Julia DeLuney has been on trial for allegedly murdering her 70-year-old mother Helen Gregory at her Khandallah home. Photo: RNZ / Mark Papalii
The jury in the murder trial of Julia DeLuney will resume deliberations this morning.
DeLuney is accused of murdering her 70-year-old mother Helen Gregory at her home in the Wellington suburb of Khandallah in January last year.
She has denied the charge.
The jury began deliberations yesterday after hearing more than four weeks of evidence.
Among the evidence was the story of how police went about identifying a potential murder weapon - with the help of an old photograph, an office-wide email and a TradeMe listing.
Detective sergeant Hayley Adams told the court when police downloaded the data from Gregory's cellphone, they found a picture of her standing in a bedroom in August 2023, the same bedroom in which she would later be killed.
In the background of the photo was a bedside table, with two framed photographs and a pale blue vase sitting upon it.
Adams said the bedside table and the photo frames remained as pictured when police examined the scene, but the vase was not accounted for, a gap where it had been.
She said this stood out, as it had become clear that Gregory was "not the kind of person who got rid of things".
Adams told the court it occurred to her that this vase might also be responsible for rings of a substance which could have been blood, which showed up during Luminol testing on the bench in the kitchen.
The kitchen sink had also tested positive for blood, with ESR forensic scientist Glenys Knight telling the court it appeared as though someone had filled the sink, and washed blood off their hands or an object.
The hunt for the vase began.
Police inquired with friends and family - but nobody knew if it had it been given away or broken.
Police then began searching for a similar vase to work out whether it could, in theory, be used to produce the injuries found on Gregory's body.
Adams explained she did a reverse Google image search for the item in the photo, but that did not turn up any results.
Next, she sent out a "missing poster" to her colleagues asking if anyone had seen anything like it for sale.
The next day, a stroke of luck - an email from a colleague with a link to TradeMe auction for a similar vase, with a buy-now price of $35.
The seller was in Auckland, and Adams told the court she got in touch to explain the situation, and then had a detective colleague collect it.
The seller told the police it had originally been picked up for free on Facebook Marketplace, and Adams said there was nothing to indicate it was the actual vase from Baroda Street.
Forensic pathologist Dr Judy Melinek told the court a similar item could have been heavy enough to produce those injuries.
Knight took a chip out of this vase, but found it was not a match for a cream-coloured particle found in Gregory's scalp.
The Crown told the jury in its closing argument this did not rule out a similar vase as a murder weapon.
Another witness had told the court in evidence the particle was of a material commonly used in household items, and could have come from a number of things found bloodied, probably from contact with Gregory's head, including the headboard of the bed.
The circles of blood did not quite match the vase base or mouth millimetre-for-millimetre - but Crown prosecutor Stephanie Bishop reminded the jury the vases were handmade, and likely differed in their dimensions.
The stand-in vase sat on a table at the front of the court room throughout the trial, available for the jury to inspect, alongside items such as a bright yellow shirt, a pair of Rollie shoes, a life-sized mannequin of a head and shoulders marked with pen to show Gregory's injuries, and a green Michael Kors handbag.
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