Premier: no power to help
Terrified mum begs for intervention
PREMIER Annastacia Palaszczuk says the story of a Gold Coast woman terrified of being killed by her bikie husband is heartbreaking but she and her Government are powerless to intervene.
The Bulletin yesterday revealed the young mother’s letter to the Premier, where she says she fears she would “be the next Teresa Bradford”, comparing herself to the Pimpama mother stabbed to death in 2017 by a violent and mentally ill husband who was given bail by the courts.
The Premier’s office yesterday detailed the events that followed the woman’s email, saying it was “sent for urgent action to relevant government departments”, including police and prevention of domestic violence.
An offer of a place in a domestic violence shelter was refused and an arrest warrant Terrified mum’s personal letter to Annastacia Palaszczuk to escape bikie thug husband
for her husband was issued, but he was later bailed with conditions not to contact the woman.
A spokesman for the Premier told the Bulletin: “(The woman) asks the Government to adjudicate the case against her husband. Although her story is heartbreaking, no government can do that.
“A basic tenet of our society is that courts and governments are separate. All a government can do is make sure perpetrators face justice and victims are supported.
“(Her) pleas were never in vain and they were not ignored. They were acted on immediately, as the timeline shows. She was listened to, as any woman in her position should be.”
Both the LNP and emergency services sources believe the story highlights how the woman was treated at the courts differently to how highrisk cases were handled by the specialist courts at Southport.
Coast MP and LNP frontbencher Ros Bates said the case showed why Labor should take the proactive step and rotate magistrates through the specialist domestic violence court.
“These are tragic cases and the last thing anyone wants to see is highly violent cases become normalised by their shocking regularity,” Ms Bates said.