Children killed to ‘break’ Kiwi mother
A New Zealand woman’s estranged husband has been jailed for life in Australia after murdering their young children.
Jason Craig Headland, 36, killed five-year-old Zaraiyah-Lily Headland and three-year-old Andreas Headland in Western Australia to make their mother, Anatoria Headland, suffer amid a custody battle.
Police found the children’s bodies on a bed at a Perth home on October 20 last year. Headland was also found lying on the floor with self-inflicted wounds.
The WA Supreme Court heard on Thursday that the cause of death could not be ascertained but the children had been drugged with a sleeping tablet and asphyxiated.
The court also heard Headland’s relationship with his wife had deteriorated and he wanted to take the children away from her.
‘‘I’m going to break your heart into 50 million little pieces,’’ Headland told her over the phone, adding that it would be the last time she would speak to the children.
She also heard him giggle before he ended the call. She went to the police for help.
In a note police found at the house, Headland addressed his estranged wife, saying she would have to ‘‘live with this for the rest of your life’’.
Anatoria Headland said in her victim impact statement that her children were bubbly and excited to learn. They were her heart and soul.
‘‘Two peas in a pod they were and polar opposites,’’ she said. ‘‘They completed each other and they completed me.’’
She described her daughter as a ‘‘determined little girl’’ and her son as a ‘‘brave soldier’’.
Since the children’s murders, she had suffered anxiety and depression, and was scared that if Headland were freed he would come after her.
‘‘You make me sick. I’ll never forgive you,’’ she said, addressing Headland in her statement.
Jason Headland’s counsel said he had had a strong sense of family values and was an active member of the indigenous community, including being a mentor to young Aboriginal men and coaching a women’s football team.
Justice Lindy Jenkins recognised Headland’s early guilty plea but questioned the extent of his remorse, adding he had not given an account of how the children died.
His lawyer said Headland had no memory of what happened.
Prosecutor Amanda Forrester said Headland had shown no
"I'm going to break your heart into 50 million little pieces." Jason Craig Headland, in a phone call to Anatoria Headland
remorse or contrition, describing him as self-centred and lacking insight or empathy.
He may have been a loving parent, but he ‘‘destroyed every remnant of that’’ by his actions, she said. ‘‘There is no such thing as a comparable case.’’
Forrester urged Justice Jenkins to hand down a long non-parole period to demonstrate society’s ‘‘utter condemnation’’ of a ‘‘grotesque act of family violence’’.
The judge said Headland’s actions were vindictive and his note was ‘‘callous, shallow and self-centred’’.
‘‘You had a duty to love and protect them. Instead of protecting them, you used them as weapons,’’ she said. ‘‘You made your children pay with their lives in order to inflict pain.’’
Headland was sentenced to life in prison with a minimum term of 31 years.