Kenneth Andrew Gillespie found not guilty of threatening to kill Premier Steven Marshall

A man accused of threatening to kill Premier Steven Marshall in two ‘angry’ and ‘abusive’ phone calls has been found not guilty of threatening a public officer.

Kenneth Gillespie made angry calls to Premier Steven Marshall’s electoral office. Picture: Mitch Mott

A man accused of threatening to kill Premier Steven Marshall during two calls to his electoral office has been found not guilty of threatening a public official.

Kenneth Andrew Gillespie said he was relieved the trial was over, as he was leaving the District Court on Thursday.

However, he was not critical of police who laid the charges against him in 2018, saying they were “just doing their jobs”.

He had pleaded not guilty to threatening a public officer and stood trial before a jury.

The trial took less than two days and the jury of six men and six women deliberated for only an hour and a half before returning a unanimous not guilty verdict.

Earlier on Thursday, Gillespie took the stand in his own defence, telling the jury that he had become interested in politics three years ago.

“I was on the dole and I saw my bills going up and up and I started looking into it further,” he said.

Gillespie said he had first called his energy retailer before calling the energy regulator and then turning his attention to Federal Senator Penny Wong.

When asked how many phone calls he had made to politicians over the years Gillespie “hundreds and hundreds”.

“But they were all without incident,” he said.

“If you’ve been in contact with as many politicians as I have you learn they really don’t care and you need to make an impact.

“I was spitting out words to make an impact.”

Kenneth Gillespie has been found not guilty of threatening a public official. Picture: Kathryn Bermingham

Gillespie agreed that he was angry and had been abusive during the calls in 2018, but he denied making any threats towards Mr Marshall or his family.

“I learnt very early on in the piece that you cannot say anything harmful or say kill or death, to any politician because they have to report to the police immediately,” he said.

Gillespie is accused of making the threats during two phone calls to Mr Marshall’s electoral office on September 6, 2018.

Both phone calls lasted around a minute and ended with Gillespie hanging up on electoral assistant Samuel Diprose, who answered the call.

Mr Diprose gave evidence on the first day of the trial that the caller had been angry about the closure of regional and metropolitan TAFE sites.

Gillespie said that was false, he had been enraged about the privatisation of the prisons as well.

He told the jury that he referred to the privatisation as “human trafficking” in an effort to change the policy.

Gillespie said he made no attempt to disguise his phone number or who he was but was surprised when police appeared at his door an hour after the two phone calls.