Accused Family Court bomber Leonard John Warwick ‘violent, controlling’, ex-wife says

The accused Family Court bomber’s ex-wife has told court she wasn’t even permitted to have a set of keys to the couple’s home.

Warwick is accused of shooting a judge and his brother-in-law. Picture: AAP

Accused Family Court bomber Leonard John Warwick became controlling and physically abusive just five months into marriage in the mid-70s, his ex wife has told a Sydney court.

Andrea Blanchard gave evidence on the fifth day of the Supreme Court trial of Mr Warwick, who has pleaded not guilty to 24 charges related to a series of high profile murders and bombings in the 1980s.

Mr Warwick, 71, is accused of the shooting deaths of a Family Court judge and his brother-in-law Stephen Blanchard, as well as the bombing attacks of the Parramatta Family Court and a Jehovah’s Witness Church between 1980 and 1985.

The prosecution alleged Mr Warwick’s prior tendency to commit violence against individuals successfully linked him to the Family Court attacks which left four people dead and dozens injured.

Ms Blanchard said the pair married in October 1974 and immediately moved into their newly purchased home in Casula, 35km southwest of Sydney.

While their marriage began as any other, Ms Blanchard said her husband became “violent” about five or six months after their wedding.

When asked by crown prosecutor Ken McKay to explain how their relationship had changed, Ms Blanchard said Mr Warwick wouldn’t allow her to drive, apply for her driver’s licence or use the telephone at home.

“I wasn’t allowed to see my family, Leonard wouldn’t allow me to see them,” Ms Blanchard said.

The court heard that Ms Blanchard wasn’t even permitted to have a set of keys to the couple’s home so she secretly had pair made in order to leave the house when her husband was at work.

“He was in the shower and I took an impression of one of the keys on a cake of soap and took it up to the local shops to get a key made,” Ms Blanchard said.

“He didn’t know I had it.”

Ms Blanchard said she would often wait until Mr Warwick had left for work before walking through the bush to visit her sister in the next suburb or calling her family on the telephone.

Once, in 1975, she left her husband after he kicked and punched her, she told the court.

“I ran out of the house and rang my father … I made the call from the telephone box near our house and my father came and picked me,” she said.

But the separation only lasted a number of weeks before Ms Blanchard moved home “on the proviso that he would let me see my family and wouldn’t abuse me again”.

Less than a year after the couple was married, Ms Blanchard left her husband after she was severely injured in another attack.

While arguing, Mr Warwick allegedly began punching Ms Blanchard repeatedly on the floor.

“He started punching me, then pushed me down onto the floor and started kicking me on the body,” she said.

“He repeatedly punched me in the right arm and I was screaming so he let me go.”

She ran to take her daughter with her but, due to her injuries, she was unable to lift the baby from her cot.

“I couldn’t move my arm to support her because my arm was so badly bruised and sprained,” she said.

Ms Blanchard said she left her daughter with Mr Warwick and ran out of the house to call for help.

“My arm was badly sprained and bruised and I wore a sling,” she said.

Soon after, Ms Blanchard filed for divorce.

Defence solicitor Alan Conolly objected several times during Ms Blanchard’s testimony, claiming that evidence relating to the personal life of the accused was “unfairly prejudicial” and had no place in a murder trial.

“This is a murder trial and what we’re looking at ….is completely unrelated,” Mr Conolly said.

“There is simply no nexus between family court proceedings, family violence and these murders.”

Mr Conolly said his client worked successfully with the court system “from the beginning of his family court litigation in 1979 to the very end in 1986”.

Mr McKay also asked Ms Blanchard about her ex-husband’s love of firearms.

She claimed Mr Warwick was an avid shooter, collecting gun magazines and hunting rabbits and foxes.

“We would rent a cottage and go shooting there … or on people’s properties and parks,” Ms Blanchard said.

She said Mr Warwick owned five firearms, including a shotgun, a .22 rifle and an air rifle and would keep them in cupboards in their house.

Mr Warwick also used to reload and reuse his ammunition, especially his shot gun cartridges.

“He would reload them with gun powder and put the casings on them,” Ms Blancahrd said.

Mr Conolly argued that discussing Mr Warwick’s enthusiasm for firearms was “irrelevant, emotional and prejudicial”.

“The idea that someone has magazines about guns or owns guns is not what this case is about,” he said.

“It doesn’t distinguish Mr Warwick from literally hundreds of thousands of people with guns and magazines … when one looks to the connection between these murders and the guns there is none”.