While Damien Dickie waited anxiously at his dad's empty homestead, just days after he was last seen, a car pulled up outside the front gate.
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But it wasn't his missing father who got out.
"The person was similar to the person sitting over there ... very similar," Damien told the court, gesturing to where 51-year-old accused killer Kylie So sat in the dock, flanked by an interpreter and correctional officers.
So is alleged to have killed retired Elong Elong farmer Robert Dickie sometime between June 14, 2016, when he was last seen by someone other than the accused, and June 16, 2016, when he was reported missing.
Mr Dickie had invited So to fly over from her home in New Zealand to stay at his off-grid property, professing his "true love" for her.
Crown prosecutor Liam Shaw argues So and Mr Dickie had a fight which resulted in his death when he tried to kick her out of his home only a few days after she arrived.
'He needs to come home, there's people worried about him'
Giving evidence before the NSW Supreme Court in Dubbo, Damien - the fourth of Mr Dickie's seven children - said he drove to his father's home from Cessnock to check on him on June 16 when his aunt said she was unable to reach him by phone.
When Damien and his then-girlfriend entered the property, there was no sign of anyone inside or outside of the house and he noticed all the animals were running around.
The pair decided to wait inside the house for police to arrive later that evening.
But before they came someone else showed up.
So, who had spent the day shopping in Dubbo, had hitched a ride back to the house with the same Dunedoo man who drove her into town that morning. Earlier, the driver told the court So seemed "wary" and said she didn't know who the people in the house were.
So then climbed the fence and made her way up the driveway towards the house where Damien said he intercepted her and asked who she was.
"She said she was Bob's wife and she had been married to him for six years," Damien told the court.
Damien told So he was Mr Dickie's neighbour and asked where he was.
"She said 'Bob's not coming home' and I said 'yes he is, he needs to come home, there's people worried about him'," Damien continued, becoming emotional on the stand.
"She said he'd gone to a party and he wouldn't be back for a couple of days. She said a couple of blokes picked him up from the side of the house.
"She wasn't very with it ... she was acting a bit weird, very tired looking."
Damien said he doubted So's story as his father was not the type to go to parties and was "very security conscious" and would "never" leave someone at home when he wasn't there.
When police eventually arrived Damien had no further conversations with So.
'I thought the dogs ate my father'
Damien told the court when he looked around the property earlier that day he hadn't noticed anything unusual except a syringe at the front gate and a strong smell of "perfume" inside the house.
The court earlier heard the syringe was forensically tested and was found to have the DNA of another woman who had slept with Mr Dickie in exchange for money to buy drugs with.
He also noted the usually-aggressive pitbulls on the property, which Mr Dickie bred, were more timid and "fat" looking than usual.
However, defence counsel Ian Nash said Damien's comment about the dogs looking fat differed from the original statement he gave to police on June 19, 2016 where he had only mentioned one dog looked pregnant.
"You've had a lot of time to think about it," Mr Nash said.
But Damien lashed back.
"I've also got a son that's missing and deceased who I was focused on at the time," he said.
"I told the police and they told me not to think of it... I thought the dogs ate my father ... an evil person had done it."
Mr Nash then suggested some of the inconsistencies in what So said about her relationship with Mr Dickie and where he was going on the evening he disappeared could be due to So not having English as her first language.
Pressed on whether he heard his then-girlfriend asking So questions to clarify what she had meant, Damien said he didn't.
"I was worried about my dad," he said.
No trace of the body has ever been found
Despite extensive searches of Mr Dickie's property and neighbouring properties - including dives into dams and draining septic tanks - no trace of his body has ever been found.
On day six of the trial, the court heard the theory about animals eating Mr Dickie's body had been explored but no physical evidence had been found.
"The hurdle the crown has in relation to those in particular is that there has been an extensive search and no bones or teeth or anything were found," Mr Shaw told presiding judge Justice Mark Ierace.
"The Crown doesn't have a particularly singular way to establish the disappearance of the body."
"We cannot say exactly how the body was disposed of."
The trial of Kylie So will continue at the NSW Supreme Court in Dubbo on Monday, August 28.
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