NSW: Clingwrap murder accused "looked up websites on killing"
05 Feb 2009 12:17 PM
SYDNEY, Feb 5 AAP - A woman accused of murdering her father after binding him with cling wrap admitted looking up internet sites on how to get away with killing someone, a Sydney jury has been told.
Daniela Beltrame, 55, has pleaded not guilty to murdering her father, Ederino, 70, on April 26, 2001.
She is accused of smothering him with a pillow, after binding him with cling wrap to his bed in Canley Heights, in Sydney's west.
Giving evidence in the NSW Supreme Court on Thursday, her daughter Romina Beltrame said she had asked why police had taken her mother's computer.
"I think she told me she had been looking up sites on ways to inject air into someone ... how to kill someone without people knowing," she said.
"I was disgusted."
Ms Beltrame has told the jury she saw her mother kneeling over her grandfather with a pillow over his face in the early hours of April 26, 2001.
But she said she did not report this to police until early 2007 because her mother threatened to kill herself.
Ms Beltrame said she told her mother in 2007 that she was going to police because, "I cannot take this anymore".
She said her mother again asked her not to do it and mentioned killing herself.
"I said if you are a real mother, you would not have got your kids involved," she told the court.
"She said that is why she had not wanted to get us involved, that is why she gave us a sleeping tablet on the night before."
Ms Beltrame said she had no memory of being drugged that night, but her mother could have put the tablet in some hot chocolate she drank.
She also said she told her then boyfriend, Paul, she had "witnessed a murder".
"I don't think I went into great detail and then I went home and told my mum."
Ms Beltrame said her mother told her she would have to go back to Paul and say she had been angry with her mother and that it was a lie.
Ms Beltrame said she did this, but she thought Paul had "some suspicions".
The trial is continuing before Acting Justice Jane Mathews and a jury of seven women and five men.
