The younger brother of one-punch victim Thomas Kelly was targeted with hazing and death threats, leaving the teen broken months before he took his own life, his parents say.
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
$0/
(min cost $0)
or signup to continue reading
Speaking with 60 Minutes on Sunday night Ralph Kelly said abuse directed at his family over lockout laws weighed on his son, Stuart, who suicided in 2016.
"It took its toll in the end ... We paid the price very badly for it," Mr Kelly said.
The teen's parents also said he became a different person overnight after attending St Paul's College at Sydney University.
"He went off to university at Sydney, for one night at a college, and he came home a different person the following day ... He was broken," Kathy Kelly said.
Mr Kelly's family said he didn't leave his bedroom for months after spending one night at the college and never told them the full story of what happened but believed he may have been targeted in hazing.
Stuart was found dead on Sydney's northern beaches in July last year. It was just weeks after the fourth anniversary of his brother's death.
Stuart Kelly was 14 when his older brother died after being randomly punched while walking with his girlfriend in Kings Cross in July 2012.
Thomas, 18, was walking with his girlfriend along Victoria Street on July 7, 2012, when a heavily intoxicated stranger - Kieran Loveridge - punched him on the head.
Thomas suffered a traumatic brain injury and died in St Vincent's Hospital two days later.
Following his brother's death, Stuart went on to campaign heavily against alcohol-fuelled violence and to support the work of the Thomas Kelly Foundation.
The campaign, coupled with the death of one-punch attack victim Daniel Christie in 2013, eventually led to the controversial lockout laws being introduced by the NSW government the following year.
Ms Kelly said their family's support for lockout laws had made them a target of abuse, including death threats.
In 2016, death threats were made to the Kellys after reports emerged about the salary Mr Kelly drew from the Thomas Kelly Youth Foundation.
"There were death threats and things like that to our family. What does that do to an 18-year-old?" she said.
In 2015, at a gala event to raise money for the foundation, Stuart addressed an audience of more than 700, including the state's most powerful figures, and revealed the lasting impact his brother's death had on him.
He recalled the moment he and his sister, Madeleine, learnt that Thomas' life support would be switched off.
"I look back at that moment: I was 14 years old, I was told by a stranger that my brother, my best friend, was going to die. Those few words would change my life forever," he told the crowd, including NSW Premier Mike Baird, NSW Police Commissioner Andrew Scipione and lord mayor Clover Moore.
"I'm now 17 - that was three years ago. However, I carry a deep scar that you cannot see. It's always there, it never leaves. It sits below the surface of your skin and surfaces when you least expect it."
Stuart displayed stoicism and composure beyond his years that night as he shared, with a room mostly full of strangers, his last memory of Thomas alive and his journey to his critically injured brother's hospital bedside.
"Tom never deserved to die that night, it was not meant to be his time. In fact, I believe now that it could and should have been avoided. Our family lost a son and a brother," he said.
"It is a sentence that I have to carry for the rest of my life. My mother, father and sister now carry this sentence. Our relatives and friends, Tom's friends, carry this sentence."
Support is available for those who may be distressed by phoning Lifeline 13 11 14; Mensline 1300 789 978; Kids Helpline 1800 551 800; beyondblue 1300 224 636.
AAP
