Toby Loughnane facing Supreme Court murder trial over death of girlfriend Maryam Hamka

Maryam Hamka’s abusive on-off boyfriend Toby Loughnane sent her a series of death threats before he allegedly murdered her at his Brighton home, a jury has heard.

Toby Loughnane is accused of murdering his girlfriend Maryam Hamka in 2021.

Accused killer Toby Loughnane filmed a “distressing” video “mocking and degrading” his slain girlfriend Maryam Hamka who was crying and naked from the waist down just hours before she was allegedly murdered, a court has heard.

Neighbours heard a woman screaming and sobbing for hours at the Brighton home of Mr Loughnane, her abusive on-off boyfriend, on the night prosecutors say he murdered her, about 3am on April 11, 2021.

A Supreme Court murder trial was on Tuesday told that after she was dead, Mr Loughnane contacted his friend Oscar Newman at about 11am asking him to come over because he was withdrawing and needing drugs.

When Mr Newman arrived, Crown prosecutor Kristie Churchill said he found blood splattered on the walls, human faeces on the floor, and saw Ms Hamka’s naked body, with a swollen face, lying upright in the corner of the shower.

A court heard hours before her alleged murder Maryam Hamka’s boyfriend filmed a ‘distressing’ video of her.

Within days, Mr Newman – who will give evidence during the trial – would agree to purchase a steam cleaner from Gumtree to clean the Brighton home.

During a search warrant on April 16, police found an “overpowering” scent of cleaning products and a soaked carpet.

They arrested Mr Loughnane, who claimed he didn’t know his girlfriend was missing despite having sent text messages to her phone for days that had gone unanswered.

Then more than two years later, in May 2023, the court heard Mr Loughnane gave police directions via his lawyers to where Ms Hamka’s body could be found, hidden in a grave in a national park at the Mornington Peninsula’s Cape Schanck.

After police failed to locate her remains, the accused killer went with officers to the scene and “pointed out landmarks” where she was buried, with human bones found in a grave filled with lime that had been disturbed by animals.

Ms Churchill said fractures were later found on Ms Hamka’s bones, including to her eye, nasal bones and behind her ear.

But Mr Loughnane, via his lawyer, instead claimed “Ms Hamka didn’t succumb to violence … (rather) that she tragically and unfortunately did succumb to a drug overdose” as the pair were heavy users of GHB.

Mr Loughnane initially claimed he didn’t know his girlfriend Maryam Hamka was missing.

Defence barrister Daniel Sala said his client had “accepted responsibility for the death of Ms Hamka” by pleading guilty to negligent manslaughter – a plea the prosecution refused.

The court heard that the relationship between Ms Hamka and Mr Loughnane was marred by horror domestic violence, with his own lawyer telling the jury “you probably have … feelings of hatred towards Mr Loughnane”.

Mr Sala conceded that footage Mr Loughnane filmed of Ms Hamka on a tablet in the hours before her death was “not a nice video” and that “no-one … wants to show you”, but that it was a “critical and crucial piece of evidence”.

“It’s a piece of evidence you simply cannot overlook,” he said.

For months before her death, the court heard that Mr Loughnane had been sending his girlfriend abusive texts and death threats, even notifying her friends to “tell Maryam she’s dead”, while other friends noticed injuries to her body.

In February 2021, after he threw a ladder at her and a friend who was over for dinner, he messaged Ms Hamka that he’d “go to jail just to see you suffer … I’ll f---king murder you c--- … if it’s the last thing I do.”

Just weeks before she died, Mr Loughnane texted Ms Hamka: “I will beat you beyond recognition within two inches of your life … I’m going to cut your f--king head off, you better hope the cops come for your sake I’m going to literally kill you.”

As details of the abuse suffered by Ms Hamka were read to the jury, a woman in the public gallery could be heard breaking down in tears and had to walk out of the room.

Ms Hamka was last seen by her mother outside their Brunswick home on April 10, when she saw her daughter driving away with Mr Loughane after he screamed at her to “get in the f--king car now”.

It’s the prosecution’s case that within hours, Ms Hamka would be dead at the hand of her abusive boyfriend.

Earlier on Tuesday, Mr Loughnane pleaded not guilty to murder but guilty to negligent manslaughter, suggesting he breached a duty of care to Ms Hamka that had caused her death.

But his plea offer was denied by the prosecution, who are forging on with their murder case.

The trial, before Justice Christopher Beale, continues on Wednesday where the first witnesses are expected to be called to give evidence.