Behind a 20-year wait for justice in case of murdered mum Irene Jomes

A woman who was last week found guilty of strangling and stabbing her mother to death had attempted to avoid facing trial.

A woman found guilty of murdering her mother at her southwestern Sydney home 20 years ago had attempted to avoid trial – and the reasons she was ordered to face a jury can now be revealed.

A Supreme Court jury last week found Isabela Carolina Camelo-Gomez guilty of murdering her mother Irene Jones in November 2001.

Camelo-Gomez, 47, had pleaded not guilty to murdering Ms Jones, who was found strangled and stabbed in the neck in her Lansvale home.

Before she faced a jury, Camelo-Gomez made an application for a permanent stay of proceedings.

If granted, it would have meant that she would have never faced trial.

However, her application was knocked back by Justice Helen Wilson.

Camelo-Gomez then took her fight to avoid a trial to the Court of Criminal Appeal, arguing there had been an unreasonable delay in bringing the case before a jury and the charges were “unfairly burdensome and vexatious”.

Isabela Camelo-Gomez was last week found guilty of murdering her mother. Picture: Supplied

An inquest into Ms Jones’s death in November 2007 found that the identity of her killer could not be determined and the coroner found that the evidence fell short of the criminal standard.

After being treated as the prime suspect for two decades, Camelo-Gomez was arrested and charged in September 2019.

The court was told that after the killing, Camelo-Gomez went to a neighbour’s home claiming an intruder was in the house and that she had fled after being assaulted.

She also made a triple-0 call.

Police found Ms Jones lying face down in a pool of blood on her kitchen floor and there was no evidence of anything having been stolen, the court was told.

Camelo-Gomez told police that she was assaulted by a man with a stocking over his head.

She suffered minor injuries, which the Crown said were inconsistent with the assault she alleged took place.

Irene Jones was found dead in her Lansvale home. Picture: NSW Police

The Crown alleged that Camelo-Gomez killed Ms Jones because her mother disapproved and stood in the way of her relationship with a man named Carlos Camelo.

It was argued that she entered into a sham marriage with Mr Camelo’s brother in Colombia so he could move to Australia, in order to please Mr Camelo.

The court was also told that the Crown alleged that near the coffin at Ms Jones’s funeral Camelo-Gomez said something similar to: “I’m sorry Mum, it wasn’t meant to go this far.”

After the verdict was handed down last week Camelo-Gomez told her lawyer that the jury got it “wrong” and expressed disbelief.

She is set to face a sentencing hearing in August before she learns how long she will spend in jail.

Camelo-Gomez was arrested in 2019 over her mother’s murder. Source - NSW Police

She unsuccessfully applied to the Court of Appeal for a stay of proceedings, but the court’s reason for rejecting her application was only revealed in a judgment published on Wednesday.

She had argued before the Court of Appeal that she ought to have been granted a permanent stay of proceedings on six grounds, including that the delay in charging her was unreasonable and that the continuation of the proceedings amounted to an “abuse of process”.

However the Court of Appeal upheld Judge Wilson’s finding that the 20-year delay was not unreasonable, adding that additional forensic evidence that had been found in intervening years bolstered the Crown case.

Justice Desmond Fagan – one of the three judges to hear the appeal along with Justices David Davies and Geoff Bellew – said Camelo-Gomez had alleged the investigation was neglected by police and there was an unjustified failure to lay charges over many years.

“In order to justify a permanent stay in such a case, it must be shown that actual irremediable prejudice and unfairness to the accused in the conduct of his or her defence at trial will occur as a result of the delay … That has not been shown by the applicant,” Justice Fagan said.