Arabic version: رفض استئناف في قضية القتل غير العمد لكاسيوس تورفي

According to ABC News, Western Australia’s Court of Appeal has dismissed Mitchell Forth’s challenge to his nine-year prison sentence for the manslaughter of Perth teenager Cassius Turvey.

Cassius, 15, was chased and beaten with a metal trolley pole while walking with friends in Perth’s east in October 2022. He died in hospital 10 days later. Forth, who was 24 at the time, was convicted of manslaughter. Jack Brearley and Brodie Palmer were convicted of murder and received sentences of 22 years and 18 years respectively.

Forth argued his sentence was “manifestly excessive”, saying he was not present when Cassius was attacked and that his actions did not directly increase the likelihood of the teenager’s death. The three-judge panel rejected that argument.

The judges said Forth had “substantial culpability”, finding he joined, encouraged and later celebrated the pursuit of an unlawful common purpose of chasing children, terrorising them and potentially attacking them while one man was armed. They ruled the sentence was not unreasonable or plainly unjust.

Cassius’s mother, Mechelle, said the appeal process caused further pain for her family and forced them to relive the trauma of losing her son. She welcomed the court’s decision, saying: “You do the crime, you do the time … violence doesn’t work for anybody.”