Convinced she didn’t commit suicide, the devastated parents of a teenage girl found dead in a small town on the Tasmanian coast are still fighting for answers eight years later.
Eden Westbrook, 15, was found in Fisherman’s Memorial Park in St Helens in the state’s northeast, two hours from Launceston, at dawn on February 18, 2015.
Despite police arriving quickly and clumsily trying to shield the scene from the public, Mrs. Westbrook’s body was seen by several people, including a busload of school children, due to her position in a tree.
The message spread through the city with about 2,200 people and reached Eden’s parents, Jason and Amanda Westbrook, who ran to the park to be confronted by their little girl who was on public display, with police not wanting the scene to disturb.
Eden had stormed off the night before after an argument over her cell phone, and they’d spent much of the night searching the streets for her.
Eden Westbrook, 15, was found in Fisherman’s Memorial Park in St Helens in the state’s northeast, two hours from Launceston, at dawn on February 18, 2015
Eden’s parents, Jason and Amanda Westbrook, faced their 15-year-old daughter’s terrifying scene at Fisherman’s Memorial Park
Coroner Olivia McTaggart ruled in September 2016 that Eden had died by suicide.
No inquest was held where the coroner relied solely on the information from the police investigation.
Her parents are adamant that she did not commit suicide and are critical of the investigation, saying vital information was overlooked by the police.
They also claim that more information has emerged in the years since that casts further doubt on the circumstances of their daughter’s death.
Tasmanian newspaper The Mercury has followed the case consistently, publishing sensational claims earlier this year that an anonymous man had visited the Westbrooks’ home and told them he knew what had happened to Eden.
The couple were working in their garden after moving from NSW to St Helen’s to run a landscaping business a few years earlier when the man pulled into their driveway.
He told them that he had been drinking with a friend and they had started talking about the subject of Eden.
The man told them that the teenager had not committed suicide, but that she had been to a party, overdosed and that the way her body was found was staged.
Mr Westbrook called his friend, Sydney-based barrister Peter Lavac, who flew over to meet with them and audio-recorded the man’s claims.
Eden Westbrook died in February 2015. Her death was ruled a suicide, but her father Jason believes it may have been foul play.
Eden’s parents are pushing for a new study they hope will help restore her memory and heal a wound that still lurks beneath the surface of the remote Tasmanian community.
On the recording heard by the newspaper, the man, who is well known in the fishing community, said he had been with someone in Launceston a few weeks earlier.
“(My friend) heard there was more to it and presumably two people were involved in hanging her in that tree… a man and a woman.”
‘They had used a rope from one of the boats . . . at the wharf.
“(Anyone who knew) the man who supposedly put Eden in the tree had passed this information on to the person I was talking to.”
The visitor passed on the names of a man and a much younger woman, who are known in the city but never mentioned by the media.
He explained that the man allegedly confessed his involvement to his girlfriend at the time, who in turn told her mother, who told the visitor’s friend.
The Westbrooks said the younger girl the visitor identified was known to act increasingly strange in the years since Eden’s death, occasionally going to members of their family to rant that it was her “sorry.”
Mr Lavac spoke to a Tasmania police inspector and offered to have the visitor interviewed by police, but when he refused to allow a lawyer to be present, he withdrew the offer, reports The Australian.
Mr Westbrook told the paper this week that he believes part of the reason he has struggled to pursue further investigation into Eden’s case is because he is considered an outsider.
A memorial in the foreshore park where Eden was found in St Helens, Tasmania
The year 10 student was well regarded by both her fellow students and teachers
The couple, who have seven children and are originally from the Sunshine Coast, moved to the town in the early 2000s but are still not considered locals, according to Mr Westbrook.
“We have just supported an attack on our character as mainlanders who have come to Tasmania and are troublemakers,” he told the publication.
“So we’ve kind of been discredited with all the efforts we’ve made to get to the truth.”
The coroner said in her findings that Eden was a caring individual who did well in Year 10 and was highly regarded by both her students and teachers.
But she noted that her school Internet search history, perhaps not unusual for a teen, showed searches on topics such as unprotected sex, depression, and drugs.
She assumed Eden had been depressed, had previously tried to harm herself, and had written a note six months earlier stating the “intention to end her life.”
Mr Westbrook strongly denies that this was the case, saying ‘At no point did Eden attempt to take his own life’.
Despite there being a huge gap between leaving her parents’ house and going missing arriving at the park, the coroner said she was “satisfied that there are no suspicious circumstances surrounding Eden’s death or that there has been any other person was involved’.
The Westbrooks are pushing for a new open and transparent judicial inquiry that would examine new information and interview new witnesses.
They hope that this will not only provide them with answers, but also help put the memory of Eden to rest and heal a wound that still lingers beneath the surface of the remote Tasmanian community.