The compassionate family of a vulnerable man who was brutally beaten to death ‘for sport’ have expressed their condolences after hearing one of his killers has died in a car crash.
Brent Martin was savagely kicked and punched by three young men who bet each other they could knock him out for £5 in an attack that sickened the country.
The 23-year-old, who had learning difficulties and trusted his attackers, was left in a pool of blood in the Town End Farm area of Sunderland in August 2007 and died in hospital.
Read more: Family pay tribute to man killed in Durham car crash
In 2008, ringleader William Hughes, 22, was jailed for a minimum of 22 years, while accomplice Marcus Miller, 16, give at least 15 years behind bars and 17-year-old Stephen Bonallie was told he would serve at least 18.
Bonallie, who was a trained boxer, appealed against his sentence, and, in 2016, after apologising to Brent’s family, had his minimum term cut to 14 years.
He was released last year but died aged 32 in the early hours of New Year’s Eve when the silver Audi A6 estate he was travelling in left the A167, between Whitesmocks and Sniperley, near Durham, and collided a tree.
Bonallie died from his injuries and another man in his 30s, who was also in the car, remains in a critical condition in hospital.
Responding to the news, Brent’s twin sister, Danielle Flynn said: “When he was released I was upset, angry he was getting to start his life again when he was a big part in my brother losing his.
“However when I found out in disbelief that he died in a car accident I spent the day with mixed emotions: happy, sad, gutted.
“God works in mysterious ways and I think it comes to us all.
“I guess it’s because I’m human, I know what it feels like to lose a brother and my mother knows what it feels like to lose a son so condolences to his family.”
Ms Flynn’s said her mother, Brenda Martin’s compassion for Bonallie is evidence of her ‘big heart’.
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Bonallie’s family said he was a much-loved son, brother, boyfriend, nephew, uncle, brother-in-law and cousin and will be sadly missed.
At his appeal hearing at the High Court in 2016 the judge said he had done all he could to rehabilitate himself and shown himself to be a ‘mature’ person who helped other inmates and took responsibility for his actions as a 17-year-old.
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In a letter to Brent’s family at the time he wrote: “The night of the attack was knowones (sic) fault but my own.
“I was a young, angry, immature teenager that thought it was clever to drink and take drugs with peers, but now I know it was stupid.
“Not that I didn’t know then because I did, I just never thought it would lead to a man’s death.
“I do have genuine remorse and will never truly understand what my victim’s family and loved ones are still going through.”
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