Marco Deng found guilty of murdering Machar Kot after ‘snitch’ taunt
A 22-year-old man was so angry at rumours he had been called a snitch that he fatally stabbed an acquaintance on the steps of a CBD hotel.
Police & Courts
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A young Melbourne man drove a knife into the heart of a rival after hearing rumours he had called him a “snitch”.
Marco Deng, then 22, became angered when told by associate’s that Machar Kot, 21, had made the snide remarks on June 22, 2020.
He armed himself with the knife and set out to track down Mr Kot to set the record straight.
“I didn’t want to talk, just to fight, that’s it,” Deng later told police when arrested.
“Machar was saying I’m a bitch, I’m a snitch.”
Mr Kot was celebrating with friends at Oaks Melbourne when he got the message that Deng was downstairs and wanted to see him to buy Xanax.
The pair went into a laneway to make the “drug deal” when Deng confronted him about the name-calling, punching him to the head about 5am.
But the ambush didn’t go to plan, with Mr Kot returning fire and the pair getting into a fist fight.
When Mr Kot overpowered his attacker, and seemingly won the fight, he tried to flee the scene.
But Deng gave chase and despite the best efforts of Mr Kot’s friends to shield him, he lunged at him with a knife on the steps of the hotel.
The blade entered Mr Kot’s abdomen before piercing his heart by 1cm.
The shocking attack was aired in Victoria’s Supreme Court where Deng was this month on trial for murder.
He told the court he never intended to kill or seriously injure Mr Kot and should be found guilty of the lesser offence of manslaughter instead.
Senior crown prosecutor, Mark Gibson QC, told the jury Deng admitted himself to police that he had travelled to the city to “fight” Mr Kot as he had a “beef” with him.
Mr Gibson said Deng was out for blood after suffering “embarrassment” of losing the one-on-one fight with Mr Kot.
“By the time that Mr Deng gets to the steps of the hotel, the Crown says that, one, he has been felled by Mr Kot, two, he has been slung to the ground by Mr Kot, three, he has suffered the embarrassment of not only losing the fight … but he has suffered the embarrassment of losing that fight in front of his friends,” Mr Gibson said.
Defence lawyer David Cronin argued his client’s judgment was skewered as he was drunk after earlier guzzling spirits with friends and taking Xanax.
Mr Cronin said Deng’s state of mind at the time of the attack could not have been that he wanted to kill or seriously wound.
“There’s no longstanding animosity between these two,” Mr Cronin told the jury.
“They’d been friends. But an issue’s come up between them and they met.”
He asked the jury to put Deng’s actions down to “alcohol, Xanax and stupid conduct”.
“Poor behaviour and that one second where he inflicted that fatal wound,” Mr Cronin said.
But the jurors did not agree and took just 24 hours to return a guilty verdict to murder on Friday.
Deng will face a pre-sentencing hearing in September.
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