The tradie who allegedly bound a group of Indigenous children with cable ties says his actions were not racially motivated and that he regrets the incident.
Shocking footage posted to Facebook showed a girl, six, and boys, seven and eight, in tears with their hands tied together outside a home in Broome, Western Australia, on Tuesday afternoon.
Mat Radelic, 45, an air-conditioning installation boss, was charged with three counts of aggravated assault by Western Australia Police on Wednesday and will face court on March 25.
‘It didn’t come from the place of hate or nothing, just disappointment then a bit of anger.’
The tradie claimed the children were trespassing and that he had lost thousands of dollars to youth crime. He is considering leaving Broome.
Margaret, 6, and Stuart, 7, (pictured) were in distress and crying for their mum
Rowena, mother to little Stuart, seven, and Margaret, six, said the man’s alleged actions were a ‘disgrace’ and that she asked him in desperation if he had children of his own to consider how they might feel in a similar situation.
‘Standing behind a fence and seeing my children tied up like that it was emotion like “what can I do?” we just had to wait for the police,’ Rowena told A Current Affair.
‘He had no feeling or anything for my children crying there. My boy was crying for water and I couldn’t even get him a water.’
Rowena, who struggled to speak through tears, said she begged Radelic to release her children but was ‘afraid’ of him because of his size.
The distraught mother said her son had suffered a nightmare and also had a ‘scratch on the right side of his hand’.
She also questioned the possible double standards in the legal system.
‘If it was the other way around, if an Aboriginal man was holding three white children, like that, and saying to the families, you can wait until the cops come, if he goes to court, the Aboriginal man… he would have been gone,’ she said.
‘They would not even let him out of prison. He would have stayed in prison. They would not give him bail. They would have put him off maybe for kidnapping.’
In video footage obtained exclusively by Daily Mail Australia, Radelic can be heard complaining to the person recording him: ‘They are on my property.
‘It’s not the first time – six times [this has happened],’ he claimed.
Stuart, seven, (pictured) has since had a nightmare and has a scratch on his hand after the incident
Margaret, six, (pictured) was tied up with her brother for about an hour on a 33C day
However, Rowena told the program that it was actually not the man’s property.
Regional WA Acting Assistant Commissioner Rod Wilde said a neighbour called police at 1.35pm on Tuesday after noticing the children swimming in an ‘unoccupied’ pool.
‘About 10 minutes later police received a call from a male person who [allegedly] said he had restrained three children for causing damage in that backyard,’ Commissioner Wilde said.
‘Police attended and located two children at that time – one had left – who had [allegedly] been cable tied at that premises.’
Police will allege a fourth boy had also been in the pool but managed to flee and alert family members to what was going on.
A woman, who is related to the little girl and the seven-year-old boy, livestreamed the shocking ordeal and said the tradie refused to let them go.
‘When we tried to walk in there to get them he pushed me and my mum out of the yard,’ she told the West Australian newspaper earlier on Wednesday.
‘When we pulled up there, and when that man was pushing me out of the gate… the little (eight-year-old) boy snapped the cable ties with his hands and then he just jumped over the fence and ran down the road.
‘It was just upsetting, we were so angry with (the tradie) just shouting at him, telling him to let them go but he just didn’t want to listen to us.’
The children’s mother, Rowena, said she begged the tradie to let her kids go but was scared of his size
An earlier photo on Facebook showed a third child tied up who later managed to escape (pictured)
The relative said Radelic kept saying he was ‘waiting for police’ to arrive.
She said one of the kids also claimed the man told them he was going to ‘hit them with a big stick’.
St John Ambulance paramedics assessed the children, who have since been reunited with their family.
After officers arrived at the property, Radelic was taken into custody and interviewed.
His company’s website has been taken offline after it was bombarded by one-star Google reviews in the wake of the incident, and the business phone is switched off.
Daily Mail Australia understands the home where the alleged incident occurred was put up for sale recently.
He was later charged and has been granted bail to appear in Broome Magistrates Court on March 25.
