Group believed eight-year-old girl ‘would rise from diabetes death’, court hears
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An eight-year-old girl watched “joyously” as her father was baptised into a faith that would soon convince him to fatally withhold medical care and await her resurrection, a judge has heard.Elizabeth Struhs died at the family home in Toowoomba, west of Brisbane, on January 7, 2022, after her parents and 12 others allegedly withheld her diabetes insulin medication for six days.Crown prosecutor Caroline Marco said Elizabeth’s parents and other defendants were present during Elizabeth’s last days and on January 8 after she had died in the night.
Elizabeth’s father, Jason Richard Struhs, 52, and the group’s leader, Brendan Luke Stevens, 62, are charged with murder while her mother, Kerrie Elizabeth Struhs, 49, and the others are charged with manslaughter.Marco said Jason Struhs had been under continuous pressure from the other defendants to join the Saints and reject man-made treatments.”Pressure was brought on Jason Struhs to change … to persuade him not to administer insulin under their fundamental tenet that God heals,” Marco said.Marco described the Saints as a “small congregation with extreme beliefs” that had split off from a church in Brisbane.Jason Struhs agreed to be baptised into the Saints in August 2021 while his wife was serving a five-month sentence for neglecting to provide Elizabeth with medical treatment in 2019, which nearly proved fatal.”In the video (of the baptism), Your Honour can see Mr Struhs submerged in a trough of water and Mr Stevens speaking in tongues … members of the congregation singing and see Elizabeth’s joy at her father being baptised,” Marco said.Marco said Jason Struhs continued to provide insulin for Elizabeth’s type-1 diabetes, leading to further attempts to get him to stop.Stevens wrote to Kerrie Struhs in November 2021 saying he was praying for Jason Struhs “not to put off” having God heal Elizabeth.Jason Struhs told police he decided he could not be “half and half” about his faith and stopped giving Elizabeth her rapid-acting insulin on January 1, 2022.
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