Regina v Crespin Adanguidi [2005] NSWSC 519

New South Wales Supreme Court

CITATION : Regina v Crespin Adanguidi [2005] NSWSC 519

HEARING DATE(S) : 29 March 2005 - 14 April 2005, 20 May 2005, 3 June 2005

JUDGMENT DATE : 3 June 2005

JUDGMENT OF : Barr J at 1

DECISION : For the murder of Shiquin Zhu the offender is sentenced to imprisonment for life. The sentence will be taken to have commenced on 1 February 2003. For the murder of Pin Shen the offender is sentenced to imprisonment for life. The sentence will be taken to have commenced on 1 February 2003. For the murder of Christy Bo Shen the offender is sentenced to imprisonment for life. The sentence will be taken to have commenced on 1 February 2003.

PARTIES : Regina, Crespin Adanguidi

FILE NUMBER(S) : SC 2003/163

T Hoyle COUNSEL : L Flannery

S Kavanagh SOLICITORS : N Marshall

LOWER COURT JURISDICTION :

- 13 - IN THE SUPREME COURT OF NEW SOUTH WALES COMMON LAW DIVISION

GRAHAM BARR J

3 JUNE 2005

2003/163 REGINA v CRESPIN ADANGUIDI

SENTENCE 1 HIS HONOUR: The offender, Crespin Adanguidi, was found guilty by a jury of the murders on 1 February 2003 at Rockdale of Shiquin Zhu, Pin Shen and Christy Bo Shen. 2 The deceased Shiquin Zhu was the mother of the other deceased. The offender did not know them well but he was friendly with Mr Raymond Shen, their husband and father. Mr Shen came to Australia from China in 1991. He studied at university and worked in the travel industry. In 1995 he was joined in Australia by his wife and children. In 2001 he established a travel agency in Sydney. He and the deceased lived together in a home unit at Rockdale. 3 The offender was born in Benin. He came to Australia in about 1998. In 1999 he formed a relationship with Ms Alicia Richards and she gave birth to a son in 2000. They married in 2001. Ms Richards gave birth to a second son in 2001. Until January 2003 the offender was living with his family in a unit at Maroubra. At the time of the events giving rise to the charges against the offender, however, they had separated. The offender occupied the home unit alone. The offender first met Mr Shen in 2000 while he was working as a security guard at the building in Rockdale in which the Shen unit was situated. A friendship developed between them. They discussed business ventures they might possibly undertake together. After some time, their friendship developed into a sexual relationship. While the offender still worked at the building in Rockdale they would meet in Mr Shen's unit. The offender ceased working in that building in about 2001 and the two men thereafter usually met at Mr Shen's office after hours. 4 In January 2003 Mr Shen travelled to China on business. He returned on 29 January. On the next day the offender telephoned him and said that he was eager to see him. He invited him to come to his unit at Maroubra at any time after 7:00pm in the evening. 5 I am satisfied that the offender issued his invitation with the intention of attacking, disabling and robbing Mr Shen and his family. In anticipation of a visit by Mr Shen, he provided himself with a loaded pistol, strong adhesive tape, strong cord, various tools, a torch, cloths and a device to enable him to see in the dark. He had a pair of rubber gloves and a bag in which to carry these things and the money he expected to steal. 6 As invited, Mr Shen arranged to visit the offender on the evening of 31 January. He telephoned him on the way and they arranged to meet near the University of New South Wales because Mr Shen had never been to the offender's home and did not know the area well. They met as arranged and drove to the offender's unit block. The offender parked both their cars under the building and they went to the unit. 7 Once inside, they spent some time talking and looking at photographs of the offender's family. They moved into the bedroom and undressed and there was some intimate touching. As Mr Shen was putting on his clothes the offender took out the pistol and struck him hard on the back of the head. Mr Shen fell to the floor. The offender told him to remain silent and to lie on the floor. He placed one cloth in Mr Shen's mouth and another around his mouth and head. He took the adhesive tape and bound his head, hands and feet. He continued to threaten him with the pistol, telling him to remain quiet. 8 The offender moved Mr Shen into a second bedroom and began to demand money from him. He said that a "Slovenian gang" was after him, that he needed money to pay a "Mascot cop" and that he needed to leave Australia because he had killed a pharmacist at Hurstville. None of these things was true. He accused Mr Shen of sending photographs of them to his, the offender's, wife. 9 He held Mr Shen there for hours, demanding that he make over money and other valuable things. Mr Shen told him where he could find such money as was available, including some that he carried with him and some that he kept in his car. The offender went to the car and took the money. Mr Shen was obliged to explain to the offender that he was unable there and then to sign over to him assets, property or the proceeds of bank accounts that the offender was asking for. The offender began to make threats against Mr Shen's family and Mr Shen pleaded with him not to harm his wife or children. The offender produced a knife and cut off some of Mr Shen's hair. He said that he was going to show it to his wife. 10 The offender left the room from time to time and made and received calls on his mobile telephone. He had a contract with the operator of the Ritz Cinema, Randwick to clean the premises and employees of his were there while he was holding Mr Shen captive. Some of his telephone conversations were with those employees. 11 After one such conversation the offender returned to the room where Mr Shen was and told him that the Slovenian gang were chasing him and that he had only ten minutes left. He counted down the ten minutes and as he did so he held the pistol to Mr Shen's head. He left the unit, having stolen Mr Shen's car and unit keys. As he did so he set the alarm. 12 Having left Mr Shen bound and gagged, he went to the Ritz Cinema, driving Mr Shen's car, and spoke to his employees. After that he went to Rockdale. He knew the security arrangements at the building in which the Shen unit was situated and used Mr Shen's keys to get in. It was then 2:54am. He travelled to the floor on which the unit was situated but before entering it he turned off the electric power to the unit and to adjoining units. He entered the unit taking with him the bag containing his various belongings. He put on rubber gloves and carried a torch. 13 The offender was in the Shen unit for about an hour and during that time he carried out a number of different acts. The evidence does not permit any confident conclusion about the order in which they took place. He stole money and valuable property, including jewellery, computer equipment and mobile telephones. Because he was wearing the gloves he left no fingerprints. It seems unlikely that all this property would have been on open display, particularly the substantial amounts of cash that he took, and probable that he found it after searching or after having been told by Mrs Shen where it was. 14 As the offender was going about his work a number of things happened. Pin Shen, who kept a tennis racket in his room, took it and approached the offender. Whether the offender was then stealing or attacking Mrs or Ms Shen or was merely an unwelcome entrant it is not possible to say. The offender, facing him, shot him through the head at close range. Pin Shen died straight away. 15 Ms Shen also was alarmed. The clothes she was wearing when she was found make it appear likely that she was in bed at the time. If she was, she got out of bed and, still in her bedroom, took her mobile phone and called triple 0. She managed to make the connection, but it was almost immediately broken. I think that the offender must have done that. He shot her through the back of the head from close range. She died, slumped over her bed. 16 The offender killed Pin Shen to prevent him from getting in the way of what he was doing. He shot Ms Shen for the same reason and in particular to prevent her from calling for help. His intent in shooting them was to kill. 17 The offender attacked Mrs Shen with the pistol, but he did not shoot her. He tortured her by pressing the tip of the barrel into her breasts and perhaps rotating it. He did so to hurt her, perhaps with the intent of making her tell him where valuable things might be found. Mrs Shen was unlikely to have told him voluntarily. He used some instrument, presumably the pistol, to cause a superficial injury to her sexual parts. There was damage to the fingers, with breaking of the finger bones, tearing of the soft tissues and dislocation of the joints. He killed her by striking her repeatedly in the face and head with a hard object. I think that that was probably the pistol. There was extensive fracturing of the bones of the face, some of them extending into the base of the skull. There was bleeding within the skull. There was brain damage. The lacerations so produced bled extensively and some blood was inhaled and some swallowed. There was bruising about the neck and fractures of the ribs. Those fractures may have been caused post mortem. 18 Shiquin Zhu died of these injuries and from inhaling blood. Her death was painful. She probably knew before she died that her children had been murdered. 19 The offender left the unit shortly after 4am, taking with him the money and other valuable things he had stolen, together with the pistol, the gloves, the infrared device and other things in a sports bag. He also had a backpack and a computer in a bag. He drove to the unit of a woman with whom he had a casual sexual relationship, got her out of bed and told her a false story about his wife's having just left him. He left with her the bag containing the things I have mentioned, the backpack and the bag containing the computer. He made sure that she stowed them out of sight. He returned to his car and drove towards his own unit intending, no doubt, to deal in some way with Mr Shen. 20 In the meantime, after a long, difficult and painful struggle, Mr Shen had managed to free himself from his bonds. He got himself out of the offender's unit. He could not use his car, of course. He knocked on doors and called for help but at that hour of the morning there was no help. Eventually he managed to find a public telephone and made a call to the emergency services. Police officers came and helped him. He told them what had happened and gave them his family's telephone numbers. Ambulance officers took him to hospital, where he was treated. 21 Police officers telephoned the Shen unit. Only one of the several calls that they made was answered and on that occasion nobody spoke but the police could hear noises. They went to the unit and found the bodies of the deceased. 22 When the offender arrived at his unit block, waiting police officers arrested and disarmed him. He was taken into custody. 23 When police officers recovered the bag from the home of the offender's friend it contained the items I have mentioned, including the bloodstained gloves. Patterns on the fingertips of the gloves matched impressions left in blood on surfaces in the Shen unit. 24 On 2 February the offender was found, collapsed and unresponsive, in his cell at the police station. Ambulance officers attended and examined him. They assessed his Glasgow Coma Score at seven. The Glasgow Coma Score is a method of assessing the level of consciousness of a patient. The maximum possible score is fifteen and the minimum three. The patient is assessed in various ways, including by apparent reaction to light and painful stimulus and according to whether the patient appears to know who and where he is and what day or time it is. It is possible to feign reduced consciousness by appearing to be disoriented and by resisting reaction to stimuli. 25 The ambulance officers took the offender to hospital. An emergency registrar saw him there. The offender would not say where he was from or what his occupation was. He admitted having taken soap and agreed when asked that he had intended in so doing to kill himself. He denied killing anyone and said that he had been set up. He was fully conscious. The emergency registrar formed the view that he was trying to fake unconsciousness. 26 The offender was next examined by Dr O'Neill, a neurosurgeon. Dr O'Neill could find no clinical explanation for any loss of consciousness. The offender was next examined by Dr Atherton, a psychiatric registrar. The offender repeatedly denied killing the deceased. He denied any unusual experience, persecution or change in life. Dr Atherton found no sign of psychosis. 27 The offender was kept in hospital for observation. Dr McDonald, psychiatrist, saw him on 3 February. He noted that he appeared fearful, highly aroused, hypervigilant, suspicious, paranoid and frequently unable to answer questions in an appropriately oriented or coherent fashion. He appeared distressed and dysphoric and his level of distress fluctuated during the course of their brief interview. 28 The offender described perceptual disturbances and hearing a male voice coming from behind him. He was turning to look for the source of the voice. The voice was saying "I'll get you". He said that he had been hearing the voice since yesterday. He said that he was not eating or drinking anything because he was afraid that he would be poisoned. He believed that the police officers positioned outside his room were his friends and were there to protect him. He said that he was in great danger and that something was going to be taken away from him, but he could not say what. 29 Dr McDonald asked him why anyone might wish to harm him and he gave an account of entering a room, feeling cold and feeling drunk even though he had not been drinking. He described in vague terms a bloody scene with at least two young people, picking up a pistol and putting it in the front of his shorts and a bag with money. He said repetitively and tearfully, "I did not help them. Oh God, nobody will ever forgive me". 30 Dr McDonald concluded that the offender was at risk of harming himself and that he needed to be watched. He was unable to make a diagnosis but thought that his mental state suggested psychotic and dissociative features. He was of the opinion that such a mental state could occur in response to extreme stress. 31 Dr Wilhelm saw the offender on 4 February. She noted that he was alert and co-operative but appeared to be having hallucinations. He appeared startled and looked around the room suspiciously. He told her that he could hear voices but that there was no one there when he looked. He was still not eating or drinking and said that he did not trust the food. Dr Wilhelm thought that he remained a high suicide risk and might become more distressed upon returning to gaol. He was oriented in time and place and his mood was labile. 32 The offender was taken to Long Bay and placed in the general medical ward. Dr Varga saw him there. The offender was recorded as being in a foetal position under the bed, anxious and distressed and crying out "Don't beat me" and "I didn't do it". On 8 February 2003 he was again found distressed, clutching his head. He said that he could hear voices. He was transferred to the acute psychiatric ward on 17 February 2003. Dr Varga saw the offender three times but did not note any evidence of psychosis. He noted that he was obviously distressed and thought him a high suicide risk. 33 Dr Ellis was senior registrar in psychiatry in the acute psychiatric ward. He first saw the offender on 9 February and recorded that he told him that he believed that strangers were looking at him and having him followed. He said that he had thought so for several weeks. He said that people on the television were looking at him, so he stopped watching. He said that he was hearing voices, male and female, outside his head, saying "We are going to get you" and "Help me". He believed that people were continuing to watch him and that he could somehow "feel" it. He attributed the voices he was hearing to dead people. 34 He told Dr Ellis that he had been asked by a friend, Raymond Shen, to hit him, take his belongings from his house and burn his car in an insurance scam. He said that he had agreed to do so after much pressure and after having drunk half a bottle of wine. He told Dr Ellis that he had hit his friend with binoculars and had drawn blood. When he went to the house, he said that he had found three bodies and a gun. He had taken the gun and the friend's belongings and had left them at a friend's house. He recognised the gun as Mr Shen's as he had looked after a gun for him in the past. He said that he had been arrested when he drove Mr Shen's car home. 35 Dr Ellis' assessment of the offender's mental state was that he was guarded, quiet and staring at non-apparent stimuli. When asked, he told Dr Ellis that it was the voice. His mood was "scared" and his affect was "perplexed and fearful". He appeared to be experiencing referential delusions, auditory hallucinations and some thought disorder. 36 Dr Ellis thought that the offender was suffering from a schizophreniform disorder or a brief psychotic episode. He noted that he should be observed for any self-harm. 37 Dr Ellis' notes include an entry on 10 February about information obtained from the offender's wife. She told him that she had never seen unusual or psychotic symptoms. He had not complained of hearing voices or of having delusions. 38 Dr Ellis last saw the offender on 12 February. The offender reported that the frequency and intensity of the voices was less but still felt that he was being watched and that people on the television were watching him. Dr Ellis thought that his affect was a little more open, that he was less agitated and that his thought form was more coherent. He concluded that the psychosis was improving. 39 Dr Reznik, consultant psychiatrist, was in charge of the offender's care for about the next two years. He saw him approximately once per month. He noted that when the offender had been admitted to the ward by Dr Cassidy, that doctor had noted him as "constantly looking around in response to internal stimuli". Dr Cassidy had thought that he was suffering from an acute psychosis with restriction of food. 40 On Dr Reznik's first examination the offender said that he felt afraid, that there were people watching him, that there was somebody there whom he could not see and that he could hear a voice like a little boy's voice. He said that he was leaving food because he wanted to help the little boy. Dr Reznik thought that the diagnosis was unclear but that the offender might have had an acute stress reaction, a brief psychotic disorder or that he might be reacting to substance abuse. He saw the offender at least twice over the next week, and he presented in much the same way. 41 On 3 March Dr Canessa, a registrar, noted that the offender had been depressed since about early December 2002 and was describing auditory and visual hallucinations and feeling paranoid in that people were looking at him. 42 On 13 March the offender again told Dr Reznik that he had been hearing voices. There were a little boy and adults. He told Dr Reznik that he had started hearing the voices before the night that he was arrested, perhaps a month before. He appeared distracted and responding to hallucinations. 43 Dr Wilcox saw the offender on 20 October and thought that he had a "resulting" (which may mean "resolving") psychotic illness. 44 By November, Dr Reznik thought that the offender was no longer acutely ill and that he could be managed outside the acute psychiatric ward. So he was removed from the ward, but Dr Reznik continued to see him. He noted continuing fluctuation of symptoms, including hearing voices.