Celeste Manno’s mother vows to fight for law changes in her daughter’s memory
Celeste Manno was stabbed to death by her alleged stalker. Now her mum is pushing for law changes.
Police & Courts
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The state government has ordered an urgent review into intervention orders following the brutal murder of 23-year-old Celeste Manno.
Ms Manno’s mum Aggie Di Mauro and brother Alessandro, met with state Attorney General Jill Hennessy on Wednesday to discuss the justice system failures which preceded the brutal killing of their daughter in November.
The review will also consider strengthening responses to stalking and harassment in a bid to better protect women.
“What happened to Celeste Manno was an unimaginable tragedy and I cannot begin to understand the pain her family and friends are feeling,” she said.
“We know that stalking can cause great harm to victims’ mental and physical health and can escalate to more serious offending, including serious violence, and that types of stalking behaviour have evolved as technology changes.
“That’s why I will ask the Victorian Law Reform Commission to urgently review Victoria’s responses to stalking, harassment and similar conduct, including the framework for, operation and enforcement of the Personal Safety Intervention Order (PSIO) system.
“We will continue to do everything we can to end violence against women and support them to be and feel safe.”
CELESTE’S MUM PUSHES FOR CHANGE
The mother of murdered Melbourne woman Celeste Manno is pushing for an overhaul of the justice system, which she says failed to protect her daughter.
Aggie Di Mauro has broken her silence after her 23-year-old daughter was stabbed to death by her alleged stalker, Luay Sako, 35, as she slept in her bedroom in Mernda in the city’s north last month.
The grieving mum is calling for high-risk stalkers and violent perpetrators to be tracked with GPS monitoring, and to face harsher penalties including immediate jail for intervention order breaches.
“I am driven by an immense amount of anger. It happened and I have to live with it now,” she said.
The Herald Sun can reveal Ms Manno was told by police they could do nothing when she initially went to them for help over disturbing messages sent to her on social media by her obsessed stalker.
Her mother also revealed police advised her daughter to shut down her social media accounts as a solution to the escalating behaviour.
“The first time we went to police, the officer said ‘he’s not threatening anything and a crime hadn’t taken place’,” Ms Di Mauro said.
“The suggestion was to delete and block him or start a new account or get off social media.
“I thought, ‘ are you kidding me?’ She said she was not going to let one person dictate what she does or doesn’t do.”
Ms Di Mauro claimed her daughter had been bombarded with over 150 messages from numerous Instagram accounts operated by her alleged stalker throughout the ordeal, which lasted more than a year.
The messages ranged from declarations of misplaced love to “vile” plots of violence, she alleged.
“Disgusting is not a strong enough word,” she said.
Ms Manno allegedly became the target of his obsession after being kind to him the day he was fired from their former workplace, a Serco call centre in Mill Park.
Her colleagues knew about it and always made sure to walk her to her car after her shift and she would call her mum during the 10-minute car ride home.
Ms Manno also had a carefully laid out plan to drive straight to Mernda or Mill Park police station and call her mum for help if she ever felt she was being followed.
“Celeste was always 100 per cent sure he didn’t know where we lived but she checked her rear-view mirrors constantly,” her mum said.
Ms Di Mauro said police eventually took her daughter’s case seriously and supported her in her applying for an intervention order.
An interim order was made but Ms Manno remained wary about how protected she really was, her mum said.
“We both walked out of court and thought, ‘it’s just a piece of paper’,” she said.
Mr Sako stopped contacting Ms Manno for a period after the order was filed.
Her mother said: “My daughter felt safer. I thought hopefully it had scared him and maybe he had realised this was serious and he needed to forget about Celeste.”
But he allegedly resumed contact, pleading with her to drop the intervention order and that he didn’t know what he was doing was wrong.
Mr Sako was charged with breaching the order and released on summons, enabling him to allegedly smash his way into her bedroom and kill her in the early hours of November 16.
Ms Di Mauro said Mr Sako should have been locked up after the first intervention order breach, and the lack of punishment for such acts would drive desperate people to vigilante acts.
“Other parents might look at what happened to Celeste and say, ‘That’s not happening to my child and I better take matters into my own hands’,” she said.
“If the choice was saving my daughter’s life or doing (jail) time, I would do time.”
Speaking at Victorian Parliament on Wednesday, Ms Di Mauro held back tears as she urged for changes to improve the enforcement of the intervention order system.
She said she still visits her daughter’s resting place daily.
“But I can’t talk to her because I don’t know what to say,” she said.
“We felt safe, I thought we were safe.
“There may be laws and legislations out there but they’re not being addressed.”
Ms Di Mauro said she hoped politicians would act quickly to look at reform and urged the government not to postpone the issue.
“How many more parents have to live through this?” she said.
Ms Di Mauro said her daughter had dreamed of a bright future, showing her homes she hoped to live in and dresses she might one day wear to her wedding.
“We’re never going to get her back,” she said.
“To me justice would be having her here.”
Ms Di Mauro wants high-risk offenders to have to wear GPS tracking bracelets that alert both police and the victim when a breach occurs.
She said those who breached intervention orders should also face the prospect of immediate imprisonment.
“Intervention orders give victims absolutely no peace of mind … it’s a piece of paper,” Ms Di Mauro said.
“It’s not keeping them safe and if the perpetrator breaches … it’s just a slap on the wrist and they get the opportunity to breach again.
“Our government is continuing to allow this because the consequences (of breaches) are not scary enough, especially to someone that way inclined.
“The government must look into making changes now. Not in two years, not in five years, not when there are other stalkers or victims … this should have been done ages ago and then my baby would still be here.”
She is backed by Justice Party MP Tania Maxwell, who will speak about the reform in state parliament on Wednesday.
Ms Maxwell will also be pushing for offenders to be risk-assessed by professionals and be subject to criminal and mental health history checks prior to being released into the community.
She believes behavioural change programs or counselling should also be made mandatory for people subject to intervention orders, and that high-risk offenders be tracked by GPS.
“Unless stalkers are made accountable, we are going to continue to see people’s lives being lost when this could have been prevented,” Ms Maxwell said.
Mr Sako is remanded in custody and will return to court on April 27.
A public vigil will be held for Ms Manno by the lake at the corner of Waterview Drive and Poets Court in Mernda on December 16.
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