Bender killing ends in prison
A SYDNEY strip club regular will spend at least 20 years behind bars after a 30hour bender ended in a former DJ being senselessly shot and left for dead in a luxury hotel suite.
Hasan Fazlilar, 32, (right) was sentenced yesterday for murdering Donovan Mileham, from the NSW central coast, who died in 2015 after a bullet fired into his leg passed through his bowel and struck a vital vein.
NSW Supreme Court Justice Natalie Adams said the “senseless killing” stemmed from Mr Mileham’s killer finding a phone contact listing for “police crime” and thinking it meant the victim was a police informant.
Having formed that irrational and incorrect opinion, the unemployed Fazlilar beat Mr Mileham about the head with a pistol and then shot the whimpering man’s leg, the judge said.
Justice Adams suggested the 44-year-old victim, who was curled in the foetal position on a couch when shot, could have survived if given immediate medical attention.
But instead, Fazlilar and eyewitness Elias Dimarelis, left the Fraser Suites Sydney room within minutes of the shooting one Saturday afternoon in November 2015.
The 44-year-old’s body wasn’t discovered until Monday morning by hotel staff. Justice Adams said Fazlilar was an extreme drug user and had consumed ice, coke and whiskey as he partied with Mr Mileham and others at a Kings Cross strip club and brothel and the CBD hotel.
Evidence linking Fazlilar to the murder included fingerprints, CCTV, the victim’s blood on his shoe, Dimarelis’ evidence and accounts the killer always carried a pistol.
Yet, he denied being in the hotel, pleaded not guilty at trial and planned to appeal his conviction, Justice Adams said.
Dustan Mileham and Danie Sims carried portraits of their older brother into the court yesterday.
“My brother was a good man, a normal bloke like us ... and then he met that psychopath,” an emotional Dustan said outside court.
Fazlilar was sentenced to 26 years behind bars with a non-parole period of 19 years and six months.
With time already served he’ll be eligible for release in May 2035.