WEBVTT - Aboriginal boy Cassius Turvey’s murder ‘not about race’ 0:00:04.360 --> 0:00:07.240 From the Australian. Here's what's on the front. I'm Claire Harvey. 0:00:07.280 --> 0:00:14.720 It's Monday, February seventeen. Three foreign born people with criminal 0:00:14.720 --> 0:00:17.960 convictions will be deported to Nauru under a deal struck 0:00:18.000 --> 0:00:21.120 by Immigration Minister Tony Burke. They're part of a group 0:00:21.160 --> 0:00:24.200 the government has been unable to deport or detain after 0:00:24.239 --> 0:00:28.040 a High Court ruling, despite some having committed violent offenses, 0:00:28.240 --> 0:00:31.760 including murder. Now the government's looking for more deals to 0:00:31.880 --> 0:00:39.400 resettle the remaining two hundred and eighty plus people. Anthony 0:00:39.440 --> 0:00:42.279 Alberanezi's approval rating has hit a record low, and a 0:00:42.280 --> 0:00:45.279 majority of voters don't think Labor should be re elected. 0:00:45.760 --> 0:00:49.680 Those newsport figures are exclusively at the Australian dot com 0:00:49.760 --> 0:00:58.120 dou right now. It's a shocking case. A fifteen year 0:00:58.120 --> 0:01:02.240 old na Yamachi boy in his school uniform savagely beaten 0:01:02.320 --> 0:01:07.840 in Perth's suburbs. Cassius Turvy's death was murder according to prosecutors, 0:01:08.000 --> 0:01:11.440 but they say it was not a racially motivated attack. 0:01:12.080 --> 0:01:16.160 Four adults have pleaded not guilty to murdering Cassius in 0:01:16.240 --> 0:01:21.240 twenty twenty two. Today, the huge and complex trial underway 0:01:21.400 --> 0:01:30.520 in Western Australia. On October thirteen, twenty twenty two, Cassius Turvy, 0:01:30.800 --> 0:01:34.880 a fifteen year old schoolboy from Perth's Nunga Yamachi community, 0:01:35.200 --> 0:01:37.640 stepped off a bus with a group of friends and 0:01:37.680 --> 0:01:41.440 began the walk home. Within hours, Cassius would be in 0:01:41.480 --> 0:01:45.839 hospital with lacerations and two brain bleeds. Ten days later 0:01:46.080 --> 0:01:50.840 he was dead. Vigils were held around Australia and overseas 0:01:51.120 --> 0:01:52.919 for cassius. 0:01:52.800 --> 0:02:01.160 One tragic death uniting the community. There were fifteen five 0:02:01.200 --> 0:02:04.280 pits at the ceremony, one to mark each year of 0:02:04.320 --> 0:02:09.880 Cassius Turvey's life. Cassius's mother has called for unity, not division. 0:02:10.400 --> 0:02:17.040 Do not use my son's tragedy as a platform to 0:02:17.120 --> 0:02:18.120 blow your trumpets. 0:02:19.360 --> 0:02:22.519 Now, a ten week trial is underway with four adults 0:02:22.560 --> 0:02:27.279 accused of Cassius's murder. All the accused are non Indigenous, 0:02:27.680 --> 0:02:31.720 but prosecutor Ben Stanwick's sc told the jury their alleged 0:02:31.720 --> 0:02:35.440 attack on an Aboriginal child was not about race. 0:02:36.440 --> 0:02:39.520 The prosecutor's been very clear to the jury that this 0:02:39.720 --> 0:02:41.640 was not a racially motivated crime. 0:02:42.760 --> 0:02:47.040 Page Tailor's, the Australian's Indigenous Affairs correspondent and she's covering 0:02:47.080 --> 0:02:47.519 the trial. 0:02:48.800 --> 0:02:51.240 He has told them you are going to hear some 0:02:51.360 --> 0:02:56.160 racially tainted language, and as an example, he said black this, 0:02:56.520 --> 0:02:59.440 black that. But the jury has been told it will 0:02:59.480 --> 0:03:02.480 be wrong for them to believe that Cassius was targeted 0:03:02.520 --> 0:03:03.720 because he was Aboriginal. 0:03:04.840 --> 0:03:07.920 Stanwicks told the jury there had been claims the incident 0:03:08.000 --> 0:03:11.600 was racially motivated, but anyone who said that had not 0:03:11.760 --> 0:03:15.800 heard or seen one shred of evidence. That message was 0:03:15.800 --> 0:03:18.920 echoed by the defense for at least one of the accused, 0:03:19.200 --> 0:03:23.239 who said any suggestion this was a race crime was misinformed, 0:03:23.480 --> 0:03:28.520 ill advised and misguided. Murder is a Supreme Court matter 0:03:28.680 --> 0:03:31.200 in Western Australia, and this is being heard by the 0:03:31.240 --> 0:03:35.000 States Chief Justice Peter Quinlan. But this trial is being 0:03:35.040 --> 0:03:37.680 heard in one of the state's modern court rooms, in 0:03:37.720 --> 0:03:38.600 the District Court. 0:03:39.440 --> 0:03:42.320 It's a very large room. I can see ten lawyers 0:03:42.440 --> 0:03:46.000 there every day and they are up the front near 0:03:46.040 --> 0:03:50.520 the Chief Justice Peter Quinlan. The five accused in the 0:03:50.600 --> 0:03:53.680 dock facing the jury, who are on the other side 0:03:53.680 --> 0:03:56.560 of the room. The public galleri has been pretty full 0:03:56.560 --> 0:03:59.880 at times, and in fact the public gallery has been 0:04:00.080 --> 0:04:03.000 so full at times that the media goes to a 0:04:03.040 --> 0:04:05.520 media room where they can see what's going on from 0:04:05.520 --> 0:04:06.000 a screen. 0:04:07.400 --> 0:04:11.360 They accused are Jack Briley and Alisia Gilmore, both twenty three, 0:04:11.760 --> 0:04:14.760 along with twenty six year old Mitchell Fourth and twenty 0:04:14.840 --> 0:04:18.520 nine year old Brodie Palmer. Each has their own lawyers, 0:04:18.520 --> 0:04:21.920 and Brodie Palmer is represented by former Commonwealth Attorney General 0:04:22.240 --> 0:04:26.560 Christian Porter. They've all pleaded not guilty, but this case 0:04:26.640 --> 0:04:29.800 is full of twists and turns, including two of the 0:04:29.839 --> 0:04:32.719 men in the dock pointing the finger at one another. 0:04:34.600 --> 0:04:36.800 All the jury has been told the story of how 0:04:36.920 --> 0:04:40.679 Cassiers came to be murdered is remarkable for the way 0:04:40.800 --> 0:04:43.680 that his death was the endpoint of a series of 0:04:43.680 --> 0:04:46.600 events that had absolutely nothing to do with him. 0:04:46.880 --> 0:04:49.880 In fact, according to the Crown, it's a tangled story 0:04:49.920 --> 0:04:52.880 of teenage love and mistaken identity. 0:04:53.960 --> 0:04:57.720 The prosecutor Ben Stanwick sc has told the jury that 0:04:58.600 --> 0:05:03.719 the genesis of this in fact a dispute between Alisha 0:05:03.800 --> 0:05:06.960 Gilmore's much younger brother. He was a fourteen year old 0:05:07.000 --> 0:05:11.080 boy at the time and he was dating a girl 0:05:11.440 --> 0:05:16.360 who had previously dated another boy around the same age, 0:05:16.960 --> 0:05:20.720 and the prosecutors telling the jury keep in mind when 0:05:20.800 --> 0:05:24.279 we say dating. These are fourteen year olds who had 0:05:24.360 --> 0:05:27.240 been seeing each other for a matter of days. So 0:05:27.360 --> 0:05:30.039 there was some tension apparently between this fourteen year old 0:05:30.040 --> 0:05:34.400 boy and the other boy who had previously dated his girlfriend, 0:05:34.800 --> 0:05:38.400 and this tension is alleged to have triggered a series 0:05:38.440 --> 0:05:43.760 of disputes. The boy's older sister is Alisha Gilmore, the 0:05:43.800 --> 0:05:48.479 girlfriend of Jack Brieley, and somehow they became involved in 0:05:48.520 --> 0:05:52.160 this dispute which appears to have got bigger and escalated. 0:05:52.640 --> 0:05:56.080 At one point, Jack Brealley's windows were smashed, and on 0:05:56.120 --> 0:05:59.320 the day that Cassius was attacked, the prosecution says Jack 0:05:59.360 --> 0:06:03.600 Breally was looking looking for revenge for his broken windows. 0:06:05.240 --> 0:06:08.200 The jury heard really had said this. We've used a 0:06:08.240 --> 0:06:10.480 voice actor to bring you the words read aloud to 0:06:10.520 --> 0:06:13.919 the jury, allegedly spoken by Jack Brealley. 0:06:14.880 --> 0:06:16.839 Somebody smashed my car windows. 0:06:17.000 --> 0:06:18.040 They're about to die. 0:06:19.480 --> 0:06:21.680 What the Crown is attempting to show the jury is 0:06:21.720 --> 0:06:26.120 an escalating series of violent events. Four days before Cassius 0:06:26.160 --> 0:06:29.760 was beaten, the Crown says Jack Mitchell fourth and another man, 0:06:29.880 --> 0:06:33.680 Ethan Mackenzie, were involved in an assault on another fifteen 0:06:33.760 --> 0:06:34.440 year old boy. 0:06:36.000 --> 0:06:39.120 They say that three men that's Jack Brealley, Mitchell fourth 0:06:39.440 --> 0:06:45.640 and Ethan mackenzie were driving around looking to find some 0:06:45.720 --> 0:06:48.719 kids who had been making threats online. It was all 0:06:48.800 --> 0:06:52.800 part of what the prosecution said were petty grievances. And 0:06:53.240 --> 0:06:56.280 the prosecution says that on that day, four days before 0:06:56.320 --> 0:07:01.200 Cassius was attacked, they did find a boy, Cassius, age fifteen. 0:07:01.320 --> 0:07:05.200 They weren't looking for Cassius, they were looking for kids 0:07:05.200 --> 0:07:08.640 that had been involved in this dispute, and the prosecution 0:07:08.960 --> 0:07:11.600 claims that they deprived this boy of his liberty. Driving 0:07:11.680 --> 0:07:15.440 around in the car, the jury saw some CCTV footage 0:07:15.520 --> 0:07:19.840 which appeared to show three large figures dragging and kicking 0:07:19.880 --> 0:07:24.200 and attacking this boy, and the prosecution says, that's Jack Breeley, 0:07:24.320 --> 0:07:28.640 that's Mitchell fourth, and that's Ethan McKenzie delivering some rough 0:07:28.840 --> 0:07:30.400 justice onto this child. 0:07:31.400 --> 0:07:34.760 And that's when someone tried to intervene a local man 0:07:34.800 --> 0:07:37.440 who saw this alleged attack unfolding. 0:07:38.520 --> 0:07:41.240 The CCTV that was played to the jury shows in 0:07:41.280 --> 0:07:43.040 the middle of this scene, a sixty eight year old 0:07:43.080 --> 0:07:45.680 man comes out of his own home. He sees what's 0:07:45.760 --> 0:07:49.640 going on, and his name's Reginald Burgess. The jury has 0:07:49.680 --> 0:07:52.880 been told and Reginald Burgess says to this group of 0:07:52.960 --> 0:07:56.200 men who are attacking a child, get out of here, police, 0:07:56.960 --> 0:07:59.600 and you can hear a male voice saying back to 0:07:59.640 --> 0:08:03.120 mister Burgess, get out of it, dog walk away. 0:08:03.800 --> 0:08:06.360 The Crown says, at some point during this alleged attack, 0:08:06.440 --> 0:08:09.640 the group realized they'd got the wrong kid, that whomever 0:08:09.680 --> 0:08:11.720 they were looking for it wasn't him. 0:08:12.280 --> 0:08:15.760 This kid had nothing to do with the group they 0:08:15.800 --> 0:08:20.239 were looking for, and they allegedly took him home, cleaned 0:08:20.280 --> 0:08:23.760 him up a bit, and gave him a Nintendo switch 0:08:23.800 --> 0:08:26.160 and a pair of shoes and tried to smooth things over. 0:08:27.240 --> 0:08:30.080 Ethan Mackenzie, Jack Breally, and Mitchell Fourth are accused of 0:08:30.080 --> 0:08:34.439 assaulting this boy, and Brealley's girlfriend, Alicia Gilmore is accused 0:08:34.520 --> 0:08:38.040 of detaining the boy. They've all pleaded not guilty to 0:08:38.120 --> 0:08:46.199 all charges coming up. After the break, the accused men 0:08:46.440 --> 0:09:03.160 turn on one another. Any trial with five accused is 0:09:03.280 --> 0:09:06.640 going to be complicated and detailed. The jury will have 0:09:06.679 --> 0:09:09.200 to absorb a lot of evidence before they retire to 0:09:09.240 --> 0:09:12.560 deliberate on their verdict, and part of that complexity is 0:09:12.600 --> 0:09:15.920 that four people are charged with Cassius's murder, even though 0:09:15.960 --> 0:09:18.760 only one is alleged to have struck him with a 0:09:18.800 --> 0:09:19.480 metal pole. 0:09:21.240 --> 0:09:24.240 Well, the prosecution says only Jack really struck the blows, 0:09:24.240 --> 0:09:26.320 but the other three are guilty of murder because of 0:09:26.360 --> 0:09:29.640 their roles on the day. They say that his friend 0:09:29.760 --> 0:09:32.360 Mitchell fourth is guilty of murder, and they say that 0:09:32.400 --> 0:09:35.240 Brodie is too, because they were there on the day 0:09:35.760 --> 0:09:39.520 and met the criteria for murder, which does not require 0:09:39.559 --> 0:09:43.200 the person to have actually struck any blows. They need 0:09:43.240 --> 0:09:47.679 to have shared a common purpose. For example, Jack b 0:09:47.720 --> 0:09:51.080 Really was the twenty one year old who had done 0:09:51.080 --> 0:09:54.080 a shift earlier that day at his job as a paver, 0:09:54.840 --> 0:09:58.720 But according to the prosecution, him and his friends and 0:09:58.760 --> 0:10:02.359 his girlfriend at the time line had been involving themselves 0:10:02.720 --> 0:10:07.520 in the disputes of local children, and according to the prosecution, 0:10:07.800 --> 0:10:12.240 Jack was extremely angry that his car windows had been broken. 0:10:12.640 --> 0:10:17.199 This was allegedly part of these ongoing disputes involving local kids, 0:10:17.880 --> 0:10:22.080 and he set out, according to the prosecution, to hurt 0:10:22.160 --> 0:10:26.080 someone that day, and that's when he is alleged to 0:10:26.080 --> 0:10:27.840 have come across this group of children. 0:10:28.800 --> 0:10:32.040 Glimpses of Bally have popped up in witness testimony in 0:10:32.120 --> 0:10:35.520 the trials first few days, with young people telling the 0:10:35.559 --> 0:10:38.600 court they saw brilliant a car pulling up and asking 0:10:38.679 --> 0:10:41.480 where a particular group of young boys was in the 0:10:41.559 --> 0:10:45.280 days before the attack on Cassius. One young witness told 0:10:45.280 --> 0:10:47.560 the court really said to us if we were lying, 0:10:47.880 --> 0:10:52.760 he was going to smash our heads. In what do 0:10:52.760 --> 0:10:54.560 you think will be the defense of Jack Breally? 0:10:55.160 --> 0:10:59.000 So far we've heard from Simon Waters, the very senior 0:10:59.080 --> 0:11:03.160 defense lawyer for mister Breeley, and he has said that 0:11:03.240 --> 0:11:06.200 it was not Jack really at all that hit Cassius 0:11:06.240 --> 0:11:09.080 that day. It was Brody Palmer, who was twenty seven 0:11:09.160 --> 0:11:13.319 at the time, and that man was his friend back then, 0:11:14.000 --> 0:11:17.320 and they're sitting in the dock together pointing the finger 0:11:17.360 --> 0:11:17.960 at one another. 0:11:19.520 --> 0:11:22.920 What has said his client, Jack Brealley, chased Cassius into 0:11:22.960 --> 0:11:26.520 bushland and that Cassius was armed with a knife. What 0:11:26.640 --> 0:11:31.480 has said Cassius slashed Breeley's leg about three times? What 0:11:31.640 --> 0:11:35.600 has said really punched Cassius but then watched as Brody 0:11:35.679 --> 0:11:40.000 Palmer hit Cassius with a metal pole. Breally's case is that, 0:11:40.040 --> 0:11:43.640 in fact, he yelled at Brody Palmer to stop. Brially 0:11:43.679 --> 0:11:47.200 says Palmer then threatened him, saying Brilly and his girlfriend 0:11:47.240 --> 0:11:50.439 would be dead and in body bags if they told 0:11:50.480 --> 0:11:56.040 anyone what had happened. Brody Palmer's represented by Christian Porter, 0:11:56.120 --> 0:11:59.720 the former Attorney General. He's now practicing as a barrister. 0:12:00.559 --> 0:12:03.679 What's Christian Porter saying in Brodie Palmer's defense? 0:12:04.480 --> 0:12:07.319 Will Mister Porter has addressed the jury and he's told 0:12:07.360 --> 0:12:10.680 them this is a tragedy. This is the story of 0:12:10.720 --> 0:12:13.440 a beautiful fifteen year old boy who had his life 0:12:13.480 --> 0:12:17.160 cut short in the most disgusting of circumstances. And then 0:12:17.200 --> 0:12:19.640 he went on to say that his own client had 0:12:19.679 --> 0:12:21.280 behaved appallingly on that day. 0:12:22.440 --> 0:12:25.199 Here's a voice actor reading the words spoken in court 0:12:25.320 --> 0:12:26.280 by Christian Porter. 0:12:27.400 --> 0:12:29.920 At no point will I try to put any lipstick 0:12:29.960 --> 0:12:34.320 on the pig of my client's atrocious behavior. He was 0:12:34.360 --> 0:12:38.040 behaving in an utterly and totally appalling way, but he 0:12:38.080 --> 0:12:40.439 did not strike Cassius Turvy. 0:12:41.280 --> 0:12:44.480 So he's telling the jury that while his client did 0:12:44.520 --> 0:12:47.479 some things that were appalling and there are no excuses, 0:12:47.559 --> 0:12:48.720 he's not guilty of murder. 0:12:49.640 --> 0:12:52.240 Christian Porter said vis of Jack Breally, the man the 0:12:52.280 --> 0:12:54.000 Crown says is the real attacker. 0:12:54.880 --> 0:12:57.920 He is pointing the finger at his former friend to 0:12:58.080 --> 0:13:02.080 save his own skin. This is the desperate act of 0:13:02.160 --> 0:13:05.880 someone who had proved to be a thug, a bully 0:13:06.160 --> 0:13:06.880 and a coward. 0:13:12.600 --> 0:13:15.280 Page Taylors are Indigenous Affairs right now, and she's one 0:13:15.280 --> 0:13:19.120 of the smartest and most diligent journals around. We can't 0:13:19.200 --> 0:13:22.760 do The Australian's type of journalism, fair and fearless without 0:13:22.760 --> 0:13:25.520 the support of our subscribers, so if you like what 0:13:25.640 --> 0:13:29.600 you hear, consider subscribing at the Australian dot com dot 0:13:29.600 --> 0:13:29.920 au