Cross waits on judge verdictL

ON THE final day of Nicholas Cross’ murder trial, his lawyer submitted that while the accused might be responsible for loading the weapon used to kill Maddison Parrott, he was not the man who pulled the trigger.

In closing submissions to the Victorian Supreme Court, defence lawyer Glenn Casement submitted Ms Parrott was murdered by another man, who cannot be named for legal reasons, and that Mr Cross’ role extended only to owning the murder weapon and attempting to cover up the crime.

Mr Cross (inset) has pleaded not guilty to murdering Ms Parrott, and his lawyer has asked the court to find him not guilty on the lesser charge of manslaughter.

Mr Casement submitted his client was the only one during the trial to express “regret and remorse” for Ms Parrott’s murder, while the other man was “anything but”.

Responding to prosecutor David Glynn’s suggestion Mr Cross had made up a story, Mr Casement said a “convenient reconstruction would look nothing like what Mr Cross said during his trial” and he had “self-evidentially taken the harder road to tell the truth” about Ms Parrott’s murder.

Mr Casement said Ms Parrott was murdered by the other man who was desperate for drugs and frustrated by a homophobic slur.

“Tragically, a collision course occurred between what he needed, what he was denied and a comment that clearly set him off,” Mr Casement said.

“The relationship between he and the deceased was one that revolved around the use of drugs and it had its ups and downs. Downs would more often than not coincide when neither of them had drugs and would be abusive.”

On a text message Mr Cross sent that read he would be “doing 10 years min”, Mr Casement said this referred only to Mr Cross acknowledging he would be charged as an accomplice to the cover-up.

“If Nicholas Cross really believed he had murdered an unarmed woman and then had gone back under the cover of darkness to burn the tent with her body still inside, he would not have been talking about a minimum of 10 years,” he said.

Justice Rita Incerti told Mr Cross she would “do my darnedest to deliberate and to come to a conclusion” in a matter of weeks.

“I ask for your patience in that because I know the weight of it must be enormous on you and for that I am sorry, but it was an election that was taken to go judge alone. My real work begins now,” she said.