Blood Brother

Summary:

15 year fight for justice

 

A leafy street in St Ives, an affluent Sydney suburb. An engineer, his wife and three children live a privileged life—private schools, boating weekends in the family motor launch, two cars, normal friends and family. But all is not as it seems …

Fifteen years ago, the engineer, then student Jeffrey Ian Gilham, lived with his family in a different leafy street in Woronora, a river frontage home in secluded surroundings.

On the Friday night of 27 August 1993, 23 year-old Jeffrey Gilham, asleep in the boatshed of the family home, says he awoke to the screams of his mother on the intercom from the house. Pulling on a pair of shorts, he ran up the steep steps, finding his 25 year old brother Christopher in the lounge room, standing over their mother’s body with a lit match. There was a knife on the floor.

“I’ve just killed mum and dad,’ said Christopher calmly, before setting his mother alight.

Picking up the knife Jeffrey said he chased his brother downstairs. Stabbed him 16 times for killing his parents. Escaped from the burning house in the nick of time, to alert the neighbours.

The bodies of Stephen and Helen Gilham were severely burned. Vital forensic evidence was lost forever. Christopher’s body was not burned, but vital forensic evidence was lost again, this time by the police. Jeffrey was the only witness.

Pleading guilty to Christopher’s manslaughter, Jeffrey copped a 5-year good behaviour bond. Inherited just under $1M. Got on with his life. But all was not as it seemed…