Man jailed for killing pregnant partner - weeks after she saved his life
The relationship had tested Michelle Darragh to the limit, but over the years she’d forgiven Benjamin Coman’s toxic behaviour several times. The 32-year-old social worker had given her partner many chances and they had two young sons, who were her world. But when she became pregnant with their third child, things grew considerably worse.
Michelle and cabinet maker Coman lived in Bayswater North, east of Melbourne, Australia, with their sons. They’d been together for about five years. Growing up, Coman had been friends with her younger brother, and her family were surprised when they started dating.
As part of her work, Michelle was involved in drug rehabilitation. And while she always thought of others first, Coman, 29, did the opposite. He visited brothels and sex workers and was a drug user who spent the family money on cannabis, methamphetamine and cocaine.
Michelle and her parents Dianne and Ashley (facebook)Poisoned food
Michelle continued to show him loyalty, yet he accused her of having an affair with his best friend and suggested one of their sons wasn’t his. The cruel and unfounded allegations were a result of Coman having fallen asleep at her 30th birthday in September 2019 and wrongly believing she’d taken the opportunity to cheat on him.
The on-off relationship was turbulent, but she continued to try and make it work and in 2021 she discovered she was pregnant with their third child. It was a chance for a fresh start – but Coman continued to let her down.
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Michelle discovered he had spent more than $80,000 on a sports car – and had taken the money from the $100,000 they’d saved for a deposit on a house. She was devastated and confided to a friend that she felt her life was a mess. She also said that Coman had told her to have an abortion and gave her an ultimatum – the baby or him. By September 2021, she had taken her sons and moved back
in with her parents, Dianne and Ashley.
Coman went into a downward spiral, yet still Michelle showed him nothing but kindness. The same month she found him in his car, which was filling with toxic gas from a pipe attached to the exhaust pipe. She dragged him out of the car and saved his life
– just three weeks before he stabbed her to death.
Coman spent a week on a mental health ward, where he was treated for depression and substance abuse. He said he thought that Michelle was tracking him through a chip in his brain, that supermarkets were poisoning his food and that he was being spied on, according to a forensic psychiatrist. But he was released, with medication and returned home.
Michelle was stabbed to death after going to Coman's home to collect some clothes (facebook)Three weeks after saving his life, Michelle told her parents she was going to collect some clothes from the home she’d once shared with Coman. She was 12 weeks pregnant.
It was 9 October, and Michelle left her children with her mum and dad as she headed to her old home. Earlier that day she’d asked for legal advice and had messaged Coman instructing him to transfer money to her account.
“You can’t take all the money and leave me with nothing, that’s unfair,” she wrote. He didn’t reply.
Her parents grew concerned when Michelle didn’t return and failed to answer her phone. At about 7pm, her father, Ashley, drove to the house, where he knocked but got no reply. Entering the house, he went into a bedroom, where he discovered his daughter, lifeless, and Coman. Michelle had suffered several stab wounds, while Coman had knife injuries to his stomach.
Fatally stabbed
Ashley realised Michelle was dead and believed Coman was, too. He called an ambulance and then his wife. “Hun, it’s our worst nightmare,” he cried over the phone. When the emergency services arrived, they pronounced Michelle and her unborn child dead. But Coman was still alive.
He was taken to hospital and put under guard as he underwent surgery. Investigators believed he’d stabbed Michelle and his wounds were self-inflicted. During questioning, he admitted the killing.
Coman said that when Michelle had arrived, he’d considered killing himself in front of her but instead had lunged at her with a large kitchen knife and stabbed her in the thigh as she tried to run. “Once I lunged at her, I thought, ‘I’ve got to go through with this, she needs to die now,’” he told detectives.
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Michelle suffered abrasions and lacerations, suggesting she’d been beaten, and died from a stab wound to her back, which extended
to her neck and severed her spine. Death would have been almost instantaneous.
Michelle is survived by two sons, aged two and five (Facebook)Coman then repeatedly stabbed himself in the stomach.
Michelle’s family and friends were in disbelief that she’d been killed by a man they’d trusted.
After pleading guilty to murder, Coman faced a presentencing hearing in February this year. In honour of Michelle, her family and friends wore ribbons in her favourite colour, orange.
The prosecution said Michelle had suffered a sustained attack before being fatally stabbed in the back with a 20cm knife, by the man whose life she had saved just weeks earlier.
Michelle’s father recalled the day he found her body. “My heart was wrenched out of me as I saw Michelle’s feet sticking out from behind the bed,” he told the court. “I knew instantly she was dead… I know I’ll never be the same.”
He added that he was glad he hadn’t realised at the time that Coman was still alive, as he wouldn’t have been able to control himself.
Michelle’s mother sobbed as she told Coman she wished he was dead. “Ben has turned Michelle into one of the biggest statistics of all, being murdered for domestic violence because he chose her life was not worthy, and it breaks my heart,” she said.
His defence said that at the time of the murder Coman was suffering from psychotic depression, but experts insisted he knew what he was doing when he plunged the knife into his ex.
'Suffer, you dog'
In March, Coman, now 31, was sentenced to 25 years in prison with a chance of parole after 20 years. The judge called it a vicious attack and a shocking breach of trust against a woman who had done everything in her power to make their relationship work. He accepted that Coman had been suffering from mental health issues but said that didn’t reduce his moral culpability. The crime had been driven by jealousy and anger.
“You knew full well what you were doing when you attacked and killed Michelle,” he said.
As the sentence was handed down, a family friend turned to Coman and said, “Suffer, you dog.”
Michelle’s parents are raising her sons, now two and five. One day they will discover that while their mother saved their father’s life, he took hers.
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