Amanda Carter murder: Ricardo Da Silva killed her 10 years ago today
There was no sign of forced entry, no weapon was ever found and no eyewitnesses. The case against Ricardo Da Silva was purely circumstantial. Here’s the evidence he fought to suppress, in a murder that rocked the Central Coast 10 years ago today.
Central Coast
Don't miss out on the headlines from Central Coast. Followed categories will be added to My News.
The late Kevin Pearce was a big man who had seen a lot in his many years as a respected solicitor and as chairman of Wyong Leagues Club.
He appeared briefly before Wyong Local Court on behalf of accused killer Ricardo Francis Herman Da Silva, who had been charged over the weekend of November 30, 2013, with the murder of Amanda Carter.
His arrest was the culmination of a three-year investigation.
After the brief appearance, where he did not apply for his client’s bail, Mr Pearce made his way through the foyer of the court when he was approached by a journalist he knew well who asked — off the record — the one question everyone wanted to know: “Did he do it?”
Mr Pearce paused for a moment, as if he too had been wrestling with the same lingering doubt.
He told the reporter Da Silva had looked him in the eye, calm as you like and denied having anything to do with Ms Carter’s death.
“When you’ve done this job for as long as I have you get a good instinct for the one’s who are telling the truth and the one’s who aren’t,” Mr Pearce said.
The big man leant in and added “but if he did, he’s the best liar I’ve ever met”.
Da Silva went through a lot of lawyers after Mr Pearce. Some he fired, some washed their hands of him.
Every time it was yet another delay, another stall tactic to avoid facing trial for the murder of popular Wyong High School maths teacher, mother-of-three and soccer referee Ms Carter.
The pair met on the RSVP dating site in 2006 and after an on-again, off-again relationship he moved in to her Woongarrah home in 2009 and they became engaged in November.
A month later their relationship deteriorated and by Valentine’s Day 2010 Ms Carter, then aged 46, called it quits for good and later gave him a formal written notice to vacate her premises.
In the months that followed Da Silva, a then 60-year-old real estate agent, became increasingly erratic, bombarding her with calls and messages, working odd hours and drinking on the job.
On March 29, 2010, Da Silva made an anonymous telephone call to the Principal at Wyong High School and alleged Ms Carter was having an inappropriate sexual relationship with one of her students at the school.
He sent the school a letter to the same effect along with letters to the Express Advocate and Newcastle Herald.
In the early hours of April 3, 2010, Da Silva called Ms Carter telling her that he had taken pills. She reported the matter to the police who took him to a local mental health unit for assessment.
During April 2010, Da Silva entered Ms Carter’s home one morning in the early hours, gaining access through the laundry.
Ms Carter was on her computer in her study at the time and discovered Da Silva heading towards her bedroom.
On another occasion he let himself in and accessed her computer, printing out a “chat log” she had had with another man she had met on a dating site before she met Da Silva.
On May 8, 2010, Da Silva went to Ms Carter’s home uninvited to give her some paperwork relating to a cat he had purchased for her.
Not long after the cat disappeared, never to be seen again.
Three days later Da Silva was spotted at Wyong High School and the principal spoke to Ms Carter about taking formal steps to prevent him entering the grounds again.
Ms Carter inquired at Wyong Local Court about taking out an AVO.
At 11.53am on May 15 — the day before she was killed — Ms Carter sent an email to her friend Elwyn Bennett which included a line that Da Silva “seems to have gone past the not accepting stage and is entering the angry stage”.
The rest of the afternoon Ms Carter was at Pluim Park, Lisarow, refereeing soccer.
At 9.40pm, a 4WD vehicle similar to Da Silva’s was seen driving down the bike path near Ms Carter’s house and onto Peppercorn Ave, Woongarrah.
At 9.56pm, Ms Carter sent a routine email from her home computer about refereeing duties.
That was her last known communication with anyone.
Sometime thereafter Da Silva entered her home and beat her to death with an unidentified weapon, which to this day has never been found.
She was in her bed at the time and he took the time to pull the sheets up neatly before placing a pan of cooking oil on the stove in the kitchen and lighting the wrong burner.
The pan never caught fire and about 10am the next day Ms Carter’s youngest adult daughter and her boyfriend returned home and discovered the burner on and her mother’s gruesome murder.
A Supreme Court Justice would later describe that Ms Carter “had been beaten so ferociously that her face was unrecognisable”.
Da Silva was charged and later convicted of making false accusations about Ms Carter in the letters he sent and was sentenced to two years jail.
Two other men Ms Carter had met through online dating sites were interviewed and quickly ruled out as suspects.
Police searched multiple properties around where Da Silva worked at Charmhaven and divers searched nearby dams for any trace of the murder weapon that could link him to the scene.
Ms Carter’s three adult children made an emotional public appeal for information.
The officer in charge (OIC) Detective Sergeant Mark Conway was relentless in his pursuit for evidence.
The officer forewent promotions so he could stay on the case and travelled to Trinidad and Tobago to interview people who knew Da Silva before he immigrated to Australia in 1971.
Over time he compiled a list of 64 witnesses including ex-girlfriends who gave statements documenting years of shocking abuse at the hand of Da Silva.
THE EVIDENCE HE DID NOT WANT A JURY TO SEE
On the eve of a six-week trial at Newcastle, Da Silva’s Legal Aid lawyer — at least his fifth since his initial arrest — argued to vacate the matter to allow a computer expert to analyse Ms Carter’s computer.
The assertion was Da Silva believed there would be logs of further chats Ms Carter had with other men, which could cast doubt that he was the only man capable of her murder.
All along he maintained he had fallen asleep watching TV that night and “an unknown and unidentified person with whom she connected on one or other of the adult sites that she had utilised” may have been responsible.
But the application was ultimately rejected by the Supreme Court because “the prospect that such a computer analysis would uncover a person who can be demonstrated to have murdered Ms Carter in fact is speculative and remote at best”.
In another last ditch bid, Da Silva’s defence applied to have tendency evidence in the form of several statements from ex-girlfriends to be ruled inadmissable because they would prejudice a jury.
However a Supreme Court Justice allowed the statements to be tendered after finding “the probative value of the evidence substantially outweighs any prejudicial effect it may have on Mr Da Silva”.
Included in that evidence was a statement from his first wife who he married in 1974 and who he choked in the back of a van they used to do a milk run in.
“He also kicked her in the legs and kicked her cat to death,” the Supreme Court judgment read.
She escaped his violent clutches after Da Silva started cheating on her with a woman who was one of their milk run customers.
He later threw her against a refrigerator, punched her knocking out three of her front teeth and kept kicking her while she lay on the floor.
She also had a cockatoo. Da Silva told her “You love that cockatoo more than me” and the bird went missing after that.
Another woman he met on the RSVP website in about 2002 became an alcoholic and attempted suicide after he kept her “a slave” and broke her shoulder by pushing her over.
Da Silva was sentenced to 24 years jail with a non-parole period of 18 years after a jury found him guilty of Ms Carter’s murder.
He never took the stand and in handing down his sentence the Supreme Court Justice said the expressionless Da Silva never showed remorse.
With time already served he will be eligible for parole on November 30, 2031.
He will be 82.