Police Commissioner said Beaumont case is ‘more difficult’ to solve as time goes on

SA’s top cop has said the Beaumont case is “more difficult” to solve as time goes on, however the missing children case is still open.

The disappearance of the Beaumont children is arguably one of South Australia’s most enduring mysterious and 57 years later the case is still open.

Police Commissioner Grant Stevens said on Wednesday the likelihood of the police solving the case of the missing children was “more difficult” as time goes on.

“Every year that goes past I think there is less likelihood of successfully resolving the Beaumont case,” he said.

WITHOUT A TRACE: THE FINAL HOURS OF THE BEAUMONT CHILDREN

“It’s over 50 years now and the reality is that the quality of forensic evidence that was collected at that time when the children went missing, the memory of witnesses, witnesses having passed away, all of these factors contribute to greater difficulties in resolving this particular sort of investigation.

“It’s still speculation as to whether the children may or may not be alive.”

Despite this Mr Stevens said the case is still open and police will “assess any further information that is brought” to them.

“There is a genuine desire to resolve the case but … it becomes more difficult with the passage of time,” he said.

Inside the lives of the Beaumont children

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His comments come after a call for a memorial to remember the tragic disappearance.

However there will be no memorial for the missing Beaumont children because the parents “never asked” for one.

Holdfast Bay Mayor Amanda Wilson said she knows “that Jim and Nancy did not want to talk about it and never asked for a memorial” for the children who disappeared at Glenelg Beach 57 years ago.

Fresh talk of a memorial surfaced this week with news of the death of the children’s father Grant Beaumont, aged 97.

Grant, known as Jim, and Nancy Beaumont, who separated in the 1970s, were the parents of Jane, 9, Arnna, 7, and Grant, 4, who disappeared from Glenelg on Australia Day in 1966.

“The ongoing trauma of this event is still felt by many Glenelg residents,” Ms Wilson told The Advertiser.

“The parents never asked for one and so there will not be a memorial at Glenelg.”

The Holdfast Bay Mayor said “the entire family is remembered here in our hearts”.

Jim Beaumont with his children Grant, Jane and Arnna.

While there has been no formal proposal for a memorial at Glenelg, the idea had come up again this week and Premier Peter Malinauskas said the idea was a “thoughtful suggestion”.

“We would be willing to turn our minds to that, naturally we would engage with the local council,” he said.

Mr Beaumont's death follows that of his former wife Nancy who died in September 2019 at the age of 92.

Mr Jim Beaumont died in early April aged 97, never knowing what happened to his three children.

Grant ‘Jim’ and Nancy Beaumont.

Tear sheet from Adelaide newspaper "The News" dated 27 Jan 1966.

The last confirmed sighting of the children was at 3pm on January 26, 1966, three hours after they were due home, walking alone on Jetty Rd.

Witnesses claim to have seen the children leave the beach with a tall, blond-haired man.

To this day the children have never been found, nor have their bodies, despite many searches, including one in February 2018.

There have been many unproven claims made about the children.

A psychic named Gerard Croiset even predicted the children were buried under a warehouse however that was proved wrong.

In 2013 and again in 2018, police conducted a dig at the New Castalloy factory in North Plympton in the hope of finding the children’s bones.

In 2013, two men told police that they had been asked to dig a large hole at the Castalloy factory at the behest of businessman Harry Phipps, only days after the children disappeared.

School photo of Arnna Beaumont.

School photo of Jane Beaumont.

(L-r) Arnna, Grant and Jane Beaumont.

Convicted murderer Bevan Spencer von Einem was accused of killing the Beaumont children, among others, by a witness, named Mr B, in his trial for the murder of Alan Arthur Barnes.

Mr B claimed that von Einem had told him he had taken the three Beaumont children in 1966 and performed “brilliant surgery” and “connected them together” but one of the children had died and at least one body had been later dumped at Moana or Myponga south of Adelaide.

Mr B’s claims had no evidence.

Police have investigated a variety of leads however the case still has not been solved.

Police mugshot of convicted murder Bevan Spencer von Einem, Nov 1983. On Einem was found guilty of the murder of Richard Dallas Kelvin, 15. Richard was abducted from a laneway off Ward Street, North Adelaide, on June 5 1983 and his body was found at Kersbrook on July 24 that same year.

Bevan Spencer von Einem at the 1971 inquest into George Duncan’s death. Picture: Supplied

Police cadets and members of the police emergency operations group searched sandhills at North Glenelg and West Beach for the fourth time days after the disappearance of the Beaumont children. Senior Constable B. Higgs directing the search at West Beach.

There was a previous call for a memorial in 2018 after former Mitcham resident Rupert Godwin pushed for a monument to be erected in Glenelg’s Colley Reserve.

He was a child in Adelaide at the time of the disappearance and was moved by the case.

“For the people of that era, it changed their existence,” the former Blackwood High student told The Advertiser at the time.