A man has admitted helping to kidnap a Mangerton pensioner in return for a free place to stay before the victim was killed and his body stuffed into a surfboard bag and left to rot.
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A grim-faced Paul William Turner appeared at a NSW Supreme Court sentence hearing on Thursday after previously pleading guilty to detaining Mark Dower in company to obtain an advantage.
The 56-year-old’s decomposing body was found in 2015 after it was dropped out a second-floor window and left bagged in the laundry of a Crana Place, Mangerton housing commission complex.
Mark Kenneth Jenkin, who took money from Mr Dower and violently assaulted him before his death, was last month found guilty of manslaughter following a judge-only trial.
Turner, now 51, has admitted to detaining Mr Dower at Jenkin’s unit before the killing.
But his lawyer, Philip Young, said he was ‘‘simply present’’ and didn’t play an active role in the kidnapping which was committed as part of a joint criminal enterprise with Jenkin.
It occurred when Turner was on the run from police after breaching his parole and needed a place to stay.
‘‘This offender was motivated by a reason - that his previous accommodation had become unavailable to him very recently and Mr Jenkin had offered him a roof over his head,’’ Mr Young said.
However, Crown prosecutor Michael Fox said Turner’s lesser role in the offence was still important as he helped Jenkin get Mr Dower to his unit before the pensioner’s death.
He was well aware of the physical and psychological abuse Mr Dower suffered at the Mangerton residence and was shown in one video holding the man up in Jenkin’s bathroom while Jenkin abused him.
‘‘The fact that Mr Dower is not tied up or physically restrained does not diminish the objective gravity of the offence, because, clearly, he was under the spell of the violence that was inflicted,’’ Mr Fox said.
Mr Young argued his client moved out before Mr Dower had been seriously injured and Turner didn’t know what fate ultimately awaited him.
‘‘He definitely abandoned a vulnerable man who had been detained against his will,’’ Justice Peter Hamill responded.
Turner is scheduled to be sentenced in the same court, which is sitting in Wollongong, on Friday.
He definitely abandoned a vulnerable man who had been detained against his will.
- Justice Peter Hamill
- AAP
