WA mum accused of trying to kill daughter with insulin told police it could make her ‘go peacefully’

The WA mother on trial for trying to kill her severely disabled daughter with insulin has denied “the real reason” she threw away a first batch of the drug was because she felt “guilty and ashamed” about the alleged murder plot. The woman, who cannot be named to protect her daughter’s identity, also denied she made up the claim about injecting her daughter with the diabetic medication to get her into hospital because she was interrupted by her husband. During her second day on the stand in her WA Supreme Court trial, the Great Southern mother was grilled by prosecutor Ben Stanwix and denied her explanation for why she used the drug was a “fantasy” or a complete “lie”. The woman does not deny she injected her daughter with insulin but she denies she tried to murder her. She testified on Tuesday that she only used it to fake an emergency to get her admitted to hospital so she would receive the care she needed. She told the court that, in the months leading up to the incident, she had difficulty in obtaining services for her daughter and that her child needed to be urgently admitted into hospital because she was in the early stages of dying. The trial has been told the girl was failing to put on weight, had breathing issues and had increasing problems with her bowels. But, under cross-examination, the woman conceded that despite her daughter’s desperate situation she never took her to emergency to get her help and claimed she always took her to see their family doctor, Pieter Austin. She also conceded her daughter had never been refused admission when they had taken to her to hospital previously and denied she had intended to kill her. The court was also told on the day she injected her daughter with the insulin — January 17, 2022 — her daughter had an appointment at Perth Children’s Hospital which she missed. In her evidence, the woman denied knowing about the appointment – which was sent to her via text message – claiming she never saw it. She also claimed she only injected her daughter with a small amount of insulin to create a medical emergency that would see her eventually admitted into Perth Children’s Hospital. But in her police interview, that was played to the court, the woman told investigating officers that she thought there would have been two possibilities from her actions — that she would “go peacefully” or end up in hospital. She also told the officers when they asked why she did not tell anyone what she had done that she thought they were “going to judge me for the rest of my life but not as bad as me”. When pressed by Mr Stanwix that she said that because she was ashamed because she tried to kill her daughter, the woman replied: “I was not ashamed. I did not try to kill my daughter.” Mr Stanwix also questioned why the woman continued to see Dr Austin multiple times if she believed he wanted to kill her daughter. In her evidence on Tuesday, the woman claimed it was the GP who suggested using the insulin to kill her daughter and that she only wanted it to create a fake emergency. Austin, who is currently serving a jail term for the attempted murder of the child in 2022 for supplying the mother with both prescriptions, testified woman came to him wanting a “humane” way to end her daughter’s life. He also claimed she had confessed to trying to kill her daughter before by trying to smother her with a pillow and Glad Wrap. The woman denied this claiming she “only ever asked for help”. The trial continues.