Killer watched porn, drank beside body
Aaron Richard Potts spent 12 hours drinking and watching pornography in a vehicle with his exgirlfriend’s body after he killed her in her West Coast home.
Potts, 36, pleaded guilty in the High Court in Christchurch yesterday to murdering Barbara Ann Quinn, 41. A second charge of assault of a person in a family relationship was withdrawn.
Quinn was last seen alive on the afternoon of December 6. Her body was found in the boot of her car at a mine site in Greymouth about 2.30pm the next day.
Potts and Quinn were in a relationship for about eight months, which ended about two to three weeks before the murder. Potts wanted to continue the relationship but Quinn refused.
Potts drove to Quinn’s home in Greymouth after having an argument with her over the phone the night before he killed her. He had been drinking and was unable to stand steady. He argued with Quinn and grabbed her by her arms and pinned her against a wall in the hallway. Quinn yelled for help and her daughter intervened and pushed Potts off her.
Potts was still angry the next day. He made seven suicide-related internet searches just before 6am on December 6. He sent ominous Facebook messages to an acquaintance about three hours later, including: ‘‘Do you think I can be a monster? Just pure evil?’’
Potts told the friend he wanted to ‘‘try something completely different’’ and see how it made him feel. He wrote: ‘‘Going to try a new game today. I’ll tell you once I’ve try it and call you bro . . . let you know how it feels. It’s out the gate trust me (sic).’’
Records show Potts’ cellphone connected to Quinn’s home wi-fi at 8.37am and he was seen sitting in a vehicle on Byron St, around the corner from Quinn’s home, by someone he knew. He used his cellphone to Google ‘‘how to choke someone’’ three times at 11.48am.
He knew Quinn would be returning home between 1pm and 2pm for her lunch break, as she usually did, and that she would be alone. Potts moved closer to Quinn’s house on foot and positioned himself so he could see when she returned home. He had alcohol, chocolates, flowers and his cellphone with him. He entered the home through the back door when he saw Quinn’s Mazda hatchback pulling into the driveway. Quinn was surprised and angry to see him and asked him to leave, but he punched and strangled her.
He worried he had gone too far and that he would be in significant trouble if she recovered, so took a knife from a kitchen drawer and stabbed her four times in the chest, penetrating her heart.
Potts then returned the knife to the drawer and placed Quinn’s body in her car before driving it north out of Greymouth. He stopped at a garage in Dobson and bought a Stanley knife before driving to a secluded gold mine area off Notown Rd. He spent the next 12 hours in the vehicle, drinking alcohol and accessing 24 pornographic videos on a website.
He tried to kill himself, but was unsuccessful. He then decided to flee the scene, but police found him just 800 metres away and arrested him after discovering Quinn’s vehicle with her body in the boot. Potts will be sentenced on April 3.