Police have upgraded the charge against ex Australian cop Jamie Flanagan after concluding that his girlfriend’s murder was pre-meditated.
Speaking today (Thursday, July 25), police major Gilbert Diaz said: “We upgraded the charge after taking statements from the mother, father and sister of the victim as well as one of her children.”
He also told Australian Associated Press that representatives of the Australian Embassy had visited 53-year-old Flanagan this morning.
As we previously reported, Flanagan called police on Sunday to report that his 25-year-old live-in partner, Desiree Manozo, had hanged herself in the bedroom of their home in the subdivision of Santa Monica.
However, later that day a police autopsy found evidence that she was already dead before being suspended from three neckties.
Police then returned to the property to arrest Flanagan, who denies the charges against him.
Major Diaz confirmed that Flanagan is now being held in a cell with three other prisoners.
“He is mostly very silent,” Major Diaz said of the former police sergeant.
“The last time I spoke to him, he said he would wait to face a court but that he would be pleading not guilty to the charge.”
Relatives said the couple had a heated argument the night before before Ms Manozo was found hanged. According to a report on the website Rappler, the grim discovery was made by one of the dead woman’s two children from a previous relationship.
The relatives also told police that there had previously been disagreements over Flanagan wanting to take their one-year-old daughter to Australia.
Major Diaz said Flanagan had been allowed visits from friends and supporters.
“And the Australian Embassy people were here just a little while ago,” he said. “We are still gathering other witness statements.”
He added that the original intention was to charge Flanagan with a lesser charge reflecting that the killing may have happened in the “heat of the moment”. However, fresh evidence has led police to press ahead with a charge of premeditated murder.
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