AN extreme body modification artist who killed one woman and seriously injured two others during dangerous cosmetic procedures in Newcastle and the Central Coast is "a monster" who has not shown any remorse or accepted responsibility, one victim's mother says.
Brendan Leigh Russell, now 41, known as BSLICE, was in November found guilty of manslaughter, intentionally causing grievous bodily harm and female genital mutilation after a judge-alone trial in NSW District Court. Among the procedures, Russell used a branding iron to mutilate a female customer's genitals at a Newcastle West tattoo parlour in 2015 and implanted a silicone snowflake under the skin of a woman's hand in 2017. Judge Helen Syme found the second woman died of septicemia and Russell had breached his duty of care at such a gross level that he was criminally responsible for her death.
He faced a sentence hearing on Wednesday and listened as one of his victims and the mother of the woman he killed spoke of the impact of his unauthorised medical procedures.
"Brendan Russell handed us a life sentence the day [my daughter] died," the victim's mother said. "A mother is dead and yet he has still not shown the slightest remorse at any time nor has he accepted any responsibility for her death. "The heartache for [my daughter's] loss will never leave us. I was going to say there are no winners here. But there are because I truly believe a monster has been kept off the streets here today."
Another woman who Russell performed a "tummy tuck" on in 2016 was left in "extreme pain" and required corrective surgery.
She told Russell she wished they had never met.
"You were not qualified to do that procedure on me," she said. "You did not take responsibility as a friend or as a business owner. My sons could have lost their mother, but you didn't care."
Defence barrsiter, Mark Tedeschi QC, said Russell could be given an intensive corrections order for the two procedures that resulted in serious injuries and time served for the manslaughter.
Judge Syme will sentence Russell next month.
Meanwhile, the NSW Health Care Complaints Commission revealed they had imposed a permanent prohibition order banning Russell from providing any health services, either in paid employment or voluntarily, to any member of the public.
