Jayden Williams admits role in home invasion attempt that led to murder

Jayden Douglas Williams, 20, pleaded guilty in the ACT Supreme Court on Wednesday to a charge of being knowingly concerned in an attempted aggravated burglary.

An agreed statement of facts shows Williams was living in rural NSW in June 2021, when a group allegedly directed by his mother, Nicole Williams, tried to invade a Phillip unit in order to steal money and drugs.

The planned targets were Julianne Williams, a member of their family, and her partner Rhys Dugdale, both of whom were known criminals.

From afar, Jayden Williams took part in the planning by liaising with two of the people who were preparing to carry out the home invasion.

He also exchanged text messages with Nicole Williams, who named the targets and referred to a plan to "do them fullas over".

While Jayden Williams was in the tiny NSW town of Baradine, a roughly seven-hour drive away, three would-be intruders travelled to a unit complex in Phillip.

The trio went to what they thought was their targets' door and knocked.

However, they had the wrong address and Glenn Walewicz, an innocent 48-year-old man, opened the door.

One of the would-be home invaders, who cannot be named because he was a juvenile at the time, shot Mr Walewicz in the neck with a .22 pump-action rifle.

Paramedics raced the victim to hospital, but he did not survive the gunshot wound.

It took a year of painstaking investigations for homicide detectives to make major breakthroughs in what one officer described as "a real whodunnit".

Investigators did what Detective Inspector Mark Steel called "good old-fashioned police work", piecing together cell tower data and images from traffic cameras to identify who was in the area at the time in question.

They made six arrests in June 2022, culminating with the extradition of Jayden Williams from Glen Innes on a charge of accessory to murder.

The 20-year-old denied that allegation and was due to stand trial in September, alongside his mother, before acting ACT Director of Public Prosecutions Anthony Williamson SC filed a fresh indictment in court on Wednesday.

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It contained the new attempted aggravated burglary charge, to which Jayden Williams, who has been behind bars on remand since his arrest, pleaded guilty.

Noting the time he had spent in custody already, defence lawyer Anastasia Qvist told the court she was hopeful of quickly obtaining a sentencing date.

Justice David Mossop placed the case into an administrative list on Thursday morning, when the court's registrar is likely to allocate a date.

Wednesday's development means Nicole Williams will face trial alone in September, having pleaded not guilty to a series of charges that include accessory to murder and recruiting a child to engage in criminal activity.

The teenager who shot Mr Walewicz pleaded guilty to a murder charge earlier this year and is awaiting sentencing, but denies he fired the gun deliberately.

Gary Taylor, another of the would-be intruders, pleaded guilty to joint commission murder and was sentenced in March to 10 years and three months in jail.

Justice Mossop ordered the 25-year-old to serve a minimum of five years and five months before becoming eligible for parole.

The other person who went to Mr Walewicz's door was a boy aged 12 at the time. The charges levelled at him were discontinued last year.

Reatile Ncube, the would-be home invaders' getaway driver, was the first person to learn his fate when he was sentenced in February to two years in jail for being an accessory to murder.

Ncube, 20, had already served about six months behind bars and had the rest of his prison term suspended by Acting Justice Peter Berman.

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