15 The Two Intruders | We talk to Irma’s grandson

In all the trials we've covered, we've never heard directly from a victim or their family. This episode we change that. Irma Palasics's grandson, John Mikita, joins the pod to reveal his thoughts on the verdict, and describe the Irma and Gregor Palasics he knew and loved. The Case Of is the follow-up to the hit podcast Mushroom Case Daily, and all episodes of that show will remain available in the back catalogue of The Case Of.

• 0:00Speaker 00

  Hello, I'm Annabelle Crabbe. Now, I wouldn't say I'm a hoarder exactly, but I do hang on to things. It's not just you and me. Australia's oldest library is crammed with stuff that isn't books. Terrible paintings, old menus, human hair. Is this history or hoarding? Come and have a rummage through the story of us, told by our stuff. Search for the History or Hoarding podcast on ABC Listen or wherever you get your podcasts. ABC Listen, podcasts, radio, news, music and more.

• 0:45Speaker 01

  What's it like to sit in court beneath the details of your grandmother's violent death and the excuses of the accused poured over in front of an audience? In this episode, we find out. I'm Stephen Stockwell. Welcome to episode 15 of The Case of the Two Intruders.

• 1:02Speaker 02

  Irma Pelazik's brutal murder rocked her family and has haunted them for 24 long years.

• 1:08Speaker 03

  This wasn't the average robbery. The brutality of the attack shocked the community.

• 1:12Speaker 02

  They were virtually tortured that night.

• 1:15Speaker 04

  Violently assaulted before the two men ransacked the premises and stole cash and jewellery.

• 1:21Speaker 03

  My grandparents were beaten and my grandmother was left to die on the lounge room floor.

• 1:28Speaker 01

  John Mikita was in his twenties when his grandmother Irma Pelazik was killed in 1999. And for decades after, he ran a campaign asking Cam Barrens, who killed Irma? Now he knows. And after sitting in court for the trial which found two men guilty of Irma's manslaughter, I wanted to know what he thought of the process, the verdict, and also what his grandparents were like. John Mikita, welcome to The Case Of.

• 1:55Speaker 03

  Thank you.

• 1:55Speaker 01

  And as well as John, we're also joined by ABC Court reporter Elizabeth Byrne. Welcome Liz. Hi Stocky. To get us going, I really want to start with kind of how the trial ended. You know, the verdict that was handed down relating to Steve Fabrizi, Joseph Ikony, guilty of the manslaughter of your grandmother, Irma Plasix, in 1999. John, are you happy with the verdict? This was a murder trial. Are you comfortable with manslaughter?

• 2:21Speaker 03

  Oh, look, Stocky, I think from the family's perspective, we're just happy that there's a conviction of something. Yeah, we would have loved to have received a murder conviction for both of the offenders. But manslaughter to us is just good enough, I suppose, for now. Because it's not the only charge that they've been found guilty of. So we're more interested in finding out what the actual sentencing is going to be for these two offenders, more so than what it actually means to murder versus manslaughter.

• 2:50Speaker 01

  Yeah, we do have the sentencing coming August 24th. You know, something that I find often gets lost in trials are the people who are at the centre of them. In this case, your grandmother and your grandfather, Irma and Gregor. Can you tell us a bit about who they were?

• 3:06Speaker 03

  Oh, look, I loved my grandparents so much. I had such a good relationship with them. I spent a phenomenal amount of time with them. Whenever I was sick or during the school holidays, I would always go to my grandparents. And so I have very fond memories of both my grandparents, more so my grandmother, because my grandfather would always go to work in the morning. He worked in the family carpentry business. But even on the weekends, when I'd see him or if I was sick, you know, he was always quite jovial, always a bit of a joker with us kids, and always very, very kind. But my grandmother, to me, was the most important person in my life. I listened to everything that she said. I took her advice. And, you know, she, she really cared for everybody in the family. She was the matriarch

• 3:50Speaker 03

  of our family. And it was, yeah, it was terrible when suddenly she just disappeared from being that person for everybody in the family. They were generous, they loved their community, they loved going out. You know, some of the fond memories that I have with my grandparents was especially when I was there on school holidays, was when I was sick, when they lived in Red Hill. It was, we'd go down at lunchtime or in the, in mid-morning to the local shops and my grandmother would buy, myself and if my brother was with me, something sweet to eat and we'd always get a toy or something. But we always had to be back home at lunchtime for Bold and the Beautiful and Days of Our Lives. And she'd make us the, the baguette sandwich and sit us down and sort of like say, shh,

• 4:35Speaker 03

  okay, now, no talking now for the next hour and a half. And it doesn't matter if anybody rang on the telephone, they were all ignored because that was the time for Malena and Stephen and the others. So it's those sort of memories that you, you remember the most. And of course, their cooking, my grandma was a five-star Michelin chef as far as I was concerned. And she'd make wonderful walnut cakes and, and lots of different Hungarian sweets and things. So, yeah, it was just, it's a lot of, a lot of really great memories which came crashing to an end on that night, yeah.

• 5:11Speaker 02

  It's so sad that you lost her and obviously such lovely memories. One of the things that struck me during the trial was that during the evidence, some of the people in the family had expressed concern about Irma's money storing practices. And it raised the question for me, why was there so much money in the house? And not just in 1999, but also At the, in the other times, particularly nineteen ninety seven, when they lost over a hundred thousand dollars in cash.

• 5:45Speaker 03

  Um. We have to remember too that the back where my grandparents came from, so they came from Hungary during the revolution. And they left the country with basically the clothes on their back. They, uh, the, my grandmother was cooking and cleaning, I think, for uh, one of the Russian soldiers and she had learnt a little bit of Russian and she had worked out one evening that um, that the government was going to clamp down on the revolution and close the borders. So she literally went home, grabbed my auntie and my, my mum and my grandfather and they walked across the border that night into Austria. And so coming to Australia with nothing and starting from basically scratch, I think my grandmother had a bit of a fear of

• 6:29Speaker 03

  uh, losing money, um, and leaving things behind. And the best way of coping with that was just to, to keep it somewhere within close reach. Also, look, I've got to admit to back in those days, it was a cash economy. So they had a family business making kitchens and cabinets. And a lot of people would pay cash. And so they had quite a bit of cash around, which they, they still had a good amount of money in the bank. But um, they just wanted to have it readily accessible. And that's the reason why that they had such a large amount of money in their home in Red Hill. And I think that continued to follow them, obviously, when they moved to McKellar, that they still felt safer if they had some disposable income at ready hands reach.

• 7:08Speaker 02

  Yeah. Which brings me to the compartment. Did you know about that secret compartment?

• 7:13Speaker 03

  No, I, I was one of the ones that didn't. It was only a few of the family members, my mum, my dad, um, my brother who built the kitchen. And like we had heard during the court case, there may have been one or two other people, but um, I was never aware. My grandmother, I remember going to the house in Red Hill and it was, uh, she, she would place things in unusual locations. So if you went to the cupboard to get a tea towel, um, suddenly there would be you know, either some money or there would be a, a gold ring wrapped up in something. I mean, this is just the way it was. She would just hide things all across the house, which inevitably ended up as the reason why they, these, some of these offenders had gone through the whole house, especially in McKellar.

• 7:54Speaker 03

  Um, because that's what the way that my grandma did, did it. Um, she would not keep everything in one location, but um, obviously having that, that safety hidey hole. In McKellar, it allowed her to put everything in the one spot.

• 8:08Speaker 02

  And, and that's in fact what your mother told the court, she said. We felt we had to give them something, otherwise it would be spread all over the house. When did you first learn that there was a secret compartment and in fact see it?

• 8:21Speaker 03

  I think it was basically during the police investigation. I had never seen it. The first time that I had seen any photos inside the house, or even photos of uh my grandfather when he was first beaten, when they had brought him to the hospital, was on the sixty minutes special. And that was quite confronting. Uh but prior to that, we'd never seen anything. I'd never been into the house in McKellar after it had happened. I just couldn't bring myself to do that. So it was the hidey hole. I had no idea at all that there was such a thing. It was, we, we always used to joke as the family, as if anything ever happened to them and they eventually passed away, that we would have to literally leave no, no stone unturned in the house to find, to make sure we're not just throwing, you know, valuables out.

• 9:02Speaker 02

  So let's flip forward to nineteen ninety eight, the second burglary, where Irma was actually assaulted. What was life like for them after that? Because obviously that prompted them to move.

• 9:16Speaker 03

  Hmm, yeah, look, they were very, very scared after that it happened. Uh the first time obviously was a big jolt, especially losing, losing so much. But um to be physically attacked, that my grandmother was in that second home invasion that they had, or robbery, if we call it that. They felt very unsecure. They did lock, lock their doors more than they used to because my grandmother and grandfather always had this thing where you could essentially walk straight into the garage, uh which was underneath their house in Red Hill. There was not, the roller door sometimes was left open. I mean, they were just trusting of other people. Uh but from that point, it all changed. When they had bought the house in uh in McKellar, they uh uh they had basically turned it into Fort Knox.

• 9:59Speaker 03

  And I think that came out through the police investigation and the trial where, you know, they put up high fences. Uh they basically refurbished the whole house. There was dead locks, there was large gates everywhere. Um and unfortunately, in the end, the place that the, the two offenders got through was just somewhere which we would never thought somebody would fit through.

• 10:19Speaker 02

  So after the nineteen ninety nine incident.

• 10:23Speaker 02

  What was the family's feeling about who might have been responsible? And what was the relationship with the Hungarian community like at that time? Did you suspect anyone from there?

• 10:36Speaker 03

  Well, my grandparents were quite active, the Hungarian Australian Club. And also in Hungarian community, they were very well respected and widely known. And yeah, we obviously did think about that too. I mean, my grandparents had known so many people. And, you know, especially in their carpentry business too. You know, it wasn't just the Hungarian community. There was, there was a lot of Europeans that would come to them and get kitchens built. And so, you know, the suspects could have been basically anybody. But yeah, certainly the Hungarian community was suspected. And in this instance, we never actually thought about Hungarian community further afield like in Melbourne.

• 11:13Speaker 01

  John, how did you hear about the 1999 burglary? And that your grandmother Irma had been killed and that your grandfather was in hospital?

• 11:25Speaker 03

  That's a night that we'll never forget. I think the whole family will never forget. But for me personally, I had just come back from Sydney and I was living with my parents in their Ainsley home. And it was, oh gosh, maybe three, three thirty, four o'clock in the morning. And the dog started to bark. And it was not the usual expectation at that time of the morning or night. We heard the, some people come in through the gate or they're trying to attempt to try to come through the gate. My dad had gone out to the front or to the back door and asked like who was there? And they basically announced themselves as the police. When I first heard that, the thing that went through my mind was my brother. Because, you know, my brother likes to go out and drink and all those sorts of things.

• 12:10Speaker 03

  And I just presumed that, oh, what has he done? You know, and that's why the police are here. And the police asked to come inside the house. I was still in my bedroom, which wasn't far from the lounge room. And they asked my parents to sit down. And they said, are you the daughter of Emmett Place's Elizabeth Mikita? And they confirmed and they said, we're sorry to inform you, but there's been a break in at the McKenna house.

• 12:39Speaker 03

  And, um, and your mother has passed away at the scene. And, um, I remember at that point, um, in my bedroom, I broke down, um, and, and I cried quite a bit. Um, moments later, my mum came in and consoled me. She didn't cry. I, for quite some time, I don't remember my mum ever crying after it had happened. The police, from, from that point forward, like, I remember that, that point or that, that part quite extensively. But from then on, it became a bit of a blur. Uh, we, um, uh, we basically got changed because they had told us where my grandfather was. And then we, um, got driven down in the police car to, um, Calvary Hospital, uh, which is in Belconnen.

• 13:22Speaker 03

  And, uh, I remember coming to the ward and seeing the, the police officer at the front door of my grandfather's room and we went in. By that time, they had already cleaned him up a bit, but he had, um, the telephone cable still tied around his arms. And, and then, yeah, from there, we, we stayed there for a little while. Uh, we went home for a little bit and then everybody in the family was asked to attend, uh, one of the different police stations because there were so many of us, um, to give a formal interview. And that went on for, you know, several hours for each of us.

• 14:00Speaker 03

  Uh, essentially trying to rule out the family because in these instances, you know, uh, family is always the first suspect. Um, and then from there, yeah, a lot, a lot of those early years just became a bit of a blur. But I'll never forget that night, ever, in, in my life.

• 14:17Speaker 02

  Such a sad time, John. After that though, you never let people forget about Irma. There was the Who Killed Irma campaign from the Corps flutes. And I've also seen lit signs on the road up to Parliament House. How did all of that start?

• 14:36Speaker 03

  In those first few years after it had all happened, we just let the police do what they needed to do. We were obviously grieving. We tried to live our lives as best as possible and just not think about it as much. And then sort of like it got to the stage where in probably around 2010 to 11, I decided I had started a successful business as a graphic designer and I was doing quite well. And I thought, you know what, I have the resources at my hand. I'm not satisfied with where things are going because just there had been obviously no arrests and no progress in the case.

• 15:17Speaker 03

  That I would get on board with the Who Killed Doma campaign and ensure that nobody in Canberra forgot what had happened on that night in November 1999.

• 15:27Speaker 02

  How important do you think the campaign was in finally getting the result and in keeping it in the public's mind, keeping it in the police's mind, even though of course now we know that the people responsible were way out of the range of the campaign?

• 15:44Speaker 03

  Well, it's interesting because yeah, we spent a phenomenal, I spent a phenomenal amount of time working in the Canberra community to get the message out, not knowing that it was all the way down the road in Melbourne where we should have been concentrating. But I started to realise through just talking with police over the years that resources weren't available to continuously work on a lot of these cold cases and including ours, which was one of the most recent ones. And there were questions about people who had submitted evidence or leads to ACT policing, but there was no resources available to be following them up. And that sort of like got me into the frame of mind that I really need to do something

• 16:28Speaker 03

  now about this because if that is the case, then I want the police and I want the government to do everything they possibly can to be able to catch these people.

• 16:38Speaker 02

  The arrests were quite spectacular and a bit of a surprise. How did you find out that someone had been arrested?

• 16:45Speaker 03

  I was actually interstate for work and I had received a call from Craig Marriott to say that we've actually arrested, we're about to arrest somebody. So they had given us a 24 hours heads up just to let the family know, to prepare ourselves. And so I flew back to Canberra so that we could do some media straight away as soon as it had happened. But that was essentially the first time that we had known that they were actually going to arrest somebody for the crime, the first person.

• 17:15Speaker 01

  John, what was that moment like, you know, hearing that there'd been people arrested, you know, this campaign you'd kind of worked on for 20, 25 years at that point?

• 17:25Speaker 03

  It was a little bit of disbelief. The phone call really threw me. I remember I was actually at train station on the north coast of New South Wales and my colleagues who were with me were sort of like, are you okay? Because I sort of like lost the feeling in my legs and I was squatting on the ground. It was just utter amazement that after so long and fighting so hard that we were actually going to have somebody now be responsible for what had happened to my grandparents.

• 17:59Speaker 01

  John, you've, we've spoken about, it's been such a long road to get to this trial. You know, you have the campaign that you've worked on for all those years. The trial comes, the first day of it, you know, begins. What was it like being there as this was finally getting underway?

• 18:18Speaker 03

  Well, in the, in the first few days, unfortunately, I was unable to be inside the courtroom because I was going to be called as a witness. And so I missed out on, on the opening statements and a few other things, which I wasn't overly happy about. My parents couldn't come into the courtroom because it was just too hard on them. For my mum, it has made her unwell. It has affected her health quite considerably where she...

• 18:49Speaker 03

  She can't eat a lot of the time when we have different things that come up during the trial. And so they had to be removed outside of that. We were very fortunate that they were given a victim liaison officer from ACT policing who could basically hold their hand and walk with them at home and tell them things that they needed to hear. But there were some instances where there were things that were shown or talked about which were quite distressing for all of us in the family. I was adamant to stay in the courtroom even when they were showing photos and videos. The DPP or the Crown were quite respectful for the family and made sure that the screens were not able to be seen from the gallery easily.

• 19:33Speaker 03

  So my wife would be there and say, oh, you can look up now or you can look down, just so that you don't see certain things. It did get to the stage towards the end where I felt as though I needed to see some stuff. And I did look up and see some images of my grandmother laying in the hallway and some of the brutality that was shown to her and her body and, you know, the blood and things like that. I think the thing that hurt us the most and was the fact of seeing the emotion also on the first responders who had arrived on the scene. There are a couple of instances where we had police officers and they were quite visibly

• 20:12Speaker 03

  shaken even 25 years later in how they felt when they had been on the scene. And also hearing what they had said, hearing, you know, what they had seen and what they had found. That was really hard for us to hear. And I think for closure, we needed to hear it. It'll be something that we'll never forget. But when we did get the jury decision, there was, I can say, this huge amount of weight that was lifted off my shoulders, walking out of the courtroom, knowing that after so long that we had got these two convictions of manslaughter against these two offenders.

• 21:00Speaker 01

  What was it like being in the court as a victim of a crime? Having to sit there and kind of watch the, you know, the kind of really unemotional, the really kind of cold proceedings, the way that your grandmother and your grandfather were talked about in that room?

• 21:15Speaker 03

  Yeah, it wasn't easy also, you know, you have to sit there calmly. You can't have any outbursts, like you see on TV, you know, people screaming out and wailing and that sort of stuff. So being in the courtroom with the two offenders on a daily basis was quite, it was quite hard to do because you just feel as though that you do need to say something, but they very rarely ever gave us a glance.

• 21:43Speaker 02

  John, the sentencing is coming. Are you preparing a victim impact statement and other members of the family?

• 21:52Speaker 03

  Yes, absolutely. I think we've, I've asked most of the family if possible, if anybody would like to be involved. I think this is an opportunity for each of us to, to share what our experiences were like. And especially considering that during the jury's deliberations, we got the feeling that there was potentially a bit of toying with the difference between murder versus manslaughter. And therefore I think the judge needs to know, Justice Mossop going forward, that how this has affected each and every one of us for so long, when he makes his decision

• 22:34Speaker 03

  as to what he's going to sentence these two offenders to, that it is going to be commiserable with what they have actually done. In our eyes, it's always going to be is that they went in there, you know, with their, I'll call them weapons, or, you know, and, and therefore we believe that they had every, every expectation that potentially something would happen to my grandparents of, of a terrible nature. And so, you know, we would like to hope that through the victim impact statements that we can get the judge to give us a maximum sentence or something that would be, would be acceptable or palatable to, to our family after waiting for so long. Especially considering that I think most people will say in their, their impact statements

• 23:19Speaker 03

  that we have, we have lived a life sentence of 25 years. Waiting without any knowledge of what had happened to my grandparents whilst these two offenders have lived their best years of their lives. And whilst they might be a little bit older now, I think, and I'd like to hope that that's taken into consideration, that it's time for them to do the time to pay for their crime as to what they did to my grandparents on that night.

• 23:48Speaker 01

  John, something I find myself kind of expecting, or I think when I started reporting on courts expecting was that I'd find out, you know, why things happen a certain way or what led to the moment that ended up with everyone being in court. But the thing I've realised is that courts are really there to define whether or not someone committed a very specific act. You know, at the end of this process with Joseph Akoni and Steve Fabritzi guilty of the manslaughter of your grandmother, do you feel like you have all the answers that you wanted?

• 24:19Speaker 03

  No, we don't. I can't, look, I'll be upfront and hundred percent and say, no, we don't. We still don't know how these two men found out about my grandparents. And that's going to be something which will continue to niggled at us and not allow us to have full closure as a family. There somehow, people who lived all the way on the other side of, down south in Melbourne, had found out about my grandparents back in the first incident when they were robbed. And who told them? Was it my grandparents by a slip of mouth? Or was it, you know, a family member? Was it a friend during the actual trial? A number of things came out about, you know, various people who could have potentially said something or been involved.

• 25:04Speaker 03

  And at this stage, we don't expect that we will, may never know. Unless, of course, the two offenders are the only two who do know. If they truly are remorseful and in a position to tell us how they had found out, I think that would be the end of, after obviously the sentencing for the Hukeyldema campaign and for my, for what had happened to my grandparents in 1999.

• 25:33Speaker 01

  How important is this conviction for you and your family to kind of start that process of healing for what happened in 1999?

• 25:41Speaker 03

  It's very important. I think it was more so the fact of just knowing now who. Not knowing who it was for 25 years before they had been arrested is obviously something that was much harder to live with. But, you know, certainly having a conviction, having them behind bars. And there are members of the family who would quite openly say to you that they want them to die behind bars now. More so for myself is just justice that now it's finally been served. Obviously, again, all depending on what the sentencing is going to be in August this year.

• 26:19Speaker 01

  Yep. John, thank you so much for joining us on the case of to share your experiences of, you know, this whole investigation, memories of your grandparents and your experience through the trial.

• 26:30Speaker 03

  Thank you, Stocky. And I just wanted to take this opportunity to say thank you again to people like Elizabeth and James for the work that they do. But also, I've been quite vocal recently for the Australian Federal Police and for the Director of Public Prosecutions Office. I mean, without people who work so hard, and they have, to bring about the conviction of these two murderers, as in our eyes we call the murderers, even though it's manslaughter, we are eternally grateful to these people. And I'd just like to, again, acknowledge them and say thank you to them and everybody who has ever been involved in our case, and to the listeners at home too. There are a lot of people who have been following the Who Killed Irma campaign for many, many years. And it means a lot to us to have their support for so long and say thank you, thank you to them

• 27:15Speaker 03

  all.

• 27:16Speaker 01

  Thank you, John. And I'll second the thanks to Elizabeth Byrne and to James Viver as well. Both absolutely wonderful colleagues, court reporters. And Liz, thank you so much for being a part of this episode as well.

• 27:29Speaker 02

  Thank you, Stocky. And John, I'd also like to thank you and your family, particularly your mother, for allowing me to share in this story. It's been, I've sort of been covering it on and off for the whole time. And it's been great to get to know you all. But I know it's a sad story, but I feel that your family has, it's brought out the best in them.

• 27:54Speaker 03

  Thank you, Elizabeth.

• 27:56Speaker 01

  It's been such a pleasure to take you through this trial. This is our final Two Intruders episode until the sentencing, which we're expecting in late August, as we mentioned, unless there is an appeal, where we'll pop back up with an update. If you are just joining us here, I would love it if you checked out the full series of The Case of the Two Intruders in the Case of Feed. You can find that in ABC Listen or wherever you get your podcasts. And if you've enjoyed listening to this, please leave us a rating or a review because it makes it much easier for people to find us on the non-ABC Listen podcast app. So it would be very much appreciated. I'll be back in your feed on Tuesday.

• 28:39Speaker 01

  The Case of the Two Intruders is produced by ABC Audio Studios and ABC News. Our guest for this episode was John Mikita, and it was hosted by Elizabeth Byrne and myself, Stephen Stockwell, with help from James Viver. Our supervising producer is Greg Muller, and our executive producer is Claire Rollinson. Thank you to senior lawyer Jasmine Sims, our legal queen, to the ACT newsroom and to Audio Studios manager, Eric George. This episode was produced on the land of the Nunawal, Nanbury, and Weirundre people.