Neighbour tells court accused killer returned home during police manhunt

The Supreme Court trial in Launceston resumed on Tuesday, June 11.

Anita Nicole Harris, who lived next door to Whiting, 46, in Waverley for 12 years told the jury she went outside for a smoke on the morning of November 27, 2021.

This was two days after Whiting allegedly broke into his former partner Natalie Joyce Harris' house at Ravenswood and murdered her partner Adrian Paul Mayne, and attempted to murder his ex.

While she was outside her house, the Waverley woman said she heard somebody talking nearby.

"I heard a voice talking," Ms Harris said.

"I looked over my carport roof ... and I saw Kerry."

Ms Harris said Whiting was on his back deck with a phone in his hand, wearing a green and black shirt and his head was shaved.

During his cross-examination defence lawyer Greg Melick disputed that Whiting was holding a telephone.

Mr Melick said: "I suggest although you saw Mr Whiting, and heard him speaking he didn't have a telephone."

Ms Harris replied "I did."

When asked what colour the phone was, she said "I didn't take that much notice."

Ms Harris said this was because she went back inside her house and reported the sighting to police.

The jury heard from Tasmania Police Constable Dominic Watson that a wide-ranging search for Whiting was underway at that point.

This involved specialist resources including the Special Operations Group, drones and helicopters.

As well as being one of the first responders sent to the scene of the alleged attack on November 25, 2021, Constable Watson was also tasked with maintaining a police cordon on Ravenswood Road on November 29.

This was set up after reports Whiting was in nearby bushland, however, the jury heard officers did not find Whiting.

Constable Watson was then called to Whiting's home at 11 Dalkeith Street late on December 1 that year, when the man was arrested.

He remembered Whiting's feet were swollen and covered in scabs, and the man was unable to stand without assistance.

The jury heard from Whiting's daughter, who said she tried to warn her mother and her partner about their safety.

The teenage girl, who was 14 at the time of the alleged attack, told Crown prosecutor Madeleine Figg her parents' relationship was "toxic" with frequent arguments.

She said Whiting was frequently the more aggressive of the two.

"My dad had a really raised-up voice," she said.

"My mum was always just standing there saying 'okay, okay'."

Defence lawyer Rochelle Mainwaring asked about a specific incident, when Whiting was told by Ms Harris' sister Skye that his former partner was in a relationship with Mr Mayne.

The teenager said Whiting quizzed her about Mr Mayne.

"He said 'Skye told me mum has a boyfriend'," she said.

"He asked 'how much do you know about Adrian?'.

"I wondered why he was asking me, no one ever asks me things like that."

This was "a couple of weeks" before the alleged attack, and the teenager said Whiting became enraged.

"He was going up and down the hallway, yelling, saying he was going to kill Adrian," she said.

The teenager said when she returned to her mother's house she told Ms Harris "dad was going to kill Adrian", but one of the pair - she could not remember which - said "oh, he's just mad" and the other agreed.

Ms Mainwaring also asked the girl if she saw Ms Harris smoke cannabis the night before the alleged attack.

The teenager said she did not remember smelling the illicit substance that night, but she had previously smelled it in sheds at her father's home.

The teenager was also home when somebody - alleged to be Whiting - broke into the family home at Prosser's Forest Road, Ravenswood.

Then, she found a man standing on the family's washing machine facing away from her.

When the teenager disturbed him, he turned around and told her to go back to bed.

Asked how she knew it was Whiting, the girl said she was "pretty sure [she] knew what her dad looks like".

This was later reported to police.

The jury heard the girl did not directly witness the alleged murder but heard the disturbance - something she detailed in a police interview on November 25, 2021.

She looked out her bedroom door to see a bloody handprint on a wall and Mr Mayne's feet sticking through another doorway, and so shut the door and sat in the bedroom until police arrived.

The teenager was also asked how she felt about the events of the day, to which she said she felt "awful".

"I tried to warn them multiple times that it was day, that he wanted to hurt Adrian," she said.

"They didn't listen."