On Wednesday, a full investigation in the Coroner’s Court revealed what led to the double fatality.<\/p>\n
Willow Grove Road was closed for almost two days while authorities investigated the crash.<\/p>\n
Coroner Audrey Jamieson found that Mr Smith’s Subaru veered into the opposite lane, where it collided with a truck carrying a cattle trailer.<\/p>\n
She said the truck driver was unable to take any action, resulting in the vehicles colliding head-on before Mr Smith’s car came to rest on the side of the road.<\/p>\n
The truck driver was taken to hospital with non-life threatening injuries.<\/p>\n
The court heard Harley, Mr Smith and their two pet dogs were found dead inside the vehicle, but substantial damage to the car made “identification impossible at that time”.<\/p>\n
A roadside memorial, which included a teddy bear, dinosaur toy and flowers, was set up for Harley after the crash.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Police investigate the crash at Trafalgar in April last year. (ABC Gippsland: Jack Colantuono)<\/p>\n
Family home destroyed<\/p>\n
Ms Jamieson found Mr Smith set his family home on fire before leaving the property with Harley and the dogs.<\/p>\n
Witnesses immediately called emergency services, with some entering the property to try to extinguish the blaze.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Mr Smith set his family home on fire shortly before the deadly crash. (ABC Gippsland: Jack Colantuono)<\/p>\n
Victoria Police arson chemist John Kelleher said there had been two fires in the house, and another fire in the backyard.<\/p>\n
A teddy bear and flowers were also left at the Longwarry home, suggesting the house fire and the Trafalgar crash were linked.<\/p>\n
Mother dies days before<\/p>\n
The tragedy happened just days after Harley’s mother, Amy Galea, who was separated from Mr Smith, died from an aggressive type of cancer that she was diagnosed with only a month before.<\/p>\n
In her findings, Ms Jamieson said the “sudden deterioration” and death of Ms Galea ultimately led to Mr Smith’s actions.<\/p>\n
The court heard Mr Smith had a history of mental health issues, including post-traumatic stress disorder and depression, which were exacerbated by her death.<\/p>\n
Mr Smith set fire to his Longwarry home about 3.40pm on the day of the crash, causing the collapse of large parts of the ceiling.<\/p>\n
He then left a bag containing $6,000 at a friend’s place, asking him to give it to the director of a Warragul funeral home to pay for Ms Galea’s funeral. \u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
He then drove to Trafalgar, where the crash occurred.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Flowers were placed at Harley Galea-Smith’s roadside memorial in Trafalgar. (ABC Gippsland: Jack Colantuono)<\/p>\n
Coroner’s conclusion<\/p>\n
Ms Jamieson found that Harley’s death was caused by the “intentional act” of his father, who intended to “take his own life”.<\/p>\n
“I find that Harley James Smith died from multiple injuries sustained in a motor vehicle collision in which he was the passenger,” she said.<\/p>\n
“There was no substantive evidence and no overt behaviours of Conan James Smith to have caused anyone to envisage that he would so violently end his son\u2019s life.<\/p>\n
She said Harley was remembered as a lovable, beautiful and cheeky boy.\u00a0<\/p>\n
“He loved toy trucks and cars and was particularly fond of his Sonic the Hedgehog toy which brought him great comfort,” she said.<\/p>\n
“I convey my sincere condolences to Harley’s family for their loss.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A coroner has found that a Longwarry father intentionally caused a horrific crash in Gippsland that killed himself,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":100066,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[72904,64,63,72903,72901,39042,1108,2973,72898,72902,72905,44,72899,72900],"class_list":["post-100065","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-australia","tag-amy-galea","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-conan-smith","tag-coroners-court-of-victoria","tag-coronial-inquest","tag-court","tag-courts","tag-double-fatal-crash","tag-harley-galea-smith","tag-murder-suicide","tag-news","tag-trafalgar","tag-trafalgar-fatal-crash"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/100065","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=100065"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/100065\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/100066"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=100065"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=100065"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=100065"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}