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Women tells murder trial of holding ‘set up’ fiance as his life slipped away

Ex-patients tell court how dentist Werner Otto Schwarz, now 82, hypnotised and abused them.

Ex-patients tell court how dentist Werner Otto Schwarz, now 82, hypnotised and abused them. Getty

Lyndal Archbold and her fiance, Raymond Pasnin, were walking to their car outside his mother’s Sydney home when she heard shots, saw sparks and was faced by a gunman.

“The eyes, they just didn’t leave me. I was face-to-face with the shooter,” Ms Archbold told the NSW Supreme Court on Friday.

“Raymond said something like ‘You son of a bitch, you motherf****r’, and started chasing him … he just flew for this man to try and stop him from shooting.”

Mr Pasnin died that night in October, 2013, from a shot that penetrated his aorta, the court heard.

Ms Archbold said she held him in her arms and urged him to breathe but “it was like he was choking on his blood”.

“I just keep screaming ‘help, help, help’,” she said.

April Barber: charged with being an accessory to Raymond Pasnin alleged killing.

“I had my fingers in Raymond’s mouth trying to stop from him from swallowing his tongue but there was too much blood coming out.”

Ms Archbold on Friday was giving evidence at the trial of Mr Pasnin’s former lovers, Louise Catherine Spiteri-Ahern and April Barber, who were allegedly involved in the plot to attack him.

Spiteri-Ahern, 26, has pleaded not guilty to murder while Barber, 30, has pleaded not guilty to being an accessory.

Crown prosecutor David Patch says Spiteri-Ahern solicited a man named Daniel Haile to shoot Mr Pasnin while Barber “set him up” by ensuring he would be at his mother’s home at a certain time.

Barber allegedly arranged to meet with Mr Pasnin to collect a child outside his mother’s Pendle Hill home shortly before the shooting.

“Haile was looking for that handover, in order to be able to identify his intended target,” Mr Patch said in a written version of his opening address.

“This was part of the ‘set up’ of the deceased, as agreed between April Barber and Louise Spiteri-Ahern.”

The Crown alleges Spiteri-Ahern was driven by “anger, possessiveness, jealously, vengeance and hatred” to pay Haile at least $4000 to do the shooting.

Mr Pasnin broke up with her in late 2012, a week after she had an abortion, and afterwards she bombarded him with angry and bitter SMS messages, the opening address said.

But other correspondence showed “she still loved him, and believed, or hoped, that he still loved her”.

Amin Zraika, 39, who was Barber’s partner at the time of the killing, is also on trial after pleading not guilty to being an accessory after the fact.

The judge-alone trial before Justice Stephen Rothman continues.

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