Stacey Klimovitch murder: jury reaches verdict in Stockton hitman case

CANBERRA man Jason Paul Hawkins has been found guilty of murdering Stockton grandmother Stacey Klimovitch, a jury left with no doubt he was the hitman who shot her at her front door in June, 2021.

Mrs Klimovitch's family, who packed one side of Newcastle Supreme Court on Wednesday morning, exploded with emotion as the verdict was read while Hawkins just shook his head.

Mrs Klimovitch was the victim of a "targeted" and "premeditated" killing and was shot once in the chest at close range with a shotgun in Queen Street about 8pm on June 9, 2021.

Stacey Klimovitch was shot dead at her front door over an ugly dispute with her former son-in-law.

Hawkins, 48, had spent the last three weeks on trial in Newcastle Supreme Court accused of being the man who executed Mrs Klimovitch and did the bidding of her former son-in-law Stuart Campbell, who had organised the killing over an ugly dispute with the 61-year-old swimming teacher.

Hawkins becomes the second man convicted over the shooting, with 65-year-old former Nomads bikie Stephen John Garland last month found guilty of manslaughter.

Garland, who drove the hitman to and from Stockton on the night of the shooting, was found not guilty of murder after a jury found he did not know about the murder plot.

Campbell, a drug dealer who had the motive and organised the other two men to help kill Mrs Klimovitch, was charged with murder but died before facing trial.

Jason Hawkins was on Wednesday morning found guilty of murdering Stacey Klimovitch at Stockton in June, 2021.

Hawkins and Garland will be sentenced in February.

Full story to come.