S03E13: THE DEATH OF WARRIENA WRIGHT

AJ: Coming up on this episode of Crime Family.

Shortly before 2:20 AM that morning, 26 year old Warriena Wright falls to her death from a balcony 14 stories above the ground. At 12:55 AM a recording device is activated by Gable and the horrific events of the night from this point on are disturbingly caught on audio tape.

Katie: I'll probably have nightmares. That was creepy. Not even a minute goes by and he already calls his lawyer. It just seems like he already has figured out what he needs to do to help himself.

AJ: And so it was a very controversial case. There were many people on both sides. There were people who felt that he should be acquitted and then other people said he's definitely guilty, based on the audio tape,

Hi, everyone. Welcome to another episode of Crime Family. I'm your cohost AJ and I'm here with my two sisters, Stephanie and Katie, just like always. This week, I'm actually going to be covering a case from Australia that is both bizarre and pretty controversial. That is the death of Warriena Wright. And for those of you who are unfamiliar with this case, I just want to place a warning upfront because I will be playing some pretty intense audio footage in this episode that might be upsetting or triggering or hard to listen to. I do feel like the audio clip is critical to the entire case. So I feel like I have to play it just because it's important to everything that happens. It basically is the case. That's why I'll be playing it. But yeah, I just wanted to put a little bit of a warning upfront. So the case happens in the early morning hours of August 8th, 2014 and shortly before 2:20 AM that morning, 26 year old Warriena Wright falls to her death from a balcony, 14 stories above the ground. Immediately questions are raised about what exactly happened. Was it a possible suicide? Was it a murder? Was it an accident? Initially I'm sure when it happened, that was probably the question that was running through everyone's mind. This woman just fell from the balcony so it's probably one of those three scenarios and everyone didn't really quite know what had happened. But the investigation didn't last long however. Very shortly afterwards, 28 year old Gable Tostee was arrested and charged with her murder. So it sounds like case closed, but not exactly. The reason that this case was so controversial and captured Australia's attention was because of the circumstances in the hours leading up to, and after Warriena's death. Warriena Wright was a tourist from New Zealand who was on vacation in Gold Coast, which is a city just south of Brisbane on the east coast of Australia. She was there for a friend's wedding and then she was going to be in Australia for about a week and Gable Tostee lived in Gold Coast and he was a self-proclaimed Playboy. He loved fast cars, working out, partying, and meeting women. In fact, he would often boast about the number of women he would hook up with. He loved to frequent the different dating apps and hookup with all these different women. So that was his lifestyle. The night of August 7th, that woman was Warriena Wright. About a week prior to the events that happened in this case Warriena and Gable matched on the dating app Tinder, and they planned to meet up while Warriena was still on vacation in the city. At some point before she left, they both wanted to meet up. They eventually did meet on the night of August 7th, around 8:45 PM. Surveillance footage shows the pair meeting outside of a surf shop in the downtown core of the city. Then after meeting the pair goes to Surfers Paradise Tavern Beergarden. They leave shortly thereafter and instead go to a local store and buy a six pack of beer. Then they head back to Gable's apartment building, which was called the Avalon Apartments. They entered the building just before 9:00 PM that night. The next trackable movement that we know from the pair happens early the next morning, which is at 12:55 AM. So this would have been about nearly four hours after they entered the apartment building. At 12:55 a recording device is activated by Gable and the horrific events of the night from this point on are disturbingly caught on audio tape. So I'm going to play some of this audio in just a little bit, but first I'll describe a little bit of what takes place, and then I'll let you hear some of that for yourself. In interviews with 60 Minutes Australia, Gable admits that the pair did have sex in his apartment. Then afterwards continued to drink. It's clear that the two are very drunk from the moment that the recording starts at 12:55 AM. Like I said, which was nearly four hours after they entered the apartment building. They were pretty much drinking the majority of the time. So when questioned on 60 Minutes Australia, about why he was recording the events of that night, Gable says, " Why wouldn't you do that? Obviously, I used to go out quite a lot drinking. I don't have the best memory when I drink. This day and age recording your night out is as easy as pressing a button and leaving your phone in your pocket." Then he also says, "More of a just in case thing, because you're better off having something and not needing it than needing something and not having it." Just in case! Well, you know, the thing that happened on the 8th of August, 2014 is a perfect example. So my question is, "Why did he turn this recording on at that time? Did he know something sinister was going to happen? Did he plan for something to happen? Was he recording it for his own sick pleasure? Like I said, I don't know. No one really knows exactly why he turned that recording on, but for whatever reason he did, and it is a good thing that he did because it definitely gives us a better idea of what really happened inside that apartment that night. The full recording that includes the events of this night is over 3 hours long in total. There is a YouTube video that has the entire recording on it unedited. It is about 3 hours and 20 minutes. When the recording starts, you can hear the pair having conversations and they're fighting a little bit or arguing. They're drinking and they're playing music, et cetera. One random conversation they're having, they're talking about what happens after death and Gable makes a reference to being thrown off the balcony. He says, "Throw me off the balcony and that is it. This is it. Boom," which is a random comment to make, considering what happens a little bit later, it's just interesting. But it goes to show you the nature of their conversations. It's really random. They're jumping from topic to topic, playing music and fighting. The point in the recording where things really take a turn for the worst is when Warriena decides that she's going to leave, but can not find her phone. She accuses Gable of taking it and this obviously upsets her. Then Gable says, "I should have never given you so much to drink. I thought we were going to have fun." Then the conversation calmed down once again, which is the pattern throughout the recording. At the beginning, it starts as intense arguing, followed by a calmer stretch where they're just talking and then it goes back to arguing again, and then it escalates and escalates and escalates. Eventually to the point where it's only fighting and there's no calmer periods in between. A witnesses' police statement says that around 2:00 AM, she was woken up by the pair because she lived directly below Gable's apartment and the commotion inside his apartment was now escalating to the point where it was waking up other people in the complex, because they were being so loud and disruptive. Then shortly after 2:10 AM the sound of rocks being thrown around the apartment by Warriena can be heard. Gable had these small white decorative pebbles in the apartment, I guess. For some reason he just had them there and these must've been the items that Warriena was throwing around. She was throwing them around the apartment, throwing them at him directly. And then at 2:14 AM, there's a chilling exchange between the two that's even more sinister given the events of what happens just minutes later. Gable says, "That is enough. You have worn out your welcome, you have to leave." Then Warriena says, "Okay." Then at 2:15 AM, Gable says, "I thought you were kidding. I have taken enough. This is fucking bullshit. You are lucky I haven't chucked you off my fucking balcony. You goddamn psycho little bitch." So I'm actually going to play that portion of the audio for you so that you can hear the tone of his voice and a little bit of the context of the situation of what's happening. That's what you're going to be hearing in the audio clip. So I will play that now.

Gable Tostee: So I thought that you were kidding and I've taken enough. This is fucking bullshit. You're lucky I haven't chucked you off my fucking balcony. You goddamn psycho little bitch. Who the fuck do you think I am? Yeah, do your muay thai now? What?

Warriena Wright: You're a sexist.

Gable Tostee: Got something to say? Say it! I'm the one who's injured.. You don't have a goddamn scratch on you. Seriously, what?

Warriena Wright: You see...you see...

Gable Tostee: Fucking sick of this shit.

AJ: So what did you guys think of that clip or have any thoughts?

Stephanie: I don't really understand what was happening. Did she hurt him? He said he was injured. I don't really know.

AJ: Yeah. Well, she was throwing the rocks, the little pebbles around the room at him.

Stephanie: Oh yes, okay.

AJ: Allegedly she had been slapping him or punching him or hitting him in some way. I'll go into a little bit more detail later on about all that. At the beginning of the clip where he says, " You're lucky I haven't thrown you off the balcony." She's clearly, I mean, you can tell from that clip that she is very drunk.

Stephanie: Yeah, you can tell, from the very beginning of the video, how drunk she was. She's not really speaking in sentences. She's just mumbling.

AJ: Yeah, the classic sound of someone who's very drunk. Then she calls him a sexist. The one thing that she says. I don't know. It's a bit hard to make out. Maybe she calls him a sexist and then he says, "Well I'm the one with marks on me and you don't have a scratch on you." It's basically the beginning of the escalation.

Stephanie: What were they arguing about?

AJ: Who knows? I mean, they're both very drunk. I think they both just got aggressive with each other. Like I said, they had never met before that night so they have literally no history. So it's not like they were fighting about anything in particular. There would be nothing for them to really fight about. It's not like this couple had years of history.

Katie: And for her, if I didn't know that she was drunk, to me it sounds like she's in distress because she's breathing really heavily. You can't even understand what she's saying. So if you don't have any context, it almost sounds like he is holding her down because she's breathing and she can hardly talk. That's what comes to my mind.

AJ: I feel like you always say the next part of what I'm going to go into. So it's very interesting that you say that because that does play in to a little bit of what happens. Yeah. That's definitely not just your own observation. It is a very important part of this whole thing.

Katie: Okay. Yeah, because it doesn't sound like they're having a conversation. Right? He's talking at her while she's struggling.

AJ: Yeah. At that point, I just took that piece of the clip obviously cause I said it's three hours full. Actually this part here is right before the next clip I'm going to play which is the most intense one. This one is already an hour into the recording. So this is already, if you listen to the whole thing, it already has been an hour of arguing, and calling each other names. But then there is periodic moments where they'll calm down. Then they'll have another drink and then they're just talking regularly and then it escalates again. Each time it escalates, it just escalates to the next highest level until it just explodes. Yeah that one comment at the very beginning of the clip where he says, "You're lucky I haven't thrown you off the balcony," that's the second time in this recording that he's mentioned falling off a balcony. He says that the first time he's like, "Just fall off the balcony. That's it. Boom," when they're talking about what happens after death. He has talked about the balcony a few times, which is, I mean, could just be a random coincidence. But maybe just an interesting note. Oh, and also too, what you were saying about the reasoning, why he may have turned on the recording. That was the reason he says in this interview, "I don't really have the best memory when I'm drinking", which makes it allude to the fact that it could be that he's curious about what he sounds like. To me, it just seems like there had been something that happened that made him need to be recording this for some specific reason. He turns it on at 12:55 AM, which like I said, it's four hours after they enter the apartment. So did something happen? Did she say something that then, "Well shit. I better be recording this just in case." But we don't ever get a clear answer about why. In an interview with 60 Minutes Australia, Gable says that he regrets his choice of words at that moment where he says, "You're lucky I haven't thrown you off the balcony." He says that, "It was the worst choice of words one could have used." The interviewer of course brings that up. He's like, "It's very interesting that you say this, considering what happens." That was his response to that. So next in the recording you heard Warriena accuse Gable of being sexist and Gable responds by saying, "You're a goddamn psycho. I'm going to let you go. I'm going to walk you out of this apartment just the way you are. You're not going to collect any of your belongings. You're just going to walk out and I'm going to slam the door on you. Do you understand? If you try to pull anything, I'll knock you out. Do you understand?" That was another part of this whole interaction as well. Then Warriena apologizes, but Gable doesn't accept it. He's clearly very agitated at this point in the tape. So now I'm actually going to play the next audio clip, which is about three and a half minutes. I'm going to play this one uninterrupted. Then I'll go back and explain what investigators believe is happening. It's not all talking. It's a lot of sounds and noises. Then the investigators try to piece it together based on what the recording is. This is a disturbing one, so I'll just warn you again. It's a domestic situation. So this is audio clip number two.

Gable Tostee: You don't understand do you? You don't understand anything at all do you? You don't understand. You think you can hit me and I'll fall down, like in the movies? Let go of it. Let go. Let go.

Warriena Wright: Please, please don't!

Gable Tostee: Who the fuck do you think you are?

Warriena Wright: NO! NO!

Gable Tostee: You trying to kill me? Are you going to hit me with that?

Warriena Wright: NO! NO!

AJ: All right. So did you have any thoughts about this one before I explain it. A little bit about what's happening.

Stephanie: In the beginning of that clip, it sounds like he has his hand around her throat. It sounds like she's struggling to breathe. I don't know. It sounds like a gurgling noise. That's what it sounded like to me. Did she have something in her hand? He kept saying "Let go." It's a very disturbing clip.

Katie: Yeah, I'll probably have nightmares. That was creepy. Yeah, I was thinking too, it sounds like he's trying to choke her and he says, "You think you're just going to fall over, like in the movies or something." It makes me think he's trying to choke her until she passes out. I don't know. It almost seems like, I picture when he's saying, "Just let go," maybe she's holding on to the balcony rails. He's trying to push her, strangle her and push her over, but she won't let go. Then she starts screaming. So he does let go of her throat so she can finally breathe and yell again. So that's what I'm picturing and what I find interesting though is that he doesn't forget that it's recording. He tells her it's recording the whole time. So if he is doing something that he knows is illegal, why would he just keep recording? It's strange.

AJ: Yeah. You can't say that he forgot it was recording because he literally mentioned it in that audio clip, that it's recording. Making sure that she knows it's recording. So I guess I'll just explain a little bit and most of what Steph said was right. Katie, the part you said where he's, "You think you're going to just fall down." I think he's referring to, she had something in her hand and she thought she was just going to hit him and he would fall down like in the movies. I think that's what he meant by that. So in this audio it's believed that Warriena had picked up a metal object and this is thought to be a metal clamp for a microscope that he had in his apartment. A little clamp that attached it to the desk. So she had taken that and she was going to be using that as a weapon. That's what she has in her hands. Then as a defense, it's alleged that Gable began choking her in an attempt to get her to drop it. That's where you can hear him say, "Let it go, let it go," a few times. Then you can hear choking sounds from Warreina as Gable, again, this what is speculated by the prosecutors later on. You can hear choking sounds from Warriena as Gable's grasp on her tightens.

And then she begins breathing really heavily. It was, as you can tell, you can hear the gargling sound of someone who's very clearly being choked and then the heavy breathing. Then Gable says, "Let go", again and that's when you hear the sound of the metal object hitting the ground, which is probably when she lets go of what she was holding. Then this is when Gable takes her to the balcony. He puts her onto the balcony and then he locks the screen door behind her and leaves her on the balcony. She's screaming, "No, no, just let me go home." He says, "No, cause you've been a bad girl." Then he locks the door. During this, you can hear her screaming the word no numerous times and then very shortly after this, I'm not sure if you guys caught this, it's very faint. But towards the end of the clip, you can hear a faint scream from a woman that lasts just about a second or two, and it's believed that this is the moment that you can hear Warriena falling 14 floors to her death. I'm going to play that 15 to 20 seconds again, just so that you can hear that last bit in case you didn't hear it the first time. Just listen closely, you can probably hear it a little bit in the background.

So it is creepy to hear cause it's very obvious. I feel like that is what it is. So that same witness who was woken up by the pair earlier on says in her police statement, that at approximately 2:21 AM, she could hear a woman , "No, no, no." Then she sees " two legs, dangling down. In a matter of seconds, I saw the person fall from the balcony above mine." She then calls 0 0 0, which is the equivalent to 9 1 1 in Australia at about 2:23 AM. This detailed timeline of events is from an article by the Brisbane Times and they do a really good job of outlining the timeline. So it's speculated that it's only 27 seconds from the time he locks her onto the balcony until when she falls. She felt so fearful that she tried to either climb down to the apartment below or climb to the next apartment over. She was obviously very drunk. So that's obviously not going to go well. Then she falls in the process of doing that. Immediately following the fall Gable also gets on the phone, but not to 9 1 1. He calls his lawyer. His lawyer doesn't answer cause it is 2:30 in the morning. In the 60 Minutes Australia episode, they interview Gable in depth. The interviewer points out that there was only 35 seconds between the time Warriena fell to her death and Gable calling for his lawyer. So rather than going out to the balcony, checking out what happened, he went right into action in his own defense. That's the first thing he thinks of "Oh, I better call my lawyer." Then Gable claims in this interview that he didn't go outside or look over the balcony out of fear that someone might see him looking over directly after the fall, which would then not look good for him at all. You know, this woman falls down and then they just see him staring. It's not really necessarily the actions of a remorseful person. That's his first thoughts, "Oh, I better not go out there because people are gonna think I pushed her." So the interviewer pushes back on this and it's very clear in the interview that you can see what they think of this man. They're challenging everything he says and questioning every reasoning he comes up with, they just questioned it. The police very quickly arrive on the scene at 2:25 AM, which is about two minutes after the 9 1 1 call was placed. This is around the same time that the key fob for Gable Tostee's apartment is activated. Security camera captures a man that was believed to be Gable approach the front entrance of the building, but then walk back to the elevator and ride it down to the basement. Then another security footage catches him going out another entrance, which was through the underground parking garage. So this is probably because there were multiple police officers on the scene and he didn't want to be seen walking in that area. Although this is very early on it's very unlikely that him just walking out of the apartment building, no one's going to think anything of him at that time. This is literally like minutes after. It's not going to be focused on him. So I think he just thought, "Well, I better go out this back way to the underground parking garage, cause I don't want to even interact with the police at this time." The recording captures all of this. It goes for three and a half hours uninterrupted. You can hear the sound of footsteps, then at around 3:10 AM, you can hear Gable ordering a slice of pizza. He walked to the nearest pizza place and ordered a slice of pizza, which is really random. He's just walking around this area close by his apartment. After locking Wariena out on the balcony, drunk and frantic, and after she falls 14 floors to her death, he calls his lawyer, walks outside through a back entrance and goes and orders a slice of pizza. Not once has he called the police or alerted anybody to anything that's transpired. So then Gable calls his father and again this is being recorded and I'm going to play a portion of that audio as well. That's the third and final audio clip, when he calls his dad.

Gable Tostee: Hello, Dad? I might have a bit of a situation. See, I met up with a girl for a date tonight and she started getting really aggressive. It was alright at first and like, we, you know, had sex in bed. And then after that, like she kept drinking and we were both drinking and she, like, I think she thought it was like a joke or something but she kept like bidding me up and whatever. And, um, it was because she was really drunk and I'm like, I forced her out on the balcony and I think she might've jumped off. Like I've been walking around and there are like a million cops in my building. I'm fucked. I don't know what to do.

Right. Like where? I didn't, I didn't cause this, like, I, I didn't push her or anything. Like I just know, I know, um, I'm like just walking around the area and there's like a million cops in the area. It is really fucked up. I'm like, um, next to Domino's.

Dad, I didn't, this wasn't my fault. I didn't do this. I, I, I was giving her my alcohol, but she, she was really violent and, um, dunno, um, I like tackled her on my floor inside the building and then I never forced her over the balcony. God, I'd never do anything like that. I just really fucked up. I don't know what to do. Like I'm just, I'm, I'm walking around the area and I just see a million cops around Avalon.

AJ: So you guys have any thoughts about either the phone call with his dad, and that's just a portion of it. It goes on for awhile. Do you have thoughts about his actions after the fact?

Stephanie: I just find it really callous. I feel like he's just not taking responsibility for putting her out on the balcony because he locked the door so she couldn't get out. So if she was trying to get away from him, to climb down the balcony or whatever, he's kind of confining her to this one location. So I feel like he caused her to fall over the balcony, even though he didn't push her. She had no other place to go. And then when he calls his dad, He is playing the victim card saying he had nothing to do with it. She was hurting me. She was being violent towards me. He doesn't really take a whole lot of responsibility for hurting her. So I just find that really just very callous.

Katie: Also it is not even a minute goes by and he already calls his lawyer. It just seems like he already has figured out what he needs to do to help himself. He's not as frantic as you would think, someone just fell off your balcony and is dead on the road right below your balcony. You think you'd be more frantic if you cared at all about people. In the first audio, when he's saying she just wants to go home and he's saying I would, but you've been bad girl. Why not if he just wants her out, why not just put her out the door of his apartment, into the hallway, not the balcony, you know what I mean? So why not just shove her out the other door and lock it? So she's out of your apartment. Just the fact that he goes to get some food, he sneaks out of the apartment and then calls his dad and keeps saying over and over again he had nothing to do with it, you know, it just makes me think that obviously he feels like people have reason to think that he did it. So it seems like he's thinking about it way too much, rather than flipping out the way I probably would, if that happened to me. I think he kept the tape because he thinks he is innocent and if he actually didn't have anything to do with it directly, he thinks that that tape will prove it because that's actually what happened, you know what I mean? So this is what happened. This is what you can hear happening and to him, because he knows what happened, he thinks it's helping him when, if you have no context and you're just listening, it really looks bad for him. But he doesn't know that because he, if he is innocent, you know what I mean? He thinks because he is, it's going to help him. Yeah. That's what makes me think that maybe he is innocent or he feels like he is, and that's why he kept it.

AJ: Is there any part of you that think, I mean you guys obviously haven't heard the whole thing, I haven't even listened to the full three and a half hours, but I've listened to a much larger portion than you guys, I get the sense that some of the things that he says, he's saying it because he knows it's being recorded. So he's narrating what's happening. He's making it very obvious in certain spots he's mentioning that this is being recorded and I just feel like maybe that wasn't what he was thinking at all. To me there's some moments where I'm thinking he definitely said that because he knows it's being recorded.

Katie: Yeah, in the first recording, when you listen, it doesn't sound like somebody that's scared. He's not scared of her, even though she's allegedly attacking him. So if he was actually scared, you think he would show that, but it just sounds scary what he's saying and how calm he is. He's trying to control her, but if he was actually freaking out, why wouldn't that be part of the tape? You know what I mean? It sounds like he's definitely in control and is the one that's being the aggressor.

AJ: Yeah. Yeah. And there's no point in the tape, that I heard, that he ever sounded fearful during his interactions with her. The only time he ever sounds a little bit stressed is after the fact when he's breathing heavily and trying to figure out what the fuck to do. That's when he sounds the most stressed in the whole thing. He doesn't sound, like you said, he doesn't sound scared of her at all in any of their interactions. There was a point that's brought up by the interviewer in the 60 Minutes Australia, that is also the point that you made Katie. The interviewer says, "Why put her on the balcony? He could have just put her outside the door, into the hallway of the apartment building." He says that he was trying to deescalate the situation and calm her down. That was the first thing he thought that he could do. The apartment door was just as close as the balcony door. So to me that doesn't really make any sense at all. It's very bizarre, how going to put somebody on your balcony is your first choice versus putting them out the front door.

Stephanie: And I'm going to assume the balcony is not very big if it's on the 14th floor. I've been on some balconies that are high up and they are very skinny. She wouldn't have a whole lot of room to move around.

AJ: Well it is a decent size. They do show photos of the apartment and the balcony and it's not huge, but you know, there's enough to have patio furniture out there to sit. It's big enough. But there's no room to actually do anything. I think that any rational person would just put her out the door into the hallway versus the balcony.

Katie: She's on the balcony but she's going to have to come back in to get out anyway so why not just get her out of the apartment. She never has to come back in.

AJ: It sounds very much like he's just trying to do it to scare her, intimidate her, trap her there.

Katie: She can't leave.

AJ: Yeah, just being vindictive. He knows this is going to be terrifying, you know, scary. He's going to lock her out on the balcony versus just being a rational person.

Katie: Yeah, exactly.

AJ: So the conversation with his father goes on for a while on the audio tape. Then after the phone call, the recording stops and it's about 4:15 AM. According to the same timeline by the Brisbane Times, Gable and his lawyer go to the local police station at 11:30 AM that morning. That would only be, you know, like six, seven hours later. While at the police station, Gable refuses to participate in a police interview, but he is examined after a forensic investigation is ordered. A doctor who examines him does notice a series of small cuts on Gable's body, but he is released without charges at that time. They do show in the 60 Minutes Australia, a few pictures of that time that he was examined, cuts on his knees and his arms. To me, they weren't scratches necessarily, they look scabbed over. They did notice that he had some noticeable cuts on his body. On August 9th, so this would only be the next day, the police search a car that's parked outside Gable's father's home and they find a Sony Xperia cell phone where the full three and a half hour recording is discovered by the police for the first time. So of course they seize that phone. Investigators were able to determine that the audio file was transferred onto that phone from another device, although they were unable to determine what device it was initially recorded on. For some reason it was transferred, whether it was a little audio tape or a little tape recorder, or if it was a cell phone. For whatever reason it was transferred off its initial source onto this other phone that was then in this car that the police searched.

Katie: If it was on his own cell phone he probably tried to get rid of it. He knew the police were going to look at his stuff, but he wanted to keep it for some reason and put it somewhere else or he didn't think they'd find it.

AJ: Yeah. So whoever's phone that was, it was in a car that was parked at his dad's house. It could be a second phone he had, or who knows whose phone that was. He also could have been advised by a lawyer too. We don't know if his lawyer was saying, "Get that off your phone.", or also, "Keep it just in case we need it later." You never know what the lawyer's telling him. There is also an autopsy that is conducted on Warriena, but because of the extent of her injuries, they were unable to determine if she had any substantial injuries prior to her fall. They couldn't tell if she had any injuries before she fell because there was too much injury obviously from her fall. It's pretty much impossible to determine that. Then less than a week later, on August 15th, or I guess it would been exactly a week after the 8th, Gable Tostee is arrested and charged with murder and manslaughter. The argument of the prosecution is not that Gable threw her off the balcony, but that Warriena's death was caused by the intense fear she must have felt. She fell to her death trying to escape, and that was the bulk of their argument. So I find it interesting that he was charged with murder and manslaughter, which was an interesting point. I feel like it's either one or the other.

Katie: Yeah. I didn't know you could do that. In case he doesn't get murder, we'll get him for manslaughter instead. I didn't think you could double up like that on the same thing.

AJ: Yeah, me neither. Maybe in Australia you can, but I feel like it's either manslaughter or murder. If it's murder, it's not manslaughter. If it's manslaughter, it's not murder. It's just weird.

Katie: Yeah. That is weird.

AJ: That was an interesting thing that I noted. Then this begins the highly publicized trial of Gable Tostee. I think in Australia and in New Zealand, since Warriena was from New Zealand, I think it was a high profile case there, but it wasn't really well-known outside of Australia, I don't think. A lot of people were following the trial and the case because of course he was pleading not guilty to the charges. There was a public trial. He denies that he ever physically assaulted Warriena, he denies choking her like the prosecution claims. He says that the sounds on the audio tape were not of choking. In his interview with 60 Minutes, which is interesting, Gable says that in court, the pathologist disproved the choking theory by determining that there were no signs of physical injury prior to her fall. But that seems to contradict the initial statement that because of the severity of her injuries, they could not determine whether some of her injuries were sustained before her fall. So maybe that did come out later on during the trial, but initially when they did the autopsy, they couldn't determine that. That must have changed later when they got the pathologist to come into the courtroom and testify that there wasn't any marks on her body before. An article by The Guardian says that the defense argued that Gable used a reasonable force to subdue her and that his actions were justified because of the erratic and violent behavior of Warriena that night. So it was a very controversial case. There were many people on both sides. There were people who felt that he should be acquitted because, you know, he didn't push her off the balcony. He didn't throw her over the balcony or anything like that. Then other people said, he definitely should be guilty just based on the audio tape. Clearly she was in that position because of him, which I think maybe could lean, you could see more of a case for a, maybe a manslaughter charge. There was definitely people on both sides. There is an article by CNN that showcases some tweets that people were tweeting at the time. A little on both sides. So what do you think of the defense's argument that he was reasonable in the force he used?

Stephanie: No, I feel like he knew what he was doing to her. To me in that clip that we heard, the second one, it clearly sounds to me that she's having a hard time breathing like choking. I'm sorry, but I know they said it wasn't conclusive, but I feel like that's what it sounds like to me.

AJ: Yeah, I think it was just what it sounds like. I think it's pretty obvious, but I mean, there's no video, so we don't know for sure. He's denying it and the defense is denying it. There's no way to really know other than if you just listened to it, which I think sounds pretty obvious, but..

Stephanie: The fact that he avoided going out the front door and being seen by people and trying to avoid the whole situation, shows me that he knew what he did. He knew that he was going to get in trouble and that he put her on that balcony, confined her to that space, so I feel like he should've got obviously manslaughter. I feel like he should've got what he was charged with.

AJ: Do you think it should be murder or manslaughter? There's different rules in Australia. There must be different guidelines of what each charge sort of entails. To me, I could see more of a case for, if I was a prosecutor, I'd probably push for the manslaughter, because that seems more a likely conclusion that the jury could come to, given the fact that he didn't actually push her over, that we know of.

Stephanie: I want to say murder just because he put her on that balcony knowing that she had nowhere else to go and he could have just easily have put her out the front door and let her go. He chose to put her out there.

AJ: I don't know if the defense made this argument, but you could also make the argument just playing devil's advocate that she could have just sat there and did nothing and he eventually would have opened it and let her back in. She didn't have to climb, you know what I mean? So you can make that argument as well if you're playing devil's advocate. But obviously if you're drunk and you're not in your right mind, you're not going to be thinking that well.

Katie: Yeah. So to me, it does seem like manslaughter because he put her out there and made her scared enough that she didn't want to just wait there for him to open the door. She felt like she had to get out of there. And of course she was drunk so she wasn't thinking clearly. But the fact that she was that scared was probably his fault even if she was being aggressive, he still scared her enough for her to think that that her only option was to get down that balcony. Also, I feel like, like you were saying at the beginning, he described himself as a Playboy and that was his lifestyle and he just seems like very arrogant. And you can hear in that video where he's saying that he's not going to let her go because she's been a bad girl. It was like if she fought back, that is him being arrogant enough to be, "Well, now you deserve something bad to happen to you because you're going to stand up to me." It just seems like that's what is happening here. Then he put her out there to be her punishment for even trying to come at him. It feels like he did all these things wrong and that's what caused her to die. So manslaughter, I feel like for sure, at least.

AJ: After the closing arguments and before the jury left to go deliberate, the judge reminded them that they could not find him guilty just because they found his actions after the event, calling his lawyer or leaving through the basement and ordering pizza, troubling. They can't just find him guilty because of that. They had to be satisfied without a reasonable doubt that he intended to cause bodily harm to Warriena. Separate it from however he reacted after the fact. He left them with that message. The prosecution argued that he did that when he choked her for up to 45 seconds on the audio recording. That's clear that you are violent and are trying to do harm. Then the defense obviously denies that as well. They say that she was never choked or if she was, it was in self-defense. Throughout all of this Gable's parents supported him and stood by his side every step of the way. They actually are interviewed as well by 60 Minutes Australia and Gable's mother, Helene says, " I think that Gable behaved in a way that was appropriate." This is a weird, messed up thing for her to say.

Katie: Yeah. I did only listen to those few minutes of tape, but from what I can hear, even just the fact that she's saying, just let me go home and he's not letting her leave, that's unlawful confinement or something, you know what I mean? So I think that's enough to charge him with something. He won't let her leave because he's pissed that he's the man and she stood up to him. That's what it feels like to me.

AJ: Yeah. So that's also brought up in 60 Minutes, the interviewer mentioned, "Why didn't you just leave or why didn't you just let her leave?" Then he says, there is one point in the audio where he does say," I'm going to walk you out the door. You're going to leave right now." Then he was, "Well, I offered for her to leave and she just didn't want to do that." That was why his defense did mention that. He took her and picked her up and put her on the balcony when he could've just put her outside the door.

Stephanie: That's what I was going to say. He could have just picked her up and put her outside the door. It's his apartment. If he didn't want her to be there, just fucking pick her up and put her outside the door and lock the door.

Katie: Or call the police. They would come and take her. Then he doesn't even have to be involved with even putting his hands on her to get her out of there. You know what I mean? He could have even got out himself, called the police and they would have dealt with it.

AJ: Yeah. He could have left or he could have walked himself on the balcony and said, "There's this woman in my apartment who's aggressive and won't leave like, come." You know what I mean?

Katie: Exactly.

Stephanie: To me, it seems weird that they've only met for four hours and how escalated it got when they got back to the apartment. He doesn't even seem that drunk to me in both of the audio clips. She sounds way more drunk than he does.

AJ: Yeah. I don't know. He was drinking I'm sure, but I don't know if he was technically drunk. He said he drank a lot, so who knows? He probably had a high tolerance. She was way drunker than he was.

Stephanie: He even said he gave her some of his alcohol from his house.

AJ: Yeah. They bought the six pack of beer at that store before, and then they went up, but she sounded way drunker than a couple of beers. You know what I mean? He definitely was giving her alcohol while she was there. The point is there were so many other options, I could think of off the top of my head, that he could have done versus what he did. Deliberation by the jury actually took four days. And on October 20th, 2016, the jury ultimately acquitted Gable of both murder and manslaughter charges and he walked away a free man. They didn't convict him of anything. So right after that he was able to walk away. That was crazy. I think at the very least manslaughter, like Katie said, I could see maybe an argument as to why maybe not murder, but I think manslaughter would have been appropriate. So it's just bizarre that he was just acquitted of everything.

Katie: Yeah. It is crazy that he didn't get anything. Like you said, they really can not prove that he pushed her, but he definitely caused what happened to happen in some way.

AJ: Yeah. And since the trial, so that was back in 2016, it's been six years since then, Gable has assumed a new identity changing his name to Eric Thomas and actually, when I was researching for this case, there was actually a news article from March of this year that had a little bit of an update on Gable. So this news article reports that Eric Thomas, so aka Gable Tostee was found naked and trapped in his car after a crash. The crash actually happened in October of last year but I guess the article just came out in March. The report says that his car was drifting. It hit a concrete barrier, then crossed the entire roadway before going into the bushes. He refused to submit a breath or blood sample. His eyes were bloodshot and his speech was slurred, allegedly. Police reportedly found empty bottles of mouthwash in his car and previous to this incident and previously to the Warriena Wright case Gable had been charged with a DUI in 2004, in 2012, and then again, in 2015. This is a man who has a history of DUIs and erratic behavior. So that was just a little update I saw.

Stephanie: Did you say he was found naked in his car?

AJ: Yes. That's what the article said. This is a very bizarre.

Katie: Yeah. So he definitely has a drinking problem. Maybe what did happen in his apartment that night messed him up even more.

AJ: Yeah. The point that they mentioned that there were empty bottles of mouthwash found in the car, that screams to me somebody with a drinking problem. I feel like mouthwash is a last resort for people.

Katie: Yeah, definitely. If the liquor store is closed, not open 24/7, but he found a store that was open 24/7 and just went in to get some mouthwash cause he couldn't get actual liquor at the time, that is definitely addiction.

AJ: Yeah. Obviously, it could be because he was affected obviously by this case, which I don't know how you couldn't be. That is the Warriena Wright case. It's sad that he was acquitted of everything and here this 26 year old woman was so young and she just died so unexpectedly and definitely preventable. He walked away, clean and clear from it.

Katie: Yeah, it was interesting, and maybe he really was drunker than he sounds and he wasn't thinking straight, he couldn't remember, and that tape was his evidence of what he did that night. We don't know.

AJ: I feel like it was a good thing that he recorded it, otherwise there'd be no evidence of any altercation. He could have just said, "Well she was drunk and got up on the balcony and jumped off." Right? There would be no way to say that that didn't happen. It'd be more unclear if he didn't record it. But also the fact that he did record it was able to make the defense pinpoint certain things. She had hit him with something. Then it gave them something to sort of grab onto as well.

Katie: Yeah. I feel like it did help him because there is evidence that maybe they were physically fighting each other and she had maybe picked up a weapon. It was sort of self-defense in a way, because the fact that he got off with nothing makes me think that it did help him.

AJ: Yeah. I was thinking of that throughout, what the outcome would have been if there had been no recording. The recording is the bulk of the case. That outlines the entire timeline of events from the time the altercation starts. It's obviously the key point, but if they didn't have that, you know, what would they have? Just witnesses from the apartment, that person downstairs who says they heard them fighting.

Katie: Yeah, they would have less evidence, but it would feel like because they didn't have any evidence, it might've gone the other way. It seems like he could have just pushed her, but with the recording it sounds like maybe he didn't. It's hard to say. I feel like it did help him though.

AJ: Yeah. I don't know what I feel. It could have been the same outcome, honestly, if there wasn't a recording. He could have been acquitted as well. Lack of evidence.

Katie: Also, what a coincidence, that he said, "You're lucky, I don't just push you off or throw you off my balcony." Then she happens to fall off his balcony that night and he happens to be recording the whole thing. It just seems a little bit fishy.

AJ: Yeah, that's true. That's why that's highlighted in 60 Minutes. They actually sit down and the interviewer plays that portion of the audio for Gable. He says, "Why did you say that?" Because like I said before, it's very obvious what the reporter thinks of this person. They're saying, "What are the chances that you would say that? Then, literally 20 minutes later she falls off the balcony."

Katie: It's obviously something he's thinking about. Also, most people, if you're in a fight with somebody, that's not something a normal person would say." Oh, you're lucky I don't just throw you off the balcony." Which is basically saying, "You're lucky I don't just kill you." That's not something that I would say to somebody while fighting with them. He definitely does have a vicious side to say something like that.

AJ: Yeah. I don't know if this was an official point by the defense, but I feel like an easy argument that he could have made, or the defense could have made would have been, "Well if he wanted to kill her, then he could have just choked her." When you look at the whole picture of what actually happened and the situation he put her in, it's very clear that he was responsible for that. I keep going back to what prompted him to start recording in the first place? I want to know if there was something specific she said that made him think, "Oh, I should be recording." It seems really random.

Katie: Maybe he's recorded things before though and, like I said, he wants to listen to his night or, you know, he just wants to see what's actually happening. Then it just happens that this happened on one of those nights that he was recording. We don't know this was the first time he ever did that.

AJ: Yeah. Obviously there was outrage because people thought that he should have been convicted for at least the manslaughter charge. So the fact that he was acquitted and just walked scot-free is pretty tragic, I think.

Stephanie: Going back to the charges, I find it weird that he was charged with murder and manslaughter, but then just got nothing. Why do both of those charges? There's not enough evidence and so they're just going to let him go. Obviously there was some evidence there to charge him with both at the beginning.

AJ: It's just so confusing to me because I always thought manslaughter or murder, it's either one or the other. I feel like it's just so weird that you can kind of double up on the charge like that.

Katie: Yeah. You can't just pick every charge out there and hope one of them sticks. You pick one because that's what happened.

AJ: Yeah. " We're going to charge you with first degree and second degree murder...

Katie: And third degree and just see if we can get any of them. It seems like you don't even know what happened, you're just grasping.

AJ: It wasn't a hundred percent clear, it said that he was charged with murder and manslaughter initially, but by the time that the trial happened, which was two years later, it could have been reduced to just one of those things. But it says that he was acquitted of murder so the other one could have been thrown out.

Katie: Well was he charged with both at the same time or was he maybe charged with one first and then they dropped that and then he was charged with the other one later? Was it at the same time?

AJ: Well, it says that on August 15th he was arrested and charged with manslaughter and murder.

Stephanie: I'm just surprised he didn't get anything, like wrongful confinement.

AJ: Just confinement, I guess. Or assault if he's choking her.

Katie: Yeah. That's interesting.

AJ: Yeah. So interesting, and a sad case.

That's the case that we have for you this week. So hope you enjoyed our discussion and if you want to follow us, you can find us on all the social medias, @crimefamilypodcast on Instagram and @crimefamilypod1 on Twitter and @Crime Family Podcast on Facebook. Our email is crimefamilypodcast@gmail.com so definitely send us an email if you have a case suggestion or tips, feedback, or anything like that. Leave us a review on apple podcasts or on our website. Our website is www.crimefamilypodcast.ca. You can definitely leave us a review there. You can check out the new transcripts and you can listen to full episodes on there as well. So definitely do all of those things. We hope you're enjoying the season and we will be back next week with another case. So until then, take care. Bye.

Katie: Bye.

Stephanie: Bye.