Jury in High-Profile Down Under Murder Case Visits Shoreline At Which Victim Was Discovered
Members of the jury involved in a high-profile Australian homicide case have traveled to the isolated shore where the victim was located.
Toyah Cordingley was repeatedly stabbed with a bladed weapon and buried in a sandy grave with little or no hope of surviving, the court has heard.
Her body were discovered by her father the next day on Wangetti Beach – a section of shoreline nestled between the tourist centres of Cairns and Port Douglas.
Rajwinder Singh, 41, denies murdering Ms Cordingley on a weekend in October 2018 in northern Australia.
Court Visit to Beach
The jury of 12 individuals plus three back-up jurors visited the location along with the judge and legal counsel on the start of the week in Queensland.
In a acknowledgment of the hot climate and sweltering heat, Justice Lincoln Crowley opted for a T-shirt, athletic wear and sneakers rather than a wig and robes.
Both the prosecuting and defense attorneys selected polo shirts, shorts and headwear.
Location Particulars
The court members were led around 1.2km north up the sand to observe where Ms Cordingley's remains were uncovered.
Earlier, as they traveled to the site, four red and white cones indicated where the victim's car had been left.
The trip was designed to help the panel become familiar with key locations in the trial and no testimony was presented.
Context of the Trial
Last week, the court heard that the following day Ms Cordingley's body were discovered, Mr Singh departed from Australia to India – abandoning his spouse, family and parents.
He was out of contact until he was arrested years after, the prosecution said.
Prosecution Argument
It is claimed that Mr Singh, who was employed in healthcare in the town of Innisfail, south of Cairns, had a altercation with Ms Cordingley.
The pharmacy worker was found wearing a swimwear, with all her other clothes and most of her possessions absent.
Those items were taken by the killer to avoid detection, the prosecution contend.
Her dog, Indie, which Ms Cordingley had taken to the beach for a stroll, was located tied up to a post concealed in bushland about 30 metres from the grave.
No murder weapon was ever recovered, and no one have been identified.
But the state says the evidence – though circumstantial – was made up of proof that indicated Mr Singh "and eliminated others."
This will involve evidence that DNA recovered from a object at the scene was 3.8 billion times more probable to have originated from Mr Singh than a random member of the public.
The jury has already heard evidence indicating that Ms Cordingley's mobile device departed the beach after the incident – and that its travel corresponded with those of a blue Alfa Romeo owned by the accused.
Mr Singh's sudden departure from Australia also pointed to his guilt, the state has argued.
Defence Position
"While authorities were discovering Toyah's remains, he was arranging... a rushed single journey back to India," the prosecutor said previously as he opened his case.
The defence is yet to provided testimony, but in his opening address, Mr Singh's barrister Greg McGuire portrayed his client as a "placid" and "compassionate" man, who was in the "wrong place at the wrong time."
He also foreshadowed evidence to come later in the trial that, after his arrest, Mr Singh informed an plainclothes agent he had seen two masked men attack Ms Cordingley and then had run away in fear – something he said was his "gravest error."
Mr McGuire has also said he will testify about individuals "identified and unidentified" who should come under investigation.
Additional Testimony
Ms Cordingley's partner, the witness, whom police quickly ruled out as a person of interest, was among those who gave evidence last week.
The court was informed he was an immediate person of interest – and that he had faced questions from Ms Cordingley's father about whether he was implicated in his girlfriend's vanishing, prior to her remains were found.
Photographs depicting the witness on a walk with a companion on the date Ms Cordingley went missing have been shown to the court, with an specialist saying he was confident the pictures were genuine and had not been doctored in any manner.
The trial will return to the more conventional setting of the courthouse on Tuesday.