R v REID [2005] NSWSC 230

New South Wales Supreme Court

CITATION : R v REID [2005] NSWSC 230

HEARING DATE(S) : 1/11/04; 3/11/04; 12/11/04

JUDGMENT DATE : 1 April 2005

JUDGMENT OF : Hulme J at 1

DECISION : Imprisonment for a non-parole period of 17 years to date from 23 May 2003 and a balance of sentence of 5 years and 6 months to commence on 23 May 2020. I specify as the date upon which he will become eligible for release on parole to be 23 May 2020.

Regina PARTIES : Craig Anthony Reid

FILE NUMBER(S) : SC 70083/03

Crown: M Hobart COUNSEL : Prisoner: D Dalton

S Kavanagh SOLICITORS : SE O'Connor

LOWER COURT JURISDICTION :

- 31 - IN THE SUPREME COURT OF NEW SOUTH WALES CRIMINAL DIVISION No: 70083/03 HULME J 1 April 2005 R v Craig Anthony REID

SENTENCE 1 HULME J: On 5 July 2004 the abovenamed pleaded guilty to a charge that on or about 7 August 2002 at Lavington in the State of New South Wales he did murder Samantha Meredith. He was convicted, he applied for me to disqualify myself because I had sentenced one Sharon Ward for being an accessory after the fact to the murder and in those proceedings had made findings about her and, at least implicitly, him. I reserved my decision to consider some additional documentation and the Prisoner's matter adjourned. On 23 July 2004 I rejected the disqualification application (and another made that day) and most of the documents relied on by the Crown were then tendered. On 25 August 2004 the Court of Criminal Appeal rejected an appeal from my refusal to disqualify myself – see R v Reid [2004] NSWCCA 301 - and on Monday 1 November the sentencing proceedings resumed. Although 3 days had been set aside in fact the proceedings occupied short periods on 1 and 3 November and some further time on 12 November. I then reserved my decision. 2 It is appropriate that I acknowledge at the outset that apart from such matters as are implicit in the Prisoner's plea, before I can use any matters of fact adversely to the Prisoner, I must be satisfied of such matters to the criminal standard of proof. It is sufficient that I be satisfied of matters which go in mitigation on the balance of probabilities. 3 An autopsy report by Dr Sugo, supplemented by a further expert certificate of 21 July 2004, states that the cause of death was the existence of multiple incised (and, the photographs would indicate, to a substantial degree overlapping) wounds to the neck. In totality, the wound extended for a distance of approximately 220mm from near the left ear to behind the right ear. There was incomplete incision of the left sternomastoid muscle, division of all anterior strap muscles of the neck below the level of the hyoid bone and transection of the right sternomastoid muscle, three of the carotid arteries, the right internal jugular vein and of the posterior pharyngeal wall. The front of bones in the upper cervical spine show a number of defects where a sharp implement has impacted with sufficient force to cut into the outer surface of the bone. 4 There were also two or three incised wounds on the right hand and fingers, four such wounds on the fingers of the left hand, two wounds to the left cheek and three 15 or 16mm wounds to the deceased's scalp. The cause of these latter wounds was the subject of debate and to them I will return. 5 On 19 August 2002 the deceased was reported by her parents to be missing. On 21 November 2002 police executed a search warrant at a rural property "Greg Greg" which was occupied by the Prisoner's mother. There the deceased's body was found wrapped up and in the boot of a Falcon motor vehicle parked in the garage. The body showed signs of decomposition. The motor vehicle in which the deceased was found had been driven to Greg Greg on 17 August by the Prisoner and Sharon Ward. It had not left the property between then and 21 November. 6 On 23 November during the course of execution of another search warrant at Ms Ward's home at 11 Glenelg Drive, Lavington, the Prisoner was found in a storage cupboard and arrested. 7 The evidence establishes that the deceased was killed in the house situate at 14 Gardenia Street, Lavington where she lived with her two children, aged, in June 2004, 7 and 3. The Prisoner and the deceased had been in an intermittent de facto relationship for approximately 6 years and he was the father of the deceased's eldest child. 8 After the deceased's death the Prisoner returned to the house of Ms Ward and spoke to her. Later both returned to the premises at 14 Gardenia Street, Lavington where extensive efforts were made to clean up those premises. Despite those efforts, forensic examination of the scene established the presence of blood on numerous surfaces of the house. These included numerous spots or spatter marks in the kitchen and on the ceiling of what was referred to as the dining room, an area at the end of the kitchen. There were also blood marks in the bathroom, laundry and main bedroom. 9 The Statement of Facts tendered without objection during the sentencing proceedings records that when the Prisoner went to 14 Gardenia Street, Lavington on 7 August 2002 he took with him a hammer and had a fishing knife taped to his back. He entered the house, spoke briefly to the deceased, she turned away from him and he hit her on the back of the head with the hammer. … (the) blows did not render the deceased unconscious and a struggle ensued with the Prisoner producing the knife. The Prisoner stabbed the deceased twice to the neck. After stabbing the deceased to the neck the Prisoner inflicted multiple cuts to the neck of the deceased the effect of which is described in paragraph 3 above. 10 I said that I would return to the topic of the wounds to the deceased's scalp. They were the subject of the original and a supplementary autopsy report by Dr Sugo, a report by Dr Ellis another forensic pathologist obtained on behalf of the Prisoner and the subject of cross-examination of these witnesses. Dr Sugo was of the opinion that a hammer head, photographs of which she was shown, and which had been found in a bag in the room occupied by the Prisoner at Ms Ward's premises could have caused these wounds. However, Dr Sugo also accepted that they could have been caused by the deceased hitting her head while falling backwards – an event which the Prisoner told 2 psychiatrists, Drs Carne and Allnutt, had occurred. Dr Ellis expressed similar views to those of Dr Sugo. 11 There was no fracture of the deceased's skull and Dr Sugo detected no effect of any blow on the surface of the skull. Both pathologists were of the view that "the apparent lack of any deeper injury suggests either that the hammer was used with little force or that an alternative object struck the skin with relatively little impact". Dr Sugo also agreed that had the head of the hammer impacted squarely on the deceased's scull she would have expected to see more of a circumference in the head wounds than she observed. 12 On the other hand, the relative position of the wounds on the deceased's skull was such that I remain unpersuaded that the wounds were caused by the deceased falling. I can summarise the effect of the evidence as to these wounds by saying that I do not regard it as indicating one way or another whether the deceased was hit by a hammer. 13 Included in the material tendered during the sentencing proceedings were statements from a number of persons who assert that the Prisoner spoke to them concerning the death of the deceased. Not all of the accounts attributed to the Prisoner were consistent. 14 One of the persons who asserts that the Prisoner spoke to her on the topic was a Ms Sharon Blackmore who had married the Prisoner in July of 1999 and whose relationship, according to her, ended in October 2001. In a statement of 1 February 2003, she said that on an occasion when she had visited the Prisoner in December 2002 at the Junee Gaol he had said he wanted to tell her what happened. Ms Blackmore's account of the conversation includes the following (I set it out as recorded):- "I had been praying to God for a month to tell me what to do with her and every time the same answer kept coming back. Kill her. Kill her. After Skye told me what she told me I knew she had to go. She rang me up and asked me for some money and went around to give her some money. I took the hammer and I taped the knife to my back. It was late because I wanted to make sure the girls were asleep. The front door was open and I walked through the front door and I waited in the kitchen because I knew that's where I wanted to do it so the blood wouldn't splatter on the carpet. She had been out the back and she was in her nightie and she came into the kitchen and she said, "oh you're here". She was washing her hands at the sink and I hit her on the back of the head with the hammer. I hit her that hard it should have killed her. As she went down she groaned "Craig" but the dirty filthy evil cunt didn't die she got back up and she grabbed the hammer out of my hand like it was a lollypop. I've fought three men before and she had more strength that them put together. I heard her skull crack. I was struggling with her and then she was screaming, "Nicole, Nicole" (the next door neighbour). And that's when I stabbed her twice in the neck. She still wouldn't die so I slit her throat. I pushed the knife right back until I felt the backbone. And the cunt was still trying to breathe you should have heard the noise. I went and grabbed the doona off her bed and wrapped her in the doona and put her in the laundry. I took off all my clothes because I knew I had clean ones there in the house to change into. I got dressed and woke both the girls up and put them in the car… You know I didn't feel a thing, I didn't feel a thing and I still don't feel a thing, because I did what I did to protect my angels. She was evil mate." 15 Ms Blackmore said that shortly before the statements of the Prisoner which I have just recounted he had made statements to her which may be fairly described as allegations that the deceased had been sexually assaulting her daughters or at least not discouraging them from inappropriate sexual activity. 16 Ms Blackmore also deposed to other statements by the Prisoner to the effect that he proposed to say the deceased commenced to attack him with the hammer and there was a struggle which got out of hand. 17 In her statement Ms Blackmore also said that her visit to the Prisoner occurred because she did not believe he could have murdered the deceased and wanted to see him to see what she could do to help him. Correspondence from Ms Blackmore which became Exhibit 6 tends to show strongly that she was not antipathetic towards the Prisoner. 18 On 1 November 2004 the sentencing proceedings were adjourned so that, inter alia, Ms Blackmore could come to Court to be cross-examined. When the proceedings resumed on 3 November, counsel for the Prisoner announced that the Crown Prosecutor had agreed to withdraw from evidence a second statement of Ms Blackmore and that he no longer required Ms Blackmore for cross-examination. The second statement was withdrawn.