Walter Finch
A GERMAN couple who went missing in Catalunya this summer appeared to go on a massive fire sale of everything they owned just days before they vanished.
Ralf Buchholz and Petra Gehde, both 53, have not been heard from since July 19, when their grey VW campervan was discovered abandoned in a crime-ridden neighbourhood of Barcelona.
According to neighbours, a red Volkswagen van then disappeared from outside their house in Hamburg the following day on July 20.
Neighbours also started to notice that furniture had disappeared from the rented house on or around July 26, while the whereabouts of a large black lorry the couple bought shortly before their disappearance is unknown.
Meanwhile, a BMW that they also owned also disappeared sometime before they did.
“It seems like they sold these things before they disappeared, or cancelled the rental contracts on them,” a source close to the case told the Olive Press.
“They were looking to get their hands on cash by any means possible, we suspect, by selling everything they owned and even things that weren’t theirs.”
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Fears have been growing for the couple since they checked out of a hotel in La Jonquera, a small town near the French border, on the same day as they disappeared.
Reports have suggested that they were staying with a third person, who also checked out at the same time.
A grey Volkswagen van belonging to Ralf and Petra was discovered unlocked and abandoned in a street in the troubled La Mina neighbourhood, in Sant Adria de Besos, on the same day.
Police removed it, but not before finding suitcases, medication, documentation – including at least Petra’s passport – and a pet dog and cat.
Family members of Petra have said that she would ‘never abandon her pets.’
However, no missing person report was ever made until the president of a local shelter that took in the animals managed to track down Petra’s children.
The unmarried couple, who have been together eight years, told employees of the fruit and transportation companies that they manage that they were going off for a few days to ‘disconnect’ amid rumours that the companies were struggling financially.
But now those with knowledge of the case believe that the couple might have had debt problems which drove them to set off on their journey to Spain in July.
They had last communicated with employees via text message on July 16, and Ralf had contacted them again on July 17 from an unknown number.
The children made a missing persons report in Germany, while another one was made in Catalunya on August 29, sparking an international investigation into Ralf and Petra’s disappearance.
Petra is described as 1.68m (5ft 6), thin, sporting dark blond hair with highlights, and a wrist tattoo, while Ralf is 1.67m (5ft 5), has a normal build, brown hair with some white, and is diabetic.
