A young man who ended up fatally wounding his own friend while taking a selfie with a gun, has gotten himself into trouble.
Albert Rapovski (centre) accidently shot dead Mohammed Hassan (right) in March.
Albert Rapovski is a Melbourne man who accidentally shot dead his friend while posing for photos with a gun.
The young man has been sentenced to eight years in prison for the act.
According to ABC News, Albert Rapovski pleaded guilty to the manslaughter of Mohammed Hassan while the pair and other friends were using drugs and playing around with a shotgun at a motel at Kingsbury, in Melbourne’s north-east, on March 5.
The group had been taking photos and videos in what Supreme Court Justice Michael Croucher described as posing by “would-be gangsters”.
Rapovski, 20, who had not slept for four days in the lead-up to the shooting, had been told by Hassan to unload the gun.
The court heard Rapovski had been high on “juice” — the term given to the drug GHB.
He later admitted to police that he had been “drugf****d” and did not remember the details of the incident except that people were yelling and screaming.
Rapovski tried to flee to Macedonia the day after the shooting but was detained by Border Force officials at Melbourne airport.
Justice Croucher was critical of the men and remarked on Rapovski’s “breathtaking lack of judgement”.
A woman with the group on the night removed two cartridges from the gun and Justice Croucher accepted Rapovski did not think it was loaded or that the safety catch was in position.
But Justice Croucher was critical of the “nonchalant, even arrogant” way Rapovski ignored the “concerns expressed by his friends at the hotel that night”.
Justice Croucher accepted the killing of the man Rapovski described as a “good friend and really good mate”was accidental.
However he described as “just disgraceful” Rapovski’s behaviour after the killing in trying to leave the country when he had a “moral duty to stay”.
In delivering the sentence, Justice Croucher told Rapovski “guns, drugs and stupidity did not mix”.
He also accepted that Rapovski was remorseful and by pleading guilty had accepted legal responsibility for his actions.
Rapovski was given a non-parole period of five years.
