Speaking to A Current Affair after the sentencing, White\u2019s daughter Cindy Micallef said the punishment could never reflect the magnitude of their loss.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere\u2019s no justice for us,\u201d Micallef said.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019ve got a life sentence and he\u2019s free after, like, 25, 26 (years old).\u201d<\/p>\n
She said her family was still trying to rebuild but remained haunted by fear and loss.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe gets to have a life after all this. We\u2019ve got nothing,\u201d she said, adding that her family no longer feels safe in public.<\/p>\n
While Micallef praised Chief Justice Bowskill for doing what she could within the law, she said the system had failed her mother.<\/p>\n
Had her killer been kept in custody after three armed robbery charges, she said, \u201cnumber four, which was Mum, wouldn\u2019t have happened\u201d.<\/p>\n
Determined to create change, Micallef said her family\u2019s campaign for \u201cadult crime, adult time\u201d laws was about protecting others from similar pain.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe can\u2019t get Mum back, but we can try and save some lives,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
The court was told the boy had been hanging around the centre drinking vodka with friends and stealing items while wearing a surgical mask.<\/p>\n
About 6pm, the teenage killer approached White and her 6-year-old granddaughter in the centre\u2019s carpark, demanding her keys.<\/p>\n
Vyleen White, who was fatally stabbed at Redbank Plains shopping centre in February 2024. Photo \/ Twitter<\/p>\n
She raised her hands and took a few steps back, when the boy stabbed her once and fled in her car.<\/p>\n
The court was told he was seeking a car to be used in later robberies.<\/p>\n
Justice Bowskill said despite the \u201cbrave\u201d efforts of the young girl to raise the alarm and help her grandmother, White died at the scene.<\/p>\n
\u201cYour actions on that evening, taking the life of another human being, have caused immense, indeed catastrophic, pain and suffering to her family,\u201d the judge said.<\/p>\n
\u201cShe was by all accounts a kind, caring, loving and devoted mother and grandmother.\u201d<\/p>\n
Justice Bowskill said White\u2019s life mattered and was not something to be wasted by senseless and selfish acts of violence.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe description of Mrs White stepping back, with her hands raised, reveals a defenceless woman, who posed no threat whatsoever to you, a towering young man, more than 2 metres tall, acting with determination,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
\u201cYour actions were callous and cowardly.\u201d<\/p>\n
The judge rejected a suggestion the offending occurred in a \u201cmoment of madness\u201d nor that he\u2019d \u201cblacked out\u201d.<\/p>\n
Vyleen White’s murder caused an outpouring of grief. Photo \/ NewsWire<\/p>\n
The court was told the boy, who had come with his loving family from South Sudan in 2007, had struggled to adjust after his family moved from Canberra to Ipswich. Disconnecting from his family, the teenager soon fell in with a criminal gang and began offending to feel \u201cvalued and accepted\u201d by them.<\/p>\n
Because of the offending taking place in February last year, the court was told the Queensland Government\u2019s adult crime, adult time laws do not apply. These laws came into force in December.<\/p>\n
He will be released from detention after serving 60%, or just under a decade, of his sentence.<\/p>\n
In a statement delivered to the court on Wednesday, Victor White said the loss of Vyleen, his partner of 50 years, took away his future.<\/p>\n
\u201cI live with the knowledge my life will never be the same,\u201d he wrote.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis crime has left me and my family broken in ways words can never fully capture.\u201d<\/p>\n
Grieving daughter Cindy Micallef said there\u2019s \u201cno justice\u201d for her family after the murder of her mother. Photo \/ NewsWire<\/p>\n
Micallef described her mother as a woman of deep faith and generosity who was always ready to help others, even strangers in need.<\/p>\n
\u201cShe was such a caring, giving person,\u201d Micallef told ACA.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019d all be better off if we were more like Vyleen.\u201d<\/p>\n
Although she\u2019s not ready to forgive, Micallef said her grief has become a driving force.<\/p>\n
\u201cMaybe one day \u2026 but I\u2019m on a mission, I\u2019m in a fight, and I\u2019m gonna keep fighting for people.\u201d<\/p>\n
Fighting back tears, she said her biggest regret was the time she never got to share with her mother.<\/p>\n
\u201cI was always working and trying to keep my family afloat \u2026 I didn\u2019t get to say goodbye. She was an amazing mum. I\u2019ve lost my rock.\u201d<\/p>\n
Sign up to Herald Premium Editor\u2019s Picks<\/a>, delivered straight to your inbox every Friday. Editor-in-Chief Murray Kirkness picks the week\u2019s best features, interviews and investigations. Sign up for Herald Premium here<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Speaking to A Current Affair after the sentencing, White\u2019s daughter Cindy Micallef said the punishment could never reflect…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":134625,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[1558,26665,1550,14032,634,380,2109,32255,4975,92147,92148,14322,42,14235,56057,101,424,30510,43,3048,5763,1243,72230,5163,10706,61,40,38,41,39,34890,6123,1299,1533,102,10119],"class_list":["post-134624","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-been","tag-carpark","tag-centre","tag-daughter","tag-death","tag-decade","tag-family","tag-familys","tag-free","tag-fury","tag-gran","tag-grandmother","tag-headlines","tag-killer","tag-knowing","tag-left","tag-life","tag-mothers","tag-news","tag-said","tag-sentence","tag-shopping","tag-stabbed","tag-teen","tag-teenage","tag-to","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories","tag-walk","tag-while","tag-who","tag-will","tag-with","tag-within"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/134624","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=134624"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/134624\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/134625"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=134624"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=134624"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=134624"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}