Charges against Aussie mum Maree Crabtree over the death of her daughter are dropped just weeks after she was found not guilty of killing her son with a poisoned smoothie

By REX MARTINICH FOR AUSTRALIAN ASSOCIATED PRESS Published: 05:18, 18 June 2026 | Updated: 05:25, 18 June 2026 A woman accused of killing her two adult children years apart has had a remaining murder charge dropped.  Maree Mavis Crabtree, 59, was found not guilty of murdering her 26-year-old son Jonathan with an overdose of prescription painkillers served in a fruit smoothie on July 19, 2017. The charge against Crabtree for the alleged murder of her 18-year-old daughter Erin in 2012 was on Thursday dropped during a review of the case in Brisbane Supreme Court. At trial regarding her son's death, prosecutors alleged Crabtree killed Jonathan by concealing drugs in his fruit smoothie. Crabtree had pleaded not guilty to murdering him at the family's Maudsland home north of the Gold Coast and to making a fraudulent $125,000 insurance claim on his superannuation. She also denied attempting to murder Jonathan in January 2017. A jury in June found her not guilty of all charges relating to Jonathan after deliberating for nearly two-and-a-half days. The proceedings on charges relating to her daughter Erin had been put on hold for the murder trial over Jonathan's death. Maree Crabtree (pictured) has been found not guilty of killing both her son Jonathan and her daughter Erin Maree (left) accused of killing Jonathon (right) with a drug-spiked smoothie before making a $125,000 insurance claim however the jury found her not guilty on all counts The charge against Crabtree for the alleged murder of her 18-year-old daughter Erin (pictured) in 2012 was dropped on Thursday Crabtree was not present for the Supreme Court review on Thursday when the murder charge was dropped. She was granted bail and released from custody in February 2024.  A judge had questioned the strength of the prosecution case after an earlier attempt to convict her over Jonathan’s death ended in a mistrial.  Crabtree had spent six years on remand at that point. No comments have so far been submitted. Why not be the first to send us your thoughts, or debate this issue live on our message boards. By posting your comment you agree to our house rules. Do you want to automatically post your MailOnline comments to your Facebook Timeline? Your comment will be posted to MailOnline as usual. Do you want to automatically post your MailOnline comments to your Facebook Timeline? Your comment will be posted to MailOnline as usual We will automatically post your comment and a link to the news story to your Facebook timeline at the same time it is posted on MailOnline. To do this we will link your MailOnline account with your Facebook account. We’ll ask you to confirm this for your first post to Facebook. You can choose on each post whether you would like it to be posted to Facebook. Your details from Facebook will be used to provide you with tailored content, marketing and ads in line with our Privacy Policy.