Inquests hears of chilling note found with Charmaine McLeod after Kingaroy Crash

A mother died along with four of her children in a violent accident that police believe was “retaliation” for proceedings in family court, a judicial inquiry has heard.

An eight-page note found in Charmaine McLeod’s handbag after the crash read, “Blame the courts, not enough help for victims of domestic violence and children,” which Detective Senior Constable Lisa O’Leary said it was central to the theory.

Ms McLeod’s note also said she finally had the ‘courage to report my abusive husband’, the inquest found, but no accusation against her partner James McLeod was ever proven.

A police officer also told the inquest that he believed Ms McLeod claimed she had been raped by her husband.

The mother, 35, and her children Aaleyn, 6, Matilda, 5, Wyatt, 4, and Zaidok, 2, were killed when her small SUV was involved in a head-on collision with a truck on May 27, 2019, on the Bunya Highway at Kingaroy, northwest of Brisbane.

The inquest into the crash and the circumstances leading up to it began in Brisbane Coroner’s Court on Wednesday.

Wyatt, Ally, Zaidok and Matilda (photo lr) lived like “princes and princesses” before the crash, a friend said

Attorney Emily Cooper, representing the police commissioner, asked Senator Const O’Leary about the eight-page note.

“You refer there, among other things, to the interpretation of information from the family court as the cause of the traffic accident,” she asked.

“To be clear, page seven… (of Mrs. McLeod’s note)… it says, isn’t it ‘blaming the courts that there isn’t enough help for victims of domestic violence and children'”.

“Did that play a big part in your conclusion in your report as I just read?”

Det Const. O’Leary said yes.

At the inquest on Friday, a police officer investigating Ms McLeod’s allegations that her former partner James McLeod raped her said he believed one of the allegations was “completely fabricated”, the brisbane times reported.

The officer told the inquest that he had investigated four rape allegations made by Ms McLeod against James, who claimed during police questioning that two of the incidents were consensual and two never happened.

James McLeod has not been charged with any criminal offence.

The inquest also heard that police did not pursue a sexual assault allegation against Mr McLeod.

On the second day of the Brisbane inquest on Thursday, testimonies were heard from two of Ms McLeod’s friends and a child care worker.

A friend said they heard a female police officer tell Ms McLeod that no investigation would be pursued into an allegation that her daughter Matilda had been sexually assaulted by Mr McLeod because officers had concluded that the child had been ‘coached’ in what they had to say.

Mr McLeod’s lawyer, Amelia Hughes, on Wednesday disputed claims made by another witness that she saw Mr McLeod ask Matilda to perform a sexual act.

Mrs Hughes suggested to the witness that she fabricated the incident because she did not like Mr McLeod, which the witness denied.

Emergency workers described the crash as “catastrophic” and one of the worst scenes they’d been to

Another witness said on Thursday that Ms McLeod had told her police would not investigate Matilda’s allegations, as they believed she had coached her daughter to make the allegation.

The witness also said Ms McLeod’s “involuntary smiling” damaged her credibility when she spoke to police.

The former child care worker testified that Wyatt had twice demanded other children engage in sexual behavior and approached her with a knife.

“(Wyatt) said, ‘I’m going to cut you like a bad guy cuts me'”… and “there’s a bad man with daddy,” the childcare worker said.

The employee discussed these incidents with Ms McLeod, who said she suspected Wyatt had been “treated inappropriately” and “the brunt of (Mr. McLeod’s) bad moods.”

The employee said she had a policy of not automatically believing one parent over the other and contacted Child Services, who told her the matter was already under investigation.

Ms. Hughes asked the employee if she had discussed the claims with Mr. McLeod and she said no because Ms. McLeod had not provided his contact details.

The charwoman admitted that she went to the same school as Mrs. McLeod, that they had been socialized, and that she had never seen how Mr. McLeod interacted with his children.

All three witnesses who testified on Thursday cannot be named for legal reasons.

Mrs. McLeod is depicted with her four children

Ms. McLeod’s friends also testified about the impact her mental illnesses, including schizophrenia, had on her life.

A friend said Mrs. McLeod hallucinated that there was a giraffe on the hood of her car while she was driving and once thought her house was surrounded by people yelling at her.

“She heard voices telling her that if she didn’t kill herself, they would kill someone close to her,” the friend said.

Another friend said that Mrs. McLeod would “tell one person one version of events and another” and decided she had “lied” when she claimed to have been raped by Mr. McLeod.

The judicial investigation continues.

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