Laniet Bain told a former teacher the day before she was murdered that she was scared of her brother David, the teacher told Bain's murder trial today.
Joanne Dryden, a music teacher at Laniet's school, Bayfield High, said Laniet was agitated and said David was picking her up to take her to a family meeting and she did not want to go.
The evidence was given on day 28 of the retrial of Bain, 37, who denies charges of murdering five members of his family, including Laniet, at their home in Every Street, Dunedin, in June 1994.
Ms Dryden said she could tell from her body language, voice, and facial expressions that 18-year-old Laniet was agitated.
She said Laniet did not give any reason for the meeting, but said she was scared of David.
Another witness said Laniet had told him that she was in a hurry to get home for a family meeting that David had organised.
Kelly Gillan said Laniet was on her way home from work at the Museum Cafe when she stopped to share a cigarette.
She told him that David was picking her up for the meeting.
Defence counsel Helen Cull QC asked both witnesses if they knew that Laniet had arranged with her mother to have a meal and sleep over at the family home that night.
She also asked if they knew she had invited two other people over for the evening and that her sister Arawa Bain had arranged to go babysitting.
Both replied that they did not know any details.
Marcelle Nader-Turner said she saw Laniet on the day before the murders. Laniet started talking about her family and became agitated, stressed and anxious. She told of her dislike of David and said she was scared of him.
She said Laniet did not want to go to the family meeting David had called. He had told her if she did not go, he would come and get her and take her there kicking and screaming if he had to.
A friend of Arawa Bain, Kirsten Koch, said Laniet had been over-the-top and dramatic.
The witness said she was always a bit scared of David. She said there was "an intensity about him".
The second-to-last time she saw Arawa, she told her that there were family secrets she could not reveal. The last time, Arawa said Laniet had been causing family troubles.
One day when she was at the Bain house, Arawa went to get something from father Robin Bain's room and had to get a key to open it.
John Mouat recalled an incident two to three weeks before the murders when he was at a choral workshop with David Bain, who he did not know.
He saw David become agitated and he climbed over the witness to get out of his position in the middle of the choir. David appeared to be distressed and sat with his hands pressed together, rocking himself for a few minutes.
A classmate of Arawa Bain at teachers' college said Arawa phoned her crying because something was wrong. She said: "I wish Dad would just f... off and leave the rest of us alone."
She thought Arawa said she was "uncomfortable and unhappy" with her home life.
The trial is before Justice Graham Panckhurst and a jury in the High Court at Christchurch.
