{"id":185348,"date":"2025-10-02T15:39:09","date_gmt":"2025-10-02T15:39:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/185348\/"},"modified":"2025-10-02T15:39:09","modified_gmt":"2025-10-02T15:39:09","slug":"woman-left-with-brain-bleed-after-being-attacked-by-unknown-man-on-beach-walk-at-peregian-sunshine-coast","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/185348\/","title":{"rendered":"Woman left with brain bleed after being attacked by unknown man on beach walk at Peregian, Sunshine Coast"},"content":{"rendered":"

Kathy will tell you she’s not a victim – she’s a survivor of violence, allegedly committed at the hands of a random man during her regular morning walk on a beach.<\/p>\n

The accused is now before the courts, but Kathy’s experience can give us all a remarkable insight into the failures of a system set up to support victims who desperately just want to get their lives back on track.<\/p>\n

Kathy was allegedly attacked on April 8 this year, around 9am on a beach at Peregian on the Sunshine Coast – a council designated dog free zone.<\/p>\n

READ MORE: Locals up in arms over noise and smell of boat full of dogs\ufeff<\/a><\/p>\n

\"KathyKathy with her husband John. (A Current Affair)<\/p>\n

She says she was walking near a man with his dog, and pointed out the rules.<\/p>\n

“And then … I was like, on the grond, and I didn’t really know what had happened,” Kathy told A Current Affair.<\/p>\n

Police alleged a man tackled 60-year-old Kathy to the ground and then fled the beach with his dog.<\/p>\n

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Semi conscious and struggling to breath, Kathy called her husband John who rushed to the beach.<\/p>\n

Three witnesses helped keep Kathy comfortable until paramedics arrived and she was rushed to hospital.<\/p>\n

“One guy said, well, where was the car accident? And he said, those sort of injuries aren’t from being hit by someone,” John told A Current Affair.<\/p>\n

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\"KathyKathy will tell you she’s not a victim, she’s a survivor of violence, allegedly committed at the hands of a random man during her regular morning walk on a beach. (A Current Affair)<\/p>\n

Kathy’s injuries included five broken ribs, a fractured sacrum, a brain bleed and several fractures to her foot.<\/p>\n

“You know, I just sort of look at it and go, it could have been a fatality,” said Kathy’s husband John.<\/p>\n

CCTV footage from a property near the beach captured a man and his dog running from the area around the time Kathy was hurt.<\/p>\n

Three months later 28-year-old Thomas Keys was arrested and charged with causing grievous bodily harm.<\/p>\n

And when A Current Affair called Keys to get his response to the allegations his phone was switched off.<\/p>\n

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\"KathyKathy called her husband John who rushed to the beach. (A Current Affair)<\/p>\n

For Kathy, her recovery has been slow and expensive.<\/p>\n

She’s entitled to some compensation to cover medical expenses as an alleged victim of crime, but those payments aren’t forthcoming yet.<\/p>\n

Adding to the financial stress Kathy’s Workcover claim was rejected on a technicality, because she’s the director not a staff member of her company “Fire Up Coaching”.<\/p>\n

“There’s been just such massive consequences for me, for us, actually, you know, it’s been, it was very hard for us in the first, you know, the first six weeks,” Kathy said.<\/p>\n

John agreed.<\/p>\n

READ MORE:\ufeff Police sergeant preyed upon stepdaughters after mum’s death<\/a><\/p>\n

\"KathyKathy was left with several fractures to her foot. (A Current Affair)<\/p>\n

“A lot of people would say Kath’s exactly the same. But you know, when you live with someone, you know,” he said,<\/p>\n

Thomas Keys’ case returns to court later this month.<\/p>\n

Kathy’s main reason for sharing her story was to help others and highlight the systematic problems alleged victims of crime face.<\/p>\n

“For me, I think it’s really important that someone voices that all of this escalating violence against women has to stop,” she said.<\/p>\n

“Justice delayed is justice denied, because for any victim, you can’t really move forward until things are finalised… You know, this might have been one day on the beach, but the ramifications after that day go on and on and on,” Kathy added.<\/p>\n

A Current Affair reached out to Noosa Council regarding their signage on designated dog free beaches, and about general confusion and confrontations between locals and dog owner who don’t obey the rules.<\/p>\n

In a statement they said: “Noosa Council is installing new signage at Noosa Beaches, including Peregian Beach as part of a wider educational campaign, which commenced in September.<\/p>\n

The signs aim to make it clearer for dog owners as to where their dogs are and are not permitted.<\/p>\n

Director of Development and Regulation Richard MacGillivray said officers are also conducting regular beach patrols with the newly replaced all-terrain vehicle (ATV)<\/p>\n

“These new measures are part of our proactive program by Council to educate dog owners about off-leash areas and being a responsible pet owner,” he said.<\/p>\n

The measures follow changes made by the State Government in the Animal Management (Cats and Dogs) Act where fines for not having a dog under effective control increase to $834.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Kathy will tell you she’s not a victim – she’s a survivor of violence, allegedly committed at the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":185349,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[43,44,41,39,42,40],"class_list":["post-185348","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-headlines","tag-news","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/185348","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=185348"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/185348\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/185349"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=185348"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=185348"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=185348"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}