D (13:59)

Water damage is no joke. Did you know that water damage makes up more than 25% of all home insurance claims and the average claim costs over $13,000. Don't let a small leak turn into a big expense. Learn more at go.pemco.com Nojoke Pemco Mutual Insurance Co. Seattle, WA thank you for.

C (14:17)

Listening to this episode's ads. By supporting our sponsors, you support casefile to continue to deliver quality content the body was identified as 15 year old Adrien de Gucci. He lay next to an oozing glue gun and an overturned small wooden chair. It looked as though he had been fixing the chair when he was attacked. When crime scene examiners pulled back the blanket, they confirmed that Adrian's injuries were as brutal as Jennifer and Sarah's. His head had been so severely wounded that a number of his teeth were lying on the ground next to him. Flicks of cast off blood streaked across the ceiling indicated that Adrian's body had only been covered after the violent assault. Beneath Adrian's T shirt, his chest was marked with the same parallel tram track like bruises as Sarah's right arm. There was also a circular mark, but unlike his mother and sister, Adrian had no defensive injuries. When it came time to transfer Adrian's body from the crime scene, investigators noticed large areas of skin peeling off his left arm where it had been in contact with the concrete floor. As soon as his body was removed, they were hit with the strong smell of petrol. His clothing was soaked with it. A red jerry can sat nearby. It appeared that the killer had poured petrol on Adrian's body as if intending to set him alight before changing their mind, the triple homicide was sustained and extremely violent. A number of police who attended the crime scene were subsequently diagnosed with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. While the brutality they saw in the degree home wasn't the only reason they acquired this mental health condition, it was a contributing factor given that all three victims had been killed in the same way. The attacks were likely committed by one person, yet autopsies revealed that the murder weapon was not a shotgun as initially believed. The victim's head and facial injuries were actually caused by repeated blows with a heavy object such as a crowbar or wheel brace. The handle of a wheel brace, the device used to loosen and remove the nuts on a car wheel before changing a tyre, could cause the long parallel bruises found on Sarah and Adrian. The circular wound Adrian sustained to his chest could also correspond with the wheel brace's round head. Jennifer DeGrutchy's Toyota Seeker was parked in the family's driveway. A search of the car revealed a tuft of carpet fibres on the floor near the back seat. Similar in colour to the grey carpet removed from Jennifer's bedroom. It had a tiny reddish stain that looked like blood. An expert concluded it was highly probable that the tuft had its origin in the bedroom carpet. The rear space that contained the car jack was closed, but it hadn't been clicked shut. The jack was inside, but there was no sign of the wheel brace. In the boot, detectives found a brand new spare tyre. The car itself was less than a year old. If the tyre had never been changed, it seemed odd that the jack hatch was open and the wheel brace was missing. Police sourced a wheel brace from the same model Seeker from a local Toyota dealer. When they compared the tool to Sarah and Adrian's injuries, they found that it was a perfect match. Right from the start, the investigators knew there was something about the Degree murder scene that wasn't quite right. Jennifer and Sarah had been in bed, not disturbing an intruder, and Adrian was in the garage, where the killer would have had to actively seek him out. While a burglar interrupted in the act might assault a homeowner in order to get away quickly, committing a triple homicide of such violence seemed an extreme way to cover up a break in. The frenzied nature of the crime was also in contrast with the careful efforts the killer had made to clean up the scenes. If the robbery was staged, the detectives had to look at alternative theories. The most likely being someone wanted members of the Degree family dead and had tried to throw the police off. With Matthew DeGruecci having been taken to the hospital, that left only the patriarch Wayne DeGruechi unaccounted for. When detectives called Wayne's workplace, they were told that he was on the road. But eventually the Degree's home telephone rang. Detective Sharkey answered. Wayne DeGrutchy was on the other line, calling home to check in on his family. He sounded surprised to be greeted by a detective. Instead, Wayne was almost two hours away in the greater Western Sydney suburb of Parramatta. Detective Sharkey carefully broke the news of the family members deaths. He then arranged for officers to collect Wayne and bring him in for an interview. Upon arriving at the police station, Wayne sat down to provide a statement. He explained that he'd spent the previous night at his parents home in Western Sydney, which he often did on weeknights due to his workplace being located there. The last contact he'd had with his family had been when he chatted on the phone with Jennifer at around 6:30 the night she was later killed. Wayne had told Jennifer he intended to stay at his parents home for an additional night. At the station, Wayne was also reunited with his only surviving child, Matthew. The teenager had spent the morning in the hospital being treated for shock and the pair spoke to a grief counsellor. In his own police interview, Matthew elaborated on his whereabouts during the killings. He said he'd driven to his girlfriend's house the previous night, where he'd spent the entire evening, including the crucial time period between 8pm and 1am when the crime was thought to have taken place. It was only when he returned home in the morning that he discovered the crime scene. Wayne and Matthew were permitted to return home to examine their belongings in case anything was missing that police hadn't noticed. They couldn't find Jennifer's purse. Matthew also pointed out that some CDs and a number of other items, including two calculators belonging to him and his brother, were also gone. As husbands are more usually the perpetrators in family annihilation cases, it was vital that Wayne DeGrutchy's alibi be confirmed. On the day of the murders, Wayne claimed to have attended a company golf day at Pennant Hills Golf Club in Sydney before spending the night with his parents. Two colleagues confirmed that he was at the club till around 7pm Wayne's dad confirmed he was with his son in the evening until 10:30 when he went to bed. However, a neighbour of the degrudge reported having seen a car similar to Wayne's Holden Bolina being driven in Shearwater Boulevard in the early morning hours before the murders were discovered. The driver looked like Wayne. Detectives began to calculate whether it was possible for Wayne to have driven back to his house in the middle of the night to kill his family. But that theory was scrapped when detectives found out his Holden Bolina had been in an accident and was in for repairs. The car Wayne had been driving at the time was a rented Holden Commodore. Nine days after the murders, a memorial service was held for Jennifer, Adrian and Sarah DeGrutchy. Among the mourners was Wayne DeGrutchy, supported by his only surviving child. Casefile will be back shortly. Thank you for supporting us by listening to this episode's sponsors.

D (23:08)

Water Damage is no Joke. Did you know that water damage makes up more than 25% of all home insurance claims and the average claim costs over $13,000. Don't let a small leak turn into a big expense. Learn more at go.pemco.com Nojoke Pemco Mutual Insurance Co. Seattle, WA thank you for.

C (23:25)

Listening to this episode's ads. By supporting our sponsors, you support Casefile to continue to deliver quality content Some time after the Degree Triple homicide, several local boys were riding their BMX bikes alongside a dam at the Old Borel Brickworks. The structure was located on the western side of the Princes highway in Wanuna, a coastal suburb 30 minutes drive north of Albion Park Railway. As they cycled along, the boys spotted a bag in the shallow water. They fished it out and went through its contents. Among other things, the bag contained a hammer and a big piece of carpet. The boys helped themselves to a couple of items from the bag, then tossed it back into the dam. While they thought nothing of the incident, one of the boys mentioned it to his father. A few weeks later, it occurred to the boy's father that the bag might hold some significance to the murder investigation that was currently featured all over the news. The discovery was brought to police attention on Sunday, May 12, 1996, exactly two months after the Degrudge murders. The following day, officers headed to the Old Borel Brickworks Dam. Police divers located not one but two bags, a red and white sports bag and a black backpack. Their contents were laid out onto sheets of plastic. There was a VCR, a calculator labelled a degree, various CDs and videotapes, and Jennifer DeGrutchi's purse. The sports bag contained a piece of carpet similar in size to the piece missing from Jennifer's room, and a small Ziploc bag containing a number of unopened band aids. There were also pieces of a torn up note. One of the officers remarked, wouldn't it be funny if that note was a how to list? The note was carefully dried out and then the pieces were put back together like a jigsaw puzzle. Printed on the flip side of the paper was the letterhead for a hotel located further north along the New South Wales coast, Noah's on the Beach. Pieced together, the handwritten portion did in fact contain a list. It read in part, open gate, throw bottle down the track, throw things down wall in roof, Tracksuit pants, one knife, two T shirts, two sho Two open blinds to see through. Sarah Mum. Adrian have shower. The note appeared to be a list of instructions to fake a burglary. While it was possible that the items in the bag could have been stolen and discarded by a random intruder, this seemed unlikely due to the use of one single word, Mum. This was a name only one of Jennifer's three children would call her. And there was only one degree child whose name wasn't on the list. At 7:30am on Saturday, June 22, Detective Sharky found 18 year old Matthew DeGruecci at his girlfriend's house. He told the teenager that he wanted to speak to him about the murders of his mother and siblings. Matthew asked when Sharky replied now. Detective Sharkey and his colleagues had been suspicious of Matthew DeGrutchy ever since they found a problem with his alibi. In a police interview on the day the bodies were discovered, Matthew said he'd been at his girlfriend's house the previous night from the early evening on. But when detectives checked with Matthew's girlfriend, she told police that Matthew had called her at around 8pm and said he would be over shortly. Yet two hours passed with no sign of him. At 10pm, Matthew's girlfriend rang the degree house to check where he was. There was no answer. He finally arrived at her house roughly an hour later. Matthew explained he was late because his mum had asked him to stay. The Degree's had received some prank phone calls saying three members of their family would die that night and it had left them shaken. Matthew hadn't mentioned anything about prank calls or death threats in police interviews. If true, detectives couldn't understand why he would have omitted this detail. And since it was estimated that the 3 Degree family members were murdered between 8pm and 1am, his girlfriend's story put Matthew at home for several hours. During this crucial window. Phone records revealed that Matthew had spoken to his girlfriend from the Degree house on the night of the murders. But there was no record of the alleged prank calls. There were a few other factors that caught the detective's attention. According to Wayne DeGrutchy, when he called home on the evening of the murders, Jennifer told him that she'd refused Matthew's request to borrow her car. Yet Matthew had told detectives that he'd borrowed the Toyota Seeker to drive to his girlfriend's house. He'd driven it back home the next morning at around 8:30 and parked it in the driveway before entering the home to find his mother and sister murdered. This meant that Mathieu Degretchy was the last one to access the seeker and its wheel brace, which was suspected to be the murder weapon, had been stored in the back prior to disappearing altogether. The degree extended family had picked up on the suspicion against Matthew and were not happy about it. Wayne DeGrucie's brother Paul even advised Matthew not to cooperate. But Matthew agreed to a follow up interview as requested, accompanied by several relatives. As he was over 18 and could be interviewed without a parent or guardian present, Matthew was escorted into an interrogation room alone. After some preliminary questions, Detective Danny Sharkey became more direct. He said, matthew, I believe that you know a lot more about what happened to your mother, brother and sister, more than what you said in the statement you made. Is there anything you want to say to me about what happened? Matthew sat silently with his arms across his stomach, rocking back and forward with his head bowed. Another detective asked if Matthew had anything to say about the night of the murders. He didn't answer. Detective Sharky then stated, matthew, this is not going to go away. We will be investigating this for as long as it takes. Do you understand what I'm saying? After a long silence, Matthew finally spoke. I told the policeman the other night what I know. The detectives questioned why Matthew didn't return home until after 8 on the morning after the murders when his mother needed her car much earlier to drive his siblings to school. Why would he have kept the car from her unless he knew she no longer needed it? They then turned their attention to the car's missing wheel brace, asking Matthew if he knew where it was. Matthew told the detectives that he felt sick. They wrapped up the interview by informing Matthew that they would need blood and hair samples from him for elimination purposes. When Detective Sharkey opened the door to the interview room, Matthew's Uncle Paul was waiting right outside. While Matthew was taken back to the rest of his family, Paul made his displeasure known to the detectives. As far as the family was concerned, their grief over the loss of Jennifer, Adrian and Sarah was being compounded by the police's baseless and unfair pursuit of Matthew. The investigators weren't dissuaded. They questioned Matthew again. They wanted a record of his exact movements in the house when he discovered the bodies to compare his account against the evidence. Matthew gave mostly monosyllabic answers as he leaned on the interview table, his chin on his hand and his face expressionless. This time he told police that he'd arrived home at 8.30am he said he'd gone inside to get his wallet, then left straight away to go buy cigarettes. He hadn't seen any members of his family at the time, when he returned, he walked back down the hallway to the kitchen and noticed the house was unusually quiet. He retraced his steps up the hall, past Sarah's door and into his mother's room. It was then he discovered his mum's body and immediately ran outside in a panic. When asked if he'd gone into Sarah's bedroom, Matthew said that he hadn't. This was one of the first anomalies in his account. Neighbour Steve Bailey was certain that when Matthew ran out of the house on the morning of the murders, he had said, there's something wrong with Mum and Sarah. But according to Matthew, he hadn't gone into Sarah's room at all, so how could he have known there was anything wrong with her? Detective Sharkey also noted it as strange when Matthew had listed two calculators as missing from the house. He wondered how a young man who had just lost three members of his family would notice something as inconsequential as this at such an intense time. By this point, police had canvassed the neighbours. They learned that Matthew was sometimes violent towards his mother and that the two often fought about him wanting to drive her car. When police asked Matthew if this was true, he replied, I wouldn't call them arguments. The detectives wondered whether the whole terrible incident had been over something as trivial as Jennifer's refusal to let her son borrow her car. The partial bloody fingerprint on the vanity door in the family bathroom was found to be Matthew's blood. Spots throughout the house, including in his mother's room, and the attached ensuite were also confirmed to have come from him. This hinted that Matthew had not only interacted with the crime scene, but had entered several rooms he had not established in his sequence of events. As Matthew had no wounds on his body. Detectives were aware that all this could be brushed aside by claiming the blood was the result of an innocuous and unrelated incident, like a nosebleed. Yet his prints were also found on the jerrycan of petrol left near Adrian's body. While he did use the jerrycan to put petrol in both the family cars, the last person to use the can would have been the one who poured petrol on Adrian. Matthew was brought in for questioning for a fourth time so that detectives could see how he responded to the mounting evidence against him. Matthew again arrived at the police station with his supportive father and a number of relatives in tow. They were still angry, feeling that detectives were still wasting time on Matthew instead of going out and catching the real killer in the interview room. It appeared that Matthew was starting to feel the pressure. At one point, Detective Sharky thought the young man was on the verge of making an admission. Suddenly, one of Matthew's uncles burst into the room. Even though the detectives escorted the uncle out again, the moment was lost. Mathieu de Grucci was subsequently placed under covert surveillance, but he never said or did anything incriminating. With nothing close to a confession, the police built the case against him from the mounting forensic evidence. Over a hundred samples, specimens and exhibits had to be examined. Matthew's DNA was found on the carpet tuft recovered from Jennifer's car, on the hallway tiles and on the wall above his mother's bed. Detective Sharkey looked at his suspect's known movements on the night of the murders. Matthew had spoken to his girlfriend from the Shearwater Boulevard house at 8 and arrived at her house around 11. Her home was the only place detectives knew Matthew had definitely driven to that night. Perhaps he'd dumped the stolen items from the Degree residence somewhere along the way. Investigators found out there were 15 creeks and waterholes on the route between the two houses. Police Rescue squad officers began searching the area's watercourses to a distance of 500 metres from the banks, looking for anything from the degree residents. When they learnt that some local boys had found a bag in a nearby dam, they finally had a lead. The dam where the bag was found was located at the Old Borel Brickworks between the Degree residence and Matthew's girlfriend's house. To test a theory, Detective Sharkey drove the distance between the three locations and found the 31 kilometre drive could be comfortably completed in 26 minutes. When travelling five kilometres below the speed limit, Matthew DeGruecci had plenty of time between the phone call to his girlfriend at 8 and his arriving at her house at 11 to drive via the dam and ditch the evidence with lines like hit arm with pole, hit leg with pole and cut somewhere with knife. The note recovered from the dam suggested Matthew had intended to harm himself to make it look like he too had been attacked. The lack of follow through indicated that part of the plan had changed. A handwriting Expert later found 12 points of comparison between the how to list and Matthew DeGrutchy's writing his report. There were many significant similarities between the note and samples of Matthew's writing and no significant differences. It is my opinion that the person who wrote the specimen writings also wrote the questioned writings on item one. On the morning of Saturday, June 22, three months and nine days after the murders, Matthieu DeGrutchy was arrested at his girlfriend's home and taken into custody. Wayne arrived at the police station soon after and arranged legal representation for his son. After another interview, during which Matthew made no admissions of guilt, the 18 year old was charged with the murders of his mother, brother and sister. Later that day, police went back to the DeGrutchis house to search Matthew's bedroom. They found a single sheet of a notepad bearing the words Noah's on the Beach. The same letterhead on the back of the how to list. The note indicated an intention to dispose of evidence in the walls via the roof space. Police checked the roof space only to discover that there was no access to the internal wall cavities. No evidence had been disposed of there. In the immediate aftermath of Matthew's arrest, headlines in the local newspaper declared Father Vows to Stand by His Son. In the first court appearance after his son's arrest, Wayne Degree was quoted in the media as offering to put up $100,000 surety for his bail, to open his home to him and to drive him to and from work each day in an effort to acquire his freedom. Mathieu de Grucci's legal aid solicitor applied for bail, telling the court the accused young man had the full support of his father and the remaining members of his family. They had found the allegations against Matthew unbelievable and Matthew had continued to live with his father in the Shearwater Boulevard home where the murders were committed. Despite his father's unwavering loyalty, Matthew was denied bail and remanded into custody. By the following day, the family had appointed a senior barrister to represent Matthew in another bail hearing. According to media reports, the lawyer had angry outbursts and was critical of the police case, saying that it was dangerous stuff when people were convicted on forensic evidence alone. Despite the lawyer's appeals, Matthew was again denied Bailey, with the magistrate stating, I am also not satisfied he's not a danger to the community or that he would not commit further offences. Two and a half years later, Mathieu de Grucci stood trial. His defence endeavoured to present their client as a gentle and loving boy who never fought with his family or had any anger issues. This description contradicted statements given by outside observers of the Degree family dynamic, including Matthew's girlfriend. She attested to the anger Matthew harboured towards his mother and that he had a pension for alcohol and cannabis. The torn up how to list penned by Matthew was considered the strongest piece of evidence against him. He had never confessed, the murder weapon was never located and no clear motive had been established. While Matthew conceded to writing the damning note, he insisted it was a to do list for his upcoming birthday, not a murder plot. After a period of being deadlocked, on Wednesday, October 14, 1998, the jury found Mathieu de Grucci guilty. He received a maximum sentence of 28 years with a non parole period of 21 years. Matthew failed to appeal his conviction in 1999 before making a final attempt to the high court in 2002 at age 24. The court's five judges unanimously agreed that the arguments offered against Matthew's guilt were too improbable. In addressing the particularly brutal nature of the murders, one of the judges stated, the mind recoils from the idea that an apparently quiet, gentle young man of good character and with no known animus against his family, should brutally slay his mother and young sister and brother. During Mathieu de Grucci's incarceration, he was involved in a brutal group attack against two inmates who were brothers. The others who participated in the assault included three other convicted killers and two violent sex offenders. The prison attack resulted in one of the brothers suffering severe head injuries and requiring brain surgery. The other victim was treated for a broken arm. Aside from this incident, Matthew seemingly served the rest of his sentence quietly with a 21 year non parole period. His earliest possible release date was in 2017. That year, Matthew was approved for day release and began working in an abattoir. In an attempt to reassure the public, a spokesperson clarified that Degree had been working in the chill room and had no access to knives. Despite the day release, Matthew was refused parole at his first attempt. The state parole authority said he presented an unacceptable risk to the community and he had not participated in the required external leave programs. Two years later, in April 2019, it was announced that Mathieu de Grucci had been approved for parole. He walked out of prison in August that year aged 41 years old. Under the conditions of Matthew's release, he was forbidden from returning to the areas related to his crimes. While he was not allowed to contact, stalk, harass or intimidate any of the family members of his victims, he was permitted to reach out to those who continued to support him. Jennifer DeGruecci's side of the family spoke to the media through a representative. They said that while Matthew's sentence would end, they had to endure a life sentence because of what he had done. Matthew's supporters claimed that he was motivated to do nothing else than live a normal community life and his legal representative maintained that he was no longer a risk to society. Yet in a letter to the parole authority before his release, Matthew expressed his own concerns about his ability to reintegrate, citing limited support and his lack of skills to contribute. The family members who remained supportive of Matthew, including his father, Wayne, felt he had been unfairly stitched up by the investigators. To this day, Matthew asserts his innocence. This is in stark contrast with the opinions of case detectives who never doubted Matthew's guilt. They are still left questioning what perceived indiscretion led Matthew to bludgeon his mother and siblings. A forensic detective who worked the investigation told The Canberra Matthew DeGruecci has never admitted to it. For someone who doesn't admit they did it, how can they be rehabilitated? If he's done something like this over something so trivial, if something made him snap down the track, you wouldn't know what he would do. I wouldn't want to be living anywhere near the guy if he gets out. By the time his son was released, Wayne DeGrutchy was a pensioner living in Tasmania. Matthew was permitted to contact his father, who continued to support his only living child. Wayne had been a witness at the trial, and because witnesses are not permitted in court until after they've given evidence, he'd never heard the full case against his son. But by 2003, seven years after the murders, enough time had elapsed for the bereaved husband and father to want to know the truth. He contacted the case's lead detective, Danny Sharkey, to request a meeting to discuss the crime. The subsequent appointment ended up taking nearly an entire day. The detective showed Wayne statements, photographs and evidence lists and patiently explained why the detectives had targeted his son. Right from the start, everything had pointed to Matthew. Detective Sharkey detailed the holes in Matthew's story until it became obvious that Wayne could understand why the police concluded his son was a killer. It was a lot for the father to take in. Detective Sharkey told Wayne to get in touch if he ever needed any further information. He didn't hear from him again.

D (48:49)

Water damage is no joke. Did you know that water damage makes up more than 25% of all home insurance claims? And the average claim costs over $13,000? Don't let a small leak turn into a big expense. Learn more at go.pemco.com nojoke Pemco Mutual Insurance Co. Seattle, WA water damage is no joke. Did you know that water damage makes up more than 25% of all home insurance claims? And the average claim costs over 13,000 DOL dollars. Don't let a small leak turn into a big expense. Learn more@go.pemco.com no joke. Pemco Mutual Insurance Company, Seattle, Washington.