Former police officer Beau Lamarre-Condon admitted to entering Jesse Baird’s home and going through his phone in testimony about their on-and-off relationship at his double murder trial.
Mr Lamarre-Condon was called as the first witness in the defence case during a NSW Supreme Court trial, which is now in its seventh week.
The 31-year-old is accused of shooting Mr Baird, his former partner, and his new boyfriend Luke Davies with his police pistol in Mr Baird’s Paddington share house in February 2024.
The Crown’s case is that Mr Lamarre-Condon developed an obsessive and jealous infatuation with Mr Baird after a casual romance during parts of 2023.
He has pleaded not guilty and has indicated he would be arguing self-defence, with his lawyers previously telling the jury the deaths were the result of two separate struggles involving the pistol.
Under questioning from his defence counsel, Mr Lamarre-Condon recalled meeting Mr Baird in October 2022 at Universal, an LGBT-friendly club on Sydney’s Oxford Street.
He told the jury that in subsequent months, their connection was one of “friends with a sexual relationship”.
“By December 2022, that’s when we started going on romantic dates,” he said.
Mr Lamarre-Condon said the two would go to movies, dinners, musicals, and because Mr Baird was new to Sydney, he would show him around places like the Royal National Park.
“Jesse was very much like me, he was very outgoing and into sporting activities and willing to give anything a crack,”
he said.
Accused ‘didn’t feel great’ about messages on Baird’s phone
Mr Lamarre-Condon said the relationship was still romantic throughout early 2023.
On April 14, he said he was editing a video on Mr Baird’s phone while Mr Baird showered and saw an Instagram conversation with another man.
“I did block [him] … I did not delete any messages, I did not unfollow [anyone],” the accused told the court.
Mr Lamarre-Condon told the court about his relationship with Jesse Baird (pictured). (Supplied: Instagram)
Mr Lamarre-Condon said he also took photos of the messages with his own phone and sent them to friends.
The accused said after seeing the messages, he left Mr Baird’s house and the sound of the front door closing woke Mr Baird up.
A text message Mr Lamarre-Condon sent the following day was shown to the court.
The accused said it showed he told Mr Baird he “didn’t feel great and I just wanted my own bed”.
The next day, Mr Baird says to the accused: “Can’t help but feel like something is wrong.”
“I’m just processing my own stuff ATM, nothing to personally do with you,” Mr Lamarre-Condon replied.
He around this time also discovered Mr Baird was on Tinder and considering the messages he saw, decided he would raise their relationship with him.
The couple break-up
Mr Lamarre-Condon said on April 17, 2023 he met up and “was very honest and direct with Jesse”.
He said he told him he was “a bit upset” about the Instagram messages with another man because he thought they were moving into a relationship.
“This is when Jesse was honest with me, he was crying … says he wasn’t ready for a relationship,”
he said.
Mr Lamarre-Condon gave Mr Baird a note saying he enjoyed the good times but needed to “respect himself”.
The following week, Mr Lamarre-Condon said he went to Mr Baird’s house to collect some of his things and saw Mr Baird having sex through his bedroom window.
“I kind of froze in shock,” he told the court.
“I immediately left. I didn’t’ stay like a little creep.”
He denied taking or sending photos of the incident.
Mr Lamarre-Condon said Mr Baird would “very often” leave his key for Lamarre-Condon from the start of 2023 to the first break-up in April.
Relationship resumed in mid-2023
Mr Lamarre-Condon said he resumed a sexual relationship with Mr Baird around his birthday in late June.
On August 17, 2023, he had a conversation about staying the night at Mr Baird’s.
“He told me if I wanted to come over to do a morning run … then I could come over,” he said.
“I said I would think about it because he wasn’t free until 10pm.
“He said he would leave the key in his letter box.”
Mr Lamarre-Condon said he entered with the key but left a bobby pin in the lock so it looked like an intruder got in.
Mr Baird was asleep in bed and Mr Lamarre-Condon said he wanted to go through his phone to check messages.
“I wanted to see if Jesse was in a relationship or not because I didn’t want to be in a sexual relationship with him [if he was],” he testified.
“I walked into his bedroom, his phone was on his bedroom table.”
The accused said he put Mr Baird’s phone on airplane mode and unplugged it.
The charger dropped to the phone, waking Mr Baird.
“I panicked and I had a split-second decision” about having a conversation why he had Mr Baird’s phone and wallet, or “just [run]”.
Mr Baird “gave chase” after him, thinking it was an intruder before he lost Mr Lamarre-Condon.
Days after breaking into Mr Baird’s house, Mr Lamarre-Condon said the pair met for dinner and the topic of the intruder came up.
“He never asked if it was me … if Jesse did ask me I planned to tell him the truth, but I wouldn’t volunteer that information,” the accused said.
He told the court: “I admit that it was stupid.”
‘We should stop seeing each other’
The relationship finally came to an end in November when Mr Lamarre-Condon put up a picture of flowers on a private Instagram story on his own account to get the attention of another man Mr Baird was seeing.
On November 15 or 16, he said he went through Mr Baird’s phone while he was in the shower to see whether the man was still messaging him.
On a call on November 16, he said he initially denied blocking the man on Mr Baird’s phone, before admitting to him he blocked the man and posted the photo of flowers to “insinuate they were from you when they weren’t”.
Mr Lamarre-Condon told the court Mr Baird told him he thought “we should stop seeing each other” and asked to “refrain from contacting me”.
The accused said later he reacted to a suggestion Mr Baird scratched his car.
“I know tit-for-tat isn’t right … but I did pour water in his petrol tank,” he said.
Lamarre-Condon details mental health struggles
Mr Lamarre-Condon has denied murdering the couple with his police-issue pistol. (Supplied: Liam Mendes)
Mr Lamarre-Condon testified that in the latter part of 2023 and early 2024 he was struggling with his mental health, and on three occasions planned to take his own life.
He said he did not seek professional help because he feared it would jeopardise his career in NSW Police.
Mr Lamarre-Condon has also testified about starting his policing career in 2017 as an openly gay man.
He said one particular sergeant who he did not get along well with would refer to him in “many” ways, including a homophobic slur.
He claimed that colleague would also speak openly about how he “used to bash gay people”.
Mr Lamarre-Condon said he made complaints about an incident of homophobic language.
He was expected to resume giving evidence on Friday.
Source: www.abc.net.au
