Teen kills himself over mum's murder
19.06.2001
By: Glenis Green
THE teenage son of a woman murdered by confessed killer Ross Farrah has committed suicide after enduring years of torment over his mother's death.
Wade Nash, the 18-year-old son of murdered Sunshine Coast woman Christine Nash, plunged 73m to his death from a cliff near his New Zealand home on June 6.
Friends said he had left rugby union training about 3.30pm that day, saying he was going for a swim.
Instead he caught the regular ferry for the short trip across the Whitianga River mouth, scaled the popular Shakespeare's Cliff lookout, then strode past barriers
and warning signs to jump to his death.
Two horrified German tourists who saw what happened raised the alarm.
Wade had been living with his uncle and aunt, Michael and Debbie Nash, at the tourist town of Whitianga on the North Island's Coromandel Peninsula since his 33-year-old mother was strangled and kicked to death by Farrah in 1995.
Farrah had left her battered body in the Coolum State School grounds. Wade was 13 at the time, and his sister Tashauna, who subsequently went to live with her father at Inverell, was nine.
Yesterday Christine's parents, Ron and Patricia Nash of Caloundra, placed the blame for their grandson's suicide on Farrah.
Mrs Nash said Wade had blamed himself for introducing Farrah to his mother, and for the past six years had carried a sense of guilt for splitting his family.
He also carried the memory of saving Farrah's life, when as a 12-year-old he had helped rescue Farrah from a fall while they were climbing Mt Coolum.
Farrah's mother, Yvonne Farrah, who also lives on the Sunshine Coast, described Wade's death as ``tragic''.
``Honestly, I worried about the children,'' she said.
``This is the tragedy of these things, it never ends.
``It's always the children who suffer.''
Mrs Farrah said Wade had been ``Ross's little mate . . . the loveliest little boy'', and she still had a photo of both of them with Farrah's dog.
She said she was not surprised that the Nashes had blamed her son for their grandson's suicide.
``I always prayed that I would win Gold Lotto so I could compensate them (Wade and Tashauna) for what happened,'' Mrs Farrah said.
But the Nashes said Wade had also borne the frustration of seeing Farrah confess to his mother's callous murder, only to avoid trial after being found to have been of unsound mind at the time after a hearing of Queensland's Mental Health Tribunal.
They said Wade had never come to terms with Farrah being allowed movie and golf outings as a patient at the John Oxley Memorial Hospital, while he had had to endure a lifetime of horror over what had happened to his mother.
In a letter he wrote to The Courier-Mail in December 1997, just after Farrah had escaped custody while attending a Sunnybank cinema, Wade said: ``I still miss my mum . . . I would love to just see her again, but he (Farrah) made sure that will never happen.
``He should have stood trial and gone to jail for life. That is justice -- not going to movie theatres where there are innocent children.
``I would love to see my mum and go to the movies with her.''
Wade's funeral was held in New Zealand last Wednesday.
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Teen kills himself over mum's murder
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Mrs Nash said Wade's suicide ``has just killed us''.
She said they last spoke to him by phone, during a regular call, just two days before his death. There was no hint of what was to come, and he had sounded positive and happy.
``He was just such a gorgeous kid,'' Mrs Nash said.
``He was doing so well. He was captain of the First XV, he was looking forward to his school prom -- going with his girlfriend -- he'd been out hunting and got a wild pig. He was in his last year at school and ready to go into the navy.''
The Nashes said the only clue to Wade's intention was that he had shaken all his schoolmates' hands on the day he died, telling them he was ``leaving''. Everyone had assumed he was talking about going into the navy.
The Nashes said yesterday they wanted justice for their family. They said that as a confessed murderer, Farrah should have come before a criminal court, not a Mental Health Tribunal hearing, and should have been locked away for life, ``more so if he is mentally unstable''.
Mrs Nash said she was still so terrified of Farrah that she and her husband had recently moved to a new address.
She said she understood the fear currently being felt by the friends and family of Gold Coast woman Robyn Clarke, whose daughter Janaya's killer had been granted leave from a mental hospital after just 2 1/2 years.
The Nashes were among more than 400 mourners at Wade's funeral, where his football team performed a traditional haka.
