Appoche production.
Or she realizes that she's got to do it now or ever, and she stabs him.
Brittany Dwyer is currently serving a life sentence with a minimum twenty years jail for stabbing her granddad to death, who co accused Bernadette Burns is also in jail for life with a minimum of thirteen and a half years. In episode three, you heard Brittany who traveled down to her granddad's house in Adelaide from Brisbane. Her accomplice in, Bernadette, is in the car egging her on, telling her to
harden up. When she has second thoughts after having breakfast with her papa and then going through old photos and reliving memories, she says she needs to leave, and as her eighty one year old granddad walks her down to the front door, she pulls a knife from her sleeve and stabs him in the neck.
A couple of times.
From what I understand, it was like a butcher's no, this is a night she's had up her sleeve.
Yeah, for the whole.
Duration of the breakfast and they're reminiscing about family. Yeah, you know what happens next because of not just what was told in court, but equally your letters between you and Brittany over the time that she's been in jail.
Yeah, what happened. She felt a bit remorseful. He sort of stumbled back and asked her why she'd done it, and I think in the state of shock, he sort of stumbling around a little bit. She then takes him into the kitchen where the dining table is at and pulls up a chair and sits him down, And she went and got a band aid for him to cover one of the cuts.
A band aid.
A band aid which isn't going to do very much.
I'm guessing the knife wound is very deep, and so she gets him a band aid.
She gets some a band aid, and I think that's where there was a bit of a reflection of I think remorse. But you know, it had already been done.
Her granddad didn't die instantly. No, what did he say to Brittany, She's told you this in a letter, since I believe.
That, you know, she didn't need to do this, you know that, you know he struggled to understand, you know, why why she would even do this. But she couldn't, She couldn't sort of banter watch. So she turned around and why he was bleeding out. She did the dishes.
Did she text Bernadette?
She did as soon as he had passed away.
So she waited until he died.
The whole time. Yeah, she stood in the kitchen and waited, and then she sent a text message today it's done. Once that had happened, Bernadette had come in and they essentially ransacked, well I use that loosely, but they went through the house and again, being the photographer that my grandfather was, he had a lot of cameras and she had taken some of those cameras and she couldn't find the money anywhere, and so he had one thousand dollars
in his wallet. She took that and I think a couple of other bits and pieces, but then then left. Then they leave because it was winter. The heater was on and they left that running, and so he was there on that chair when they left, and he sat there for quite some time.
Ryan's memory of where his granddad was stabbed and how many times is different to what the autopsy showed. Britney stabbed her grandad four times, mostly in the neck and once in the chest. That was the fatal wound. It would cause him to bleed out in the kitchen chair that Britney placed him on. Robert sat dead in that chair for three days. It was only his neighbors that raised the alarm when they thought something was strange over at his house. Someone realized something was up.
They again, with him being so meticulous in a routine all the time, they started noticing that the Saturday newspaper hadn't been picked up, and that the electric shutters, which particularly on his bedroom, he would raise half a meter every single day, but then in the evening they would drop, and then again in the morning they'd go up. And they had noticed that they'd been in the same place in that half state. But normally it wouldn't be exact, you know, it wouldn't be like it. It was a
set button. He had to stop it in order for it to sort of stop halfway. And so they noticed that it had been in the exact same spot for Saturday and Sunday, and it wasn't until Monday came that the newspaper from Saturday was still there, and there was another newspaper there now on Monday, and he got up quite early and would normally go and get it. Binins were out and he used to bring the bins in for like the whole end of the culder sack to take them all in for the neighbors, and they were
still out. And so the neighbor that noticed that is actually an ambulance driver, went to the next door neighbors and said, I think there's something wrong with Bob and we need to go over and have a look. And so they went over that that same morning on the Monday. They went to the front door and the door was
opened locked, not a jar. The screen door had closed, but the main wooden door was open and just open fully, and there was a pull of blood at the door at the entrance, and so they went in and they were calling out for him and no answer. And as they sort of went towards the end of the hallway, they saw him on the chair in the kitchen in a state of what would happen with the heater being
left on and what that does to a body. You know, as a family, I think we're really really thankful that, you know, they were so willing to do that and look out for my grandfather and to see blood at the front door. Most people would probably stop and to sort of go in and see him like that. You know, I wouldn't want to wish that upon anybody, my worst enemies. That would be an image that would just be stuck to you. And I think about if I was in
their shoes, having to see my grandfather like that. I honestly don't think I would be able to comprehend and ever sort of move past it. So for them to, I guess, do that for us. So I think, you know, I would be forever like forever in their dead, forever grateful. But yet then they obviously alerted the police when they found it.
Ryan's mum and him are back in Brisbane on that Monday morning. They have no idea on what's about to happen and how it will tear a family apart. They think that Brittany's at home in Brisbane, but she's not. After stabbing Robert to death, she and her co accused get back in the car and start the drive for twenty four hours back to Brisbane.
I was getting ready for work. I had woken up at seven to a text message from my mother, who's sent it probably about an hour earlier, going when you wake up, can you call me? I never get text messages like that so I knew immediately something was wrong. So I called her and her voice was very shaky, and she said, Papa has died. And I sort of thought to myself in that time, Okay, he years older. He just not long ago had his eightieth birthday, and so I'm like, okay, all right, I'm sad, but I'm
not devastated at this point. Then she said the police have called me and he's been found with stab wounds. And I just remember like this wave of anger coming over me at that point, and I remember saying to my mom, like, what the actual who would stab an old man? And Mum said to me, you know, and I then I burst into tears. And I remember my partner at the time coming in, going like what has happened? And he obviously heard me say who would stab an
old man? And then she goes, look, they don't know what it could be. They said it could be self harm, or it could be a robbery that's gone wrong. The detectives at the time, we didn't realize. I look back now and it sort of makes sense, but they really, you know, I used the analogy, treated us like mushrooms, kept us in the dark, and fed our ship like, just really didn't want to tell us a lot. And I get that now, but at the time it's infuriating.
And every time we found out information it was because of the media. We were never told first, which I think is incredibly wrong.
An elderly man has been stabbed to anyone who witnessed this assault, police amation that could assist police.
So we get told that these costabe wounds. And immediately I said, there's just no way that he would have done it himself, because again he was so tidy and so meticulous. He would have just taken pills and laid down, you know. And I said, how was the house? And then my mum said about the blood. I said, so there was no pilot, paperwork, letter will And she's like no, And I'm like, yeah, he didn't do this, There's no way.
Did you have any thoughts at that time who would have done it? Or do you think it's a random robbery?
Yes? I had immediately jumped to a conclusion, and I thought I knew.
Who it was, but that wasn't your sister.
You were thinking, no, it was not my sister.
Did you ever think it would have been your sister?
No? Never, no way, No, there's just no way.
What about your mom?
No, no, no way.
Just not even in the realms of possibility.
Nope, that thought didn't even cross my mind, not at all.
Who called your sister to tell her about your poh?
My mom? So she had already called her before I spoke to my mom, and she said, your grandfather has died. And before my mother could even say anymore, my sister burst into hysterics on the phone, absolutely broke down, and my mom sort of changed pace and sort of went, I need you to come with me to Adlaide. I need yours and Ryan's support. And she said yes, Mom, like I'll do anything you need. I'm a few hours away,
but I can be at your house. And she said, well, we're gonna We're going to fly out from Brisbane to the airport.
She's driving back to Brisbane in a Silver Captiva, which is not her car or Bernadette's car. It belonged to someone at the sharehouse who will become a crucial witness. That phone call was super important in the police investigation, which you only found out later, which was they were able to ping her phone and track pretty much where her phone had been on both that journey and the prior journey was yeah, mis Shelby.
Yeah, it started to piece together when my mum actually made the call and she answered. They were able to track through multiple cell stations that while they're on the phone, they were moving up the highway.
So police are obviously investigating this as it's happening. In police a line of investigation like this, from our previous experience, we know that everyone's a suspect until nobody's a suspect until they find who did it. So you're a suspect, your mum's a suspect. Anyone that's in the family is a suspect. Equally next door neighbors, you know, anyone that has affiliation with your granddad, But at the same time,
also anyone that doesn't. The car that drove past a couple of times, that's interesting for a police and then they obviously start to hone down their investigations. Brittany arrives at Ryan's house in the Silver Captiva. She gets out of the car and Bernadette drives away. Ryan, Brittany, and Tanya, their mum heads to the airport and board the next available flight to Adelaide. They're in distress. Their granddad is dead and worse still seems that he's been stabbed to death.
They're wondering who did it? Was it for money? Was it self harm? Was it a home break in? There was one person on the plane that knew how Robert had died. She knew because she killed him. And now she's sitting between Ryan and his mum on the way back to Adelaide. What's the conversation down on the plane.
I guess we were playing detectives a little bit and sort of thinking who could have done it more more or less talking about who we thought had done it and why.
And your sister's joining in on this conversation.
Absolutely she was talking about I think she was, you know, hindsight, it's an amazing thing. But I look back and I'm like, okay, I can see why now. But she was immediately jumping on board with our speculations, you know, of who it could be in. But the conversation quickly turned on the way down about about the money, which at the time I didn't think was odd because.
Who turned the conversation to the money?
Brittany, Yep, she talked about the money that was in the shed and said, Ryan can distract the police and I'll quickly run in and I'll go get it. But it was all very much framed around this other family member who could potentially come and get it or searched the house. It's all just sort of fed back into the same theory that we all had to the point that.
And Brittany's reinforcing this narrative. Absolutely, of course, this is cover, this is yeah. She was very much saying, yep, we'll go in, I'll get the money, you know. And it was very much like for my mom, right, I'll go get the money, I'll give it to you. You know, we just need to get there before he does, you know that sort of thing. We were like, it's gonna be a crime scene, and it all seemed very like childish in a way. And I said, not only that,
but the money's long gone. If the police are already there, which they certainly were. The whole house was a crime scene.
It was all cord and off like that money had already been found by the police and you know, seized. And so we drove and he lived on this very quiet street and he sort of turned you turn into it, and as soon as you turn into it, there was just lines of undercover cop cars everywhere where. There was blue and white tape all around, and I remember turning to my mum's and said, yeah, he definitely didn't do
this himself. I knew from that moment that whatever the police said, and they steal for a long time, they were still saying potential suicide, I knew right there, I'm not a chance.
In a crime scene like this, the first job of police is to secure the scene. It's one of the first protocols police do. It means no family can enter the house. The next steps are about securing evidence, both physical and other evidence. This process can take days or weeks before they hand the house back to the family. But in a case like this, with blood everywhere, there was one question police asked the family which they hadn't expected.
They did ask us if we wanted them to clean the house or leave it as is, which like, no, clean the house and we don't want that. We did not want to see the blood and stuff like that, which I thought was a bit odd, but I guess, you know, people have their preferences. Because my mom and I were the executives of the will, but more importantly, my mom was the enduring power of attorney for both my grandfather and my nanna. They gave the keys back
to us. Yeah, after the house has been cleaned, and after it was I was about a week later.
Yeah, not a crime scene anymore. So what are you and your family thinking at this stage? Like, what's your mom thinking?
Mom still thinking that it had to do with the other family member. We are inside the house, and you know, it's funny. We went to the house a lot afterwards, but I don't know why we didn't stay there.
Did your sister come with you?
Yeah? Every time?
And how was she in the house?
She was normal like us, I guess the first couple of times we went to the house, we sort of just sort of sat there and you know, remember to hear my guests and thought about that sort of stuff. And we actually the moment we got the house, we changed the locks because we knew that my grandfather had a key that used to be in the electrical box so that you could get in, but the key was gone. Later we found out the police had taken the key, but we didn't know that at the time, so we
had all the locks changed. What about the money, The money was all gone.
Police found it.
Every Yeah found that.
Did you tell them where? Like your grandfather hadn't told anyone where that money was.
They found it on their own court.
So the police would have used their forensic powers to yeat amazing, Yeah, because it was heated. It was well heated.
Yeah, so we found that. They also found one thousand dollars in numeric order from the serial numbers which my grandfather had collected, and they had found some more money sort of inside the house.
It's about thirteen grand I believe.
Yes. Yeah, so yeah, they had well and truly taken it before we had gotten there.
While Ryan and his mum and his sister Brittany are heading back to Adelaide, there are two significant things that happened back in Brisbane. They won't seem significant right now, but later in court more is revealed about Brittany's other life. It all makes sense.
So the day happened, and we then went and checked into a motel in Prospect and we get a call from Queensland Police. And because the car is registered in my mother's name, she gets a call and goes, is your silver Astra stolen? And my mum said, well, it's not my car, it's my daughter's but no, I don't believe so, dear, She's like, why, and they said, this guy has been pulled over driving the vehicle. He has the keys, nothing's broken on the car, but this guy
is known to police and he is not a good person. Immediately, she turns to my sisters and goes, do you know anything about this? And my sister no, my husband stolen. Then the police pressed and said, just it doesn't seem like it's been stolen. It seems like it's been lent. And so we pressed her on it. Obviously our mind is somewhere else. We're not really thinking all that straight.
And she goes, I did lend it to my housemate, not a guy and Brittany, so someone's obviously come into the house and steal in the stolen the keys, and stolen the car. And it turned out later that's not what happened. Brittany had lent it to one of her colleagues in the drug world to do errands with.
Along with that car that was lent, not stolen by sister. Something else happens at your parents' place while you're traveling down to Adelaide.
Yeah, so we find out that prior to going to Adelaide. My parents' house had been broken into, laptop, stolen jewelry, stolen watches, all the sort of things that you can steal and sell essentially, and there was an investigation happening, and whilst we were away, the police called about that and they had found that some of the items, so I think my mum's wedding jewelry, had been stolen and they had turned up at a porn stock they were
trying to be sold. So they figured out where that had happened, and obviously porn stores are probably be pretty used to that, and so it goes into a database and if it gets reported that's been stolen, when it actually turns up to be sold, they know what's going on. And so later we found out after Britney's arrest for murder, she had actually orchestrated the break in and the robbery.
She got her friends that are in the drug world to break in, told them how to get in, told them when my parents wouldn't be there and where and what to steal exactly to sell on her behalf. Whether or not Britney gained any money from that, or it was to feed a debt, but it was all set up by her.
Have you asked your sister about that? In the letters?
Absolutely?
What'd she say?
The question that I actually raised her was she had keys to my house. Adam and I my ex partner, were never home. We had busy jobs. We were always working, We were always out doing stuff on the weekend. She knew the dog. We had a lot of artwork. And I said to her, why did you never break in and steal from me? That would have been the easiest way. Why drive all the way to Jim Boomber to steal product?
And then when I live in the city. And her response was You're the one person I would never steal from, which I guess in a way is touching and also odd. And I said to her in the letters, why did you do that? And she said I needed the money and she didn't care about it being our parents.
This wasn't the only time Brittany was stealing from someone that she loved. After she killed her granddad and they were in Adelaide sorting out his affairs while Ryan and his mum were out of the house, Britney was stealing from her dead granddad.
We figured this out later, but again, my grandfather, being as organized as he is. We already knew what pieces of jewel he needed to go to who and my mum was to have the wedding jewelry of my nunner and of my grandfather. We later realized whilst were down there and cleaning up the house and looking for paperwork and that sort of thing, Brittany was off in the
house stealing. She had gone into and obviously we had hours in the house and we weren't all together, We're all in different rooms doing what we needed to do, and she had, Yeah, she had taken hit the jewelry. My grandfather also had a coin collection that he had with his wife. Every single coin was documented. Every single day was a list of every single coin he had. And there was three particular coins that were worth tens
of thousands of dollars and they were gone. And I know she was going through all the coins because she pretended to look for these coins that were worth a lot. And then by the time we'd come in and been like, did you find them, and she said, no, they're not here.
Did she ever admit that to you.
No, But the police did say to us that yes, they were stolen, and they were already discarded.
Of so the police are deep into their investigation. The family are completely unaware of the police's suspicions about Brittany, so the family stay close and try to stay as normal as possible while in Adelaide. While they're there, Ryan celebrates his birthday and his mum and Brittany decide to try and keep things together by honoring their granddad with a special lunch.
Went out to the Barossa, which was my grandfather's favorite spot and he absolutely loved Maggie Beer. There's actually photos of us on that day, So that day was about thinking about him, but also trying to be happy and obviously celebrate my birthday and think about all the good times that we've had with him as well. But yeah, she was with us that day.
Although the family are trying to keep things as normal as possible, Brittany becomes more and more irritated and acts out in ways it seemed out of kilter with someone that was grieving. Are you imagining at that stage? Did she sister?
No?
The only thing that looked a little odd to me was that she wasn't sleeping that well. She would be up all night and then sleep all through the day. Very irate, very moody. Was she talking to Bernadette?
Still?
She was on the phone all the time, Okay, all the time, whether it was Bernadette, yes, other people. She would go outside make the phone calls. And she Chane smoked something wicked. I didn't even know she was a smoker. I knew from the amount and neither to my mom and the amount she was smoking. And it was really weird because we grew up in a pretty strict household that you wouldn't just even now, I don't swear in
front of my parents. I wouldn't just be whipping out a cigarette, just Jane smoking in front of my parents. And she did not care. She smoked all the time. My mom's said, having been a pass smoker, that's not an overnight or I've just taken up smoking like you've obviously been smoking a very long time. And I look back now at the reason why she was chained smoking and it totally stress related.
How long did you stay in Adelaide before you head back to Brisbane?
A few weeks so we were obviously preparing for the funeral and my mum and I were doing those arrangements. We wanted to do it in Prospect because that's where our original family members from the UK all those years ago moved to and that's where my grandfather grew up. So it was really quite important that we did it there. So we were back and forth from the city to Prospect and we were setting all the funeral arrangements up, but we couldn't do anything yet because the body wasn't
being released from by the coroner. Obviously, the investigation was still going and at that point it had already been I think about three weeks and I had to get back to work and it was becoming a cold case. The police were starting to tell us now that there's been no new leads. We've obviously had news reports, articles go out about this.
This is big news, right, this is big.
News, particularly in Adelaide. It's huge news. The news reports were all still framed around it died of natural causes. But if you have any information, it was a little sus and you.
Think that was just deployed from police.
Absolutely then looking at it, I had no clue. I just thought it was strange. It was in the newspaper that sort of thing. Not national news at this point, but just local news. And so we decided that Okay, well, it's still all going. I'm going to go home. And so my sister had flown out a couple of days earlier, and I had driven down from Wallaro where we were staying and flew out.
While recording with Ryan, over a few days, spent some time out of the studio, and in one of our coffee catch ups, Ryan told me of something he had learned about his granddad's death and what might have happened inside that house on the day Britney stabbed him.
Because they said to what the police did tell us that he would have had time to get to the phone and make a call, but he probably chose not to.
Wow.
Yeah, I think to still protect her and away because it was still his granddaughter.
I think. In that same coffee catch up, Ryan also told me of something that he remembered, something that's a little unnerving. It was after his granddad was killed, but before Brittany was arrested for his murder.
It's crazy. Do you know what's really crazy? I don't know if you believe in this sort of stuff. I sort of here and there that when we're in the house, my grandfather had this mantle peace clock, you know, the old school wound clocks, and it was his grap It was his mother's, my great grandmother, and he's had it for years and I always knew it to be broken, and I always just say to him, you know, if you have passed, I would have loved that, and he goes, Yep,
it's all, it's yours. No problems anyway. The face of it was broken and the chimes inside had been broken, and I'm like, okay, cool, no worries anywhere. He passed away, and I got it from up on the bookshelf and I took it into the formal lounge and I was bubble wrapping it and I got my sister to pick it up so that I could put the bubble wrap underneath.
And as she picked it up, it chimed, and it was so loud, and it just kept chiming, even to the point my mum was on the other end of the house and she's like, what is that noise?
Like what's going on?
And she comes in.
My sister's gone, why is a ghost? And I said this was broken, like it mustn't be. It's chiming right. It was caked and dust like this thing had not been picked up Anyway, I put it in a storage. About a year later, I get it out of storage and I take it to Tambourine Mountain clock shop and I said, can we fix this?
And he goes, yeah, yeah, what's wrong with it? And I said, Oh, I need to get the face of it fixed and maybe just a tuna and he goes, oh, do all the cords and things to work. I'm like yeah, because it chimed. Anyway, he fixed it and he came back and said, oh, it's actually going to be more because there's no chimee in here. And I said, no, it chimes like really loudly, so yes, there is. He's like, no, literally, I had to put new ones in. There's no there's
nothing that had been completely removed. They've broken off.
When does your sister get arrested?
What day do you remember? I think it was a couple of weeks. I can't remember exactly, but I think it was a Friday night from memory, because I had a couple of glasses of wine and it was late and I get a knock at the door, which was a bit strange. I think. Yeah. I think it was like nine or ten at night and it was the police and they said, we need to speak to you,
and I said, okay, come on in. And at the time when they turned up, I just thought, okay, there's been a breakthrough with the case and they're here to update me. And I said okay. So they come in and they're like, oh, can you sit down? I said okay. They said I can't. We can't tell you anything just yet, but we need to call your mum and your dad and we all need to get the call to like together.
I said, okay, all right. My mom was in Wallarou staying with family, and my dad was at the Jimboomber House, and I was obviously a carried out. Yep. They get on the phone and they get everybody on the call. There's uniformed police officers at my dad's, there's police officers where my mom's staying. And then over the phone there was detectives with my mom and they said, your sister has been arrested for murder.
It starts to thinking like what the police are saying is true, and because you're in denial at first, and then it's yeah. And I wanted to talk to Brittany when she was when she had already been arrested. She wouldn't. She wouldn't speak to me, so I've never spoken to her since this happened, which is really bad.
H m hm