December 27, 2025 • 31 mins
On New Year’s Day 1993, Perth woman Michelle Steck, 24, packed her bags and left her abusive four-year relationship with her violent partner’s words ringing in her ears. “You’re going to pay for your actions for a very long time,” spat Kevin East, 34.
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
When Michelle Steck met Kevin East at a Perth shopping
center in nineteen eighty nine, he seemed like a successful,
put together gentleman. At nineteen, Michelle was just starting her
career after studying and traveling, and this chance encounter with
a charming older man left her smitten. But that meeting
would set her on a path towards a tragedy that
(00:23):
would change her life forever. Michelle had always wanted children,
and when she fell pregnant earlier in their relationship, she
was excited to become a mum. But even back then,
East's true nature had begun to emerge. We didn't use
the term coercive control in the early nineteen nineties, but
that's exactly what Michelle was experiencing. East was jealous, quick
(00:47):
to anger, and constantly accused her of affairs that never happened.
He slowly and methodically cut her off from her friends
and family, making it very clear that they were not
welcome and that she needed his permission to go anywhere.
He tracked her every move, questioned her constantly, and controlled
all their finances, forcing Michelle to ask for money for
(01:09):
even the smallest of things. When the abuse turned violent,
She tried to leave, but like many men who see
women as their property, East pulled her back with promises
of change. They had another child, a little boy, Wesley,
but by then Michelle's situation had become even more dangerous. Eventually,
(01:30):
despite all the risk, she knew she had to go.
What followed in the weeks and months after she left
would read like a horror film, stalking, spying, and the
unraveling of a man furious that he no longer had control.
And then Kevin East did something only a very small
extreme group of domestic violence perpetrators, usually men, have ever
(01:54):
done to punish a partner who leaves. It's called retaliatory philocide.
Leave a vulnerable three year old girl at the mercy
of a violent father determined to use her as a
weapon against her mother. I'm Claire Murphy and this is
(02:14):
True Crime Conversations, a Muma Mere podcast exploring the world's
most notorious crimes by speaking to the people who know
the most about them. You're going to pay for your
actions for a long time. That's what little Kelly East's
father said to her mother Michelle, when she made it
clear she would not return to their violent and controlling relationship.
(02:37):
She had no idea just how true.
Speaker 2 (02:39):
Those words would be.
Speaker 1 (02:41):
Motivated by spite, Kevin East would commit an act that
would inflict a lifetime of grief and suffering on Michelle.
Statistic show that in Australia, one woman a week is
killed in domestic violence. Statistic show that in Australia, one
woman a week is killed in a situation of domestic violence,
and data from a twelve year study found one child
(03:03):
is killed every two weeks by a biological parent or stepparent.
The most dangerous day for children in cases of retaliatory
philocide is a Sunday, the day dads return them to
their mothers after access visits. And that's where Michelle Steck
found herself, waiting for Kevin East to return her daughter
from a weekend visit, waiting for a little girl who would.
Speaker 2 (03:26):
Never come home.
Speaker 1 (03:28):
Just before you hear from Michelle, we want to make
it clear that this conversation discusses domestic violence and suicide,
Michelle joins us. Now, Michelle, tell me about Kelly.
Speaker 2 (03:39):
What was she like?
Speaker 3 (03:40):
She was really funny, and as she grew up she
was more like a little butterfly. She just was a
sponge of life, and I guess in our short time
together we really did squeeze a lot of things in.
Speaker 2 (03:55):
Before she was two and a half.
Speaker 3 (03:57):
She knew all a shape, she knew what they were were,
she knew simple mathematic equations. And this sounds ridiculous, but
it's true. She was walking at nine months. She was
always an exploring child. She was never a person that
you could hold back, not even when we went to
visit things. When she was to you know, big pelicans
were not a big problem for her.
Speaker 2 (04:17):
You know, she wanted to go and be part of them,
and I.
Speaker 3 (04:21):
Tried to say no, so she bit my hand. That
was the kind of child she was.
Speaker 2 (04:27):
She was always, always the explorer, always into life. Sounds
like she had a bit of a sassy attitude too,
and she did.
Speaker 3 (04:36):
She did, And she had a passion for drawing on wolves.
She would draw on wolves, like as soon as there
was a pen or a text or anything a kid
you not, you can go and hang out washing.
Speaker 2 (04:47):
Before you know, there she was drawing on walls.
Speaker 1 (04:52):
So, of course, during the lead up to Kelly's arrival,
during your pregnancy, your relationship with your then partner Kevin
East is already starting to show signs of being a
domestic violence situation. For those of us who've never experienced
domestic violence, do you recognize in that moment when it's happening,
(05:14):
that that is domestic violence and it is happening to me?
Or is that something that hits you in hindsight? Is
there a moment you think, oh my gosh, this is
what's really happening.
Speaker 3 (05:24):
To be honest, it's a very slow creep. It's a
very very slow creep. It starts off by, you know,
the care factor. You think, Wow, this guy's really caring
because he rings every day, sees how you are, sees
what's going on in the house, and all these kinds
of things are just things of what you believe is
a caring nature.
Speaker 2 (05:45):
You see. I worked up until I was only a few.
Speaker 3 (05:48):
Weeks out of delivery, so a lot of the things
were still very much situation as usual, eating out, both
working to the calls, you know, two homes, one rental.
He was professional, so was I in a way as
a secretary. And I didn't notice it, really, I didn't
(06:11):
notice it then. It wasn't until after Kelly was born,
when she was six weeks it started to change and
it changed very fast and very dramatically. It started to
be more financial orientated. First thing to go was my vehicle,
because even though I owned.
Speaker 2 (06:28):
It, it was just extra cash that we could have.
Speaker 3 (06:32):
Then after that six week period, it started to take
a turn because he wanted me to go back to work,
and I said, no, bloody ay am I going back
to work when my child is so young. And there
are some professionals who choose to do that, but I'm
just not one of them.
Speaker 2 (06:46):
It was just terrible.
Speaker 3 (06:49):
He assumed control of who could visit, and it really
did stress me out at the time. But you just
go with the flow kind of thing to not make
it very obvious, even though some people in your family
become offended. And then people had to ring and give
(07:09):
advance notice to come to the house. Even when my
mom came to visit, it was highly offensive, you know,
for me and her, that he would request that she
would have to give us advance warning that she was
coming to rob This is.
Speaker 2 (07:27):
My mom, This is my mom.
Speaker 3 (07:29):
My Nnner of eighty years old, came over to stay
with us, and she left. The first night she left,
she said, if you take my advice, you'd get the
bloody hell out of here.
Speaker 2 (07:40):
Now he's no good. He's no good.
Speaker 1 (07:43):
She told me that you did leave Kevin that first
time when Kelly was still quite young. What was that
final straw? After all of this stuff is bubbling and boiling,
and he's more controlling, and we have terminology for that now,
coercive control, But that wasn't a in the nineties. So
he's monitoring all your movements, he's monitoring who you can
(08:04):
and can't see, he's monitoring the finances. But what finally
pushed you to leave that first time?
Speaker 3 (08:10):
What was the straw mister Nasko to everyone else? Wasn't
mister nask behind the scenes? And I got sick and
tie of being the presentation that he wanted me to
be and not being me. Slowly but slowly, I started
to go away from who I really really was, and
so I planned it.
Speaker 2 (08:31):
I did plan it.
Speaker 3 (08:32):
I knew that I only had a certain amount of
time before he would call, so I had to make
sure those scenes went to work. I was quickly packing things,
getting my things together, and I went to my mom's.
Speaker 2 (08:44):
And since I got to my mom's.
Speaker 3 (08:45):
Because I wasn't at home at the allowable time, they
were all in a driveway, my auntie and her panicking.
Speaker 2 (08:52):
I'll go, well, what's he going to do about it?
I'm here? And I never really revealed the truth anyway.
Speaker 3 (08:58):
I never revealed because I at that point still very private,
and even though people could see that, just thought he
was an arrogant sod and they never really saw the truth.
Speaker 2 (09:11):
No one did.
Speaker 3 (09:12):
He was very careful about he betrayed himself, very very careful,
and even so much so that even when he came
down he was so apologetic and things like that. And
the truth is when I got home, things were far
more escalated again and far worse.
Speaker 1 (09:33):
So while all of this is going on, Kelly's fast growing,
and you go on to have a second child with Kevin,
little Wesley, what kind of dad is he like during
all of this? Is he different to them than the
way he's treating you.
Speaker 3 (09:49):
Absolutely, he was always trying to be an attentive farmer,
but he worked long hours. He was an electronics engineering,
a computer programmer. He used to bring a big suitcase
home and in that was a telephone and a computer
system that could tap into the government networks. So he
was always on call or being part of that. And
(10:13):
he was always a person who looked after himself, went
to the gym, very strict with his diet, very much
obsessed with that.
Speaker 2 (10:24):
He was.
Speaker 3 (10:26):
Really just all for himself. Even though he acted on
the outward sense that he was for you know, family,
he wasn't. He was very selfish. So he would just
stay longer at the gym and use excusive work and
all these sorts of things.
Speaker 2 (10:43):
So by the time he'd get home.
Speaker 3 (10:45):
These days, the kids were already asleep anyhow, so it
was only sort of weekends that he would really see them,
and even then he was busy doing his own thing.
Speaker 1 (10:53):
And what was your relationship like with him at this point?
Speaker 3 (10:56):
So when it came to Kevin, it was always on eggshells.
By this point, you just couldn't piss him off because
otherwise it was just not worse your trouble.
Speaker 2 (11:07):
You were in for it.
Speaker 3 (11:09):
And it just got more and more aggressive, even to
the stupid point of going shopping.
Speaker 2 (11:15):
You go shopping while he's at work because you have.
Speaker 3 (11:17):
To get bread or milk or eggs or something for
the kids, or taken to the doctor or whatever. A
simple little thing becomes so so difficult, and you check in.
He'd checking with a phone called checking when you get back.
Then I didn't realize he was checking my kilometers? Was
that allowable distance? Because one day I went to visit
my sister in Subiaco.
Speaker 2 (11:38):
Why did you get it?
Speaker 3 (11:38):
Oh, because my sister really needed me at the time
and we just wanted to have chat. Well, you didn't
confirm with me first. You didn't say you were going there.
Why didn't you tell me you were going there? I
didn't know. My whole day had to be confirmed. This
is how ridiculous it got after the break.
Speaker 1 (11:56):
Michelle shares the moment she realized she had to pack
up in a skier situation. Michelle, can you explain what
happened when you did finally realize no, I have to
get away from this guy, and you decide to pack
up and go for that second time?
Speaker 2 (12:15):
What happened?
Speaker 3 (12:17):
I made the mistake of telling him, didn't I That
was the night that That was the night that he
tied me up, started slapping me around. The kids were screaming.
I should never have told him. I should have just
done what I did before, just left during the day
(12:39):
when he was at work and said nothing.
Speaker 2 (12:42):
That would have been easier. So I made that mistake.
In any way.
Speaker 3 (12:48):
A few hours later he came through senses, untied me
and said, I'll help you leave. I thought, well, he
probably knew at this point that I would start to
say something or start to do something because I'd had enough,
and he probably knew that. But once I got to
my mom's done had a little house for myself, and
(13:13):
all of a sudden, it was like when I moved
that sort of half stepping stone in Perth. He thought
he could come when it suited him. He tried to
be consistent in my life. Still, he tried to act
like he was being nice. Still it was still up
to his bad habits, and eventually it came to buying gifts,
(13:37):
buying a puppy, buying the kids over the top stuff
of toys until such time as I said, no, this
is not your house. This is my house. You have
to stop. You can't come here anymore. And that's when
I escalated again. It just got out of control. The
problem that I had is back then.
Speaker 2 (14:00):
One was listening. After it escalated even worse because.
Speaker 3 (14:05):
After that he would then write stupid letters that were
really nasty. He would be drunk coming up to the
doorstep telling me he was going to slit his wrists
and wrap himself in plastic. Then I'd get a letter
to the last Will and Testament. His sister, who was
(14:29):
nine months pregnant, got a letter that said, you're replacing
the child your relative you're about to lose. I actually
had a solicit at that time because he said that
I was the one that was stopping him seeing his children.
I was the one that was controlling. I was the
(14:51):
one that was unreasonable. He started to really flip. He'd
go into the local hotel smoke a joint. This is
not the person that would normally be the case. He
got a tattoo. He doesn't believe in tattoos. He had
an access visit with Kelly, and he tried to suffocate
(15:14):
her with a biscuit on a pillow because she came
home to me and she said, Mum, they put a
pillow over my face and I had biscuit. I couldn't breathe.
She was really good in language, very very clever young girl.
I understood very clearly what she was telling me. When
I told my solicitor, it's inadmissible. She's only your child.
No one's going to take any notice. But I knew
(15:37):
I knew no one would help me, no one.
Speaker 2 (15:41):
The only thing I.
Speaker 3 (15:42):
Could do was protect Wesley because he really couldn't talk
still at this time.
Speaker 2 (15:46):
Remember he was only ten months old. I was only young.
Speaker 3 (15:51):
So I made sure Kevin couldn't get access to him overnight.
I piloted supervised access because of this. I wouldn't let
her go overnight with him, but I lost she was
old enough to go. Wesley was not I knew, I
knew he wasn't the same. But he was sinister.
Speaker 2 (16:15):
He didn't do.
Speaker 3 (16:15):
This because he flipped out emotionally and flipped out psychologically
in all these words that people want to put to it.
He knew what he was doing. He knew all right,
and he was sinister.
Speaker 2 (16:27):
He knew that whatever he did, it was.
Speaker 3 (16:29):
Out for punishment for me, and that was the only
reason why he did it, the only reason. And no
one can say to me that they know better, because
they don't.
Speaker 2 (16:41):
They didn't live it.
Speaker 1 (16:44):
Michelle, during this time when he's doing all these behaviors
and you find out that he's also bugged your house
under the guise of helping you do some rewiring, and
he set up on a camp across the road on
a vacant block so he can watch you. And when
he's come to your doorstep and threatened to take his
own life. So police eventually get involved in this situation.
(17:09):
What did police tell you about what you could do
to protect yourself? Did they help you in these situations?
Speaker 2 (17:15):
No?
Speaker 3 (17:17):
No. The only thing is if he was menacing, they
would just take him out of town, tell him to
get moving on.
Speaker 2 (17:25):
No one did anything about it.
Speaker 3 (17:27):
And even though I kept saying to everyone, if he
was doing this, and at this point he was still,
you know, just running across my roof, sitting on my roof,
antagonizing me in every single way. He had barged my phone,
so he was even monitoring every single phone call that
I made. He ended up in my ceiling. Who was
(17:51):
living in my ceiling? Things would go missing in my house,
like small, stipid little food items and things in the fridge,
all sorts of things. Then one day I was taking
the children downtown doing shopping or something like that, and
I came back in because I forgot something and the
toilet was flushing. Now I'd heard things rattling through the
(18:14):
roof on many occasions, but I thought it was a possum.
I didn't think anything of it, as not even that sounds.
I really didn't until that day when I heard that
toilet flush. I was panicking. I was scared. I was frightened,
and I went down to the police station. I told them,
and you know they did. They went to the house,
(18:38):
they went in the roof, They got him out, and
then they let him shower because he couldn't go into
court the way it was because he'd been living in
the ceiling for some time and there was debri in
the ceiling, food and everything.
Speaker 2 (18:57):
And they didn't think it was a bad guy.
Speaker 3 (19:01):
I just thought he was just not coping with the
breakup of the family unit.
Speaker 2 (19:07):
And boy were they all so.
Speaker 1 (19:09):
At no stage did they think to charge him with
anything with trespassing or anything from living and spying on
you from your roof cavity.
Speaker 2 (19:18):
No charge of the laid correct. Correct.
Speaker 3 (19:23):
And that's the thing that you used to really get
into my gizzards. I just went, for goodness sake, if
this was a stranger in my roof, they would be charged.
That was my home, not his. Tell me why he
was able to be.
Speaker 2 (19:39):
There, Tell me why they didn't charge him.
Speaker 3 (19:41):
If I charged him, then he wouldn't have had the
capacity to do what he did because I had proof
he was in my ceiling. There was not here, say
that he was running on my roof, like every time
that I'd call.
Speaker 2 (19:54):
And you have to.
Speaker 3 (19:55):
Balance these things because otherwise, if you overact, the police
think loloopy, or you're overreacting, or you're trying to be biased.
So you try and go, well, give a thought, don't react,
be calm. If no unites chaos, you just try not
(20:16):
to overreact. And then guess what, no one cares anyway,
I didn't care. They didn't care about me, They didn't
care about my little kids. And then on the first
visit that he had Kelly overnight after that, the first
(20:36):
visit went fine. He spoilt them with gifts, lots of photographs,
lots of things, we're shopping and all sorts, acted like
it was normal, agetting back to himself, and in the
second visit she never came back.
Speaker 1 (20:50):
Next, Michelle reveals the heartbreak of sending her daughter Kelly
on access visits with her dangerous father. What was it
like to send Kelly off on those access of visits
after she's already said to you that he's tried to
smother her on one of these occasions. What was it
like for you to have to hand them over to
(21:12):
him again and again?
Speaker 2 (21:13):
Was torture?
Speaker 3 (21:15):
Absolute torture because I couldn't trust. I couldn't trust that
he was going to keep her safe, couldn't trust and
he was going to be the father that he pretended
he was. And you know, even if she left that day,
her little favorite was Roger Ramjit a little bunny.
Speaker 2 (21:39):
She's going.
Speaker 3 (21:39):
Don't worry mummy, because I was crying. I remember it
very well, and I can tell you it's not fair
when you get but in that place, really not fair.
You try, you try, and everything and odds are stacked
(22:04):
against you. Solicitors give you advice because they're too guartless
to do anything. The system is too gartless to protect
vulnerable women and worse, vulnerable children. And the worst thing
is it's the same today, after thirty years of me
(22:24):
telling them a story, it is a damn same thing today,
the same.
Speaker 2 (22:31):
Michelle. You know that.
Speaker 1 (22:34):
When Kevin took Kelly's life, he documented it and police
told you that specifically he did so to make it
as awful as humanly possible for you, Worse than anything
he could have ever done to you physically or emotionally
or psychologically. We know that you have not read that diary.
(22:57):
Is there still a part of you who wants to know?
Speaker 2 (23:00):
Yes, I can tell you now.
Speaker 3 (23:02):
I can tell you that I honestly wanted to read it.
I did, and the police said no, don't. Was the
detectives that worked on the case. They were seasoned detectives,
and they said this case was gut wrenching for them,
no different in a sense of pain.
Speaker 2 (23:24):
They couldn't believe the outcome.
Speaker 3 (23:28):
And through these years, when I first went there to
read it, they said, please don't.
Speaker 2 (23:33):
It's meant for you. Don't read it. And they just
would not relate it.
Speaker 3 (23:37):
They said, no, this will damage you. You can't because
it damaged them reading it. And like I said, they
were seasoned detectives. And to this day, I've never met
the bushwalkers who found my daughter was burying in mind
she went missing. And I was the last person to
(24:01):
speak to Kevin, because he said to me, you know
all this stuff, and I just said to him, Kevin,
I don't want to talk. I just want you to
bring Kelly back. I won't have police here. I just
want her back. And he wouldn't listen.
Speaker 2 (24:19):
He wouldn't.
Speaker 3 (24:21):
And the thing is is that when anyone says that
it wasn't predetermined what he was going to do, he
knew from the moment he took her to the beach
he had purchased hoes who was sitting there writing she
died with her Roger Ramjit. He watched her, He diarized
(24:41):
her Zach time that she died. What kind of father
does that? And I know over the years, I've met
many women. I've heard many stories of news reports of
women have suffered more by losing more children, set on fire,
(25:03):
bludgeoned death.
Speaker 2 (25:05):
Truth of matter is they're all the same.
Speaker 3 (25:08):
They don't do it because they've got a psychological disorder.
They do it for life long pain, and there's a punishment,
punishment for how dare you leave because your property? Nothing more,
nothing less?
Speaker 1 (25:25):
Michelle, As you said, it's been thirty years since Kelly died,
and still this is happening, and in fact, some studies
say that it's happening more frequently. How do you keep
telling this story over thirty years and not feel like
you're shouting into.
Speaker 3 (25:45):
The void Because I don't lose hope as an optimist.
I don't lose hope. I believe that greater movement comes
with greater message so that everyone understands.
Speaker 2 (26:03):
But then no one talked about things. It was taboo.
Speaker 3 (26:08):
And I hate the word sexy politics because I don't
give a damn why they don't believe that this is
not at the forefront of this country. It is, and
someone needs to stand up and take notice and stop
calling it sexy politics because they can't fundraise towards this,
so they can't walk in and swam around the room
(26:28):
and get people to fund their campaigns to win an election.
Speaker 2 (26:32):
I'm so sick of that. It's not funny. Even in
Wa politics.
Speaker 3 (26:38):
In two thousand and one, state parliament was introduced with
a nineteen point three percent rise in domestic family violence
twenty percent, really, and what in two thousand and one
policy came out of that.
Speaker 2 (26:52):
Nothing?
Speaker 3 (26:54):
Nothing, tokenism, That's what it was, No different than federal parliament,
session of governance. Are all just tokenism politics when it
comes to diversic violence in this country.
Speaker 2 (27:07):
And now you see on.
Speaker 3 (27:08):
The TV all sorts of smaller ads that are accepted
by governments, But where's the policy? Where is it missing?
An action is where so much they need to do
to repair every state in this country, not just one,
but every state. You know, some states go a little
bit further. But the problem is there's inconsistencies across legislation
(27:33):
in all these states. And what jurisdiction Is it commonwealth
or is it state law? Is it federal police that
come in like they do in the Eastern States, or
is it state police that come in like they do
in wa But even women trying to flee a marriage,
let's look at the marriage Act, let's have that conversation.
(27:55):
I really tried with the attorney generals, and you know what,
none of them has the gizzards to eat and contemplate change.
Someone has to keep saying enough is enough. Sure, it's
sometimes draining on me. That's why sometimes I've had to
stop and do other things, But it's never not important
to me to keep the conversation, to keep the activation going,
(28:19):
to keep the awareness going, to make sure that other
people can make positive change for themselves.
Speaker 1 (28:27):
Michelle, do you ever let yourself think about who Kelly
would be today?
Speaker 2 (28:33):
All the time? All the time. That's one of the
things that haunts me.
Speaker 3 (28:39):
What kind of beautiful young woman would she be, What
would she be doing, How would her life be, What
choices would she make if she had children?
Speaker 2 (28:51):
What would they be like? If you liken it to a.
Speaker 3 (28:54):
Tree of life, or her branch has been cut off
for good and in actual fact, her tree's been mowed
down on, the roots pulled out. That's what's happened to
her legacy. She was a child cut short, like all
of them are, through domestic violence, through no fault of
their own, because in apt human being can't even keep
(29:16):
their own emotions together and just want to cause violence
and chaos against their partner because they want to punish
them simple and these poor innocent little babes in the
firing line.
Speaker 2 (29:30):
It's so not fair when a parent is meant to.
Speaker 3 (29:33):
Be the absolute guardian, the person who will be there
for them through thick and thin.
Speaker 1 (29:41):
If there is anyone listening who might be going through
a situation of their own, is there anything you'd like
to say to them?
Speaker 3 (29:48):
I would say to anyone who's really trapped and really
can't see how to get out, use a simple little
thing that everyone's been using for many, many generations, A
simple letter. A simple letter. When you go to the shops,
find a way to distribute a letter, even if you
(30:09):
go for walking the pram and put it in one
of those little red post boxes around your community. I
know that sounds ridiculous, but I'm telling you there are
ways to get out and find a way. And whatever
you do when you do leave, john't go back and
put real support around you.
Speaker 2 (30:32):
And tap into resources. I hope that helps. Michelle.
Speaker 1 (30:38):
I want to say thank you for going here with
us today, for letting us into your world, for giving
us understanding, for showing your passion, for introducing us to Kelly.
Thank you for fighting hard for people who often go unnoticed,
(31:00):
and for those in the future because we know there
will be them who might hear this and it might
make a change. Thank you for all of that.
Speaker 2 (31:08):
Michelle, You're welcome.
Speaker 1 (31:10):
Thanks Claire, Thank you so much to Michelle for sharing
her story with us. If you need support, reach out
to one eight hundred Respect for Violence and Abuse Support
or Lifeline on thirteen eleven fourteen for twenty four hour
crisis support and suicide prevention. True Crime Conversations is hosted
(31:30):
by me Claire Murphy. Our senior producer is Tarlie Blackman.
The group executive producer is a Larier Brophy and it's
been audio designed by Tina Madeloff. Thank you so much
for listening. I'll be back next week with another True
Crime Conversation. True Crime Conversations acknowledges the traditional owners of
(31:52):
land and waters that this podcast was recorded on
When Michelle Steck met Kevin East at a Perth shopping
center in nineteen eighty nine, he seemed like a successful,
put together gentleman. At nineteen, Michelle was just starting her
career after studying and traveling, and this chance encounter with
a charming older man left her smitten. But that meeting
would set her on a path towards a tragedy that
(00:23):
would change her life forever. Michelle had always wanted children,
and when she fell pregnant earlier in their relationship, she
was excited to become a mum. But even back then,
East's true nature had begun to emerge. We didn't use
the term coercive control in the early nineteen nineties, but
that's exactly what Michelle was experiencing. East was jealous, quick
(00:47):
to anger, and constantly accused her of affairs that never happened.
He slowly and methodically cut her off from her friends
and family, making it very clear that they were not
welcome and that she needed his permission to go anywhere.
He tracked her every move, questioned her constantly, and controlled
all their finances, forcing Michelle to ask for money for
(01:09):
even the smallest of things. When the abuse turned violent,
She tried to leave, but like many men who see
women as their property, East pulled her back with promises
of change. They had another child, a little boy, Wesley,
but by then Michelle's situation had become even more dangerous. Eventually,
(01:30):
despite all the risk, she knew she had to go.
What followed in the weeks and months after she left
would read like a horror film, stalking, spying, and the
unraveling of a man furious that he no longer had control.
And then Kevin East did something only a very small
extreme group of domestic violence perpetrators, usually men, have ever
(01:54):
done to punish a partner who leaves. It's called retaliatory philocide.
Leave a vulnerable three year old girl at the mercy
of a violent father determined to use her as a
weapon against her mother. I'm Claire Murphy and this is
(02:14):
True Crime Conversations, a Muma Mere podcast exploring the world's
most notorious crimes by speaking to the people who know
the most about them. You're going to pay for your
actions for a long time. That's what little Kelly East's
father said to her mother Michelle, when she made it
clear she would not return to their violent and controlling relationship.
(02:37):
She had no idea just how true.
Speaker 2 (02:39):
Those words would be.
Speaker 1 (02:41):
Motivated by spite, Kevin East would commit an act that
would inflict a lifetime of grief and suffering on Michelle.
Statistic show that in Australia, one woman a week is
killed in domestic violence. Statistic show that in Australia, one
woman a week is killed in a situation of domestic violence,
and data from a twelve year study found one child
(03:03):
is killed every two weeks by a biological parent or stepparent.
The most dangerous day for children in cases of retaliatory
philocide is a Sunday, the day dads return them to
their mothers after access visits. And that's where Michelle Steck
found herself, waiting for Kevin East to return her daughter
from a weekend visit, waiting for a little girl who would.
Speaker 2 (03:26):
Never come home.
Speaker 1 (03:28):
Just before you hear from Michelle, we want to make
it clear that this conversation discusses domestic violence and suicide,
Michelle joins us. Now, Michelle, tell me about Kelly.
Speaker 2 (03:39):
What was she like?
Speaker 3 (03:40):
She was really funny, and as she grew up she
was more like a little butterfly. She just was a
sponge of life, and I guess in our short time
together we really did squeeze a lot of things in.
Speaker 2 (03:55):
Before she was two and a half.
Speaker 3 (03:57):
She knew all a shape, she knew what they were were,
she knew simple mathematic equations. And this sounds ridiculous, but
it's true. She was walking at nine months. She was
always an exploring child. She was never a person that
you could hold back, not even when we went to
visit things. When she was to you know, big pelicans
were not a big problem for her.
Speaker 2 (04:17):
You know, she wanted to go and be part of them,
and I.
Speaker 3 (04:21):
Tried to say no, so she bit my hand. That
was the kind of child she was.
Speaker 2 (04:27):
She was always, always the explorer, always into life. Sounds
like she had a bit of a sassy attitude too,
and she did.
Speaker 3 (04:36):
She did, And she had a passion for drawing on wolves.
She would draw on wolves, like as soon as there
was a pen or a text or anything a kid
you not, you can go and hang out washing.
Speaker 2 (04:47):
Before you know, there she was drawing on walls.
Speaker 1 (04:52):
So, of course, during the lead up to Kelly's arrival,
during your pregnancy, your relationship with your then partner Kevin
East is already starting to show signs of being a
domestic violence situation. For those of us who've never experienced
domestic violence, do you recognize in that moment when it's happening,
(05:14):
that that is domestic violence and it is happening to me?
Or is that something that hits you in hindsight? Is
there a moment you think, oh my gosh, this is
what's really happening.
Speaker 3 (05:24):
To be honest, it's a very slow creep. It's a
very very slow creep. It starts off by, you know,
the care factor. You think, Wow, this guy's really caring
because he rings every day, sees how you are, sees
what's going on in the house, and all these kinds
of things are just things of what you believe is
a caring nature.
Speaker 2 (05:45):
You see. I worked up until I was only a few.
Speaker 3 (05:48):
Weeks out of delivery, so a lot of the things
were still very much situation as usual, eating out, both
working to the calls, you know, two homes, one rental.
He was professional, so was I in a way as
a secretary. And I didn't notice it, really, I didn't
(06:11):
notice it then. It wasn't until after Kelly was born,
when she was six weeks it started to change and
it changed very fast and very dramatically. It started to
be more financial orientated. First thing to go was my vehicle,
because even though I owned.
Speaker 2 (06:28):
It, it was just extra cash that we could have.
Speaker 3 (06:32):
Then after that six week period, it started to take
a turn because he wanted me to go back to work,
and I said, no, bloody ay am I going back
to work when my child is so young. And there
are some professionals who choose to do that, but I'm
just not one of them.
Speaker 2 (06:46):
It was just terrible.
Speaker 3 (06:49):
He assumed control of who could visit, and it really
did stress me out at the time. But you just
go with the flow kind of thing to not make
it very obvious, even though some people in your family
become offended. And then people had to ring and give
(07:09):
advance notice to come to the house. Even when my
mom came to visit, it was highly offensive, you know,
for me and her, that he would request that she
would have to give us advance warning that she was
coming to rob This is.
Speaker 2 (07:27):
My mom, This is my mom.
Speaker 3 (07:29):
My Nnner of eighty years old, came over to stay
with us, and she left. The first night she left,
she said, if you take my advice, you'd get the
bloody hell out of here.
Speaker 2 (07:40):
Now he's no good. He's no good.
Speaker 1 (07:43):
She told me that you did leave Kevin that first
time when Kelly was still quite young. What was that
final straw? After all of this stuff is bubbling and boiling,
and he's more controlling, and we have terminology for that now,
coercive control, But that wasn't a in the nineties. So
he's monitoring all your movements, he's monitoring who you can
(08:04):
and can't see, he's monitoring the finances. But what finally
pushed you to leave that first time?
Speaker 3 (08:10):
What was the straw mister Nasko to everyone else? Wasn't
mister nask behind the scenes? And I got sick and
tie of being the presentation that he wanted me to
be and not being me. Slowly but slowly, I started
to go away from who I really really was, and
so I planned it.
Speaker 2 (08:31):
I did plan it.
Speaker 3 (08:32):
I knew that I only had a certain amount of
time before he would call, so I had to make
sure those scenes went to work. I was quickly packing things,
getting my things together, and I went to my mom's.
Speaker 2 (08:44):
And since I got to my mom's.
Speaker 3 (08:45):
Because I wasn't at home at the allowable time, they
were all in a driveway, my auntie and her panicking.
Speaker 2 (08:52):
I'll go, well, what's he going to do about it?
I'm here? And I never really revealed the truth anyway.
Speaker 3 (08:58):
I never revealed because I at that point still very private,
and even though people could see that, just thought he
was an arrogant sod and they never really saw the truth.
Speaker 2 (09:11):
No one did.
Speaker 3 (09:12):
He was very careful about he betrayed himself, very very careful,
and even so much so that even when he came
down he was so apologetic and things like that. And
the truth is when I got home, things were far
more escalated again and far worse.
Speaker 1 (09:33):
So while all of this is going on, Kelly's fast growing,
and you go on to have a second child with Kevin,
little Wesley, what kind of dad is he like during
all of this? Is he different to them than the
way he's treating you.
Speaker 3 (09:49):
Absolutely, he was always trying to be an attentive farmer,
but he worked long hours. He was an electronics engineering,
a computer programmer. He used to bring a big suitcase
home and in that was a telephone and a computer
system that could tap into the government networks. So he
was always on call or being part of that. And
(10:13):
he was always a person who looked after himself, went
to the gym, very strict with his diet, very much
obsessed with that.
Speaker 2 (10:24):
He was.
Speaker 3 (10:26):
Really just all for himself. Even though he acted on
the outward sense that he was for you know, family,
he wasn't. He was very selfish. So he would just
stay longer at the gym and use excusive work and
all these sorts of things.
Speaker 2 (10:43):
So by the time he'd get home.
Speaker 3 (10:45):
These days, the kids were already asleep anyhow, so it
was only sort of weekends that he would really see them,
and even then he was busy doing his own thing.
Speaker 1 (10:53):
And what was your relationship like with him at this point?
Speaker 3 (10:56):
So when it came to Kevin, it was always on eggshells.
By this point, you just couldn't piss him off because
otherwise it was just not worse your trouble.
Speaker 2 (11:07):
You were in for it.
Speaker 3 (11:09):
And it just got more and more aggressive, even to
the stupid point of going shopping.
Speaker 2 (11:15):
You go shopping while he's at work because you have.
Speaker 3 (11:17):
To get bread or milk or eggs or something for
the kids, or taken to the doctor or whatever. A
simple little thing becomes so so difficult, and you check in.
He'd checking with a phone called checking when you get back.
Then I didn't realize he was checking my kilometers? Was
that allowable distance? Because one day I went to visit
my sister in Subiaco.
Speaker 2 (11:38):
Why did you get it?
Speaker 3 (11:38):
Oh, because my sister really needed me at the time
and we just wanted to have chat. Well, you didn't
confirm with me first. You didn't say you were going there.
Why didn't you tell me you were going there? I
didn't know. My whole day had to be confirmed. This
is how ridiculous it got after the break.
Speaker 1 (11:56):
Michelle shares the moment she realized she had to pack
up in a skier situation. Michelle, can you explain what
happened when you did finally realize no, I have to
get away from this guy, and you decide to pack
up and go for that second time?
Speaker 2 (12:15):
What happened?
Speaker 3 (12:17):
I made the mistake of telling him, didn't I That
was the night that That was the night that he
tied me up, started slapping me around. The kids were screaming.
I should never have told him. I should have just
done what I did before, just left during the day
(12:39):
when he was at work and said nothing.
Speaker 2 (12:42):
That would have been easier. So I made that mistake.
In any way.
Speaker 3 (12:48):
A few hours later he came through senses, untied me
and said, I'll help you leave. I thought, well, he
probably knew at this point that I would start to
say something or start to do something because I'd had enough,
and he probably knew that. But once I got to
my mom's done had a little house for myself, and
(13:13):
all of a sudden, it was like when I moved
that sort of half stepping stone in Perth. He thought
he could come when it suited him. He tried to
be consistent in my life. Still, he tried to act
like he was being nice. Still it was still up
to his bad habits, and eventually it came to buying gifts,
(13:37):
buying a puppy, buying the kids over the top stuff
of toys until such time as I said, no, this
is not your house. This is my house. You have
to stop. You can't come here anymore. And that's when
I escalated again. It just got out of control. The
problem that I had is back then.
Speaker 2 (14:00):
One was listening. After it escalated even worse because.
Speaker 3 (14:05):
After that he would then write stupid letters that were
really nasty. He would be drunk coming up to the
doorstep telling me he was going to slit his wrists
and wrap himself in plastic. Then I'd get a letter
to the last Will and Testament. His sister, who was
(14:29):
nine months pregnant, got a letter that said, you're replacing
the child your relative you're about to lose. I actually
had a solicit at that time because he said that
I was the one that was stopping him seeing his children.
I was the one that was controlling. I was the
(14:51):
one that was unreasonable. He started to really flip. He'd
go into the local hotel smoke a joint. This is
not the person that would normally be the case. He
got a tattoo. He doesn't believe in tattoos. He had
an access visit with Kelly, and he tried to suffocate
(15:14):
her with a biscuit on a pillow because she came
home to me and she said, Mum, they put a
pillow over my face and I had biscuit. I couldn't breathe.
She was really good in language, very very clever young girl.
I understood very clearly what she was telling me. When
I told my solicitor, it's inadmissible. She's only your child.
No one's going to take any notice. But I knew
(15:37):
I knew no one would help me, no one.
Speaker 2 (15:41):
The only thing I.
Speaker 3 (15:42):
Could do was protect Wesley because he really couldn't talk
still at this time.
Speaker 2 (15:46):
Remember he was only ten months old. I was only young.
Speaker 3 (15:51):
So I made sure Kevin couldn't get access to him overnight.
I piloted supervised access because of this. I wouldn't let
her go overnight with him, but I lost she was
old enough to go. Wesley was not I knew, I
knew he wasn't the same. But he was sinister.
Speaker 2 (16:15):
He didn't do.
Speaker 3 (16:15):
This because he flipped out emotionally and flipped out psychologically
in all these words that people want to put to it.
He knew what he was doing. He knew all right,
and he was sinister.
Speaker 2 (16:27):
He knew that whatever he did, it was.
Speaker 3 (16:29):
Out for punishment for me, and that was the only
reason why he did it, the only reason. And no
one can say to me that they know better, because
they don't.
Speaker 2 (16:41):
They didn't live it.
Speaker 1 (16:44):
Michelle, during this time when he's doing all these behaviors
and you find out that he's also bugged your house
under the guise of helping you do some rewiring, and
he set up on a camp across the road on
a vacant block so he can watch you. And when
he's come to your doorstep and threatened to take his
own life. So police eventually get involved in this situation.
(17:09):
What did police tell you about what you could do
to protect yourself? Did they help you in these situations?
Speaker 2 (17:15):
No?
Speaker 3 (17:17):
No. The only thing is if he was menacing, they
would just take him out of town, tell him to
get moving on.
Speaker 2 (17:25):
No one did anything about it.
Speaker 3 (17:27):
And even though I kept saying to everyone, if he
was doing this, and at this point he was still,
you know, just running across my roof, sitting on my roof,
antagonizing me in every single way. He had barged my phone,
so he was even monitoring every single phone call that
I made. He ended up in my ceiling. Who was
(17:51):
living in my ceiling? Things would go missing in my house,
like small, stipid little food items and things in the fridge,
all sorts of things. Then one day I was taking
the children downtown doing shopping or something like that, and
I came back in because I forgot something and the
toilet was flushing. Now I'd heard things rattling through the
(18:14):
roof on many occasions, but I thought it was a possum.
I didn't think anything of it, as not even that sounds.
I really didn't until that day when I heard that
toilet flush. I was panicking. I was scared. I was frightened,
and I went down to the police station. I told them,
and you know they did. They went to the house,
(18:38):
they went in the roof, They got him out, and
then they let him shower because he couldn't go into
court the way it was because he'd been living in
the ceiling for some time and there was debri in
the ceiling, food and everything.
Speaker 2 (18:57):
And they didn't think it was a bad guy.
Speaker 3 (19:01):
I just thought he was just not coping with the
breakup of the family unit.
Speaker 2 (19:07):
And boy were they all so.
Speaker 1 (19:09):
At no stage did they think to charge him with
anything with trespassing or anything from living and spying on
you from your roof cavity.
Speaker 2 (19:18):
No charge of the laid correct. Correct.
Speaker 3 (19:23):
And that's the thing that you used to really get
into my gizzards. I just went, for goodness sake, if
this was a stranger in my roof, they would be charged.
That was my home, not his. Tell me why he
was able to be.
Speaker 2 (19:39):
There, Tell me why they didn't charge him.
Speaker 3 (19:41):
If I charged him, then he wouldn't have had the
capacity to do what he did because I had proof
he was in my ceiling. There was not here, say
that he was running on my roof, like every time
that I'd call.
Speaker 2 (19:54):
And you have to.
Speaker 3 (19:55):
Balance these things because otherwise, if you overact, the police
think loloopy, or you're overreacting, or you're trying to be biased.
So you try and go, well, give a thought, don't react,
be calm. If no unites chaos, you just try not
(20:16):
to overreact. And then guess what, no one cares anyway,
I didn't care. They didn't care about me, They didn't
care about my little kids. And then on the first
visit that he had Kelly overnight after that, the first
(20:36):
visit went fine. He spoilt them with gifts, lots of photographs,
lots of things, we're shopping and all sorts, acted like
it was normal, agetting back to himself, and in the
second visit she never came back.
Speaker 1 (20:50):
Next, Michelle reveals the heartbreak of sending her daughter Kelly
on access visits with her dangerous father. What was it
like to send Kelly off on those access of visits
after she's already said to you that he's tried to
smother her on one of these occasions. What was it
like for you to have to hand them over to
(21:12):
him again and again?
Speaker 2 (21:13):
Was torture?
Speaker 3 (21:15):
Absolute torture because I couldn't trust. I couldn't trust that
he was going to keep her safe, couldn't trust and
he was going to be the father that he pretended
he was. And you know, even if she left that day,
her little favorite was Roger Ramjit a little bunny.
Speaker 2 (21:39):
She's going.
Speaker 3 (21:39):
Don't worry mummy, because I was crying. I remember it
very well, and I can tell you it's not fair
when you get but in that place, really not fair.
You try, you try, and everything and odds are stacked
(22:04):
against you. Solicitors give you advice because they're too guartless
to do anything. The system is too gartless to protect
vulnerable women and worse, vulnerable children. And the worst thing
is it's the same today, after thirty years of me
(22:24):
telling them a story, it is a damn same thing today,
the same.
Speaker 2 (22:31):
Michelle. You know that.
Speaker 1 (22:34):
When Kevin took Kelly's life, he documented it and police
told you that specifically he did so to make it
as awful as humanly possible for you, Worse than anything
he could have ever done to you physically or emotionally
or psychologically. We know that you have not read that diary.
(22:57):
Is there still a part of you who wants to know?
Speaker 2 (23:00):
Yes, I can tell you now.
Speaker 3 (23:02):
I can tell you that I honestly wanted to read it.
I did, and the police said no, don't. Was the
detectives that worked on the case. They were seasoned detectives,
and they said this case was gut wrenching for them,
no different in a sense of pain.
Speaker 2 (23:24):
They couldn't believe the outcome.
Speaker 3 (23:28):
And through these years, when I first went there to
read it, they said, please don't.
Speaker 2 (23:33):
It's meant for you. Don't read it. And they just
would not relate it.
Speaker 3 (23:37):
They said, no, this will damage you. You can't because
it damaged them reading it. And like I said, they
were seasoned detectives. And to this day, I've never met
the bushwalkers who found my daughter was burying in mind
she went missing. And I was the last person to
(24:01):
speak to Kevin, because he said to me, you know
all this stuff, and I just said to him, Kevin,
I don't want to talk. I just want you to
bring Kelly back. I won't have police here. I just
want her back. And he wouldn't listen.
Speaker 2 (24:19):
He wouldn't.
Speaker 3 (24:21):
And the thing is is that when anyone says that
it wasn't predetermined what he was going to do, he
knew from the moment he took her to the beach
he had purchased hoes who was sitting there writing she
died with her Roger Ramjit. He watched her, He diarized
(24:41):
her Zach time that she died. What kind of father
does that? And I know over the years, I've met
many women. I've heard many stories of news reports of
women have suffered more by losing more children, set on fire,
(25:03):
bludgeoned death.
Speaker 2 (25:05):
Truth of matter is they're all the same.
Speaker 3 (25:08):
They don't do it because they've got a psychological disorder.
They do it for life long pain, and there's a punishment,
punishment for how dare you leave because your property? Nothing more,
nothing less?
Speaker 1 (25:25):
Michelle, As you said, it's been thirty years since Kelly died,
and still this is happening, and in fact, some studies
say that it's happening more frequently. How do you keep
telling this story over thirty years and not feel like
you're shouting into.
Speaker 3 (25:45):
The void Because I don't lose hope as an optimist.
I don't lose hope. I believe that greater movement comes
with greater message so that everyone understands.
Speaker 2 (26:03):
But then no one talked about things. It was taboo.
Speaker 3 (26:08):
And I hate the word sexy politics because I don't
give a damn why they don't believe that this is
not at the forefront of this country. It is, and
someone needs to stand up and take notice and stop
calling it sexy politics because they can't fundraise towards this,
so they can't walk in and swam around the room
(26:28):
and get people to fund their campaigns to win an election.
Speaker 2 (26:32):
I'm so sick of that. It's not funny. Even in
Wa politics.
Speaker 3 (26:38):
In two thousand and one, state parliament was introduced with
a nineteen point three percent rise in domestic family violence
twenty percent, really, and what in two thousand and one
policy came out of that.
Speaker 2 (26:52):
Nothing?
Speaker 3 (26:54):
Nothing, tokenism, That's what it was, No different than federal parliament,
session of governance. Are all just tokenism politics when it
comes to diversic violence in this country.
Speaker 2 (27:07):
And now you see on.
Speaker 3 (27:08):
The TV all sorts of smaller ads that are accepted
by governments, But where's the policy? Where is it missing?
An action is where so much they need to do
to repair every state in this country, not just one,
but every state. You know, some states go a little
bit further. But the problem is there's inconsistencies across legislation
(27:33):
in all these states. And what jurisdiction Is it commonwealth
or is it state law? Is it federal police that
come in like they do in the Eastern States, or
is it state police that come in like they do
in wa But even women trying to flee a marriage,
let's look at the marriage Act, let's have that conversation.
(27:55):
I really tried with the attorney generals, and you know what,
none of them has the gizzards to eat and contemplate change.
Someone has to keep saying enough is enough. Sure, it's
sometimes draining on me. That's why sometimes I've had to
stop and do other things, But it's never not important
to me to keep the conversation, to keep the activation going,
(28:19):
to keep the awareness going, to make sure that other
people can make positive change for themselves.
Speaker 1 (28:27):
Michelle, do you ever let yourself think about who Kelly
would be today?
Speaker 2 (28:33):
All the time? All the time. That's one of the
things that haunts me.
Speaker 3 (28:39):
What kind of beautiful young woman would she be, What
would she be doing, How would her life be, What
choices would she make if she had children?
Speaker 2 (28:51):
What would they be like? If you liken it to a.
Speaker 3 (28:54):
Tree of life, or her branch has been cut off
for good and in actual fact, her tree's been mowed
down on, the roots pulled out. That's what's happened to
her legacy. She was a child cut short, like all
of them are, through domestic violence, through no fault of
their own, because in apt human being can't even keep
(29:16):
their own emotions together and just want to cause violence
and chaos against their partner because they want to punish
them simple and these poor innocent little babes in the
firing line.
Speaker 2 (29:30):
It's so not fair when a parent is meant to.
Speaker 3 (29:33):
Be the absolute guardian, the person who will be there
for them through thick and thin.
Speaker 1 (29:41):
If there is anyone listening who might be going through
a situation of their own, is there anything you'd like
to say to them?
Speaker 3 (29:48):
I would say to anyone who's really trapped and really
can't see how to get out, use a simple little
thing that everyone's been using for many, many generations, A
simple letter. A simple letter. When you go to the shops,
find a way to distribute a letter, even if you
(30:09):
go for walking the pram and put it in one
of those little red post boxes around your community. I
know that sounds ridiculous, but I'm telling you there are
ways to get out and find a way. And whatever
you do when you do leave, john't go back and
put real support around you.
Speaker 2 (30:32):
And tap into resources. I hope that helps. Michelle.
Speaker 1 (30:38):
I want to say thank you for going here with
us today, for letting us into your world, for giving
us understanding, for showing your passion, for introducing us to Kelly.
Thank you for fighting hard for people who often go unnoticed,
(31:00):
and for those in the future because we know there
will be them who might hear this and it might
make a change. Thank you for all of that.
Speaker 2 (31:08):
Michelle, You're welcome.
Speaker 1 (31:10):
Thanks Claire, Thank you so much to Michelle for sharing
her story with us. If you need support, reach out
to one eight hundred Respect for Violence and Abuse Support
or Lifeline on thirteen eleven fourteen for twenty four hour
crisis support and suicide prevention. True Crime Conversations is hosted
(31:30):
by me Claire Murphy. Our senior producer is Tarlie Blackman.
The group executive producer is a Larier Brophy and it's
been audio designed by Tina Madeloff. Thank you so much
for listening. I'll be back next week with another True
Crime Conversation. True Crime Conversations acknowledges the traditional owners of
(31:52):
land and waters that this podcast was recorded on
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