Katherine Knight’s case remains one of the most disturbing crimes in Australian history. Before the murder, her relationship with John Price had been filled with volatility, breakups, and repeated warnings from friends and authorities about her escalating behavior. Despite this, Price allowed her back into his home shortly before the tragedy, hoping to keep the peace.

In February 2000, tensions between the two reached a breaking point. Price expressed fear for his safety, telling coworkers that Knight had become unpredictable and dangerous. He even attempted to end the relationship, but her threats and emotional manipulation made it difficult for him to fully distance himself. Those who knew him later said he seemed exhausted and anxious in the final days of his life.

One night, after another argument, Knight attacked Price in his own home. The assault was brutal and fatal, shocking even seasoned investigators. What followed was behavior that authorities later described as “beyond comprehension,” revealing the extent of Knight’s psychological instability and her capacity for extreme cruelty.

When police entered the home the next morning, the scene was unlike anything they had encountered before. Knight had staged parts of the house and prepared food using Price’s remains, seemingly intending to serve it to his family. This discovery stunned the entire community and quickly became one of the most infamous criminal cases the country had ever seen.

Katherine Knight was arrested, declared fit to stand trial, and ultimately became the first woman in Australia sentenced to life imprisonment without the possibility of parole. Her case is frequently cited in discussions of domestic violence, mental illness, and the warning signs that often precede extreme acts. Even decades later, it continues to serve as a grim reminder of how dangerous an unchecked spiral of abuse, obsession, and rage can become.

 
 

 

 Our souls sparkle brightly with Creative Energy, our beings are as complex as the universe, and at the same time we help make up a higher Body of Energy.

She lay in her coffin in 1903 Deadwood, South Dakota, the wild woman finally still after a lifetime spent outrunning bullets, whiskey, and grief. Martha Jane Cannary — the same girl who rode dispatch through blizzards, who hauled wounded soldiers from ambushes, who drank harder than most men could dream — looked almost gentle under the lamplight. Folks crowded the small parlor, whispering stories of the chaos she carried and the kindness she never bragged about. They said you could measure a frontier town by how many times Calamity Jane saved it.

Even in death, her rough edges clung to her like dust from the plains she’d crossed a thousand times. She’d ridden for the Army, scouted for wagon trains, and nursed the sick when cholera swept through Deadwood. But beneath all that grit lived a woman chewed up by loneliness — burying friends, burying children, burying the parts of herself she never talked about. She fought through every loss, every winter, every heartbreak with the same ferocity she used to face down gunfire. Survival was her trade long before fame caught her name.

When they closed the lid, the town fell quiet in a way it hadn’t in years. They laid her beside Wild Bill Hickok, honoring the bond she swore was real, whether the world believed her or not. And as the night wind swept over Mount Moriah Cemetery, one question hung in the cold Dakota air: after a life lived on the edge of danger and mercy, what peace finally found Calamity Jane?

 

“In our world," said Eustace, "a star is a huge ball of flaming gas." Even in your world, my son, that is not what a star is, but only what it is made of.” ― C.S. Lewis T