Scammer blackmailed parents of dying baby.png

Jay and Deanne Windross were parents of their 11-month-old daughter, Amiyah. Amiya was in hospital dying from a neurological disease which caused her to have an ineffective swallow reflex. She required a stomach tube so that she could receive nutrients.

She had virtually no body tone, could not raise her head, suffered great physical discomfort, thrashing about constantly, and could sleep for only 15 minutes maximum at a time and only while being held by one of her parents.

Deanne used her phone as the main way to take photos and collect memories of her daughter. However, she did not back-up her phone and this meant that if she lost her phone, all those photos would be gone.

One day, Jay and Deanne were at the Chadstone Shopping Centre and Deane went to the bathroom taking her Samsung phone with her. She placed her phone on the toilet roll holder and accidentally left the bathroom with her phone still on the holder.

Soon after, she realised that he had left her phone in the bathroom and ran back to find it. However, the phone was gone. She called out to passers by in the hope that whoever picked up the phone would hear her pleas.

She went to the Telstra and Samsung stores to see if the phone could be tracked and she also went to the Chadstone Centre Management to see if the phone had been handed in. She called the phone a total of 105 times in the hope that the person who took the phone would answer. Unfortunately, all of Deanne’s attempts were unsuccessful.

Jay posted on his Facebook page their situation and offered a cash reward for whoever returned the phone. His post was picked up by a number of media outlets who widely publicised the appeal to locate the phone.

Siti Nurhidayah Kamal, the defendant, became aware of Jay and Deanne’s situation. Siti did not have their phone but decided to message Jay regardless claiming that she did. Throughout the following conversation, Siti did not have the phone at any point in time but the Windross’ thought that she did.

After Siti reached out to Jay, he described that was filled with hope. He wrote in response, “please put it in my letterbox. I’ll get my neighbour to check that it’s there and I’ll transfer you the money to wherever you want it”. Siti asked for $1,000 and said that if the money was not transferred, she would not give the phone to Jay. Jay said, “my baby is in her last minutes … can we discuss this tomorrow, she’s about to leave us”.

A few hours later, Siti asked Jay how the money would be transferred. Jay wrote, “I don’t know yet. I can’t think at the moment. My baby isn’t going to last out the night. What do you suggest”. Siti responded with, “please transfer me money I will return you the phone or maybe I just sell it … I hope you can help me … you maybe help me today god may help you”.

The next morning, Amiyah passed away while being held in her parent’s arms.

That same morning, Siti sent jay a message saying, “please I’m begging you I don’t want to sell and erase all of your memory I pro mise you I’m an honest person”. Jay responded with, “please don’t erase anything our baby passed away in our arms early this morning you have our memories of her please let us have some rest and then we will organise something I promise”.

Even after Siti learned of Amiyah’s death, she continued to berede Jay for money and sent him a screenshot of her bank details. Jay wrote, “I am going to do it but I need to know that you have the phone and you are not just trying to get money out of me”. Jay also suggested a few ways to exchange the phone as he was in hospital with his recently dead daughter. Later, Siti responded with, “are you going to deposit or not”. In total, 160 messages were exchanged between Jay and Siti in 24 hours.

Jay and Deanne were traumatised by Siti’s behaviour and reported her to the Police. Two days later Siti was arrested and charged with blackmail. In the court judgment, Judge Gaynor wrote that she found Siti’s behaviour “so reprehensible as to be amoral. I regard the objective gravity of this offending and [her] moral culpability to be of the highest order.”

Siti pleaded guilty to blackmail and was sentenced to 3 years imprisonment. The Windross’ never found the phone.

Further Reading