Warning: This story contains graphic details and may be triggering to some readers
The police in New Zealand have left out some key evidence in the case against Lauren Dickason, the South African woman accused of murdering her three daughters, Liané, 6, and 2-year-old twins Maya and Karla, on September 16, 2021.
During the second week of the trial at a High Court in Christchurch on Monday, Dickason’s defence attorneys cross examined police relating to the cellphone data they collected from Lauren’s phone.
Police compiled cellphone messages from Lauren’s phone that dates back to 2016 until a few hours before the murder, NZ Herald’s Anna Leask reported.
The prosecution is maintaining that Lauren acted knowing full and well what she was doing at the time of the murder, but the defence is arguing that Dickason suffered a long history of depression and anxiety and did not act in full conscience.
On Monday, Lauren’s lawyer Anne Toohey questioned detective Edward Mitchell about why some of the videos and text messages were left out of the prosecution's case.
Mitchell told Toohey he had used Google Translate to transcribe messages from Afrikaans to English when police analysed her cellphone.
Toohey made specific mention of a message about the children playing in a paddling pool.
The video was accompanied with a text from Lauren saying: “I think my kids are crazy”.
The message was sent to the Dickason family group chat, but the video was not included in the evidence, only the text was, Stuff.NZ reported.
“Why didn’t you include the video or photos along with the text, detective?” Toohey asked.
Mitchell said the context had been missed during the translation.
Toohey asked him if it was possible that this error could have occurred perhaps hundreds of times, to which he said it was possible.
In another cross examination, defence lawyer Abbie Hollingworth questioned police’s digital forensic analyst Joshua Locke about the evidence he gave.
Locke analysed Lauren’s search history, GPS locations and messages.
Some of Lauren’s search history was shown to the jury by the prosecution.
The searches included:
“Lethal dosage alprazolam in children” (July 31).
“Ambien lethal dose” (August 14).
“Most effective overdose in children” (August 20).
“Drugs to overdose kids” (late August).
But during the cross examination, Hollingworth asked if Locke was instructed to remove some searches from his final phone analysis report. This included a search found relating to poisoning using liquorice.
Locke said he did not include it in his final report after being instructed that it wasn’t relevant by the officer in charge of the case.
Hollngworth said Lauren was watching TV at the time of the search and saw something about poisoning using liquorice.
Hollingworth said though the search may appear sinister, without context it was not a true reflection of Lauren’s state of mind, which Locke agreed to.
Lauren’s defence team also produced a number of text messages that she sent, which police did not include in their case.
Detective Mitchell read a number of these messages out to the court at the request of Toohey. They were sent in mid-2021.
“Our kids are damn cute,” one read.
“Graham’s birthday is tomorrow so Liane and I are baking a cake. We can’t do anything with Covid so we are just going to order Mr. Delivery and watch movies,” she said to a friend in June.
The second week of trial will begin tomorrow morning with forensic pathologist Martin Sage leading the evidence.
IOL
Are you or someone you know affected by mental health? If so here are some important numbers:
- The SA Depression and Anxiety Group's 24-hour mental health helpline: 080 045 6789
- The SA Federation for Mental Health: 011 781 1852.