Perth victim had Taranaki roots
The grandmother allegedly murdered along with her daughter and grandchildren in Perth, was a former Taranaki resident and a ‘‘fun-loving person’’, according to her brother.
Police believe Beverley Quinn, who was 74, died on September 4, the day after her daughter, Mara Harvey, and grandchildren, Charlotte, Beatrix and Alice.
Western Australia Police Commissioner Chris Dawson said it would be alleged that Mara’s partner, 24-year-old Anthony Harvey, used knives and a blunt instrument to commit the murders, and then hung around the property for days afterwards.
Beverley Quinn’s brother, Graeme Kempton, of Ha¯wera, South Taranaki, was still in shock at her death. ‘‘Nobody expects it, do they?’’ he said.
‘‘I knew it last night [Monday] but to wake up this morning and see it on Sky News, and see the picture of your sister, who you now know is no longer with us ...’’
When police arrived at the two-bedroom home on Sunday, they found the television set still turned on.
It was an ominous sign for first responders, who were acting on information received from Harvey when he turned up at the police station in the remote Pilbara mining town of Pannawonica, 16 hours’ drive from Perth, earlier in the day. What he told police is not yet known, but it prompted officers to descend on the home, in the suburb of Bedford.
Once inside the suburban brick-and-tile house, police made the horrific discovery of the bodies of the two women and three children, who had been there, undiscovered, for several days. Kempton said Beverley was one of five siblings who had moved from Masterton to Ha¯ wera in the 1960s.
She had worked at the town’s telephone exchange before heading abroad.
‘‘I was fairly young when she went off overseas, here in Ha¯ wera at the high school.
‘‘She used to always send things home.’’
Beverley Kempton, as she was then, came back to Ha¯wera briefly before moving to Perth, where she married Brian Quinn and had two daughters, Mara and Taryn, who both had three children.
‘‘She headed off and never came back,’’ Kempton said.
‘‘We haven’t been terribly close in recent years since my mother passed away, because as happens in some families, mum was the go-between for all the kids.’’
He said his oldest sister, Maureen, was heading to Perth to represent the family, and his youngest sister, Wendy, may also be going over from Brisbane.
He thought many people in South Taranaki would remember her as Beverley Kempton.
‘‘I feel that people should be aware of her South Taranaki connections.’’