June 9, 2024 • 26 mins
Brittney and her co-accused travel down to Adelaide, this time with murderous intent.
As Bernadette sits in the car outside Brittney's poppa's house, Brittney texts and says 's she doesn't know if she can go through with it.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:05):
Apogee production. Ryan Whitwell Dwyer's sister murdered their granddad. She's
currently serving twenty years for his murder, all to try
and steal one hundred thousand dollars in cash that he'd
stashed in his house. In the last episode, we heard
how Brittany and another friend, Shelby, drove to Adelaide from Brisbane.
(00:28):
They unsuccessfully tried to jump the fence and find cash
hid in Robert shed. They left Adelaide empty handed.
Speaker 2 (00:35):
He really jumped into security mode and he actually had
all of his the color bond defences heightened. He actually
had them all redone.
Speaker 3 (00:46):
So that was my last conversation with Dad. He was
talking about someone jumping into the backyard and that he
had noticed this car. He was saying it was like
a suv, like a bigger piner car, but it was
parked in this little lane way that Dad had near
(01:08):
his brightney, his house, or the lane way that went
through to the next brod. This car had actually parked
in the lane way and he was saying, I've never
seen a car park in there before, and it had
interstate number plates on it. And this was our last conversation,
so little did we know that we're Brittany's doing.
Speaker 2 (01:31):
So did that and then also relocated the money?
Speaker 1 (01:35):
Did he tell anyone that he was doing that?
Speaker 2 (01:37):
He told us about the fences, Okay, didn't tell anyone
about the money.
Speaker 1 (01:41):
Yeah, so I'm guessing if he's told you about the fences,
you've possibly mentioned it to your sister.
Speaker 2 (01:47):
Yeah, maybe someone, I think, because she wasn't living with
us at that time, I actually don't think she knew
that the fences had been done. Yea, it could have
come up in conversation. I don't remember, but yeah, I
obviously knew about it.
Speaker 1 (02:01):
This point is important because it now makes sense that
when Brittany went back to Adelaide with Bernadette, this time
to kill her granddad, she wouldn't climb a fence. She
would ring the doorbell and a granddad would let her in.
He'd be excited to see his granddaughter, and although surprised,
he would invite her in and offer a breakfast. The
(02:22):
person that accompanied Brittany down to Adelaide this second time
was Bernadette Burns. She was twenty two. In Facebook pictures,
Bernadette has tattoos on her arms and her neck. She's
wearing a nose ring and is smiling in the selfie
that she took in the front seat of a car.
Speaker 2 (02:40):
They met through gumdry of all places.
Speaker 1 (02:45):
How do you meet someone a gum tree.
Speaker 2 (02:47):
I think they were either there to buy something or
it was like a rental advertisement, and that's how they
sort of connect. It is my understanding.
Speaker 1 (03:02):
What else do you know about Bernadette has.
Speaker 2 (03:04):
Had some trouble in the past. She's a single, She
was a single mum, didn't really work or anything like that,
had some troubles with her ex partner, cust the issues,
that sort of thing.
Speaker 1 (03:16):
Your sister and Bernadette. Were they in a relationship?
Speaker 2 (03:19):
We believed, so, Yeah, there was a lot that sort
of came out in the letters that I that I
communicated with Brittany with through when she was in jail.
And again from what Brittany had said to me, it's
it seemed like the story to change.
Speaker 1 (03:35):
A fair bit.
Speaker 2 (03:36):
It was yes, they were, No, they weren't. They were
just friends. The time when she was living with me,
there was conversations around moving and moving into like a
better house and up in the North side of Brisbane.
You know, She's like, oh, you know, we can rent
this four bedroom, double story house. It's only eight hundred
a week and all of this, and I think they
(03:58):
weren't going to go back to Shelby's. Potentially Shelby was
going to move in with Brittany into the sharehouse, and
I think that all sort of fell through, and that's
where sort of Bernadette came in handy. Whether or not
they actually ever moved into this house, I'm not sure.
As we sort of figure out, there was a lot
of lies of where they did, didn't live, what they
(04:21):
were doing, to what was told to us, but I
know that Brittany did live in a shower home and
Bernadette lived there.
Speaker 1 (04:28):
They were using drugs.
Speaker 2 (04:30):
They were using a lot of drugs. Apparently what sort
of drugs what came out in the court case was
a substantial amount of cocaine. There was references to ice
as well.
Speaker 1 (04:44):
Which is okay, not a cheap drug, not a cheap
drug at all. No, how were they acquiring you know,
those sort of Class A drugs that are reasonably expensive.
Speaker 2 (04:55):
There was a lot that sort of came out in
the letters that I that I communicated with Brittany with
through when she was in jail, and money was being
made through prostitution and dealing drugs on behalf of people,
you know, to then get I guess free stock.
Speaker 1 (05:16):
Let's just go to that. The prostitution piece. This is
something that was revealed in court, and I guess this
now makes sense or made sense to you at the
time when it was revealed. Although it was a revelation,
this was essentially Brittany's domino's job and you're picking her
up from strip clubs. What was she using the strip
(05:37):
clubs for? Do you think, I think.
Speaker 2 (05:39):
To potentially meet people to then go and do it.
I don't think it really ever happened at the strip clubs,
but you were sort of able to wiazle your way
in and then sort of go a, you know, we
can do this, and then off we go.
Speaker 1 (05:56):
She got a captive audience, right, yeah, yeah, prime target.
How did you feel when you heard that about your sister?
Speaker 2 (06:05):
Disappointed? Just some people have said to me. Or did
you feel ashamed or did you feel embarrassed? No? Not really.
It was more just I felt so sad that at
any time she could have come and spoke to any
of us, any of us, you know, and talk about
(06:27):
how to get out of this or money or whatever
the case might have been, and she didn't feel like
she could for some reason, and to have to go
down that path is just so awful, just troubling. In
the letters, we spoke about this and it seemed like
(06:49):
she'd been doing this for a long time. There was
days at high school that she was doing.
Speaker 1 (06:56):
This prostitution at what age in high school.
Speaker 2 (07:02):
I can't pinpointed exactly. That she does talk about in
the letters about you know, meeting with people and that
sort of thing, and you sort of have to read
in between the lines a little bit with that.
Speaker 3 (07:16):
I think that all the drugs that they were using,
or she was using, and the prostitution, she wasn't living
at home, but she would tell me that that Shelby
worked in the strip club and that's why they went
(07:38):
to the strip club a lot. Either she was picking
Shelby up from work or dropping her off or whatever.
Not that I would mind that they go to places
like that, but she just had to lie to me
all the time. I think.
Speaker 1 (07:53):
Across the years Brittany has been in jail, Ryan has
communicated with his sister. He told me that part of
it is trying to find out what happened and part
of it is trying to understand why she did it.
Ryan's mom, Tanya, hasn't spoken to her daughter Brittany since
she murdered Robert.
Speaker 2 (08:12):
So this letter was actually sent to my mom via
me on the eighteenth of December of twenty nineteen. So
it says to Mum, I am so sorry that it
has been so long since I wrote you. The last
letter Ryan mentioned that you needed time and that you
(08:33):
hadn't read any of the last letters that I had sent.
I'm so sorry that I couldn't be the daughter you
and Dad deserved to have. I did not mean to
live this life, or to continue lying to both of
you about having a job, a house, and committing a
crime to live. Once I moved out of home, my
life started to spiral downwards, and I was ashamed to
(08:56):
come to you for help. I became highly dependent on
alcohol and ice. Honestly, I did not think I think
that you would understand. For years, you made me feel
like I had to live up to Ryan, and I
just couldn't. I was never enough. I knew that if
I had come clean that our relationship would have become
(09:17):
more distant, and all I ever wanted was to feel
loved by you and have a healthier mother daughter relationship.
I don't want you to blame yourself. I know that
you did the best you could, and you always made
sure that we never went without. I have been broken
and dealing with my demons for years and years, and
(09:38):
I eventually became very good at keeping them a secret
from everybody. Once I became addicted to the drug Eyes,
I could no longer control the flashbacks and pain. This
led to my imprisonment. I regret each and every action
that I ever did. I live with the remorse and
the regret every day, and I just want you to
(10:01):
know that I'm completely and utterly sorry for all of it.
You and the rest so the family did not deserve
to feel pain for an action that I regret deeply,
and I'm so sorry for the for inflicting that sort
of nightmare onto you all. And I understand that sorry
in quotations simply does not go back and change the
past that I have created. But I miss having you
(10:22):
in my life, Mum, and I need you to know
that what I did torments me every day, and if
I could go back, I would go back, but I can't,
and I can't change anything that I've done. You're still
my mother, and I honestly need you now more than ever.
Every occasion, every birthday, every Christmas that goes by without
hearing from you honestly is killing me inside. I know
(10:44):
that I have not been the daughter you deserve to have,
but I am honestly so broken without my mum. I
cannot start moving on with my life in here without you.
I truly do not expect your forgiveness, and I do
not believe that I deserve such leniency, but I do
need my mum being in my life. I love your mum.
Speaker 1 (11:03):
Brittany, how did you feel reading that for the first time?
Speaker 2 (11:13):
Oh, it actually makes me want to cry. To be fair,
it's you know, I it's I didn't realize. You know,
I haven't read that letter for a long time, and
actually that was the first time I physically read it
in years, since twenty nineteen. And to be fair, I
(11:37):
think I blocked a lot of that out because in
my communication with her, I didn't ever really feel like
she was properly remorseful. And then I read that the
original time, and it made me feel like she was
sorry because it was convenient for her to be sorry
and she needed something out of that, which you know
(11:59):
is mum to communicate to her. But reading that again, now,
you know, it does make me, you know, quite emotional,
very hard to read.
Speaker 1 (12:12):
There was a portion in the letter that felt a
little like victim blaming where she said she didn't use
these words, but I'm paraphrasing, and you know, the standards
for her were so high because of you and Ryan.
How did that make you feel? I sort of went, oh, wow,
(12:34):
that sounds like she's going, hey, listen, I did this,
and really it's a bit of your fault too.
Speaker 2 (12:39):
Yeah, I certainly feel that as well reading that.
Speaker 1 (12:45):
Have you read any of her letters?
Speaker 2 (12:48):
Don't I did.
Speaker 3 (12:50):
I think Ryan kept them from me for a while,
knowing that I couldn't handle them back in the day.
But there came a time when I just said to Ryan,
can I have those letters? I want to read those
and you know, you just know that you're going to
cry for a few days because you know that's my
(13:12):
daughter and it is but I did. I cut through.
There was a pair few letters and cards. There was
Mother's Day card and birthday cards, and then it was
probably a year after I read those letters that I
decided to write her a letter. So I did write
(13:38):
her a letter, and that was about eighteen months ago,
and I haven't heard. I never got a response from
my letter, so I really don't even know if she
actually got it in jail or if she just has
written me off and doesn't want anything to do with me.
Speaker 1 (14:01):
Bernadette Burns is Britney's co accused. As we heard, they
met on gum Try and lived together in a sharehouse.
It's unclear if they were romantically together. The story seems
to differ across a few different people. Bernadette had a
child at seventeen that she battled for custody on She
told Brittany that's why she needed the money.
Speaker 2 (14:22):
Honestly, that part I sort of have not thought about
a great deal. There's a lot of anger for me
with her, and I think she got off way too lightly,
saying with Shelby when all of that stuff was coming
out about having a hard life, I didn't care because
I think you can either be the victim and play
(14:42):
the victim, or be a survivor and change her own path.
And for me that was a bit of a similar thing.
But yeah, I had heard that she was also bullied
at school, and she had sort of turned to drugs
and all of that sort of stuff.
Speaker 1 (14:57):
But she was a New Zealand citizen. Yeah, and so
her parents were over from New Zealand. I'm guessing.
Speaker 2 (15:02):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (15:03):
The judge took into account her obviously early plea, her
guilty lee liking that they did. Your sister. She talked
about to a psychologist that she'd had difficulties at school,
being bullied. She left in year eleven. Apparently the family
was devastated by floods and they moved, and then she
gave birth to her child when she was seventeen, amid
(15:25):
a volatile relationship with her father. She apparently had unemployment, homelessness,
and significant drug use, and she had attempted suicide. So
she had a rough young life. But that doesn't admonish
her behavior. If your sister had never met Bernadette, she
thinks she would have murdered your grandad.
Speaker 2 (15:45):
Yeah. I think it goes back to Shelby. Brittany needed
somebody to support her through doing this, and I think
if it wasn't Bernadette, it STI would have been someone else.
I don't think that makes me think anything differently of Bernadette.
I think think she had the ability to say something
(16:07):
and stop all of this, and as did Shelby. They didn't,
So there is much to blame. But if those two
had never met Bernadette and Brittany, Brittany would have found
someone else or did it by herself.
Speaker 1 (16:22):
In August of twenty sixteen, Bernadette and your sister Brittany
leave Brisbane for Adelaide by car again. They took the
same bag that Brittany had taken with Shelby in the
April of that same year. Do you know what happened
(16:44):
on the way down in that drive with Bernadette.
Speaker 2 (16:48):
A lot of conversations between them. I know that they
were pretty much rushing to get down. They weren't doing
a lot of stopping. There was indications that they were
certainly on something to get there.
Speaker 1 (17:03):
You made drugs, yeah, keep them alert, speed or something.
Speaker 2 (17:07):
Yeah. Yeah, yeah, that's exactly what I would have thought.
And then again it was all very clear her intention.
You know, they paid for cash for the petrol stations,
and they you know, they paid cash at the They
did stay at a motel. You know, they knew that
they didn't want to be tracked, except they did have
(17:28):
one thing that was very much their undoing.
Speaker 1 (17:30):
But what was that thing? Their phone, both of their
mobile phones.
Speaker 2 (17:35):
Yeah, ping to their locations, and they weren't shy of
sending text messages, so.
Speaker 1 (17:40):
They were sending text messages while traveling from Brisbane to Adelaide.
Speaker 2 (17:44):
They were obviously very clear about what they need to
do to stay off the radar, but then to have
the phone on them was little little ridiculous.
Speaker 1 (17:58):
You mentioned there were lots of conversations from the court docks.
We learned that one of those conversations was a lot
of stations around having second thoughts about it.
Speaker 2 (18:08):
I think, particularly when Brittany was in the house, was
the most shocking one where she said I don't think
I can go through with this, and then the return
text message saying, you know, just harden up and do it.
Speaker 1 (18:27):
That text message is from Bernadare.
Speaker 2 (18:28):
Yeah in reply.
Speaker 1 (18:38):
What we do know is that this time your sister
hadn't planned just to rob your granddad. She had planned
this time to kill him, yeah, and make it look
like a robbery, like she'd told numerous people before she
got there. In court, it was also said that Bernadette
(19:02):
didn't think your sister would kill your granddad. She thought
that maybe they could get the money and get out
and not have a problem. There was a lenience in
Bernadette's sentence because of that. Yeah, how do you feel
about that?
Speaker 2 (19:19):
Angry? Because like outside of looking in anybody could see that,
you get a message like the one Britney saying I
can't and you reply do it. I don't care what
anybody says. Clearly she knew what was going to happen,
and she was egging Brittany on. The plan was set
(19:42):
from the time that they left and to go. Oh,
I don't think she went actually went through it load
of ship.
Speaker 1 (19:52):
Who do you think was the controlling force in the
relationship between Brittany and Bernadette.
Speaker 2 (19:57):
You know, it's funny. I've really gone back and forth
in my head about this, and obviously, with the love
of true crimes, people love to make up their own
narratives and sort of play detective. I think a lot
of people will tend to say it's Brittany, that she
was the controlling one, but I actually don't think that's
the case. I think maybe at the beginning, sure, but
(20:20):
I think Bernadette had it, saw an opportunity and ran
with it, and I think she was really controlling the narrative.
Speaker 1 (20:29):
So they arrive at your granddad's house in the morning
after a really long drive from Brisbane straight through. They've
obviously had some sort of drugs to keep them awake.
Tell me what happens next.
Speaker 2 (20:43):
She and Bernadette were talking about how they'll go about this.
So they pull up at the at my grandfather's house.
Speaker 1 (20:55):
And whose car are they in?
Speaker 2 (20:57):
Their housemates the silver Captiva. So Brittany drove her hold
an Astra and yeah, that was still in Brisbane.
Speaker 1 (21:06):
And the silver Captaver, I'm guessing has Queensland plates.
Speaker 2 (21:09):
On it it does. They pull up and they park
out the front or in the side street. I actually
think it was still in the side street. They were
talking about how it's going to happen, and Bernadette said
that she would like to come in and watch my
(21:30):
grandfather be killed, and Brittany said no, and that you
were to wait in the car. And so Bernadette did
stay in the car doing a makeup and weird stuff
like that to pass time. Brittany went to the front
(21:50):
door and my grandfather came to the door and was
surprised to see my sister.
Speaker 1 (21:59):
They hadn't arranged it. No, like your granddad had no idea,
and I obviously knew your sister lived in.
Speaker 2 (22:05):
And so you know, mid morning, mid morning, and it
was a bit odd for her to obviously do that.
But like myself, I've done that in the past. I
traveled a lot for work and so I happened to
be in Adelaide and I'd go and surprise him. So,
you know, for her to do that, whilst she didn't
really ever travel to Adelaide, it's not totally crazy that
(22:26):
that would have happened. And so my grandfather was surprised
but really happy about it, invited her in.
Speaker 1 (22:32):
He doesn't realize at the time that she's wearing gloves. No,
and she's also got a knife with her. No, she's
hidden that from his view up personally. Yeah, so she's
holding the knife in her jacket. Hidden't but she's wearing
gloves as well. What sort of gloves were they.
Speaker 2 (22:48):
I think they were just normal gloves. I don't think
they were. I think it was just so that would
look into gloves that might look a bit weird. But
we're talking August in.
Speaker 1 (22:56):
Adelaide, Yeah, which is cold cold, right, So so like nothing.
Speaker 2 (23:02):
Not crazy and she wore a lot of normally, she
wore a lot of very baggy, oversized sweaters, hoodies, that
sort of thing. So again, not totally uncommon. You know,
if I had opened the door and saw her and gloves, yeah,
probably a bit strange. But to my grandfather again because
he didn't see a lot of each other, you know,
(23:25):
not uncommon.
Speaker 1 (23:30):
So they walked down that long corridor past the front
room into the kitchen. In the kitchen there's a dining
table and your granddad's cooking brecky, cooking breakfast.
Speaker 2 (23:44):
I think prior to him starting to cook breakfast, he
went and got photo a photo album as he would
always and start flicking through photos while he was cooking breakfast.
Brittany would go through the photos of like our family
growing up and whatnot. And then yeah, they he finished
having cooking breakfast, and they sat down and they ate
(24:07):
it together and then back on the couch and flicking
through photos for quite some time.
Speaker 1 (24:14):
So this seems very normal. This seems like a granddaughter
going to see her poppaea sitting in the kitchen. Grandad's
making brecky. After a long drive for Brittany reminiscing about
photos of great times together, probably remembering, as you said earlier,
(24:35):
the lineage of your family and how important that was
to your granddad. Yeah, and then what happens.
Speaker 2 (24:43):
That's when she sends the text message to Bernadade to say, like,
I can't go through with this. And that's when Bernadette
replied and said, you know, harden up and just get
it done. So Brittany says, I've got to go, and
he's said okay, and he was walking her out down
(25:05):
past the dining table, you know, down past the long hallway.
Just as they get to the front door, she realizes
that she's got to She's got to do it now
or ever, and she she stabs him.
Speaker 1 (25:25):
In the next episode of My Sister the Murderer.
Speaker 2 (25:29):
She then takes him into the kitchen where the dining
table is at and pulls up a chair and like
sits him down. But she couldn't she couldn't sort of
bear to watch, so she turned around and while he
was bleeding out the detectives. At the time, we didn't realize.
(25:55):
I look back now and it sort of makes sense.
But they really, I use the analogy, treated us like mushrooms,
kept us in the dark and fed ours shit like
just really didn't want to tell us a lot, and
I get that now. At the time, it's infuriating. And
every time we found out information it was because of
(26:17):
the media.
Apogee production. Ryan Whitwell Dwyer's sister murdered their granddad. She's
currently serving twenty years for his murder, all to try
and steal one hundred thousand dollars in cash that he'd
stashed in his house. In the last episode, we heard
how Brittany and another friend, Shelby, drove to Adelaide from Brisbane.
(00:28):
They unsuccessfully tried to jump the fence and find cash
hid in Robert shed. They left Adelaide empty handed.
Speaker 2 (00:35):
He really jumped into security mode and he actually had
all of his the color bond defences heightened. He actually
had them all redone.
Speaker 3 (00:46):
So that was my last conversation with Dad. He was
talking about someone jumping into the backyard and that he
had noticed this car. He was saying it was like
a suv, like a bigger piner car, but it was
parked in this little lane way that Dad had near
(01:08):
his brightney, his house, or the lane way that went
through to the next brod. This car had actually parked
in the lane way and he was saying, I've never
seen a car park in there before, and it had
interstate number plates on it. And this was our last conversation,
so little did we know that we're Brittany's doing.
Speaker 2 (01:31):
So did that and then also relocated the money?
Speaker 1 (01:35):
Did he tell anyone that he was doing that?
Speaker 2 (01:37):
He told us about the fences, Okay, didn't tell anyone
about the money.
Speaker 1 (01:41):
Yeah, so I'm guessing if he's told you about the fences,
you've possibly mentioned it to your sister.
Speaker 2 (01:47):
Yeah, maybe someone, I think, because she wasn't living with
us at that time, I actually don't think she knew
that the fences had been done. Yea, it could have
come up in conversation. I don't remember, but yeah, I
obviously knew about it.
Speaker 1 (02:01):
This point is important because it now makes sense that
when Brittany went back to Adelaide with Bernadette, this time
to kill her granddad, she wouldn't climb a fence. She
would ring the doorbell and a granddad would let her in.
He'd be excited to see his granddaughter, and although surprised,
he would invite her in and offer a breakfast. The
(02:22):
person that accompanied Brittany down to Adelaide this second time
was Bernadette Burns. She was twenty two. In Facebook pictures,
Bernadette has tattoos on her arms and her neck. She's
wearing a nose ring and is smiling in the selfie
that she took in the front seat of a car.
Speaker 2 (02:40):
They met through gumdry of all places.
Speaker 1 (02:45):
How do you meet someone a gum tree.
Speaker 2 (02:47):
I think they were either there to buy something or
it was like a rental advertisement, and that's how they
sort of connect. It is my understanding.
Speaker 1 (03:02):
What else do you know about Bernadette has.
Speaker 2 (03:04):
Had some trouble in the past. She's a single, She
was a single mum, didn't really work or anything like that,
had some troubles with her ex partner, cust the issues,
that sort of thing.
Speaker 1 (03:16):
Your sister and Bernadette. Were they in a relationship?
Speaker 2 (03:19):
We believed, so, Yeah, there was a lot that sort
of came out in the letters that I that I
communicated with Brittany with through when she was in jail.
And again from what Brittany had said to me, it's
it seemed like the story to change.
Speaker 1 (03:35):
A fair bit.
Speaker 2 (03:36):
It was yes, they were, No, they weren't. They were
just friends. The time when she was living with me,
there was conversations around moving and moving into like a
better house and up in the North side of Brisbane.
You know, She's like, oh, you know, we can rent
this four bedroom, double story house. It's only eight hundred
a week and all of this, and I think they
(03:58):
weren't going to go back to Shelby's. Potentially Shelby was
going to move in with Brittany into the sharehouse, and
I think that all sort of fell through, and that's
where sort of Bernadette came in handy. Whether or not
they actually ever moved into this house, I'm not sure.
As we sort of figure out, there was a lot
of lies of where they did, didn't live, what they
(04:21):
were doing, to what was told to us, but I
know that Brittany did live in a shower home and
Bernadette lived there.
Speaker 1 (04:28):
They were using drugs.
Speaker 2 (04:30):
They were using a lot of drugs. Apparently what sort
of drugs what came out in the court case was
a substantial amount of cocaine. There was references to ice
as well.
Speaker 1 (04:44):
Which is okay, not a cheap drug, not a cheap
drug at all. No, how were they acquiring you know,
those sort of Class A drugs that are reasonably expensive.
Speaker 2 (04:55):
There was a lot that sort of came out in
the letters that I that I communicated with Brittany with
through when she was in jail, and money was being
made through prostitution and dealing drugs on behalf of people,
you know, to then get I guess free stock.
Speaker 1 (05:16):
Let's just go to that. The prostitution piece. This is
something that was revealed in court, and I guess this
now makes sense or made sense to you at the
time when it was revealed. Although it was a revelation,
this was essentially Brittany's domino's job and you're picking her
up from strip clubs. What was she using the strip
(05:37):
clubs for? Do you think, I think.
Speaker 2 (05:39):
To potentially meet people to then go and do it.
I don't think it really ever happened at the strip clubs,
but you were sort of able to wiazle your way
in and then sort of go a, you know, we
can do this, and then off we go.
Speaker 1 (05:56):
She got a captive audience, right, yeah, yeah, prime target.
How did you feel when you heard that about your sister?
Speaker 2 (06:05):
Disappointed? Just some people have said to me. Or did
you feel ashamed or did you feel embarrassed? No? Not really.
It was more just I felt so sad that at
any time she could have come and spoke to any
of us, any of us, you know, and talk about
(06:27):
how to get out of this or money or whatever
the case might have been, and she didn't feel like
she could for some reason, and to have to go
down that path is just so awful, just troubling. In
the letters, we spoke about this and it seemed like
(06:49):
she'd been doing this for a long time. There was
days at high school that she was doing.
Speaker 1 (06:56):
This prostitution at what age in high school.
Speaker 2 (07:02):
I can't pinpointed exactly. That she does talk about in
the letters about you know, meeting with people and that
sort of thing, and you sort of have to read
in between the lines a little bit with that.
Speaker 3 (07:16):
I think that all the drugs that they were using,
or she was using, and the prostitution, she wasn't living
at home, but she would tell me that that Shelby
worked in the strip club and that's why they went
(07:38):
to the strip club a lot. Either she was picking
Shelby up from work or dropping her off or whatever.
Not that I would mind that they go to places
like that, but she just had to lie to me
all the time. I think.
Speaker 1 (07:53):
Across the years Brittany has been in jail, Ryan has
communicated with his sister. He told me that part of
it is trying to find out what happened and part
of it is trying to understand why she did it.
Ryan's mom, Tanya, hasn't spoken to her daughter Brittany since
she murdered Robert.
Speaker 2 (08:12):
So this letter was actually sent to my mom via
me on the eighteenth of December of twenty nineteen. So
it says to Mum, I am so sorry that it
has been so long since I wrote you. The last
letter Ryan mentioned that you needed time and that you
(08:33):
hadn't read any of the last letters that I had sent.
I'm so sorry that I couldn't be the daughter you
and Dad deserved to have. I did not mean to
live this life, or to continue lying to both of
you about having a job, a house, and committing a
crime to live. Once I moved out of home, my
life started to spiral downwards, and I was ashamed to
(08:56):
come to you for help. I became highly dependent on
alcohol and ice. Honestly, I did not think I think
that you would understand. For years, you made me feel
like I had to live up to Ryan, and I
just couldn't. I was never enough. I knew that if
I had come clean that our relationship would have become
(09:17):
more distant, and all I ever wanted was to feel
loved by you and have a healthier mother daughter relationship.
I don't want you to blame yourself. I know that
you did the best you could, and you always made
sure that we never went without. I have been broken
and dealing with my demons for years and years, and
(09:38):
I eventually became very good at keeping them a secret
from everybody. Once I became addicted to the drug Eyes,
I could no longer control the flashbacks and pain. This
led to my imprisonment. I regret each and every action
that I ever did. I live with the remorse and
the regret every day, and I just want you to
(10:01):
know that I'm completely and utterly sorry for all of it.
You and the rest so the family did not deserve
to feel pain for an action that I regret deeply,
and I'm so sorry for the for inflicting that sort
of nightmare onto you all. And I understand that sorry
in quotations simply does not go back and change the
past that I have created. But I miss having you
(10:22):
in my life, Mum, and I need you to know
that what I did torments me every day, and if
I could go back, I would go back, but I can't,
and I can't change anything that I've done. You're still
my mother, and I honestly need you now more than ever.
Every occasion, every birthday, every Christmas that goes by without
hearing from you honestly is killing me inside. I know
(10:44):
that I have not been the daughter you deserve to have,
but I am honestly so broken without my mum. I
cannot start moving on with my life in here without you.
I truly do not expect your forgiveness, and I do
not believe that I deserve such leniency, but I do
need my mum being in my life. I love your mum.
Speaker 1 (11:03):
Brittany, how did you feel reading that for the first time?
Speaker 2 (11:13):
Oh, it actually makes me want to cry. To be fair,
it's you know, I it's I didn't realize. You know,
I haven't read that letter for a long time, and
actually that was the first time I physically read it
in years, since twenty nineteen. And to be fair, I
(11:37):
think I blocked a lot of that out because in
my communication with her, I didn't ever really feel like
she was properly remorseful. And then I read that the
original time, and it made me feel like she was
sorry because it was convenient for her to be sorry
and she needed something out of that, which you know
(11:59):
is mum to communicate to her. But reading that again, now,
you know, it does make me, you know, quite emotional,
very hard to read.
Speaker 1 (12:12):
There was a portion in the letter that felt a
little like victim blaming where she said she didn't use
these words, but I'm paraphrasing, and you know, the standards
for her were so high because of you and Ryan.
How did that make you feel? I sort of went, oh, wow,
(12:34):
that sounds like she's going, hey, listen, I did this,
and really it's a bit of your fault too.
Speaker 2 (12:39):
Yeah, I certainly feel that as well reading that.
Speaker 1 (12:45):
Have you read any of her letters?
Speaker 2 (12:48):
Don't I did.
Speaker 3 (12:50):
I think Ryan kept them from me for a while,
knowing that I couldn't handle them back in the day.
But there came a time when I just said to Ryan,
can I have those letters? I want to read those
and you know, you just know that you're going to
cry for a few days because you know that's my
(13:12):
daughter and it is but I did. I cut through.
There was a pair few letters and cards. There was
Mother's Day card and birthday cards, and then it was
probably a year after I read those letters that I
decided to write her a letter. So I did write
(13:38):
her a letter, and that was about eighteen months ago,
and I haven't heard. I never got a response from
my letter, so I really don't even know if she
actually got it in jail or if she just has
written me off and doesn't want anything to do with me.
Speaker 1 (14:01):
Bernadette Burns is Britney's co accused. As we heard, they
met on gum Try and lived together in a sharehouse.
It's unclear if they were romantically together. The story seems
to differ across a few different people. Bernadette had a
child at seventeen that she battled for custody on She
told Brittany that's why she needed the money.
Speaker 2 (14:22):
Honestly, that part I sort of have not thought about
a great deal. There's a lot of anger for me
with her, and I think she got off way too lightly,
saying with Shelby when all of that stuff was coming
out about having a hard life, I didn't care because
I think you can either be the victim and play
(14:42):
the victim, or be a survivor and change her own path.
And for me that was a bit of a similar thing.
But yeah, I had heard that she was also bullied
at school, and she had sort of turned to drugs
and all of that sort of stuff.
Speaker 1 (14:57):
But she was a New Zealand citizen. Yeah, and so
her parents were over from New Zealand. I'm guessing.
Speaker 2 (15:02):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (15:03):
The judge took into account her obviously early plea, her
guilty lee liking that they did. Your sister. She talked
about to a psychologist that she'd had difficulties at school,
being bullied. She left in year eleven. Apparently the family
was devastated by floods and they moved, and then she
gave birth to her child when she was seventeen, amid
(15:25):
a volatile relationship with her father. She apparently had unemployment, homelessness,
and significant drug use, and she had attempted suicide. So
she had a rough young life. But that doesn't admonish
her behavior. If your sister had never met Bernadette, she
thinks she would have murdered your grandad.
Speaker 2 (15:45):
Yeah. I think it goes back to Shelby. Brittany needed
somebody to support her through doing this, and I think
if it wasn't Bernadette, it STI would have been someone else.
I don't think that makes me think anything differently of Bernadette.
I think think she had the ability to say something
(16:07):
and stop all of this, and as did Shelby. They didn't,
So there is much to blame. But if those two
had never met Bernadette and Brittany, Brittany would have found
someone else or did it by herself.
Speaker 1 (16:22):
In August of twenty sixteen, Bernadette and your sister Brittany
leave Brisbane for Adelaide by car again. They took the
same bag that Brittany had taken with Shelby in the
April of that same year. Do you know what happened
(16:44):
on the way down in that drive with Bernadette.
Speaker 2 (16:48):
A lot of conversations between them. I know that they
were pretty much rushing to get down. They weren't doing
a lot of stopping. There was indications that they were
certainly on something to get there.
Speaker 1 (17:03):
You made drugs, yeah, keep them alert, speed or something.
Speaker 2 (17:07):
Yeah. Yeah, yeah, that's exactly what I would have thought.
And then again it was all very clear her intention.
You know, they paid for cash for the petrol stations,
and they you know, they paid cash at the They
did stay at a motel. You know, they knew that
they didn't want to be tracked, except they did have
(17:28):
one thing that was very much their undoing.
Speaker 1 (17:30):
But what was that thing? Their phone, both of their
mobile phones.
Speaker 2 (17:35):
Yeah, ping to their locations, and they weren't shy of
sending text messages, so.
Speaker 1 (17:40):
They were sending text messages while traveling from Brisbane to Adelaide.
Speaker 2 (17:44):
They were obviously very clear about what they need to
do to stay off the radar, but then to have
the phone on them was little little ridiculous.
Speaker 1 (17:58):
You mentioned there were lots of conversations from the court docks.
We learned that one of those conversations was a lot
of stations around having second thoughts about it.
Speaker 2 (18:08):
I think, particularly when Brittany was in the house, was
the most shocking one where she said I don't think
I can go through with this, and then the return
text message saying, you know, just harden up and do it.
Speaker 1 (18:27):
That text message is from Bernadare.
Speaker 2 (18:28):
Yeah in reply.
Speaker 1 (18:38):
What we do know is that this time your sister
hadn't planned just to rob your granddad. She had planned
this time to kill him, yeah, and make it look
like a robbery, like she'd told numerous people before she
got there. In court, it was also said that Bernadette
(19:02):
didn't think your sister would kill your granddad. She thought
that maybe they could get the money and get out
and not have a problem. There was a lenience in
Bernadette's sentence because of that. Yeah, how do you feel
about that?
Speaker 2 (19:19):
Angry? Because like outside of looking in anybody could see that,
you get a message like the one Britney saying I
can't and you reply do it. I don't care what
anybody says. Clearly she knew what was going to happen,
and she was egging Brittany on. The plan was set
(19:42):
from the time that they left and to go. Oh,
I don't think she went actually went through it load
of ship.
Speaker 1 (19:52):
Who do you think was the controlling force in the
relationship between Brittany and Bernadette.
Speaker 2 (19:57):
You know, it's funny. I've really gone back and forth
in my head about this, and obviously, with the love
of true crimes, people love to make up their own
narratives and sort of play detective. I think a lot
of people will tend to say it's Brittany, that she
was the controlling one, but I actually don't think that's
the case. I think maybe at the beginning, sure, but
(20:20):
I think Bernadette had it, saw an opportunity and ran
with it, and I think she was really controlling the narrative.
Speaker 1 (20:29):
So they arrive at your granddad's house in the morning
after a really long drive from Brisbane straight through. They've
obviously had some sort of drugs to keep them awake.
Tell me what happens next.
Speaker 2 (20:43):
She and Bernadette were talking about how they'll go about this.
So they pull up at the at my grandfather's house.
Speaker 1 (20:55):
And whose car are they in?
Speaker 2 (20:57):
Their housemates the silver Captiva. So Brittany drove her hold
an Astra and yeah, that was still in Brisbane.
Speaker 1 (21:06):
And the silver Captaver, I'm guessing has Queensland plates.
Speaker 2 (21:09):
On it it does. They pull up and they park
out the front or in the side street. I actually
think it was still in the side street. They were
talking about how it's going to happen, and Bernadette said
that she would like to come in and watch my
(21:30):
grandfather be killed, and Brittany said no, and that you
were to wait in the car. And so Bernadette did
stay in the car doing a makeup and weird stuff
like that to pass time. Brittany went to the front
(21:50):
door and my grandfather came to the door and was
surprised to see my sister.
Speaker 1 (21:59):
They hadn't arranged it. No, like your granddad had no idea,
and I obviously knew your sister lived in.
Speaker 2 (22:05):
And so you know, mid morning, mid morning, and it
was a bit odd for her to obviously do that.
But like myself, I've done that in the past. I
traveled a lot for work and so I happened to
be in Adelaide and I'd go and surprise him. So,
you know, for her to do that, whilst she didn't
really ever travel to Adelaide, it's not totally crazy that
(22:26):
that would have happened. And so my grandfather was surprised
but really happy about it, invited her in.
Speaker 1 (22:32):
He doesn't realize at the time that she's wearing gloves. No,
and she's also got a knife with her. No, she's
hidden that from his view up personally. Yeah, so she's
holding the knife in her jacket. Hidden't but she's wearing
gloves as well. What sort of gloves were they.
Speaker 2 (22:48):
I think they were just normal gloves. I don't think
they were. I think it was just so that would
look into gloves that might look a bit weird. But
we're talking August in.
Speaker 1 (22:56):
Adelaide, Yeah, which is cold cold, right, So so like nothing.
Speaker 2 (23:02):
Not crazy and she wore a lot of normally, she
wore a lot of very baggy, oversized sweaters, hoodies, that
sort of thing. So again, not totally uncommon. You know,
if I had opened the door and saw her and gloves, yeah,
probably a bit strange. But to my grandfather again because
he didn't see a lot of each other, you know,
(23:25):
not uncommon.
Speaker 1 (23:30):
So they walked down that long corridor past the front
room into the kitchen. In the kitchen there's a dining
table and your granddad's cooking brecky, cooking breakfast.
Speaker 2 (23:44):
I think prior to him starting to cook breakfast, he
went and got photo a photo album as he would
always and start flicking through photos while he was cooking breakfast.
Brittany would go through the photos of like our family
growing up and whatnot. And then yeah, they he finished
having cooking breakfast, and they sat down and they ate
(24:07):
it together and then back on the couch and flicking
through photos for quite some time.
Speaker 1 (24:14):
So this seems very normal. This seems like a granddaughter
going to see her poppaea sitting in the kitchen. Grandad's
making brecky. After a long drive for Brittany reminiscing about
photos of great times together, probably remembering, as you said earlier,
(24:35):
the lineage of your family and how important that was
to your granddad. Yeah, and then what happens.
Speaker 2 (24:43):
That's when she sends the text message to Bernadade to say, like,
I can't go through with this. And that's when Bernadette
replied and said, you know, harden up and just get
it done. So Brittany says, I've got to go, and
he's said okay, and he was walking her out down
(25:05):
past the dining table, you know, down past the long hallway.
Just as they get to the front door, she realizes
that she's got to She's got to do it now
or ever, and she she stabs him.
Speaker 1 (25:25):
In the next episode of My Sister the Murderer.
Speaker 2 (25:29):
She then takes him into the kitchen where the dining
table is at and pulls up a chair and like
sits him down. But she couldn't she couldn't sort of
bear to watch, so she turned around and while he
was bleeding out the detectives. At the time, we didn't realize.
(25:55):
I look back now and it sort of makes sense.
But they really, I use the analogy, treated us like mushrooms,
kept us in the dark and fed ours shit like
just really didn't want to tell us a lot, and
I get that now. At the time, it's infuriating. And
every time we found out information it was because of
(26:17):
the media.
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