Darko Desic: Prison escapee back behind bars fears deportation

The Yugoslavian-born handyman, 64, is struggling being back in the jail he broke free from. “I’m so upset that I may be deported,” he said. “This is my home.”

Prison escapee Darko Desic, who faces deportation after going on the run for 30 years, has issued a plea from his prison cell begging the Australian government: “This is my home, please let me stay.”

Speaking through his lawyer from Clarence Correctional Centre, the Yugoslavian-born handyman, 64, revealed he was struggling being back in the jail, and said: “I’m so upset that I may be deported. I don’t want to be sent back to a country that doesn’t exist anymore. This is my home. The Northern Beaches and the people in it have been my life for almost 30 years.

“I’ve tried to be the best person I can in the beaches community and I owe all the people who are supporting me the world. I see myself as an Australian and hope the government will understand that for almost half my life Sydney has been my home.”

Darko Desic handed himself in after 30 years on the run.

Desic broke out of Grafton Jail in 1992 using a hacksaw and boltcutters to avoid being returned to war-torn Yugoslavia from where he fled to ­escape military service.

He lived under the radar ­accepting cash-in-hand jobs on Sydney’s Northern Beaches to avoid being caught.

Work dried up during Covid and he was homeless when he walked into Dee Why police station in mid-September and confessed to breaking out of the jail 29 years earlier.

“I believe you’ve been looking for me,” he told stunned officers. A police source said at the time: “He handed himself in to get a roof over his head.”

Darko Desic in 1985. Picture: Supplied

Last week, Desic pleaded guilty to escaping from lawful custody and was sentenced to two months’ extra jail for the offence. He had already been returned to prison to serve out the rest of his original jail term for supplying marijuana.

He is eligible for parole for the drugs offence in October 2022, but with the additional sentence, his earliest release date is now December 2022.

He became a permanent resident while on the run in 2008 during which he carved a new life for himself as “Dougie”, the trusty handyman for local families in the beachside Sydney suburb of Avalon.

Desic’s case has captured the heart of the Northern Beaches community who have funded a defence campaign to keep him in Australia, raising $30,000 for his legal bills and housing needs. His lawyer Paul McGirr, who is working pro bono, said he had written to the attorney-general and the governor-general seeking clemency for Desic.