Woman gets jail time after stabbing her alleged rapist, dragging his body with car
A mother was sentenced to jail Monday after killing her alleged rapist and dragging his body with a car, reports CBS News partner Network Ten in Australia. Roxanne Eka Peters, 35, faces nine years in prison for manslaughter and an additional 18 months for interfering with a corpse, the Brisbane Supreme Court ruled. However, she will be eligible for parole in less than two years.
Peters fatally stabbed Grant Jason Cassar, 51, in the heart using a kitchen knife at her home in Capalaba, Queensland, in December 2015, according to Network Ten. She then tied a rope around his body, including his neck, and dragged it behind her car to a ditch where she hid it.
Before the killing, Cassar allegedly threatened Peters that he was going to harm her child if she didn't continue having sex with him.
Justice David Bodice said in Brisbane Supreme Court that Peters had "significant provocation" after Cassar raped her and threatened her child.
"I accept the stabbing occurred in circumstances when you were enraged by what the deceased had done to you and was threatening to do to you again," he said.
However, Bodice said she should have called for help after the stabbing and shown respect for Cassar's human dignity instead of "callously disposing of the deceased body."
Boddice said Peters' upbringing around drug users, where she was subjected to sexual abuse, had acerbated the rage she felt when Cassar came to her home on the day he died, according to the report.
With time served, Peters will be eligible for parole in June 2020.