While a mother and son have admitted wrongdoing after driving over an Indigenous teen with their ute and leaving him to die by the roadside, they have claimed their actions were not murder.
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Jayden Walmsley-Hume, 20, and Katie Walmsley, 40, are facing a four-week trial in the NSW Supreme Court over the killing of 18-year-old Taj Jared Hart in Nowra on February 24, 2024.
Crown prosecutor Kate Ratcliffe previously told jurors about animosity and a history of violence between Walmsley-Hume and Mr Hart which included verbal and physical altercations.
Because of this, the mother and son sought retribution and formed an agreement to deliberately run Mr Hart over after seeing him walking alone on the roadside, the prosecutor said on Wednesday.
Days after the impact, the 20-year-old denied he had been involved in the hit-and-run, telling others the damage to the vehicle was caused by an impact with a kangaroo, the jury heard.
Both accused have pleaded not guilty to murder, with Walmsley also pleading not guilty to an alternative count of being an accessory after the murder.
On Thursday, Ms Ratcliffe told jurors that the 40-year-old had helped clean out the ute before it was seized by police and had used fake names to arrange accommodation in various hotels, motels and caravan parks for weeks after the collision to help her son evade detection.
The pair were on the run until their arrest on April 7, 2022, the jury was told.
Walmsley-Hume's barrister Sharyn Hall SC said her client accepted that he was guilty of manslaughter but denied he had any murderous intent.
"He was not trying to kill Taj Hart and he was not trying to cause him serious injury," she said.
The 20-year-old had fled after the fatal collision as emotions ran high in the community, Ms Hall told the Wollongong court.
His father's house was firebombed a day after and a number of threats were made, jurors heard.
Barrister Edward Anderson, representing Walmsley, said his client was not blameless either.
She accepted that she "improperly, inexcusably" aided her son to avoid police detection after the manslaughter.
However, she denied that she formed any agreement with her son to murder or cause really serious injury to Mr Hart.
The best the jury could do, even after hearing the evidence, was to guess, speculate or be suspicious about the existence of any such agreement but it could not find this beyond reasonable doubt, Mr Anderson said.
The trial before Justice Robertson Wright continues.
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Australian Associated Press
