How a 15-year-old boy killed Petr Levkovskiy who was acting in the pursuit of justice

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It is an act that many could only hope they would be brave enough to emulate.

A family man, who is about to sit down to breakfast with his wife, hears a young boy on the street screaming for help after his precious bicycle is stolen senselessly from the front of a friend’s house.

Most would have looked the other way, but Petr Levkovskiy was not that kind of man.

The 42-year-old father-of-three, a man of principle who would “willingly do anything for anyone”, left his home on the morning of Sunday, May 22 last year, to see what the fuss was about outside.

Petr Levkovskiy.Credit:9 News Perth

He found a group of young boys, between the ages of nine and 12, distressed and calling for help.

Levkovskiy and his wife Anna Levskovskaya jumped into their car in pursuit of the thief and toured the streets of the usually quiet neighborhood of Bull Creek, south of Perth.

Levskovskaya eventually tracked down the attacker, and told a jury in January of this year. Her husband got out of the car and approached the boy and said: “Let’s talk”.

“He was calm,” she said.

“It wasn’t a barn. He said it in a calm way.”

The boy dropped the bike and tried to flee, but Levkovskiy caught him and tried to make him stay. In retaliation, the boy, who cannot be named because of his age, pulled out a seven-inch fillet knife and inflicted a swift wound on Levkovskiy’s abdomen.

Whether or not the wound was intentional was a matter of contention between state prosecutors and the boy’s defense team during a nine-day trial in January, and was still in question when he was sentenced for his crimes in the WA Supreme Court on Friday. .

One aspect that was not discussed was that the injury Levkovskiy suffered that day led to his death a few hours later.

It was a heinous act that deeply affected his wife of 21 years, his three children, his parents, the bystanders who came to the scene during the altercation, the young boy whose bike he was trying to get back and the 15-year-old who will now spend the rest of his childhood behind bars for a moment of reckless abandon.

A troubled boy

That boy, the court heard, was a troubled youth with a history of violent crime, a drug problem and a desire to be part of a “gangster culture”.

The teenager accused of murdering Perth’s father Petr Levkovskiy.

The product of a dysfunctional upbringing, the boy – formerly an up-and-coming football and baseball star – embarked on a difficult path that led to him assaulting a police officer in 2021, for which he received a five-month supervision order that he only completed one. day before he killed Levkovskiy in the streets of Bull Creek.

The court also heard how the teenager started using Xanax at the age of 14 and continued to regularly use marijuana, methamphetamine and LSD as well as other non-prescribed medications. He told a psychologist that he was using LSD on a weekly basis.

In what must have been difficult for Levkovskiy’s family to hear, the court heard how the teenager, now aged 16, bragged about what he had done shortly after committing the offence, telling a friend he doesn’t feel bad about the crime and, barbarically, sang a TikTok song titled I Am a Murderer.

“[The boy] was immersing himself in a lifestyle of drugs and antisocial behaviour,” said the public prosecutor.

“It is his rebellious and antisocial behavior and his interest in knives that contributed to his offending that day.”

And as Levkovskiy fought for his life in the back of an ambulance and later at Perth Royal Hospital, in behavior described as “flexible” and “cavalier”, the boy hid in bushes and threw away the knife and his clothes. and making videos with a friend where he re-enacted the moment he killed an innocent man.

Petr Levkovskiy and his wife Anna Levskovskaya.

“Tell us how you killed today,” the boy’s friend asked him.

“I stabbed,” he says, making a stabbing motion before jabbing two fingers at the camera.

On Friday, the boy sat quietly in front of a packed courtroom where members of Levkovskiy’s family came to see that justice was finally served.

Sentencing, Judge Anthony Derrick said he was satisfied the boy intended to stab Levkovskiy in the stomach, but not that he intended to endanger his life.

That meant he would be convicted of type 2 murder, a charge that carries a maximum sentence of life in prison. Instead, he received eight years and six months in custody, with the opportunity to be released after five years and six months.

“Mr Levkovskiy was clearly a good man,” he said.

“No sentence I impose on you can undo the damage you have caused and the pain and damage you have caused to Ms Levskovskaya, Mr Levkovskiy’s daughters, his son and his parents.”

Described as a role model by his son and “the love of my life” by his wife, Derrick read from the victim impact statements submitted to the court before Friday’s sentencing.

None were more poignant than the one delivered by the dead man’s wife.

“My life will never be the same,” Ms Levskovskaya said.

“I miss him terribly, my Petr.”

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