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Against the dark backdrop of his model mother’s mysterious disappearance and his father’s murder suspicion, Kim Ramchen forged a path of redemption by achieving a perfect VCE score.
It put the then-17-year-old in the headlines for the right reasons, years after his family name was in the public spotlight over the high-profile disappearance of his TV model mother, Jacqui Ramchen.
Kim was only four when his mother vanished; his father, Slavik Ramchen, was suspected of having a hand in his wife’s disappearance, but died in 2002 from pancreatic cancer after the charges against him were withdrawn.
Jacqui Ramchen.
Kim dedicated the result to his parents and said he hoped to go on and study science and engineering.
However, two decades later, the Ramchen name is back before the courts.
Kim, an IT teacher at Keysborough Secondary College in Melbourne’s south-eastern suburbs, stands accused of stabbing principal Aaron Sykes.
The family’s tragic tale began in 1992, when former model Jacqueline Ramchen vanished in suspicious circumstances.
Jacqueline was a host for popular television game show The Price is Right and worked as a model.
Her husband and Kim’s father, Slavik, was charged with murder in 2002, even though Jacqueline’s body was never found.
Former “The Price is Right” model Jacqui Ramchen, right. who went missing on April 10, 1992, pictured during her game show days in the 1970s.Credit: TV Week
The court heard Jacqueline told friends she could voluntarily “disappear without [a] trace and never be heard from again”.
The millionaire engineer strenuously denied any involvement in her disappearance and death, the case against him collapsing in 2002 because of insufficient evidence.
The magistrate found that if the prosecution’s case was judged on the balance of probabilities, Jacqueline could be presumed dead, but not on the criminal standard requiring proof beyond reasonable doubt.
Kim Ramchen
Kim supported his father, nursing him as he died.
In 2005, the Herald Sun reported that Kim had overcome the twin tragedies to achieve a perfect ENTER score of 99.95.
“Somehow I pulled it off in the end,” Kim, who attended Melbourne Grammar, said at the time.
“I was surprised, I was confident I’d get a reasonably good score, but I didn’t think it would be this high.”
On Tuesday, Kim allegedly stabbed his school principal following an altercation at the Acacia campus about 3pm.
Sykes was taken to hospital after the violent incident, which forced some students to hide under desks.
Kim, a computer and digital studies teacher at the school, was arrested at the scene.
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