Julie Da Souza: Brazilian’s DNA found on gun after police raid
A Brazilian beauty wept in court as it was revealed her DNA was found on a “movie-style” revolver after police raided her then-boyfriend’s home. She pleaded with cops, arguing that guns are “normal” in her country and that even “my dad has one”.
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A glamorous Brazilian national will appeal a conviction of possessing an unauthorised pistol, which a court accepted she only held for a moment as she told her partner to get rid of it.
Julie Gessica Da Souza, 26, was arrested in June 2019 alongside her then-boyfriend Jake Hudson, after police raided his Rosebery apartment and found a “movie-style” revolver and a large amount of drugs inside.
The revolver was loaded and the serial number was rubbed off, a Downing Centre Local Court heard.
Magistrate Carolyn Huntsman accepted that Da Souza picked up the gun at its handle for a moment after seeing it on her boyfriend’s couch, as she told police.
Ms Da Souza, who has lived in Australia for about three years, told police she said: “What the f*** is that … can you please get it, this, f***ing out of my way”.
Police found both her and Hudson’s DNA on the gun’s handle.
But Magistrate Huntsman found that was enough to equate possession and that gun laws were so broad for a reason.
“When she held the gun, she was in control of it and in possession of it,” Magistrate Huntsman found.
In a police interview following her arrest, Da Souza said guns were “normal in my country … my dad has one” and that she didn’t know guns were a bad thing, telling the police that her partner may have possessed it for security.
The beach-enthusiast and keen traveller appeared in court alongside an apparent new flame, who held her hand and cried with her as she was told she would now have a criminal record.
Da Souza was sentenced to a six-month Conditional Corrections Order but will now appeal the guilty conviction and sentence in the District Court.
Police today backed down from their initial allegation that Da Souza lived with Mr Hudson in that apartment, withdrawing a charge of occupier knowingly allow use as a drug premises.
The court heard she had only been casually dating Hudson for a few months and had slept at his home about nine times.
“I know it would be of great regret to you that you got mixed up in this matter,” Magistrate Huntsman said to Da Souza.
But Magistrate Huntsman also told the court she thought her police interview was “disingenuous”.
Despite telling police she did not think her then-boyfriend was a “drug person” or selling drugs, the court heard there were 70 bottles of Xanax in a bag on her side of the bed, scales in the kitchen and the bedroom, a cup of heroin on the coffee table and methamphetamine on a shelf in his wardrobe.
“It seems to me disingenuous that you would not have known in the context of the visible drug paraphernalia that there was something untoward about the gun,” Magistrate Huntsman said.
“It’s a pistol in a house full of drugs,” she said.
But said she could not find that Da Souza knew the extent that the home was a drug premises.
Hudson has pleaded guilty to a possession of an unauthorised firearm charge and other more serious offences, and is set to be sentenced in the District Court.
Da Souza also faces separate charges of dishonestly obtain financial advantage by deception (x2), deal with property proceeds of crime (x2), supply a small quantity of prohibited drug (x2) and falsely nominate other for camera recorded offence following her re-arrest in February this year.
She has pleaded not guilty to all the offences and will face Waverley Local Court on September 16 to set a hearing date.