A DNA-covered lighter allegedly left behind near a smouldering crime scene, a burned shoe and CCTV ignorance.
Police believe the blunders formed part of a bumbling evidence trail that led them straight to those allegedly linked to Queensland mother Sabrina Bremer's murder.
The law caught up with Joshua Mundy, 28, Rachel Wheatley, 27, and Jade Rodney Nielsen, 38, this week after homicide detectives in two states allege they carefully retraced the trio's uncovered tracks.
Those tracks are alleged to have first been uncovered on the side of an isolated road at Dulguigan, near Tweed Heads, in northern NSW.
A motorist found mother-of-two Ms Bremer's burning body on Thursday, August 18, a day after her teenage daughter reported her missing in Logan in Queensland.
Police say those responsible for setting Ms Bremer's body alight left the fire source behind.
Police will allege they found a lighter, complete with DNA traces, near the crime scene's charred earth, Fairfax Media understands.
Investigators believe those behind the fire early on that Thursday morning were burned in the process and may have dropped the lighter in a panic.
Officers also recovered a burned shoe from a garbage bin that a member of the public came across and reported to police.
Four days later, hours after police issued a media release asking for information about Ms Bremer's missing white Camry sedan, CCTV emerged showing a man leaving it on a suburban street in Woodridge.
The footage, shown on TV news bulletins, clearly captured the man getting out of the vehicle, looking in the window before strolling away.
The man was not one of the three charged on Thursday over Ms Bremer's death however detectives warned the investigation was not over.
Mundy, from Kingston, and Wheatley, from Woodridge, were both charged with murder and interfering with a corpse while Nielsen, from Wynnum, was charged with bring an accessory after the fact to murder.
All three appeared in court in Queensland on Thursday and were formally refused bail.
Tensions boiled over outside Beenleigh Magistrates Court with some of Ms Bremer's relatives clashing with a waiting media pack.
Most of the slain mother's supporters declined to comment, except one woman who told reporters they wanted "justice for Sabrina".
Ms Bremer was last seen at Logan Police Station on August 15, after she was arrested on an outstanding warrant for failing to show up at court on drug charges.
The 34-year-old left the police station south of Brisbane that night and called a man she lived with to tell him she was coming home.
She never showed up but her daughter spoke to her on the phone the following day.
Police allege Ms Bremer was murdered on August 16 before her body was transported more than 100km south to Pollards Road in Dulguigan.
The story Lighter allegedly left behind at smoldering crime scene following Sabrina Bremer's death first appeared on The Sydney Morning Herald.