Frightening new details emerge on Cleo Smith kidnapping
New details have come to light regarding four-year-old Cleo Smith’s 2021 abduction, one day after the man responsible was sentenced to at least 11 years and six months in prison.
Cleo was taken from her family’s Western Australia campsite and was missing for a total of 18 days. After an intense police investigation, and a $1 million reward offered by the Western Australia government, detectives found Cleo at a property 75 km south of where she’d been kidnapped by the 37-year-old Terence Kelly.
While appearing before Judge Julie Wager in court, Kelly had nothing to say, offering only a nod to acknowledge both his own name and his guilty plea. Cleo’s parents - mother Ellie and stepfather Jake - also did not share any words outside of the courthouse in the wake of Kelly’s sentencing.
But what was said inside has revealed frightening new insight into what young Cleo went through during her days of captivity, with Commissioner Blanch - who was Assistant Commissioner at the time - noting that he did not believe the community would ever think Kelly’s time behind bars would be enough.
“Judge Wager had to weigh up many things,” he said, “and there were many mitigating circumstances, and I respect the court’s decision.”
For the entire 18 days of her nightmare situation, Cleo was kept in Kelly’s Carnarvon property, often locked alone in a bedroom while Kelly was out - the door had been modified, and Cleo was unable to open it from her side. He reportedly attended a number of employment meetings in person, and even visited his relatives.
It was also revealed that Cleo would plead with him to be allowed to see her parents, leading Kelly to play the radio at a loud volume to mask her noise.
“When the young victim heard her name on the radio, she said ‘they’re saying my name’,” Judge Wagner told the court.
As the University of Newcastle’s criminologist Dr Xanthe Mallett told Sunrise, “eighteen days is a really long time in a four-year-old’s life, and to hear her name on the radio and not understand why he wouldn’t return her to her mother must have been incredibly traumatic for her.”
Additionally, in a police interview, Kelly admitted that he grew frustrated and was rough with a number of times, but that she was “a bit of a fighter” when he attempted to restrain her.
He even added Cleo’s mum as a Facebook friend while he had Cleo, although as he told police, he was never “planning to keep her forever.”
Following Kelly’s arrest, social media played a role again, with pictures of his home emerging, showcasing his collection of Bratz dolls, one Judge Wager described as being “consistent with your anxiety.”
Those in the courtroom were informed that Kelly had a “significant interest” in dolls, and that it was possible he had imagined his very own family with them.
“You’d opened Facebook pages,” Judge Wager stated, “for your fantasy children and communicated with them.”
She also shared her understanding that Cleo played into Kelly’s “fantasy of having a little girl he could dress up and play with”, although she still considered his actions to be “at the highest level of seriousness”.
“This isn’t a case of luring a child away, that would be serious enough, but the taking of a little four-year-old girl from the zipped-up family tent in the middle of the night when her parents assumed she was safe is even more concerning,” Wager continued.
“Her parents woke to find her missing, not knowing if she was alive or dead for the next 18 days. They didn’t know what had happened to her, or whether she’d ever be returned. This shattered her family, and has been damaging and traumatising for the child.”
Images: Getty