A former police officer, Beau Lamarre-Condon, allegedly told a friend 'I love you' and 'not everything in the news is true' after his arrest over a double murder, a court has heard. Lamarre-Condon, 31, has been accused of fatally shooting Sydney couple Jesse Baird and Luke Davies with his police service weapon in Baird’s Paddington home on 19 February 2024. The former officer has pleaded not guilty to two counts of murder and one charge of aggravated break and enter.
Dayna Schagen, a friend of Lamarre-Condon and an officer with the NSW police, told his trial on Monday about a call she received in late March 2024, about a month after the alleged murders. She initially did not pick up because it came at about 9pm from a number she did not recognise and she believed it was 'rude to call after dinner time on a weeknight'. But after the number dialled a second time, she picked up the phone and immediately recognised Lamarre-Condon’s voice. He then said: 'I just wanted to tell you that I love you and before you do anything, you need to know not everything in the news is true. It will all come out in court.'
The court heard Schagen then cut off Lamarre-Condon and said: 'You killed two people, why would I ever want to speak to you again?' She then told her boss about the phone call and made a statement to police about the incident. Earlier on Monday, Schagen told the jury Lamarre-Condon had been seeing Baird on and off during 2023 and had been hoping to turn it into a relationship. When Baird made it clear he wasn’t interested and the two broke up in April 2023, Lamarre-Condon was 'still very much invested in him', Schagen said.