Money and Friends

Elizabeth Cox and her sister Annette had known Simone Hill for some time, and they were all now in their late teens. 17-year old Simone had loaned Annette some money, and unfortunately, as is often the case when money and friends mix, tensions between the Cox girls and Simone began to rise.

On Thursday December 18, 1997, Simone went to visit Annette at her East Maitland flat. She had been drinking, smoking pot and doing speed for a good part of the day, so was fairly high when she arrived at Annette's in the mid-evening. Annette's flatmate Tracey was also home with her boyfriend, and the four of them continued on drinking, smoking, and the rest.

That evening, they hatched a plot to lure Simone over to Annette's on the promise that they had the money she was owed. It was never clear who actually came up with the plan, although Tracey was the one to phone Simone and invite her over. It seems that part of the plan was to hurt Simone in some way, to teach her a lesson, although this was never entirely clear.

Simone, perhaps sensing the imminent danger, arrived with some friends of hers, a couple. Of course, Annette did not actually have the money she owed, and after a short time, Simone and her friends left. Naturally there was some verbal sparring between the girls, with various insults thrown back and forth. This continued as Elizabeth followed Simone and her friends out to the car. Although they intended to drive away, one last remark from Elizabeth prompted Simone to get back out of the car and challenge her. At this point Elizabeth pulled out a knife she'd been hiding and stabbed Simone once in the stomach.

Simone's friends raced her to Newcastle Hospital, but despite emergency surgery, she died four days later of internal bleeding.

Elizabeth threw away the knife, and concocted a story along with Annette and Tracey to fool the police, however this was fairly swiftly brought undone, and the knife was located.

Elizabeth eventually pleaded guilty to murder in the Newcastle Supreme Court. The Judge took into account the fact that she was only 18 years old at the time, and that she had not intended to actually kill Simone. He stated that her aggression was fueled by the fairly large quantities of alcohol and drugs she had consumed during the previous 12 hours or so, and this had lowered her inhibitions. This was of course an explanation for her behaviour, but not an excuse, and he sentenced her to 16 years imprisonment, with a non-parole period of 11 years.

Elizabeth appealed this sentence on the basis that it was too severe, because the judge had not taken into account the fact that she had pleaded guilty (sparing the time and expense of a trial), she had no prior criminal record, and that she would be separated from her baby son (born after the murder) for quite some time.

The Appeal Court found that Elizabeth's baby would be well cared for by her parents, who would bring him to visit her frequently, and that unfortunately being deprived of the company of loved ones was one of the tragic consequences of imprisonment. It must be remembered that Elizabeth had deprived Simone Hills parents of ever seeing her again.

However, the Court found that the Judge had failed to consider her lack of criminal record, and her plea of guilty, which showed she had accepted her actions, and was remorseful. Her sentence was reduced to 14 years, with a non-parole period of nine years.

Elizabeth was released on June 22, 2007.