Grandmum’s grisly Halloween murder to remain a mystery
NSW’s top prosecutor has refused to charge the person that the coroner believes should face a jury over the death of Western Sydney grandmother Lynette Bradbury
NSW
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The state’s top prosecutor has refused to charge the person that the coroner believes should face a jury over the death of Western Sydney grandmother Lynette Bradbury.
State Coroner Teresa O’Sullivan, who referred the case to the Office of Director of Public Prosecutions in June last year, revealed today that DPP Lloyd Babb told her last month that he would be taking no action despite the coroner’s finding there was a “reasonable prospect” a jury would convict that person.
The only person to be charged over the death of Ms Bradbury, 52, who was hog-tied and bludgeoned to death in her Oatlands home on Halloween in 2011, was her hospital cleaner husband Brian Bradbury, who has always vehemently denied any involvement.
The grandfather, who was accused of killing his wife of 32 years during an argument about his gambling addiction, had pleaded not guilty and was due to face trial in 2014 when the DPP dropped the charge because "there was no reasonable prospect of conviction".
Following the DPP’s decision in 2014, the inquest resumed into Ms Bradbury’s death and Ms O’Sullivan today found her death was a homicide and she had died from a blunt trauma head injury inflicted by “another person or persons”.
Ms O’Sullivan found there was no evidence of intruders at the Bradburys’ home in Oatlands, the evidence was that there had been an attempt to stage a robbery at the house and forensic police found no fingerprints or DNA that did not belong to “anyone other than a member of the extended Bradbury family”.
“On the evidence I accept that there is insufficient evidence to find that Ms Bradbury was killed as a result of an intruder or intruders entering the house,” the state coroner found.
She ruled out any involvement by three young men seen about 6.20pm that evening after being told that rigor mortis had set in showing the grandmother of seven had been dead for around seven or eight hours before her body was examined by paramedics at 11.32pm.
The coroner said she could not conclude that the grandmother of seven was killed by one or more people but she said it was clear that the fatal wounds were inflicted by a blue plastic-covered dumbbell hand weight found in the house.
Ms Bradbury, a receptionist at Westmead Hospital’s emergency department, had arrived home on October 31, 2011, at about 4.20pm after finishing work at 4pm.
“Mr Bradbury was in the house alone when Ms Bradbury arrived there,” the coroner said in her findings.
The coroner said Mr Bradbury had arrived at work at 4.44pm, leaving shortly after 11pm and calling into a service station to buy milk and cigarettes on the way home when he used his key to unlock the front door.
About 11.30pm, the couple’s neighbours were woken by Mr Bradbury knocking on their front door. The husband accompanied Mr Bradbury back to his home where Ms Bradbury was found lying face down on the floor in the second bedroom still wearing her work clothes and laced up shoes, “suggesting she never got to the stage of changing out of her work clothes”.
Her hands were tied behind her back and her ankles tied with tape which the evidence suggested came from a roll of silver duct tape which had been inside the house for a number of years. Her head was covered with a black towel from the house, the coroner said.
When Mr Bradbury called the Triple O operator, he was in a hysterical state, the coroner said.
An autopsy found there were cuts and extensive bruising on Ms Bradbury’s scalp, face and neck, bruises on her upper limbs and extensive bruising on the back of both hands.
The streets had been filled with “trick or treaters” and Ms Bradbury had been looking forward to the night with Halloween decorations and sweets ready to give to the children who visited the house. They remained unopened after children who knocked on the door from 6.30pm had “no response”.
Mr Bradbury had sent his wife a text message from work at about 6.50pm.
The coroner said the back door to the couple’s home had been unlocked but the only footwear impressions from the laundry to the second bedroom matched the soles of the shoes worn by Mr Bradbury that day.
Ms O’Sullivan said the inquest had been held to look at issues including whether a known person murdered Ms Bradbury and “is there evidence of or evidence that could exclude the possibility that a person other than Brian Bradbury or Lynette Bradbury entered (the home) in the afternoon or evening of October 31, 2011”.
A spokeswoman for the Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions declined to comment.
Originally published as Grandmum’s grisly Halloween murder to remain a mystery