Dick Pesamino not guilty of Brett Nicholls murder due to mental illness
When police arrived at Brett Nicholls’s flat, a trail of blood led straight to his killer. But despite battering him with his fists and even a concrete chess piece he was found not guilty of his murder as he couldn’t be held criminally responsible due to mental illness.
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Dick AJ Pesamino has been found not guilty of murdering Brett Nicholls in his Villawood apartment due to mental illness.
The Supreme Court pews were filled with about 20 family members of the victim and accused, as the details of the 2018 bare-fisted incident were read out.
It was heard a delusional Pesamino entered his neighbour’s home, and hit him in the face, neck and head in an unprovoked attack.
The attack was so vicious that after Pesamino had left, police could follow a trail of blood out of the apartment towards the accused, who was laying down with his head in a gutter.
Pesamino, 32, had no recollection of that day, the court heard, and thought demons were sending him messages through the television.
Justice Helen Wilson acknowledged the “terrible tragedy” of the 41-year-old’s death after telling the court Pesamino did “deliberately attack”andkillMr Nicholls but could not “be held criminally responsible (for his actions)” due to schizophrenia marked by paranoid delusions.
Speaking directly to Mr Nicholls’ family, she said: “He did nothing to bring about the two attacks on him.
“He should have had many more years of life left to him.”
On May 3, 2018, neighbour Greg McDougall heard loud screams coming from his friend’s apartment and could make out Nicholls yelling “don’t”.
When he ran down to the unit, he saw Mr Nicholls lying on the floor with the accused leaning over him, the court heard.
His hand was moving up and down, Mr McDougall described.
It is also likely Pesamino hit Mr Nicholls with a concrete chess piece, the court heard, which was stained with blood, and had DNA of the accused on the bottom and Mr Nicholls on the top.
Mr McDougall could already see that Mr Nicholls’ face was swollen, blood was coming from his mouth and spread all around the unit.
As McDougall tried to help Mr Nicholls, Pesamino slammed the unit door into McDougall, causing a cut to his arm.
Mr McDougall left to call the police and the accused ran from the unit.
When police arrived at 5.46pm, they found Nicholls lying on the floor covered in blood, with injuries to his face and head.
He was pronounced dead at the scene.
They soon found the accused unresponsive with his head face-down in a drain outside.
His knuckles were injured, the facts state, and there was blood on his clothes and hands and a trail of blood from the drain to Mr Nicholls’ apartment.
Pesamino started to wake up and became wild, yelling and screaming, even clucking like a chicken.
He was placed in caged police van and yelled “get the f*** off me” before he was sedated.
When police visited Pesamino at Liverpool hospital, they told him Mr Nicholls had died and he asked “is he dead?”
He then said: “Something in the sky was telling me something. Something happened and now we are here. I just want to finish it. Take me to jail”.
A toxicology report came back positive for cannabinoids only.
He was taken to Bankstown Police Station and was laughing and acting “fatuous” during a police interview, Judge Wilson said.
He told police someone had broken into his house the night before, messed the place up and pissed into his juice bottles.
Judge Wilson found he may have included Nicholls “into his deluded belief system”.
A long-term sufferer of schizophrenia, the court heard, Pesamino had stopped taking his prescribed medication about four months before the incident and had stopped using mental health services.
He later told a psychologist: “I didn’t mean for the victim to die. If it was me I’m sorry. I don’t remember what happened. I was in psychosis”.
Pesamino‘s barrister read out an apology in court, which appeared to prompt one of Nicholls’ family members to walk out.
“I want to say sorry to the victim’s family and my own family”.
“Monday is the first time I saw the record of my interview (with police) … I hardly recognise myself.
“I’m so sorry for what I did and would do anything to change it”.
A hulking figure, in court the jarringly softly-spoken Pesamino told his family – young children, grandparents and siblings – he loved them as they left.
Pesamino was also found not guilty of two counts of assault occasioning actual bodily harm for stomping on Mr Nicholls foot unprovoked and breaking his toe on March 27, 2018, and for injuring McDougall in the unit on the same day he killed Mr Nicholls.
Pesamino will remain in prison until he is deemed fit to be released by mental health authorities.