Tosha Thakkar had little familiarity with her neighbour, Daniel Stani-Reginald.
However, prior to his heinous act of raping and murdering the 24-year-old Indian student, the man next door had been scheming his “cold and calculated” crime, as presented to the Supreme Court in Sydney.
According to the court on Monday, Stani-Reginald stuffed Ms Thakkar’s body into a suitcase, discarded it in a canal, and then returned home to read an article titled Beginnings of a Serial Killer.
Crown prosecutor Mark Tedeschi QC has urged Justice Derek Price to impose a life sentence on Stani-Reginald, suggesting that he seeks to attain notoriety as a serial killer.
While peers his age were pursuing higher education or vocational training, Stani-Reginald, at 21, “made a calculated decision to educate himself on how to become a serial rapist and murderer,” remarked Mr Tedeschi.
In the three months leading up to the rape and strangulation of Ms Thakkar in the Croydon unit next to his, he reportedly accessed around 9500 disturbing articles and websites about serial killers and infamous rapists.
He researched notorious Australian cases, including that of Dean Shillingsworth, the toddler whose body was found in a suitcase.
The court heard that he examined rulings on the sentences of infamous murderers and viewed pornography related to the “degradation of Indian women” on the morning of Ms Thakkar’s murder.
Stani-Reginald has admitted guilt for the rape and murder of Ms Thakkar on March 9, 2011.
Construction workers found her body two days later.
Her parents traveled from India for the sentencing hearing, expressing their grief over the loss of their sweet and caring daughter.
Mr Tedeschi mentioned that Stani-Reginald displayed no signs of mental illness and was not under the influence of substances when he executed his premeditated murder.
Following the act, he summoned a taxi, transported Ms Thakkar’s body to the canal in the suitcase, and later visited a shopping centre.
The court heard that he continued to search for serial killer information even while police were present outside his unit, and he engaged in casual conversation with Ms Thakkar’s boyfriend that same day.
“There’s not the slightest indication he was horrified by what he had done,” Mr Tedeschi stated, emphasizing that Stani-Reginald has shown no remorse.
“The community would justifiably feel aggrieved should he receive anything less than a life sentence,” Mr Tedeschi asserted.
The hearing for the sentencing is ongoing.
