Once worth more than $100 million, Mr Medich, 69, was overheard complaining last week that he had only $1000 left in the bank.

On Thursday, just short of three weeks of deliberations, the jury informed the judge they were unable to reach a unanimous verdict on whether Mr Medich was the mastermind behind the 2009 murder of his business foe Michael McGurk.

Wild shouts could be heard from the jury room after they were formally discharged by the judge. Whether it was from rage or relief was not discernible.

Meanwhile, Mr Medich sat stony-faced in the dock while his daughter Pamela wept.

After eight weeks of evidence and three of deliberations, Mr Medich was back to square one. The $1.8 million he'd spent on his defence - a senior counsel, Winston Terracini, two junior barristers and two solicitors - was gone and he now faces the prospect of funding a new trial.

With his claims of near destitution, where has all the money gone?

In May 2016 Mr Medich tried, unsuccessfully, to have his murder trial postponed because he told the court he had no money.

However, court documents revealed that he had been given $2.9 million in September 2014, but by October the following year, he had gone through the lot. The money had been released from the $37 million sale of his and ex-wife Odettas's waterfront mansion in Point Piper.

But the rest of their joint assets, worth an estimated $80 million, had been frozen while the pair battled in the Family Court.

It is understood those matters have still not been resolved.

Documents presented to court last year showed that Mr Medich had frittered away the $2.9 million on fine dining, massage parlours, paying his son Peter $120,000 a year to be his personal assistant, leasing a $160,000 BMW and paying one lawyer $180,000 to liaise with his other lawyers.

Grilled about his daily lunch bills, some of which came to almost $700, Crown prosecutor Gina O'Rourke asked: "Haven't you ever considered eating in, Mr Medich, cooking a steak, having a salad?"

Mr Medich replied that because he used to have chef, he had never learnt to cook, so he was forced to eat out.

The court heard he'd also spent in excess of $33,000 on a luxury holiday to Hayman Island.

Mr Medich blamed his financial situation on his estranged wife Odetta, who he claimed would not give him "one red cent".

On that occasion Justice Geoff Bellew dismissed Mr Medich's application for a stay on the grounds he had no money, but as it transpired the trial was delayed anyway owing to revelations that the Crown's star witness Lucky Gattellari had allegedly attempted to extort $15 million from Mr Medich in order to change his evidence.

Gattellari had been Mr Medich's closest associate until he was arrested and charged in October 2010 over the McGurk murder.

He immediately got word to Mr Medich seeking $1 million for bail and legal fees.

Mr Medich, who had previously ploughed $16 million into Gattellari's struggling electrical companies with no security and no documentation, refused Gattellari's request.

His once close friend had a message delivered to Mr Medich's son Peter saying: "If that's the case he can pack his bag, too."

Gattellari rolled over and began co-operating with the police. A fortnight later, Mr Medich was arrested and charged with soliciting the murder of McGurk.

Some of Ron Medich's expenditures in 2015. Photo: Supplied

But the rich property tycoon spent just six weeks in jail before being released just before Christmas in 2010 with his younger brother Roy putting up $1 million for his bail.

In granting him bail, Justice David Price gave "little weight" to Mr Medich's "need to have regular contact with his stockbroker" but he did note that Mr Medich was in custody in segregation and that his "trial might not start until 2012".

In fact, Mr Medich's trial did not start until five years later, and when it did he was allowed to deposit $1.8 million into his solicitor's trust account to pay for his trial.

In refusing Mr Medich's request last May seeking an order that his trial be delayed because he had no money, Justice Bellew said that Mr Medich had "failed (or refused) to consider how he proposed to fund his defence ... and rather decided quite deliberately to spend his money as though it came from a bottomless pit.

"This is an affront to the community and to the family of the deceased who have been waiting nearly seven years for the resolution of this matter," said the judge in May 2016.

It now appears that it will be even longer until Mr Medich's guilt or innocence is established, but hopefully by then his assets will be unfrozen by the Family Court, allowing him to fight another day.