Woman ‘tied up and murdered’ after Mother’s Day dinner

Rex Martinich | July 27, 2026

A woman on her way home from a Mother’s Day dinner was ambushed and tied up before her body was burned beside an isolated mountain track, a jury has heard. 

Braydon Franklin and Clinton Travis Oliver on Monday pleaded not guilty in Brisbane Supreme Court to the murder of Donna Louise Howe at Caboolture on Queensland’s Sunshine Coast.

The pair both pleaded guilty to mistreatment of a corpse.

Ms Howe, 57, was reported missing by her daughter a month after she was last seen on May 8, 2022.

Her skeletal remains were found soon after along a four-wheel-drive track in the Glasshouse Mountains.

Ms Howe was most likely killed on the night she disappeared, crown prosecutor Nathan Crane told the jury.

“She made no phone calls after 9pm when we knew she was home,” he said.

Olivier and Franklin allegedly waited for Ms Howe to return to the four-bedroom house she owned in Caboolture.

“Donna left on May 8 to have dinner with her daughter,” Mr Crane said.

“They knew she was coming home.”

Ms Howe allowed the defendants to move in or frequently stay with their partners, the jury heard.

“She was confronted by Mr Oliver, she was confronted by Mr Franklin and they had a plan to enact violence upon her,” Mr Crane said.

Oliver and Franklin allegedly had “animosity” towards Ms Howe over their belief she was stealing items from their partners.

The defendants exchanged messages about Ms Howe stealing a bank card and described the situation as “ridiculous”.

The prosecution alleged Oliver and Franklin burned Ms Howe’s body to destroy forensic evidence and to conceal the cause of death, the jury heard.

“When skin goes away, so do injuries,” Mr Crane said.

The jury was shown an image of Ms Howe’s skull with a fracture and hole in the temple.

Oliver sent a text message the day before she disappeared describing Ms Howe in derogatory terms and saying he was “done with” her.

Ms Howe was likely attacked in her lounge room and suffered “quite a severe head injury” either before or after death, Mr Crane said.

Oliver allegedly instructed Ms Howe be tied up and Franklin encouraged him to take part in the plan knowing her death was a likely outcome, the jury heard.

Text messages would allegedly show how the defendants discussed how to move Ms Howe’s more than 100kg body and who would do so, the jury heard.

Oliver had now admitted to taking Ms Howe’s body into the mountains and burning it but had told police back in 2022 he did not know where she was, Mr Crane said.

Oliver’s barrister John Cook told the jury not to “jump to the conclusion” that because he pleaded guilty to interfering with a corpse that he was also guilty of murder.

Franklin’s barrister Damian Walsh told the jury the prosecution “must prove his presence and participation” in the killing beyond reasonable doubt.

The trial is due to run for 12 days before Justice Martin Burns.