Ibrahim’s girlfriend acquitted of two gun charges
John Ibrahim’s girlfriend has been acquitted of two firearm possession charges but a verdict is still pending as to whether Sarah Budge knew the Kings Cross identity stashed a gun at her Sydney home.
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A Sydney jury has acquitted John Ibrahim’s girlfriend of two firearm possession charges but is yet to decide the critical question of whether Sarah Budge knew the Kings Cross identity stashed a gun at her Sydney home.
The glamorous restaurateur blames her 51-year-old partner or someone close to him for planting a loaded, stolen Glock pistol in her Double Bay apartment without her knowledge two years ago.
The 29-year-old model openly wept on Tuesday after a jury found her not guilty of possessing a defaced gun and ammunition without a permit at Downing Centre District Court, which each carry 14-year maximum jail sentences.
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Six men and six women accepted that Budge had no idea the weapon had its serial identification number scratched out, or that there were also bullets in her bedroom wardrobe when police searched her flat in August 2017.
But after deliberating for nearly two days, the jurors have so far been unable to reach a unanimous verdict about the major charge of possessing an unauthorised pistol.
They will return on Wednesday to deliberate Budge’s fate with only 11 jurors left after one of them was discharged due to family obligations in Hobart.
Budge looked visibly rattled during the hair-raising day, but smiled with her head held high as she left court with her father to fight another day tomorrow.
She claimed DNA found on the trigger of the gun likely belonged to Mr Ibrahim and the former nightclub owner, who Budge has been dating since 2014, has not once accompanied her to court.
The three-week trial revealed just how turbulent their relationship had become by the time Budge was arrested on August 8, 2017, with Mr Ibrahim at times treating his partner with “absolute contempt.”
Text messages sent between the couple while Budge fretted over her dying mother revealed arguments about Mr Ibrahim’s past lovers, and two weeks before the dawn raids the man who called himself “Sexy John” enraged her by declaring he was single on live radio.
Ms Budge was desperate to marry the “charismatic” man who is 21 years her senior, sending him photographs of herself in a wedding dress from a bridal fashion shoot as well as pictures of rings as a “playful hint.”
But while giving evidence Ms Budge took aim at Mr Ibrahim’s coldness during a time when she needed him most - he ignored her for days on end as her terminally ill mum battled breast cancer.
After spending the night in jail Ms Budge said she confronted Mr Ibrahim who told her it was “best I didn’t know” why the gun was in her unit, adding she was in “enough trouble as it is.”
The owner of Crane Bar in Potts Point broke down in the witness box as she defended her decision to stay in a relationship with Mr Ibrahim in the two years since that night.
“I don’t think he deliberately put me in this bad position,” an emotional Ms Budge said.
“I don’t think he’d try and do something to hurt me.”
Days before the raids Mr Ibrahim ordered eyebrow-waxings for two underlings who’d allegedly been caught stealing $30,000 from his furious brother Michael Ibrahim to “calm things down”, and video of the bizarre punishment was played to the jury.
The footage shows former real estate agent Ryan Watsford begging a laughing Mr Ibrahim to “go easy” and “just rip it!” before he smiles proudly while posing with the brows as if they were trophies.
DNA from the same mystery man thought to be Mr Ibrahim was found on both the gun and a pair of waxed human eyebrows seized by police from his clifftop Dover Heights mansion, the defence says.
This became an important piece of evidence in the case, with Ms Budge’s lawyers questioning whether Mr Ibrahim had obtained the gun which he needed to stash while trying to smooth over tensions between his brother and the browless thieves.
Detectives were looking for Mr Ibrahim’s laptop when they searched Ms Budge’s unit in connection with a suspected international drug smuggling ring, but found the gun in a cardboard T2 box by surprise, the court heard.
Ms Budge’s fingerprints were found on a paper bag containing the ammunition magazine inside the black box.
That pharmacy bag also allegedly contained a single fingerprint belonging to Michael Frank Amante, a former strip club baron and childhood friend of Mr Ibrahim who denied ever seeing the gun or visiting Ms Budge’s home.
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