It was a crime that shocked Perth: a family and domestic violence murder in the heart of Perth's affluent western suburbs.
In what Mark Bombara's daughter, Ariel, would later describe as "planned choices … made to murder, underpinned by a lifetime of power, privilege, control and entitlement", Bombara forced his way into the home of his wife's best friend, Jennifer Petelczyc, in May 2024.
Bombara was looking for his estranged wife, Rowena; instead he found medical receptionist Jennifer, 59, and her 18-year-old daughter, Gretl.
"When he realised my mum wasn’t in your home, rather than walking back out of that house he decided time was up, and murdering your whole family would be the next best punishment," Ariel Bombara would tell an inquest into their deaths this week in an devastating disavowal of her father's actions.
Held over five days, the inquest laid bare a cascading series of police errors and missed opportunities to save the lives of the Petelczyc women before they were murdered in cold blood.
The startling revelations include a two-decades-long failure to review gun licences, four separate pleas to police for help that went unheeded, and multiple Triple Zero (000) calls — made as the murders were unfolding — left on hold.
