Brave dad makes citizen’s arrest in horror Cairns home invasion

A Cairns couple have told of a terrifying home invasion that ended with the husband making a citizen’s arrest of a teen suspect.

A Cairns mother who woke up to invaders allegedly armed with a crowbar and a knife, leading to her husband performing a citizen’s arrest on one of them says she has struggled to sleep since the incident.

On Sunday at 4am, Angela Vaili woke to at least two teens allegedly trying to break into her home in Cairns.

Her husband, Winnie Vaili, pinned a 15-year-old boy and waited for the police to arrive. In the process he fractured one of his arms.

Ms Vaili was sleeping when she heard her husband.

“(My husband’s) tackled him, and they’re like, fluffing about, I’ve woken up because I’ve heard everything, and heard him wrestling with this person, and I’m still half asleep, trying to understand what’s going on,” she said.

“ I thought he had fallen and then I realised there was another person that I couldn’t recognise.”

During the altercation there was another individual who allegedly had a knife and pointed it to Ms Vaili.

A 15-year-old boy was detained by the owner of a Cairns home.

“No one really knows what to do in those circumstances,” she said.

“It was my husband in trouble, these strangers in our home. It just happened so quickly.

“Everything just happened at once.”

Footage shows the offenders walking in and staying there for about 40 minutes. Before at least one getting away.

A 15-year-old has been charged with enter and commit. While police are still searching for the other offender.

He is expected to appear in Cairns Children’s Court on Tuesday.

The incident has been hard on the family.

“My husband couldn’t sleep last night. He just kept on walking around in and out, just trying to make sure we were OK,” she said.

“This is our home. We should never have to feel that we’re not safe.

“We were sleeping, and my husband felt someone kind of go past him, and he thought it was me.”

Ms Vaili got teary when she told The Courier-Mail her husband had struggled with it all on Sunday night.

Winnie Vaili performed the citizen's arrest. Picture: 9 News

“For now, we’re just kind of ticking the boxes and just doing what we need to do to just get us through and just hopefully able to get past it and move on to some normality, for us and our kids,” she said.

Ms Vaili said people had a right to feel safe in their own home.

“I’ve heard so many stories. I’ve had friends at work who have spoken about their elderly parents who’ve been broken into twice within three weeks,” she said.

“What the hell is going on? It’s just so bad, and just to know that a lot of them have spoken up and nothing really gets done about it, has to be the worst thing about it as well”

Ms Vaili praised her husband for what he did.

“It was just the heat of the moment and just those instincts of being a father,” she said.

“There was just no thought other than to just protect myself and our family from whatever it was, he had no idea who these people were or what was happening.”

Since the incident she has found herself constantly thinking about it.

“My husband and I were speaking about it and just running through different scenarios, how it could have been different,” she said.