Add Category
Tia Landers’ mother Mary (centre) is comforted by supporters outside the Brisbane Supreme Court. Picture: Jodie Richter
A Queensland couple have both been given life jail terms for the “sadistic†and prolonged killing of mother-of-four Tia Landers.
John Edward Harris and Linda Eileen Appleton were sentenced in Brisbane’s Supreme Court on Friday, a week after having pleaded guilty, midway through their trial, to murdering Ms Landers in a brutal and bloodied encounter at their Brighton home in June 2014.
Ms Landers was stabbed, stomped on, bashed and shot, with her wounded body found wrapped in a blanket in a shallow grave at the Beerburrum forest more than a fortnight later.
In sentencing Harris and Appleton, Justice Jean Dalton described what they did as sadistic, hideous and disturbing.
Harris was ordered to serve at least 27 years in jail before being eligible for parole, while Appleton must spent at least 23 years behind bars.
In a victim impact statement, Tia’s mother Mary wrote that the family would live with the “evil†long after those responsible were sentenced.
Tia Landers.Source:No Source
Tia Landers.Source:News Corp Australia
“It is cemented firmly forever in our family’s history,†she wrote.
Earlier, in his opening remarks to the jury, crown prosecutor Philip McCarthy said an undercover police officer was placed in Appleton’s cell soon after her arrest.
He said: “She will tell that officer: ‘We carved her up, we chopped her up, we chopped her up with a machete’.â€
Mr McCarthy said Appleton then gestured two gun shots to the head.
He said Harris told a fellow prisoner that he fired the shots that killed her and he had had an affair with Ms Landers while Appleton was previously in jail.
Mr McCarthy said two acquaintances — Jake McKenzie and Ryan Morgan — were with Ms Landers when she was tortured and then murdered on June 16, 2014.
The bush where the body of Tia Landers was found off Roys Road, Beerwah. Picture: Glenn BarnesSource:News Corp Australia
They will testify how she had pleaded for her life and they were ordered to clean up the blood before being driven home.
Mr McCarthy said prior conversations between the accused couple, recorded while Appleton was incarcerated over another matter, showed her feelings towards Ms Landers.
Mr McCarthy said the post-mortem examination found wounds consistent with a machete to the ankle, thigh, shoulder, scalp and two “incise wounds to her vaginaâ€, however it was two gunshot wounds to her head that caused her death.
He told the jury a handgun and silencer found at their home matched bullet fragments in Ms Landers’ body, which was seriously decomposed when found.
Ms Landers’ mother Mary wiped tears from her face as she identified photos of her daughter’s jewellery late on Monday.
On Friday, outside court, she was comforted by friends and family.