The warning signs missed before little Biddy Porter, 10, was **** **** by a teenage girl at a remote farmhouse – as inquest hears chilling new evidence from mum and dad
A teenage girl who **** Bridgette ‘Biddy’ Porter, 10, to **** had named her favourite sharp **** before telling her parents she wanted to **** them, an inquest has heard. The 14-year-old, known only as XR for legal reasons, was in the throes of psychosis when she **** Biddy to **** at a property in Gunnedah, in north-east NSW, on July 8, 2020. XR confessed to the **** shortly afterwards, but the NSW Supreme Court found she was not legally responsible due to her then-undiagnosed mental illness. She is now 20-years-old and has been in a specialised mental health facility ever since. An inquest into Biddy’s **** began on Tuesday, examining if systemic failures contributed to the tragedy or if XR’s declining mental health could have been detected sooner. The inquest heard XR was a loving and conscientious girl who loved animals so much that she refused to eat them, but that began to change at age 10 when she started ****. Over the next four years, XR’s mental health declined to the point where she heard voices, fantasised about **** people – including her parents – ‘all the time’, **** six chickens with a , and started watching ‘ **** ****’. By 2019, she kept a series of **** in her room – including a paring ****, a pocket ****, a filleting ****, and a homemade **** – which all had names, including Rue, Storm, Ray, and Lou. XR was regularly **** and **** herself, talking about **** at school, and she felt so disturbed by her own **** thoughts that she tried to confide in her parents, but they didn’t recognise the seriousness of the situation.
Bridgette ‘Biddy’ Porter, 10, was **** to **** at a property in Gunnedah
Biddy’s **** is known only as XR for legal reasons. She is pictured being interviewed by police in 2020
Her mother, who can’t be identified for legal reasons, was questioned by counsel assisting the coroner, Peggy Dwyer.
The mother told the inquiry: ‘I’m very ashamed to say I didn’t believe in mental illness.’
She said XR was **** **** by another child from the age of five. XR’s parents did not know the extent of the **** for many years.
By late June 2020, just weeks before Biddy’s ****, XR approached her mother and said: ‘Mum, I want to tell you something, but I’m not sure how you’ll react.’
Her mother replied: ‘Try me.’
XR said: ‘I think about **** people all the time’.
Her mother explained: ‘If you do something like that, there’s no coming back. This is real, those people will be ****.’
XR told her mother that she would **** herself after **** anyone else.
Biddy’s father Dominic Porter is comforted by friends and family as he arrives at the inquest
Rebekah Keukenmeester (centre) arrives for the inquest into the **** of her daughter
Family, friends and supporters wore shirts with Biddy’s face at the Lidcombe Coroners Court
During that conversation, XR spoke about an incident six months earlier when she **** her mother’s six chickens.
The inquiry previously heard that XR **** the chickens with a **** ‘to see what’s inside’. She filmed the **** to show her friends at school and took their **** **** to science class.
When speaking with her mother, XR said that she would have **** someone else if she hadn’t **** the chickens. She also explained that she had thought about **** her parents in their sleep that same day.
The inquiry heard XR’s mother was ‘horrified’, but stayed calm because her daughter had never opened up about her feelings before.
XR told her mother that she heard voices saying: ‘If you **** someone, it will be OK… you’ll get away with it’.
Her mother told the inquiry on Monday that she was ‘reeling’ after that conversation.
‘It was shocking to hear it, and I was reeling, and I thought “what the hell”, to put it politely, but I have never experienced anything like that, and I don’t know how to deal with that,’ she said.
‘I don’t even have the beginning of an inclination as to how to work with that kind of stuff – that was what got me on guard to ring the doctor, but I didn’t know what to do with that.’
Biddy’s mother holds a photo pf her daughter in 2024
Biddy (pictured) was **** by XR – a girl, 14, who was known to her
Her mother was very concerned and had a lengthy telehealth conversation with a GP a few days later, which was standard at the time during the Covid pandemic.
She went into detail with the GP, telling them about XR **** the chickens, hearing voices, her increasing isolation, **** fantasies, and ****.
The inquiry heard the GP told XR’s mother: ‘You don’t have anything to worry about, she seems like a normal teenager, but if you do want to get her checked out, we will refer her to a psychologist in Sydney.’
That conversation took place on July 1, eight days before XR **** Biddy.
Despite XR’s admissions about her **** fantasies, her mother said she ‘never, ever’ thought her daughter was ‘capable of doing what she did’.
She became emotional when she said her daughter’s behaviour was very concerning in hindsight, but that she honestly didn’t see it at the time.
XR’s father, who cannot be named for legal reasons, also gave evidence on Tuesday.
He told the inquiry that he didn’t know what the word ‘schizophrenia’ meant before his daughter was diagnosed with it after Biddy’s ****.
Biddy’s **** is pictured in the back of a police car after the tragedy
Her father attributed XR’s behaviour to bullying at school. When asked whether he was alarmed when his wife told him XR had thought about **** them both, he told the inquiry that he didn’t think it was cause for concern. ‘At no point would I have been concerned because she wasn’t displaying what she was saying – she wasn’t running around threatening to **** people, she said it in a general conversation,’ he said. ‘I’ve heard people say a lot of things, but they never do it.’ In February or March 2020, months before Biddy’s ****, XR was in the car with her father when she started talking about the voices in her head, and seeing the Cheshire cat’s eyes when she closed her eyes. He told the inquiry that XR’s grandparents used to let his two children watch ‘inappropriate’ films, and he figured the eyes were the result of the films and his daughter’s ‘terrific’ imagination. ‘We spoke in depth, for maybe ten minutes, and we both came to the conclusion that it was her imagination,’ he said. Counsel assisting the coroner, Ms Dwyer, read a passage from her father’s original police statement, written in 2020. She asked him if he remembered saying: ‘XR and I have always been close, and she and I do a lot of things around the farm. ‘She doesn’t confide in me much. She said she could see cat eyes, I would just tell her that was crap and she was looking for attention.’ Her father said he didn’t remember saying ‘crap’, but said his own imagination went wild when he closed his eyes, and believed XR was experiencing the same thing. ‘I was trying to tease out whether it was something she was recalling – watching something she shouldn’t have watched and couldn’t get it out of her mind,’ he said. He was then asked about a physical fight XR had with a boy at school just days before Biddy’s ****. The inquiry heard XR threw **** at the boy. When he refused to give them back, she **** him, put him in a ****, and **** him in the head. Ms Dwyer asked: ‘Did you know she put him in a ?’ Her father replied: ‘That’s what I tell my girls.’ Ms Dwyer said: ‘If they’re being bullied at school, you tell them to **** them to make it stop?’ The father replied: ‘Absolutely.’ He also told the inquiry that he wasn’t alarmed when XR **** the chickens because she grew up on a farm, like he did, and he thought **** animals for ‘no reason’ was a normal thing for kids to do. Biddy went to stay with XR’s family two days before the tragedy. XR’s parents said their two daughters got along well with Biddy. The day before, XR had wanted to play ‘ ****’ and started chasing her sister and Biddy around with one of her ****. XR got in trouble for running with a ****. Her father confiscated her PlayStation and three of her ****. He told the inquiry that he didn’t know how many **** she had. The inquest continues.