‘Welcome to your future’: Coward attacker’s deadly threats
A coward attacker tried to kill his ex-wife and her friend in a murder-suicide, after stalking her following their split which led to her taking out at AVO. Last month, Shawn Marsh was sentenced to 18 years in prison.
NSW
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A coward attacker who stalked his ex-wife and then tried to kill her and her friend, and threatened to kill his stepdaughter, has been hit with a massive jail sentence by a Judge, who slammed his lack of remorse and told him: “Women are not possessions belonging to men”.
Shawn Marsh tried to collide head-on with his ex-wife Kylie on a country road outside Goulburn on May 6, 2023, hoping the crash would kill her and him, in a murder-suicide.
But instead Marsh hit the side of the car she and friend Michelle Giles were in, sending their vehicle flying off the road into paddocks and leaving them suffering lifelong injuries and trauma.
His attempted murder of the two women – who he had watched through binoculars approaching from a way off – was the culmination of a six-month campaign of domestic violence and stalking, that began when he and Ms Marsh split and escalated when he found out she had a new boyfriend.
Judge Julia Baly last month sentenced Marsh to a minimum of 18 years in prison in the Goulburn District Court.
In the process she chastised an attempt by him to play the mental health card after a psychologist ruled he had no mental illness, while at the same time saying he continued to “blame” his ex-wife for his crimes.
“This offender has shown no remorse or insight into his offending and blames the victim for his conduct,” Judge Baly said.
“He has no mental illness, no mental condition, no cognitive impairment and I do not accept he has no control of his personality.”
Following their separation in December 2022, Marsh began stalking his ex-wife when she was out and about, turning up at the same cafes and shopping centres, and even booking seats to the same concerts.
Text message exchanges presented to the court in evidence during the trial show Marsh took photos from outside his ex-wife’s house and asked about her new boyfriend.
“What are you doing?” Mrs Marsh asked in response.
“Just fact finding,” he responded, before adding further on, “And you let him move in my house. Bad move”.
The court heard Marsh believed his ex-wife had made “a promise to the effect that she would not leave him, yet in his view she broke that promise”.
But it then proceeded to deliver a series of threats – including having her kidnapped, held for four days and killed – depending on whether she took his side in the separation.
“The way you all treated me is beyond my comprehension. I did nothing wrong … so my love is turned to hate and you will all be dealt with,” Marsh wrote.
“You and your mother left me for dead, welcome to your future.”
The part of his plan involved the killing of his ex-wife saw him lay in wait off Laggan Rd in Crookwell, on the morning of Saturday, May 6, until he spotted a Suzuki carrying Mrs Marsh and Ms Giles driving down the road towards him through a pair of binoculars.
As police arrived at the scene, Marsh said to one officer: “I need to let you know that this is a domestic situation, I shouldn’t be here … my ex-wife’s in the other car”.
Mrs Marsh went to police as a result of her husband’s stalking and officers took out an AVO for the protection of her and Emma, one of her two daughters from her first marriage.
The other stepdaughter Jessica was also targeted by Marsh, to who he wrote a “wicked and disturbing” letter in early 2023, left outside his former home.
The letter, which was found first by her mother, addressed Jessica as his “loving and caring daughter”.
Incredible vision taken from the body worn camera of one of the officers shows them talking with Marsh on the side of the road, as in the background the wreckage of the two cars can be seen strewn through a paddock.
The court heard that Mrs Marsh and Ms Giles had suffered devastating “emotional and physical” damage as a result of the crash.
In sentencing Marsh on two counts of attempted murder and one count of threatening to kill,
Judge Baly said she was handing down such a lengthy prison term because of his lack of remorse.
“While Mr Marsh maintains his views, blaming the victims, and maintains his self-righteous attitudes to what he did, he does not have good prospects of rehabilitation and is not of a low likelihood to offend again,” she said.
“Women are not possessions belonging to men.
“Women have a right to live their lives free of such views and free of violence.”
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