Lee Lovell’s wife was murdered by a teenager. He hopes Queensland election will bring about change

On Boxing Day 2022, Lee Lovell’s life changed forever.

A 17-year-old boy, who had been drug addicted for three days, broke into his family’s North Lakes home in the middle of the night with a knife.

Mr Lovell confronted the intruder and in the chaos that followed, his wife, Emma, ​​was stabbed in the heart and died in their front yard.

Lee was stabbed twice and survived.

“To be honest, I don’t think I’ll ever get over it,” Mr Lovell said.

“What would you do? Would you take the baseball bat? Would you have time to get it? What if I’m in the kitchen and the kids are in the bedroom?”

That moment of senseless violence changed the course of the Lovell family’s lives and thrust a grieving husband and father into the spotlight as the reluctant face of Queensland’s youth crime crisis.

The case marked a turning point in public opinion about the government’s handling of youth crime, which is shaping up to be one of the major issues that will decide next month’s state elections.

Emma Lovell’s killer was on bail and had 84 previous convictions to his name, including 16 for unlawful entry.

The teenager was convicted of murder and sentenced to 14 years in prison.

Mr Lovell is among a growing number of Queenslanders who say they no longer feel safe in their homes.

He said the punishment was not enough and he did not believe justice had been served.

“A lot of people have talked about bail as a last resort and not letting people out, but it’s kind of too late for us now,” he said.

“I understand that you probably shouldn’t lock up everybody, but I think there comes a point where you have to start saying, ‘Look, you’ve done something pretty terrible, you need to be locked up for that.'”

“If it was his 18th birthday, we wouldn’t complain. Everyone would say, ‘He’s been locked up for 20 years, isn’t that great?'”

The state of play

Although youth crime as a whole has declined slightly over the past five years, some serious offences are occurring more frequently.

Between 2020 and 2024, the number of juveniles charged with unlawful use of a motor vehicle, breaking and entering, assault and armed robbery increased, according to the Department of Youth Justice.

Detective Inspector Paul Fletcher, who oversees the Gold Coast Police District’s child protection unit, said the problem was being fuelled by social media hype.

“The severity of juvenile delinquency has increased markedly in recent years, with young criminals committing more brazen and violent crimes,” he said.

“There is a fine line between keeping the community safe and giving these young offenders a chance to rehabilitate and get their lives back on track.”

A “race to the bottom”

The Australian Human Rights Commission believes that fine line has been crossed and is calling for a complete overhaul of the youth justice system.

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National Children’s Commissioner Anne Hollonds said Queensland had some of the strictest laws in the country and had already locked up more young people than New South Wales, Victoria, South Australia and the ACT combined.

She said the fact that serious crime was increasing proved that incarceration was not making the community safer and that governments should instead focus on tackling the underlying causes of youth crime.

“Fundamentally, we have misunderstood the nature of these problems and we need to understand that justice systems will not – cannot – solve the problems of juvenile delinquency.

“We have taken these issues in the wrong direction and now we have to acknowledge our mistakes and say we have to change course.”

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“What change is there?”

As Lee Lovell approaches the second anniversary of his wife’s death, it’s a tough pill to swallow.

“We think that another month has passed and that this last one has been really difficult to manage.”

With every high-profile crime involving minors, he is forced to relive that night in 2022.

Increasingly uncomfortable with the politicization of his family’s tragedy, he has distanced himself from the Voice for Victims movement, but still believes things need to change.

Although he does not know what the solution is to the problem of youth crime, he said it is clear that the current situation is not working.

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“I’m not surprised that we still hear about this all the time: young people terrorizing people and families and the number of crimes that are still happening,” Mr Lovell said.

“I just thought that after what happened to us, things would calm down a little.

“That’s all people see, the same revolving door over and over again. Until you change that, the public’s not going to be happy, right?”

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