Australia: Bashed granny's bail fury

But the thug is classed as a black so gets privileged treatment



A GREAT-grandmother savagely bashed in her bed and left for dead by a burglar wants to know why her alleged attacker has been granted bail. "It stinks. The justice system bloody stinks," 75-year-old Barbara Durea said. "It's a damn disgrace. I'm the one suffering, and (the alleged offender is) out there as free as a bird. "I'm very upset about that. If he's done the crime, he's got to pay for it."

Ashley Wayne Brooks, 18, was bailed on his own undertaking by Gippsland magistrate John Dugdale, and is living at an Aboriginal youth services hostel in Northcote as a condition of his bail. Mr Brooks was freed despite two previous failures to answer bail and a previous breach of a court undertaking relating to a charge of affray.

Mrs Durea is recovering from injuries that left her critically ill in an intensive care unit for 12 days. She was left lying unconscious in a pool of blood after being attacked in the middle of the night by a burglar who broke into her Housing Ministry flat in Traralgon. Mrs Durea said she could not remember the attack and did not know how long she had lain unconscious. "All I know is, my bedroom was a bloodbath," she said. "If you're not safe in your own bed, where are you safe? "Why didn't he just take the money and leave me? I didn't see him, but the pain -- I remember him by the pain."

Mrs Durea suffered a broken nose, a dislocated jaw, serious throat and eye injuries, and severe bruising. She was flown to Melbourne in a helicopter ambulance after the attack on March 17. Mrs Durea is still in pain eight weeks later, but says what hurts most is the way her alleged attacker has been treated by the law. She said she could not understand why the man charged with her assault had been released on bail.

Mr Brooks was arrested by Morwell police on March 20, aboard the last train from Traralgon to Melbourne. He was refused bail by a justice of the peace that night because of doubts over Mrs Durea's condition, and did not apply for bail in the Latrobe Valley Magistrates' Court next day. Mr Dugdale, the senior magistrate, granted bail on April 27 because of Mr Brooks' youth. [At age 18 the thug is legally and physically a man]

A police prosecutor opposed the bail bid by an Aboriginal Legal Service barrister from Melbourne. Sen-Det Dean Ludekens, of Morwell CIU, told the court Mr Brooks had made admissions about the burglary and assault and had failed to answer bail previously.

Mr Dugdale ordered Mr Brooks to live at the Northcote hostel and obey lawful directions of staff. He imposed bail conditions of a 10pm-7am curfew, a ban on entering Gippsland, and ordered Mr Brooks to abstain from alcohol and drugs. Mr Brooks is due back in court on June 12.

Mrs Durea, who has eight grandchildren and 11 great-grandchildren, said her first clear recollection after the attack was of one of her grandsons kneeling, crying, beside her hospital bed. Mrs Durea said her hands were black with bruises, injuries police believe she sustained as she fought back, trying to defend herself. She said a lens in her left eye was smashed, her arms, legs and stomach were also bruised, and she had "a huge cauliflower ear".

Mrs Durea went to bed about 9 the night she was attacked. She rang one of her children about 4.15am to raise the alarm. Daughter Christina Shephard said she'd feared her mother might not survive. "I just can't describe how shocked I was by the way she looked," Ms Shephard said. "I thought she'd been bashed with some kind of weapon. It was horrific, the state she was in."

Ms Shephard said her mother, who had been very independent, doing everything for herself, moved into the flat just before last Christmas. "She'd just got herself all settled and organised. She was happy as a pig in mud, and then this happened. "Now, she's too petrified to go anywhere near the place -- not that we'd let her."

Mrs Durea was in the intensive care unit at Royal Melbourne Hospital for more than a week, and has been back twice since then for operations on her nose and eye. She said she would now move into a nursing home with her invalid husband, Kevin. "I think I'll be safe there," Mrs Durea said.

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