Joanne Ratcliffe (born 1962) aged 11 and Kirste Jane Gordon (born 1968) aged 4 were two Australian girls who disappeared during an Australian rules football match at the Adelaide Oval on 25 August 1973. Their disappearance, believed to be an a*duction and m*rder, became one of the most well-known crimes in South Australia. The police and media suspect a connection between their presumed m*rders and the disappearance of the Beaumont children in 1966. This case is often referred to as the Adelaide Oval a*ductions.
Joanne Ratcliffe attended a football game with her parents, Les and Kathleen Ratcliffe, her older brother, and a family friend named “Frank.” Kirste Gordon was there with her grandmother while her parents visited friends in Renmark with their younger daughter. The two families sat together in the Sir Edwin Smith Stand.
The parents and grandmother, who were friends, allowed Joanne and Kirste to go to the restroom together twice during the day. The Ratcliffe family had a rule that the children couldn’t use the restroom during breaks in the game or during the last quarter. Around 3:45 p.m., the girls left for the restroom, and the Ratcliffe family started searching around 4:00 p.m. After an unsuccessful initial search, Kathleen Ratcliffe was able to make an announcement on the loudspeaker after the game ended around 5:00 p.m. The girls were officially reported missing to the police at 5:12 p.m.
Investigation
After leaving their families, Ratcliffe and Gordon were seen multiple times within 90 minutes. Witnesses spotted them trying to attract a stray cat, being in the company of other children, and later appearing distressed with an unknown man carrying Gordon. These witnesses, unaware of the kidn*pping, assumed the man was a parent with his children. The last reported sighting of the girls was on a bridge near the Adelaide Zoo, but another witness claimed to have seen them between North Adelaide railway station and Port Road, Thebarton. Despite extensive searches, a $5,000 reward, and significant media attention, the kidn*pping became a cold case.
In 1979, Ratcliffe’s father testified in the Coroners Court of Queensland. He stated that his daughter had visited the oval many times, would not have willingly left, and knew how to use a telephone to call for help. He also mentioned that Joanne had not met Kirste or her parents before that day.
On the fortieth anniversary of the case, Ratcliffe’s sister, Suzie Wilkinson, expressed a desire for further investigations. She questioned why certain evidence had been dismissed and why certain leads were not pursued. She emphasized that to her family, the case represented 40 years of not being able to see Joanne grow up and the absence of a daughter, sister, and aunt.
In 2014, the South Australian government offered a $1 million reward in hopes of generating new information about the case.
Suspect
Several suspects in the Beaumont children’s disappearance are also considered suspects in this case, including Bevan Spencer von Einem and Derek Percy, known child k*llers. Witness testimonies led the police to believe that the girls were a*ducted by a middle-aged man. The police sketch of the man seen with the girls bears resemblance to the sketch of the man last seen with the Beaumont children.
Arthur Stanley Brown, who closely resembled the identical picture of the suspect in both cases, is considered a suspect. A witness reported seeing a man near the oval carrying a young girl, followed by another distressed older girl. The witness first saw him for a brief moment at the age of 14 and later identified him on television 25 years later in December 1998.
Stanley Arthur Hart is another potential suspect. Properties previously owned by Hart were investigated, as he rarely missed a North Adelaide match. A decade after the a*duction, he was found to be a child ab*ser.
In 2013, Joanne Ratcliffe’s sister, Suzie Wilkinson, urged authorities to investigate the role of a family friend named “Frank” in the girls’ disappearance. Frank had accompanied the families to the oval on the day of the a*duction but may not have been thoroughly questioned by the police. It is alleged that Frank had intimate knowledge of the girls’ routine during football matches. According to Kathleen Ratcliffe, Frank left his seat for around 30 minutes before the girls went missing but later remained seated and did not participate in the search efforts. Gordon’s grandmother also noticed Frank’s behavior during the search, stating that “the other man stayed in his seat.” Wilkinson expressed her hope that authorities would actively continue working on her sister’s case.
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