‘How dare you make something up like that’: Half-brother lashes out

Friday, 3 May 2024

• A coronial inquest into the death of three-year-old Lachie Jones is underway.

• Lachie was found dead in a pond near his house in 2019.

• The inquest is set down for three weeks.

Lachie Jones’ oldest half-brother has denied claims his mother called him about a pizza order to create a record that he was not at the family house until much later on the night the three-year-old died.

“How dare you make something up like that,’’ Cameron Scott told lawyer Max Simpkins, as he gave evidence via video link from Brisbane.

Scott was giving evidence into the death of his little brother Lachie Jones, who was three-years-old when he was found dead late on the evening of January 29, 2019, face up in a council oxidation pond near his home.

Simpkins, who is representing Lachie’s father Paul Jones, put it to Scott that he left work near Balclutha early that day and went to his mother’s house to help her and his younger brother dispose of Lachie’s body in the Gore District Council’s wastewater ponds.

“There is no chance I knocked off work early that day. That is speculation,’’ Scott said.

Simpkins asked: “Mr Scott, you arrived at your mum’s house in the afternoon to discover he was already dead. That’s correct isn’t it?’’

“I found out he had passed when Cynthia [senior sergeant Cynthia Fairley] had told my mother,’’ Scott said.

“You needed to help with disposing of the body because he was home, already deceased,’’ Simpkins said.

Scott replied: “That’s a disgusting accusation Max. There’s no way we would have hid my little brother’s body.’’

Scott earlier told police counsel Robin Bates that Lachie was ‘’so much fun, he was an awesome little kid’’.

He often helped feed Lachie and would play with him, and would sometimes look after him while his mother was at work.

His relationship with Lachie’s father Paul Jones was not as good.

“Any time he was sober he wasn’t too bad,’’ he said.

“He was drinking and gambling every weekend. Their relationship [Jones and Officer] was quite volatile and it got worse and worse.’’

Scott said Officer was an ‘’awesome mum’’ who treated all three of her boys the same way, was over-protective and always worrying about them.

Simpkins also put it to Scott that his mother had sent him a text about ordering pizza, and again asking what the emergency number for police was, so that there could be a record that he was not at his mother’s house until much later.

“How dare you make something up like that,’’ Scott replied.

Simpkins also asked why, after receiving a panicked phone call from Officer saying Lachie was missing, he went to bed at his father’s house, where he lived.

“I went to bed because I thought they would find him. I did not think something like this would happen.’’

Scott admitted smoking cannabis on the night his brother died.

“Yes, but we did anything to cope with the devastation of losing our little brother,’’ he said.

Because it was six years ago, Scott said he could not remember who he smoked cannabis with or where it happened, but was adamant he did not smoke it in Lachie’s room.

Earlier in the week, his brother Jonathan gave evidence that the two brothers and a neighbour had smoked cannabis in the neighbour’s garage on the night Lachie died, after Jonathan had bought a $50 bag of cannabis during the search for his brother.

The first sitting of the inquest is set down for three weeks before Coroner Alexander Ho, in Invercargill.