Dying Rose | Police emails reveal mum-of-two Lyla Nettle’s death deemed ‘unusual’

When a mum-of-two’s body was found on an embankment by her drug-using boyfriend, her family feared foul play. But cops disagreed, and her family say they wrote off their concerns.

Police admitted the location and position of a 39-year-old mum of two’s body was “unusual” after she was found dead on a rubbish-filled embankment off a busy highway – but her mum believes more could have been done to investigate her death.

The pathologist who conducted her autopsy could not rule out involvement of a third party, but many of her mother’s concerns over the investigation – laid out in a series of emails spanning years – were dismissed by police.

The body of Lyla Nettle was found on the morning of May 17, 2019, in a scene so strange it is difficult to comprehend.

She was discovered lying face down in a muddy culvert off the side of Port Wakefield Rd, at Bolivar in Adelaide’s north.

Her partner, who found her body and then tried to get help from passers-by, said he had slept the night in a car parked just five metres away.

Police told her mother, Sue Nowland, that the 39-year-old Whajuk Noongar and Bibbulman woman had taken her own life – but her mother couldn’t believe it.

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander readers are advised that this story contains images and voices of people who have died.

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Sue said police never treated Lyla’s partner, Jason (a pseudonym), with suspicion despite his history of drug use and the unusual positioning of her body on a sloped embankment.

The Advertiser is examining Lyla’s death as part of Dying Rose, a podcast investigation into the deaths of six Aboriginal women.

Lyla’s autopsy report found “a relatively high level of methylamphetamine” in her system. The pathologist said this was high enough to cause an overdose in some cases – but said it was not the cause of her death, which was determined to be hanging.

The pathologist said there was no finding that would indicate the involvement of another person in Lyla’s death – but also could not “exclude the actions of another party”, which may not have left a mark.

A police detective told Lyla’s mother Sue that the location and position that her body was found was “unusual”.

Lyla Nettle was 39 when her body was discovered on the side of a busy Adelaide highway. Picture: Supplied

Lyla Nettle was found dead in May 2019 in a parking area on Port Wakefield Rd at Bolivar. Picture: Kathryn Bermingham

Sue has spent the years since her daughter’s death trying to match up the position of Lyla’s body with the finding that she had taken her own life.

“We tried so many ways of thinking,” she said.

“Was she on her knees and she just fell down? (Police) must have thought something of that position, because it was an unusual position to suicide.”

Her brother, Thibul Nettle, visited the parking area and reached a similar conclusion.

“I know she was only skinny but would (a small tree) hold her body? Probably not, the way that we looked at it, because it’s only like a bush tree, it’s not like an actual tree,” he said.

Police told Sue “due to the unusual location and position” of Lyla’s body, top forensic specialists were called to the scene “but ruled out foul play and that anyone else was involved in her death”.

Jason has adamantly denied any involvement in Lyla’s death, saying it was “a tragic suicide, that’s all it was”.

In an interview with the Advertiser, he said he believed Lyla probably did not intend to take her own life, and that it was an accident and a cry for help.

Lyla’s mum Sue believes police did not properly investigate her daughter’s death. Picture: Supplied

Despite years trying to comprehend what happened to their beloved Lyla, her family knows little about what happened in the hours leading up to her death.

Lyla’s autopsy said she and her partner had argued at an oval in Parafield Gardens between 1pm and 2pm on the day prior to her death.

Jason drove without her to the parking area, where he cooked food and drank wine. He messaged Lyla to say she was welcome to join him for dinner, and she arrived just before sunset.

At that point she “had apparently appeared agitated”, the autopsy said, and there were more arguments before he packed up and got in the car to go to sleep between 7-8pm.

He got up during the night to go to the toilet, at which time Lyla was not with him, before he woke in the morning and discovered her body.

Changing outside temperatures overnight and during the day meant a forensic pathologist who attended the scene could not make a temperature-based estimate of what time Lyla had died.

Sue feared there was more to her daughter’s final moments than police had discovered and laid out her concerns in a series of emails to an SA Police detective, seen by The Advertiser.

After first emailing police in late 2019, Sue was often left waiting weeks or months for a reply to her pleas for information – but many of her concerns were dismissed.

SA Police declined to respond to a number of assertions about Lyla’s death. The Coroner’s Court declined to release files on Lyla’s death on the basis the matter was not heard at inquest.

Excerpts of emails sent by an SA Police detective in response to Sue Nowland, who questioned the investigation into her daughter's death.

In the lead-up to Lyla’s death, she had found work in Queensland and was preparing to move.

Her brother, Thibul, said it had been a hard few months but it seemed like things were finally on the up.

“She was excited to go,” her brother, Thibul, said. “It was all happy.”

Sue and Thibul believed Lyla would head interstate alone, but the autopsy indicated they would be moving together – something Jason later reaffirmed in an interview with The Advertiser.

After the heartache of Lyla’s death and the frustration of the following months and years, she said her move to Bali has brought a level of peace.

“I feel Lyla’s really close to me here,” she said. “It’s just me and Lyla.”

Lyla’s brother Thibul Nettle says her family still feels like they have unanswered questions over her death. Picture: Russell Millard

Sue Nowland said she was often left waiting weeks or months for a response from SA Police over her daughter’s death. Picture: Supplied

Today, the parking area at Bolivar is still used as a free camping site, with the surrounding grass overgrown, deep potholes in the ground and rubbish strewn around.

A tribute site set-up by Sue shortly after Lyla died is still against the fence. There are flowers, photos and trinkets, and above it reads the words “Lyle Nettle RIP”.

It’s not as colourful as it was four years ago, and parts have been knocked over or damaged.

But Sue wants people to know that this carpark was where her daughter died – and that, after four years, she still doesn’t know why.

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