Perth man Andre Rebelo will spend at least 25 years in jail for murdering his mother in cold blood and hatching a plan to collect her life insurance.
A Western Australian Supreme Court justice sentencing him today described the “monstrous act”, designed to help Rebelo keep living his lavish lifestyle, as the “ultimate betrayal”.
Justice Bruno Fiannaca slammed the “amateurish” plot to cash out on Coleen Rebelo’s million-dollar life insurance, which he set up, after murdering her in her Bicton home.
Colleen was found dead in the shower in May 2020, placed there by her killer son who tried to make it look like she died naturally.
“You stripped her of her dignity with a final degrading act,” the judge told him.
The court heard he was in more than $100,000 of debt with his influencer girlfriend, Grace Piscopo.
“The persona you had created was more important to you than a familial connection to your mother,” Fiannaca said.
After murdering the 58-year-old, Rebelo desperately tried to cash in on her life insurance, forging several documents in a plot labelled elaborate and amateurish.
The judge also considered the impact of the offending on Rebelo’s six-year-old son, saying he would grow up knowing his father as a prisoner and deprived of his grandmother.
Asked outside court if he ever thought his son was capable of this, Antonio Rebelo said: “No. We didn’t really know what happened to his mother, still don’t know what happened.”
He said he still supported his son.
The 29-year-old will be eligible for parole after spending 25 years behind bars.
