Markets 
Rex Martinich
A woman obsessed with true-crime podcasts and a teenage girl’s murder started a relationship with a suspect in a bid to solve the cold case, a coroner has heard.
The woman spoke of her “reckless” plan on Wednesday, when the long-running inquest into 15-year-old Annette Mason’s murder resumed for a one-day hearing in Brisbane.
Annette was bludgeoned to death in a house she shared with friends in Toowoomba, west of Brisbane, in November 1989.
No one has been charged over her death.
The inquest heard the woman, who cannot be named for legal reasons, contacted police claiming to have new evidence in 2025.
She claimed a suspect told her previously undisclosed details about the brutal murder while they were living together.
The woman consumed podcast episodes and news stories about the cold case before seeking out a suspect, Queensland coroner Terry Ryan heard.
“It was a friendship that sort of just went into a relationship,” the woman said.
Under questioning by Mason family barrister Clem van der Weegen, the woman agreed she was “trying to solve this murder” herself when she sought out the suspect.
“Yeah, I was just so reckless,” she said.
“Today, sitting here, I’m proud of what I have done.
“I know that it is a big risk, and I know my life could have been ended any time, but I just took it in my own hands.”
Annette’s body was discovered in her bed, with the cause of death found to be blunt-force trauma to her head, inflicted by a piece of timber found in the laundry.
The woman testified she talked about Annette with the male suspect, who cannot be identified for legal reasons.
“He kept calling her ‘she’. He said she was bashed before she got to the house,” the woman said.
“Then she was hit around the head.”
The man had previously claimed to be innocent, Ryan heard.
“He said it was a copper that had killed her. He said, ‘That’s why all the evidence went missing and they’re just trying to put the blame on me’,” the woman said.
When asked what impact the suspect’s alleged words had on her, she said: “Clearly, he had killed Annette Mason. He had done that.”
The woman denied her claims were based on details previously available in podcasts and news stories.
The suspect also gave evidence at Wednesday’s hearing, which was attended by Annette’s mother and siblings, who were wearing T-shirts printed with her image.
He described the true-crime-obsessed woman as a “nutcase”, and testified they had only been friends.
The suspect said the woman’s claims were “absolutely not” true, and he “would not have a clue” why she made them.
“She was good to hang around with – a good friend,” he said.
The inquest into Annette’s death was initially closed in 1991 only to be reopened in 2018 after pressure from her family.
Hearings were last held in 2022.
The inquest will spend the next several months receiving written submissions.
AAP
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