SHE WAS ONLY 10: GRIEVING FATHER’S HEARTBREAK TURNS TO FURY AS HE REVEALS THE SH0CKING PRICE HE PAID AFTER HIS DAUGHTER’S MU-RDER — WHILE HER KI-LLER RECEIVED MILLIONS IN SUPPORT
A father has lashed out at the government for spending more than $5million on support for his daughter’s killer, while he was left homeless after trying to fund his own lawyers and healthcare.
Bridgette ‘Biddy’ Porter, 10, was stabbed to death by a 14-year-old girl, known as XR for legal reasons, who was in the midst of a psychotic episode at a property in Gunnedah, north-east NSW, in July 2020.
XR was charged with murder at the time, but the NSW Supreme Court found she was not guilty by reason of mental illness due to her then-undiagnosed schizophrenia.
She is now 20, lives in a mental health facility and will be heavily medicated for the rest of her life.
Biddy’s father Dominic Porter has now spoken out about how the trauma, grief and lengthy court processes after losing his daughter in such horrific circumstances led to the loss of his banking career, his home and his assets.
He said he has struggled to pay for his own lawyers, private healthcare and mental health professionals while maintaining his living expenses over the last six years, while Biddy’s killer has her life funded by the taxpayer.
XR has NDIS funding, the disability support pension, accommodation, and medical support, he said in an emotional social media post on Sunday.
‘I have watched enormous amounts of money, resources, treatment, rehabilitation and legal protections poured into the person responsible for taking Biddy’s life, while I have spent over six f***ing years fighting just to be heard,’ he wrote.
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Bridgette ‘Biddy’ Porter is pictured with her father Dominic Porter
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Biddy (pictured) was stabbed by XR – a girl, 14, who was known to her
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Biddy’s father Dominic Porter wrote a lengthy social media post, slamming the government (pictured)
‘It is a system that pays murderers while the people left behind pay for the murder for the rest of their lives.
‘For over six f***ing years I have been dragged through system after system, hearing after hearing, process after process – constantly expected to explain myself, remember everything, understand everything and somehow keep functioning through it all.’
Mr Porter said he now has access to disability support services, but he only needs it because of what happened to his daughter.
A series of hospital visits, a mental health diagnosis, and suicide attempts have resulted in his private health premiums hitting $35,000 annually.
Without private health insurance, he said, his hospital visits alone would have cost more than $1million.
Mr Porter also pointed out that it costs the state $2,573 per day to maintain a juvenile offender in detention, according to Productivity Commission data 2024-25, which equates to about $939,000 per year.
‘Now, I understand those are system-wide youth detention costs,’ he wrote.
‘They include facilities, staffing, security and all the other costs involved in operating youth detention. I am not pretending that $939,000 is handed directly to an offender.
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Biddy’s father Dominic Porter is comforted by friends and family as he arrives at the inquest into the death of his daughter
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Bridgette ‘Biddy’ Porter, 10, (pictured) was stabbed to death at a property in Gunnedah
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In the post, he pointed out that his daughter’s killer has significantly more social supports than he does
‘But it demonstrates something important: When the State decides someone requires detention, supervision, accommodation and treatment, enormous resources can be found.
‘Meanwhile, what has happened to the family whose child was murdered? I have paid nearly $35,000 just in private health insurance premiums since Biddy was murdered.’
Biddy’s parents separated after the murder. Her mother, Rebekah Keukenmeester, has since remarried.
They both attended an inquest into their daughter’s murder in the Coroner’s Court in Sydney in June, which was held to determine whether systemic failures contributed to the tragedy, or if XR’s declining mental health could have been detected sooner.
The inquest heard XR was a loving and conscientious girl who adored animals so much that she refused to eat them, but that began to change at age 10 when she started self-harming.
Over the next four years, XR’s mental health declined to the point where she heard voices, fantasised about killing people – including her parents – ‘all the time’, killed six chickens with a skewer, and started watching ‘serial killer porn’.
By 2019, she kept a series of knives in her room – including a paring knife, a pocket knife, a filleting knife, and a homemade knife – which all had names, including Rue, Storm, Ray, and Lou.
XR was regularly burning and cutting herself, talking about suicide at school, and she felt so disturbed by her own violent thoughts that she tried to confide in her parents, but they didn’t recognise the seriousness of the situation.
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Biddy’s killer is known only as XR for legal reasons. She is pictured being interviewed by police in 2020
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Biddy’s mother Rebekah Keukenmeester holds a photo of her daughter in 2024
Mr Porter told the inquest there were ‘obvious’ warning signs that XR’s parents missed, and that he hoped the inquest would prevent a tragedy like that happening again.
He remembered his daughter as a bright and bubbly girl who dreamed of being a journalist.
The inquest will conclude with oral submissions in November.
SOURCE: https://www.dailymail.com/news/article-16077413/biddy-porter-gunnedah-father-nightmare-5-million-support-killer.html
