A neighbour who aided in the immediate search for Lachlan Jones the night of his death has told the inquest what happened to the Gore preschooler was “a tragic accident”.
A 15-day coroners inquest into the death of 3-year-old Lachie Jones, who was found face-up in an oxidation pond 1.2km from his home on January 19, 2019, has entered its fourth day.
Neighbour Deborah Thurston told the inquest she trusted the mother’s version of events, and a statement she had previously made to police alleging the mother said “Lachie had done her a favour” was taken out of context.
A strong element of the cross-examination focused on her ability to recall the events of the night Lachie went missing, with Thurston admitting she may be susceptible to suggestion at times.
Under questioning from police counsel Robin Bates, she said Lachie’s mother, Michelle Officer, had previously been in a relationship with Thurston’s ex-husband, and she knew both Officer and Lachie well.
“He’d always be around you talking, playing - your attention was quite often on Lachie when you were there,” she told the inquest.
Her own grandchildren were a similar age to Lachie at the time. With Lachie, “you’d sort of have to keep an eye on him”.
She recalled occasions when she was with Lachie and her grandchildren, needing to call out to Lachie for him to stop or slow down.
“Lachie was the sort of child that, to me, he would still go - even if you said stop.”
Thurston told the inquest the day in question had already been a traumatic event for her, as she had just returned from Slope Point, at the Catlins, where a search was under way for a relative who had been swept out to sea while fishing.
After returning from Slope Point some time around 7.30pm, she sat down to watch television, but doesn’t believe she had the chance to begin her episode.
Some time later, Thurston told the inquest she heard Officer telling Lachie to knock on the door and could hear the preschooler with her.
“I could hear Lachlan moving around in the washhouse area and trying to keep hold of him.”
She did not hear him talking, she said.
Thurston told the inquest that the boy’s mother said she had been chasing Lachie and had to go home to change his nappy, but decided to stop by for a chat.
At no stage did Thurston physically see Lachlan, and she estimated Officer was only present for “a minute or two,” she told the inquest.
“The next thing, [Officer] said ‘s**t, he’s gone again,’ and then she left.”
Officer returned having not found Lachie, and Thurston commenced searching. The pair searched around both properties, yelling his name.
“I think I recall seeing [Jonathan Scott] in his bed, telling him to get up and look for Lachie. But he said to Michelle, ‘he’ll be playing hide and seek’, like it wasn’t serious.”
Two young girls told Thurston they had seen Lachie run in the direction of the river. She told the inquest she told the girls to go inside and get their dad, and asked them to get on their bikes to help with the search.
She looked at the gate to the oxidation ponds, but did not think Lachie had gone over it: “I wish I had.”
Later that evening, Thurston was present at Officer’s property when the mum was told police had found Lachie’s body.
Thurston was questioned about her marijuana use but alleged she had not smoked for some time around the period of Lachie’s death.
The counsel for Paul Jones, Max Simpkins, questioned Thurston regarding her first statement to police on January 31, 2019.
“Would you accept there’s nothing in that statement that you provided to police at that first opportunity that indicates that you could hear Lachie, except for that tapping at the door?” he asked.
“Well, she didn’t ask me anything else. I usually take for gospel what people ask me,” she said.
In her second statement, she mentioned mumbling but not scuffling or banging.
She later told counsel to assist the coroner Simon Mount, KC, that her television was on at the time, but she was 99 per cent sure the noises she heard were Lachie.
Mount played the court audio from the call Officer made to police while searching for Lachie, where a voice alleged to be Thurston’s was heard in the background.
“I can’t believe he’s done this Debbie, he was just in your laundry,” Officer could be heard saying.
The voice believed to be Thurston’s replied: “What was he doing there in the first place?”
Mount asked Thurston if the voice sounded surprised.
Thurston told the inquest this was because she was not sure why he had “taken off”.
Mount asked if a statement she made to Simpkins, that she took things ‘for gospel’, meant her memory may have been altered due to her interactions in the years since.
Thurston accepted it was possible.
Thurston described her friendship with Officer as “up and down”.
“We’ve just got that type of friendship. I’m pretty hard work sometimes when it comes to keeping friends .... I really care about her, as a mum and a person.
“There have been times when I’m really frustrated with Michelle, but putting all my issues aside ... On the day, I trust what she was saying and I know what I heard.”
Simpkins alleged in a statement Thurston made to police, she had said the day after Lachie’s death: “Lachie has done me a favour.”
Thurston said this was taken out of context, as Officer was frustrated at Paul at the time. She said Officer meant Lachie had foreseen her future with Paul, and she no longer had a connection to him.
Simpkins alleged Thurston had made a statement to police on April 9 this year that she had been thinking about the night Lachie died and remembered, while searching for Lachie, she found a butt of a cannabis cigarette in her garage.
When Officer entered, she “asked for a puff”, she alleged.
Thurston told Simpkins she later amended this statement, having been confused, and now believed it occurred on a separate night.
He asked if it was possible outside influences may have affected her recollection of events, including what she had heard from Officer and read in the media, as the inquest was the first time she had spoken and given material to authorities and the court about hearing scuffling, banging, and footsteps.
She told the inquest she did not pay attention to the media until the past few days and did not speak with Officer about the events of that evening.
In a police statement, she said she saw three girls that evening, later stating there were two, Simpkins alleged.
“I never thought this case with Lachie would get to this point, and I never realised it was such an important question to be asked and what I was saying would be said in court ... I was very casual in what I was saying, but when it comes to the death or the drowning of a child, that’s very different when it comes to three girls who were playing outside their home safely.”
Asked if there were two or three girls, Thurston could not remember.
Mount asked Thurston if it was possible what she was remembering was Officer telling her Lachie was in her laundry, not her own recollection.
“Anything is a possibility, but I don’t think so.”
Prompted by Mount, Thurston told the inquest what happened to Lachie was “a tragic accident, and that he drowned”.
The inquest is ongoing.
Ben Tomsett is a Multimedia Journalist for the New Zealand Herald, based in Dunedin.
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