Alexander Mark Sutton: Minimum 20-year sentence for gruesome murder of former Eagles masseuse Patrik Weiss

WARNING: CONFRONTING CONTENT A young man who bludgeoned a father-of-two to death at his Lockridge home had journaled his gruesome plans for months in “one of the most depraved and monstruous murders this State has seen”. The shocking details of Patrik Weiss’ violent death on June 12, 2023 were revealed at Alexander Mark Sutton’s sentencing on Thursday, with the Supreme Court told the killer even wrote about cannibalism. The 21-year-old from High Wycombe showed no visible reaction when Justice Joseph McGrath sentenced him to life imprisonment, with eligibility for parole after 20 years. He was just 19 when he attacked Mr Weiss with a pick axe, after meeting him on a networking website for bondage fetishists and pretending to share his sexual interest. They arranged a tryst, with the 45-year-old leaving his front door key in the meter box and waiting in his bedroom - bound, blindfolded and gagged. Mr Weiss, who was the national men’s beach handball team coach and had worked as a soft-tissue therapist for the West Coast Eagles, was found by his former wife. She was concerned after he failed to pick up their children from school, as arranged. He had been struck twice in the head. Sutton’s own lawyer Katherine Dowling described the killing as “one of the most depraved and monstrous murders this State has seen”. “Surely this is as close to an example of evil as one could imagine,” she said. “This is a particularly serious example of murder.” Prosecutor Paul Usher said Sutton had been fantasising about taking a human life since the age of 14. And from November 2022, his journal laid bare his premeditated “mission”. Sutton wrote he had been hearing voices and intended to use a claw hammer, which he would also slay his father and sister with. “The thought of slaughtering someone gets me going,” he wrote. Sutton had communicated with other men on the networking site, writing about one of them: “Maybe I will eat a part of him as well.” “The internet is truly a dangerous place,” he added. Sutton also wrote that he went to a man’s house to kill him on Christmas Eve 2022 but “he noticed my gloves and escorted me out”. “Would this be attempted murder? Oh well, Happy Christmas,” he wrote. In a social media post, Sutton shouted in caps that he was “going to kill someone in three weeks”, adding “Armageddon will begin soon”. Another journal entry - this time about Mr Weiss - read: “Should be fun. I hope this helps my anger.” “He has a wife and kids. How cute.” Moments after the murder, Sutton changed into clothes he’d brought along in a backpack and deactivated his account on the networking site. He’d planned to do it two days before, but had been “ghosted” by Mr Weiss, writing in his diary that may have been “intuition”. Ms Dowling said her client had been examined by psychiatrists and “currently defies categorisation”. He had shown features of sexual sadism, schizoaffective disorder, autism and psychosis but had not been formally diagnosed. “He continues to have some depraved thoughts,” Ms Dowling said. Prosecutor Paul Usher said Sutton “wanted to know what it felt like” and had described the heinous crime as a “stress relief”. Mr Weiss’ former wife tearfully gave her victim impact statement in person, saying their young son and daughter “still ask questions no child should have to ask”. “Their innocence was stolen the day their papa was killed,” she said. “Every day is a struggle.” She read out a statement by the girl, who said her dad “didn’t deserve to die like that”, while the son wrote that his father had been “killed in a scary way in our home”, and he didn’t understand. Justice McGrath said Mr Weiss had been in “an extremely vulnerable position”, as requested by Sutton, and was then left with no dignity. “Your offending is extraordinarily callous,” the judge said. In a letter to the court, Sutton wrote: “No sentence will ever be long enough . . . it can never be taken back.”