Hannah McGuire suffocated and was dead when car set alight, killer allegedly told workmate

A workmate of Lachlan Young has testified the accused murderer told him Hannah McGuire was already dead and had suffocated before Young torched her car with her body inside in bushland south-west of Ballarat.

Ballarat man Benjamin O’Keefe has admitted to travelling to Scarsdale, 25 kilometres from Ballarat, alongside Young to dispose of McGuire’s car in the early hours of April 5 last year.

O’Keefe, who says he did not know McGuire, 23, was in the car when it was set alight, told Young’s Supreme Court trial in Ballarat on Wednesday that he learnt of the university student and education support worker’s death through a former colleague.

“One of the people I used to work with sent me a message saying Hannah was dead,” he told the jury. “I called Lachie [Young] because I was worried I was implicated in a murder ... I just wanted to talk to him face to face. He said, ‘Yeah, come over for a beer’.”

Young, 23, has admitted he killed McGuire, his former partner, before driving her body to bushland and setting her car on fire with her body inside. He has pleaded guilty to manslaughter but not guilty to murder.

Last week, Young’s lawyer, Glenn Casement, said McGuire’s death was “an unplanned and spontaneous incident”.

O’Keefe said that when he arrived at Young’s parents’ house in Ballarat on April 6, Young’s demeanour was calm.

He said he confronted Young outside the house about McGuire’s death and asked him if she had been in the Mitsubishi Triton ute when Young set it on fire the previous evening.

“He said she was already deceased. She was suffocated,” O’Keefe told the court. “I said, ‘Why would you get me to do something like that?’”

As O’Keefe testified about his conversation with Young the day after McGuire was killed, her friends and family members, packed into the courtroom, wiped away tears.

Her mother, Debbie, sitting in the front row of the public gallery, wrapped her arm around the university student’s father, Glenn, who sat with his head lowered in his hands.

Young, who sat in the dock at the back of the courtroom, remained expressionless and stared straight ahead as his workmate testified. The pair worked together as carpenters.

O’Keefe told the jury on Tuesday that Young had come to his house on the afternoon of April 2, 2024, with a plan to scare McGuire.

According to O’Keefe, Young told him while the two men were sitting in Young’s car that he had a plan to “roofie” McGuire to “scare her so she wouldn’t take the house” following the breakdown of their relationship.

Asked by prosecutor Kristie Churchill what the plan was once McGuire had been drugged unconscious, O’Keefe said: “He wanted to put her in a car and roll her down a hill.”

The court also heard that as part of his plan Young had asked O’Keefe to help him dispose of McGuire’s car. O’Keefe said he had initially agreed to help Young but had changed his mind and said he was unable to do so.

But Young spoke to O’Keefe again on April 4 asking him if he could help dispose of McGuire’s car and O’Keefe had agreed to help and give him a lift home, the court heard.

O’Keefe said he went to bed and woke to Young honking the horn of McGuire’s ute outside his home at 2.53am on April 5. He said Young asked him where they should take McGuire’s car.

Once they arrived in dense bushland in Scarsdale, O’Keefe said, Young asked him what he should do with the car.

“I said, ‘Dump it, don’t burn it. You get in more trouble for a fire.’” O’Keefe testified.

He told the jury that from the rear-view mirror of his own car he saw Young get a yellow blowtorch and set the front seats of the ute on fire. Young later paid him $45, he said.

O’Keefe said the pair had a conversation on the way home from the bushland where the car was torched that if the police became involved Young would have to pay him more money.

He also said Young asked him to pull over on the way back from Scarsdale, and he observed him sending text messages.

Prosecutors allege Young tried to cover up McGuire’s murder by sending texts purporting to be her, resembling a suicide note, to her mother at 3.43am.

The court heard O’Keefe left his phone at home when he accompanied Young and when he got home he deleted security camera footage that captured movement on his property.

The jury was told O’Keefe initially disliked Young when they began working together. The court also heard the two were not overly close friends and O’Keefe had Young’s number saved as “F---head” in his phone.

During hours of heated cross-examination, Young’s lawyer, Glenn Casement, accused O’Keefe of lying to avoid being charged over McGuire’s death.

“You realise how ridiculous your story is,” Casement said. “You knew if you told the truth you would be charged with being an accessory ... at that point you started lying about Mr Young.”

Casement suggested to O’Keefe he had gone to Young’s house and seen McGuire dead inside the bathroom and then agreed to help dispose of her body the night she was killed.

O’Keefe vehemently denied this.

“I was not inside that house,” he said

O’Keefe later told the court Young had “thrown him under a bus”.

“I had no clue she was in the car,” he said.

The trial continues.

If you or anyone you know needs support, you can contact the National Sexual Assault, Domestic and Family Violence Counselling Service on 1800RESPECT (1800 737 732), Lifeline 131 114, or Beyond Blue 1300 224 636.

Start the day with a summary of the day’s most important and interesting stories, analysis and insights. Sign up for our Morning Edition newsletter.