Supt Bray said the deception extended to tricking Ms Pearce-Stevenson’s mother Colleen – who died in 2012 – to deposit money into her account.
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Today, the shocking double murder took a new twist with detectives from the NSW and South Australian investigating task forces revealing Karlie Pearce-Stevenson’s bank account was accessed on more than 1200 occasions between November 2008 until March 2012 from locations in South Australia, Northern Territory and the ACT.
In June 2010 a woman in a wheelchair updated Ms Pearce-Stevenson’s banking records at the Australian Central Credit Union at Elizabeth in Adelaide.
People involved in the murder of Karlie Pearce-Stevenson texted her family from her mobile phone to reassure them she was OK years after she and her toddler daughter Khandalyce disappeared, police have said.
Ms Pearce-Stevenson’s family lodge missing persons report for the mother and daughter with Northern Territory Police.
“People we believe may be the offenders and others have taken over Karlie’s identity, her telephone, her bank accounts, her Centrelink and family payments”, DS Bray said.
Detective Superintendent Bray said it appeared Karlie’s phone was kept active until 2011 and used to provide proof of life to concerned family members as well as elicit money from them.
The three people are believed to have lived at, or been associated with, homes in Davoren Park, Hillbank, Holden Hill and Charnwood in Canberra.
Police believe the woman could have been killed in another location and dumped in the forest, south of Sydney, anywhere from six months up to 10 years prior to the gruesome discovery.
Police at the scene of where Ms Pearce-Stevenson’s remains were found in Belanglo State Forest in 2010.
ABC journalist Andrew McGarry, who covered the Snowtown murders extensively and wrote a book on them, said similar frauds were committed in those cases. “From time to time the message bank on Karlie’s phone was accessed”, Det Supt Bray said.
Bray said police were still investigating whether the fraudsters were also involved in the murders.
“The last recorded sighting is now confirmed as being in Charnwood in Canberra”, he said.
Ms Pearce-Stevenson, 20, left her hometown of Alice Springs to find work, taking her daughter Khandalyce, then two-years-old, with her.
“The focus of the financial investigation is around determining the role of those people that were involved in those frauds and to see whether they were involved before the deaths, during the deaths or after the deaths”.
Police used DNA testing to match the pair, revealing their horrific discovery last Wednesday.
Det Supt Bray said there was no solid evidence to suggest a serial killer was responsible for the pair’s deaths, however given the brutal nature of the crimes he it was something he would “keep in the back of your mind”.
Karlie’s mother died in 2012.
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The remains of her daughter, Khandalyce, were found 1100km away in a suitcase by the side of the road on the outskirts of Wynarka, South Australia, in July.
