Man jailed for fatally bashing stranger in North Frankston
A MINDLESS thug who beat to death a man on the request of a complete stranger will rot in jail for at least the next 18 years.
Law & Order
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A MINDLESS thug who beat to death a man on the request of a complete stranger will rot in jail for at least the next 18 years.
Timothy Michael Bennison, 35, beat to death Jason Stone, 27, inside his girlfriend’s North Frankston unit moments after meeting a man who claimed Stone owed him money.
The port-swilling drunk agreed to help “touch” Mr Stone up, killing him with a “sustained, protracted and brutal” beating.
When he was done, he dumped his victim’s body in scrubland near the Ricketts Point foreshore in Beaumaris.
Supreme Court Justice James Elliott sentenced Bennison to 21-years in jail.
He described the murder as “utterly senseless” and difficult to conceive.
“You’d never met him but agreed to assault him,” he said.
The court heard Bennison met a man named Terry Mitchell on November 8, 2014 after being introduced to him by a mate he’d met about a week earlier.
Mitchell, who has pleaded guilty to the lesser charge of manslaughter and will be sentenced in February, told Bennison he would be “looked after” if he helped him carry out the attack.
Mr Stone was punched in the face by Bennison — a total stranger — as he arrived at the unit.
What occurred next resembled something from Quentin Tarantino’s Pulp Fiction, with Mr Stone taken into the laundry and bashed to within an inch of his life.
The court heard Mr Stone was still alive when he was bound and had a sock taped into his mouth.
Neighbours heard him kicking from inside the boot of a car as Bennison and his mate drove him away.
While Bennison later came forward to police, he continued to deny he’d participated in the murder up until his plea of guilty in March this year.
Mr Stone’s family stared down Bennison throughout the sentence, with one man shouting out: “I hope you’re sorry for what you did.”