The loved ones of Synamin Bell are calling for justice after the man accused of her death was sentenced to 11 years in jail.
And with time served, he could be out in six years.
”It’s a spit in her face, it’s a spit in the face of her children, her mother, everything,” sister Shenta Bell told cameras outside Mount Gambier Courthouse.
“Her life means nothing.”
Some members of Bell’s family got up and stormed out of the emotionally-charged courtroom mid-way through sentencing, upset and vocal about it.
“A man can take drugs and you can murder a woman, and get a slap on the wrist basically,” friend Zoe Widdison said.
Bell was beaten to death at her home in Millicent in the early hours of March 12, 2022.
Cody Edwards, then 25, was arrested on the front lawn, dazed and intoxicated.
Edwards was charged with murder but just days into his trial this year, he pleaded guilty to manslaughter – a charge with a lesser sentence.
He claimed he was in a drug-induced psychosis and it was he who felt threatened.
He’d taken the little-known drug DOI, its effects more potent than LSD.
The same drug had made him paranoid before but, still, he chose to do it again.
The judge noted that makes him more culpable.
The Bell family is now renewing calls for the law to change so that self-induced intoxication can’t be used as a defence.
“Just a bit more justice to actually recognise he took those drugs willingly, he took those drugs himself,” Widdison said.
“Not just the drugs, he took a life, she’s gone, that’s it,” Shenta said.
SA Attorney-General Kyam Maher agreed the law doesn’t meet community expectations.
“The court has applied the law as it stands, we think there is a gap in the law, we are going to look to change that,” he said.
Maher said he planned to meet with the Bell family in the coming days to talk further.