Before a widespread search for missing schoolgirl Charlise Mutten, Mr Stein allegedly dumped her body in the Colo River in the Blue Mountains.
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Police say that, between last Tuesday night and Wednesday morning, Mr Stein allegedly murdered his fiancee’s nine-year-old daughter, Charlise Mutten, who was visiting the lavish grounds of his family’s remote Blue Mountains estate, Wildenstein.
To hide what he had allegedly done, Mr Stein towed a boat from the Mount Wilson property and tried to dump the schoolgirl’s body in the Hawkesbury River, but was unable to start the vessel.
So he drove his ute to the Colo River, where he allegedly planned to cast Charlise into the water inside a barrel filled with the sand he had bought from a Bunnings hardware store last Thursday afternoon. But it was all too heavy for him to shift, forcing him to allegedly leave it on the water’s edge.
Last Friday morning, Charlise’s mother Kallista Mutten and Mr Stein reported her daughter missing, saying they had last seen the girl on Thursday. It sparked a five-day search involving hundreds of police and thousands of volunteers in the bushland surrounding the property.
But police were running a separate homicide investigation, examining the possibility Charlise had met with foul play. Many of Mr Stein’s movements in the 24 hours before Charlise was reported missing had been captured on CCTV and through the GPS on his mobile phone.
Court documents say Mr Stein murdered Charlise between 7pm last Tuesday and 10am on Wednesday.
That behaviour also allegedly included a series of phone calls made to his fiancee while buying the sandbags and fuel for the boat at a local petrol station.
He said Mr Stein had told Ms Mutten and his mother he was out looking for Charlise on January 13, but allegedly left Mount Wilson with a barrel under a tarp in the back of the ute, as well as towing his boat.
He went to Bunnings and allegedly bought five 20kg bags of sand, most of which was later found in the barrel with the girl’s body, the jury was told.
With the girl’s body allegedly stuffed in a barrel at the back of the ute and hidden under a tarp, Mr McKay told the jury Mr Stein stopped in at a 7/11 where he bought a can of coke, snickers and a slushie before putting more than $120 of petrol in a boat he was towing.
The jury was told Mr Stein later Google searched “Colo River” and allegedly dumped the barrel down an embankment before returning to Mount Wilson at 4.22am on January 15.
The barrel was found on January 18 buried within some foliage partway down the embankment, with a toxicology report showing Charlise tested positive for Mr Stein’s schizophrenia medication.
Defence barrister Carolyn Davenport SC told the jury her client told “various versions” of what happened to the child to protect his former partner.
On Thursday, January 13, Justin Stein left the Wildenstein property at Mount Wilson in his Holden Colorado, police say, towing a boat carrying the barrel with Charlise's body inside.
A blue tarpaulin is believed to have been draped over the barrel in the boat.
According to GPS data detectives later obtained from Stein's mobile phone and his ute, he allegedly made the approximately one hour 20 minute journey to Marsden Park Bunnings.
At Bunnings, Stein bought five 20kg bags of sand and made a phone call to Kallista Mutten, police allege.
He then allegedly made a three minute drive to the BP service station at Marsden Park, where he filled up the boat with marine fuel and called Kallista Mutten again.
At some point, Stein must have emptied the bags of sand into the barrel to weight it down.
From the BP, it is at 40 minute drive to Five Dock boat ramp on the Parramatta River in inner western Sydney, where he is said to have failed to launch the motor boat, because it was 'inoperable'.
Stein again allegedly called Kallista Mutton and discussed his futile attempt to float the vessel and is then believed to have made the hour-long 60km drive to Windsor boat ramp......