Jimmy Bartel and his girlfriend Lauren Mand shame a VILE troll who compared his marriage breakdown to the actions of killer dad Rowan Baxter
- Rowan Baxter murdered his estranged wife and three children on Wednesday
- He set them alight in a family car before stabbing himself to death
- Jimmy Bartel, a retired footy star and anti-domestic violence campaigner, labelled Baxter a 'coward' on Instagram on Friday
- A sick troll claimed that Bartel's decision to leave his wife, Nadia, last year was the 'emotional equivalent' of Baxter's actions
- 'A marriage breakdown is NOT murdering your wife and kids!' Bartel responded
Jimmy Bartel has lashed out at a sick Internet troll who compared the footy star's marriage breakdown to the disgraceful actions of killer dad Rowan Baxter.
The retired AFL player, 36, shared a post to Instagram on Friday in which he labelled Baxter a 'coward' for murdering his estranged wife and three children in Brisbane two days earlier.
His post caught the attention of a troll who bizarrely suggested that the quadruple murder suicide was the 'emotional equivalent' of Bartel leaving his wife, Nadia, for another woman, Lauren Mand, last year.
In response, Bartel shared the vile comment with his 126,000 followers and wrote: 'A marriage breakdown is NOT murdering your wife and kids!'
Shocking: Jimmy Bartel and his girlfriend, Lauren Mand, have shamed a vile Internet troll who compared his marriage breakdown to the actions of killer dad Rowan Baxter
'Tearing down people trying to highlight a major issue in this country is not the way forward,' Bartel added.
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Mand, who began dating the Geelong Cats legend following his marriage split, re-posted Bartel's comment, adding that she 'agreed'.
Bartel, a longtime advocate for domestic violence victims, said in his original post that Baxter should 'rot in hell'.
'I hope you rot in hell': Bartel shared a post to Instagram on Friday in which he labelled Baxter a 'coward' for murdering his estranged wife and three children in Brisbane two days earlier
Shocking: Bartel's post caught the attention of a troll who bizarrely suggested that the quadruple murder suicide was the 'emotional equivalent' of Bartel leaving his wife, Nadia, for another woman, Lauren Mand, last year. In response, Bartel shared the vile comment with his 126,000 followers and wrote, 'A marriage breakdown is NOT murdering your wife and kids!'
'To do what you did is pure cowardice, weakness and a blatant disregard for your family's life,' he wrote.
'Again another woman and her family die at the hands of DV [domestic violence] in this country, this should never happen.
'Our system, once again, has failed Hannah and her children.'
Hannah Clarke and her three children were torched in their car on Wednesday morning by Baxter, who stabbed himself to death at the scene in Camp Hill, Brisbane.
Pure evil: Hannah Clarke and her three children were torched in their car on Wednesday morning by Baxter, who stabbed himself to death at the scene in Camp Hill, Brisbane
On Friday morning, her friend Manja Whaley, who met Ms Clarke at a gym last year, revealed the mother-of-three had been abused throughout her relationship.
Speaking on the Today show, Ms Whaley also said that Baxter had once admitted threatening to kill his eldest child from a previous relationship.
He also threatened to harm Ms Clarke's children if she refused to have sex with him and wouldn't let her wear shorts to the gym in case she attracted other men.
Bartel - whose split from Nadia, the mother of his two children, was made public on August 15 - has long been open about his family's experience of domestic violence.
In 2016, he told the Herald Sun that his mother, Dianne, had been a victim of domestic violence at the hands of his late father, Terry.
'I remember mum being on the floor in the hallway; he had repeatedly hit her, and she was trying to crawl away from him,' Bartel said.
Outspoken: Bartel - whose split from Nadia, the mother of his two children, was made public on August 15 - has long been open about his family's experience of domestic violence
'I remember Olivia [his eldest sister] trying to push him away from mum, and he physically threw her against the wall, like a rag doll, which is hard to comprehend.
'I tried to get in between him and mum, and I was the next to get thrown, into an old-fashioned bureau. He belted mum one more time before he left. That was a major turning point in my life.'
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