David Bagster: Jury finds man accused of Woonona wheelie bin death guilty

The second trial into the Woonona wheelie bin death has reached a unanimous verdict in Wollongong District Court some 11 years after Valmai ‘Jane’ Birch’s rotting body was discovered.

The man who hogtied his partner and dumped her in a wheelie bin, resulting in her death, has been found guilty of manslaughter in Wollongong District Court on Friday.

David Bagster, 55, had pleaded not guilty to the manslaughter of Valmai ‘Jane’ Birch, 34, whose rotting corpse was found upside down in a wheelie bin in March 2011.

The jury, made up of eight men and five women, reached a unanimous guilty verdict after a two-week trial and four days of deliberations.

Bagster shook his head as the verdict was read out before removing his glasses and placing them in his shirt pocket.

David Bagster was arrested over the 2011 death last year. Picture: NSW Police

The verdict comes a year on from an initial trial where the jury were unable to reach a verdict.

Judge Andrew Haesler told the court that now that Bagster was guilty, he was facing up to 25 years behind bars.

Bagster was arrested in February last year, nearly 10 years after police found the bin - which was half filled with water - in Ms Birch’s bathroom after being alerted by a neighbour of a foul odour coming from her Woods Ave, Woonona unit.

Ms Birch had been in what the Crown described as a “volatile” relationship with Bagster with the use of illicit drugs a common feature of the bond.

Valmai Birch caught on CCTV in 2011. Picture: NSW Police

The prosecutor told the jury Bagster had told police they “had fun together”, that even though they did argue, they would “work things out” and he had helped maintain Ms Birch’s Woonona address by mowing the lawn, taking the bins out and scrubbing them clean.

The court also heard Ms Birch had complained about violence and being tied up to her friends, who reported to police seeing bruises on her neck and wrists.

A post-mortem examination at the time said the clear cause of death was inconclusive given the state of decomposition of her body.

The examiner concluded it was likely positional asphyxia due to her being upside down in the bin, neck compressions, drowning or a drug overdose – or a combination of those – could have caused her death.

Bagster’s defence barrister Scott Fraser had told the jury at the beginning of the trial that the relationship between his client and Ms Birch was not in dispute, however, physical violence was “very much in dispute”.

Bagster will be sentenced in the same court on Friday, September 30, 2022.