Bain 'worried about play rehearsals'

Jan Scott said she found David Bain's attitude threatening. Photo / Getty Images

David Bain wanted to get to university on the day five members of his family were killed, a court has heard.

The High Court at Christchurch was told yesterday that Bain asked how long speaking to police would take as he was in a play coming up, while an ambulance officer described Bain as "scary" and "threatening".

A police witness also revealed for the first time that he picked up a pair of glasses frames in Bain's room on the day of the killings. Glasses and lenses in the house are now considered important evidence in the case.

The prosecution says Bain shot dead his parents and three siblings on June 20, 1994, but the defence says it was his father Robin who killed his family before shooting himself.

According to a statement police said he made, Bain watched a video with his family on the night before the killings, but switched it off at 8.30pm so his parents could watch their own film.

Bain said he went to bed, finished off a book, and woke up about 5.30am - he dozed until 5.40am, which was his normal weekday routine.

He said he left the house at 5.45am to do his paper run with his dog Casey, and arrived back about 6.40am.

He took off his running shoes, walked in, went downstairs, put a clothes wash on, and washed the printer's ink off his hands.

Bain said he thought the light to his mother's room was on and the lounge door was closed. He said he went back to his room and switched on the light and noticed rifle shells on the floor.

"I went to Mum's room and she was dead. She didn't move. I went to the lounge and [Robin] was there. Then I called the police. I remember loud noises and lots of banging, but I don't remember anything else until the ambulance officer came in."

Police and ambulance officers said they found Bain in a fetal position and he lay on the floor for 2hours.

One witness said he appeared to have a fit.

But an ambulance officer who attended to Bain, Raymond Anderson, said: "I had seen similar presentations and they have been a person who was trying to get us to believe they are having a fit ... but in actual fact we are able to determine they are not."

Ambulance officer Jan Scott said Bain made a comment where she had to ask several times what he said.

"In the end I understood him to say that the black hands were coming to get him."

Ms Scott said while she was sitting with Bain in his bedroom, he asked for his glasses so he could see, but later said he could see fine without them.

"But it was the tone he said that in - the look he looked at me, it was quite scary, threatening."

Terry van Turnhout, then a constable in Dunedin, was sent to observe Bain while he lay in his bedroom and recalled that at 8.15am, Bain said "I have got to get up. I have got to go to university. I study music. I sing".

Mr van Turnhout said Bain later asked him at the police station: "Is this going to hold me up for long? The next week or so? It's just, I'm in a play. We are in rehearsals at the moment. It may pay to ring the producer".

Mr van Turnhout told the court he picked up the pair of glasses without lenses off a chair in Bain's room, but put them down when he realised he was in a crime scene. One lens was on the chair. He said he was not aware then they would become significant.

Bain's full statement to police will be read in court today.