Arthur Freeman guilty of Darcey's murder

ARTHUR Phillip Freeman, the man who threw his four-year-old daughter off Melbourne's West Gate Bridge, has been convicted of her murder.A jury of five men and seven women, after five days of difficult deliberation, last night found that Freeman, 37, of Hawthorn, had consciously, voluntarily and intentionally tossed Darcey Iris Freeman to her death at 9.15am on January 29, 2009.The jury had been asked by defence barrister David Brustman, SC, to decide if Freeman knew what he was doing when he killed his daughter, or if he was mentally impaired. ''Was Mr Freeman mad or was he bad,'' Mr Brustman said.Shortly before 8 o'clock last night, the jurors gave their answer. They concluded that Freeman had been so angry at his ex-wife following their acrimonious marital split and a reduction in access to his three young children the day before, that he carried out the ultimate act of ''spousal revenge''.Freeman remained motionless with his hands clasped as the jury foreman announced his fate following a two-week trial in Victoria's Supreme Court.A relative of Freeman’s, who asked not to be named, has also told The Age of a comment the father-of-three made at a family dinner at the height of his custody concerns in 2008.‘‘We were discussing the custody of his children, and Arthur said, ‘She [Ms Barnes] would regret it if he lost custody of the children’,’’ the relative said last week.‘‘I thought he was referring to spending every cent he had to regain custody should he lose it. It was only later that that comment began to play over and over in my mind. Could it have meant something else?’’Chief Crown prosecutor Gavin Silbert, SC, argued Freeman's actions were conscious, voluntary and deliberate. But Mr Brustman claimed his client was mentally impaired at the time.Of six psychiatrists who assessed Freeman, Graham Burrows was the only one to conclude he was mentally ill at the time of the killing. Professor Burrows, the sole defence witness, told the jury Freeman had suffered a ''major depressive disorder'' and was in a ''dissociative state'', like a sleep walker or someone under hypnosis.But psychiatrists Yvonne Skinner and Douglas Bell disagreed, testifying there was no evidence to suggest he was mentally impaired to a point where he did not know what he was doing was wrong.Dr Skinner said his actions were consistent with ''spousal revenge'' or ''filicide'' (a parent who kills their own child).Dr Bell said Freeman's ''complex and protracted sequence of goal-directed behaviours'' were ''not compatible with a state of mind in which the behaviour is not conscious or voluntary''.Justice Coghlan will sentence Freeman next month.