Khandallah murder trial: Victim was bludgeoned, forensic pathologist tells jury

8:43 am on 3 July 2025
A white house on Baroda Street police where police were carrying our a scene investigation.

Helen Gregory died at her Khandallah home in January last year. Photo: RNZ / Soumya Bhamidipati

The elderly woman found dead in her home in Wellington's suburb of Khandallah last year was bludgeoned, a forensic pathologist has told a jury.

Helen Gregory, 79, was killed in January 2024 - her daughter Julia DeLuney is on trial for murder in the High Court at Wellington. She has pleaded not guilty.

The Crown says DeLuney attacked her mother, possibly with a vase that has never been found, before staging it to look like she had fallen from the attic.

But the defence says someone else caused those injuries in the 90 minutes in which DeLuney went to get help.

Julia DeLuney in the High Court

Julia DeLuney in the High Court. Photo: RNZ / Mark Papalii

On Wednesday, the court heard from forensic pathologist Dr Judy Melinek, who peer-reviewed Gregory's post-mortem.

Melinek said she agreed with the post-mortem, which found the 79-year-old had died from complications of blunt force trauma - primarily to the head.

She said death would not have been instantaneous, as the swelling of the brain that results from such trauma typically takes several hours.

Melinek took pains to describe to the jury the different types of injuries that can result from blunt force trauma - abrasions, contusions, and lacerations - before using the bust of a mannequin to point out the type and location of Gregory's wounds.

She said Gregory had a total of "11 planes of injury on the head alone," meaning she had sustained at least 11 separate impacts.

She said the impacts were caused by "significant force".

"You know, someone taking a heavy object, like a cricket bat or something, or a large hefty object and hitting it with a good amount of force over the head."

In response to questions from the prosecution, Melinek said the injuries could have been caused by a vase.

"An object like that vase would be a blunt force object and it's hefty and heavy, so it could easily cause the lacerations such as we see on Ms Gregory."

Under cross-examination, Melinek said a fall could also cause blunt force injuries, but the pattern tended to be different from being struck by an object.

She said a fall from a height of a metre or two could cause one of the smaller head wounds, but a fall couldn't explain a large injury on the back of her head.

"I've never seen an injury of that magnitude caused by a fall in someone's residence, even if we're talking from stairs. It's too big and there are too many planes of impact.

"You need a bludgeoning to get this many planes of injury."

Melinek said it was plausible that multiple and repeated strikes against an entertainment unit could have caused the head wounds, but maintained it was unlikely they were the result of being kicked.

She said in total, Gregory had about 75 discrete injuries, including lacerations, contusions, abrasions and fractures.

She also said bruising on the soft tissue of her arms was consistent with "grab marks" and defensive injuries on her wrists.

She said injuries from a fall tended to be located on boney parts of the body.

The defence said it was not suggesting all the injuries happened in a single fall, and that some could have been sustained at a different time.

The trial continues.

Sign up for Ngā Pitopito Kōrero, a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.

Get the RNZ app

for ad-free news and current affairs