‘I’ve been with police’: Messages from accused Zumba instructor killer revealed

Before she was allegedly killed by her Zumba instructor boyfriend, Priscilla Brooten had written pages of her thoughts in a notebook, later seized by detectives, which detailed allegations of a beating and arguments, a jury has heard.

Brooten, a US citizen, disappeared in 2018 from her Brisbane home she shared with her boyfriend, Mark Sheridan Waden. Her body was never found.

Waden, who she had met through Zumba classes in 2016, is now facing a Supreme Court trial over her alleged murder. He has pleaded not guilty.

The prosecution case is that Waden killed Brooten following an argument, possibly disposed of her body in a tip, then gave her belongings to his new girlfriend.

On Friday, the jury heard police seized multiple items from the Bracken Ridge home in Brisbane’s north, including the notebook, a laptop and a wheelie bin.

Crown Prosecutor Andrew Walklate read to the jury from the green A4 notebook.

Many entries did not specify what person they were referring to, including one that read: “Remember when you beat the shit out of me.”

“You gave me excuses ... I hate you for what you did to me. I tried to kill myself. You don’t care. You hit me, you don’t care. I have nothing now. Everything I had, everything believed was just lies.

Other sections of the notebook included: “He claims he fears for his life, that I will stab him while he is sleeping. He chooses to sleep next to me. I have never threatened to kill, stab or physically hurt him. Why would I kill or stab him?

“According to him, I have threatened to ruin his life by exposing his weed growing and selling operation and publishing my injuries he gave me after almost killing me on Facebook.

“Mark is trying to put all this on me. Yes, it may appear he is taking responsibility and apologising but his facts regarding my mental health are incorrect. It is an attempt to save himself, to give himself an out or to try and make me appear crazier than I am.”

The notes included explanations that she was not crazy, but mentally unwell.

Brooten wrote: “He claims I am uncontrollable, but doesn’t explain what that entails. It means I cry and cry and cry. I make myself more upset, I never threaten to hurt him.”

She wrote about arguments and how she would call and text: “He calls back screaming so loud I cannot understand him.”

Brooten detailed her struggles with her mental health, saying it was normal to seek help. “It is hard to face, to realise, to see that I am this way.”

“I will not continually beat myself up over this … while I am sorry I cannot change what I did or didn’t do but I’m not going