QLD: Family sues railways over bashing

AAP General News (Australia)
08-05-2008
QLD: Family sues railways over bashing

BRISBANE, Aug 5 AAP - The family of a man brutally bashed at a railway station two
years ago, leaving him with permanent memory loss, is suing Queensland Rail.

Gold Coast father of two, Scott Lillicrap, 35, was robbed, beaten and stomped on at
the Sunnybank railway station in Brisbane's south on July 30, 2006.

The Coomera man was then dragged through the station's car park and dumped near a charity
bin before witnesses called an ambulance.

The attack, over which three men have now been jailed, left him in a coma and with
facial fractures.

Mr Lillicrap still struggles to remember details of the six months leading up to the
attack - including his wife's pregnancy - and has no memory of the attack itself.

His wife Barbara said today her solicitor had served Queensland Rail with court papers.

But she said the decision was not about money.

"The decision came about mainly because Queensland Rail has to accept the fact and
acknowledge the fact that the railway system is not safe and that Scott is not the first
one to be attacked and is certainly not the last one," Mrs Lillicrap told ABC Radio.

"We just want Queensland Rail to acknowledge that they were in the wrong and what they've
done is not enough."

She said witnesses had pushed the emergency button at the station at least three times,
but rail officers believed it to be a prank and ignored it.

She said Scott had not caught public transport since the attack and had found work as a labourer.

"In some ways he's almost like a three-year-old in just the way he behaves," she said.

A Queensland Rail spokesman said it was inappropriate to comment on the case as legal
action was pending.

But the spokesman said Queensland Rail took the issue of criminal activity and antisocial
behaviour on train services very seriously.

"Despite considerable patronage growth across the network, serious crime has not increased
in recent years and assaults on the Queensland Rail network account for only two to three
per cent of such offences throughout the entire community," the spokesman said.

He said there were 54 officers in the police service's railway squad and 110 transit officers.

Private security guards patrolled trains at night and there were 6,000 security cameras
at stations, in car parks and on trains, with more to come.

AAP pjo/jfm/bwl

KEYWORD: LILLICRAP NIGHTLEAD

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