The sister of Steven Donaldson revealed murder accused Tasmin Glass urged the family to “stay strong” in a message sent hours after his charred body was discovered at an Angus beauty spot.
Mr Donaldson’s younger sister Lori Robertson was giving evidence on a dramatic opening day of evidence in the trial of 20-year-old Glass and 24-year-olds Steven Dickie and Callum Davidson, all of Kirriemuir, at the High Court in Edinburgh.
Ms Robertson said the last time she had seen her brother was the evening before his body was found at Loch of Kinnordy nature reserve car park.
The court heard it later emerged Mr Donaldson, 27, may have been setting off for a planned meeting with his girlfriend, Glass, to which she said he never turned up.
Ms Robertson said she had been staying at her parents’ home in June last year with her young children. Mr Donaldson also lived there.
She said her brother worked away for long periods, earning a “good salary” and had properties in Arbroath and Aberdeen which he rented out.
On the evening of June 6, Ms Robertson said Mr Donaldson had been playing in the garden with one of her children and was “fine, his usual self”.
“I remember Steven waving up and that was the last time I saw him,” she tearfully told the jury.
Ms Robertson was asked if she had met her brother’s girlfriend at the family home and said she had seen Glass there “a few times”, having first met her in early 2018.
On the afternoon of June 7, a friend of Steven’s came to the family home to say no one had heard of him since the previous day, and that they were aware from the news a body had been found in Angus.
Ms Robertson said: “I spoke to the police.
“Police told me that if I thought he was heading towards Kirrie and was going to meet Tasmin Glass, I should contact her and get her details.”
Ms Robertson made contact through Facebook Messenger that afternoon, telling the court: “She (Glass) told me that she had arranged to meet him and he didn’t turn up.”
The witness said Glass had told Mr Donaldson not to come to her house, but go somewhere else. When she got there, he was not there, she had said.
In another message later that day, Glass said: “OK, love you all, please stay strong.”
Ms Robertson told the court she subsequently went to identify her brother’s body.
The charge faced by all three accused – Tasmin Glass, Steven Dickie and Callum Davidson – alleges that between June 6 and 7 last year, at the Peter Pan playpark, Kirriemuir, and Loch of Kinnordy nature reserve car park, they assaulted Mr Donaldson and arranged to meet him with the intention of assaulting him.
Once there, they are alleged to have repeatedly struck him on the head and body with unknown instruments whereby he was incapacitated, and thereafter took him to Loch of Kinnordy where they repeatedly struck him on the head and body with a knife and baseball bat or similar instruments, repeatedly struck him on the head and neck with an unknown heavy bladed instrument and set fire to him and his motor vehicle, registration S73 VED, and murdered him.
Dickie and Davidson also face four other charges which include behaving in a threatening manner on two occasions, putting a kitten in a bag and assaulting the animal, staring at a woman and kicking her car, with Dickie accused of assaulting a woman by seizing her by the neck.
The three deny all the charges.
The trial continues.
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