This one confounds me....

Trio involved in bloody death, court told

By Lee Glendinning February 26 2003

After Craig Collins had been stabbed 13 times, bashed around the head and neck with a cricket bat, and left dead on the kitchen floor of his Katoomba flat, Shiree Smit allegedly made a phone call.

"There's a dead body we need to get rid of," she allegedly told friend Ricky Ranse, the NSW Supreme Court heard yesterday.

Mr Collins, 35, was found lying naked, face down on the floor on August 29, 2001. His head was heavily soaked in blood, his body wrapped in a blanket. Beside him was a cricket bat, also wrapped in a blanket. The door of the flat had been deadlocked.

Under the chairs lay four knives covered in the victim's blood.

Husband and wife Steven and Shiree Smit, both 32, and Mr Collins's flatmate Donna Tarrant, 30, all from Katoomba, have pleaded not guilty to the murder.

Crown Prosecutor Laura Wells said all three "were involved in one way or another in the intentional act which caused, or assisted in the cause of the death of Craig Collins - even if it can't be said who struck the fatal blow".

When police searched the flat they found a knife with the partial palm print of Shiree Smit on the handle and an army knife under the lounge. There was also a kitchen knife with a bent blade, and a large chef's knife with the tip broken. A partial palm print of Tarrant was found on the handle of the cricket bat, the court heard yesterday.

Ms Wells said that when Mr Ranse asked Shiree Smit in the morning who had killed Mr Collins, she replied "both of us, mainly Steve though" and went on to say they had kicked and bashed him to death with a cricket bat.

In an interview three days after the killing, Steven Smit told police he was drunk when he arrived at Mr Collins's house.

He told them Mr Collins was trying to rape his flatmate, who police allege was Tarrant.
"So I pulled him up on that," he said. "I didn't kill him, but I punched him a couple of times and then dragged him off. I don't really know what happened after that."

Mr Collins had come at him with a cricket bat, and later a knife, he said.

Steven Smit told police he had fallen asleep, waking up hours later to find Mr Collins on the floor. He wrapped the body in a blanket and moved it to the kitchen and waited eight or nine hours for help to arrive before walking home at about 4.30am.

He was wearing a black and white tracksuit and Nike sneakers, both of which were soaked and splattered with the victim's blood, the court heard.

The trial continues.

From: http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2003/02/25/1046064035719.html accessed 4 September 2009