‘They’re monsters’: teen’s murderers get life in prison
Aaron Bunch |
A murdered Indigenous teenager’s heartbroken mother has expressed her fury at his killers after two of his assailants were handed life sentences.
Cassius Turvey, a Noongar Yamatji boy, died in hospital 10 days after he was deliberately struck to the head in Perth’s eastern suburbs on October 13, 2022.
Jack Steven James Brearley, 24, and Brodie Lee Palmer, 30, were convicted in May of murdering the 15-year-old after a 12-week trial.
They were each sentenced on Friday to life imprisonment, with Brearley eligible for parole after serving 22 years and Palmer after serving 18 years.
Mitchell Colin Forth, 27, who also stood trial in the West Australian Supreme Court for the murder of Cassius and was found guilty of manslaughter, was sentenced to 12 years. He will be eligible for parole after serving 10 years.
Cassius’s mother, Mechelle Turvey, said she was satisfied with the sentences handed to the three men as she vented her frustration and anger over the death of her son.
“I wish I was a bit younger and had better knees so I could have jumped that f**king dock,” she said outside the court on Friday.
“They’re all freaking monsters.
“No mother should have to visit the grave of a 15-year-old innocent child who did absolutely nothing.”
The sentences were met with applause from dozens of supporters inside the court, while verbal abuse was directed at the killers.
“First thing that come to mind after Jack Brearley was sentenced was how he said my son had learned his lesson after he had bashed him in the bush,” Ms Turvey said.
“He learned a life lesson now.”
Aleesha Louise Gilmore, 23, also stood trial but was acquitted of a murder charge.
Cassius was with fellow students who caught a bus to parklands to watch a fight being talked about on social media.
Brearley, Forth and Palmer intercepted them near the field and Cassius and other “terrified school kids” fled into nearby bushland.
It was there that Brearley caught up with him, the trial heard, before the teen was knocked to the ground and hit in the head with a metal pole.
Cassius was struck at least twice, the impact splitting his ear in half and causing bleeding in his brain.
The attack on Cassius followed a complex series of events that started on October 9 when Forth, Brearley, Gilmore and another man who was tried on lesser charges, Ethan Robert MacKenzie, 21, “snatched two kids off the street” before punching, kicking and stabbing one of them.
Four days later, Brearley and his co-accused allegedly armed themselves with metal poles pulled from shopping trolleys before climbing into Palmer’s ute and driving off to search for youths before they came across Cassius.
In sentencing, Chief Justice Peter Quinlan said the killers had cut Cassius’s life short in a horrendous and vengeful act of aggression, violence and brutality.
“Cassius Turvey was robbed of his life and of his promise … all because you killed him, Mr Brearley,” he said.
Brearley had a complete lack of remorse and had lied throughout the trial, falsely accusing Cassius of knifing him and attempting to blame an innocent man for the killing, Justice Quinlan said.
“Mr Brearley, you were the person who killed Cassius Turvey in that fit of rage and brutality,” he said.
“You went onto that field looking for someone, anyone to inflict serious injury on, and you carried out that intention with unflinching violence.
“While you did not intend to kill Cassius Turvey, your attack was persistent and sustained and only stopped by the arrival of Mr Palmer.”
Palmer and Forth were at the scene and found to have a common purpose.
The five defendants variously faced 20 charges over the events of October 9 and 13.
The jury found them guilty of all except Gilmore’s murder charge and a theft charge faced by Brearley.
Gilmore was sentenced to one year and three months, conditionally suspended for 24 months.
MacKenzie received two years and six months and will be eligible for parole in November.
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AAP
