The haunting finals words of fraudster Melissa Caddick

As federal police and ASIC investigators filed out of Melissa Caddick’s palatial Dover Heights mansion on a fateful Wednesday evening in November 2020, they captured the haunting final recorded words of the fraudster.

For nearly two years, the 49-year-old’s photo has been splashed across news stories and television screens but rarely has her voice been heard.

Mystery has shrouded her disappearance, which came just hours after the AFP and ASIC raided her home, which doubled as the premises for her financial services business Maliver.

The corporate regulator estimates she ripped off between $20m and $30m from investors via a Ponzi scheme and when it was uncovered, she vanished.

This month, a coronial inquest has examined her final movements, the police investigation, theories about her fate and what the inquest heard was described by one police officer as the “extremely strange and unusual behaviour” of her husband Anthony Koletti.

While many questions have been answered, some still linger.

CADDICK’S LAST KNOWN WORDS

Among a trove of documents and files released by the NSW Coroner’s Court was an audio recording made by the AFP on the evening of the raid on Ms Caddick’s home on November 11, 2020.

During the recording, AFP Constable Amelia Griffen asks Ms Caddick a series of simple questions about the raid and the items which have been seized.

The recording was made at 6.18pm - with investigators having poured over the four-storey home for the last 12 hours.

Ms Caddick answers “yes” and “no” in hushed tones.

But they also provided an important insight into Ms Caddick’s thinking after her house of cards came tumbling down around her.

“Do you have any comment about the way the search warrant was conducted?” Constable Griffen asks.

“No,” Ms Caddick replies.

“Before we leave the premises, is there anything further you wish to say?” Constable Griffen asks, giving her the chance to make a comment about the raid.

“No,” Ms Caddick again says.

While the conversation appears unassuming, it played a key role in the inquest, during which the court was told that Ms Caddick’s family and Mr Koletti had made unfounded statements and blamed ASIC for her death.

The last time Melissa Caddick's voice was captured on tape revealed in audio recording revealed during the inquest into her suspected death.

“NEGLIGENCE, CRUELTY AND INHUMANITY”

During the inquest, the court heard that Ms Caddick’s mother Barbara Grimley had pointed the finger at ASIC and blamed her for her daughter’s death.

“Ms Caddick’s mother says that they were not offered food or drink for the full duration of the search warrant, and holds ASIC responsible for her suspected death,” Counsel assisting Jason Downing said.

However claims made against ASIC were categorically denied and, the inquest heard, contradicted by other evidence.

Ms Caddick’s brother, Adam Grimley, confronted ASIC investigator Isabella Allen in June 2021 during which he said: “How do you feel being responsible for Melissa’s death?”

Similar claims have been repeated by Mr Koletti, a 40-year-old part-time DJ and hairdresser, who told the court of the raid: “I saw it as torture.”

In his music, released under the name “Paws Off”, he in one track claimed: “Just waiting for a coroner’s report to tell me something that I already know, my wife died as the direct result of an ASIC investigation.”

In the same track, he also claims that Ms Caddick was given no food or water during the raid.

In a statement he made last year, Mr Koletti claimed: “I believe (Ms Caddick) died as a direct result of ASIC’s negligence, cruelty and inhumanity.”

However, under cross examination, Mr Koletti was forced to walk back on many of his claims.

The court heard that she had a smoothie while she spoke to investigators, was offered muesli bars by officers, she smoked in her backyard and even took a nap in the afternoon.

And by his own admission, Mr Koletti said he made Ms Caddick several cups of coffee and was allowed to roam freely around her house.

“We weren’t denied anything,” Mr Koletti said.

When played the audio recording of Ms Caddick’s conversation with Constable Griffen, Mr Koletti acknowledged that his wife made no complaint about the conduct of the officers that day.

During his testimony, Mr Koletti admitted that he had since learned the breadth of the fraud perpetrated by his wife.

As well, when asked about the conduct of Ms Allen during the raid, he said he accepted she acted in a “professional and distant manner”.

30 HOURS

Large parts of the inquest centred on the contradictory and inconsistent statements made by Mr Koletti to police in the days after Ms Caddick went missing.

Ms Caddick was heard walking out the front door of her home - sometime between 5.30am and 6am - on the morning of November 12, 2020.

However, it took Mr Koletti until 11.45am on November 12 - a full 30 hours after she was last seen - to report her missing.

She did not take her phone, keys or wallet and a CCTV canvas of the area proved unfruitful.

He told the court that he believed he had to wait 24 hours to report someone missing.

NSW Police Sergeant Trent Riley said in his evidence that he found it “extremely strange and unusual” that Mr Koletti had initially told police he did not want them to come around to his house or to go to the station to make a statement.

As well, he gave officers conflicting information about what time he last saw her.

Bodyworn camera footage played during the inquest showed Sergeant Riley attending the Caddick residence and telling Mr Koletti he was “worried” that he had told him he last saw Ms Caddick at 5.30am, but told his offsider it was midnight.

Melissa Caddick's husband speaks to police after they held concerns about his early statements.

AN HONEST OPINION

Mr Koletti says that on November 12, after his wife failed to return home, he sent her a series of text message about 7.16am.

“U ok?” he said in one before asking “Have you got your key”.

But he soon found her phone plugged in inside their walk-in closet.

He left a post-it note on her phone, along with a present of earrings, saying: “Melissa I no (sic) our love is deeper than pocesssions (sic).

“Thought you may like one of your Christmas (sic) early. All my love.”

During the day, he cruised around their neighbourhood trying to find her.

In the evening, he phoned several of her family and friends - but didn’t tell any of them that by that stage she had been missing for 12 hours.

One of those calls was to Scott Little, one of Ms Caddick’s good friends.

During the call, instead of informing Mr Little that he hadn’t seen his wife all day, Mr Koletti told him that she was asleep in their bed.

Mr Koletti was later quizzed by Detective Sergeant Michael Kyneur about his call with Mr Little.

“I’ve called Scott on the Thursday night,” Mr Koletti explained.

“I’ve told him she’s asleep, just so he didn’t think that I thought anything suspicious, because I wanted an honest opinion from him about whether she was with him or not.”

Sergeant Kyneur responds: “You’ve lost me there.”

When Sergeant Kyneur asked him why he didn’t just ask Mr Little whether he had seen Ms Caddick, Mr Koletti said: “I didn’t want them to worry at that point number one, number two I wanted an honest opinion.

“But you weren’t honest yourself,” Detective Kyneur responds.

“Exactly,” Mr Koletti said.

During his testimony, Mr Koletti described the first couple of days after his wife went missing as “hazy” and accepted that his inconsistent statements to police made it difficult for them to clarify key events.

Melissa Caddick's husband Anthony Koletti explains why he didn't tell friends that she was missing.

“IS SHE NOT THERE?”

On the morning of Friday, November 13, 2020, Ms Caddick was due to make her first appearance in the Federal Court to answer the charges laid by ASIC.

At 9.30am, Mr Koletti logged onto the court’s audiovisual link on Ms Caddick’s phone.

“Melissa Caddick is my wife,” he told the court.

“Is she not there?”

When Justice Jayne Jagot told him that Ms Caddick had failed to make an appearance, Mr Koletti said he began to become worried.

“That was the straw that broke the camel’s back,” Mr Koletti told the inquest.

He phoned Ms Allen and Constable Griffen, before finally phoning police.

WHAT HAPPENED TO MELISSA?

Initially, police investigated the possibility that Ms Caddick went on the run and Mr Koletti delayed reporting her missing to give her a head start.

It’s a claim he denied in his testimony.

“Did you delay reporting her missing until that point in order to give her time to try to go somewhere?” Counsel assisting Jason Downing asked.

“No,” Mr Koletti said.

Police also said there was no sign of a struggle at their Dover Height residence and ruled out the theory that Mr Koletti had harmed her.

Ms Caddick is suspected to be dead after a foot, which was DNA matched to her, washed up inside a running shoe on Bournda Beach on the NSW south coast in February 2021.

Oceanographer Dr David Griffin told the inquest that it was possible the foot floated along the NSW Coast for three months before washing ashore.

In a report provided to the court, forensic psychiatrist Dr Kerri Eagle said that Ms Caddick likely suffered narcissistic personality disorder and was “preoccupied with fantasies” of wealth, success and power.

Dr Eagle explained that her self esteem was reliant on the admiration of others and she had an “excessive need for approval”.

“Ms Caddick was potentially susceptible to intense shame in circumstances of perceived failure and disappointment by others, due to her personality structure,” Dr Eagle said.

“The ASIC investigation would have ultimately been a public and personal humiliation, costing her friendships, damaging her family relationships and destroying her existing lifestyle.

“Given that she appeared to largely measure her self worth through the perceptions of others, this would have resulted in a significant narcissistic injury to her self esteem and potentially caused a catastrophic level of shame and despair.”

Dr Eagle said that people with narcissistic personality disorder are at risk of suicide without warning.

“If Ms Caddick did end her life, the decision may have been impulsive, influenced by feelings of intense shame and despair arising from the circumstances,” Dr Eagles said.

The inquest into Ms Caddick’s disappearance will conclude with a final two days of hearings in November.

Mental health support