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Cleo Smith’s alleged abductor had room full of dolls
By Heather McNeill and Peter de Kruijff
November 4, 2021 — 7.41pm
The man accused of abducting four-year-old Cleo Smith from her family tent and holding her captive for 18 days had a doll room inside his house.
Terence Darrell Kelly, 36, was arrested by WA Police after detectives raided his locked Tonkin Crescent home at 12.46am on Wednesday local time and found the little girl alone inside a bedroom.
Terence Kelly.
A day later he was charged with child abduction and appeared before Carnarvon Magistrates Court.
WA Police Detective Senior Sergeant Cameron Blaine said Cleo was found in physically good health in a bedroom inside Mr Kelly’s house.
“The lights were on and she was playing with toys, I think that’s about all I want to say. This is still a matter that needs to go before the courts. There’s certain aspects about what we saw that is going to be evidence,” he said.
Detectives declined to comment on whether dolls were found inside the house, with the head of Taskforce Rodia, Superintendent Rod Wilde, telling journalists he “didn’t want to go into that”.
Terence Kelly.
Since his arrest, video has emerged of Mr Kelly recording himself inside a room filled with dozens of dolls, some still in their packaging.
The man also uploaded photos to Facebook in April 2020 taking a doll for a car drive, captioning the post, “I love taking my dolls for drive arounds and doing their hair and taking selfies in public”.
In another post dated July 2020, Mr Kelly is pictured wearing a Bratz doll shirt and holding a doll in each hand, commenting, “Nothing beats chilling at home with my Bratz dolls”.
A Carnarvon Toyworld worker said the store had sold several dolls to the man over the years which they would gift wrap.
She did not know when the last time was he had visited the store but was checking CCTV footage which went as far back as October 18 to provide to police.
Several times during his court appearance, Mr Kelly asked journalists in the public gallery what they were staring at, and told them when he got out, he would come for them.
He was remanded in custody and is due to appear in court again on December 6.
Neighbours described Mr Kelly as a loner who lived in his public housing property by himself. In recent days, residents said he had been coming and going from the house with groceries.
“He’s been acting a bit strange lately, he would get in his car drive that fast,” one neighbour said.
“He doesn’t have his dog out the front, he had his dog out the back, but for all this week he had his dog out the front and he’s been acting like weird.”
Shanika Dickerson, who was staying two homes down, said she was relieved Cleo had been found.
“It’s very scary, this is where we live and young kids live here,” she said.
Another neighbour spoke of borrowing a lawnmower on Monday from Mr Kelly and how he was acting ‘normal’.
“He’d say hello and ask for a smoke,” she said.
“I didn’t think he would be like that but nobody thought that.”
![119efc1954d6993a9e5d39d77daf8eabe2d4670c"](https://static.ffx.io/images/$zoom_0.502%2C$multiply_1.0423%2C$ratio_0.666667%2C$width_378%2C$x_52%2C$y_0/t_crop_custom/q_86%2Cf_auto/119efc1954d6993a9e5d39d77daf8eabe2d4670c")
WA Police acting Commissioner Col Blanch said mobile phone data and CCTV footage of a car entering Carnarvon the night Cleo vanished led police to raid Mr Kelly’s house.
![23ece95b2b05718f55368b442e53121d66645e36"](https://static.ffx.io/images/$zoom_0.199%2C$multiply_1.0582%2C$ratio_1.5%2C$width_756%2C$x_0%2C$y_0/t_crop_custom/q_86%2Cf_auto/23ece95b2b05718f55368b442e53121d66645e36")
Cleo Smith on Thursday with her mother Ellie.CREDIT:AAP
It followed reports from two witnesses of a vehicle turning south off the road that leads to the remote Quobba blowholes campsite where Cleo was snatched around 3am on October 16.
“The information acted on from [Tuesday] night onwards, starts out really small and quickly snowballs,” he said.
“There were car movements, there were phone movements ... the jigsaw fit the puzzle.
“But it took really good intelligence analysts and detectives and specialists to look at all that information, put it together and go, ‘You know what, that doesn’t seem right to me, I’ve been doing this a long time, and we’re going to act on it’. And that’s how we get results.”
Forensic officers have spent the past two days combing Mr Kelly’s property, which included a grey car parked in the carport that had no number plate.
More than 140 police officers were assigned to Cleo’s case, with 63 working full time out of Carnarvon.
By Heather McNeill and Peter de Kruijff
November 4, 2021 — 7.41pm
The man accused of abducting four-year-old Cleo Smith from her family tent and holding her captive for 18 days had a doll room inside his house.
Terence Darrell Kelly, 36, was arrested by WA Police after detectives raided his locked Tonkin Crescent home at 12.46am on Wednesday local time and found the little girl alone inside a bedroom.
Terence Kelly.
A day later he was charged with child abduction and appeared before Carnarvon Magistrates Court.
WA Police Detective Senior Sergeant Cameron Blaine said Cleo was found in physically good health in a bedroom inside Mr Kelly’s house.
“The lights were on and she was playing with toys, I think that’s about all I want to say. This is still a matter that needs to go before the courts. There’s certain aspects about what we saw that is going to be evidence,” he said.
Detectives declined to comment on whether dolls were found inside the house, with the head of Taskforce Rodia, Superintendent Rod Wilde, telling journalists he “didn’t want to go into that”.
Terence Kelly.
Since his arrest, video has emerged of Mr Kelly recording himself inside a room filled with dozens of dolls, some still in their packaging.
The man also uploaded photos to Facebook in April 2020 taking a doll for a car drive, captioning the post, “I love taking my dolls for drive arounds and doing their hair and taking selfies in public”.
In another post dated July 2020, Mr Kelly is pictured wearing a Bratz doll shirt and holding a doll in each hand, commenting, “Nothing beats chilling at home with my Bratz dolls”.
A Carnarvon Toyworld worker said the store had sold several dolls to the man over the years which they would gift wrap.
She did not know when the last time was he had visited the store but was checking CCTV footage which went as far back as October 18 to provide to police.
Several times during his court appearance, Mr Kelly asked journalists in the public gallery what they were staring at, and told them when he got out, he would come for them.
He was remanded in custody and is due to appear in court again on December 6.
Neighbours described Mr Kelly as a loner who lived in his public housing property by himself. In recent days, residents said he had been coming and going from the house with groceries.
“He’s been acting a bit strange lately, he would get in his car drive that fast,” one neighbour said.
“He doesn’t have his dog out the front, he had his dog out the back, but for all this week he had his dog out the front and he’s been acting like weird.”
Shanika Dickerson, who was staying two homes down, said she was relieved Cleo had been found.
“It’s very scary, this is where we live and young kids live here,” she said.
Another neighbour spoke of borrowing a lawnmower on Monday from Mr Kelly and how he was acting ‘normal’.
“He’d say hello and ask for a smoke,” she said.
“I didn’t think he would be like that but nobody thought that.”
WA Police acting Commissioner Col Blanch said mobile phone data and CCTV footage of a car entering Carnarvon the night Cleo vanished led police to raid Mr Kelly’s house.
Cleo Smith on Thursday with her mother Ellie.CREDIT:AAP
It followed reports from two witnesses of a vehicle turning south off the road that leads to the remote Quobba blowholes campsite where Cleo was snatched around 3am on October 16.
“The information acted on from [Tuesday] night onwards, starts out really small and quickly snowballs,” he said.
“There were car movements, there were phone movements ... the jigsaw fit the puzzle.
“But it took really good intelligence analysts and detectives and specialists to look at all that information, put it together and go, ‘You know what, that doesn’t seem right to me, I’ve been doing this a long time, and we’re going to act on it’. And that’s how we get results.”
Forensic officers have spent the past two days combing Mr Kelly’s property, which included a grey car parked in the carport that had no number plate.
More than 140 police officers were assigned to Cleo’s case, with 63 working full time out of Carnarvon.
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