David Harrison murder: How Emma Barrett organised the killing of her lover
It’s a recipe for murder not out of place in a Tarantino film — a mix of horrific violence and cold-blooded callousness with a hint of sociopathic motive on a bed of raw sexual energy.
Newcastle
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It is well into the early hours of Saturday and David Harrison is slumped on a chair next to an old shed in the backyard of a rundown Muswellbrook house.
The young man already has one knife wound to his face. Blood is gushing from the slash across his cheek but it is debatable about whether, in his semiconscious state, Harrison would have been able to grasp the brutal gravity of what was about to occur.
In a town known as the blue heeler capital of Australia, the next hour or so would become an ocker take on the Tarantino film Reservoir Dogs.
And this recipe for murder has been complex. A mixture of horrific levels of violence and cold-blooded callousness with a hint of sociopathic motive on a bed of raw sexual energy and high drug use.
It is homicide in a slow cooker after a meticulous preparation.
Harrison’s only crime was that he had fallen for the wrong woman, herself surviving a terrible upbringing that has moulded her into what some would suggest was a black widow-type.
A young mother who had used sex as a passport for existence and would use lust as a weapon for murder.
And detectives investigating Harrison’s suspicious disappearance and ultimate death would make up their own secret moniker for the unique Emma Barrett – The She-Devil.
FALLING IN LOVE WITH EVIL
David Harrison was infatuated with Barrett as soon as their eyes met on a lonely dairy farm in South Australia in 2004.
Harrison, then 21, had moved from Shepparton for the job. His ability to work with cattle was well-respected and he went to the farm to learn more about animal husbandry.
He also learnt about lust.
Barrett was 18 and a mother of two children. The pair hit it off instantly and the relationship only ceased — for the first time — when Barrett became the victim of a horrific kidnapping at gunpoint by a former partner.
Harrison rushed back to Victoria. But he never stopped thinking about Barrett and he knew they would meet again.
And the lovebirds again find each other when Harrison travelled back to South Australia to give evidence at the kidnapping trial in 2006.
Barrett would move to NSW following the trial, trying to remain incognito despite her kidnapper getting jail time. He would get out one day and the best thing for her and the kids was to find a new life far away from his violent ways.
And so she picked Curlewis, a tiny village just south of Gunnedah on the northwest slopes. Harrison moved up and the pair created a little love nest.
It is here she would meet Dean Reginald Fordham and create a bizarre love triangle that would lead to constant jealousy and hot-headed threats of violence.
Fordham also fell quickly for Barrett. And Harrison was still desperate for a monogamous relationship with The She-Devil.
Barrett was well aware of the hold she had on both men. She had learnt how to use sex as a tool when she was trying to survive as a teenage prostitute.
There would be no doubt that her abusive formative years had skewed her thought process involving intimacy.
And now she had two men who would do almost anything for her. Including murder.
SEX, LIES AND A HIT LIST
As far as premeditated murders go, the planning for this hit would be a slow blossom.
Barrett carefully and manipulatively planted the seed and slowly nurtured the growing angst against her target, using a mix of Fordham’s low intelligence and propensity for extreme jealousy as the perfect fertiliser.
The seed was in an old pair of Harrison’s trousers that Barrett randomly pulled out in mid to late 2006. It was a piece of paper with names and phone numbers on it.
To all and sundry – both beforehand and afterwards – it was an innocent page ripped out of a contact book.
But Barrett was able to convince Fordham that it was something much more sinister – a secret hit list that Harrison had drawn up.
The young cattleman had a stupid habit of big noting at parties and on the drink that he was a contract killer. There is still no evidence that it ever occurred and, more to the point, no one ever believed him.
Well, not until Fordham arrived. A man who would be described by a NSW Supreme Court judge as “impressionable young man of limited education and intelligence”, Fordham was as gullible as a kid.
So when Fordham took the hit list bait, it was hook-line-sinker stuff. And what got him even more riled up was that there were two names on the list which he knew – his own and his lover’s.
If The She-Devil needed motive, she just found it. And that was because she felt Harrison needed to be out of the way. But instead of ending any on-and-off relationship, she wanted him gone. Forever.
And the reason was never revealed.
Harrison found himself back in Victoria in about April 2007. And he had a plan.
He would tell his mother he needed to earn as much cash as possible to support Barrett and the children. That they would live happily ever after.
But his plan was different from Barrett’s. And when things again started to cool off, Harrison made a decision which would really get the murder process in motion.
By May 2007, Harrison was getting increasingly frustrated with Barrett. She had moved to Muswellbrook with Fordham and was sporadic at returning texts at best. And by June, his jealousy was getting the better of him.
He sent a few nasty texts.
“Your just like ya mum a using bitch f—k u I will make sure everyone knows where u are I will make life hell 4 u and ya kids r f—ked,’’ read one.
And another: “Like I say u f—k with my heart u get whats coming to u.’’
As the sentencing judge was to later say: “It is apparent in retrospect that it was these messages which ultimately sealed the deceased’s fate’’
Barrett may have taken the “I will make sure everyone knows where u are” as a threat to tell her ex-partner and kidnapper of her new life.
And the threats to the children were obvious. Whether they should have been taken seriously from Harrison is another thing. But they were definitely threats.
Something had to be done. Barrett showed Fordham the texts and they agreed it was time for Harrison to go.
Barrett reached out to Harrison and was able to lure him back to Muswellbrook. And, in the meantime, the murder plan was put into place.
Fordham drives to the Central Coast and makes a number of purchases for the burgeoning murder kit.
The first was a car for $500, registered under a fictitious name. They also bought a Wiltshire carving knife, which would become the murder weapon, garbage bags, bleach and numerous sheets and blankets.
Barrett also wrote several notes setting out varying methods of committing the murder and getting rid of Harrison’ body.
One of the notes, later found buried on a Fordham’s family’s property, read: “Wipe him out of existence, go somewheretwo hours out, burn his body, bushland or bury him in bushland, keep driving half an hour out somewhere, burn the parked car, take the number places, dispose off them on the way then burn all the evidence, drop me off at home, go somewhere about one or two hours out and burn the car.’’
TOO MANY TARANTINO FILMS
Harrison leaves home on June 21, 2007, telling his parents he would be back in time for work the following Monday. They would never see him again.
He arrives at Fordham and Barrett’s home on Maitland Rd at Muswellbrook in the early hours of Friday, June 22.
Being so early, Harrison decides to climb through a window rather than knock on the door. But that riles Fordham up even more.
The initial plan was to lure him into the garage that day before Fordham was to slide up behind him and cut his throat. But it was foiled when Harrison refuses to go into the garage.
Instead, Harrison and Barrett went out together that night. Fordham was told to stay home and go into attack mode when they got back.
The trio spend the day together. Fordham had lost a close friend in a car accident the previous day and is drinking heavily. Barrett is having her usual daily dose of between 20 and 30 cones of cannabis.
Barrett and Harrison go out and were set to return about 2am. Harrison goes into a service station for something to eat and Barrett rings Fordham to tell him.
She would later claim she pleaded with Fordham to not kill him. It was an obvious ploy to diminish her role in the murder.
But the call goes for 21 seconds. Hardly enough time to plead the case to keep a man alive.
As Barrett and Harrison arrive back at Maitland Rd, Fordham walks out with the Wiltshire knife up his sleeve. As Harrison gets out of the driver’s seat, he is stabbed in the face.
He tries to run off but Fordham catches him and drags him back to the house.
Harrison is thrown onto the chair next to the shed, badly injured with the facial cut.
Barrett walks back into the house for a few more cones, aware but apparently uncaringly happy to leave the killing to her lover.
And Fordham goes to work, just like in that movie. More than 30 times he stabs Harrison, all over his body. It is horrific.
When he is done, he walks inside to smoke some weed with Barrett. And the second scene plays out.
Some time later, Barrett walks outside to see Fordham’s murderous handiwork.
But, somehow, through her cannabis-infused, glazed-over eyes, Barrett sees Harrison is still breathing. What?
“He’s still alive,’’ Barrett yells.
The pair then make another sadistic pact – they would both take turns to stab Harrison again.
One lunge each and Harrison is dead.
They place Harrison’s body into the boot of his own car, and Fordham gets in the driver’s seat.
Barrett follows in the $500 bomb they bought with a dodgy name and they head to Greta, towards Newcastle, where they bury Harrison next to a large tree but only about 100 metres from hours.
They later return to pour concrete over the top.
Later that day, they head to Newcastle where Harrison’s car runs out of petrol at Mayfield. They abandon it but not before smashing a window and taking the stereo to make it look like it had been stolen.
Within days, Harrison’s distraught family report him missing. But not before Barrett tries to hide her tracks by calling Harrison’s phone 14 times and sending him 28 texts between June 23 and June 27.
By June 30, police ring Barrett asking if she had seen Harrison. She says he left early on June 23 (the Saturday morning he was murdered) and that he was going to Newcastle.
On July 2, Barrett tells Harrison’s distraught mum that: “David really loved me and I loved David very much.’’
Barrett and Fordham move out of the Muswellbrook home and go their separate ways, almost certainly because of the increased pressure on their relationship because of their secret.
Barrett ends up at a refuge at Gosford, and she can not keep it to herself any longer. She blurts out a confession to another woman, who tells police.
The ruse is up, and detectives pull Fordham in. He tells them everything and takes them everywhere to find evidence.
For his help, he gets a significantly reduced sentence and is now on parole. Barrett gets 22 years’ jail with 16 years on the bottom. She is eligible to be released in just over two years.
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