Your morning Briefing
Welcome to your morning roundup of what’s making news and the must-reads for today.
Hello readers. Here is your two-minute digest of what’s making news today.
Fear and looting
Victorians are feeling increasingly less safe at home alone at night and walking around their neighbourhoods, according to new data that shows a five-year spike in public safety fears in the state. A Productivity Commission report into justice services, released today, reveals 79.1 per cent of Victorians felt safe when they were at home by themselves at night last financial year, a sharp decline compared with 90.4 per cent recorded in 2013-14.
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Bad debts
A criminal lawyer gunned down in southwest Sydney was in debt and owed money to “the wrong people”, but told friends he wasn’t aware of any threat. Ho Ledinh, a 65-year-old father of five, died minutes after he was shot up to four times outside the Happy Cup Cafe at Bankstown City Plaza in broad daylight on Tuesday. The Daily Telegraph reports Mr Ledinh was in “a lot of debt”, according to a source, and deregistered his law firm Ledinh Lawyers Pty Ltd for six months last year because of financial troubles.
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Mum’s murder rap
To her surviving daughter, Maree Crabtree was the mum who helped her rescue small animals in need of a new home. But police now allege that not only was Ms Crabtree secretly torturing her daughter, she had also murdered two of her adult children, staging their overdose deaths to make them look like suicides for her own financial gain. Handwriting experts have been consulted to examine her son’s apparent suicide note, which police believe was written by Ms Crabtree. The shocking case emerged yesterday when Ms Crabtree, 51, was arrested in Brisbane.
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Cat chills
Domain chairman Nick Falloon was calming anxious investors yesterday as former chief executive Antony Catalano grabbed a morning coffee in Sorrento, Victoria’s seaside playground of the rich and famous, a world away from the corporate disruption back in Sydney. Amid the multi-million-dollar waterfront properties that the company he so abruptly left is reliant on for lucrative real estate listings, Mr Catalano looked casual in shorts, T-shirt and a zip-up hoodie at Itali.co, a modern Italian eatery serving gourmet pizzas and pasta.
As Mr Catalano went on the morning coffee run, it has emerged he has surrendered yet another big payday. Asked whether he thought investors deserved an apology for their losses, Mr Catalano told the Herald Sun:
“Why should I be sorry?”
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Loneliness of the long distance liar
When ultra-marathon runner Mark Robson crossed the finish line of the gruelling Australia Day Ultra race last weekend, he raised his arms in triumph, shouted “Booyah” and asked the organisers for a medal. “I think I’ve earned one of them,” said a smiling Mr Robson after finishing fifth in the 100km event in the southwest of Western Australia. Instead of presenting him with a medal, organisers wanted to ask Mr Robson about their suspicions he had cheated his way to the line — by hiding in bushes and taking shortcuts — in a race that featured elite runners from as far away as Finland, Germany and Britain.
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Kudelka’s view
China’s great wall of silence
China deliberately concealed information about the coronavirus, and now it is fighting an inquiry. So what is Beijing hiding?
Your noon Briefing
Your 2-minute digest of the day’s top stories.