Milenko Snjegota on trial accused of murdering father in Wollongong backyard
Milenko Snjegota, 49, also known as Gobesan, has pleaded not guilty to murdering his 74-year-old father, Vitomir Snjegota, at their Farmborough Heights home west of Wollongong in February last year.
Mr G Snjegota, who lives with diagnosed schizophrenia, wore earbuds as Justice Stephen Campbell opened the judge-only Supreme Court trial in Wollongong on Monday.
Crown prosecutor Nerissa Keay told the court the victim was a divorced father of two, retired steel worker and Foxtel cable installer who lived in the downstairs portion of a two-storey home he built 50 years ago.
Ms Keay said the accused had lived upstairs in the same property since his mental health began deteriorating in the late 1990s and was known to be "rude to his father".
"He expressed hostility about being forced to receive mental health treatment," Ms Keay told the court.
The court heard Mr V Snjegota was found face down in his backyard covered in a white sheet, with "significant" blunt-force trauma to his head.
Ms Keay said it was the Crown's case that Mr V Snjegota's son struck him over the head "at least seven times" with an object "like a crowbar or hammer".
"It's the Crown case the accused killed Mr [V] Snjegota while mowing [the lawn] on February 3, and that the violence was more than necessary to kill him," Ms Keay told the court.
"The victim may have been dead 16 to 48 hours before being taken to the mortuary."
The court heard Mr G Snjegota was due to receive an injection for his mental condition the day after his father's body was found.
Ms Keay told the court the victim's neighbour made the grim discovery on February 4 after noticing waterlogging and leakage from the property.
"The Crown will allege the accused tried to clean the scene with water," Ms Keay said.
The court was also shown police body-worn camera vision and photos of brown leather shoes owned by the accused, which Ms Keay said contained traces of the victim's blood.
"DNA of the accused was also found on the white sheet covering the victim's body," she told the court.
However, the court heard no DNA evidence was found on two crowbars located in the family garage.
In his brief opening, defence lawyer Scott Fraser told the court there was "only circumstantial evidence" linking his client to the alleged murder.
He said the defence agreed with forensic information provided by the Crown and that the "cause of death is not an issue".
In regards to the crowbars being cleaned with bleach, Mr Fraser said cleaning had been a "significant matter" in his client's life, not just in "this circumstance".
The court heard the accused believed he had been misdiagnosed with schizophrenia and that the judge may have to consider the Cognitive Impairment Provisions Act in this case.
As the Crown's first witness, the victim's daughter Silvana Gnjegota held back tears as she detailed her brother's long history of mental decline.
She told the court during cross-examination, in the years before the alleged murder, Mr G Snjegota was "emotionally abusive" to her and sent her threatening emails because he disagreed with the methods used to treat his condition.
Neighbour Stephen Peck later gave evidence and said the accused would "speak to Jesus … play music from his parked car every day … and was always pretty nasty to his father, which is a shame".
The trial is expected to run for two weeks.
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