Satudarah bikie gang 'dramas' may be behind shooting, Sugimatatihuna Mena trial told

Defence barristers raised the possibility people associated with a bikie gang might be to blame as they presented closing arguments to an ACT Supreme Court jury on Tuesday.

Sugimatatihuna Bernard Gabriel Mena, 24, has been on trial in that court for the past two weeks, having pleaded not guilty to four charges that include attempted murder.

Co-accused Bradley Joe Roberts, 24, and Rebecca Dulcie Parlov, 25, are also on trial, having joined Mena in denying an aggravated burglary allegation.

Crown prosecutor Trent Hickey closed his case on Monday, saying it was only "good luck" that saved the victim after three intruders burst into a Spence home in March 2021.

Mr Hickey said those people were the accused and that Mena had shot the victim, whose jaw was "broken into small pieces", multiple times.

It is the Crown case that the accused were motivated by "made-up" rumours the victim was "a kiddie fiddler".

Defence counsel have countered by arguing jurors could not even be satisfied the accused were at the scene of the shooting when it occurred.

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Barrister Keegan Lee, representing Parlov, said on Tuesday that the trio's apparent motive was "implausible", arguing the victim's text messages revealed "the true situation".

Mr Lee said the man's messages showed the victim was "having dramas" with different people, including a bikie gang he had quit, in the lead-up to the shooting.

The jury had previously heard the man's partner give evidence that she understood he had been involved in the Satudarah outlaw motorcycle gang.

Mr Lee said the gang had "nothing to do with the accused", and the victim had sent his partner texts about needing to give "the bloke who bashes people" $750 within an hour.

He said the victim had told his partner this was the result of him quitting the gang, which had told him to "blood out".

This, Mr Lee said, referred to the victim needing to bleed for the gang unless he could come up with the cash.

The victim told the court during his evidence that he had lied to his partner in these texts in order to get money out of her, saying he was "a fiend" who needed cash to buy drugs.

But Mr Lee said on Tuesday that the evidence showed the victim was a drug dealer who had access to illicit substances at the time in question, suggesting to jurors that the texts showed what was really going on in the man's life.

Mr Lee and his fellow defence counsel, James Sabharwal and Mary Keaney, all attacked the reliability and credibility of the shooting victim and a woman who witnessed the shooting.

The pair identified the accused as the intruders but Mr Lee said both were "admitted liars", who "lie when it suits them to get what they want and to protect themselves".

Ms Keaney told the jury the pair's evidence "just did not have the ring of truth".

She said it had been "convenient" for them to falsely accuse her client, Roberts, of being involved so they did not have to tell police the truth about the shooting.

Mr Sabharwal, acting for Mena, noted the victim had agreed during cross-examination that one of the reasons he spoke to police had been to protect his family from bikie gangs.

"If it was Mr Mena who shot him, why is he frightened of the bikie gangs?" Mr Sabharwal asked jurors.

"Does that make sense to you?"

Mr Sabharwal also criticised police for not conducting an identification parade, or a "line-up", with his client, saying an officer questioned about why had "kept fudging".

He ultimately told jurors he had "every confidence" they would acquit Mena.

Justice Chrissa Loukas-Karlsson began summing up the case for the jury, which will soon begin deliberating, late on Tuesday.

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