The woman was accused of exchanging her grandmother's pills with those that were prescribed for her late uncle – including some containing morphine. Photo: Shana Novak, via Getty.
A woman has been found guilty of murdering her own grandmother by tampering with the 91-year-old’s medication—months after posting on social media that she hated her.The Western Australian Supreme Court heard it was pills containing morphine that ultimately led to the death of Dawn Baldwin in January 2012, a week after she collapsed at her home in western Perth. Baldwin’s granddaughter, mother of two Alaine Dawn Sturniolo, had poisoned the elderly woman by swapping her pills with those that had been prescribed for Sturniolo’s uncle, who died from cancer in June 2011, the ABC reports."The accused intentionally gave her grandmother the medication of her deceased uncle ... to kill or to cause her a bodily injury that was life-endangering or likely to be life-endangering," state prosecutor Paul Usher told the court. "It was the intentional and deliberate killing of her grandmother by the accused."Prosecutors further alleged that Sturniolo disliked her grandmother because of the way she treated her mother, and that this motivated her to commit the act. The court heard that Sturniolo posted on Facebook in May and June 2011 saying she hated Dawn and would like to change her "life status.”It was not until 2018, however, that police began an investigation and charged the now 39-year-old, based on information they received from her sister’s partner.Sturniolo had allegedly confessed to her sister and her former brother-in-law in the months after Baldwin’s death, admitting that she swapped her grandmother's medication with her uncle's pills, but also claiming that she had not meant for "Grandma Dawn" to die and had only wanted to cause her pain and discomfort. Sturniolo's lawyer suggested in court that the witnesses who testified against his client in fact had an axe to grind with her.Sturniolo, for her part, denied the allegations, and claimed that while she hated Dawn during her teenage years she had since changed her feelings towards her grandmother after spending more time with her. She also previously told police that the two Facebook posts were jokes. When she was told Dawn had died, she said she was "in disbelief" because "she was still meant to be there.”She faces a possible life jail term when sentenced.Follow Gavin on Twitter
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