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Hello and welcome to our live coverage of former NSW police officer Beau Lamarre-Condon’s double murder trial in the Supreme Court in Sydney.
Today marks the beginning of the defence case after more than six weeks of evidence from the Crown.
The accused killer and former NSW police officer will give evidence about what he says happened on the day Sydney couple Jesse Baird and Luke Davies died of gunshot wounds from his police-issued Glock pistol.
Lamarre-Condon, 31, has pleaded not guilty to two counts of murder over the deaths of Baird, 26, a former TV presenter, and Davies, 29, a Qantas flight attendant, in Paddington on February 19, 2024. His case is that he acted in self-defence, the 15-person jury has been told.
He has also pleaded not guilty to an aggravated charge of breaking into Baird’s home six months earlier on August 17, 2023, and stealing his mobile phone and wallet.
The Crown alleges Lamarre-Condon developed an obsessive and jealous infatuation with Baird that escalated when Baird ended their casual romantic relationship in November 2023.
The prosecution case is that he planned to kill Baird and took a number of preparatory steps, including practising shooting his police weapon in a national park to experiment with the sound of gunshots and buying a surfboard bag to dispose of his body. The Crown alleges the accused killed Davies spontaneously to eliminate a witness to the crime.
The defence case is that Lamarre-Condon went to Baird’s home disguised as an Uber Eats delivery rider to collect some of his belongings and that his gun went off twice during a struggle with Baird, wounding him fatally, and that Davies shot himself during a second struggle.
There is no dispute that Lamarre-Condon cleaned Baird’s share house while his housemates were out and disposed of the men’s bodies.
Baird had been due to move out of the home that week, the court has heard. The Crown alleges he sent messages from Baird’s phone to the housemates’ group chat to give the impression he was still alive and in the process of packing.
As to the charge of aggravated break and enter, the defence says Lamarre-Condon used a key Baird had given him to enter his home at night.
Crown prosecutor Brett Hatfield, SC, said in his opening address to the jury in September that Lamarre-Condon had “indicated that he pleaded not guilty to murder but guilty to manslaughter of Jesse Baird”.
“He’s entitled to enter a plea in those terms, but it’s not accepted by the Crown,” Hatfield said.
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“My full name is Beaumont Lamarre-Condon,” the accused says at the start of his evidence. He says he goes by “Beau”.
He tells the court that as a NSW police officer he has had to deal with the bodies of deceased people on many occasions.
One of the first pieces of evidence he gives is to allege that a police officer engaged in homophobic behaviour in his presence, including saying: “I used to bash gay people whilst working in Jindabyne.”
He says that he was openly gay when he started working as a police officer after graduating in 2017.
Lamarre-Condon gives emotional testimony that he spoke to one police officer shortly before that man took his own life.
Detective Sergeant Sasha Pinazza, the officer in charge of the Lamarre-Condon investigation, said in a statement read in court on Tuesday that she explained NSW’s “no body, no parole” laws to the accused after his arrest on February 23, 2024, and suggested he speak to a lawyer.
“I explained that legislation excluded a person convicted of murder from release on parole in circumstances where the victims had not been located, and the accused had failed to assist,” Pinazza’s statement said.
The court heard Lamarre-Condon gave information about the location of the bodies of Jesse Baird and Luke Davies to investigators on February 27, including by reference to maps shown to him by police.
“The accused believed to the best of his recollection this to be location where he left the bodies of Jesse Baird and Luke Davies,” Pinazza’s statement said.
NSW Supreme Court Justice Natalie Adams gave a direction to the jury this morning, before Lamarre-Condon started giving evidence, about an accused’s right to silence.
“You’ve heard … that when the accused was arrested on the 23rd of February, 2024, he chose not to answer questions put to him by police at that time,” the judge said.
“And you’ve also heard that on the 27th of February, 2024, he provided some limited information to police but did not otherwise participate in a full interview with police on that day, either.”
The judge said that “all people in this country have a right to silence, that is, to choose not to answer questions put to them by police”. She noted there were limited exceptions not relevant in this case.
The judge said it would be “quite wrong” for the jury “to use that fact against him”.
“The accused’s silence cannot be used against him in any way at all,” she said.
Beau Lamarre-Condon’s barrister, John Stratton, SC, said in his opening address to the jury that it was not disputed that the accused “did some stupid things, such as looking through the phone of Jesse Baird, deleting contacts with other men ... and deleting text messages between them”.
He said it was also not disputed that Lamarre-Condon entered Baird’s house one night in August 2023, but the case for the accused is that he used a key Baird had given him. Lamarre-Condon has pleaded not guilty to aggravated break and enter over the alleged incident.
Stratton told the jury that they “may have heard of cases where there’s been a killing in a domestic situation and there’s evidence of a lead-up of increasing violence towards the culminating act of a killing”.
“That’s not this case,” he said. “In my submission to you, and I don’t anticipate that there will be any evidence of any threats of violence from the accused to Jesse Baird, let alone any actual violence.”
The accused’s barrister, John Stratton, SC, said in his opening address to the jury that the defence case was that Lamarre-Condon was acting in self-defence when Sydney couple Jesse Baird and Luke Davies died from gunshot wounds from his police-issued Glock pistol.
Here is what he had to say about the aftermath of the men’s deaths:
After all that happened the accused, understandably, panicked. He was a police officer and he knew that this looked bad. He cleaned up as much as he could.
The accused bought some cleaning products and another surfboard cover. He put the bodies in the surfboard bags. The accused … drove to Cronulla and left the clothes of the deceased in a bin near Club Cronulla. The accused … hired a van and with [his friend, given the pseudonym] Ms Elizabeth Kennedy drove to the property at Bungonia near Goulburn and tried to sink the bodies. Later ... the accused picked up the bodies and left them near a Greek monastery.
It will be submitted that conduct of the accused after the events took place … on the 19th of February 2024 were not the actions of a man who believed that he was guilty of murder but the actions of a man who panicked considerably, who knew the gravity of the situation that he was in and how it might be perceived and was overawed by it.
Stratton referred to buying “another” surfboard cover because the court has heard he bought one surfboard cover two days before the alleged murders.
The Crown closed its case in Lamarre-Condon’s double murder trial this morning after more than six weeks of evidence, including from forensic experts and friends of the accused.
The defence case started just before 1pm. Justice Natalie Adams told the jury in September, when the prosecution and defence delivered opening addresses, that the trial may run for up to 12 weeks.
The accused’s barrister, John Stratton, SC, said in his opening address that the defence case was that the accused acted in self-defence when he entered Jesse Baird’s share house with his police-issued Glock pistol on February 19, 2024. The defence will now call evidence as part of its case.
Here’s a reminder of some of Stratton’s opening address:
The case for the accused is that he admits entering the house where Jesse Baird was living … on the 19th of February 2024. His reason that he wanted to recover some of his belongings, including some jewellery ... without having to go through the embarrassment of having a further meeting with Jesse Baird when he turned up at the door.
He wore a helmet so he could masquerade as being a delivery person if anyone unexpectedly opened the door. When there was no answer … he let himself into the house. He had a gun with him because he was a police officer and his training was that he was not allowed to leave a gun unminded in a car where it might be stolen.
Once in the house he was surprised by Jesse Baird who understandably did not recognise him [in the helmet] ... The two men struggled, the gun went off twice, wounding Jesse Baird fatally. The gun was flung into the loungeroom.
The accused picked up a mobile phone and began ringing Triple Zero. The accused started walking towards the front door and in the hallway he encountered a second male, who turned out to be Luke Davies.
Mr Davies was now holding the gun. The accused … grabbed Mr Davies by the arm and pushed the gun away from himself and towards Mr Davies. In the struggle that followed, Mr Davies pulled the trigger and fatally shot himself.
It’s very much in dispute that the accused … ever planned to kill or even cause any harm to anyone [at Baird’s home]. It’s his case that what he did was in self-defence.
Stratton added towards the end of this section of his opening address that Lamarre-Condon threw a knife into the front yard of a house in another street in Paddington, before saying: “I should add that it’s the case for the accused that when he encountered Mr Davies in the hallway that Mr Davies was holding onto a knife”.
Hello and welcome to our live coverage of former NSW police officer Beau Lamarre-Condon’s double murder trial in the Supreme Court in Sydney.
Today marks the beginning of the defence case after more than six weeks of evidence from the Crown.
The accused killer and former NSW police officer will give evidence about what he says happened on the day Sydney couple Jesse Baird and Luke Davies died of gunshot wounds from his police-issued Glock pistol.
Lamarre-Condon, 31, has pleaded not guilty to two counts of murder over the deaths of Baird, 26, a former TV presenter, and Davies, 29, a Qantas flight attendant, in Paddington on February 19, 2024. His case is that he acted in self-defence, the 15-person jury has been told.
