Brayden Dillon’s mum confronts getaway driver Sophie Massie

She cradled her dying son in her arms after he was shot while asleep. So when Brayden Dillon’s mother got the chance to confront the woman accused of being the getaway driver, she didn’t hold back. READ THE VICTIM IMPACT STATEMENT

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Two mothers linked by a child’s cold-blooded murder — one who lost a son, the other who helped to take him away.

In a victim impact statement read to court, the mum of 15-year-old murder victim Brayden Dillon, shot at point blank range as he lay in bed, has confronted Sophie Massie, a mother of two who drove the getaway car for Brayden’s killer.

From the witness box of Campbelltown District Court Brayden’s mother, who cannot be named for legal reasons, stared down Massie as she revealed the heartbreak her son’s murder had caused her and her family.

Speaking “mother to mother”, she asked a weeping Massie: “At Christmas, how will you be with your own children? I wonder about Mother’s Day. Will you hold your children knowing I will never hold my son again? How will that make you feel?

Brayden Dillon with his mother, who can’t be identified. Picture: Supplied

“When you say goodnight to your children and walk away from their door, will you ever think of me?

“I wonder if you’ll ever say goodnight to your kids and think that the next time you see them you will have their brains in your hands, because that’s my lasting memory.”

Massie, a 32-year-old barmaid from Bidwell, southwest Sydney, was one of seven people charged over Brayden’s murder in Glenfield on April 14, 2017, and has pleaded guilty to being an accessory after the fact. Conrad Craig has been charged with being the gunman and is due to face Burwood Local Court in August. He has not yet entered a plea.

However, even after learning she may have been involved in the shooting of a child, Massie failed to come forward before her arrest 89 days later.

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In the statement, read to the court in April but only released on Friday, Brayden’s mother said: “You Sophie Massie had 89 days to come forward; 89 days that you knew who murdered my little boy; 89 days of me living in fear; 89 days of me and my family living in hell.

“You will never fully comprehend what those 89 days and the impacts of your actions and inaction had on me and my family.

“During those 89 days I ripped out my hair. I stopped eating. I couldn’t be around my young children. I didn’t know who did this to my little boy.

“But you did Sophie. You knew who did it. You had 89 days to put me out of my misery. You knew and you said nothing.

“In those 89 days I joined a group no-one would want to join — parents who have to bury their own child. My beautiful little boy was gone.”

The court was told Brayden’s mother was at home when she heard someone bash down the front door.

As she got out of bed to investigate, she saw a man in the hallway with his arms outstretched. He told her to get back in her bedroom.

Fearing he would start shooting, the mother and other family members hid as she dialled triple-0. She then heard a loud bang.

After the gunman ran from the house to Massie’s car, the mother rushed into Brayden’s room and found him still in bed with a gunshot wound to the head.

The allegation is that Brayden was murdered in revenge for the alleged actions of his older brother, who was charged a year earlier over the fatal stabbing of 18-year-old Adam Abu Mahmoud.

Abu Mahmoud’s uncle has since been charged for allegedly organising Brayden’s murder. He has not yet entered a plea.

In the months following his brother’s arrest in July, 2016, Brayden had received threatening phone calls and told his mother he thought he had a bounty on his head.

His mother received similar phone calls. In them, the mystery caller said her family deserved to die.

The getaway car driven by Sophie Massie. Picture: NSW Police

The court heard that while Massie claimed she didn’t know what Craig was going to do when she dropped him in Glenfield, she figured out later that day what he had allegedly done.

Regardless, Massie, who was hooked on cocaine and xanax, didn’t come forward.

She also hid her car, which was used in the getaway, in an underground garage on two occasions and met with Craig to tell him about media surrounding the murder.

For 89 days police pieced together her involvement in the case, tracking her Mazda 3 through CCTV and toll cameras from the M7. She was arrested in July, 2017.

During Massie’s sentencing hearing, Brayden’s mother questioned how as a mother Massie didn’t come forward about the murder of a child.

“I cannot reconcile this,” she said. “To say my world imploded and exploded all at the same time is not even close, but I will try to convey it as best I can.

Brayden was just 15 when he was killed. Picture: Supplied

Conrad Craig has been charged with being the gunman and is due to face Burwood Local Court in August. He has not yet entered a plea. Photo: Facebook

“If only you had come forward the day my son was killed. But the fact is you didn’t so my wondering and my questions are unanswered — but mother to mother I hope that you live with and are consumed by those questions for the rest of your life.”

While Massie told a psychologist she was deeply sorry for her part in the murder, Judge Jennifer English found her ongoing communication with Craig suggested otherwise.

In one letter to her co-accused, after he was charged, Massie wrote: “I care about you Conrad. I have too much of a kind heart.”

However, Judge English said that Massie was not responsible for the murder and couldn’t be sentenced for a more serious offence than the one she had pleaded guilty to.

“She put the interests of herself and the co-accused before that of the victim’s family and the community,” the judge said.

With a discount for pleading guilty early, Massie was sentenced to a maximum of four years and six months jail. She will be eligible for parole in April next year.