‘That’s not fair man’: Baxter’s DV order protests as full conversation with cops released

Killer Rowan Baxter acted like the victim and protested a domestic violence order saying he's ‘never, ever done anything’ during an extended conversation with police weeks before he murdered his family. SEE THE FULL DETAILS

A belligerent Rowan Baxter acted confused, bewildered and protested when police arrived at his home to serve him with a police protection notice - despite having days earlier abducted his four-year-old daughter to the shocked screams of his estranged wife.

In a full transcript of his conversation with police, Baxter claimed he’d ‘never, ever done anything’ and said ‘that’s not fair man’ when he was told he would not have access to his children under the police protection order.

Baxter had grabbed his middle child, Laianah, after Hannah brought the children to a park at Bulimba on Boxing Day to spend time with their father.

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Witnesses had watched in shock as he threw the little girl in the front seat of his car and sped off, to the screams and cries of Hannah and the other children, Aaliyah, 6, and Trey, 3.

The inquest heard Baxter took Laianah to New South Wales before returning home to Brisbane a couple of days later. He called police to complain his ex-wife was trying to take the child from him.

Baxter was issued the police protection order after abducting his daughter Laianah.

Hannah and the children were murdered by Baxter on February 19, 2020, when he ambushed them as Hannah was driving them to school.

He doused them with petrol and set them alight before jumping from the car and stabbing himself in the abdomen.

Weeks earlier, police had visited Baxter at his house to serve him with a police protection notice and an application for a domestic violence order.

The notice included an order for him to hand over Laianah so she could be returned to her mother and siblings.

“What is that for?” an apparently confused Baxter said.

“Yeah, domestic violence,” one of the officers said.

“What? What for?” he exclaimed.

Body-worn footage of Baxter sitting in a shopping centre police beat office where he refused to be interviewed after being asked about being wanted for breaching a domestic violence order.

“There’s a reason why they’re doing that,” Baxter continued.

“It’s not fair. I range up last night, man, rang up last night to speak to a lady and I was on the phone for about an hour until 11, worried that someone was going to come in here and make a scene to get one of those on me because that’s what they need to get on me, to get her back. That’s not fair man.”

As the police explained who the order related to, Baxter agreed to his eldest daughter Aaliyah but exclaimed “she can’t say that” when Laianah’s name was read out.

The inquest has previously heard Baxter was cruel to his eldest daughter because she stood up to him.

“This is false,” he told the police.

“But there is nothing, a leg to stand on my friend.”

The officer explained Baxter was not allowed within 100m of his wife and children and that by keeping Laianah, he was in breach of the police protection notice.

“Oh my god, you’re not saying you’re gonna, you can’t really?” Baxter said.

“That’s just not fair man.”

Hannah Clarke and son Trey

He claimed he had ‘never, ever done anything’.

He then continued by giving the officers a rambling diatribe of allegations against Hannah - at one point claiming she had taken his dog while he was “visiting a friend” with his four-year-old daughter who he’d snatched from the park.

“I was just worried (Hannah) was going to pop around because I noticed all my alcohol had been taken because she came back and forth and has been taking stuff, which is fine, I don’t care, but I’m worried she is going to come and make a scene because she has still got the keys,” he said.

Police were able to take Laianah from Baxter and return her to her mother.

Baxter breached the police protection notice six weeks later and murdered his family soon after that.