Dane McNeill's parents call for life sentence for son's murderers
December 2 2016
'The parents of murdered Sydney man Dane McNeill have described how hopeless they felt trying to handle their son's spiralling ice addiction which eventually led him into his killers' hands.
Peter and Rebecca McNeill said they were racked by guilt that they had not been able to protect their eldest son, who was transformed into someone they did not recognise once he started smoking ice.
Mr McNeill, 20, was beaten, drugged and stabbed during a three-day long ordeal before his body was stuffed into a suitcase and set on fire in a reserve in Picnic Point in July 2014.
Brothers Azam Charbaji, 26, and Haysem, 24, were found guilty of his murder in October, while Haysem's then girlfriend, Lexy May Jamieson, 26, was found guilty of being an accessory after the fact to murder.
'"We were told that we could not see our son after his death because he was so burnt it was horrific and it was in our best interest to remember him for who he was.
"What monsters would do this to another human?"'
In an emotional sentencing hearing in the NSW Supreme Court on Friday, Mr and Mrs McNeill looked their son's killers in the eyes and called for them to be jailed for life.
"These cowards took my son's life and then took away the chance to say goodbye to him by burning his body," Mr McNeill said.'
In her submission, Crown prosecutor Margaret Cunneen, SC, argued that the circumstances of the murder were "brutal, callous and horrific" and deserved a heavy sentence at the upper end of the range.
The Charbaji brothers had a handful of supporters in court, with Ms Jameson, who remains on bail, turning up towards the end and blowing them kisses across the courtroom.
Another sentencing hearing will take place later this month, with Justice Stephen Rothman due to sentence all three together on December 20. '
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