Youth crime crisis: These are the stories the Premier needs to read
Queensland families are installing locks on their bedroom doors, sleeping in one room, or not sleeping at all after falling victim to the state’s spiralling youth crime crisis.
Police & Courts
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A family of four who were broken into in the middle of the night by teens wielding machetes say they have been sleeping in the same bed together since the incident because everybody was “traumatised”.
On February 4, Marcelo Alcantara and his family were broken into by a gang of armed teenagers, stealing cars and belongings from their home. While leaving the group also knocked a side wall from the garage resulting in more than $100,000 worth of costs.
The incident all unfolded while his children aged two and six were sleeping. But almost a month after it happened the family are still struggling.
“We are all still sleeping in the same room, it was a very traumatising experience for us and our kids are scared, my wife is scared,” he said.
“Everybody’s very traumatised, when you start to not feel safe in your own home, it’s a terrible feeling.
“Now after connecting with other people, I see that this is a common feeling everybody’s feeling like this. Which is terrible as a society.”
Mr Alcantara said his two children were frightened because their bedroom was at the front of the house.
“For example, two days ago we had a false alarm in one of our motion detectors here and one of the cameras was blocked and my wife was terrified and then could not sleep the whole night,” he said.
“So that shows the example of the trauma because now everything that happens you think maybe something like that will happen again.”
Mr Alcantara said he would be applying for support from Victims Assist.
“We’re doing lots of investments to feel safer in the house that I would have preferred to not have done,” he said.
“I’m spending over $20,000 here just to put like a fence in the front of my property to feel safer that I wish I didn’t have to.
“I’ve spent $2000 to install the alarm, so I’m out of pocket … plus all the excesses in paying for the insurance for two cars for the home insurance for the building that they knocked the wall down, for the contents insurance of every thing they took from my house – that’s $12,000-$16,000.”
Mr Alcantara said the government needed to do more to stop crime happening.
“The frustration is that we feel powerless and these guys (the offenders) feel very powerful,” he said.
“The law is not the deterrent. We need to change the laws. And we need to show people that if you don’t want to live in society, you should not live in society, you should go to jail.
“I wish they’d be punished. Something hard. They need to work. They need to do something that is tough.”
Mr Alcantara said he also felt he wasn’t getting any communication from the courts.
“We don’t have access to the courts.” he said.
“I think it is absurd to have people that invade our house with knives, and you need to treat them as protected people – like this is ridiculous”
A 16-year-old boy from Oxenford and a 16-year-old boy from Casuarina (NSW) and a 13-year-old Coomera boy were charged with one count each of enter dwelling and commit, and unlawful use of a motor vehicle.
While a 15-year-old Pimpama boy was charged with one count enter dwelling and commit.
‘I WAS DETERMINED TO STOP HIM TIL POLICE ARRIVED’
A man who confronted a youth trying to break-into his home in the middle of the night says his family are “rattled” and he hasn’t had much sleep since the incident.
Last Sunday night a teenage boy was caught allegedly trying to break into David Smedley’s Alexandra Hills home.
Mr Smedley woke to the noise of the front door and so he rushed his children and his partner to one room before confronting the offender.
“I got my eldest daughter in the same room with my partner and the other two little ones and locked the door and I got them to call the police,” Mr Smedley came.
“They came in within five minutes, which is unreal, I’ve never had a quicker response. She was on the phone to the police the entire time.
“I got out there because I didn’t want to let him take off and offend somewhere else.
“So I was pretty determined to stop him till the police arrived.
“He was pretty startled.”
Mr Smedley said he told the boy not to take another step and stayed within 2m of him until the police came.
“I basically just told him that he wasn’t going to be going anywhere,” he said.
But the effects have had a toll on his family.
“They are still quite rattled about it, to be honest. My two little ones, like the two-year-old and the six-month-old, aren’t aware of anything. They are too young to understand what’s going on. But my partner and my 17-year-old are quite rattled by it and I’ve installed the security cameras and everything.”
Mr Smedley said it had been a “rough” week.
“I’m only getting about three hours sleep at night because I’m choosing to sort of stay up and keep an eye on everything.
“I think that’s just part of the process that's going on at the moment.
“Im not sleeping the best but I’m just making sure throughout the night everything’s all good but they’re rattled.
“They obviously feel a bit safer with the security stuff installed. It’s just kind of just going to take a bit of time for them to sort of get over it a little bit.”
Mr Smedley said he believed there was no “quick fix” to the crime problem but the government needed to look at the big picture.
“My opinion is trying to set up some programs for these sort of kids to get into. My thing is to help them rather than punish them,” he said.
“Punishing doesn’t really achieve anything, I don’t think they learn anything from it. If anything it can sometimes become worse.
“They’re old enough to know right from wrong. I understand that and I’m not defending them. I’m just trying to look in a different angle to helping them rather than punish them.”
However as a short-term fix he said reoffenders should get tougher penalties.
“If the government can obviously bring in something to do with repeat offenders, harsher penalties there or trying them as adults,” he said.
A 17-year old was charged with one count of trespassing and was given NTA in Cleveland Children’s Court on April 19, 2024.
‘WE HAVE LOCKS ON OUR BEDROOM DOOR IN CASE SOMEONE GETS IN’
A woman previously attacked at knifepoint in her own home has been a victim to youth crime again and she says the latest incident brought all the “trauma” back.
CCTV footage shows a woman with a knife entering Ms Norman’s house and followed her into a room. Ms Norman had to hold the door shut as the offender tried to force the door open. This incident happened a couple of years ago.
About a month ago, Ms Norman’s bag was snatched at a North Lakes shopping centre bringing all the emotions from the original attack back.
“We had been shopping at North Lakes and I was waiting for Tim (her husband) with the trolley,” she said.
“I had a string bag in the trolley, but I had my hand on it. I was holding it because I’m scared of things like that happening now.
“A woman came up behind me . she grabbed the bag ran – a car drove up she jumped in and off they went – as quick as that, I couldn’t believe it.
“It was absolutely awful. I was hysterical. It all happened again – you know, it brought it all back.
“I just never feel safe now, I go shopping on my own, I’m scared, I hang onto my bag but you cant – if they are going to get it, I’d rather let them have it.”
Ms Norman said after the first incident – she was incredibly shaken.
“I was terrified to go out. I was locked in the house. I couldn’t let Tim go anywhere, I had to go with him,” she said.
“I’m okay now but, extremely hyper vigilant and scared. We have locks on our bedroom door just in case someone gets in and then every day in the news you hear about home invasions.”
Ms Norman said she had tried to get help and see a counsellor but there was a huge backlog.
“I was pretty okay at the start. I tried to get counselling, but there was a big backlog and they said it would be three or four month,” she said.
“I managed and with Tim’s help and you know, talking about it did help a lot.
“And I refuse to be overcome by it. But about 12 months later I fell into a big hole and they said that often happens so I did get some counselling on the phone.”
But the first incident has forever changed her life. She said after Vyleen White was killed in an alleged carjacking – she became even more concerned.
“Going to shopping centres if people ran up behind me or I hear some screaming – I am really terrified,” she said.
”I’ve got a really beautiful car and I’m scared to park it in shopping centre park’s because that woman was killed just former car.”
Ms Norman said there needed to be tougher laws that kept people behind bars. She also said psychiatric hospitals needed to be reopened.
“I worked in psychiatry for 30 years and as an occupational therapist, and I’ve never been scared at work, but now I’m scared at home. It’s stupid,” she said.
“They should reopen those places where the people who couldn’t cope were so happy.
“I had to rehabilitate people who would never be able to cope in the community.”
Ms Norman said the first incident was something that she would always think about.
“I saw her coming around with a knife and thought my god, I’m going to die here,” she said.
“I ran to the garage and she ran after me she jumped the gate and ran after me and I’m holding the door shut. She was trying to push it open and honestly, I was so terrified.”
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