The fate of an alleged accomplice in the December 2022 stabbing murder of Emma Lovell that shocked Queensland now rests in the hands of a judge after a three-day trial ended on Wednesday.
Prosecutors did not argue that the accused teenager – who cannot be named for legal reasons as he was 17 years old on the night Lovell died of a stab wound to the chest on the front lawn of her home in North Lakes, north of Brisbane’s CBD – ever wielded that fatal knife.
Now 18, he pleaded not guilty to four charges, including murder and assault occasioning bodily harm on Monday.
But crown prosecutor David Nardone said CCTV footage which captured the two-minute and 16-second struggle between Emma, her husband, Lee, and the two teenagers, around midnight on Boxing Day 2022, also clearly revealed the accused’s companion showing – or even offering him – the 11.5cm serrated blade as the pair stood poised at the front door, about to enter the Lovell home.
Given the two teenagers had already formed a common purpose to steal from the brick bungalow, the fact it was “unavoidable” that the accused saw his companion’s blade meant he was, Nardone argued, “jointly liable for possession of the knife”.
“The killing was a probable consequence of the unlawful purpose to steal property from the dwelling while armed with a knife,” Nardone told Justice Michael Copley KC in his closing submission on Tuesday afternoon.
“The liability [of the accused] arises as either an aider or an encourager of the act completed by [his companion].”
But the prosecutor conceded a murder conviction rested entirely upon the fact that the accused knew his companion was armed.
Defence barrister Laura Reece argued that the CCTV footage did not prove beyond reasonable doubt that her client did, in fact, see a knife that his companion may have been concealing in a Calvin Klein satchel bag throughout the evening in which they roamed the streets of Brisbane’s outer northern suburbs with at least two other companions.
Reece argued the infrared CCTV footage which the prosecution claimed showed the accused’s companion holding the knife centimetres from his face did not accurately reflect the gloom in the Lovell’s door well. She also argued that his face, which was not fully captured in the footage, was not looking in the direction of the blade.
“At its highest, in my submission, [my client] may have seen, or may have had the knife in peripheral vision, but only in peripheral vision – and only for a short period of time,” she said.
“Your honour cannot discern, from this footage, that he in fact turned his face towards the knife at any point.”
Reece also argued that, even if the pair had formed a common intention to steal while armed, the evidence also proved her client withdrew that consent by attempting to prevent his companion’s violence.
Earlier Tuesday afternoon the prosecution had attempted to match audio taken from a neighbour’s CCTV with the Lovell’s vision-only footage to argue “logic demanded” that it was the accused’s companion who uttered the words “I’ll kill you, I’ll kill you too” during the violent struggle on the front lawn.
Reece, however, contended the word “too” was not clearly discernible and that, significantly, the audio also captured her client saying words to the effect of “nah bra” immediately afterwards.
She played a clip which appeared to show her client running over to his companion kicking Lee Lovell as he lay on the ground.
“Stop, stop, stop,” she contends her client exhorted his companion at this point.
The pair then fled the scene, leaving both Emma and Lee Lovell slumped upon their lawn – he stabbed and beaten, she with her head in her knees, fatally wounded.
Nardone had argued the purpose of bringing a knife to the home invasion could only have been to use it “should a confrontation arise”, either to scare off a person “or in fact to cause them serious harm so as to escape”.
He conceded that the actions of both teenagers captured by the CCTV “suggest that their motivation was to escape” the scene once the Lovells’ dogs alerted them to the intruders and they confronted the pair.
“That was not able to be easily achieved by [the accused] because of the persistence of Mr and Mrs Lovell during that confrontation,” the prosecutor said. “Failing to make good his escape the actions of [his companion] involve using the knife to penetrate Mrs Lovell’s body. The location of that penetration was in a position where it would achieve most harm.
“Penetrating her heart.”
The defence barrister, however, said that although it appeared that Lee Lovell – who told the court on Monday it had been his intention to detain the intruders until police arrived – was attempting to put her client in a headlock, “immediately upon breaking free”, her client “ran away”.
His companion, in contrast, kicked Lee after he was dazed and prone and after – he would later learn – he had been stabbed, demonstrating that her client’s companion had now entered “the realms of gratuitous violence”, Reece told the court.
So even if there had been a shared intention of “meting out violence to make good an escape”, her client’s words and actions demonstrated he had withdrawn from any such “common plan”, she said.
“He did not use violence himself to the Lovells after breaking free from Mr Lovell,” she said of her client. “He cannot at any time be heard to encourage [his companion] to use a knife or force of any kind and, in my submission, the evidence is in fact quite the opposite, that he exhorted [his companion] to stop.
“That he reacted when he heard the threats to kill and that he acted when he saw [his companion] kick Mr Lovell on the ground.”
While she argued her client may be found guilty of breaking into the Lovell’s home, he ought be found not guilty of the charges of murder and assault.
Due to the high-profile nature of the case, the murder trial was held before a judge rather than a jury, with Justice Copley alone to determine the verdict.
The accused remains remanded in custody.
