Luke James Plester: Rockingham hammer attack accused reveals bizarre reason for refusing a lawyer in court

The man accused of brutally bashing a Rockingham woman with a hammer has insisted he does not need a lawyer as he doesn’t believe the matter is “that serious” and that “only a guilty person would require a lawyer”. Luke James Plester is charged with one count of wounding another with intent to do grievous bodily harm over the alleged brazen attack outside a Rockingham 7-Eleven service station. The 29-year-old appeared in Rockingham Magistrates Court via video link from Hakea Prison on Friday, bleary-eyed and sporting short hair and a beard. Mr Plester, of Bullsbrook, rejected the court’s attempts to insist he seek legal advice from duty lawyers over the alleged attack and after some back and forth, the young man said he would be representing himself. “Only a guilty person would require a lawyer,” he said. He did not wish to enter a plea on Friday, saying “it depends what the evidence says”. Before referring the matter to the District Court, the magistrate again encouraged Mr Plester to “seek legal advice” over the “serious charge” — but Mr Plester had a different view. “If it was serious I wouldn’t be allowed to walk around freely here (in Hakea Prison), so I don’t think it’s that serious,” he told the court. Mr Plester is accused of assaulting Rockingham mother Fiona, who is believed to have been unknown to him until the alleged attack, about 2am Saturday morning. Fiona was outside the service station on Dixon Road when she claims she was ambushed as she waited to buy a bottle of water from the station. Allegedly armed with a hammer and a wooden stake, police say Mr Plester beat her outside the 7-Eleven as she screamed for help, to no avail. “I was on the ground, I just kept on pleading with him and telling him I had kids and that I couldn’t die,” she told Nine News. Mr Plester allegedly beat the mother down four times, leaving her with a broken arm which required surgery, and serious head lacerations across her forehead needing stitches. A 7-Eleven employee is believed to have kept the doors locked to the service station as Fiona screamed for assistance. “He’s come out with a wooden stake... and it got my chest and all that, then I’d seen him with a knife,” the mother said, from a bed at Royal Perth Hospital. “I was just screaming at her (the attendant) ‘let me in, let me in, please, he’s not even here, just let me in.’” Fiona said she then ran to nearby bushes to wait for police after motorists allegedly failed to offer assistance, despite the 7-Eleven being located on a busy road. Police say Mr Plester was “quickly apprehended ... in the area of the service station”. Mr Plester will appear in court again in October.