A former NSW police officer accused of murdering Sydney couple Jesse Baird and Luke Davies told a friend at a dinner how he would dispose of the body if he killed someone, a court has heard.
asserted
court → accuse → someone
Beau Lamarre-Condon, 31, is standing trial in the NSW Supreme Court on two counts of murder over the shooting deaths of Baird, 26, his former casual romantic partner, and Davies, 29, in Paddington on February 19, 2024.
asserted
Condon → stand → February
He has pleaded not guilty to the charges.
asserted
He → plead → charges
Georgia Cook, a former friend of Lamarre-Condon, told the court on Monday she distanced herself from the then-police officer after he asked her over a dinner in Kirribilli in May 2023: “What would you do if I told you I killed somebody?
uncertain
I → tell → somebody
Would you help me hide the body?”
asserted
you → help → body
She said she froze and replied: “No, because I don’t want their ghost to haunt me.”
asserted
ghost → say → me
Cook said he asked her later in the dinner, “So, if you did kill someone what would you do with their bodies?”
asserted
you → say → bodies
Lamarre-Condon said he would “take their stuff, I would put it in a dumpster, and I would take their bodies to bushland where no one would ever find them”, Cook told the court.
asserted
Cook → say → court
“It felt very surreal,” she said.
asserted
she → feel → ?
“I didn’t know whether to believe anything I’d heard.
asserted
I → know → anything
I really couldn’t continue a friendship after hearing these things.”
asserted
I → continue → things
She said she had told Lamarre-Condon before the dinner about a confidential medical diagnosis, and he had said at the restaurant that “what I’m about to tell you, if you tell anyone else, I know about you”.
asserted
I → say → you
He was using the information “to hold over me, so I wouldn’t go and tell … what he had told me”, Cook said.
asserted
Cook → use → me
She said she was “really scared” after the dinner, and distanced herself from him permanently in December 2023.
asserted
she → say → December
Cook gave a statement to police in June 2024, four months after Lamarre-Condon was arrested in February.
asserted
Condon → give → February
She rejected a suggestion by one of the accused’s barristers, James Lang, that Lamarre-Condon did not have this conversation with her, and that she had repeated details about the alleged location of the bodies and other items from media reports.
asserted
she → reject → reports
“When someone says something that scary or shocking, it’s not something that leaves your mind,” Cook said.
asserted
Cook → say → mind
“I can remember it like it was yesterday.
asserted
it → remember → it
I could never forget these words being said to me.”
uncertain
I → forget → me
Asked about the delay in coming forward to police, Cook said she was “absolutely terrified”.
asserted
she → ask → police
“After the news had come out, I was scared,” she said.
asserted
she → come → ?
“I didn’t know what to do with what I knew.
asserted
I → know → what
I didn’t know if I wanted to be involved.
asserted
I → know → ?
“If he wasn’t put away, what would happen to me?
asserted
what → put → me
That puts me in a scary position.”
asserted
That → put → position
Cook testified on Friday that Lamarre-Condon had told her during the same dinner that he had been watching Baird from outside his house, using his mother’s car and wearing a black hoodie.
asserted
he → testify → hoodie
“In that time he’d seen Jesse have sex with other men,” she said he told her.
asserted
he → see → her
She said the accused also claimed that he saw Baird over the back fence taking photos with friends with a Polaroid camera he had given him.
asserted
he → say → him
Lamarre-Condon told her he kept watching until Baird left the home and saw where he left his key.
asserted
he → tell → key
“He [said he] went and got the key and unlocked the door, broke into the house, he stole the Polaroid camera, he ate Jesse’s Easter egg, and he said that there was something else that he did, but he wouldn’t tell me what it was, which concerned me,” she said.
asserted
she → say → me
The court has heard that Baird broke up with Lamarre-Condon for the first time in April 2023.
asserted
Baird → hear → April
The two men resumed seeing each other briefly in late 2023 before Baird ended it permanently in November.
asserted
Baird → resume → November
Lamarre-Condon is charged with breaking into Baird’s home in August 2023 and stealing Baird’s wallet and phone.
asserted
Condon → charge → wallet
He has pleaded not guilty to aggravated break and enter.
asserted
He → plead → break
The defence case is that he used a key Baird had given him to enter the home.
asserted
Baird → use → home
The prosecution alleges Lamarre-Condon murdered Baird, a former Network Ten producer and presenter, after developing an “obsessive and jealous infatuation” with him.
asserted
Condon → allege → him
Davies, Baird’s new boyfriend, was killed to eliminate a witness to the crime, the Crown alleges.
asserted
Crown → kill → crime
There is no dispute that Lamarre-Condon was at Baird’s Paddington share house when Baird and Davies died, that they died of gunshot wounds from his police-issued pistol, and that he was disguised as a delivery rider.
asserted
he → be → rider
However, the defence case is that Lamarre-Condon was there to pick up some of his belongings and did not expect anybody to be home.
asserted
anybody → pick → belongings
A struggle ensued in which his gun accidentally went off twice, killing Baird, and Davies accidentally shot himself in a second struggle after grabbing the gun, the defence says.
asserted
defence → ensue → gun
…and 1 more, not listed.
The Aporia
