Alleged Salt Creek backpacker kidnapping trial begins in SA’s Supreme Court
THE alleged Salt Creek kidnapper cut one backpacker’s clothes from her body with a knife and tied her up, then bashed the other with a hammer and “mowed her down” with his car, a court has heard.
THE alleged Salt Creek kidnapper cut one backpacker’s clothes from her body with a knife and tied her up, then bashed the other with a hammer and “mowed her down” with his car, a court has heard.
On Thursday, a Supreme Court jury heard the women — one naked, the other bleeding “profusely” from four “ragged” head wounds — took extreme measures to save their lives.
Prosecutor Jim Pearce QC said the first woman, from Brazil, falsely promised her attacker “more pleasure” if he untied her, just to get closer to help.
He said the second woman, from Germany, stood her ground and fought the alleged kidnapper when she caught him “red-handed” trying to rape her travelling companion.
“Having become aware he had been caught red-handed, the accused needed to do something about it — and he decided to do something about the witness,” Mr Pearce said.
“His (hammer) blows were targeted, purposeful and deliberate ... he used the car to mow her down from behind, over and over and over again.
“These actions speak eloquently of his true intention, they betray his true intention, and his true intention was to kill her.”
The man, 60, whose identity is suppressed, has pleaded not guilty to one count each of:
AGGRAVATED kidnapping;
INDECENT assault;
CAUSING harm with intent to do so;
ATTEMPTED murder;
AGGRAVATED causing serious harm with intent to do so;
ENDANGERING life; and
AGGRAVATED assault.
Opening the trial, Mr Pearce alleged the offences took place at Salt Creek, on the Coorong, on February 9 last year.
He alleged the Brazilian woman, whose identity is also suppressed, fell victim to the first three offences.
He said the man was allegedly armed with a knife, or threatened to use such a weapon, while committing those offences.
The remaining four offences, Mr Pearce said, were perpetrated against the German woman — whose identity is also suppressed.
Mr Pearce said that, prior to their arrival in Australia, the women were strangers to one another and became travelling companions only “by chance”.
Both, he said, wanted to travel to Melbourne and see the sights along the way, with the Brazilian woman advertising on Gumtree for a ride.
Mr Pearce said the man answered the advert and agreed, through SMS and social media messages, to take both women — without them ever seeing him.
He said they met at the Mawson Lakes railway station and drove toward the Coorong, as he had suggested they camp there.
“They set off for what they thought was going to be their adventure,” he said.
Upon arrival, the German woman fell asleep in the car while the man and the Brazilian woman made camp and then walked to the sand dunes to look for wild kangaroos.
“But as they walked he attacked her, grabbed her, pulled her to the ground face-first into the sand,” Mr Pearce said.
“He positioned himself over her body, preventing her from getting up, and produced a knife.
“He lodged it into the sand, tip first, next to her, as if to make the point that he had a weapon and that he was in control.”
He said the man cut the woman’s bikini bottoms from her body, removed her top and tied her hands behind her back before rolling her over.
“He had total domination over her ... with a flourish of a knife she was naked, laying on the sand and restrained by the accused ... she was helpless,” he said.
Mr Pearce said the man licked the woman all over her body as she lay in the sand.
He said that, when the man ordered the woman to kiss him, she said “you don’t have to do this” and asked if he was going to kill her.
He told her to “shut up” and tried to gag her with her bikini bottoms — still able to speak, she tried to “talk him down”.
“She told him they would be more comfortable if they went back to the camp, that he was a nice guy, that he didn’t need to do this,” Mr Pearce said.
“She said they could ‘do it a different way’ and that appeared to interest the accused, who asked ‘how?’.
“She said it would ‘be more pleasurable’ if he untied her ... really, she wanted to get back to the camp.”
He said the man tied her ankles together so she “could walk, but not run” and led her back toward the camp — but then appeared to change his mind.
At this point, he said, the woman screamed for help and the man pushed her down again, telling her she would “eat sand” if she made any further noise.
“(The German woman) had heard the screams and went to investigate ... (the Brazilian woman) began to shout, telling her the accused was dangerous and that she should run away,” he said.
“She was trying to protect her friend, but (the German woman) stood her ground and shouted at the accused ... they faced off.”
Mr Pearce said that, as the German woman ran for the car and her phone, the man attacked her with a hammer causing four “ragged” wounds to her scalp and head.
They “tussled” over the hammer before the German woman ran back to her friend, who had taken advantage of the distraction to untie her ankles.
“She still couldn’t run properly so she screamed to her friend to untie her hands, and (the German woman) came to her aid without hesitation,” he said.
“They agreed they had to run in separate directions ... they split off on their own ways.”
Mr Pearce said the Brazilian woman fled into the dunes and hid in bushes, fearful of approaching the few other cars in the area in case it attracted the man’s attention.
Eventually, she saw a ute that did not resemble the man’s four-wheel drive.
“She ran out from her hiding place — naked, screaming — and called for help,” he said.
“(The ute’s occupants) were confronted by the sight of a naked woman, screaming and hysterical.”
He said the men in the ute, together with some nearby fishermen, helped the woman and, at her request, went back to the camp to find her friend.
“Panic set in”, Mr Pearce said, when they discovered no one was there — and that was because the German woman was among the sand dunes, fighting for her life.
“The accused chased after her, but he didn’t run after her — he used his car to drive after her,” he said.
“As she tried to run away he chased her down, he mowed her down ... he did this several times, using the bull bar of his four-wheel drive as a battering ram to knock her to the ground.
“The vehicle literally ran over the top of her ... she was underneath, looking up at its undercarriage as it passed over her ... fortunately, the wheels went on either side of her.”
He said the woman soon realised the “futility” of trying to run away and so jumped on to the bonnet of the car, then climbed up on to its roof.
That perch, he said, allowed her to avoid subsequent hammer blows when the man stopped the car and demanded she come down.
“She had started to bleed, and bleed pretty quickly, from the moment she had been hit with the hammer,” he said.
“She knew she was bleeding from her face because it was getting in her eyes.
“She was bleeding profusely by the time she was being run over.”
Mr Pearce said that as he drove through sand dunes, the accused became bogged, and needed the shovel from the roof of his 4WD — where the German woman was.
A "Mexican stand-off" ensued as she refused to let him have the shovel - another potential weapon - for any reason, he said.
They reached an accord: he would throw away the hammer and knife, she would let him have the shovel and get back in the car, doors open, he said.
"There was discussion about an ambulance," Mr Pearce said. "He offered her a Panadol. She refused. She said she didn't want to die, she wanted to live."
He said the accused man then drove back toward roadhouse, where the Brazilian woman's rescuers stood with off-duty police. He drove past them.
The fishermen gave chase, Mr Pearce said, and as the accused drove over the sand dunes he again became stuck. The German woman said she was at that point "going to walk away".
"The young fishermen saw someone emerge from the dunes," Mr Pearce told the court. "It was the German woman, but they didn't know that at the time."
"She will tell you the young fishermen appeared to be afraid. They will tell you they were afraid. They were shocked by what they saw.
"They couldn't tell if the person coming toward them was male or female, had black or white skin or something in between.
"She was German with very white skin - the problem was she was covered virtually from head to toe with blood.
"Her hair was so drenched with blood, you could've wrung out the blood from it as if it were a wet towel.
Mr Pearce said the German woman was taken back to the road house "with blood pulsing from her ragged head wounds".
By this time, Mr Pearce said, the accused was driving back and forth along the beach. He was arrested, without incident, by two uniformed police.
Bill Boucaut SC, for the accused, urged the jury to heed Justice Kelly's words and "keep an open mind".
"You've just heard Mr Pearce, on behalf of the DPP, outline a very graphic, very confronting scenario to you," he said.
"You will understand this, members of the jury: sometimes things are not always what they appear to be.
"The issue in this trial will be about whether or not things happened in the way they (the women) say they happened."
The trial continues.