The heartbroken mother of a murdered young dad has confronted his killer in court saying “you knew what you were doing”.
Dozens crowded the Victorian Supreme Court on Monday as Ashley Roy Feetham, 25, returned for a pre-sentence hearing.
Last month, Feetham was found guilty of murdering Dylan Bond, 26, and causing serious injury to his younger brother, Heath Bond, in April 2021.
Returning their verdict, the jury rejected his claim that stabbing the two brothers was an act of self-defence after they drove to his then-girlfriend, Abbey Sexton’s, home to confront him.
Ms Sexton and Heath Bond had been engaged but their relationship broke down weeks before the violence because of an affair with Feetham.
The court was told Heath Bond and Feetham first came to blows in the early hours of April 25 during a night out in Geelong when Heath caught wind his ex was nearby.
He met with her out on the street and had an hours-long emotional discussion about their relationship that ended when Feetham, angry his new girlfriend was talking to her ex, approached and initiated a fight with Heath.
The two men were pulled apart by passers-by.
The following day, Feetham began messaging Dylan after he was told by Ms Sexton the two brothers were “going to come after him”.
Exchanging messages over a few hours, Feetham gave his side of the story and Dylan told him to leave them alone to “let them talk and sort themselves out”.
Feetham responded: “I don’t do this tit for tat bull----, you know where I am”.
Mid afternoon the two brothers arrived at the home, where they were met by Feetham’s sister, Melissa Feetham, who asked; “you’re not going to rough him up are you?”
According to crown prosecutor Mark Gibson KC, both responded in unison “we’re not going to touch him”.
As Heath entered the home he once shared with his fiancee, Feetham “sprinted out and stabbed” him in the chest.
His brother, Dylan, intervened and was stabbed by Feetham five or six times as they wrestled, before the offender fled the scene.
In a police interview later the same day, Feetham claimed Dylan grabbed the knife and he thought he was going to day.
“Obviously the jury didn’t accept some of that,” Mr Gibson told the court.
Conceding the two brothers had “provoked” Feetham by attending, Mr Gibson said the case should not be looked at as “excessive self-defence”.
He said Feetham was the initiator and aggressor of the violence and could have left the home to avoid a confrontation.
Twenty members of the Bond brothers’ family and friends provided victim impact statements to the court, in which they described Dylan as a “one of a kind”.
“Dylan was one incredible man with a big smile … we were only just starting our lives together,” Grace Wilson, who had married Dylan just nine weeks earlier, said.
His mother, Fiona Holloway, began sobbing as she described Dylan as her “rock” before fiercely turning to point her finger at Feetham and say “you knew what you were doing”.
Feetham, who kept his head down for much of the hearing, did not meet her gaze.
Dylan and Heath’s youngest sister, Hope Bond, told the court she no longer feels safe anywhere.
“I hope that the judge is as ruthless with the sentence as you were ruthless with my brothers when you killed Dylan and critically injured Heath,” she said.
Feetham’s barrister, Hayden Rattray, told the court his client was remorseful for what happened.
“This was decisions made in the heat of the moment and consequence were not thought about greatly before the conduct,” he said.
Feetham will be sentenced later this month.
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