1 week Ago By Rebecca Peppiatt
A WA man who was released from prison weeks before he went on to stab a young father to death has been sentenced to eight years in prison for the crime. Glen Boyce, 22, was sentenced on Thursday in the Supreme Court of WA over the stabbing death of new dad Zac Bevilaqua in September 2023 while he was on a community-based order. Police at the scene; the two young parents; Bevilaqua with his newborn daughter.
The court was told Boyce had gone back to being a methamphetamine addict almost immediately after his release from prison a month prior. Boyce had come before Magistrate Lynette Dias on August 20, 2023 after he stole the phone and wallet of a stranger in Northam almost 12 months prior. As was exclusively reported by WAtoday at the time , Dias told Boyce she thought he “had a future ahead of him” despite accepting that the unprovoked attack was “violent and aggressive and would have been very frightening for the victim”.
In that incident, the victim chased Boyce demanding his property be returned before a “scuffle ensued” and the victim received mild lacerations to the neck from a screwdriver as well as a punch to the face. Boyce was granted conditional bail to live at a house in Wagin but repeatedly ran from police when they knocked at the door to do compliance checks. Glen Boyce.
Credit: Facebook His excuse was that he had a “chronic distrust” of police and thought they were targeting him. At that time Boyce had spent seven months in prison and Dias gave him a 12-month sentence for the Northam offence, which, with a reduction for an early plea, meant he got to walk free the same day. “You’ll never see me back here, Your Honour,” Boyce said in response to the sentence.
“I won’t let you down.” Instead, Boyce, high on methamphetamine, was in the car park of Dan Murphy’s in Midland late at night on September 29 when he struck up a conversation with Bevilaqua, who he did not know, and a third man. Boyce took a liking to a gold chain that Bevilaqua was wearing and asked if he wanted to trade it for a mobile phone.
The trio then took off to Woodbridge to make a drug deal and got into an altercation that resulted in Boyce stabbing Bevilaqua in the neck with a pair of scissors. Loading Boyce took off telling his friend, “Move. Ride faster.
I did something.” But the court was told he thought he may have stabbed Bevilaqua in the arm. However, Bevilaqua had been stabbed in the jugular vein and stumbled to a nearby house where he banged on the door and asked for help.
He died a few hours later. During his sentencing for manslaughter on Thursday, the court was told Boyce had a further criminal history that included a violent assault on a woman. State prosecutors said that in June 2021, Boyce had been verbally abusive to the woman before repeatedly hitting her in the head with a wooden stick.
While in custody for that offending he then made 49 attempts — with the help of his mother, the court was told — to repeatedly threaten the same woman over the phone from prison, telling her he was going to bash her, kill her and kick her. He received a 10-month term of imprisonment for the assault. Boyce’s mother submitted a letter to the court in relation to his manslaughter charge calling her son “a loving man” with “a heart of gold”.
“The state submits those comments are made through rose-coloured glasses,” state prosecutor David Davidson told the court. The court was also told a series of prison phone calls between Boyce and his mother record him professing his innocence, telling her that the police were trying to frame him and questioning why he had even been charged. In handing down his sentence on Thursday, Justice Matthew Howard said no sentence imposed could bring Bevilaqua back.
“It will not address the grief his death has caused,” he said. Boyce was sentenced to eight years and six months in prison, backdated for time spent in custody since his arrest in October 2023. He was made eligible for parole.
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. Rebecca Peppiatt – is a journalist with WAtoday, specialising in crime and courts. Connect via email .
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