THE brother of a 16-year-old autistic boy who was strangled to death in his bedroom at Charlestown last year has told his killer the boy's family will never forgive him.
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Chadley Sheridan, now 25, was in September found guilty of murdering the boy in an unprovoked attack at a unit in Charlestown Road on March 15, the jury finding the psychosis he was suffering at the time of the killing was caused solely by using drugs, particularly methamphetamine.
Sheridan faced a sentence hearing in Sydney Supreme Court on Friday and listened as the boy's older brother read a victim impact statement, outlining his shock at the 16-year-old's violent death and disbelief that Sheridan had continued using methamphetamine, despite knowing he had a history of drug induced psychosis.
Within a few days, an innocent boy would be dead, strangled in his bed in a unit in Charlestown in the middle of the night.
"Think about how terrified [the boy] would have been," the boy's brother said to Sheridan. "Apparently, you left him breathing. You went outside his room and closed the door. At this point, you had several options available to you. You could have called for help. You had a phone. You could have got his dad, but instead you closed the door and left him to die alone. When you saw his dad, you didn't mention a thing. It may have saved him. When [the boy] was discovered, instead of providing helpful information about what had been done to him, you ran away."
Sheridan wrote a letter of apology to the boy's family, which was read, in part, on Friday and said: "Words cannot describe how sorry I am for what I have done to my friend. I still don't know why I did what I did. I am truly sorry to [the boy's] family for what I have done".
But before that, during his victim impact statement, the boy's older brother had said: "sorry is a waste of time anyway because you will not be forgiven".
"You've taken an autistic boy, a boy who already struggled enough in his life," the boy's brother said. "You took him away in an extremely violent manner. You left him to die alone, and his last memory was likely fear and terror."
Justice Peter Garling will sentence Sheridan in Sydney Supreme Court on December 9.
You've taken an autistic boy, a boy who already struggled enough in his life. You left him to die alone, and his last memory was likely fear and terror.
- The 16-year-old boy's older brother said in a victim impact statement during Chadley Sheridan's sentence hearing on Friday.
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