Killer mother Donna Fitchett dead weeks after being freed from jail

Donna Fitchett, who drugged, smothered and strangled her young sons at their Balwyn home, has been found dead.

Murderer Donna Fitchett was found dead on Monday night.

Killer mother Donna Fitchett is dead just weeks after being freed from prison for the “chilling and callous” murder of her two sons.

Fitchett’s body was found by police in a property in King St, Prahran, at 7pm on Monday.

Officers had been called to the scene to make a check after concerns about the 66-year-old’s welfare after her ankle monitor had failed to record any movement.

It is believed Fitchett died from a drug overdose.

Fitchett, pictured outside the Supreme Court in 2010, has died aged 66. Picture: AAP

“The death is not being treated as suspicious,” a Victoria Police statement said.

Fitchett, a former nurse, had been in prison since September 2005, when she murdered her sons Thomas, 11, and Matthew, 9.

In a crime described by a judge as “truly appalling and offensive to civilised society”, she gave the boys a cocktail of drugs before smothering and strangling them.

The Supreme Court was told she had been depressed about her marriage breaking down and wanted to suicide and take Thomas and Matthew with her.

Matthew, 9, and Thomas, 11, were murdered by their mother Donna Fitchett.

In a note she penned to her husband before the boys’ murders, Fitchett wrote: “I am sorry for your pain upon the discovery of what I have done.

“I overdosed the boys and when they were asleep I suffocated them and then strangled them in case they woke up.

“They put up a bit of a struggle but said nothing. They didn’t know it was me or it was happening to each other.

“They were happy this morning, said they loved you and had a great Father’s Day.”

On the day of the killings, Fitchett wrote to her psychologist detailing what she planned to do to her boys.

“Sadly I’m too broken to go on. Today the boys will be given an overdose as I cannot and wouldn’t ever abandon them,” she wrote. “They think we are going on an exciting trip today but I’ve told them they need to take some medicine so they won’t get airsick.

“I’m not a coward, nor am I crazy. I see this as my greatest act of love.”

But Justice Elizabeth Curtain said it had been her “greatest act of betrayal”.

Justice Curtain rejected Fitchett’s claim she had carried out the killings while mentally impaired.

“You knew exactly what you were doing because you contemplated, planned and wrote about it,” the judge said.

“You were their mother. Your responsibility was to nurture, care for, love and protect them.”

Prosecutors had wanted Fitchett jailed for life, which would have made her the only woman in Victoria to serve a life term, but she was instead sentenced in 2008 to 27 years in prison, with a non-parole period of 18 years.

It is understood she had been released from prison about three weeks ago after serving 20 years behind bars.

She had reportedly tried to take her own life several times while in custody.

Originally published as Killer mother Donna Fitchett dead weeks after being freed from jail