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“Can we get this over and done with?” she asked the NSW Supreme Court on Friday, two weeks after a sentencing hearing was initially scheduled.
Houllis died in hospital three days after he was bashed on a suburban Wakeley street in Sydney’s west on Valentine’s Day 2020.
Hamdach had bought a pair of AirPods from Houllis, and believing they were not genuine, enlisted Karaali for a revenge attack.
Justice Stephen Campbell indicated when sentencing Hamdach that Karaali was likely to face a harsher penalty, describing him as the “primary offender”.
In addition to not receiving the same discount on his sentence Hamdach did for pleading guilty, Karaali acted with more violence, kicking and stomping on an already unconscious Houllis.
“That was done with the intention to kill,” crown prosecutor Phil Hogan urged the judge to find on Friday.
Karaali sat in the dock, glaring at a detective who took a seat in the gallery, before casting his eyes downward, not looking up as the mother of the man he murdered mourned her son, taken “brutally and cruelly”.
“It seems to me (Karaali) did not care that he had taken another’s life, over something that didn’t really have anything to do with him,” Ms Houllis said.
“How can someone kill my son over AirPods and money?”
It’s a question that has also stumped the judge.
“I do not pretend to have found the answer,” he said, sentencing Hamdach.
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Karaali’s barrister Irving Wallach said on Friday the indescribable attack was not all Karaali’s doing.
“The whole genesis of this very, very – whatever adjective I could use would be inadequate, but the events that led to the killing of Mr Houllis – all those elements were put in train, not by Mr Karaali, but by Mr Hamdach,” he said.
Hamdach had planned for Karaali to inflict some violence on Houllis, holding his arms behind his back as Karaali dealt out blows in the car park of a suburban shopping centre, but Karaali stopped him from escaping after the initial attack.
“When Mr Houllis took flight, in response to the kick to the head … it was Mr Karaali who gave chase … it was Mr Karaali, as I understand it on my impression of the evidence, who tackled him to the ground,” the judge said.
Karaali was also the one “doing the kicking while he was down”.
Hamdach’s actions were obscured on the CCTV footage that captured the events, Mr Wallach submitted.
“I’m not suggesting Mr Karaali did nothing and did not take part … clearly the CCTV shows otherwise,” he said.
Karaali was on parole for other offences when he murdered Houllis, which was revoked when he was arrested by tactical officers in February 2020, and the judge will have to determine when his sentence should begin for the murder.
Ms Houllis lamented Karaali may one day be released.
“As if my son’s death was nothing but a mishap, a speed bump on his life.”
The judge said he did not want to rush a judgment on Friday afternoon and adjourned until Monday.
