Become an Apple Subscriber or Patron to listen!
It was just before midnight on Wednesday, October 25, 2023 when an anonymous call came through 000, Australia’s emergency service number & the caller reported a body inside a bathroom in the private Sydney school of St. Andrew’s Cathedral School. When police arrived, they were met with a gruesome scene when they discovered a young woman with extensive head injuries to the point that she was unrecognizable. They determined that the woman had been attacked by a hammer & murdered only hours earlier.
St. Andrew’s staff sent an email at 4:30 am, now in the early morning hours of Thursday, October 26, informing parents that the school would be closed for the rest of the week due to a “critical incident.” They sent a second email at 6:30 am to assure parents that no students had been involved in the incident.
At about 10:40 am, the woman’s body was confirmed to be that of 21-year-old Lilie James. Lilie worked part-time as a water polo coach at St. Andrew’s Cathedral School while she pursued a sports business degree at the University of Technology Sydney. She was born on May 21, 2002 to parents Jamie & Peta James & had a younger brother named Max & lived in Sans Souci, New South Wales. As a child, Lilie participated in dance & was an under-17s swimming-age champion.
As police began their investigation, they learned of a previous, recent romantic involvement with her 24-year-old colleague, Paul Thijssen. Paul worked as a hockey coach at the school; he had come from the Netherlands to Australia in 2015 for his father’s work where he studied at St. Andrews until he graduated in 2017. Paul was an only child of wealthy parents & during his time at St. Andrews, he was a sports captain & part of the school leadership team. Before going on to complete his degree at a university in the Netherlands, he was hired as a sports assistant coach by the school where he worked for a year before returning to the Netherlands with his parents. He came back to Australia in 2020 & moved in with a friend in Kensington to continue working at the school as a cricket & hockey coach as well as an after-hours coordinator. He was also listed as the hockey coach at St. Vincent’s College in Potts Point as well as studying for a master of teaching in order to become a PE teacher. He had no previous domestic violence related issues or any previous issues with the law.
After graduation, Paul began coaching cricket & hockey at the school & this was when he crossed paths with Lilie. The two began a romantic relationship, but after only five weeks of dating, Lilie ended the relationship only days before her brutal murder. When police spoke with students & peers at the school, Paul was described as creepy, arrogant & flirtatious & often boasted about his relationship with Lilie. He often made students feel uncomfortable & was said to have a wandering eye.
Almost immediately, Paul became the prime suspect in Lilie’s murder, however, his whereabouts were unknown. Investigators confirmed that the anonymous 000 call had come from Paul Thijssen & was traced to The Gap at Vaucluse which was a clifftop location at South Head & faces the Tasman Sea. The location is a breathtaking tourist destination but is also well-known for suicides, averaging about 50 per year. When investigators responded to this location, there was no sign of Paul who had disappeared after placing the call.
Later that same day, authorities came across items in a garbage can which they deemed “associated with the homicide” which were presumably the murder weapon inside a backpack that contained Paul’s personal belongings. They also discovered a silver Lexus, a backpack & a pair of abandoned AirPods. Police announced that they were searching for a male staff member of the school who they believed could assist with inquiries. “We don’t want to make any assumptions of the fact that the person may have taken his own life, but that’s just another line of inquiry we’re looking at at the moment.”
After searching for 24-hours, investigators had no results, but on Friday, October 27, two days after Lilie’s body was found in the school, a group of tradesmen who were working nearby saw what they believed to be a body on the rocks below Diamond Bay Reserve at Vaucluse. At 7:40 am, police initiated an operation to retrieve the body which proved to be exceptionally difficult due to the location as well as the wet & windy weather conditions.
Surf lifesavers on jet skis combed the shoreline while police rescue personnel repelled down the cliffs to access the rocks below. The rescue & bomb disposal unit, marine unit & Westpac Rescue helicopter all assisted & at 12:15 pm, the body was recovered. The body was confirmed to be that of Paul Thijssen after fingerprints were used & cross-referenced with prints from the Netherlands embassy.
On October 30, reports emerged that Paul had sent Lilie’s father a text message after her murder, using her phone, asking him to pick her up from school despite the fact that it’s believed she had her car with her at the school that day. It’s likely that he did this to ensure that her body would be found or to possibly alter the time at which police believed she died.
As police continued the investigation into the murder of Lilie James, it became clear that Paul had meticulously planned the murder & it had not been an impulsive act. Part of Paul’s job was to manage equipment returns at the sports department where he was expected to be when coaches returned from their various locations across the city to drop off equipment. Because of this role, he would have known that he would be seeing Lilie that evening on her return.
On the morning of Tuesday, October 24, Paul rented a silver Lexus & drove it to the school. He was described as acting “upbeat” that morning & had been eagerly anticipating coaching hockey at St. Vincent’s College which was the other school where he worked.
While at St. Andrew’s Cathedral School, where Lilie coached water polo, Paul was asked to organize the desks in the gym where some of the students would be taking their exams. Some of the school’s international students were taking their final exams while Year 12 students had started their HSC exams two weeks earlier.
Paul utilized a hammer as well as other tools from the school’s storeroom as he set up the desks in the gym. It was the end of the day at 6 pm when Paul & Lilie met in the school gym in order to hand over some sporting equipment & soon, an argument began. CCTV footage from the school captured Paul following Lilie into the gym’s bathroom at approximately 7 pm & then showed Paul leaving the bathroom alone about one hour later. While in the bathroom during that hour, it was theorized that Paul used the hammer he had utilized to assemble the desks to brutally murder Lilie.
About two hours after murdering Lilie, security cameras in Vaucluse, 7.5 miles or 12 kilometers away, captured Paul calmly walking down the street. This just so happened to be the very location that Paul & Lilie had visited together only weeks where they went to meet up with a friend.
The security footage captured Paul arriving at Diamond Bay Reserve in the eastern suburb. He arrived at 8:47 pm in the silver rented Lexus which he exited & walked across the road, likely to dispose of the murder weapon at 9:04 pm. He spent two hours in his car before he placed the anonymous 000 call, providing the information on where to find Lilie’s body. He then drove the Lexus to another clifftop location; his body was located about two miles down the road at the base of the rocks.
After his body was recovered, police discovered CCTV footage of Paul on the morning of the murder & he was seen purchasing a hammer at a hardware store near his Kensington home. It’s believed that he armed himself with two hammers before he followed Lilie into the bathroom; the one he had purchased & one that he obtained from the school’s storeroom. It was the hammer that he took from the school that he used to murder Lilie. The fact that Paul rented the Lexus & purchased the hammer ahead of time indicated that this was a premeditated murder.
Criminal psychologist Tim Watson-Munro said that Paul had to “build up to” killing Lilie in the days after she ended their five-week long relationship & the lengths that he went to before, during & after the murder made him seem like a psychopath. According to Tim Watson-Munro, the underlying issue for men who do this is insecurity & the need to control. The most dangerous time for a person in a controlling relationship is when they have left or are trying to leave. The controlling person realizes that they are losing the control they so desperately try to maintain.
According to Watson-Munro, men like this have a pattern of failed relationships which have underlying misogyny & cannot cope with rejection. 21-year-old Lilie would have had no idea what she was walking into when she innocently met up with Paul to return the sports equipment. If she were to try to hold her ground, a controlling, toxic person like Paul would have only tried that much harder & become more aggressive & more threatening & violent in response. In regards to Paul’s decision to take his own life, Watson-Munro indicated that this is atypical for a narcissist & Paul may have simply panicked because he knew that he would be going to jail for a very long time. His third successive working holiday visa was also set to expire.
Paul’s parents, Esther & Stef Thijssen, chose to have his body cremated before scattering his ashes in Sydney, rather than transporting his body back to the Netherlands.
After her murder, 500 staff, students & alumni attended a service to honor Lilie which was held at her former high school; attendees all came dressed in bright colors. The service was live-streamed to St. Andrew’s Cathedral where hundreds of students, parents & staff gathered. Her loved ones carried dozens of lilies to honor Lilie on a day that was all about her, according to her father, Jamie James.
According to Jaime, Lilie was an independent, vibrant young woman who was always on the go & lived each day to the fullest. In addition to working & studying, she loved coaching & playing water polo. She loved to dance & despite her busy schedule, was always there to support her brother Max, her family & her friends.
As Lilie’s coffin was taken from the school gates, it was covered in colorful flowers as a tribute to the young woman who was said to be just as vibrant. Those that knew & loved her remember her as a kind friend & an avid lover of sports.
In the days after the horrific murder, the school held an assembly which was attended by 800 students & the school’s head, Julie McGonigle, spoke & said, “If I could, I would brief you one at a time, I would say your name & sit with you in the ashes of what has happened. But I know I can’t right now. So here we are.” Julie wrote a letter to the James family & said that after an extensive investigation, the NSW police concluded that this was a completely unforeseeable event. She wrote about how valuable Lilie had been to the student body & how her bright & bubbly presence would be dearly missed. The school informed Lilie’s family that the gym bathroom where her body had been found would be demolished.
Lilie’s tragic murder sparked conversation about Australia’s ongoing struggle with domestic violence & local media highlighted that she was the third woman in the area to fall victim to domestic violence that year & the 55th victim in Australia.
Since 2010 Australia has had a National Plan to End Violence against Women & Children, but statistics show that rates of violence remain incredibly high.
NSW Minister for Domestic Violence Prevention, Jodie Harrison emphasized that the government can continue to fund programs, but unless individuals take responsibility for themselves, the funding will be wasted & women & children will remain at-risk.
The previous headmaster of St. Andrew’s Cathedral School, Dr John Collier, received backlash after he wrote a newsletter titled, Looking in the Face of Savagery where he described Paul as “an absolute delight” & “not a monster.” He indicated that he had known Paul since 2010 & believed him to be a “fine student, a perfect role model.” He went on to write:
“The shock & grief of which will cascade for a long time, is that the young man concerned was, in everybody’s estimation, an absolute delight. He appeared to be just like the best of us. An hour before he committed the atrocity, he was speaking in a relaxed, friendly mode with staff at that school. He was not a monster; rather, in the last five hours of his life, he committed a monstrous act which was in complete contradiction to what everyone who knew him observed in the rest of his short life. What led to his mental disintegration? Was it a psychotic episode which was deeply out of character?”
Dr Collier concluded his message by saying, “we earnestly desire to build, in conjunction with parents, young men of broad perspective & character who will be, in the deepest sense, beautiful men.” After his letter was distributed, many felt that his comments were an “excuse for toxic masculinity.”
Sexual consent advocate Chanel Contos indicated that Dr. Collier’s newsletter was “symbolic of a much larger problem” & said, “The idea that Paul was a perfect role model, a fine student, this does not mean it’s an anomaly that he could murder somebody. The whole point is that normal people do these crimes. It’s problematic to try & ‘other’ people who perpetrate violence because by doing that, we’re allowing people who exhibit normal behaviors in other forms of life to go unnoticed without accountability.”
Chanel Contos went on to stress the importance of schools to instill good culture & reflect.
In November 2023, Lilie’s parents were said to be seeking legal advice in a bid to sue St. Andrew’s Cathedral School, alleging that the almost $40,000 per year school was complicit in gross negligence & breached its duty of care & question how their daughter was able to be killed on campus & highlighted the lack of nighttime security. They felt that the school where she worked had a duty of care to protect Lilie as an employee.
References:
- Medium: When an ex-boyfriend won’t take no for an answer: The murder of Lilie James
- Wikipedia: The Gap (Sydney)
- Wikipedia: Murder of Lilie James
- The Sydney Morning Herald: ‘We are so proud of you’: Lilie James farewelled in Sydney
- news.com.au: Family of Sydney school worker Lilie James say her killer ‘wouldn’t take no for an answer’
- Daily Mail: Paul Thijssen, St. Andrew’s Cathedral School: How suspected killer ex-boyfriend was able to get water polo coach Lilie James alone after school hours where he is believed to have brutally beat her to death with a hammer
- Daily Mail: The ‘selfish’ reason Paul Thijssen took his own life after killing Lilie James – in a crime that’s shocked Australia
