An Adelaide murderer who buried a woman's body in a strawberry patch more than 20 years ago relapsed into drug use and breached her parole after she googled herself, a court has heard.
Nicole Therese Courcier McGuinness was using drugs when she killed 53-year-old Joanne Lillecrapp in November 2001.
Ms Lillecrapp's dismembered remains were buried in her Angle Park backyard under a strawberry patch.
McGuinness was sentenced to life in prison in 2003 with a non-parole period of 18 years.
She was released on parole in January 2021 but relapsed into drug use and breached that parole about four months later.
She was released on parole again in September, but weeks later tested positive to methamphetamine, opioids and other amphetamines and was locked up.
The Supreme Court heard her relapse was "so serious that she was at risk of dying".
McGuinness's lawyer told the court her breaches were "a false start" on her parole and asked the court to impose a new non-parole period.
"The offence for which my client is in custody was caused, or at least in part caused, by her drug use," her lawyer Joseph Henderson told the court.
"So the fact that this breach is of the use of illicit drugs, I accept at the outset will be of concern to the court."
Google search 'triggered' relapse
Mr Henderson told the court his client had been clean for 12 years when she was first released on parole but that she was always at risk of relapse and an internet search of her crime prompted the "inevitable".
"She instructs that that was caused principally as a consequence of googling her own name and seeing the nature and extent of the reporting in relation to her offending," he told the court.
"It was the realisation of the extent of that reporting, coupled with — as a consequence of reading that material — a reliving of those events, that effectively triggered her cause for relapse.
"She had been struggling with those feelings and had also been struggling with recurrent and repeating nightmares, and there was some degree of self-medication."
The court heard the parole board did not oppose a non-parole period being fixed for Ms McGuinness but noted that board chair Frances Nelson QC had some concerns.
"Whilst Ms McGuinness acknowledges that her drug use is a major problem, and clearly she does, she is yet to make a genuine commitment to change," a report from Ms Nelson QC said.
"Until she does, no amount of counselling or intervention will assist her."
But Mr Henderson told the court McGuinness now had a support system in place for her release.
"Ms McGuinness has not relapsed into reoffending," he said.
"I accept that there's a nexus between her drug use and potential for reoffending but that's not what's occurred here,” he said.
"Ms McGuinness is committed to change. Clearly she doesn't want to find herself in and out of custody."
The prosecutor told the court McGuinness had "not addressed" her issues with substance abuse and she needed a non-parole period that allowed further intervention to deal with that and her mental health issues.
Justice Laura Stein has reserved her decision.
