CCTV from date, an alleged break-in: Exhibits in ex-cop’s murder trial

Accused double-murderer Beau Lamarre-Condon allegedly used his position as a NSW Police officer to obtain CCTV footage of ex-partner Jesse Baird on a date the year before he killed him, a Sydney court has heard.

Lamarre-Condon, 31, has pleaded not guilty to two counts of murder over the shooting deaths of Baird, 26, and Luke Davies, 29, in Paddington on February 19, 2024. His NSW Supreme Court criminal trial started in Sydney on Monday.

On Thursday, the court released a series of exhibits in the trial, including CCTV footage police say was found on the former police officer’s iCloud account after his arrest.

The Crown alleges Lamarre-Condon claimed he was investigating an assault to obtain footage from the Royal Hotel in Paddington on May 19, 2023, when Baird was on a date with another man.

The court has heard Baird had broken up with Lamarre-Condon for the first time in April that year.

“Police came looking for footage about someone that was in the venue and had a fight up the road,” the assistant venue manager said in an email on May 20, 2023, tendered in court.

Among a series of other exhibits released on Thursday was a photo of Lamarre-Condon’s police-issued gun, which the Crown alleges he used to shoot Baird and his new boyfriend, Davies, and a police photo of a bobby pin in the front door lock of Baird’s home.

The Crown alleges Lamarre-Condon broke into Baird’s Paddington share house in August 2023, months before the murders, and stole his mobile phone and wallet. He has pleaded not guilty to the charge, and the defence case is that the accused used a key given to him by the former AFL umpire and Network Ten presenter and producer.

The court has heard Lamarre-Condon posted images on social media that were not visible to Baird but to a select audience of potential romantic rivals that gave the impression he was in a relationship with Baird.

This included an Instagram story when Baird was in Melbourne, showing a bouquet with the caption: “When he’s in Melbourne but still sends you these.”

Lamarre-Condon would later deny in text messages to Baird that the post was about him. He claimed it was a reference to flowers his stepfather had bought his mother.

He posted another Instagram story to a limited audience, showing him and Baird at a concert.

The court heard on Thursday that police had obtained more than 14,000 hours of CCTV footage from 200 locations as part of the investigation into Lamarre-Condon.

The Crown played the jury a series of compilations of the CCTV footage, including from inside a sports store in Westfield Miranda where the accused was shown buying a large surfboard cover with a friend on February 17, 2024, two days before the alleged murders.

The Crown has foreshadowed that the court would hear evidence that Lamarre-Condon asked whether his friend would fit inside the surfboard bag.

The friend allegedly replied “probably not”, according to the prosecution’s opening address to the jury, and the accused said: “I’ll grab this one instead, it should be big enough.”

In part of the footage from inside the sports store, the accused appears to hold one surfboard cover next to his friend. A receipt for the $85 cover Lamarre-Condon eventually bought with cash was tendered in court.

The Crown alleges that buying the surfboard cover was one of the steps Lamarre-Condon took while planning Baird’s murder.

The prosecution case is that the accused shot Baird after developing an “obsessive and jealous infatuation” with him that escalated when Baird ended their relationship permanently in November 2023.

Lamarre-Condon, then a senior constable with NSW Police, allegedly disguised himself as an Uber Eats rider and used his police-issued pistol to shoot Baird twice in the kitchen of his Paddington home, according to the Crown case.

The prosecution alleges he shot Davies spontaneously to eliminate a witness to the crime as Davies called Triple Zero for help.

Alleged FaceTime call

Later on Thursday, the court heard from a witness – known in the trial as Alex Carrol – that Lamarre-Condon had asked her in a FaceTime call on November 23, 2023, whether someone she knew could “get me a gun”.

She indicated with her thumb and two fingers that he had made a gun gesture.

Another witness, known as Anne May, told the court she observed Carrol on the call to Lamarre-Condon and saw him making the gun gesture.

May said the two women said to each other afterwards: “What the hell, why would he be asking that?”

CCTV footage

The jury was shown separate CCTV footage on Thursday of Lamarre-Condon leaving his home in Balmain at 5.01am on the day of the alleged murders, and switching from his grey Tesla to a rented Mazda in Kensington.

He was also shown getting out of the Mazda in Baird’s street wearing a dark-coloured T-shirt. He later appeared in footage after 9am dressed in a high-visibility top, black pants with a reflective strip, and a motorcycle helmet, while holding an Uber Eats bag.

The jury heard for a second time three gunshot sounds captured on CCTV footage from a neighbouring property in Paddington between 9.49am and 9.50am.

There is no dispute that Lamarre-Condon was at Baird’s home when the men died, and that he was disguised as a delivery driver, including wearing a helmet.

However, the defence says the accused had gone to Baird’s home to pick up some of his belongings after their break-up and was surprised by Baird, leading to a struggle in which Lamarre-Condon’s gun went off twice and fatally wounded Baird.

The defence case is that Davies picked up the weapon and shot himself accidentally during a second struggle with the accused, and that Lamarre-Condon panicked and dumped the men’s bodies in surfboard bags in Bungonia near Goulburn.

Lamarre-Condon’s barrister, John Stratton, SC, told the jury in his opening address, “It is very much in dispute that the accused … ever planned to kill or even cause any harm to anyone.

“It’s his case that what he did was in self-defence.”

The Crown alleges Lamarre-Condon bought a second surfboard bag after the alleged murders, for Davies’ body, and then two more when he discovered the first two bags were too small.

The trial continues.