Days before Brock Wall was caught on CCTV arriving at his partner’s house armed with the tomahawk he would use to bludgeon her to death, the convicted murderer had boasted about killing her.
Wall had been working on a construction site when he told a co-worker how he would brutally murder Fabiana Palhares.
“I am going to f–king kill her, I might punch her in the guts first,” he told him.
Palhares, 34, died in a Gold Coast, Australia, hospital in February 2015 hours after Wall broke into her Varsity Lakes home and murdered her and their unborn child.
Wall, 38, was handed two life sentences on Monday for the double murder and will spend at least 20 years in jail for the brutal killing.
Three days before Wall was due to go to trial — which would have included more than 150 witness statements and his blood-soaked clothes as evidence — the 38-year-old changed his plea to guilty.
On July 26, while entering the plea, Wall told the court he was “sorry” for the brutal killings and it had all been “so hard to live with.”
Emergency services rushed to Palhares’ home on February 2, 2015 after she managed to call triple-0 — Australia’s version of 911 — in the middle of the assault, screaming for help.
Officers took less than 20 minutes to reach her house but Wall had already bludgeoned her so badly that she wouldn’t survive.
He jumped on her stomach so hard that the soles of his shoes were later identifiable as bruises on her skin. He then used the tomahawk to fracture her face and skull.
Police found her lying on the floor of her bedroom with a faint pulse.
Wall was found down the street, a block away from his dying partner’s home and completely covered in blood. He was put in a blue suit to conserve his clothes for evidence.
Two hours before the attack, Wall had been given a fresh domestic violence order that was supposed to stop him from going near Palhares, the Courier-Mail reported.
In handing down her sentence today, Justice Ann Lyons told the court the murder was “the stuff of nightmares.”
“The facts are chilling, horrific, and the stuff of nightmares,” Justice Lyons told the court.
“Your attack became a murderous rage which was clearly full of hatred and anger.”
The court heard Wall was physically and verbally abusive towards Palhares on a number of occasions in their five months of dating.
At Christmas time, Palhares was forced to crawl under a coffee table in an attempt to protect herself from Wall hitting her and spitting at her, the court heard.
Palhares was 10 weeks pregnant when she died, meaning the baby had been conceived about a week before Christmas.
In the months leading up to her murder, Wall repeatedly sent Palhares threatening text messages, twice breached domestic violence orders issued against him, hid in the garden outside her bedroom window and watched as she fell asleep, accused her of having a sexual relationship with other people and broke into her home while she slept to go through her phone.
“You stalked her, spied on her, abused her,” Justice Lyons told the court when handing down her judgment. “You became increasingly irrational, jealous and angry.”
Palhares installed CCTV cameras after he broke into her home and it was those exact cameras that filmed Wall arriving at her front door, armed with a tomahawk to kill her.
The court heard the couple had been excited about Palhares’ pregnancy but the bliss didn’t last long.
Wall would scream at Palhares to get an abortion and told her he hoped she’d have a miscarriage, the court heard.
“I hope you lose the baby, I don’t even know if it’s mine,” Wall said.
Less than a week before he killed her, Wall had been working on a construction site when he told a co-worker how he would brutally murder the Brazilian national.
“I am going to f—ing kill her, I might punch her in the guts first,” he told him.
And three days before Palhares was found with a faint pulse in the bedroom of her home, Wall had told another colleague: “I’m going to go to jail for life over this woman.”
The day of the murder, Wall had attended Surfers Paradise Police Station and ignored a warning from officers about going to talk to his partner.
The court heard he told police at the station there was no way he was going to be having her baby.
Officers encouraged Wall to speak to a counselor but the court heard he brushed off their suggestions and instead drove straight to Palhares’ home.
Palhares’ murder sparked an outpouring of grief at the time among Brazilian expatriates on the Gold Coast.
Palhares’ brother Raphael and his wife Mariana Nakamura Palhares traveled from Brazil for Monday’s sentencing.
In his victim impact statement, Raphael Palhares told the court his sister was excited about becoming a mom and regularly sent them pictures of her growing belly.
“There was a time when Fabiana trusted you Brock,” their victim impact statement read.
“What you have done is unforgivable.”
“It is you who has to live with that, and we hope that it is something that comes to you every single day for the rest of your life, just as it comes to us.”
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