❤️SHE MATTERS: ELLA VARCOE❤️
She just wanted to make the world a better place for other people.
Paramedicine student Ella Varcoe was killed by a 26-year-old man on April 13 of this year. He deliberately drove his vehicle into the 21-year-old’s car as she travelled on the Ipswich-Boonah Road at Purga, Queensland. A stranger to Ella, he did not survive.
Ella is the 53rd Australian woman killed this year. Last year we lost 79 women to violence – the year before 106 women were killed.
It’s since been revealed the man who killed Ella was experiencing serious mental-health difficulties and suicidal. In the moments before hitting Ella’s car, he deliberately attempted to collide with another vehicle. He missed that vehicle and then entered Ella’s path. He was driving at 128km per hour.
Ella had no chance of avoiding him.
Ella was planning to become a paramedic with the intention of helping other people.
She was driving home from her university when he killed her.
“She had an entire future ahead of her – a career dedicated to helping people, a family who adored her, a partner, friends, dreams and decades of milestones she should have been here to experience,” Ella’s sister told The RED HEART Movement.
“Instead, our family is left trying to understand how another person’s apparent decision to end his life resulted in Ella losing hers.”
Ella’s family have decided to come forward with Ella’s story in the hope of highlighting an act of violence that is rarely recognised in Australia – the use of vehicles as weapons.
Of the 53 women killed this year, nine have been killed by perpetrators using vehicles. In some instances manslaughter will apply but most offenders will be charged with dangerous or culpable driving.
It is most often families or confidential police sources who confirm the intent behind these killings. Listing women like Ella under the road-toll has a knock-on impact across multiple areas including the official homicide data, policy decisions and funding allocations for prevention and other programs that can ultimately save lives.
ELLA VARCOE MATTERS❤️
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