Mum tells murder trial of final phone call to daughter

When Ellie Price spoke to her mother for the final time, her boyfriend was in the background.

Less than 24 hours later Ricardo Barbaro had allegedly stabbed the 26-year-old to death and went on the run.

Barbaro, 36, has denied he killed Ms Price and faced the first day of a murder trial on Tuesday in front of 14 jurors.

The mother-of-one was found on May 4, 2020, in a blood-soaked South Melbourne flat.

Police found Ms Price on the floor of her bedroom during a welfare check, after her mother Tracey Gangell became worried her daughter had not returned her calls.

She told the Supreme Court jury she spoke to her daughter on April 28, the day before it's alleged Barbaro killed her. She said Barbaro was present during the 12-minute Facebook video call.

The on-off couple had spent the day together, before both attending a GP appointment in the evening.

"Just a normal conversation. She seemed OK," Ms Gangell said about the call.

She would never speak to her daughter again. In the following days she sent several text messages and tried calling, but did not hear back.

"If you don't ring me tomorrow, I'm calling the police," one of Ms Gangell's final texts said.

She called triple zero on May 4. Police found Ms Price with six stab wounds, including an 8cm long cut across her neck and a 7cm deep cut to her back, prosecutor Patrick Bourke SC told the jury.

He alleged Barbaro's DNA was found in blood stains across the apartment, including at the bottom of the stairs, and said his finger print was found on a mirror in her bedroom.

"His intention was to kill her or to cause her really serious injury," Mr Bourke said.

He accused Barbaro of stabbing Ms Price in the early hours of April 29, before getting into her Mercedes Benz and leaving about 4.30am.

The prosecutor said Barbaro was seen on CCTV meeting up with his father, Joe Barbaro, in Williamstown later that morning. 

The father and son were also seen at Diggers Rest, where Mr Bourke alleged Barbaro abandoned the Mercedes. Mr Bourke said Barbaro then hired a van and drove from Victoria to NSW on May 5.

Following an interstate police manhunt, he was arrested in NSW nine days later.

Mr Bourke said there was a history of domestic violence between Barbaro and Ms Price.

He said police were called in November 2019 after Barbaro allegedly punched the windscreen of her car. She told police he had yelled at her about his own children.

Ms Gangell said her daughter told her on a trip home to Tasmania in March 2020 she was planning to come home to stay, and that she wouldn't return to Melbourne "until Rick was out of her life".

Barbaro's barrister Rishi Nathwani said the couple had a "volatile" relationship but questioned if other people she may have met as an exotic dancer were involved in her death.

"He did not cause the death of Ellie Price. That is, he was not the last person to see her alive," he said. 

"Were there any other people who she upset in the world in which she lived who wanted to harm her?"

The trial before Justice Lex Lasry will continue on Wednesday.

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