In 2013, 21-year-old Breeana Robinson plunged 11 floors from a Gold Coast apartment balcony to her death.
She and her cruise ship entertainer boyfriend Dan Shearin, almost 20 years her senior, had shared the apartment in Southport for only 38 days before Robinson fell to the concrete below.
Now, an inquest has been reopened into the cause of her death after police reviewed crucial forensic evidence, News Corp reports.
Queensland Coroner James McDougall told News Corp he will investigate “the specific circumstances surrounding Breeana’s death, particularly how she came to fall”.
Shearin, who was 38 at the time Robinson died, has always maintained she jumped from the balcony and suicided – a claim her family vehemently denies.
However the serial stalker pleaded guilty in 2013 to battering Robinson with abusive text messages in the month leading up to her death.
“You’re a piece of sh*t,” he told his cheerleader girlfriend, News Corp reports. Robinson was legally blind from a congenital eye disease and was cheerleading for the Titans NRL team at the time.
“You’re a b*tch. A sl*t. Your priorities are f**ked up,” Shearin told her.
In total, he sent 1439 text messages and spent 11 days behind bars. According to Nine News, he was later convicted on another stalking charge after abusing a woman he met online.
Shearin’s lawyer, Mark Donnelly, says his client wants “closure”.
“He is co-operating with the inquest,’ Donnelly told The Courier Mail. “He would like closure for everybody’s sake and so everybody can move on.”
The problem is, Robinson will never “move on”.
The 21-year-old with a life ahead of her was dreaming about travelling for work – her friends said she was hopeful Shearin might help her find employment on cruise ships. She was planning a future, perhaps smiling at the thought of one day teaching her own children how to dance. She will never have those opportunities.
Speaking to Nine News in 2016, Robinson’s aunt Janine Mackney called Shearin “sick” and said the family had been through “three years of hell”.
Their grief is made more potent by the fact they believe Shearin killed Robinson, and they haven’t been able to prove it.
“I’m sick of hearing people say it was suicide,” Mackney told News Corp in 2013. “In our heart of hearts, there’s no way she did that. She wouldn’t want to leave us.”
LISTEN: As soon as she picked up a tennis racket, Jelena Dokic started being abused by her father. Post continues after audio.
Shearin, meanwhile, has “moved on” to write a book about his experience, called The Blame Game.
“There were only two people in that room that night and one isn’t here to defend me,” he told Nine News in February last year when the book was released.
Robinson’s death will be formally investigated during a five-day inquest, the date of which has not been confirmed.
If this article has brought up any issues you, you are urged to call Lifeline on 13 11 14.