A diabolical killer who rolled free from court after convincing an earlier trial he had a bad back has been unable to pull the wool over a jury's eyes.
Autumn Baker, 40, of Darley - about 60km northwest of Melbourne - was murdered by Mark Graham Ludbrook on August 3, 2023.
On Thursday, a Supreme Court of Victoria jury found him guilty of the crime after the jury in his first trial failed to come up with a verdict.
Ludbrook had bamboozled them with his frail appearance, which at times had seen him sprawled on his back across the courtroom chairs.
But after four days of deliberations, this jury of 12 returned with a guilty verdict, condemning Ludbrook to at least the next two decades of his life behind bars.
The court heard Ms Baker had been friends with Ludbrook when she made the fateful call to visit the Hoppers Crossing home where he had offered her a room to rent.
The jury was shown graphic body-worn camera footage captured by an officer who attended the bloody scene.
The footage showed Ms Baker's blood-soaked body on the floor of Ludbrook's bedroom, with a steak knife resting on her chest.
Autumn Baker fought for her life as Mark Ludbrook stabbed her to death
Mark Ludbrook managed to get to his feet and murder Autumn Baker
The jury heard Ms Baker had fought for her life, with stab wounds to both arms and hands.
She had sustained multiple stab wounds to her chest, with both of her eyes targeted by the alleged killer.
In his closing address to the jury, veteran Crown prosecutor Jim Shaw said it remained unclear why Ludbrook murdered Ms Baker.
'There's no reason why he would want to kill Ms Baker ordinarily, please remember the prosecution does not have to prove a motive for the killing, it's not part of the task,' he said.
'It's a mystery why he did it, we'll never know for sure, it's clearly got something to do with the drugs.'
The jury heard a search of Ludbrook's house had turned up bags of white powder later identified as an illicit drug named PCE - a dissociative anaesthetic with hallucinogenic effects.
Ludbrook suffered from a rare condition known as Transverse Myelitis - a neurological disorder caused by inflammation of the spinal cord - and had supposedly been confined to a wheelchair leading up to the murder.
But on the day of the attack, Ludbrook's carer noted he was up and about on his feet and his behaviour was unusual.
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Ludbrook had stripped naked and was ranting incoherently in his backyard when Ms Baker knocked on the door, Mr Shaw said.
Ludbrook had admitted to self-medicating with illegal drugs for pain relief.
Prior to the incident, he had used illicit ketamine - a dissociative anaesthetic, to manage his symptoms after prescription medications proved insufficient.
Ludbrook had obtained the PCE from a friend, intending it as a painkiller to enable him to walk more freely, something he claimed he could rarely do due to his condition.
Toxicology tests confirmed the presence of PCE in his blood sample taken hours after the stabbing, with no other illicit substances detected.
The drug's effects manifested in bizarre behaviour, such as walking naked, talking to plants, self-harm, and ultimately the fatal stabbing of Ms Baker, which the prosecution argued was deliberate despite his intoxication.
'At the time he killed Autumn Baker, the accused was awake and very active you might think. He wasn't sleepwalking, we'll put that to one side. We know what he did,' Mr Shaw told the jury.
'So, here, pretty simple, when the accused stabbed Autumn Baker and killed her, it clearly wasn't an accident.
Ms Baker's body was found inside a house on Grevillea Crescent in Hoppers Crossing (pictured)
'He wasn't fumbling with the knife. It wasn't a situation where somehow she fell on the knife that he was holding. She's on the ground. He's above her driving it into her. He lunged at Ms Baker several times.'
Ms Baker had made a name for herself during Victoria's record-breaking Covid-19 lockdowns, which she vehemently opposed.
Videos captured from the time show Ms Baker participated in numerous protests across Victoria against mandatory vaccinations.
At that time, Victorians who refused to receive the Covid-19 vaccinations at least three times were being sacked, with the remainder of the state facing endless lockdowns if they did not comply.
On January 15, 2022, Ms Baker took control of a microphone at a large protest in support of tennis ace Novak Djokovic.
Djokovic had been detained and then deported from Australia after taking a stance against the Covid jab.
Standing before the mob of frustrated Melburnians, Ms Baker chanted: 'The people united will never be defeated', 'Hey Pfizer leave our kids alone', 'Hands off our kids they are not your Guinea Pigs', 'Free Victoria' and 'No more vax pass.'
Autumn Baker during a 'freedom protest' while Victorians were trapped within the world's longest Covid-19 lockdowns
Autumn Baker travelled around Victoria protesting against mandatory Covid-19 vaccinations
The court heard Ms Baker had shown compassion for her killer leading all the way up to the moment he started knifing her.
She had discussed with Ludbrook's carer what they ought to do about his bizarre behaviour when Ludbrook went to the kitchen and pulled open the cutlery drawer.
Confronted by his carer, Ludbrook took a steak knife out and took it back to his bedroom where he began stabbing himself in the stomach, the court was told.
When his carer and Ms Baker tried to intervene, Ludbrook lashed out.
The jury heard he turned on Ms Baker as his carer fled the bedroom to call police.
What he did next is the stuff of horror movies, plunging the knife into Ms Baker's eyes and chest.
'All of those wounds suggest a very focused attack, one on Ms Baker's chest area and another one around her eyes, not someone just flailing around wildly, randomly with a knife,' Mr Shaw said.
'Focused which requires a degree of consciousness. The accused seems to have become very focused on Autumn Baker's eyes.'
Ludbrook was high on illicit drugs when he murdered Autumn Baker
Ludbrook would later tell forensic psychiatrist Dr Andrew Carroll he felt as if Ms Baker had 'two cartoon crosses over her eyes.'
'He knew it was her. He said that, "I'm over her." He was looking at her eyes; he must have been because he said cartoon crosses over them.'
When Ludbrook's carer returned after rushing to call police, the killer blamed her for what he had just done.
'Look what you made me do,' he told her.
Dr Carroll had done his best to convince the jury Ludbrook ought to be set free.
The doctor has previously provided clinical advice on everyone from Bourke Street killer James 'Dimitrious' Gargasoulas to Celeste Manno's killer Luay Nader Sako.
He recently helped Nikkita Azzopardi's killer Joel Micallef secure a mental impairment finding.
Dr Carroll told the jury Ludbrook had been in a state of delirium induced by ingesting a double dose of PCE.
Ludbrook hoped his 'disability' would get him off murder
He described delirium as an 'acute brain failure' akin to organ failure where the brain is 'poisoned,' profoundly impairing higher cognitive functions such as insight, rational thinking, consequential reasoning, and the capacity for conscious, deliberative, willed actions.
In a powerful closing address, Mr Shaw urged the jury to dismiss any notion Ludbrook didn't know what he was doing when he repeatedly stabbed Ms Baker.
'For the purposes of this trial and your verdict, it doesn't matter why, it just doesn't,' he said.
'What matters is that the accused did this consciously, voluntarily, and deliberately, and that he did it intending to kill or cause really serious injury or at least knowing that death or really serious injury would probably result.
'And for the reasons I've said over the last hour or two, the prosecution has proved all those matters beyond reasonable doubt. When the accused killed Autumn Baker, it was murder and I invite you to find the accused guilty of murder.'
The jury agreed.
Ludbrook will be sentenced at a date to be fixed.
