Speaker 1: You're listening to a MoMA Mia podcast. Mamma Mia acknowledges
Speaker 1: the traditional owners of land and waters. This podcast was
Speaker 1: recorded on It's July twenty fourteen in Gympie in southeast
Speaker 1: Queensland and Alison Russell receives a phone call. It's about
Speaker 1: her daughter. Her boyfriend has told the paramedics she had
Speaker 1: an overdose of antidepressants, but after being rushed to the
Speaker 1: local hospital, Kyrillie McLaughlin's injuries are so severe she's been
Speaker 1: flown to the Gold Coast. She doesn't survive. The twenty
Speaker 1: seven year old dies the following day. A total of
Speaker 1: one hundred and five bruises are found on her body.
Speaker 1: The mother of Faur's official cause of death is from
Speaker 1: a catastrophic brain injury. Police have been called to Kirale's
Speaker 1: Beenham Valley Road home before the young mum had previously
Speaker 1: called Triple Zero herself, telling them her partner had attacked her.
Speaker 1: When they arrived, however, she told them she'd made a mistake.
Speaker 1: A few months later, she was dead and that's where
Speaker 1: the story ended for about eight years, because there were
Speaker 1: no arrests, no charges, no further investigations until two Gimpi
Speaker 1: police officers took matters into their own hands.
Speaker 2: You look at other suspicious deaths and there's plenty of
Speaker 2: coverage about them, but this just seemed to go by
Speaker 2: the wayside and she was forgotten. This case has been
Speaker 2: haunting me because I feel for the victim. I feel
Speaker 2: for her family. So when I left the police, I thought,
Speaker 2: now I could do something about it because I'm not
Speaker 2: a police officer anymore.
Speaker 1: I'm Jimmy Bath. And this is True Crime Conversations, a
Speaker 1: mom of Mere podcast exploring the world most notorious crimes
Speaker 1: by speaking to the people who know the most about them.
Speaker 1: This Domestic and Family Violence Prevention months, We're digging into
Speaker 1: our archives to revisit crimes that should have changed everything.
Speaker 1: In this case, two former cops found they were able
Speaker 1: to do more good for this victim and her family
Speaker 1: by using a podcast instead of their position within the
Speaker 1: police force to push for action. Let that sink in
Speaker 1: for a minute. In twenty nineteen, former Gimpe police officers
Speaker 1: Jamie Pultz and Tom Daunt started releasing episodes of their
Speaker 1: Beenham Valley Road investigation. It had been the case Jamie
Speaker 1: couldn't let go of he'd been called to Kirile's house
Speaker 1: while still on the bead, and he'd learned about her
Speaker 1: death while sitting in Gimpi police station. When he read
Speaker 1: her autopsy report, he noticed there was no mention of
Speaker 1: any domestic violence relationship, but he knew her former partner
Speaker 1: had multiple convictions for DV. He knew he'd previously gone
Speaker 1: to prison. He knew u Kiri Lee had been alone
Speaker 1: with him the night she was injured. He knew the
Speaker 1: toxicology report had suggested Kira Lee hadn't overdosed like the
Speaker 1: boyfriend had suggested. When Jamie spoke to True Crime Conversations
Speaker 1: in April twenty twenty, no one had been charged over
Speaker 1: Kira's death. A coronial inquest had been announced but not formalized.
Speaker 1: In twenty twenty four, all of that has changed, But
Speaker 1: first it's worth listening to where the case stood only
Speaker 1: a few short years ago. He's Jesse and Jamie.
Speaker 3: So you actually met Kierra McLaughlin. What was that encounter like?
Speaker 2: Yeah, so, Jesse, that was about twenty thirteen. I was
Speaker 2: a first year constable off police in Gimpi and you
Speaker 2: know the call when I went there wasn't actually for
Speaker 2: anything police related to do with her anyway. It's hard
Speaker 2: to explain what I was there for, but it was
Speaker 2: for something else. It was actually a case that was there.
Speaker 2: It was called the Torso case, and a torso had
Speaker 2: rocked up and had been burnt in a nearby area
Speaker 2: and no one knew who it was, and obviously, as
Speaker 2: a result, the police were going to every house and
Speaker 2: just checking that everybody was living there that was still
Speaker 2: alive and making sure they weren't the torso. And so
Speaker 2: as a result, I went to Kira's house and I
Speaker 2: knocked on the door and that's when I first met her.
Speaker 2: So that interaction was just the normal interaction. It was
Speaker 2: just an everyday job. And when I met her, she
Speaker 2: had four little kids, she was twenty seven. You know,
Speaker 2: she was nice. I could relate to her in that way.
Speaker 2: But it was the second call for a dramestic violence incident,
Speaker 2: which I can't go into too much details for legal reasons,
Speaker 2: But that was the one that really stuck with me
Speaker 2: because six months later or so, she was dead. And
Speaker 2: I guess that sort of players in your mind that
Speaker 2: did you do everything right? Or what could we have done?
Speaker 2: Or I guess you know, your brain plays tricks in.
Speaker 3: Your Did you meet her alongside her partner at the time.
Speaker 2: I met her the first time I was there. That
Speaker 2: was not to do with them. He was there and
Speaker 2: you know, it was like eight o'clock in the morning,
Speaker 2: I'm pretty sure, and he had a beer and he
Speaker 2: was a bit rough and just gave me that impression.
Speaker 2: I don't really need to say anymore. You kind of
Speaker 2: know what I'm talking about, but that kind of a
Speaker 2: guy been in trouble before and had a pretty big
Speaker 2: rap sheet. I didn't really speak to him too much, though,
Speaker 2: but my partner at the time when I was doing
Speaker 2: the podcast with Tom, he had actually interviewed him for
Speaker 2: a few offenses and knew him and was at the
Speaker 2: crime scene and he was involved in that way. But
Speaker 2: I didn't actually have to do anything with him apart
Speaker 2: from meeting him once.
Speaker 3: And the next time you heard Kira's name was in
Speaker 3: quite different circumstances. What had happened to Kira when you
Speaker 3: heard that again?
Speaker 2: Well, I was in the police station, I remember it
Speaker 2: very clearly, and someone popped up. I wasn't working at
Speaker 2: that day, and I remember coming back into work and
Speaker 2: someone had said, oh, Kira McLoughlin died, and you know,
Speaker 2: they discussed a little bit about it, how it was Susan,
Speaker 2: she'd been beaten, and I remember just sinking into the
Speaker 2: chair and just my heart dropped because it was the
Speaker 2: first time. I mean, I'd been to a few dead
Speaker 2: bodies already in my second shift was a dead body,
Speaker 2: and you come across them quite a lot, and domestic violences,
Speaker 2: but this is the first time that I had attended
Speaker 2: a job for domestic violence and this person had quite
Speaker 2: likely died as a result of domestic violence. That hasn't
Speaker 2: been proven, but that's where I'm thinking it went. And
Speaker 2: it really hit me because I thought, well, this is
Speaker 2: very serious, you know, like what we deal with, the
Speaker 2: conversations we have with people as we're attending these jobs.
Speaker 2: The consequences are massive, their life changing, their life threatening.
Speaker 2: It's hard to put into words really.
Speaker 3: And what was the cause of Kira's death.
Speaker 2: Catastrophic head injuries was the cause of her death. Basically,
Speaker 2: she was beaten to death. The pathologist doing the autopsy
Speaker 2: noted one hundred and five bruises on Kira's body, so
Speaker 2: that's a fair bit of damage. And the ultimate cause
Speaker 2: of death was head injuries and Alice and the mother
Speaker 2: had to make the heart wrenching decision to shut the
Speaker 2: life support off because there was actually her words were
Speaker 2: there was no brain activity left. The incident happened the
Speaker 2: day before. They were alone that night. Somewhere during that night,
Speaker 2: something's happened and she's been unconscious, and he waited like
Speaker 2: twelve hours to call ambulance and by the time they
Speaker 2: got there, she was in a pretty bad way. They
Speaker 2: took her to Gimpi, but they couldn't deal with what
Speaker 2: she had, so they flew her via helicopter to the
Speaker 2: Gold Coast University Hospital, where she died the next day.
Speaker 3: So going back to the day before, Kira had people
Speaker 3: over to the house, didn't.
Speaker 2: She Yeah, this was a matter of contention during the podcast.
Speaker 2: So to go back a little bit, when I was
Speaker 2: in the police, I remember hearing that there was some
Speaker 2: story of the sister of the guy I'm calling Jason,
Speaker 2: Kira's partner, which is not his real name. There was
Speaker 2: a conversation about her having a fight with Kira at
Speaker 2: that house Bean and Balley Road, And we didn't really
Speaker 2: know going into this podcast, we had no idea that
Speaker 2: was all we really knew because I couldn't go back
Speaker 2: and look on the police starticisms anymore, not being a cop.
Speaker 2: So what we did was we went to Allison and
Speaker 2: we asked her what she knew had happened, and she
Speaker 2: thought there was a gathering there of a few people.
Speaker 2: And throughout the podcast we learned that it was Jason,
Speaker 2: Jason's sister, Tamika who came on the podcast, Jason's nephew,
Speaker 2: and Tamik his nephew, Tamika's two year old, and at
Speaker 2: some point her mum was there. Jason and Tamika's mum
Speaker 2: was there in the afternoon for a little bit, and
Speaker 2: Kira and they were having drinks and they were playing music.
Speaker 2: But the part where this gets murky is that the
Speaker 2: neighbors don't agree with that they didn't see people, they
Speaker 2: didn't hear music. They can hear and see things because
Speaker 2: noise does travel in those sort of rural plays. But
Speaker 2: that's what the narrative we were given. And at some point, though,
Speaker 2: around about nine o'clock, they all left, including Jason, because Tamika,
Speaker 2: by her own admissions, had a fight with Kira and
Speaker 2: it was about something silly. They were drinking and it
Speaker 2: got out of hand and they were throwing tie chains
Speaker 2: and throwing cans of paint and it was pretty nasty,
Speaker 2: and Tamika says that she hit her about four times
Speaker 2: in total, at one point knocking her out. So Tamika
Speaker 2: does think, and she said on the record that she
Speaker 2: thinks that she might have had something to do with
Speaker 2: her death, even though it's probably not likely, but that's
Speaker 2: what she told us. Happened, and they all left the house.
Speaker 2: The mum picked them all up, leaving Kira alone. But
Speaker 2: at some point when everyone had left the house, Jason said,
Speaker 2: I need to go back. Kira is called to say
Speaker 2: that she's going to take all her pills kill herself basically.
Speaker 2: So the brother, Nakota, drove Jason back to the house
Speaker 2: and I spoke to Nakoda and he said that happened.
Speaker 2: He saw him walk up. He saw Kira there though,
Speaker 2: so she was alive at that point. After that, the
Speaker 2: other neighbor heard an argument and heard someone on the
Speaker 2: phone Jason saying, I fed up. I don't know what
Speaker 2: to do, and then they heard a car arrive. It
Speaker 2: was silent after that. The next morning, both neighbors on
Speaker 2: both sides saw a white car at around about eight
Speaker 2: o'clock in the morning at Kira's house with the man
Speaker 2: and a woman getting out of the car and walk
Speaker 2: into the house.
Speaker 1: You're listening to true crime conversations. Up next, we delve
Speaker 1: into kier Lee's partner's history of domestic violence and what
Speaker 1: Jamie was able to find out about his past relationships.
Speaker 3: The day before when that fight broke out and allegedly
Speaker 3: there were people over and Jason's sister, as you say
Speaker 3: in her own words, had a physical fight with Kira.
Speaker 3: Does it look like there was alcohol or drugs involved
Speaker 3: at that time.
Speaker 2: Yeah. So. Jesse, who is Tamika's niece I also spoke to,
Speaker 2: said that Kira was drunk. That's what she said. She
Speaker 2: was drunk. She didn't drink very often, so she was
Speaker 2: quite intoxicated. Tamika had said in episode three or four
Speaker 2: that they had all decided to take a sugar pill,
Speaker 2: which people who have known Jason said, that's absolute crap
Speaker 2: because he knows what a drug is and he's not
Speaker 2: going to fall for a sugar pill. So I'm kind
Speaker 2: of thinking that maybe they gave Kira a sugar pill
Speaker 2: because there was no drugs found in her system. As
Speaker 2: far as I'm aware from the toxicology report, but maybe
Speaker 2: they had the real drug and maybe Kira had a
Speaker 2: sugar pill, but there was definitely alcohol involved. And I
Speaker 2: don't know about the others. They certainly have a rap
Speaker 2: sheet for drug use.
Speaker 3: So and with Kira, was it usual for her to
Speaker 3: be fighting with Jason's sister. Was there of some underlying
Speaker 3: tensions there with her or why did this seem to
Speaker 3: kind of explode on that particular night.
Speaker 2: Well, Tamika told me Kira wasn't a fighter, and Jason
Speaker 2: was actually trying to hold Tamika back because you know,
Speaker 2: he was saying she's not a fighter. But Kia was
Speaker 2: feisty and she didn't take anyone's shit. That's what Allison
Speaker 2: told me. She did not take anyone's crap, and you
Speaker 2: know that would sometimes get her into trouble with certain people.
Speaker 2: She did have that feistiness about her, and that's sticking
Speaker 2: up for herself. And as far as any issues between
Speaker 2: the two, they'd only met a few times, but Tamika
Speaker 2: tells me when I first met her on the record
Speaker 2: that she didn't like Kira, straight up didn't like her.
Speaker 2: I don't know why that is. So there definitely was
Speaker 2: some underlying tension there. I believe that's why we called
Speaker 2: the episode My Brother's Keeper because she now she says
Speaker 2: she doesn't, but at that point she was her brother's keeper.
Speaker 2: She would always bail him out. They had a system.
Speaker 2: She would pick him up when he was in trouble
Speaker 2: with the police. You know, he would run out to
Speaker 2: the bush somewhere and Kui and she would know where
Speaker 2: to find him. Like they had a system. Having that
Speaker 2: often had a system.
Speaker 3: And you say that Jason had quite the record, what
Speaker 3: did that record look like? And do we know much
Speaker 3: about the relationship he'd had with Kira up until that point.
Speaker 2: He had a record of domestic violence and there's also
Speaker 2: drugs there and maybe a few other things, not one
Speaker 2: hundred percent certain of them, but definitely domestic violence charges.
Speaker 2: I know he'd been in prison for that. There was
Speaker 2: one time where he did go to jail for an
Speaker 2: offense of domestic violence for contravening in domestic violence protection order,
Speaker 2: and Kira was the aggrieved in that order. So I
Speaker 2: know that happened definitely once, and I'm not sure exactly
Speaker 2: the circumstances around that. I can't access all the information.
Speaker 2: He definitely did have other history with other things. He's
Speaker 2: incarcerated at the moment for a number of other offenses
Speaker 2: relating to another female that he met after Kira. In
Speaker 2: a relation to Kira's relationship with him, it's quite murky
Speaker 2: and it's a turbulent relationship. So what happened was Jason
Speaker 2: was in a de factor relationship with another lady who
Speaker 2: I also interviewed, Katie. They had a domestic violence relationship.
Speaker 2: It was listening to Katie's story was horrendous what she
Speaker 2: went through with Jason, and they lived nearby. They lived
Speaker 2: in Warville, the same community as Kira, and through that
Speaker 2: community and through Jason and Kira working together at the
Speaker 2: Turkey Farm, they met and Jason was quite flirtatious and
Speaker 2: that sort of thing, and they started, you know, hanging out,
Speaker 2: and basically Jason just took Kira and basically stopped the
Speaker 2: relationship with Kira's husband. She was married at the time,
Speaker 2: and Katie was left to sit at home at the
Speaker 2: shed with her kids while Jason was off with Kira,
Speaker 2: but he kept both of them. He would go to
Speaker 2: Kira's house for the day or a few nights and
Speaker 2: then come back and make sure that Katie was still
Speaker 2: there and still doing what he told her to and
Speaker 2: all that sort of stuff, and trapping her bed basically,
Speaker 2: and then she calls it her escape. She actually made
Speaker 2: an escape where she had finally swallowed her pride and
Speaker 2: contacted an old friend to come up, and they made
Speaker 2: a time and they drove her out of there. They
Speaker 2: packed their stuff up and left. Then it was just
Speaker 2: Kira and Jason. And Katie remembers calling Kira and saying,
Speaker 2: has he hit you yet? And she would say yes,
Speaker 2: and she's like, man, you've got to get out of there.
Speaker 2: You've got to get out of there. But sometimes you
Speaker 2: just can't telp when they're in this situation.
Speaker 3: And Kia, you say that she was in a relationship
Speaker 3: before she had four kids. Were they to that previous partner.
Speaker 2: Yeah, all four kids were with her husband. She was
Speaker 2: married young. It was like eighteen or nineteen off the
Speaker 2: top of my head. So she married young and she
Speaker 2: had four kids pretty quickly. Child one to four was
Speaker 2: very quick. I don't know if this is true or not,
Speaker 2: but Katie, her friend would say that she was staying
Speaker 2: to maybe look for more attention. Maybe her husband wasn't
Speaker 2: giving her what she wanted. So she started to have
Speaker 2: a bit of a fleeing with the seventeen eighteen year
Speaker 2: old neighbor who I also interview, And so they had
Speaker 2: a fling, and maybe Jason could see her vulnerability, you know,
Speaker 2: with that, and when he met her, he was giving
Speaker 2: her that attention that she might have needed after talking
Speaker 2: to all these people. I believe that that's true. Maybe she
Speaker 2: did want some more attention and he gave her that,
Speaker 2: But then when she was in it, she realized she
Speaker 2: was in trouble and was trying to make those to
Speaker 2: get away. I think because the neighbor's damo on that
Speaker 2: fateful night, he heard her say I don't love you anymore,
Speaker 2: you know, or words to that effect. So I think
Speaker 2: she had made that decision to go with him and
Speaker 2: then regretted it and paid the ultimate price for it.
Speaker 3: Really and didn't the subject of this seventeen year old
Speaker 3: neighbor come up on her last night? There was some
Speaker 3: allusion to that from ta Meeka. I believe when they
Speaker 3: were fighting. Is it possible that she was still in
Speaker 3: that relationship up until the end, or had it ended?
Speaker 2: Well? When I speak to Sean, the seventeen year old.
Speaker 2: He flat out denies that. He says he wasn't there.
Speaker 2: It stopped when Jason had got out of jail, because
Speaker 2: Kira told him, look, I've got a new partner. He's
Speaker 2: in jail. He's pretty serious, so I think this should stop.
Speaker 2: So he assures me that it stopped. And I originally
Speaker 2: did think that he may have been there after Jason
Speaker 2: and everyone had left the house. Maybe Kira had got
Speaker 2: him over there to comfort her, and Jason had returned
Speaker 2: to the house and found them together and then just
Speaker 2: lost it. That's sort of what I was thinking had happened.
Speaker 2: But his family can vouched for him that he was
Speaker 2: definitely not there. I think on that night, though, it
Speaker 2: sounds like Kira maybe was trying to get back at
Speaker 2: someone or do something, because she did bring up the
Speaker 2: seventeen year old nighbors. She did say that. I think
Speaker 2: her words were, I was hooking up with a seventeen
Speaker 2: year old or performing oral sex or something like that.
Speaker 2: And Tamika made the comment on the record as well
Speaker 2: that she went down to Jason, who was having a
Speaker 2: bong in the shed, you better put your dog on
Speaker 2: a leash. That's what her words were.
Speaker 3: So did Tamika say whether he appeared particularly angry about that?
Speaker 3: Is there a chance that that could have set him off?
Speaker 2: I do think that there was something said between the
Speaker 2: three of them that I think feuded this, and I
Speaker 2: don't know what that was, but it certainly must have
Speaker 2: been along those lines. Maybe you could assume that Kira
Speaker 2: was trying to leave the relationship, and maybe she was
Speaker 2: trying to get back at him or say something to
Speaker 2: anger him. I don't know why, but maybe that's the case.
Speaker 2: Maybe that has angered him. Maybe that has and that
Speaker 2: could have set him off for sure. But if you
Speaker 2: listen to Nakota the Brother and Katie, he would just
Speaker 2: lose it and just go off. You know, it doesn't
Speaker 2: have to be anything massive. But if he did lose it,
Speaker 2: he really lost it. And it's just one of those
Speaker 2: cases that it does appear the writing is on the wall,
Speaker 2: like it does appear that he's done something to her
Speaker 2: and she's met with foul play those kind of injuries.
Speaker 2: How do you explain that? It's hard to explain. Why
Speaker 2: do you not call the ambulance as soon as you
Speaker 2: notice something? She defecated and urinated? Why she was in
Speaker 2: the semi unconscious state, picked her up and showered her
Speaker 2: to clean her up, and then he called Nakota about
Speaker 2: eight am the next day to say what do I do?
Speaker 2: And he said, mate, call on f an evilence. I'm
Speaker 2: not a doctor, and he didn't. He waited till about
Speaker 2: two pm. So you put those dots together and you
Speaker 2: sort of think, well, she's obviously met with foul play,
Speaker 2: but it mustn't be that clear because he hasn't been
Speaker 2: charged with anything.
Speaker 3: So was he formally interviewed by the police.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I believe so, and so was Tamika. But that's
Speaker 2: the thing, what Tamika and everyone has told me on
Speaker 2: the podcast might be different to what they told police.
Speaker 2: They could lie through their teeth to the police, and
Speaker 2: there was no evidence, you know, there's no CCTV or
Speaker 2: fingerprints or anything like that. Not the fingerprints would do anything,
Speaker 2: because it only proves that they lived together. But there
Speaker 2: was no direct evidence apart from her injuries, that would
Speaker 2: tie him to it. So I guess if he lied
Speaker 2: about it, or Tamika lied about it, then it's kind
Speaker 2: of hard for them to prove beyond a reasonable doubt.
Speaker 3: If you've got on the record that Tamika is saying
Speaker 3: that she had a physical fight with Kira where she
Speaker 3: did hit her head, and it sounds quite serious, and
Speaker 3: then the next day Kira has died of a brain injury.
Speaker 3: From someone who might not know the intricacies of the case,
Speaker 3: you would think that Tamika would be a clear suspect.
Speaker 3: Was she ever a suspect.
Speaker 2: I don't know if she was ever labeled a suspect,
Speaker 2: but she was definitely interviewed and definitely gave a statement,
Speaker 2: and she was definitely on their radar. But I'm not
Speaker 2: a medical expert, but I don't think. I mean, it
Speaker 2: certainly could have contributed to it one hundred percent, but
Speaker 2: I don't one hundred percent know that that's the truth
Speaker 2: that would happen, because when I spoke to Jesse, Tamika's niece,
Speaker 2: she doesn't remember, and she was there, and she claims
Speaker 2: that she was sober, and she doesn't remember Tamika hitting
Speaker 2: her with a closed fist. She remembers her pushing her
Speaker 2: a few times, but she definitely does not remember to
Speaker 2: Meeka punching her with a closed fist up to four times.
Speaker 2: So I don't know whether Tamika has been told that
Speaker 2: by Jason. That's certainly a theory that's been thrown around that.
Speaker 2: You know, Tamika has been told that while she was
Speaker 2: drunk and intoxicated, that you had a fight with Kira,
Speaker 2: you punched her. You know, you did this, you did that.
Speaker 2: That's what I mean with this case, Like, yeah, you
Speaker 2: got one person saying I did this, but then you've
Speaker 2: got a person who's sober and doesn't have much to
Speaker 2: do with the family anymore saying that no, I was
Speaker 2: there and that didn't happen. So it's really it's really
Speaker 2: hard to know what's the truth.
Speaker 3: Here and what's to Meeka's relationship with her brother, like now.
Speaker 2: She says it's non existent. She cut ties with him,
Speaker 2: And you know, I tend to believe her on that
Speaker 2: because she did meet us, and she did provide us
Speaker 2: a lot of information. She gave us documents, and you know,
Speaker 2: she came on the record, despite what you think of
Speaker 2: her and what other people might think of her, to
Speaker 2: come on the record and put all that out there
Speaker 2: and for hundreds of thousands of people to hear, it's
Speaker 2: pretty ballsy. So I tend to believe her when she
Speaker 2: says that she doesn't have anything to do with him
Speaker 2: and doesn't want anything to do with him. It's really
Speaker 2: hard to because she's sort of not responding to me anymore.
Speaker 2: So I don't know where she stands with it.
Speaker 3: On the podcast, did she have a theory about what
Speaker 3: happened to Kira? As someone who knew her brother as
Speaker 3: well as she did and knew the dynamic of their relationship.
Speaker 3: Does she have a theory about what caused Kira's death?
Speaker 2: Yes, she does because she was told by someone. He
Speaker 2: told I don't know how much you can play on
Speaker 2: the air here, but what happened was Tamika became friends
Speaker 2: with Jason's next girl for enoughter Kira. I called her Sally.
Speaker 2: That's not her real name. She lives into state. But
Speaker 2: Jason and Sally hooked up over Facebook and they had
Speaker 2: a very bad relationship and allegedly that's why he's in
Speaker 2: prison now for stuff that happened to her. She refused
Speaker 2: to speak to me on the record, but she did
Speaker 2: give me text messages and was happy for me to
Speaker 2: reach them out. She told me, and she told Tamika, Tamika,
Speaker 2: this is not your crime. He broke down and confessed
Speaker 2: to me what happened. One day, and this is what
Speaker 2: he said happened, and allegedly he repeatedly smashed a head
Speaker 2: against the bathroom floor.
Speaker 3: And with that kind of I suppose it's not clear
Speaker 3: evidence because it's via sort of a secondary source. But
Speaker 3: is that enough for the police to sort of look
Speaker 3: more closely, because clearly this wasn't an accident. This is
Speaker 3: someone who's died as a result of foul play. And
Speaker 3: there's now been a coronial inquest opened, hasn't that.
Speaker 2: Yeah, they yet to announce a date, but yes, they
Speaker 2: have said that they would be doing a coronial inquest
Speaker 2: into it. So I would assume that that would ruffle
Speaker 2: some feathers and shake the trees a bit, because yeah,
Speaker 2: I agree, it is secondary, but when you put all
Speaker 2: those links together, it certainly strength a case. And I
Speaker 2: believe Sally has told the police that. But again, I
Speaker 2: think it comes down to he says, she says, you
Speaker 2: know that old saying if they're the only two present,
Speaker 2: and he denies it, but she says it happens. But yeah,
Speaker 2: I read that on the podcast. Actually I debated whether
Speaker 2: I should or shouldn't, but I did because it is
Speaker 2: important and well, that's what Tmka's theory was She tends
Speaker 2: to believe that that's what's happened, that he's become enraged
Speaker 2: about something and just lost it and just started smashing
Speaker 2: her head.
Speaker 3: And what does here is mother Allison think happen. You
Speaker 3: spoke to her extensively for the podcast, and she's been
Speaker 3: really involved in supportive of the work because it's put
Speaker 3: Kira back in the public's mind. Does she have a
Speaker 3: theory about what happened?
Speaker 2: Yeah, pretty much along those lines. She believes while they
Speaker 2: are alone together, he's become angry or enraged and he's
Speaker 2: beaten her to death, probably in the way that Sally describes.
Speaker 2: She has no out that's what happened because she's seen
Speaker 2: behavior from him. Kira and her were quite close, but
Speaker 2: Kira did keep this from her, And she looks back
Speaker 2: and she reflects on a few things that happened and
Speaker 2: a few little mannerisms and words that Kira said, and
Speaker 2: she now puts it together in hindsight and thinks, yeah,
Speaker 2: she was trying to protect me from him, because he
Speaker 2: did threaten Allison, and he did threaten the family. You know,
Speaker 2: that's the kind of guy he was, and she regrets
Speaker 2: it to this day. You know, not talking more, but
Speaker 2: there was those little cues, all little words, and you know,
Speaker 2: things that were said and done that maybe were more
Speaker 2: serious than came across to be. But she believes that wholeheartedly.
Speaker 2: She died as a result of Jason.
Speaker 3: I want to follow up on Kira's four kids. Where
Speaker 3: were they on that afternoon and night when there were
Speaker 3: allegedly people over at her house? Where were they?
Speaker 2: Well, God that they were not home. They were with
Speaker 2: Kira's ex husband and Alison at the same time, because
Speaker 2: Alison didn't live in Queensland, she actually lived in New
Speaker 2: South Wales, and she came up because what she'd seen
Speaker 2: and heard from the ex husband and from Kira, she
Speaker 2: as well as the ex husband were concerned about the
Speaker 2: kids being in the house with Jason, and so Allison
Speaker 2: and she still talks about it this day. She sort
Speaker 2: of blames herself in a way, but her and the
Speaker 2: ex husband were trying to get the kids back and
Speaker 2: they actually wrote to a solicitor who then contacted Kira
Speaker 2: to say, look, while Jason's in the house, we're not
Speaker 2: giving the kids back because we don't believe he's safe.
Speaker 2: And Alison sort of blames herself for that. So Alison
Speaker 2: was with the ex husband with all four kids while
Speaker 2: this terrible night was occurring.
Speaker 3: Do we know who is looking after the kids?
Speaker 1: Now?
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's Kira's ex husband, who I haven't mentioned his
Speaker 2: name throughout the podcast because he's politely asked me not
Speaker 2: to and he's refused to comment, and he's made it
Speaker 2: pretty well known to Allison that he doesn't want anything
Speaker 2: to do with it. He doesn't want the kids' names mentioned,
Speaker 2: you know, And that's why you don't hear much of
Speaker 2: Kira's story before she met up with Jason. Basically, my
Speaker 2: story starts nine months before she died because I couldn't
Speaker 2: really go into their relationship, you know, he didn't really
Speaker 2: want any part of it.
Speaker 3: So finally, I want to know if, with the information
Speaker 3: that you've compiled, and you've found by speaking to neighbors
Speaker 3: and friends and family members, and now this coronial inquest opening,
Speaker 3: do you think that it's possible that Kira's family will
Speaker 3: see justice for what happened to her?
Speaker 2: You know what I actually do, And when I first
Speaker 2: finished the series, I didn't know what to think because
Speaker 2: I wanted to make that phone call to Alison to say, look,
Speaker 2: guess what he's been charged or look, guess what this
Speaker 2: has happened. But I couldn't do that unfortunately. But you know,
Speaker 2: with what's being presented and with the future coronial inquests
Speaker 2: about to happen, will happen one day, I am confident
Speaker 2: that once they hear all this evidence, you know, because
Speaker 2: Nakoda the brother was never interviewed, a few other people
Speaker 2: were never interviewed. I'm really hoping that when they get
Speaker 2: in there and you know, if they speak truthfully, then yeah,
Speaker 2: I am confident we can get to the bottom of this. Yeah,
Speaker 2: I am.
Speaker 1: In twenty twenty one, a coronial inquest found that Kirile
Speaker 1: died from swelling of the brain caused by an obstruction
Speaker 1: of air or blood. Deputy state coroner Jane Bentley found
Speaker 1: that her de facto partner, Paul McDonald, who Jamie called
Speaker 1: Jason at the time of his podcast for legal reasons,
Speaker 1: was likely drunk and became enraged when she told him.
Speaker 2: She was leaving.
Speaker 1: Her findings went into shocking detail. If he's seventy plus
Speaker 1: miss violence convictions, including that he'd choked, bashed, and threatened
Speaker 1: multiple women, telling one of his victims he'd got away
Speaker 1: with murder. She wrote that MacDonald likely struck Kierlee's head
Speaker 1: with a baseball bat, hit her head on the floor,
Speaker 1: and possibly pushed her head into the toilet wall of
Speaker 1: the house they shared. It is highly probable he choked her.
Speaker 1: She added. While there had been claims that Kierlee's injuries
Speaker 1: were caused by a drug overdose, unrelated fight, or by
Speaker 1: striking her head on a shower wall, the coroner said
Speaker 1: they were all theories inconsistent with the medical evidence. Following
Speaker 1: the inquest, the Queensland Police Homicide Investigation Unit established an
Speaker 1: investigation center in Gimpi, and in July twenty twenty two,
Speaker 1: Paul MacDonald was charged with murder. He faced a committal
Speaker 1: hearing in April twenty twenty four. His case is still
Speaker 1: before the courts. Thanks so much for listening to this
Speaker 1: special series of true crime conversations, which was hosted by
Speaker 1: me Jemma Bath with audio design by Scott Stronik. Our
Speaker 1: executive producer is Geomoylan. Mamma Miya has partnered with the
Speaker 1: charity Rise Up Australia. Their mission is to deliver life
Speaker 1: changing and practical support to families experiencing domestic and family violence.
Speaker 1: If you'd like to support them, you'll find a link
Speaker 1: in our show notes. And if this episode has brought
Speaker 1: up anything for you, or you just feel like you
Speaker 1: need to speak to someone, please call one eight hundred
Speaker 1: respect on one eight hundred seven three seven seven three
Speaker 1: to two. I'll be back next week. See you then,