A former NSW deputy mayor has thanked his lawyers after three years was cut from his jail sentence for gunning down his elderly mother.
Paul Anthony Cohrs, who once served on the Wentworth Shire council, was jailed for 30 years in October 2024 for the shotgun murder of Bette Cohrs-Schulz, 81, almost six years earlier in Red Cliffs.
The 66-year-old appealed his conviction and sentence in Victoria’s Court of Appeal last week, returning to court on Thursday morning to learn he had a mixed outcome.
Sporting prison greens, Cohrs was beamed into the courtroom over a video link as Justice Stephen McLeish delivered the court’s judgment.
Cohrs’ bid to overturn his conviction was rejected but his appeal against sentence was allowed, and the judges resentenced him to 27 years in prison.
With almost 7½ years in prison under his belt, this means Cohrs will first become eligible for parole three years earlier in late 2038.
Cohrs was found guilty of Ms Cohrs-Schulz’s murder after a jury rejected his defence of mental impairment in May 2024 following a trial.
He admitted he killed her but, after two psychiatrists found he was suffering a delusional disorder at the time, argued he did not know what he’d done was wrong.
The jury heard at the time of Ms Cohrs-Schulz’s murder, Cohrs had been locked in a years-long dispute with his brother Raymond Cohrs, believing Raymond wanted to force him out of the successful family business, was embezzling funds and was responsible for the death of their father.
He believed their mother, Ms Cohrs-Schultz, had taken his brother’s side and was complicit in her husband’s death.
On October 30, 2018, Cohrs drove to Lake Victoria Station, in New South Wales, where he found Raymond and a real estate agent Michael Fernandez.
He shot his brother dead with a 12-gague shotgun and handcuffed Mr Fernandez inside a shed.
Cohrs then drove 110km back across the border to Ms Cohrs-Schulz’s home in Victoria and shot her dead after placing his grandson, whom she was looking after, in a bathroom.
He then drove to a property in NSW, calling police and family members along the way to confess, before shooting himself in the chest when officers arrived.
“I can’t believe I’m not dead,” he told them as they provided first aid.
“I’ve just killed my brother and my mother … they were two of the most evilest people in the world.”
Handing down her sentence, Justice Taylor said Cohrs was not to be punished for killing Raymond as it occurred in another jurisdiction, but noted his death “did not give you pause for thought”.
She found Cohrs’ actions in killing his mother were “very grave” and motivated by anger her perceived support of his brother, but that the offending was inextricably linked to his delusional disorder and may not have occurred if he was well.
In their judgment on the appeal, three Court of Appeal judges; Justice McLeish, Justice Stephen Kaye and Justice Michael O’Connell, found the three decade sentence for Cohrs was “materially higher” than other comparable cases.
They found Justice Taylor had correctly accepted that Cohrs’ disorder reduced his moral capability for the murder but that his sentence was “manifestly excessive” because it was outside the sentencing range open to the judge.
Cohrs’ sentence was set aside and the three judges instead imposed a 27-year prison term, with a non-parole period of 20 years.
The convicted killer was overheard thanking his lawyers after the court was adjourned.
