Paramedic Des Campbell found guilty of killing wealthy wife

PARAMEDIC Des Campbell murdered his wealthy wife by pushing her off a cliff while camping in a national park, jury decides.

Janet and Des Campbell

PARAMEDIC Des Campbell murdered his wealthy wife Janet by pushing her off a cliff while camping in the Royal National Park in NSW, a jury has decided.

After deliberating for more than a week, inspecting the scene for a second time and receiving a direction that they could hand down an 11-1 verdict, the panel of six male and six female jurors found the 52-year-old guilty of killing his third wife on March 24, 2005.

An unshaven Campbell showed no reaction as the verdict was announced, maintaining the same poker face he has held in place for most of the three-week trial.

He had not spent any time behind bars since the allegations were first raised in 2007, but he was taken into custody as the jury began its deliberations last week - and it’s there he will remain ahead of a sentencing hearing on a date to be fixed.

Mrs Campbell's group of close-knit siblings from her home town of Deniliquin were not in court to hear the decision, nor was Campbell’s current wife.

During Campbell's Supreme Court trial, the jury heard he met Janet "Jenny" Fisicaro, as she was formerly known, through her work as an administration clerk at Deniliquin Hospital.

The affair between the much-loved, homely farming widow and the local "cad" with a reputation for being a "gold-digger" fuelled the small Riverina town's gossip mill and greatly worried her family.

Despite their warnings that Campbell was only after the estate left to her by her late husband, Frank, Ms Fisicaro married him in a secret ceremony in Victoria in September 2004.

Soon after, they bought a house together in Otford, near Wollongong, which was placed in joint names even though the new Mrs Campbell paid the deposit and poured nearly $160,000 into the purchase.

Throughout their courtship and six-month marriage, Campbell had affairs with three different women, bringing two of them to the Otford home to stay before his wife joined him there six days prior to her death.

Before they were married, Campbell's NSW Ambulance workmates told the court he spoke of his bride-to-be in derogatory terms, calling her a "fat, ugly slut."

His sister-in-law, Toni Sanderson, also said he told her a woman named Janet was stalking him and she was "filthy rich" and wanted to buy him a sports car but he "didn't know if he could bring himself to sleep with her."

Campbell claimed his wife fell from the cliff by accident after leaving the tent to go to the toilet not long after sunset.

Experts agreed that a partial sneaker print found at the edge of the cliff suggested Mrs Campbell either tripped or was pushed.

However, they also agreed that in order for her to have tripped, she would have to have been walking at a brisk pace directly towards the edge.

As she was scared of heights, had good eyesight and balance, and it was a clear night, the Crown submitted this scenario was "manifestly absurd."

After his wife's death, Campbell didn't attend her funeral, which he claimed was taken out of his hands by her family.

Instead, he went on a luxury holiday to Townsville with one of his girlfriends, Gorica Velicanski, and was photographed lounging on a sun-bed by the resort pool at Jupiter's Casino.

When he got back, he proposed to Ms Velicanski, who owned properies at Drummoyne and Budgewoi.

In the same time period, the court heard he went to singles parties and promoted himself on dating websites as "looking for a soul-mate."

When his relationship with Ms Velicanski broke down, he soon found love again on a Filipino dating website, where he met his fourth and current wife, Melissa.

The Daily Telegraph reports that Campbell first travelled to the Philippines to visit her in May 2005 - just six weeks after Mrs Campbell's death.

They were married at the Otford house in January 2006.