Alleged killer cop Beau Lamarre-Condon returned to dam to move bodies of Jesse Baird, Luke Davies, police say
Police believe Beau Lamarre-Condon went back to retrieve the bodies of Luke Davies and Jesse Baird, after being spooked police would discover the site.
Police now believe accused killer Beau Lamarre-Condon returned at night to the dam where he had earlier hidden the bodies of murdered couple Luke Davies and Jesse Baird, retrieved their remains and moved them to another as yet unknown location.
On Monday afternoon police had turned their focus to the area in Grays Point, in southern Sydney, where Lamarre-Condon grew up.
In a case that has confounded investigators and put a question mark over the future of NSW Police Commissioner Karen Webb, police have been unable to account for a crucial “gap in the timeline” when Constable Lamarre-Condon is alleged to have dumped the bodies; why the 28-year-old police constable was able to access his pistol out of work hours; and whether he was psychologically fit to have ever have been recruited.
Adding to the mystery was how two people could have been shot with a 9mm Glock in densely packed inner-city Paddington terrace in Sydney last Monday without anyone reporting the shots.
Police have revealed a triple-zero call from Mr Davies’ phone was made from the Paddington terrace four minutes after the first shots, before being suddenly disconnected. Authorities originally reported the phone belonged to Mr Baird.
NSW Police told the Daily Telegraph they sent a patrol car to Mr Davies’ Waterloo residence, and then to Mr Baird’s home suburb of Paddington to conduct a welfare check based on the call. Police earlier claimed they had not attempted such a follow-up.
Despite digital access to the location of Mr Davies’ phone at the time of the triple-zero call, officers involved in the welfare check failed to check the right Paddington address, leaving the crime scene undiscovered for another three days.
The Daily Telegraph has reported that officers tried to call the number back but there was no answer.
Later in the day, Constable Lamarre-Condon hired a white Toyota HiAce van from Sydney Airport that he allegedly used to transport the men’s bodies. It is alleged that Lamarre-Condon had access to his “Mobipol”, a device that provides access to the state police database, despite being off-duty at the time.
The next day, police allege, the 28-year-old made a “partial admission” to a female acquaintance that he had been involved in the death of two people.
On Monday afternoon police searched houses and a creek in the Grays Point street in which Lamarre-Condon grew up. Detectives were door knocking residents requesting CCTV.
A helicopter was also seen above the area, searching along Dents Creek, which leads to Port Hacking. Lamarre-Condon’s family home was on the waterfront of Dents Creek.
“They flew around the waterway from the house to swallow rock. They also went right over the primary school a bit by entrance to the national park,” one source said.
After a fruitless two-day search by divers of two dams in Bungonia, in the NSW Southern Tablelands, police believe Constable Lamarre-Condon feared a woman who unwittingly helped him get access to the property would alert police to his attempt to hide the bodies.
The woman, an acquaintance of his who has not been identified, accompanied him to the property, 200km southwest of Sydney, on Wednesday last week, two days after the alleged murder, apparently unaware the bodies of Mr Davies and Mr Baird were in the back of the rented Toyota HiAce.
Along the way, they stopped at a Goulburn hardware store to buy an angle grinder and a padlock.
When they reached the property – which police believe Constable Lamarre-Condon had previously visited through a former relationship – he allegedly used the angle-grinder to cut the existing padlock on the gate and left the woman there while he continued on down to the dam.
When he returned half an hour later, Constable Lamarre-Condon replaced the cut padlock with the new one and they drove back to Sydney in the van.
It is unclear what explanation the policeman provided to his acquaintance about his behaviour, but police believe it was enough to arouse her suspicions and for Constable Lamarre-Condon to worry the location would be discovered.
Police believe the acquaintance was tricked into joining Constable Lamarre-Condon and say she is not a suspect
Police allege the constable drove back to the property from Sydney later that night with torches borrowed from a friend, stopping at 11pm to buy weights from a department store.
At 4.30am on Thursday, he left Bungonia and spent time around Sydney before driving to Newcastle, where he went to a friend’s home and asked for a hose to clean the van, police say.
He stayed in Newcastle until 5am Friday, when he drove to Sydney and met an uncle where he grew up in the Sutherland Shire. At 10.39am, he walked into Bondi police station.
Constable Lamarre-Condon has been charged with two counts of murder but has declined to say anything to police or assist them in locating the bodies.
Police claim that the relationship between he and Jesse Baird ended badly, prompting Constable Lamarre-Condon to break into Mr Baird’s terrace in the weeks prior to the murder.
“The relationship which ended at the end of last year … didn’t end well and we believe that the accused had attended Jesse’s home address,” Deputy Commissioner Dave Hudson said.
“We believe he had utilised a key to enter those premises. We believe he took possession of Jesse’s phone and deleted contacts and messages out of that phone before leaving the premises.”
The prior break-in was not reported to NSW Police.
Mr Hudson said police had been told Mr Baird spoke of a “man in his room” at his home but did not report it to police.
Constable Lamarre-Condon was able to get access to his firearm last Sunday by claiming he was doing a “user pays” shift, performing duties at a pro-Palestinian rally in the city, for which organisers were reimbursing police for the costs. He is Operation Support Group-trained, meaning he had completed extra training qualifying him to work user pay shifts at events such as concerts or protests.
Ms Webb said a review into the handling of police firearms would be “necessary” following the alleged use of Constable Lamarre-Condon’s service weapon.
She been criticised for taking three days to release a statement about the case, with NSW MP Rod Roberts accusing her of “hiding” and failing to reassure the public that the accused police officer “will be treated the same as any other suspect in any other crime”.
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