A WOMAN accused of masterminding a horrific abduction where another woman was repeatedly tortured over 24 hours before being dumped in bushland has been refused bail after allegedly contacting a witness in the case.
Meanwhile, a man charged over the abduction was on Sunday stabbed three times outside his house by an unknown man who told him to say "I'm not a dog" while he lay bleeding in the street.
Kyna McAuley, 41, is accused of being the ringleader of a terrifying kidnapping during which a woman was tied up, struck in the head with a hammer, doused with boiling hot water and burned with a cigarette at a house at Mount Hutton in May last year.
Ms McAuley was granted Supreme Court bail earlier this year after she agreed to wear an electronic monitoring bracelet and post a $20,000 surety.
But she was taken back into jail on Monday after allegedly using an encrypted messaging app to contact a witness in the case in a bid, police allege, to get that person to change their statement and contradict the version of the alleged victim.
Ms McAuley has pleaded not guilty to a number of charges including kidnapping and assault and has a trial date set for June, 2023.
She appeared again in Newcastle District Court on Tuesday where her bail was revoked after the prosecution applied for a detention application.
The development comes as one of Ms McAuley's co-accuseds, Martin Ronald Dumbrell, who was not the man who was stabbed on Sunday, pleaded guilty to his role in the abduction.
Dumbrell, who was in the shed at Mount Hutton during the abduction, pleaded guilty on Wednesday to detaining a person in company with intent to obtain an advantage. He will next appear in Newcastle District Court in July to get a sentence date.
Detectives say Ms McAuley became enraged after the 25-year-old alleged victim was involved in a car accident in May last year.
Ms McAuley's young daughter was a passenger in the car, but was uninjured, according to court documents.
When the 25-year-old woman later returned to the house at Mount Hutton, Ms McAuley allegedly came outside armed with a mailbox and used it to smash up the car.
Despite that, police say the 25-year-old later went back to the house and fell asleep only to be woken up by Ms McAuley, who allegedly told her to go down to the shed.
It was in the locked shed that Ms McAuley allegedly picked up a hammer and struck the woman in the head and eye, causing her to bleed profusely.
She was allegedly knocked to the ground and could feel blood coming out of her ear while she slipped in and out of consciousness.
Ms McAuley then allegedly told others in the shed to "take her arms off" and started up a grinder.
The woman wasn't injured by the grinder but she allegedly had boiling hot water poured on her head, a cigarette pressed into her forehead and had her teeth knocked out with a metal pole, according to court documents. The woman passed out a number of times before she was driven to bushland at Eleebana and dumped.
She was allegedly told not to go to the police or she would be killed.
The woman went to a hospital where she was treated for a number of injuries.
