3 Men Sentenced to Life for Locking 2 People Inside Toolbox and Dumping Them Alive into Dam Waters

Three men have been sentenced a second time in connection to the 2016 murders of two people who were locked inside a toolbox and submerged in an Australian dam.

Trent Thrupp, Stou Daniels, and Davy Taiao were sentenced to life in prison one week after being convicted in a retrial in the Brisbane Supreme Court for the murders of Cory Breton and Iuliana Triscaru, according to News Corp Australia, Australian Broadcast Corporation (ABC) and 9 News. 

Since the case involved two murder victims, Queensland law dictates that they will serve a minimum of 30 years in prison before being eligible for parole, according to News Corp.

The trio was previously convicted in 2021 by a different jury on murder and torture charges, but Australia’s Court of Appeal granted a retrial last year on the murder charges, per the outlet.

“For 9 and 1/2 years, we have not been able to say goodbye properly. We have not been able to mourn because every time we have to relive that tale,” Breton’s partner Miranda Parkinson said during a sentencing hearing, per 9 News and ABC.

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Triscaru’s family also issued a statement saying that the retrial had brought “fresh agony” in having to relive the moments of her death. They said, per ABC, “To relive every horrific detail, every moment of fear and despair … is an injustice that compounds our initial grief.”

Prosecutors claimed in the initial trial that Breton and Triscaru had been lured to an apartment unit in Kingston when they were beaten and tortured by a group of men over a drug-dealing dispute. They were then forced by Daniels and Taiao into a metal toolbox, which measured about 6 and 1/2-ft., according to News Corp.

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The pair was then transported in the toolbox to Scrubby Creek in Queensland and submerged underwater. Thrupp was reportedly the one to have dumped the toolbox in the water or was present when it happened, per the outlet. 

Police recovered the toolbox two weeks later, and Breton and Triscaru’s bodies were found in an advanced state of decomposition. It is believed that Breton and Triscaru had died of drowning, as evidence suggested they were still alive when they were submerged, per News Corp.

A total of eight people have been charged over Breton and Triscaru’s deaths, with others receiving sentences for manslaughter charges, per News Corp. Tuhirangi-Thomas Tahiata, who drove the toolbox to the creek was also sentenced to life in prison, per the outlet.