When he wasn’t taunting police to come and find him, Illawarra fugitive Justin Filipetti was using live social media videos to protest his innocence.
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“I haven’t done nothing f--king wrong,” the Mangerton resident said in a video posted on his Facebook page in mid-June, just days after police issued warrants for his arrest.
Filipetti, a convicted criminal with a history of violent and erratic behaviour, was wanted over the alleged firebombing of a neighbour’s unit on June 14, however had not answered the warrants and instead went into hiding.
Not that he put it that way.
“You won’t find me, Superintendent,” he said in one of the four videos recorded between June 19 and 22.
“Good luck with it. I’m not f--king hiding…..I’m walking the streets with my head held high.
“If you think you can find me or you think you know where I am – come. I’m daring you, come. It won’t end well, so you better call TRG (tactical response group) …
“Come and f--king find me … but I’m telling you, I’m like the wind. You know I’m there but you can’t catch me.”
Filipetti was eventually tracked down at a house in Berkeley, where he was found hiding in a cupboard in the laundry.
He has since expressed regret in court for recording the videos.
But now he’s been left even more red-faced after confessing to carrying out the very fire bombing incident he’d spent so much video-time denying.
The 27-year-old pleaded guilty in Wollongong Local Court on Tuesday to damaging property by fire, as well as resist police charges stemming from his less-than-graceful arrest on June 28.
The case was adjourned to November 14 for sentencing. Filipetti remains behind bars.