The widow of a man who died after being struck with a cricket bat while celebrating Christmas on a West Australian beach has questioned a court's acceptance of a lesser charge against her husband's accused killer.
Sheep farmer William (Bill) John Rowe, 49, died in hospital on Boxing Day last year after his family, celebrating Christmas at Geraldton's Sunset Beach about 430km north of Perth, was attacked by a group of people in the beach carpark.
Mathew Roy McDonald, 21, yesterday pleaded guilty to manslaughter in the Stirling Gardens Magistrate Court in Perth and will be sentenced in the Supreme Court in December.
Prosecutors agreed to drop a murder charge after an expert said the blow from the cricket bat alone was not sufficient to cause Mr Rowe's death.
Mr Rowe's widow Ellen today told ABC radio a letter from the Director of Public Prosecutions informing her the charge had been changed had not arrived at her remote address.
"We feel as though natural justice has been taken away from us, there's a legal justice which I completely understand, I accept and I tolerate.
"We've lost our bloke - our family's beliefs, the beliefs we've been raised to believe, have been blown out of the water."
"We miss Bill terribly and life has just been turned upside down," she said.
Mr Rowe had not expected the blow from the cricket bat before he was knocked unconscious and his head hit the ground, Mrs Rowe said.
"I was there, my children were there. When I reflect on the violence that was inflicted and I believe the harmful intention, I find it very hard, myself and my children and Bill's family, to accept this (court) outcome," she said.
"Ok the blow did not cause enough brain damage according to the forensic pathologist, Bill went down like a stone, unconscious and hit the bitumen in which case he got hit on the side of the face, he was not expecting it.
"He was holding our dog, he was just standing there."
Mrs Rowe said she hoped the man charged over her husband's death was remorseful and could change his ways.
"I hope he won't ever do it again," she said.
Mrs Rowe said she felt her husband's life was cheap.
"Is that what his life was worth? In the circumstances, the way it all happened?
"I feel sorry for all of us, including the perpetrators."
