In Memory of My Son

Article, ‘In memory of my son: the matthew stanley foundation’ by Luise Hoffmann,  first published on 31 May 2007 on ABC 612 Brisbane website,  is reproduced by permission of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation and ABC Online. (c) 2007 ABC. All rights reserved.

By Luise Hoffmann

Sometimes it takes an immensely brave individual to seek the silver lining in the darkest, bleakest cloud, but that’s what Paul Stanley is trying to do after the tragic death of his 15-year-old son, Matthew.

Matt died last September, after being savagely, senselessly beaten while attending an 18th birthday party in Alexandra Hills. Paul is still grief stricken by his son’s death, but is determined to honour Matt’s memory by doing everything he can to prevent other youth violence.

“He just gave a happiness out of himself and everyone just loved him,” Paul says of Matt. “He was an incredible kid, a great sportsman, did very well academically and just a real nice boy.

“He wound me around his little finger, I can tell you that.”

On the night he was beaten, Matt went along to a party with his friend Dominic. Paul had no concerns about the event. “It was all his friends who were going, everyone was invited. The parents were going to be there for the party itself, it was going to be supervised and I guess you don’t really think that anything’s going to happen when there’s a whole bunch of friends together.”

After a family dinner, Paul, Matt’s mum Kay and brother Nick dropped Matt off at Dominic’s place. “We waved goodbye to him as he walked up to the house and hopped in the car with Dominic and his parents and we drove home.”

Then the most ordinary suburban evening turned into a nightmare. “Nick was on the computer, I was watching the TV and I think Kay went to bed, and the next thing – we got a phone call and Nick yelled out and said, ‘It’s Charlie on the phone for you’,” Paul remembers.

“Charlie, who’s a friend of ours, said, ‘Paul, you’d better come quickly, Matthew’s been assaulted, he’s lying in a pool of blood on the road, the ambulance is on the way, the police are here and it’s really, really bad.’

“So we jumped in the car and took off, and when we got there, Matthew was lying on the road in a pool of blood. It was horrible.”

When the ambulance arrived, the paramedics rushed Matt the Redlands hospital. “I stayed in the ambulance with him,” says Paul.

“You could just tell that things were really, really bad. The first ambo who got to him shone a light into his eyes and said, ‘Oh my god,’ and I said, ‘Look, I’m his dad,’ and he said, ‘Your boy is very, very sick.’

“There were more doctors and nurses there than I even thought was in the hospital, and they said, ‘We’ve got to take him to the PA’.”

Matt’s family beat the ambulance to the Princess Alexandra hospital – the ambulance drove steadily because of Matt’s extreme injuries. When they arrived, the family faced an interminable