Otto fights murder rap
CONVICTED husband killer Margaret Anne Otto has returned to court to fight her murder sentence.
Dwayne “Doc” Davies, 47, died instantly when Bradley Scott Purkiss shot him in the head before stashing the body beneath log sand soil at L even dale in May2017.
Otto was jailed for 15 years after a jury found Purkiss and Otto had reached an agreement to murder Mr Davies.
“BROKEN woman” Margaret Otto may have wished her husband, Dwayne “Doc” Davies, dead but she never in cited them an who killed him to pull the trigger.
That’s the argument of lawyer Greg Melick SC, who is fighting to free Otto from a 15year jail term handed down after she was convicted last year of murdering her Risdon Vale tattoo artist spouse.
Mr Davies, 47, died instantly when Bradley Scott Purkiss shot him in the head before stashing the body under logs and soil at Levendale in May2017.
In October 2019, a Supreme Court of Tasmania jury found Purkiss and Otto had reached an agreement to murder the “domineering, needy, demanding” debt-rid den victim.
But Otto is appealing against her conviction, arguing the jury verdict was unsafe and unsatisfactory, and the trial judge erred by failing to find she had no case to answer.
On Monday in the Court of Criminal Appeal, Mr Melick argued that during 11 hour sofa police interview, Otto “steadfastly maintained” she played no part in planning her husband’s murder.
He said during that interview, Otto became a “broken woman” in the foetal position who made confessions that she was an accessory after the fact. However, he said there was no “hard evidence” of, and Otto had not confessed to, any murder plans or agreements.
Mr Melick said the crown speculated that Otto wanted her husband dead, with the final straw coming after Mr Davies complained about a warm serving of coconut milk.
But he said the way Mr Davies treated his wife, and the way she complained to others about him, did “not amount to instigation” on her part. “It has to be a direct incitement .”
“Even if Ms Otto says ‘I wished my husband were dead’ … she’s still not guilty of murder. She has to intend it in order to be guilty. There’s no doubt it was a difficult marriage – he was domineering, needy, demanding ,” he said.
“On the face of it, she certainly had motive to want her husband out of her life. He was bankrupting the family, he wasn’t working, he was spending money on dope. But the evidence also was that when she made comments like‘ I’ d be better off if he was dead’, it wasn’ t in a manner that caused any alarm to the people she said it to.”
But Director of Public Prosecutions Daryl Coat es said the jury was entitled to convict Otto.
The appeal hearing is expected to last two to three days.