A man on trial for murder after stabbing his parents to death had recently injected the drug ice and was suffering a psychotic episode at the time, a court has heard.
Graeme Leslie Murray admits killing his parents in their home at Oberon, in the NSW Central Tablelands region, in the early hours of August 13, 2021.
The 49-year-old is asking a judge-alone trial, which started in the NSW Supreme Court on Monday, to find him not criminally responsible for their murders by reason of mental impairment.
Police found the bodies of Glenn Murray, 68, and Susan Murray, 66, shortly after they were stabbed multiple times and left face down in pools of their own blood, crown prosecutor Paul Kerr told the court.
Mrs Murray was found dressed in her pyjamas in the family’s laundry having been stabbed eight times to the face, chest, abdomen and upper arm.
Her husband had been stabbed 14 times to the chest, neck, back and arm, and did not display any defensive injuries, the court was told.
Murray’s lawyer Tom Quilter said there was no dispute his client had committed the killing, but he was suffering a psychotic break at the time.
“The principal defence in this case is one of the defence of mental health impairment,” he said.
Murray initially denied stabbing the couple when interviewed by police, but he later told psychiatrists he had killed them while suffering delusions that they were not really his parents.
He claimed that after using methamphetamine his psychotic symptoms became more intense.
Murray told psychiatrists he believed when he stabbed his mother it was “like something evil was inside her”.
He admitted injecting ice the day before he stabbed his parents and was seen by multiple witnesses acting erratically, telling one friend he felt “scattered” and regretted using the drug.
He also reported hearing a voice speaking to him from behind his back fence.
Psychiatrists who examined Murray on behalf of both the Crown and defence concluded he was experiencing a psychotic episode at the time and had a psychotic disorder, which was either substance-induced or schizophrenia.
Quilter told the court there was no motive other than a severe mental impairment for Murray to have killed his parents.
“My mother and father were the two nicest people I’ve ever met in my f***ing life,” the 49-year-old told police.
“They were my best friends, my parents.
“I don’t know why I f—ing done it, I don’t.”
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