jad n rich

Probably a spot which would mean something to the partner, read in one of these cases, the bridge chosen was where the wife would have driven to work each day. Another guy decided the date he murdered his 3 kids should be mothers day.

Sounds like they gave it a lot of thought - really really creepy.

bingobob777

as are the latest touching tributes

"Ms Redwood and another friend Mareisha Fournier from his hometown of Belleville changed their profile pictures to that of Jay lovingly holding Brad as a baby."

Alfresco

How very tragic. Poor kid.

moneypenny20

Just before he lovingly threw the child to his death?

Broad Shoulders

I know it really shits me seeing all this. Let's put this into context.

He could have only been one of two things, mentally insane or just downright angry and seeking revenge.

If it was the former then he would still be convicted of murder as insane. Charles Manson was convicted of murder and diagnosed as insane at the same time.

If it was the latter then he clearly was not the nice guy everyone is making him out to be.

Either way, he is a ******!

sassie

One of my work colleagues were good friends with them and reading between the lines he thinks it was all about revenge as apparently Danielle (his wife) was going to leave him. I know thats no excuse as what he did was incomprehensive. Apparently he was a well respected member of the community and the school where he taught. It makes you wonder, and I guess we'll never know, what underlying issues drove him to take his childs life and ultimately his own in such tragic circumstances.

odyssey

This actual situation aside, as I dont know the people involved - I think mental illness is the least understood condition. It receives little empathy as the action of a person who has lost their mind - are just that - mindless and without rational. My first bf became mentally ill and laid on a traintrack - he made significant plans for weeks and weeks before hand - all very structured. He was lost though during those weeks, where no-one could reach him in his mind. It wasnt him that did it, for he was not present possibly for the last couple of years of his life - in the same way as your health is not present when you have terminal cancer.

No normal person could rationalise what this guy has done or think that it could be right in any way. But he did manage to go through a lot of his life in a conformist fashion ending in a career that involved other people and their wellbeing. It would seem strange to me that suddenly he turned into this evil, violent man hell bent on revenge.

I just cant imagine what his wife is going through - and his mum and his dad and everyone who loved the baby or him.

spartacus

Well said.

Petals

To take one's life I believe we have to be suffering some sort of mental illness.

I feel for the family and I have no idea what he was thinking of taking a child with him but he seemed to be looking after the child so maybe there are issues we know nothing about.

I do know the bridge is a favourite though and my friend will be going through hell with all this as her daughter took her life from the same bridge.

carolinephillips

Unfortunately there are a lot of people- and I'm not talking just men here although they seem to be in the majority- who have the controlling/jealous syndrome, whereby if they can't have their partner, they will do everything they can to spite them and take away things that bring them happiness. You see a lot of it in the playground with children who break things to stop others playing with them or to make the other child cry. As an adult this state is often subsumed, but might be brought back by trauma, or it might be an underlying subtle mental state, and once the partner that is theirs leaves or threatens to leave, they regress into that rage and become oh so destructive. It doesn't mean they can't plan things or only act on impulse, it can be a very calculated callous rage.

Scubaemma

Very sad for all those involved.

Including the emergency services who had to attend this job. I didn't because I was on holiday, but we get called to the Story Bridge on a regular basis (much more often than you hear about on the news).

Sometimes we're called there and can talk a person down, sometimes we're called and they've already jumped and we have to pull them out of the river, and sometimes they jump and survive!

We had one a couple of weeks ago and they had survived the jump and were crawling out onto the riverbank and up the steps. We had to perform CPR until the ambos arrived (felt like forever but wasn't). Sadly they died.

But it's certainly a fairly regular event, and it's always a difficult job to attend.

I also agree that putting fencing up on the bridge won't solve the problem. As someone else said, people would just jump from Kangaroo Point cliffs or somewhere like that instead.

I had someone go off the cliffs a couple of months ago as well. They jumped from the top, cartwheeled down the cliff and it didn't look good at the bottom, but they actually survived as well. A doctor was rollerblading long the bottom of the cliffs so helped us with CPR etc until the ambos arrived.

People must be so desperate to do things like this. Especially when it doesn't always work

Very sad.

Cheetah7

Having lost a friend who commit suicide, he injected himself with something called Largactil, another girl I knew took an overdose of paracetamol and died weeks later (she had several previous attempts) I truly believe people are not in their right frame of mind. Many do it as a cry for help and dont really want to die but dont know what else to do.

And many know exactly what they want - they want to die and even after failed attempts, they will find a way to do it and they will have it planned down to the last letter because they believe others are better off without them.

I think what this guy did to his child was awful but I also bet that had he been assessed mentally prior (I know that is not realistic but just saying), he would have probably been sectioned.

I cannot imagine feeling that desperate to not to want to live and as I said, taking the life of his child is unforgivable but then again, mental illness is very unforgiving in itself and often takes no prisoners.

My sympathies are for that little boy and his Mum.

Broad Shoulders

That's the classic recollection of people who knew serial killers though. I know they are two different things here, but what goes on behind closed doors we simply don't know about. Sure he was a respected member of the community on the face of things, but then I believe people said that about Thomas Hamilton. Pillar of society, owned the local shop, was a Scout-Master etc etc.

My old neighbour was really nice and friendly, didn't have a bad word to say about the guy, but one day (after he moved out to live in NSW) the Old Bill showed up and raided his place because he was part of a Child Pornography ring.

What we do know about this guy as fact is that he committed a pre-meditated murder. One does not do that without putting in some planning and therefore he had ample opportunity to back out from killing himself and his son and so I think my assessment of the guy as a ****** is pretty justified.

andrew63

Wow, so many of you would make poor jurors. I hope you never get the chance.

Dorothy

What? Are you saying there was a possibility that he didn't kill himself and his 2 year old child? Do you have any evidence to present to the jury from the defence table?