A High Court jury listened in silence as a close friend of Joanne McCarthy told how she found her friend's battered body submerged in a bath of water.
Julie Roe was giving evidence in the High Court at Auckland yesterday in the trial of 32-year-old Travis Burns, who is accused of murdering the 33-year-old kindergarten teacher at her home in Whangaparaoa on November 12, 1998.
An emotional Julie Roe told the jury how she had gone to pick up her young daughter Georgina (at 1.30 pm). Joanne McCarthy was looking after Georgina and her own son, Marcus.
She knew something was wrong when she found the children crying and screaming; it was clear they had been crying a long time, as they were "just frozen" to the spot.
Then she spotted blood on the wall behind the children.
According to the Crown, the children were so close to the attack on Joanne McCarthy they were spattered in her blood.
There was a long pause as Julie Roe composed herself before describing the moment she found her friend in the bath.
At first she could not take it in; she thought she might have cut herself and fainted into the bath of water.
Her friend's head was under the bloodied water, her legs sticking out.
Julie Roe unsuccessfully tried to find the family's portable phone so that she could call for help while assisting her friend.
She briefly returned to the bathroom and then went back to the kitchen to call 111. The children still had not moved and were crying "Mummy, Mummy."
Julie Roe said she was told by the emergency services to check for signs of life.
"I'm sure I said it's too late. Then I thought it might not be."
She returned to the bathroom, tried for a pulse and decided to try to get her friend out of the bath.
"There was no point trying to get her pulse while she was under the water."
She put the children into Marcus' bedroom so that they would not see what was happening and "just tried to ignore their crying" as she tried to get her friend out of the bath.
But her friend was too heavy, so she cradled her injured head and let the water out.
She then went to look after the children, who were still distressed and screaming.
When the ambulance service arrived, she went to comfort the children and noticed she had blood all over her arm, which she wiped off with a nappy.
Both the Crown and defence have focused on the time that Marcus was normally fed as a crucial issue in the trial.
Burns was seen on a Milford bank video at 12.50 pm. But prosecutors say he deliberately went there to get filmed, trying to give himself an alibi.
The Crown alleges that Burns attacked Joanne McCarthy as she was about to give the children lunch. Evidence has been given that she routinely fed Marcus between 11.30 am and noon.
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