Teenage witness tells Cassius Turvey trial how murder accused went on Middle Swan rampage days before killing

A teenage boy testified that he was forced into a car at knifepoint by Cassius Turvey’s alleged killers and became “s... scared” when they picked up a bloodied boy one of them had just stabbed. Jack Brearley, Aleesha Gilmore, Mitchell Forth and Brodie Palmer are all on trial for murder in the Supreme Court of WA charged after the Indigenous 15-year-old was brutally attacked in Middle Swan on October 13, 2022. Cassius was chased into bushland and hit with a shopping trolley pole. He died in hospital 10 days later. On Friday, a 16-year-old boy told the court he was walking on Talbot Road on October 9, 2022 when a car pulled up and two people got out. He said they were Ms Gilmour, who he described as being like an old family friend but yelled to “get the f... in the car” and a fifth defendant, Ethan Robert MacKenzie, who is not accused of involvement in Cassius’ death. Mr MacKenzie was brandishing a knife, which was covered with a sheath, with just the tip protruding, the witness testified. The court was told that Ms Gilmore, Mr MacKenzie, Mr Brearley and Mr Forth were driving around looking for a group of boys her younger brother had claimed were trying to bash him. “I was pretty scared of the knife, I can’t lie,” the witness said. “I kind of just hopped in the car because . . . a lot would have happened to me if I took off.” There were also two other people crammed inside the Kia hatchback wearing pink balaclavas, he said. The boy, who was 14 at the time, said that the car soon pulled up again to chase a group of about 10 males who “took off” out of sight, chased by Mr MacKenzie still holding the knife, Mr Forth and Mr Brearley. He then described how a 15-year-old he recognised emerged covered in blood, wearing no shirt or shoes, looking “shocked, scared”. The three men “seemed a bit angry”, he said, and Ms Gilmour asked, “What the f... did you do to the poor boy?”. He recalled hearing Mr MacKenzie say that he stabbed the bloodied boy. “I didn’t know what to do. I was just sitting there,” he said, describing how they wound up at Ms Gilmour’s house for about 90 minutes and the stabbing victim “cleaned up” in the bath. “I went in to see how he was doing,” the witness said. “I just wanted to go home . . . I was s... scared. Helpless. Worried.” The teen said the stabbed boy was ultimately picked up while he was dropped off home. The jury trial before Chief Justice Peter Quinlan began on Monday and is scheduled to continue for a further nine weeks.