Man’s ’supernatural sex powers’!!
Thursday, January 31st, 2008A MAN who believed he had supernatural sexual powers killed his partner’s best friend after encouraging her to sleep with him to exorcise her demons.
David Maxwell Shepherd, 38, was jailed for 19 years after admitting to murdering Malissa Mayfield at her Bossley Park home, in Sydney’s southwest, in June 2006. Mayfield, 29, died in hospital four days after being throttled in her home as her two young daughters lay sleeping just metres away. The bizarre details of the murder were made public for the first time yesterday, when the NSW Supreme Court lifted a suppression order on the case following a guilty plea by Shepherd’s de facto wife, Angela Wells. She was due to stand trial for murder, but prosecutors accepted a guilty plea to the lesser charge of being an accessary after the fact. Wells, 29, showed no emotion as she stood and quietly responded “guilty, your honour” to knowingly assisting Shepherd after the murder of Mayfield.
Wells was a longtime friend of Mayfield, and godmother to her youngest daughter. Shepherd met Mayfield through Wells, and the three of them bonded over a shared interest in the supernatural. Judge Peter Hidden said when sentencing Shepherd in December: “(Shepherd) told the deceased that he had psychic powers and that he could remove her bad demons by sleeping with her. Ms Wells had also told her that the offender could give her pleasure, and that if she had sex with him, all the evil spirits would go.” Shepherd and Mayfield slept together a few times, but Justice Hidden said she soon became afraid of the “hysteria” of his beliefs and tried to sever contact.
Justice Hidden said the circumstances involved “some bizarre interest in the supernatural” but he could make “no firm finding about why (Shepherd) went to the deceased’s house that morning, or about what it was which triggered his attack upon her”. Shepherd was jailed for 20 years, due to expire in 2025, with a non-parole period of 15 years. Barrister John Doris, acting for Wells, said he would push for a non-custodial sentence, and requested she undergo a psychiatric assessment. Judge Michael Grove continued her bail to face a sentencing hearing in the same court on February 22.
