A Queensland man who murdered his former lover two weeks after she took a temporary protection order out against him will spend life in prison.

November 30, 2018

A jealous Queensland man who cut his former lover’s throat two weeks after she was granted a temporary protection order against him will spend life in prison for the “very worst” kind of premeditated murder.

Steven Murray Storie, 48, “sliced” his former partner Adelle Collins’ throat three times after breaking into her home in the early hours of February 7, 2015.

The pair had a troubled relationship for more than a year before breaking up in July 2012 after Storie proposed to Ms Collins, 39.

They remained in contact and Storie had become jealous of Ms Collins’ relationship with her ex-husband, with whom she had two children, in months leading up to the murder.

Justice David Boddice said Storie’s crime was “horrendous” and “brutal” noting it occurred while he was subject to a temporary protection order.

“The offence you have pleaded guilty involved premeditated conduct of the very worst kind,” he said on Friday in the Brisbane Supreme Court.

“You held a knife to her throat, you told her what you were going to do, there was a struggle at the end of which you held her down on the end of the bed and sliced her throat.”

Storie then cleaned the crime scene before removing from her finger the engagement ring with which he had proposed with years earlier.

The next day Storie monitored a police scanner for details of his crime before calling his mother and confessing to the murder, Justice Boddice said.

Justice Boddice noted Storie’s history of domestic violence following his split with his wife 11 years earlier.

In the months leading up to Ms Collins’ murder, Storie’s behaviour towards her had begun to deteriorate.

Crown prosecutor Mark Whitbread says Storie made numerous threats against her life during the period.

“He told the deceased he was going to get her and he was watching her every move … he said he was on a suicide mission and anticipated being taken out by police,” he said.

Storie also used social media to bully Ms Collins before the temporary protection order was granted on January 21.

He told police “no piece of paper is going to stop me from feeling the way I am,” Mr Whitbread said.

During a chance meeting at a polling booth a week before the murder, Storie whispered to Ms Collins “you’re dead” before forming a gun shape with his fingers.

Storie was sentenced to life in prison for murder.