked them to their car and he waved at them as they drove away
00:42:52
like the sweet sweet son he was oh boy however when they pressed for more information he started becoming
00:42:59
irrationally emotional again and said I can't handle this and then just left and
00:43:04
went home like dude come on it's like you're not helping here at all help and why are you not helping yeah later that
00:43:11
evening the uh after the whale siblings son's Matthew had gathered at prudence's
00:43:16
house they started discussing where their mother and Paul could be and Damen Wells repeatedly called Matthew's house
00:43:23
like they're all sitting there trying to come up with anything and they're like should we ask Matthew but they're
00:43:28
calling Matthew and getting no reply he's not even answering his phone at this that's weird behavior and it's like
00:43:33
we're calling you we could have found mom and dad like why are you not right by the phone NOA mom and Paul excuse me
00:43:38
yeah and the more they talked and particularly when Matthew's name came up Damian started to get the feeling that
00:43:44
his brother's dramatic performance at their mom's house might have been his clumsy attempt to hide something he's
00:43:50
like he just had like a an innate feeling he's like something's really off's off here so he called detective
00:43:56
Constable Sheen to report his suspicions about Matthew and he was like can you just send an officer over there we're
00:44:01
not able to get a hold of him can you just like check out what's going on yeah and they were like sure so when they
00:44:07
reached at uh Matthew and Mar's house the officers found the place completely dark like all the lights off after they
00:44:14
rang the bell several times they finally roused the couple and were allowed inside where they talked very briefly in
00:44:20
the kitchen they explained that Damien had asked the detectives to come check on him since Matthew just
00:44:26
stopped answering his phone out of nowhere and Matthew was like oh yeah I took a sleeping pill and I just went to
00:44:32
bed and they were no one knows where your parents are you're acting devastated by this fact and you took a
00:44:40
sleeping pill what if they find them exactly like to me that's weird I'd be sitting there staring at that phone same
00:44:48
he told the officers I'm just a bit upset and concerned about my mother you know but despite what he was saying the
00:44:54
officers there felt a complete lack of sincerity and they also found it curious that he kept bringing up Margaret which
00:45:01
obviously she's his mother but he's not saying anything about Paul and remember he doesn't feel the same way about Paul
00:45:07
that his siblings do he grew up with Paul pretty much as his father yeah so the next day April 9th the family
00:45:14
gathered again this time with Matthew and mariss in attendance and Matthew's theatrical displays of emotion started
00:45:20
pretty much right upon arrival immediately after sitting on the couch he started crying and howling asking
00:45:26
where's my mama but if they question the sincerity of his performance the first time the rest of the wh siblings
00:45:32
certainly didn't believe him this time no Emma said unfortunately I could show him no affection because really I
00:45:38
smelled a rat wow I think she's the baddest [ __ ] I was just going to say she is a bad [ __ ] she's like I've been
00:45:44
on to this and I just love that she's like unfortunately I could share no affection with him I'm like that that's
00:45:50
that's ballshit she like sorry couldn't do it she's giving like shiv from sucession isn't she God I miss six
00:45:57
absolutely now like I said the whales children were not the only ones growing suspicious of Matthew investigators
00:46:03
already were and now like that they're all they're seeing him too like sitting beside his siblings and in comparison
00:46:09
they're like yeah they're like something something's off just a miss here and they're starting now to think that he
00:46:14
might have had something to do with Margaret and Paul's disappearance neither Margaret or Paul
00:46:19
were in like super great physical health and they wouldn't have been able to travel at the time with all their med
00:46:24
without all their medication and essential items which were still at the house nothing of value had been taken
00:46:31
from the house and neither Margaret or Paul's bank accounts or credit cards had been accessed since The Disappearance so
00:46:38
a kidnapping seemed highly unlikely very much and giving given both of those facts the missing person's unit ended up
00:46:45
handing the case over to the homicide squad on the assumption that the pair were very unlikely to be alive at this
00:46:51
point which that's heartbreaking now based on the suspicions of the family and the
00:46:56
officers who investigated the initial report detectives started looking a little bit deeper into Matthew and Mar
00:47:02
almost immediately and among the first things they learned was that their clothing boutique wasn't doing terribly
00:47:09
but it was hardly a financial success and just a few months after opening their expenses outweighed the profits by
00:47:17
$52,000 uhoh and this does seem like a Money Motivated crime in fact things had actually become so dire that they
00:47:24
started about they started talking about selling the boutique and opening a cafe
00:47:28
instead thinking that would be a more stable business and now detectives are hearing like yeah all of all of this
00:47:35
turmoil regarding business yeah this isn't looking good so on the morning of April 9th Matthew arrived at the melin
00:47:41
police department to be interviewed and he brought these long handwritten notes of the conversation that he had with his
00:47:47
mom and Paul on the night of their disappearance he had these like weird transcripts that he WR wrote up okay
00:47:53
like the other times that they tried to interview him every everything seemed very overprepared super performative and
00:47:59
none of it was helpful and meanwhile other detectives paid a visit to Mar at the store and they were surprised to
00:48:06
find that even though she had only been made notified of their intention to speak with her like a few hours before
00:48:12
that she had already prepped a five-page statement detailing her dinner with the
00:48:17
missing couple a five page statement wow like you you can look at that one of two
00:48:25
ways obviously like I hate to be the devil's advocate here but that's what we do you could look at that as like she's
00:48:31
like I have to cover my ass cuz I have nothing to do with this and I'm I want to be prepared and have answers to
00:48:36
everything or you could say that is [ __ ] suspicious as [ __ ] why would you take the time to do that if you're
00:48:41
innocent you can 100% look at it both of those ways you can and it's like both ways make sense they do you could argue
00:48:50
both it's true personally I think it's [ __ ] weird I know all the details say knowing what you for you to say it's
00:48:56
weird it's weird exactly so according to Mar in her five-page statement they had
00:49:01
eaten dinner with Margaret and Paul they drank one bottle of wine after which Paul and Margaret played with their
00:49:06
grandson for a while looked through some recent photos and then left around 9:45
00:49:11
p.m. the statement also claimed that she and Matthew had always gotten along fine
00:49:15
with the rest of the Wales family but she did say quote mum was a bit standoffish she was a bit snobby Matthew
00:49:21
and I never had any real problems with the other Sons or daughters she was like Margaret was not the coolest but I
00:49:29
didn't have any and she says I didn't have any problems with the other Sons or daughters which like maybe she didn't
00:49:34
realize that she did but they didn't sound like they liked her very much I was going to say it doesn't sound like
00:49:38
it was a big happy but it could have been that they just like acted fake in knows cuz you know we all do that but
00:49:43
the next day April 10th the malver detectives held their first pre press conference flanked on both sides by
00:49:49
several of the whales children detective inspector Brian Ricks which I think is just such a cool name that is a cool
00:49:54
name Brian Ricks he told reporters there seems to be no known reason as to why these people have disappeared the way
00:50:01
they have these are people you wouldn't class as at risk of going missing they're retired people who have great
00:50:06
family support it is completely out of character and within a few hours of airing police started receiving tips
00:50:13
including one from a man who lived a pretty short distance from Margaret and Paul and he actually thought that he had
00:50:19
found their missing Mercedes-Benz the caller explained that he had been out walking his dog on the
00:50:24
night of April 6th and he noticed a silver Mercedes parked along the road around the corner from
00:50:30
his house and this stuck out to him because it looked I mean it's a Mercedes it looks super expensive and it didn't
00:50:36
have a parking sticker so he knew the owner wasn't a local resident and this was just like a very random place to
00:50:41
park your car yeah for a long time and he said he probably would have forgotten all about it but that the car was still
00:50:47
there every time he went back out to walk his dog so when he heard the description of the car on the news he
00:50:53
went back and checked the license plate and sure enough it was a match for Margaret's missing car oh imagine
00:50:59
figuring that out like you've seen this car every day on your walk and then you just go to check and you're like oh
00:51:04
that's the car that's there's a super haunting detail that we'll get to later on that like could be a case of like um
00:51:15
the eyewitness not working out so well or like a strange paranormal aspect depending on how you look at it
00:51:22
interesting but crime scene technicians searched the vcle and swapped for DNA and when they attempted to lift
00:51:28
fingerprints from the steering wheel there was nothing to be lifted oh whoever drove the car and left it on the
00:51:34
street had been wearing gloves and obviously wiped the steering wheel clean so that's not good no that's creepy as
00:51:40
[ __ ] the search of the car in the surrounding area also didn't turn up any additional evidence whatsoever but
00:51:46
during their canet of the neighborhood investigators spoke with a lot of additional residents who said they had
00:51:52
seen the car parked on the street and actually were able to place it there as early as April 5th which makes sense
00:51:58
because they went missing the night of the 4th now none of the whales children could think of any reason why their
00:52:04
mom's car would have been found in that neighborhood as far as they know knew she didn't know anybody that lived there
00:52:09
nothing like that and meanwhile at Matthew and Marita's house Sergeant Steven wadell questioned Matthew about
00:52:15
his relationship with Paul and he wanted to ask some follow-up questions about the night that his parents went missing
00:52:21
so that one detective is doing that while two other detectives are looking around the house in the garage
00:52:28
detectives who were searching the house noticed that there was a strong chemical
00:52:31
smell coming from Matthew's car on the ground around it and with Matthew's permission technicians searched his car
00:52:38
and performed a a number of tests but ultimately found nothing of Interest other than that chemical smell which was
00:52:45
strange but that is strange it's in a garage so yeah I me yeah who knows weeks passed with really little progress in
00:52:52
the case until finally on April 29th Detectives got a call from a ranger at the Yara State Forest who had made a
00:52:59
really terrible Discovery Ranger uh JN Gilt was working on track three he was marking spots where a series of large
00:53:08
Boulders were going to be placed alongside of the path and he discovered amound of freshly turned dirt just a few
00:53:14
yards off the path initially he thought it was a liar bird nest uh and he didn't
00:53:18
want to disturb the birds so he just left it alone and kind of went about his day yeah but throughout the day he just
00:53:24
kept thinking about it and something about it just didn't seem right to him and it trust your gut that's the thing
00:53:29
it was nagging at him all afternoon so he was like I want to go back and take a take another look at that people are
00:53:36
amazing when you really think about it isn't it weird that like you see amound of dirt and you're like oh that's
00:53:41
probably a bird's nest perfect explanation for it but then something and and you can't explain what it is
00:53:47
like what is it that tells us something is wrong that's so fascinating it's like
00:53:52
cuz we a lot of us have dealt with that where you're gut is just telling you something else it's interesting and
00:53:58
we've all felt that feeling and it's like what the [ __ ] is that feeling why do we have those kind of instincts like
00:54:04
it's weird it's like I don't know Evolution or some [ __ ] very interesting it is that's the thing so TR your gut
00:54:11
everyone trust your gut always as [ __ ] he actually I I like really respect how
00:54:16
he went about this because he trusted his gut and he was smart he actually went with another Ranger he's like I'm
00:54:21
not going to look at this alone like I should bring someone else cuz if this happens to be something I have a witness
00:54:26
here we're not going to [ __ ] something up exactly so he took this other Ranger
00:54:31
and they went back to the spot to take a closer look and they used a rake and started pulling away the loose dirt
00:54:36
until they uncovered and this is really Grizzly and just like [ __ ] up oh jeez they found three large cinder blocks
00:54:43
chained together which appeared to be holding down a deflated child's swimming pool what the [ __ ] thinking they
00:54:51
discovered a trash pile they just kept digging and moving more removing more debris and they quickly hit what
00:54:57
appeared to be a cloth bag held closed with another chain it was only when the rake ripped the cloth that a smell hit
00:55:05
them both and they both realized that they had discovered at least one body oh my God so obviously they called the
00:55:11
police technicians come rushing to the scene and they worked late until the evening to remove two bodies and when
00:55:17
they were finally Unearthed they were informally identified as Margaret whals King and Paul King holy [ __ ] so they
00:55:24
continued working through the evening and into the morning and Dr Malcolm Dodd started his examination with Paul's body
00:55:30
once he got him into the morg after removing the cloth sack from around his head the doctor found that quote the
00:55:36
neck and head were were covered with bloody green cloth gathered together in a knot under the right jaw holy [ __ ]
00:55:44
Margaret's body had been similarly wrapped with and tied up with ropes and when they were removed she also had a
00:55:50
long strip of green cloth wrapped and tied around her neck both bodies were discovered in a
00:55:56
really Advanced state of decomp which obviously made it very difficult for them to find any obvious signs of trauma
00:56:03
cuz they're trying to figure out like where they strangled where they hit it's hard to tell their stomach contents had
00:56:09
undergone uh minimal digestion meaning they were both killed very soon after eating dinner at Matthew and Marita's
00:56:15
house oh [ __ ] despite the advanced decomposition Dr Dodd was eventually able to identify the cause of death for
00:56:22
Paul as blunt force trauma to the Head with also signs of strangulation and Margaret as as
00:56:29
exfix but she did note that there was bruising on Margaret's uh body which led him to believe that she had also been
00:56:36
rendered unconscious before she was strangled okay hit somehow holy [ __ ] later blood tests would show that both
00:56:42
Paul and Margaret had consumed normal levels of alcohol paraset paracetamol I think it is it's acetamin in the US so
00:56:49
it's like Tylenol and Codine prior to dying so pretty like normal just yeah you said they weren't in the best of
00:56:57
health ex I'm sure they were taking that kind of stuff yep so later that morning
00:57:02
Sergeant wal notified the family of the discovery which must have been absolutely horrifying and a formal
00:57:08
identification was made which was confirmed then by a forensic or uh odontologist excuse me detectives spent
00:57:14
nearly an hour with the family and during that time Matthew was there and woodell pulled him aside and handed him
00:57:21
a search warrant for his home and asked if he would accomp them back to the house immediately so that they could
00:57:27
conduct their search at the house they found among other things a large post hole shovel a set of D shackles like
00:57:35
those found on the cement blocks a ball of green twine that matched the bindings
00:57:40
on the bodies an inflatable child's raft that appeared to match the small deflated pool discovered on the bodies
00:57:47
that is so isn't something about that just turns my this whole thing is horrifying but like that just turns my
00:57:53
stomach his 2-year-old child's pool little pool that he used and those are his grandparents underneath it who like
00:58:02
that's that just and in Matthew and Mar's bedroom detectives also discovered that the quilts and sheets on the bed
00:58:10
were similar in color and fabric to that which the bodies were wrapped in before
00:58:14
they were buried my God so they're like we have everything right like oh no for you yeah the announcement of the
00:58:22
discovery of Margaret and Paul's body set off a media frenzy as reporters clamored to get more information on the
00:58:28
story in his statement to the Press detective Sergeant Charlie bazina said of the area in which the bodies were
00:58:34
found given the popularity of the area you would think that if a person is aware of the area they would have made a
00:58:40
lot more effort to get further into the bush or certainly get away from the track yeah because they were found like
00:58:45
right off of a track in a forest and it was not lost on anybody that the investigators seemed particularly
00:58:52
interested in Margaret's son and Paul's stepson Matthew and his wife mariss and they knew that they had been searching
00:59:00
the home on multiple occasions since the discovery was made so the media knows what's going on here of course publicly
00:59:07
the murders of Margaret and Paul which the Press dubbed the society murders like I said in the beginning were touted
00:59:12
as a total mystery but unaware that the couple had been murdered the night they went missing several people actually
00:59:19
came forward saying that they saw them at various points in the days after their disappearance which would have
00:59:24
been impossible that's always fascinating this for some reason and like we say it all the time
00:59:30
like eyewitness testimony is so unreliable and can be so flawed but for some reason reading this I was like I
00:59:38
don't know if people are lying like it it just feels a little paranormal to me a man who lived in the area where the
00:59:45
car was found told reporters he saw Margaret return to the car several times in the week that it was parked in the
00:59:51
neighborhood he was like I saw her there multiple times and I also was like why would he say you know I mean like that
00:59:57
just seems I mean people do weird [ __ ] so it's not like out of the the realm of
01:00:01
possibility that people are just making [ __ ] up right but these some of these like that's a weird one to make up right
01:00:07
and it's like it's not like you saw her one time and you're like no I swear saw her once multiple times and he told the
01:00:13
Daily Telegraph she was well groomed and neat she locked the car and looked up at
01:00:18
me it wasn't a passing glance it was a searching stare in in hindsight it was a bit weird see that feels like a real I
01:00:27
like he saw that and it's like he's saying like she locked eyes with me and it to I'm I I might sound crazy but to
01:00:34
me that sounds like Margaret is like pay attention to this like I'm pay attention
01:00:39
to this car know what's happening like something has happened to me and like I'm going to have a hand in having it be
01:00:45
solved I mean crazier things have happened for all my paranormal friends here yeah I know
01:00:53
you're sitting here feeling us I just feel that wayp I do like cuz that is strange that's strange the fact that and
01:00:59
again who knows this person could be lying just for like telling what he thinks is a fun story but he the fact
01:01:05
that he said it wasn't a passing glance it was a searching stare that's very interesting right but that's just the
01:01:11
little blip that I was talking about regardless of the mystery suspicion among the locals in the Press was
01:01:16
starting now frequently to fall on Matthew and Marita according to author Hillary Bonnie who I've mentioned a few
01:01:21
times she actually wrote the book The Society murders it's a really good book I definitely recommend it she said as
01:01:26
soon as it became clear that the bodies were those of Margaret and Paul and that
01:01:30
Matthew's house had been searched by the police reporters and photographers set up camp outside Matthew's house so this
01:01:35
was like a huge case in Australia yeah and if they couldn't find any peace at home things were twice as bad whenever
01:01:42
Matthew and his wife went out people stared pointed hurled questions at them they were followed like this was not
01:01:50
good for them yeah but the case against Matthew however speculative or c circumstantial was really surprisingly
01:01:56
strong he and his wife like we know had been the last two people to see his parents alive they're and their bodies
01:02:02
were discovered along with evidence connecting them back to his house yeah then you put that up with his
01:02:08
disingenuous and very theatrical reactions to the news of the deaths that also aroused suspicions among even the
01:02:16
people who knew him best yeah and all of the children in the whales family which
01:02:20
is strange right and of all those children he was the one who actually would have benefited most and most
01:02:28
immediately from the deaths that's very true and as they dug excuse me and the more they dug the more suspicious both
01:02:34
Matthew and Marita looked their stories were too similar too rehearsed too convenient so on May 7th the funeral was
01:02:43
held for Paul and Margaret where Matthew repeated his performance of the hysterical grieving son and there was
01:02:49
even more animosity between the whales children at this point because at this point literally like they're being
01:02:54
buried and Matthew is refusing to submit a DNA sample to investigators come on when Emma pressed
01:03:02
her brother for a reason why he would not do everything he could to find the killer he said I'm protecting my family
01:03:08
and then burst into tears so they were like what the [ __ ] does that mean yeah you it's like this
01:03:15
is your family man we're your family like why aren't you helping us mom is your family Paul is like your family
01:03:22
hello damn as Matthew and re attempted to go about their lives after this the Press continued like I said following
01:03:28
them everywhere unable to ignore the fact that both of them seemed to be the focus of the investigation but while
01:03:34
they tried to remain United things between Matthew and Marita were very much beginning to break apart his
01:03:41
behavior had become super erotic and unpredictable and Marita started to worry that she was putting herself at
01:03:47
considerable Risk by continuing to stand by Matthew and they have a child and they have a child so on May 7th she
01:03:53
herself was brought in for more questioning and the gravity of the situation really started sinking in on
01:03:58
this day and this has been a month now like a a little over a month that they've been dealing with this and going
01:04:05
through this so a few days later on the advice of Her counsel Marita called inspector Brian RX to set up a meeting
01:04:11
with him oh boy when they all sat down together at the station RX went out of his way he was like oh it's super cool
01:04:17
that you're in here but I'm doing you a favor I'm doing both of you guys a favor
01:04:21
he said we don't need any help he's like I I know who the Killer is but whatever
01:04:26
like tell us what you need to tell usen me y so not wanting to blow their chance
01:04:30
at immunity though Marita immediately launched into her version of events the couple had been at their home for dinner
01:04:38
Margaret and Paul had come over for dinner she said and at the end of the night something happened she said
01:04:43
Matthew hit his mother and stepfather over the back of the head a few times then stacked their bodies up against the
01:04:49
front fence in the dirt he left them there a day and buried them oh my God so it's like we invited them
01:04:57
over for dinner we they ate dinner together that night don't forget they they had digested their food sat
01:05:03
together and ate dinner presumably they hadn't digested their food and then at some point he just went up and hit them
01:05:09
over the back of well that's the thing that's even more coning she's just like and at some point it's like he just
01:05:15
wailed them over the head though and it's like also where was your child during this did your child see this
01:05:21
happen you so hope like asleep you so hope and remember they're over there celebrating that the fact that their
01:05:27
grandson just turned two and that this is a new townhouse for Mar and Matthew like they're celebrating this family
01:05:34
this is [ __ ] up it's [ __ ] but she signed that statement summarizing everything she had seen that night and
01:05:41
how is she staying quiet at like I don't know she said she was scared I mean yeah
01:05:47
I'm sure she was yikes but that was all investigators needed to get a warrant for Matthew's arrest so on the morning
01:05:53
of May 11th a team of detectives and Patrol officers arrived at the home and served the arrest warrant given his
01:06:00
behavior in history of instability there was actually considerable concern that he might try to hurt himself or somebody
01:06:06
else but when they explained the situation and asked whether or not he understood what he was under arrest for
01:06:11
he just said yes and went willingly which wow really nobody expected back at the precinct in melin Matthew almost
01:06:19
almost seemed relieved that the entire charade had finally come to an end wow which is
01:06:26
just so strange it didn't take very long before he started to explain what happened on the night of the murders he
01:06:32
said and he told detectives once Marita went upstairs so you hope that with the baby that was to put the child to bed
01:06:39
yeah you hope that he said once Marita went upstairs mom and I went outside with Paul and I hit them with a block of
01:06:44
wood on the back of the neck he even went so far as to uh draw diagrams for the investigators indicating where
01:06:51
they'd been standing in the driveway when this happened and where the blood stains had been before he cleaned
01:06:56
everything up from there things really happened more or less as Marita explained it he choked Paul and his
01:07:04
mother with those strips of fabric that had been found around their necks and then he lifted their bodies by the fence
01:07:09
in order to hide them until the morning the next morning the [ __ ] he grabbed a
01:07:14
bed sheet ripped it into strips that he used to cover their faces because he didn't want to see their expressions
01:07:19
because he's a vicious coward and then he grabbed his son's deflated pool and wrapped their bodies up with it with the
01:07:27
bodies hidden from sight he went down the road to the gas station and rented a small trailer into which he loaded the
01:07:33
bodies and pushed the trailer into the yard out of view from any neighbors from there he went to the hardware store and
01:07:40
purchased uh the red and white sash cord that had been found wrapped around the bodies as well as the D shackles and
01:07:46
concrete blocks found on top of their bodies when they were Unearthed wow you the the chain that he has left that's
01:07:53
the thing like that is just leaving breadcrumbs everywhere everywhere later that day he said after Mar returned home
01:08:00
to take care of their son because remember he's the primary caretaker for their son she goes and runs the store so
01:08:06
there are just two dead bodies who happen to be this child's grandparents sitting
01:08:12
outside while this man is taking care of his son like really think about that wow
01:08:16
wow I don't really want to no don't but like really take that into consideration
01:08:20
to see how much of a man how much of a monster this man is but later that day when Marita got home to take over care
01:08:25
of their son Matthew wrapped his parents' bodies in that old quilt cover and then loaded them into the trailer
01:08:32
and drove out to the hour ranges he said his original plan so cold blooded it's this is his mom this is so cold blooded
01:08:40
and like his stepdad who he had grown up with since he was seven which is like I
01:08:44
know like you you sit there and you're like obviously there was a lot of stuff going on you know in this family and
01:08:49
everything like that and we were saying like oh that was kind of shitty that they got together after they friends no
01:08:54
one [ __ ] deserves that like well guess what there was four other children that went through the same [ __ ] that's
01:09:00
the thing it's like so that's not an excuse like not an excuse at all at all oh that's awful he said his original
01:09:08
plan had been to drop their bodies into water and weigh them down that's what the cinder blocks were for uh but he
01:09:14
worried that they might float to the surface which I was like how would they with cinder block they like be broke
01:09:20
free of it Som somehow but he said for that for that reason that he was worried he decided to bury them in the forest
01:09:26
instead after listening to Matthew's story he's like okay like the sergeant is like I I know that this is how this
01:09:33
all happened but why why did this happen cuz he's like we went outside after eating dinner and I hit them both with a
01:09:41
thing of wood and it's likeed to that you are skipping parts of this story like you didn't did you just walk
01:09:48
outside and you immediately hit them both with wood like that's kind of what it sounds like or it's there was no AR
01:09:53
argument there was no nothing without hesitation he replied because there's so much animosity and hurt between my
01:09:59
mother and myself and then just trailed off wow it took some time and he backtracked a lot he got confused but
01:10:07
eventually he explained the motive more in depth he said he had very conflicting
01:10:11
feelings when it came to his mom he said he loved her and relied on her for oh so
01:10:16
many things yeah but he also resented the way he felt that she used her wealth to dominate and manipulate others
01:10:23
specific specifically her children he blamed her for alienating him from the rest of his family and the resentment
01:10:30
and anger he said was just building in him for years so you know what remove yourself from her go to therapy remove
01:10:36
yourself from her life if you don't like her and you don't like how she operates
01:10:39
and you think that she's you know holding [ __ ] over your head and stuff remove yourself yeah but then any of her
01:10:46
money exactly so it's like that doesn't check out my friend exactly but he said things came to a head a few weeks before
01:10:52
the murders when they got into into an argument over her decision to sell a vacation property that was hers in
01:10:59
Queensland that was connected to the will that she had set up several years earlier according to that will the
01:11:06
siblings would receive an equal share of her estate which is her estate that she
01:11:10
owns and she's leaving to them if anything happens but it would go into a trust and they all according to Matthew
01:11:18
felt like this was her way of continuing to control their lives and treat them as
01:11:21
children even once she was is gone I swear the the like move is to never tell to tell your kids that you don't have a
01:11:29
will yeah honestly whatever you have about your will is just going into the wind like just like you get nothing I'm
01:11:35
just going to be like we don't have anything so it's not worth it cuz I'm not you're not getting anything no don't
01:11:40
just be like I don't have the will N I don't have one I don't have one sorry good luck like just cuz you hear about
01:11:46
this [ __ ] and you're like people killing their parents over Wills it's crazy over
01:11:51
what they get when they die it is like mindboggling scary it really is scary it's like holy [ __ ] you just hope that
01:11:58
you you know your child's not AO path I guess it's like what kind of role of the
01:12:03
dice is that seriously it's it's people are wild but he said the fact that he just kept thinking about the sale of
01:12:10
that property and the fact that that it was going into a trust and like why does
01:12:16
it matter that it's going into a trust I don't get I don't get it but I'm glad I
01:12:21
don't get it he felt like that was her control over the situation and he was so tired of her in his own words
01:12:28
controlling these situations and it was like at that point that he was like you know what I want to kill her like he
01:12:33
started thinking about killing her at that point that's wild cuz it's like that's not your money no it's not that's
01:12:39
not yours that's theirs that's her estate she can do with whatever the [ __ ] she wants with it that's the thing and
01:12:45
it's like she bought it she earned it yeah you can't get mad man that's her money yeah what you think she should be
01:12:52
doing with it is pretty relevant exactly your it's not yours that's the way it is
01:12:58
and it's like you were making your own money like that's what's so rough is like you
01:13:03
wonder what cuz it's like obviously he is a very disturbed human being from the start something probably would have
01:13:10
happened I think I think as well if it wasn't his parents who knows what it would have been if he can do
01:13:16
that what the [ __ ] was that nothing else in this room shook what was that it was
01:13:23
something over here I told you there was a paranormal aspect to this case I wonder if you can
01:13:29
hear that in the recording because that was [ __ ] terrifying if you can hear that in the recording keep this in
01:13:35
because that was [ __ ] terrifying that was weird I don't know what there's a shelf behind me everybody on the wall I
01:13:42
don't know if you could have heard that if you you know whatever if not we'll cut this there's a shelf behind me on
01:13:48
the wall and it has candles cand but they're not lit they're not lit just candles and such mainly and as I was
01:13:56
talking it almost sounded like a woodpecker something it was like behind me and then it just stopped and nothing
01:14:02
else in this room did that the garage door didn't open it like nothing shook in this room
01:14:08
like you know like neither of us are even like we're not even moving I'm not moving I'm sitting on a couch no we both
01:14:14
heard that or it sounded like almost like somebody dropping a coin or something yeah
01:14:19
like like something like that yeah that was bizarre sorry that just like threw me totally off no that was bizarre Kil
01:14:27
her but all that to say this was her money she could do whatever she wanted yeah and I think and
01:14:34
I think I was saying now I remember I was like sorry my brain just lost U obviously something likely bad would
01:14:40
have happened oh yes with Matthew as the the culprit there you know he had a lot
01:14:47
there was a lot of signs that's something and if you're capable of doing that yeah you're capable of doing a lot
01:14:52
of things agreed but you do wonder if he didn't have that hand thing and he was able to continue working I wondered that
01:14:59
and owning that Salon if it would have changed because I always wonder if like something like that can lead someone
01:15:06
away from those thoughts or instincts that they have when they have something that they are doing pouring their energy
01:15:16
pouring all their energy into I do wonder that I I have no basis for any of that you know I mean like I don't know
01:15:22
if what research there is on that I'd love to look it up that would be interesting I thought the same wonder
01:15:27
that if he didn't H if he didn't have to close that down and didn't have to shift
01:15:32
yeah because he was bringing considerable money too yeah like he was kind of supporting himself more at least
01:15:38
and and he probably felt a little more fulfilled because he was running a business and you know he he was doing it
01:15:46
well by all accounts so it's like he had clients that relied on him and that were
01:15:51
loyal to him like you wonder you know and I know it's rough to look back like that cuz you can't go back and and shift
01:15:58
it but you just wonder like would that have been a different thing outcome well you and I were talking about this
01:16:03
yesterday like it really is crazy how one choice or one circumstance in your life can change the entire course of
01:16:10
your life like if you don't go somewhere someday you don't meet somebody and you
01:16:15
don't end up here or you know like something as simple like we were talking about like breaking up with a boyfriend
01:16:21
that's like no good you know that like you're just like yeah he's shitty and if you had stayed with that person or like
01:16:26
a girlfriend and you'd stay with that person it could alter the total course of your life right like totally
01:16:31
different life you could have exactly you know it's one decision that you make people could have not entered your life
01:16:37
opportunities you know like who you are as a person like little tiny choices right and the universe is always trying
01:16:44
to tell you I totally believe that but I do wonder I'm like I want it's really sad cuz I wonder if Margaret and Paul
01:16:50
would still be here I know it's that's sad it's really I really feel for those that family I do too because they
01:16:57
probably sit there and ask themselves that question and a myriad of other questions it seems like they've just
01:17:02
gone through a lot you know like that's they've gone through too much as a family for it all to end that way agreed
01:17:09
absolutely and that's the thing for it all to end that way yeah so woodell listened patiently sergeant woodell and
01:17:17
then asked if Matthew's plan had been just to kill his mother cuz he just said I was that's when I started think about
01:17:23
killing my mom he said why not do it when Paul wasn't around like why do why did you also feel the need to kill Paul
01:17:29
and Matthew replied I quite like Paul but at the same time he destroyed my mother and father's relationship too o
01:17:36
which is just so that's black white answer but it's so gray because he's starting it off with I actually like
01:17:43
that guy but I killed him but I killed him violently but I actually do quite like him like that's really [ __ ] up
01:17:51
and a trigger warning for uh sexual abuse later Matthew would elaborate on his reason for killing Paul he said he
01:17:58
claimed that Paul had sexually abused him as a child and a short time before the murders he said he felt very
01:18:04
strongly that Paul had actually been been abusing his son too Matthew son oh unfortunately I don't have enough
01:18:12
information to say whether or not that's true but it is that's what he said that's the only thing I know wow so if
01:18:20
that is the case that is entirely [ __ ] up but at the same time it is not a reason for murdering someone and it's
01:18:26
also Paul can't isn't here to to defend that in any way exactly shap or form or to prove himself innocent or you know so
01:18:34
I don't want to go into that too much but he did say that that's that's something he said that he alleges right
01:18:40
you know wow yeah so investigators continued to build their case against Matthew and in the weeks and months that
01:18:47
followed collecting evidence to corroborate his admission they confirmed that Margaret well whales King had
01:18:53
indeed changed her will just like he said to have greater control over the inheritance left to her children by her
01:18:59
father and while most of the children objected to her decision that was true they all were financially independent
01:19:06
adults and saw no reason to for this little matter in the grand scheme of things to ruin their relationship with
01:19:12
her yeah so they were all they all were seemingly ticked off by it but weren't going to let it blow over into this big
01:19:17
thing but Matthew on the other hand like we were saying still relied very heavily
01:19:22
on Paul and Margaret for financial and emotional help so he believed that they turned to him during the sale of that
01:19:28
Queensland property that kind of changed everything because this decision of changing the will actually had to be
01:19:34
approved by one of the children and they went to him for approval and Matthew felt like his mom assumed he would be
01:19:42
too stupid to realize what he was signing oh okay so that's where all this animosity and anger let up both during
01:19:49
and after his confession though Matthew did insist that Mar had nothing to do with the murders and actually had been
01:19:54
asleep in bed when they happened so she he said that she only learned about it the following day and he told the police
01:20:01
she cried she shook she dryr she retreated to her bed and HD hid under the covers oh wow so she he it's he
01:20:08
makes it sound like she was like scared of him at this point and was horrified and I'm glad if that's the case that he
01:20:14
was honest about that and didn't try to throw her under the bus as well if she had nothing to do with it you know
01:20:19
agreed and the days and weeks after the murder after the murder excuse me Matthew kept telling his wife that he
01:20:24
was going to turn himself into the police but he wanted to make sure that she and their son were protected so I'm
01:20:31
not claiming to understand why Marita didn't go to the police but no you can see I guess that she one was afraid and
01:20:40
two thought that her husband was going to turn himself in at some point yeah I mean I'm again I can't claim I've ever
01:20:48
been in that situation so I'm not going to sit here and be like well she definitely should have done this exactly
01:20:53
it just would have been super awesome if she could have told this ahead of time but again holy [ __ ] what a position to
01:21:00
be in exactly and he sounded like he was scary so and she has a child to right yeah so her account Mar's account of
01:21:09
things more or less confirmed that while she stood by her husband and remained silent she did want to go to the police
01:21:15
from the moment she had learned what she what Matthew had done she told police I
01:21:18
was brought up so good I can't believe this [ __ ] is happening to me I just want
01:21:22
to die I'm so tired it's like a nightmare oh so you just that rocks your soul a little bit to hear like you know
01:21:29
cuz it sounds like she was brought up in a really nice family like they got out of so much [ __ ] themselves and then look
01:21:35
what she finds herself wrapped up she finds herself wrapped up in this and you You Can Tell She's for her to be like I
01:21:40
just want to die like this is awful this is horrible she's a mother she's you know damn that's really sad so on
01:21:47
October 17th 2002 Matthew Wales appeared before a judge in Melbourne magistrates
01:21:52
Court where he pleaded guilty to two counts of first-degree murder at the same time Marita pleaded guilty to one
01:21:58
count of perverting the course of justice and was able to post bond several months later Matthew appeared
01:22:03
before The Supreme Court in Melbourne where he was sentenced to 30 years in prison with a minimum of 24 years being
01:22:09
served before becoming eligible for parole wow uh for the perversion of Justice charge Marita was actually given
01:22:16
a 2-year suspended sentence as the judge did not believe that she played any role
01:22:21
in The Murders the judge uh who was John coldry said I want to make it clear that
01:22:25
there's no evidence linking Marita Wales to these murders well that's good now initially Matthew was sent to the laden
01:22:32
prison which is a low security prison in Victoria where he arrived with a trailer
01:22:37
that was hauling a special postoptic mattress for an injured back that he had um at first he struggled to adapt to
01:22:45
prison life and continued very volatile behavior and that eventually got him transferred to hm prison barwan which is
01:22:52
a maximum security in Victoria Maximum Security Prison in Victoria oh damn uh since arriving there he is said to have
01:22:59
de demonstrated a better ability to control his anger and prison officials report that he's a model prisoner there
01:23:06
in recent years it's said that he has dedicated his time to self-improvement he's enrolled in educational classes
01:23:12
taken a job in the prison barber shop and has never been a problem for anyone at this maximum security facility I
01:23:19
wonder if they just like don't deal with your like they're like we're not Tak security facility uh he is eligible for
01:23:25
parole in 2026 oh and so far he's given officials no reason to deny him okay yeah now in 2007 uh marito
01:23:36
Wales actually appeared in the Press again when she was arrested and charged with Grand Theft after stealing an
01:23:41
$88,000 ring from the locker rooms at the Q swimming pool and then pawning it for
01:23:47
$400 when she was brought before the judge at the Melbourne magistrates court she pleaded guilty to one count of theft
01:23:53
and one count of obtaining property by deception her loyal her lawyer told the judge she saw it she made a split-second
01:23:59
decision and that split-second decision was wrong and has had serious consequences for her damn she was
01:24:05
sentenced to 6 weeks in jail suspended for 12 months and was ordered to repay $400 to the pawn shop and the pawn shop
01:24:12
was ordered to return the ring to the rightful owner wow and that altogether is the case of the society murders it is
01:24:21
so traumatic that is traumatic and it is absolutely wild to me that he could be up for parole after murdering his
01:24:30
parents and in like cold blood like murdering two people that are the closest people like some of the closest
01:24:37
people to you and seemingly out of nowhere like just over Financial dispute over like animosity because of a will
01:24:43
and it's like he acted so poorly at one prison a low security prison that they were like we can't have this going on
01:24:50
but now he's acting well at a maximum security and they're like well look at that and it's like okay that's not
01:24:55
really a good indication of how he's going to be in the world right exactly we got to be thinking here like
01:25:01
obviously we talk about like Rehabilitation all the time for sure and you hope that it's possible hope but but
01:25:08
oh boy we to say we I guess we'll find out I guess so yeah so in the meantime we hope you keep listening and we hope
01:25:14
you keep it we but that's weird that you murder your parents over their will because guess what none of that money is
01:25:20
yours anyway yeah it's not yours man bye [Music] bye sorry I just burped how dare you

Badges

This episode stands out for the following:

  • 90
    Most shocking
  • 90
    Biggest twist
  • 85
    Most dramatic
  • 85
    Most intense

Episode Highlights

  • Hyperfixation Snacks
    A light-hearted conversation about snacks that become obsessions.
    “Welcome to the world of hyperfixation snacks!”
    @ 02m 45s
    March 14, 2024
  • Divorce and Its Impact
    Exploring the emotional fallout of a traumatic divorce on a family.
    “It's a big traumatic event for everyone involved.”
    @ 11m 07s
    March 14, 2024
  • Matthew's Troubling Childhood
    Matthew displayed disturbing behavior from a young age, including animal cruelty.
    “He was Disturbed from a young age.”
    @ 20m 43s
    March 14, 2024
  • Family Wedding Exclusion
    The rift in the family was highlighted when none of the children were invited to the wedding.
    “None of the children were invited to the wedding.”
    @ 22m 36s
    March 14, 2024
  • Matthew's Career Ends Abruptly
    A repetitive strain injury forced Matthew to close his salon, impacting his family's finances.
    “They were dealt a difficult blow.”
    @ 31m 43s
    March 14, 2024
  • Mysterious Disappearance
    Emma's concern escalates as her parents go missing without a trace.
    “This is beyond weird.”
    @ 36m 31s
    March 14, 2024
  • Missing Persons Case Turns Homicide
    The case of Margaret and Paul shifts focus as evidence suggests foul play.
    “The missing person's unit handed the case over to the homicide squad.”
    @ 46m 45s
    March 14, 2024
  • Discovery of Bodies
    Two bodies were uncovered in a shocking discovery during a routine search.
    “Oh my God, they had discovered at least one body!”
    @ 55m 09s
    March 14, 2024
  • Matthew's Arrest
    Matthew was arrested after his wife revealed his involvement in the murders.
    “Wow, I don't really want to!”
    @ 01h 08m 16s
    March 14, 2024
  • Motive Uncovered
    Matthew explained his conflicting feelings towards his mother, leading to the tragic events.
    “Things came to a head a few weeks before the murders.”
    @ 01h 10m 50s
    March 14, 2024
  • The Impact of Choices
    A discussion on how one decision can alter the course of life dramatically.
    “One choice can change the entire course of your life.”
    @ 01h 16m 08s
    March 14, 2024
  • Guilty Pleas
    Matthew pleads guilty to two counts of first-degree murder, while Marita pleads guilty to perverting justice.
    “Matthew was sentenced to 30 years in prison.”
    @ 01h 21m 54s
    March 14, 2024

Episode Quotes

  • The crack started to show in the relationship.
    Matthew Wales and the Society Murders | Morbid | Podcast
  • That's scary is such a red flag.
    Matthew Wales and the Society Murders | Morbid | Podcast
  • This is beyond weird.
    Matthew Wales and the Society Murders | Morbid | Podcast
  • Trust your gut always as [ __ ].
    Matthew Wales and the Society Murders | Morbid | Podcast
  • Wow, I don't really want to!
    Matthew Wales and the Society Murders | Morbid | Podcast
  • I just want to die, I'm so tired. It's like a nightmare.
    Matthew Wales and the Society Murders | Morbid | Podcast

Key Moments

  • Gloomy Weather00:30
  • Cat Lady Pride03:57
  • Family Politics18:51
  • Family Rift22:31
  • Career Struggles23:14
  • Discovery of the Car50:20
  • Motive Revealed1:10:50
  • Financial Dispute1:24:41

Words per Minute Over Time

Vibes Breakdown