'Macabre and callous in the extreme': teens jailed for service station murder
A drug-addicted, psychotic teenage boy who stabbed a service station worker to death before scrawling a terrorist logo with his blood said he heard a voice inside his head saying "kill him, kill him, kill him" at the time.
The now 19-year-old man and his 18-year-old old accomplice have been jailed for at least 27 and 13 years respectively over a "violent and uncontrolled criminal rampage" that climaxed with the "cold-blooded murder" of Pakistani student Zeeshan Akbar at the Queanbeyan Caltex late on April 6, 2017.
Two teenagers have been jailed for the stabbing murder of Caltex service station worker Zeeshan Akbar.Credit:Facebook
In a letter to NSW Supreme Court judge Geoffrey Bellew, and to the pair's multiple victims and their families, the older teen - who cannot be named for legal reasons - described himself as a "child out of control" who "wasn't in the right headspace" when he stabbed Mr Akbar, 29, through the heart.
But, in imprisoning him for a maximum of 35½ years, with a non-parole period of 27½ years, Justice Bellew did not accept the teenager had expressed any genuine remorse for what he described as "an act of unmitigated cowardice" in stabbing the lone and vulnerable worker from behind.
The younger teen, 15 at the time of the offence, was sentenced to a maximum of 18 years and four months, with a non-parole period of 13 years and nine months for his lesser role in the murder.
As he began to ransack the service counter, the older teen, then 16 years old, inflicted two more major blows with the kitchen knife he had pocketed from home earlier that day "in an uncontrolled and ferocious display of gratuitous violence".
Justice Bellew said the older teen's final act, "which can only be described as both macabre and callous in the extreme, was to dip his fingers the deceased's blood and draw the letters 'IS' [Islamic State] on the glass window of that service station."
The pair had earlier pleaded guilty to murder and other offences related to a crime spree that ended in a police chase after the older teen stabbed and carjacked a motorist the following morning.
The deadly spree that also resulted in two hospitalisations began among a crew of 10 on the afternoon of April 6, with the older teen telling the group he had "joined ISIS", showing them images on his phone of an "Arab looking dude" with a human head in the background, as well as a number of text messages between him and the "Arab".
After the group went to Queanbeyan River to smoke cannabis, members peeled off and the spree helmed by the older boy began: a bottle shop worker was threatened and punched; an acquaintance sitting on a bench was glassed; and a man attacked inside his home. At 11.45pm the two remaining teens turned their sights on the service station.
The older teen, who, following their arrest used tomato sauce to repeat the terrorist organisation's initials on a police cell wall, told prison psychologist Dr Kerri Eagle said he was hearing voices while at the service station.
Justice Bellew said he was satisfied the teenager's schizophrenic condition contributed to the crime spree and reduced his moral culpability. He said the teenager's preoccupation with IS had not been behind the killing, and rather his use of methamphetamines - which the teen said made him a "better criminal" - played a significant role in his offending.
Despite this, Justice Bellew said the teen's prospects of rehabilitation were poor as he displayed a "disturbingly high" number of psychopathic traits and remained susceptible to the influences of violent extremists.