THERE were two sides to Cy Walsh, witnesses claim — the eccentric spiritualist who adored his father and the hallucinating, bitter man who wished his father dead.
Witness statements released to The Advertiser by the courts paint two vastly different pictures of Walsh, who was suffering a psychotic episode, due to undiagnosed and untreated schizophrenia, when he stabbed his father — Adelaide Crows coach Phil Walsh — to death on July 3, 2015.
Some witnesses describe Walsh as a gentle and caring person, keen to debate politics, economics and religion, who considered his father a “super man” and someone to emulate.
Others say Walsh was wracked with insecurity, crippled by congenital knee problems that stopped him playing football, and convinced his father considered him a disappointment.
One of Phil Walsh’s oldest friends, Graeme Watt, told SA Police nothing could have been further from the truth.
“Phil wasn’t like that at all — he was really laid back and all he wanted for his kids was for them to be happy,” he says in his statement, tendered with the court.
“Phil wasn’t even worried about Cy getting a job.”
Common among the witness statements are descriptions of Walsh as “eccentric” or having “an alternate outlook” on life.
In her statement, family friend Kim Annear says Walsh “loved to debate and discuss issues”, but would often say things that would “strike her as odd”.
She says he once asked her, and other people he considered influential in his life, to recommend five books that he should read.
Ms Annear’s son, Harrison, says Walsh was “always into gaming and reading books” and was “always philosophical and spiritual”.
Pretty much every conversation about Cy was about philosophy, and he had very strong opinions.
“A fair bit of conversation with Cy was to do with politics as well.”
His brother, Oliver Annear, describes Walsh as “quite academic and intelligent”, as well as “peaceful”.
Adelaide Crows midfielder Rory Sloane says he “got the impression” that his coach’s son was “a bit different” based on the conversations he had with the young man.
“Cy and I had a discussion about religion and, particularly, which religion might make sense for certain people to live by,” he says in his statement.
Sloane says the father-son relationship appeared to be a tight bond.
“I distinctly remember that when Cy spoke, Phil was really engaged with him and taking everything he said in,” he says.
“They seemed really happy together.”
Childhood friend Bradley Fisk says Walsh was “very different” to his father.
“I remember Phil was very sport, sport, sport, and then home, home, home, and then sport, sport, sport,” he says in his statement.
“Cy was more comfortable playing shoot ‘em up video games than sport, though … I felt that Cy felt he and his dad were on a different spectrum.
“(But) there was no real hatred toward his dad …
Cy thought he wasn’t good enough in his father’s perception, though, because he had trouble with his knees and didn’t play AFL.
“If he did any sport, he dislocated his knees.”
Mr Fisk says he believed Walsh “didn’t really like” his father being “a football superstar”.
“Phil was a bit of a hard-arse because he wanted Cy to achieve and would tell him to pull his finger out,” he says.
“Phil probably pushed Cy toward goals but Cy didn’t set goals … he didn’t have any plans after high school … he was a bit of a hazy and ‘off with the fairies’ kind of guy.”
In his statement, high school friend Paul Kramberger disagrees.
He says Walsh was inspired by US podcaster Joe Rogan to take a “zen, spiritualist” approach to life and “be a better person”, and would buy books for friends to boost their self-improvement.
“Cy wanted to live his life the most positive way he could and he wanted to help other people living with the same problem that he had, his bad knees, his congenital condition,” he says.
“I think he wanted to play footy to make his dad proud … I think he admired him and thought he was a really super man.
“Cy thought Phil was so passionate and loved what he did so much that he could always find a way to get past things and solve stuff.
“He loved his dedication to things and I think Cy tried really hard to be as good as his dad and show the same qualities his dad had.
“He told me his dad was a good leader and knew how to speak to people, which he also admired.”
Mr Kramberger says Walsh “suffered from loneliness and inadequacy”, having “copped a bit” during school, where he was not among the popular students.
The Annear brothers say Walsh was a habitual consumer of drugs but insist he did not use ice or methylamphetamine.
In his statement, Harrison says he knew Walsh drank “hallucinogenic juices”, while Oliver says he smoked cannabis as well.
“In early 2013, Cy produced a black liquid substance in a little container with a screw-on lid … he offered it to us and explained it was something called ayahuasca,” Oliver says.
“He told us it was a South American drug and was taken as part of their culture … he said it would make you hallucinate but he didn’t say for how long.”
Oliver Annear says he chose not to try the substance, and he was not alone among Walsh’s friends.
“No one else in our friendship group was taking ayahuasca because we were really against it … we didn’t want to try any of it,” Mr Kramberger says in his statement.
“Cy called it ‘The Medicine’ … it’s an ancient Amazonian drink made from leaves and bark — at least, that’s what Cy told me.
He told me you have to have a shaman to go through the spirit world (and in) ceremonies demons would haunt him but the shaman would protect you.
“Eventually you would get to the end and you would see that it’s all about love.”
Another high school friend, Stephen Trobbiani, says ayahuasca was part of Walsh’s daily routine when he lived in Perth, along with other drugs including magic mushrooms.
“He told me he had a group of friends (in Perth) who also consumed ayahuasca and he called this group of friends ‘The Community’,” he says in his statement.
“When he became interested in psychotropic drugs, he thought everyone should do them.”
After his May 2014 altercation with his father, and treatment in WA’s Graylands mental health facility, Walsh lived for several months with his aunt, Jenny Finch.
In her statement, Mrs Finch says Walsh enjoyed living and working on her cereal and cattle farm in Moriac, Victoria, but was prone to making “unusual comments” about “God and spirituality”.
“There was one night that I had this intense discussion with Cy … he was talking passionately about a power and a hierarchy that’s ‘out there’, something about warriors,” she says.
“He was saying there are powerful people at the top and then there’s inferior ones down the bottom … he said he could see things in people that other people couldn’t see.
“I asked him ‘what can you see in me?’ and he said ‘I can see you are a very loving, caring mother’ … we were embracing each other at the time and it was quite emotional.”
Mrs Finch says Walsh left the farm and travelled to Bali, after which he returned to Adelaide and the family home at Somerton Park.
Walsh’s former girlfriend, Nozomi Inoue, told police his behaviour continued to deteriorate, and he was quick to anger over things like spilled coffee or “bad calls” by football umpires.
In her statement, she says his talk of conspiracies continued — a result, she suspected, of continued hallucinogenic drug use, though he denied this.
“In May 2015, Cy told me that he had just spoken to a saint or an angel,” she says.
“He explained that he spoke to them about his future and the angel had told him to apply for the army and he would be successful.
“Cy said that happened because he was meditating.”
Despite Cy Walsh’s ayahusca use, toxicological analysis following his father’s death excluded the drug from having played any role in the incident.
That analysis further concluded no other drugs contributed to the vicious attack.
Three mental health experts agreed Cy Walsh’s actions were prompted by undiagnosed, untreated schizophrenia, masked by his “preoccupation” with illicit drugs.
Those substances, they concluded, would have exacerbated his illness but were “not the fundamental cause” of his mental health issues.
If anything, these misguided effort to address the early manifestations of his illness through self-medication only worsened its progress.
READ MORE ON THE WALSH FAMILY TRAGEDY
Cy Walsh: Spiralling into psychosis — the last 48 hours
Fistfight in Perth: His turbulent relationship with Phil Walsh