Speaker 1: Trigger on ing.
Speaker 2: Some listeners may find this podcast distressing. This is a
Speaker 2: real story about a real person that is still unfolding
Speaker 2: in real time, and any leads or information from anybody
Speaker 2: out there may help the family either find the answers
Speaker 2: or the closure they're desperately searching for. Welcome back to
Speaker 2: the Disappearance of Katie Walker. A podcast series they never
Speaker 2: thought I'd be making. I wish I wasn't making, but
Speaker 2: is already proving to be crucial in finding answers. And
Speaker 2: that's thanks to you listening right now and everyone following along,
Speaker 2: sharing the post and starting conversations out there about Katie
Speaker 2: and asking what happened to this woman. The only chance
Speaker 2: that cases like this have, where the mainstream media ignored
Speaker 2: them and the police don't want to dig deeper on
Speaker 2: for reasons I will get to in this episode, the
Speaker 2: only chance they have to find justice or and it
Speaker 2: comes from a community like this getting behind it. And
Speaker 2: in the last few days since my content started rolling
Speaker 2: out on Sunday and Australia slowly started to become aware
Speaker 2: of this sad story, several people have now come forward
Speaker 2: with bits of information that overall means that we I
Speaker 2: say we because I'm the middle person between these people
Speaker 2: and the family and the investigator, we can start to
Speaker 2: piece together some of the mystery surrounding Katie's final weeks
Speaker 2: in Sydney. And before I get into the main points
Speaker 2: of today's episode, which is I'm not gonna lie, quite
Speaker 2: disturbing to listen to and quite eerie and scary if
Speaker 2: I'm being honest, I just want to remind you that
Speaker 2: this is still an active investigation, so there's only so
Speaker 2: much I can say publicly on certain things. But one
Speaker 2: thing to know about Katie as this unfolds is her
Speaker 2: life was not conventional like most of ours, which are
Speaker 2: often defined by days that could be described as mundane.
Speaker 2: You know, We've got office hours that we build our
Speaker 2: routines around. We've got identical commutes we repeat daily, often
Speaker 2: at the same time, alongside the same faces, and we
Speaker 2: all have groups of friends who all know pretty much
Speaker 2: everything about each other. As most of our lives have
Speaker 2: spent years becoming intertwined with those around us, which is
Speaker 2: something most of us welcome if we're being honest, And
Speaker 2: you know, the odd bits of spontaneity can give us
Speaker 2: a dopamine spike and he's great, yes, But ultimately aren't
Speaker 2: we all creatures of habit and with those habits we
Speaker 2: build our own little communities around us that become so
Speaker 2: close that if you were to vanish tomorrow, if I
Speaker 2: was to vanish tomorrow, there'd be endless people who'd notice
Speaker 2: within hours, and those people could retrace my steps without
Speaker 2: the need of CCTV or the police, because again, for
Speaker 2: most of our lives are predictable in the best possible way.
Speaker 2: Yet for Katie, hers wasn't and she didn't have those
Speaker 2: people around her. And since returning to Sydney from America
Speaker 2: in February, a decision Katie made to be closer to
Speaker 2: her two teenage children who live here with their father,
Speaker 2: who Katie divorced from nine years ago, Katie's brother, and family,
Speaker 2: they have struggled to piece together her final months and
Speaker 2: weeks and days, because again, she didn't have that close
Speaker 2: circle of people here who were part of her day
Speaker 2: to day, because she was still establishing her day to
Speaker 2: day and slowly rebuilding that life here that she left
Speaker 2: a long long time ago for reasons that don't need
Speaker 2: to be made public, just out of respect. Back to
Speaker 2: today's podcast and the point of this, although Katie didn't
Speaker 2: have that close knit group of friends around her or
Speaker 2: her tribe as she often refer to her friend group
Speaker 2: in America as thanks to her story becoming public this
Speaker 2: week and you guys backing it and getting out there,
Speaker 2: we now know that she had the lovely lady that
Speaker 2: she met on a walk at the start of May
Speaker 2: in ba and became close to in those final weeks.
Speaker 2: And we also know there's the waitress who got to
Speaker 2: know her quite well in the cafe that.
Speaker 1: Nobody knew she even liked to visit.
Speaker 2: And then there's the neighbors that she'd started having little
Speaker 2: chats with near her unit in Darling Point. And this week,
Speaker 2: there's just so many people who have briefly crossed paths
Speaker 2: with Katie since she returned to Sydney who have now
Speaker 2: seen the content and are aware that she is missing,
Speaker 2: they have reached out, and when you're compiling all the
Speaker 2: little bits of information they're sharing from their various chats
Speaker 2: and interactions with Katie, alongside the things Katie had been
Speaker 2: telling her two closest friends back in America, Justine and Elizabeth,
Speaker 2: who you will hear from in this episode like it
Speaker 2: is helping massively, and the more scraps of information the
Speaker 2: continued public exposure brings to the surface.
Speaker 1: The more Katie's.
Speaker 2: Father and brother, the two family members who flew from
Speaker 2: the UK to Sydney the second they heard she'd gone missing,
Speaker 2: and are now spending thousands to fund their private investigation
Speaker 2: on the more they are becoming convinced that Katie just
Speaker 2: did not take her own life, which brings us to
Speaker 2: the main point of today's episode. In the last episode
Speaker 2: of this podcast, I retraced Katie's steps and questioned how
Speaker 2: the police can believe that Katie genuinely walked into the
Speaker 2: water in broad daylight and ended her life, something that
Speaker 2: every single person following this has also questioned too, Me
Speaker 2: and you guys listening, and Katie's family and friends. We've
Speaker 2: all then questioned, will if she didn't turn off the
Speaker 2: street towards the coastal track, then she either went into
Speaker 2: one of those houses in the CCTV dead zone on
Speaker 2: that street, or she went into a vehicle.
Speaker 1: And they're two far more plausible.
Speaker 2: Scenarios than she went into the water, given the time
Speaker 2: of day and what she was wearing. Or as I
Speaker 2: questioned at the end of the last podcast. If Katie
Speaker 2: did do one of these things, but it wasn't of
Speaker 2: her own choice and she was perhaps again it sounds insensitive,
Speaker 2: but dragged into a vehicle or a property than who
Speaker 2: possibly could be targeting her?
Speaker 1: Why Katie? Why there?
Speaker 2: And as we've explored this at this point in time,
Speaker 2: as I'm recording this today, one person comes to mind
Speaker 2: of all of those loved ones of Katie's who are
Speaker 2: now urging me to keep sharing all of this publicly
Speaker 2: because it is slowly bringing answers.
Speaker 1: Enter the Man from Dubai.
Speaker 2: Earlier this year, in February, as Katie left America for Australia,
Speaker 2: she stopped off in to buy briefly.
Speaker 1: On a work trip.
Speaker 2: Katie was hoping to relaunch her jewelry brand Dream of
Speaker 2: Maya in the Middle East, a brand which Katie says
Speaker 2: embodies her near two decades of expertise in finite jewelry
Speaker 2: design and combines artistry with deep spiritual symbolism. One night, though,
Speaker 2: while in Dubai, as Katie was tucked up in bed
Speaker 2: in her hotel suite, she was woken up by the
Speaker 2: sound of someone breaking in.
Speaker 3: I'm not sure if you heard about this but this
Speaker 3: guy in Dubai got a key to her room by
Speaker 3: posing as her husband to the concierge, and so just
Speaker 3: goes into her room late at night in Ah and
Speaker 3: this was like, gosh, it has to have been a
Speaker 3: few months ago because she was in Dubai for some time.
Speaker 3: But it really freaked her out, and she said, Elizabeth,
Speaker 3: you know, I just feel unsafe, you know, I'm just
Speaker 3: I'm sleeping and these these guys come in and to
Speaker 3: my room drinking drunk, and she had to you know,
Speaker 3: try to get him, just got him out, you know.
Speaker 3: But she was really pissed off with the you know,
Speaker 3: the front desk. You know, how dare they give this
Speaker 3: you know, person a key.
Speaker 2: Katie didn't just describe that terrifying incident to her friend Elizabeth,
Speaker 2: who you just had me speaking to, but she also
Speaker 2: offered a little bit more context as to who the
Speaker 2: mom was because he wasn't a complete stranger.
Speaker 3: You know, she'd met him in a club or but
Speaker 3: there was no relationship or any you know thing between them.
Speaker 3: But you know, so I don't know, I don't remember
Speaker 3: her saying any details, you know, what he looked like.
Speaker 3: And she goes, you know, but she said, you know,
Speaker 3: there was no you know, attraction there or anything.
Speaker 2: According to Elizabeth, Katie had met that man out earlier
Speaker 2: in the evening, and reading between the lines a little,
Speaker 2: it sounds like Katie could have rejected his advances after
Speaker 2: finding out about that incident. My first question, did Katie
Speaker 2: report this to the authorities? And although some of the
Speaker 2: people I've spoken to about this suggest she didn't necessarily
Speaker 2: want the bother of an incident involving foreign police in
Speaker 2: a country she was only briefly stopping in, one friend
Speaker 2: did suggest that the hotel may have provided her a
Speaker 2: complimentary stay and waived the bill of her stay if
Speaker 2: she didn't do that or report the work as dangerous
Speaker 2: negligence as he so carelessly handed someone a key to
Speaker 2: her room for the rest of katie stay in Dubai.
Speaker 2: Then there was nothing more with this man, no more incident.
Speaker 2: And then she did make it to Australia, as we know.
Speaker 2: But this isn't where the story with the man from
Speaker 2: Dubai ends, because this wasn't the last time Katie was
Speaker 2: to see him.
Speaker 3: He showed up in Sydney, and it's like, what is
Speaker 3: the chances of that, Like a freaking encounter that you know,
Speaker 3: nothing happened except that you know, she was a sound
Speaker 3: sleep and you know, in her bed. But you know,
Speaker 3: both me and Justine was like, what's the chances of
Speaker 3: this dude showing up in Sydney jumping into it?
Speaker 2: Huh? How do you guys know he came to Sydney.
Speaker 3: Because she told us, she said, she goes, I can't
Speaker 3: fucking believe it. You know, that guy that was in
Speaker 3: my room, that came in my room, he's in you know,
Speaker 3: I bumped into him on the beach in Sydney. She's
Speaker 3: was with the fucking chances of that, you know, she
Speaker 3: was like, what the hell?
Speaker 1: You know, going solely off what Katie told Elizabeth about
Speaker 1: the incident in Sydney.
Speaker 2: The man didn't appear to be following her, harassing her,
Speaker 2: acting suspicious, opposing as a threat during that moment where
Speaker 2: that's crossed. But the sheer coincidence of it, if that's
Speaker 2: what it even was, did leave Katie quite shaken.
Speaker 3: And so he partly said he was. She said he
Speaker 3: was really apologetic, but she said, I was still, you know,
Speaker 3: freaking freaked out about it. And he's she said, he's
Speaker 3: you know it's weird though, it's just although she told
Speaker 3: me she said, it's just weird again.
Speaker 2: As far as I'm aware at the time of recording this,
Speaker 2: this was all several weeks before Katie went missing, and
Speaker 2: in those final weeks she never mentioned to her friends
Speaker 2: that she bumped into the man from Dubai again. But
Speaker 2: when it did become known that Katie was missing, this
Speaker 2: mine is, of course the first person who came to
Speaker 2: the mind of Katie's friends. The issue is though nobody
Speaker 2: knows a single thing about him other than his ethnicity.
Speaker 2: They don't know his name, his age is high, even
Speaker 2: his nationality. Was he from Australia and just visiting Dubai
Speaker 2: the same time Katie was, or was he from to
Speaker 2: Buy and he was then visiting Australia. Katie's friends also
Speaker 2: have no idea what hotel she was staying at Dubuy,
Speaker 2: what date this incident occurred on, or anything that could help.
Speaker 3: She never formed a formal complaint, you know, to the police.
Speaker 3: I guess that's why they said they can't have any information.
Speaker 3: But the authorities know about it, but they're like, well,
Speaker 3: you know, they don't have the investigators don't have their name,
Speaker 3: his name. I said, well, surely they'll have pictures of
Speaker 3: the event, you know, like you know, people coming and
Speaker 3: going into a hotel on that particular day. They've got
Speaker 3: to have, you know, the one that gave them the key.
Speaker 3: You know. It is like they have to have some
Speaker 3: kind of way of being able to, you know, find
Speaker 3: who the hellless person is.
Speaker 2: But one thing I do know right now is that
Speaker 2: New South Wales Police they have been made aware of
Speaker 2: this person by Katie's friends, her father and her brother.
Speaker 2: Katie's father and brother even think they may have figured
Speaker 2: out the hotel and date, and they have made all
Speaker 2: of this information now from the UK where they.
Speaker 1: Are, to New South Wales Police.
Speaker 2: And in response to this, the police have done nothing
Speaker 2: because at the time of recording this, over the week
Speaker 2: they've had this information, they haven't replied because as far
Speaker 2: as we're all concerned, in the eyes of New South
Speaker 2: Wales Police, this case is as good as closed to them.
Speaker 2: Katie ended her life and chose to do that, and
Speaker 2: also to them, why bother allocating resources to try and
Speaker 2: prove otherwise. And the reason New South Wales Police seems
Speaker 2: so set on this theory that Katie did end her life,
Speaker 2: despite there still being no proof of this and their
Speaker 2: water theory just seeming impossible is because of what they
Speaker 2: discovered in Katie's apartment after she was reported missing. Trigger
Speaker 2: Wing again now, because the next part of this podcast
Speaker 2: is going to get a little dark. Please know everything
Speaker 2: you're about to hear is being shared with permission of
Speaker 2: Katie's father and brother, who at the police's point of
Speaker 2: contact in this investigation, despite their now being a noticeable
Speaker 2: lack of any contact from the police. So once Katie's
Speaker 2: disappearance was made known the police, as they broke into
Speaker 2: her apartment in Darling Bay, they found what they believe
Speaker 2: and notes left behind to her children and a friend,
Speaker 2: and they believe those notes are proof that Katie ended
Speaker 2: her life. But to those who know Katie best, you
Speaker 2: know the family she's had her entire life, and the
Speaker 2: two close friends in America who've been the closest people
Speaker 2: to her over the last five years, they've also read
Speaker 2: these notes and they do not think the same.
Speaker 4: The letter that I had seen, you know, it was
Speaker 4: you couldn't even read it, not because her cursive, but
Speaker 4: because the words didn't make sense and many of the
Speaker 4: words were misspelled. He was very articulate, she had impeccable grammar,
Speaker 4: she spoke very well, she wrote well when she communicated
Speaker 4: via text message, so it's incongruent with her traditional behavior.
Speaker 2: And before I go into this, I do acknowledge how
Speaker 2: bleak this is. But everything you're about to hear it
Speaker 2: is so vital. Katie's brother, again, who has asked I
Speaker 2: share this publicly. He tells me that amongst Katie's belongings
Speaker 2: that were left in a unit, there was a journal
Speaker 2: with some bits of paper tucked into it and next
Speaker 2: to it which were basically all full of ramblings and
Speaker 2: thoughts and messages to herself and other people throughout her life.
Speaker 2: And he has read everything on what the police believe
Speaker 2: are suicide notes. He says they are ambiguous at best,
Speaker 2: and they do not feel authentically Katie. And he says
Speaker 2: in those messages, which were so illegible that they had
Speaker 2: to use AI to decipher, there was nothing in them
Speaker 2: in his mind that would indicate Katie wanted to take
Speaker 2: her own life, as she never specifically said goodbye.
Speaker 1: He says they.
Speaker 2: Were more in the reflections, which did have some sadness
Speaker 2: and regret, but again he does not feel these notes
Speaker 2: and messages at the end of this journal were authentically Katie,
Speaker 2: which is something that her close friend Justine back in America,
Speaker 2: upon being sent pictures of these notes, agrees with.
Speaker 4: Well the interpretation that was provided. The translation is, you
Speaker 4: know in such a way that if you look at
Speaker 4: the words that are actually written, it's in gibberish. And
Speaker 4: so I feel that it's difficult to you know, these
Speaker 4: pieces of evidence are difficult discern, but when it comes
Speaker 4: down to it, there's truthfully no evidence that she ended
Speaker 4: her life, and that's I think the most pressing thing.
Speaker 4: Regardless of the presence of these letters, which are very
Speaker 4: difficult to read.
Speaker 2: In Katie's earlier journal entries, which are a lot more legible,
Speaker 2: the brother says that she talked about many personal things.
Speaker 2: They were all future orientated of future plans, business ideas,
Speaker 2: things she wanted to do and achieve, instead of what
Speaker 2: the police think were signs she wanted to.
Speaker 1: End her life.
Speaker 2: Those questionable notes and the suspicion with the man from
Speaker 2: Dubai aren't the only reason that Katie's loved ones do
Speaker 2: not believe that she took her own life. As you
Speaker 2: heard in previous episodes of this podcast, her friends explained
Speaker 2: how the woman they knew had the opposite mentality and
Speaker 2: Katie she was a fighter, and she was someone always
Speaker 2: looking forwards not backwards, as she was now building a
Speaker 2: new life.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I think for Katie, she was definitely had a
Speaker 4: big transition in her life. And with that, you know,
Speaker 4: it could be an ungroundedness or an uncertainty. We often,
Speaker 4: you know, all experience those seasons. I feel like, you know,
Speaker 4: she relocated to Sydney because she wanted to be closer
Speaker 4: to her children, and to be honest with you, in
Speaker 4: my time that I've been close friends with her her,
Speaker 4: it had never once crossed my mind that she would
Speaker 4: be somebody that would choose to in her own life
Speaker 4: just based off of her character, her just her personality.
Speaker 4: It not once crossed my mind, even in the last
Speaker 4: several months.
Speaker 1: The buffling thing, like it feels she's looking.
Speaker 2: Forward in life rather than feeling like, you know, there's
Speaker 2: no options anymore.
Speaker 4: Well, and from a logical standpoint too, she there was
Speaker 4: solutions in place, you know, And so I have felt
Speaker 4: that the behavior and the communication in that narrow end
Speaker 4: of time from her last sighting just didn't really add up.
Speaker 4: Despite the other evidence that was available.
Speaker 2: And one of the ways she was doing that, Elizabeth
Speaker 2: and just beIN tell me was by having them sell
Speaker 2: some of the jeweys she'd left with them in an
Speaker 2: America so she could use the money to get back
Speaker 2: on her feet a little bit more until she had
Speaker 2: some more consistent work coming through.
Speaker 3: It's just hard to believe, and I I just have
Speaker 3: a hard time believing that she killed herself. I don't
Speaker 3: know my first instinct that something happened to her.
Speaker 2: The last communication Justine and Elizabeth did have with Katie
Speaker 2: before her disappearance was then finalizing her bank details where
Speaker 2: they could send the money to money that Katie was
Speaker 2: relying on to help get her back on her feet
Speaker 2: so she could continue building this new life in Sydney,
Speaker 2: so she could be around for her children, who were
Speaker 2: the driving force in everything all of this. Katie's returned
Speaker 2: to Australia, it was to be there for them.
Speaker 4: If somebody less than twenty four hours prior is completing
Speaker 4: a bank transaction that could be potential relief for some circumstance,
Speaker 4: then that oftentimes to me, if somebody was truly suicidal,
Speaker 4: had a plan and was ready to act upon it,
Speaker 4: I think they would care too much about these for the.
Speaker 3: Listings that was on the twenty first of May that
Speaker 3: we text and she disappeared twenty third. You know, what's
Speaker 3: the likelihood of somebody wanting to kill themselves if they're
Speaker 3: waiting for the large sum of money, for a decent
Speaker 3: amount of money to come.
Speaker 2: One of the most asked questions this week I've seen
Speaker 2: is why I note mainstream media covering Katie's story still,
Speaker 2: And I now believe it's because of these notes.
Speaker 1: To the police.
Speaker 2: In their eyes, they've got a woman reported missing, a
Speaker 2: woman they've now realized was quite lost and a little
Speaker 2: sad at this point of her life as she was
Speaker 2: rebuilding things in Sydney and she didn't have a big
Speaker 2: support network here. And they've then discovered what they think
Speaker 2: as suicide notes, and they've then tracked her with CCTV
Speaker 2: to a block away from water. You put those things
Speaker 2: together and yeah, it's easy to make an assumption what
Speaker 2: may have happened next. And in my opinion and the
Speaker 2: opinion of Katie's friends and family, they feel that in
Speaker 2: the eyes of the police, again it's already case closed.
Speaker 2: But two Katie's father and brother, two men who have
Speaker 2: known Katie all of her life, and to Justine and Elizabeth,
Speaker 2: two of Katie's closest friends in recent years who she
Speaker 2: was still chatting with twenty four hours prior to her disappearance.
Speaker 2: None of them believe those notes were suicide notes, and
Speaker 2: they also question did Katie even write them. But the
Speaker 2: problem is these people wanting answers. They're in the UK
Speaker 2: and America and they aren't here, which is why they're
Speaker 2: asking me to keep sharing this right now and to
Speaker 2: keep the public commentary going so hopefully the police stop
Speaker 2: ignoring them and the police stop thinking they know what
Speaker 2: happened because they don't. Until the proof of that, this
Speaker 2: should still be treated as an open investigation. And the
Speaker 2: police may say it is an open investigation, but what
Speaker 2: do you investating? Even I emailed the detective and had
Speaker 2: no reply. I emailed police media for an update, and
Speaker 2: their job is to inform the media.
Speaker 1: I had no reply.
Speaker 2: And another initial theory that Katie's family tell when the
Speaker 2: police had was that Katie likely went to the Gap, which,
Speaker 2: for those who don't know Sydney's eastern suburbs is a
Speaker 2: prolific stretch of cliff top that has claimed so many
Speaker 2: lives before from people jumping off, and it is dubbed
Speaker 2: Australia's most famous suicide spot. But that entire stretch of
Speaker 2: cliffs is fenced and it's lined with endless CCTV cameras
Speaker 2: that have a live feed to the emergency services which
Speaker 2: the police know. And then further up the coast just
Speaker 2: next to that where the camera stop, it's still also
Speaker 2: fenced with houses overlooking that and these coastal tracks there
Speaker 2: running alongside the cliff top and and in broad daylight.
Speaker 2: Remember Katie went missing on a Saturday. It's just so
Speaker 2: highly unlikely that anyone can do something there without it
Speaker 2: being noticed almost instantly. And one of the reasons I'm
Speaker 2: told the police did initially suspect she may have gone
Speaker 2: to the gap when she was reported missing was because
Speaker 2: as they started tracking her final movements from leaving the
Speaker 2: apartment for the last time on CCTV, they did have
Speaker 2: footage of her leaving a cafe in Double Bay and
Speaker 2: she was pacing on the street near a bus stop
Speaker 2: and one of the buses from that stop. The final
Speaker 2: destination on that route is Watson's Bay, where the gap is.
Speaker 2: But there's also twenty other stops that that bus, if
Speaker 2: Katie even got on, it would stop at before it
Speaker 2: got to the final destination in Watson's Bay, at the
Speaker 2: gap where it then turns around, and jumping to the
Speaker 2: conclusion that hey, we've got footage of Katie pacing around
Speaker 2: near the bus stop in Double Bay and that bus
Speaker 2: goes to the gap. That just feels like convenient and
Speaker 2: lazy policing if I'm being honest, as is the fact
Speaker 2: that the police are just ignoring Katie's family about the
Speaker 2: man from Dubai. And yes, we all know the police
Speaker 2: are understaffed and under resource, but but to just ignore
Speaker 2: the desperation from Katie's friends and family, you know, the
Speaker 2: people that knew her best, and the people that keep
Speaker 2: saying she was not suicidal because you think you have
Speaker 2: a more compelling theory. It's just as I said, it's lazy,
Speaker 2: and it's sad, and it's frustrating.
Speaker 1: And that's why I'm going with this.
Speaker 2: That's why Katie's family want me to keep going with this,
Speaker 2: and they want you guys to keep listening, sharing and commenting,
Speaker 2: because the more pressure that comes from the public, the
Speaker 2: more the police have to take notice and stop thinking
Speaker 2: they know what happened because they don't and nobody does.