Families taunted online the forgotten victims of Queensland’s youth crime crisis
Kelly and her family’s grief after her daughter Jemmah’s horrific death feels forbidden, and after the worst moment of their lives they were targeted by hundreds of online trolls. Read her heartbreaking story
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The first time Kelly Cole saw her daughter Jemmah she was mesmerised by the giant blue eyes that were staring back at her and her little tufts of silvery blonde hair.
Jemmah Cole-Crighton was Kelly’s first child, the always bubbly and cheeky girl who made her a mum, and to this day the overwhelming feelings of love and gratitude when she first held her is one of her most cherished memories.
The last time Kelly would ever see Jemmah was 24 years later on the morning of January 13, 2023, just hours after her daughter was in a high-speed fiery car crash on the Warrego Highway in the Lockyer Valley.
Jemmah was unrecognisable.
Ninety-five per cent of her body had been catastrophically burnt, her long blonde hair and even her internal organs were gone, and the doctors at the Royal Brisbane and Women’s Hospital were keeping her alive long enough for her family to say goodbye.
“I just lost it – the hardest part is you bring them into the world, you don’t expect to hold them in your arms when they’re dying,” Kelly said.
The searing pain in that moment has been scarred into Kelly’s mind, but within hours her grief would only worsen when hundreds of online trolls would taunt her and celebrate Jemmah’s death on social media when it was revealed the car she was travelling in had been stolen.
The forgotten victims of Queensland’s youth crime crisis
Kelly and her family were left to pick up the pieces of their shattered lives.
Their grief felt forbidden, and they were offered little to no sympathy from the wider community, even though Kelly and other parents like her are themselves victims of the youth crime crisis gripping Queensland but completely forgotten.
But they are not the only family to go through such a harrowingly unique experience.
Across the Darling Downs last year, three young women died as a result of stolen car crashes.
Jemmah was one of Queensland’s first road fatalities in 2023, and in a horrible twist of fate several months later, her girlfriend Heidi Riding, 18, died in similar circumstances when the stolen car she was a passenger in crashed at more than 150km/hr just after midnight at a Toowoomba intersection on July 14.
In both instances the alleged drivers survived.
And a sign that the deadly car theft epidemic is not slowing down, 20-year-old Danyelle Williams was killed in the final hours of 2023 on New Year’s Eve after the stolen Triton ute she was driving near Warwick crashed.
Each time, a heartbroken family was left behind to not only deal with the overwhelming sorrow of losing a child but also navigate an onslaught of horrendous comments and messages from strangers online.
“The comments started, and it went from there and it didn’t stop for weeks and weeks,” Kelly said through tears.
“We’re the ones left behind to deal with this.
“This has changed me forever – there’s a hole in my heart that won’t ever heal.
“I want people to know Jemmah wasn’t the person that everyone was labelling her as; a druggo, a thief or someone who goes around stealing cars.
“She never stole a car ever – yes – she did fall into a bad spot, but that doesn’t make her the bad person that the online trolls were painting her as.”
For parents Shane Riding and Raylene Donald, both say they have been left traumatised by the dozens of disgusting messages sent to their daughter Heidi’s Facebook account in the wake of her death.
‘What do you call a junkie that hits a tree at 150km/hr? Heidi Riding,’’ reads one of the messages sent to the teenager’s account.
“Their behaviour has given me PTSD, we don’t want sympathy, we just want empathy,” Raylene said.
“I haven’t been able to sleep at night because of the things they sent to Heidi, knowing that the family would read it.
“I have the deepest of empathy for anyone who has had their car stolen or house broken into, but it’s the family they’re hurting.”
‘Jemmah was more than a bad split-second decision’
Covering a huge section of Kelly’s living room wall are photos of Jemmah throughout her life.
Each one a reminder to Kelly of her daughter’s bubbly and warm spirit that come through in each photograph showing the 24-year-old’s beaming smile and her arms wrapped around siblings and friends.
It has become Kelly’s memorial to her thoughtful daughter who had grown up doting on her younger siblings, playing practical jokes with her stepdad Mick and who had a passion for cheerleading and dance during high school.
“I look at it all the time. The first thing I do after coming home from work is say ‘hello’ to her, let her know how my day was. We all talk to her,” she said.
“Every day I always focus on that area, and I always light a candle for her. They’re good memories.”
Kelly said although Jemmah had fallen in with a bad crowd, she had been raised in a loving household with rules and taught right from wrong.
She said her daughter had a maternal instinct with dreams of starting a family, and her love for helping others led her to a career as a disability support worker.
“That beautiful smile of hers, she would light up a room, the laugh she had was gorgeous,” she said.
“They’re the things you miss the most because you don’t hear them anymore – it leaves a lull because you don’t hear it and you’ve heard it for so long and then it’s cut short.
“I think about her a thousand times a day. I wake up every morning and relive the nightmare.”
She is determined to keep Jemmah’s memory alive by constantly talking about her and finds herself most nights re-watching the funny videos she would record and send to family and friends.
“In the hospital I could barely recognise her. Her beautiful hair was gone, and she was just so burnt,” Kelly said.
“And then you have people say just nasty things about her, and it’s just not fair that’s the last image I’ve ever got of my daughter.
“This is why I have all these things up in the house, so I can remember her and how beautiful she was. And she deserves to be remembered.
“She wasn’t a horrible person, she was the most caring and kind person I’ve ever known.”
‘Don’t make the same mistake’
Bonded by the relationship their daughters had during their lives and now through the agonising experience of losing Jemmah and Heidi in similarly horrific circumstances, Kelly and her husband Mick and Shane and Raylene are determined to get the message out to young people to not get into suspected stolen cars.
“(I want them to) stop and think because it’s not only the repercussions on them, it’s the repercussions on the family,” Kelly said.
“If something happens to you, we’re the ones who have to live with it for the rest of our lives. We have got to pick up the pieces, and they need to think of their families before they do what they do.
“It’s not worth losing your life over or getting in trouble with police over one stupid mistake.”
Originally published as Families taunted online the forgotten victims of Queensland’s youth crime crisis
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