Sarah Budge cleared of gun charges by jury
The girlfriend of Kings Cross identity John Ibrahim has been cleared of all three firearm possession charges, with a jury convinced a gun was planted at Sarah Budge’s Sydney home behind her back.
NSW
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Kings Cross identity John Ibrahim’s girlfriend is relieved she managed to convince a jury a gun was planted at her Sydney home behind her back.
During the trial model Sarah Budge blamed her 51-year-old partner or someone close to him for stashing a loaded Glock pistol in her Double Bay apartment without her knowledge two years ago.
Ms Budge burst into tears and placed her head in her hands at Downing Centre District Court on Wednesday as she was found not guilty of possessing an unauthorised pistol, which carries a 14-year maximum jail sentence.
The smiling 29-year-old thanked the jury and later said “I’m relieved” as she left court with her father and brother.
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The glamorous restaurateur was already buoyed after the jury acquitted her of possessing a defaced gun and bullets without a permit the day before.
The jurors accepted that Ms Budge had no idea the stolen weapon had its serial identification number scratched out, or that there was also ammunition in her bedroom wardrobe when police searched her flat in August 2017.
On the fourth day of deliberation, the jurors unanimously agreed about the major charge but with only 11 people left after one of them was discharged due to family obligations in Hobart.
Ms Budge claimed DNA found on the trigger of the gun likely belonged to Mr Ibrahim and the former nightclub owner, who she has been dating since 2014, has not once accompanied her during the three-week trial.
The court was told just how turbulent their relationship had become by the time Ms Budge was arrested on August 8, 2017, and that Mr Ibrahim at times treated his partner with “absolute contempt.”
Text messages sent between the couple while Ms 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.”
Budge wanted Mr Ibrahim to one day father her children, but when she entrusted him to take care of her beloved dog it fell off a balcony at his clifftop Dover Heights mansion and broke its pelvis in two places, she said.
Mr Ibrahim was cold during a time when Ms Budge needed him most — he ignored her for days on end as her terminally ill mum battled breast cancer, she told the court.
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 claimed.
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.
Mr Ibrahim has never been charged and has refused multiple police requests to provide a statement, the court heard.
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.