Blog No. 354 – Rogues Gallery, Adelaide 2021 – Blog Written 22 April 2026
This Blog is a collection of photos of a Rogues Gallery. As well as Margaret, my Rogues Gallery contains photos of the people my wife Margaret Redden believed were her friends for many decades before she died on 22 August 2023. In reality, none of the Rogues Gallery were Margaret’s friends.
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It is very hard to pick my favourite photo of Margaret when I love nearly every photo taken of her. This is a good shot that dates from about the time I first met her in 1998. This photo was taken many years before Margaret suffered from life threatening illness.
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This another of my favourites. Here, Marg is hugging her dad Michael James Redden. I really liked Mick.
As a final selection, this is Marg before I met her. She is on The Great Ocean Road in Victoria and the rocks called the Twelve Apostles are behind her. I think this dates from about 1995.
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This is a photo of me and Margaret in about 1999. She looks so healthy, wonderful and happy.
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I need to first explain what a Rogues Gallery is. My google search came up with this answer.
One of the characters in my Rogues Gallery – Doctor Professor Ann Ryan, Emeritus Professor at Maynooth University Republic of Ireland - has threatened me in the past with legal action for defamation. I state I am not suggesting any of the inhabitants of my Rogues Gallery are criminals. They may not be criminals – or if they are, I have no knowledge of their crimes – but I definitely do think the people I list in the Rogues Gallery set out in this Blog are “unsavoury, or undesirable”.
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Doctor Professor Ann Ryan
For most of the year Ann lives in Ireland in the town of Newbridge. Marg knew her initially because Ann was stupid and married James Michael Redden (Jim Redden). Jim Redden decided he could not stay married to Ann in 1990 and ended the marriage a few months after Margaret’s husband Keith Elphick stupidly decided he would be better off with someone other than Margaret. Ann subsequently got a Doctorate from Flinders University and went back to Ireland to live permanently. Starting as a casual employee at National University of Ireland, Maynooth (now Maynooth University), Ann benefitted greatly when the university decided it needed to get on board the gender equity train. Despite her manifest lack of professorial quality, Ann Ryan became the first female professor at Maynooth University. She stayed in that position until she retired. She now holds the grand title of Professor Emeritus. In the more than 20 years I knew her, Ann never showed the slightest indication of having the intelligence that ought to be necessary to become a professor.
Margaret simply loved Ann Ryan. This photo of the two of them together illustrates the joy she got from having Ann around.
The simple truth is that when Margaret desperately needed her friends to support her, Ann Ryan persuaded most of them that she ought to be shunned rather than supported. Right to the very end, Ann and the rest of this Rogues Gallery, pretended to be Margaret’s friend while doing their absolute best to avoid her. Margaret was dying from cancer and they wanted nothing to do with her.
Doctor Professor Ann Ryan refused to come to Margaret’s funeral. She sent a video from Ireland in which she pointedly refused to ever say the name of Margaret’s heartbroken husband: me.
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Ann flew to Australia in late November 2019 and I lent her my car – a 2016 Hyundai Elantra – free of charge. She parked the car at the unit she owned in the very desirable Adelaide beachside suburb of Glenelg. She owned the unit at Glenelg. When she became unable in February 2020 to leave Australia because of covid restrictions, she kept the car and used it continuously until February 2021 when she returned the car and told me I had become a non person and said she hoped she could still be friends with Margaret. In February 2021, Margaret was, to Ann’s knowledge, dying of cancer. That made no difference to Ann’s behaviour. Every friend Ann had in Adelaide had been introduced to her by Margaret. When I became a non person, Ann made sure that every one of Margaret’s friends she knew of, avoided Margaret and never came to her home again. Margaret died 2 ½ years later.
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When covid restrictions required most places in Adelaide to remain shut, I took Ann to Morialta Conservation Park for walks. This photo is from 2020.
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Doctor Professor Ann Ryan is definitely “unsavoury, or undesirable”.
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Susan Chapman (Nee Kinnear)
Sue Chapman was almost as close a friend of Margaret’s as Ann Ryan. Sue betrayed Margaret just as comprehensively as Ann did. In the years that I knew Margaret, I saw Ann and Sue become very close and I think it is likely they became lovers, although they never publicly displayed signs they were lovers. Sue’s husband was totally and permanently disabled so he was not around. Given that Ann thought any idea coming from the left of politics should be adopted immediately, having a love affair with Sue would not have been on her list of forbidden activities. If Ann and Sue were not actually lovers, I am certain that Sue always did anything that Ann suggested was a good idea. This is in my opinion, the reason why she acted so quickly to turn me and Margaret into non persons.
This photo shows our wedding guests in Killashee House, County Kildare, Ireland on 30 July 2009. Sue Chapman is on the far right as you look at the photo. She flew to Ireland to attend our wedding. Going from the left, the photo shows Ann Ryan, Heather Long, Margaret and me. In the months before our wedding, Margaret had been continuously at death’s door. I loved marrying her because I could see the immediate improvement in her health.
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Another wedding photo from 30 July 2009 - Heather Long, Margaret and Sue Chapman.
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Susan Chapman is definitely “unsavoury, or undesirable”.
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Heather Long
Margaret knew Heather from when they were both in their 20s. Heather had qualified as a primary school teacher at the Wattle Park Teachers’ College in Adelaide. The Wattle Park Teachers’ College was shut decades ago and the land sold for development as a retirement village. Turning the land officially into a retirement village did not dramatically change the nature of the activities carried out there. Heather is definitely not the brightest bear in the forest, but her heart was usually in the right place. Heather spent the whole of her working life working for the State of South Australia in primary schools. Heather is married to Andrew Long and Margaret had a low opinion of Andrew. She told me Heather would probably divorce Andrew once their daughter had grown up. That did not happen, but as I have already said, Heather was never the brightest bear in the forest.
Heather joined the Cancellation Crew but seemed unsure whether or not she ought to be a part of it. When I was desperately ill in hospital in May 2021, Heather rang me. She seemed embarrassed to be talking to me. By that stage, the cancellation was only 3 months old so perhaps she had not yet completely learned that she was supposed to treat me as a complete pariah. She was a quick learner though and I never heard from her again.
Heather at our wedding on 30 July 2009 in County Kildare. She flew from Australia to come to our wedding.
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Heather Long is definitely “unsavoury, or undesirable”.
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Cheryl Scopazzi
Margaret thought Cheryl Scopazzi was wonderful. Cheryl came from Port Augusta and was a former trade union employee. Because of ill health, she had not worked for many years when Margaret was diagnosed with cancer. Out of the gang of friends that Margaret thought she had, Cheryl was the only one who still came to our house after Ann Ryan poured poison into the ears of her friends. At the time, I thought this was because she had some genuine principles, but I had forgotten that trade union employees rarely know how to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth. Cheryl was indeed a fluent and convincing liar. A few scant weeks after the funeral, Cheryl asked me for a loan of $1,000.00 and I immediately transferred her the money. I am still waiting for repayment of my money. In late January 2024, Cheryl decided she no longer had to keep up the pretence of still being friends with me and Margaret despite whatever lies she had been told by Ann Ryan.
That was when Cheryl decided to cease all communication with me. It was late February 2024 before I realised that Cheryl had joined the Cancellation Crew too.
I now think Cheryl was the Designated Friend. Her job was to still visit Margaret so she could report back to the other members of the Cancellation Crew on how bad Margaret’s health had become. Once Margaret was dead, it became unnecessary to maintain the fiction that she was not a Cancellation Crew member.
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Cheryl Scopazzi is on the far right as you look at the photo. Going from the left, the photo shows Margaret, Jim Redden, me, Maurine Redden and Jameson Henderson-Redden.
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Cheryl Scopazzi is definitely “unsavoury, or undesirable”.
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James Michel Redden (Jim Redden)
Jim Redden is Margaret’s brother and Margaret treated him with contempt. I used to wonder why she was so brutal with him until 23 November 2023 when Margaret had been dead a mere 2 months.
I now believe Margaret treated her brother with contempt because he is, in no particular order:
An idiot who has never had an original idea in his life.
A greedy idiot who has no idea how to manage the money he does make.
A lying idiot who told my dinner guests on 23 November 2023 that I had given permission for the guests to rifle through and take whatever they wanted from Margaret’s clothes and jewellery.
A lying thieving idiot who I am certain stole on 23 November 2023, all of the more valuable items of Margaret’s jewellery – at a replacement cost of about $55,000.00.
A lying thieving idiot who tried to strong arm me into giving him some of Margaret’s superannuation money when he was my invited guest for dinner on 23 November 2023.
Shortly after I threw Jim Redden out of my home on 23 November 2023, I started getting junk emails from Centennial Park Cemetery asking me to spend money on Margaret’s afterlife at Centennial Park and I also started getting junk emails from a number of organisations that only Jim Redden would even know existed. I was blessed by Jim Redden refusing to have anything to do with the administration of Margaret’s estate and especially by his refusal to have anything to do with the estate bank account. Jim Redden was named as an Executor but was interested only in how much money he could get out of Margaret’s death.
Margaret, Mick Redden, Maurine Redden and Jim Redden. Jim Redden really is as big an idiot as he looks in this photo.
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Jim Redden is definitely “unsavoury, or undesirable”.
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Maurine Caroline Redden
Maurine is Margaret’s sister. Out of the whole Cancellation Crew, Maurine is the only one I have any sympathy for – but I long ago ran out of patience with Maurine. Maurine is a registered nurse and a lovely human being – but is exceptionally weak and able to be controlled by others.
I spent multiple Sundays correcting the atrocious grammar in Maurine’s Doctorate thesis. Maurine is intelligent but has no idea what is needed to constitute a sentence. Out of the whole Cancellation Crew, Maurine especially knew how much I adored Margaret. She knew how devastated I was by her death. But she nevertheless joined the Cancellation Crew on 23 November 2023 and has made a point of never making any contact since then. I presume she has convinced herself that her idiot brother Jim could not possibly be a thief. How does someone who can write a thesis that results in the award of a doctorate ever manage to be so stupid? What happened Maurine? How did you manage to forget all that I did for you – stuff your idiot brother never even thought of trying to do?
Maurine and Margaret Redden, date unknown but probably late 1990s.
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Maurine Redden is not “unsavoury, or undesirable” but she has easily earned her place in this Rogues Gallery.
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Christopher Reilly
Out of the whole Cancellation Crew, Chris Reilly is the one that really managed to hurt me almost as much as Doctor Professor Ann Ryan.
Chris was married to one of the most wonderful human beings I have ever known – Susan Lea Marshall. Sue Marshall died of cancer on 7 October 2003. We visited Sue and Chris on 6 October and as we left, I told Margaret that her friend Sue had been saying goodbye. Chris Reilly rang us at about 3.00 am on the day Sue died and we immediately went to his home to comfort him.
Out of the whole Cancellation Crew, Chris Reilly, of all people, knew exactly what it was like to lose his wife because of cancer. He knew what it was like to watch his wife slowly die from an unstoppable disease. And yet Chris Reilly joined the Cancellation Crew at the earliest opportunity.
I hope you feel embarrassed Chris Reilly. I hope you need pills to help you sleep at night.
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Christopher Reilly is definitely “unsavoury, or undesirable”.
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Photo of Most of the Rogues Gallery
There is only one true member of the Rogues Gallery that is missing from this group photo taken a few weeks before cancer killed Sue Marshall. Doctor Professor Ann Ryan was back in Ireland when this photo was taken.
Sue Chapman, Sue Marshall, Andrew Long, Chris Reilly, Heather Long, Margaret and me in 20023 about 4 weeks before Sue died.
Sue Marshall was worth at least 50 of the members I have included in this Rogues Gallery. She was so smart and so compassionate. I cannot even begin to say that about my Rogues Gallery members.
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