Murdered doctor Ashley Gordon’s family confront his teenage killer

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“When I heard the words: ‘We’ve lost Ashley’, I fell to the floor. Then I had to get up, pull myself together, and pretend I was OK – so that my children wouldn’t see their mum’s heart breaking. So they wouldn’t feel their own hearts start to break too,” she told the court.

The pair loved summer and had spent over an hour on the phone the previous day planning to catch up for lunch the following Monday. Instead, Natalie told the court she spent that Monday in the coroner’s office, formally identifying her brother’s body.

“You didn’t just take Ashley’s life that day. You took mine too, you took my past,” she said.

“If you ever come looking for forgiveness, do not come to me. I will never forgive you for what you have done.”

Gordon’s older sister, Tammy, told the court the killing had shattered her sense of safety.

Turning around at times to stare directly at her brother’s killer, Tammy said she was unable to stop thinking about her brother’s final moments as he died alone, in pain and scared.

“My heart has literally broken. I sometimes wonder if I am having a heart attack, as my grief is so physically painful,” she said.

Defence barrister Amelia Beech pointed to the teenager’s young age, lack of prior convictions, reasonable prospects of rehabilitation and the impulsive nature of the crime as mitigating factors.

Beech said that at the time, the boy had become detached from his family and was disillusioned with school. She asked for the teenager to be allowed to stay in youth detention for as long as possible.

But Crown prosecutor Kristie Churchill said the attack on Gordon was “ferocious” and constituted a serious example of murder.

Outside of court, Natalie told reporters nothing would heal the pain of losing her brother and called for greater accountability for young offenders.

“We need to start acting and give real consequences. We demand back respect because we’ve lost all respect,” she said.