The Swedish tour operator had a question for the man wanting to travel to North Korea. In his application, he’d listed his age as 23 and his occupation as retired. Surely, one of these must be a mistake.
“No mistake there,’’ came the reply via an email from Thailand. “I have enough money to retire at this stage, perhaps for ever or at least for a very long time.’’
That was five years ago.
In the mind of Brenton Tarrant, Australia’s worst mass murderer, a loose plan was already forming. It didn’t involve having to work.
In 2010, Tarrant’s father killed himself after he was diagnosed with mesothelioma. He wasn’t a wealthy man; he’d worked in waste disposal at Grafton in northern NSW. But through his estate, 19-year-old Brenton received a considerable sum.
Writing under a pseudonym on an online forum, Tarrant suggested he had inherited about $500,000. It was enough to open possibilities and create a new problem.
“In my piss-ant town, you are the next Bill Gates if you have half a million in liquid assets,’’ he explained on the investor forum in May 2011. “Thus why no one must ever know I’m not a broke personal trainer living with my mother.’’
Tarrant was a young man with means, but he couldn’t tell even the few friends he had. In the real word, his unexpected wealth pushed him into isolation. The only people he trusted were those he found online, under assumed names and avatars. His true friends were anonymous.
There are two investigations being conducted in parallel by law enforcement and intelligence agencies into the radicalisation of Tarrant. Both are global in nature.
Read the article by Chip Le Grand, Mark Schliebs in The Australian.