Eva Blandis

Hi, Stockie.

Yeah, so there wasn't that much local coverage.

I think it was for lots of reasons.

I wonder as well if people weren't reading these stories as much because of the gruesome nature of it.

We were also in the midst of a state election, so I think that contributed to it as well.

Look, I think that would have played into it.

We obviously sort of in those first few days and in our first few days of coverage, there weren't very nice things said about him or what the prosecution said.

I mean, we heard he was a meth user and he was a drinker.

So that really, I think, changes the public perception of this person.

So I definitely think that played a part in it as well.

No, not at the stage we got to.

I think a huge issue with that was not that his family didn't want to come, but I think a lot of them were witnesses.

So they obviously couldn't come into the courtroom to watch.

There was a...

application at the beginning by prosecution to have no witnesses in the court until they'd given evidence.

So that I think sort of meant that we didn't see a lot of his supporters and family.

There were a few people here and there in the court I would see pop in.

I'm not sure if they were just there to watch or if they were family, but there was sort of no day-to-day presence of a group of people or anything.

But I think that's mainly because they were going to be witnesses.

And also, I was just thinking on that topic, family not being allowed in.