A Queensland mother expressed gratitude towards a neighbor who intervened last Wednesday night when a hooded man was allegedly seen peering into her teenage daughter's bedroom window. Chad Hillier, a resident of Meridan Plains on the Sunshine Coast, reacted swiftly after his partner, Demi Irwin, noticed the man outside their neighbor's home.
At the time of the incident, the teenage girl was reportedly in her room, unaware of the man's presence as she played computer games. "She was just innocently on her computer, like being a kid, and to think of her looking up at him standing there doing what he was doing, it's really quite disturbing," Ms. Irwin told A Current Affair.
Upon being alerted by Ms. Irwin, Mr. Hillier went outside to confront the suspect. "Demi said, 'he's moving babe, he's moving', so that's when I knew I had to go quick," Mr. Hillier recounted. He described sprinting towards the property and seeing the man hiding behind an air conditioning unit. The suspect then attempted to escape over a fence into Mr. Hillier's backyard but tripped and fell.
Mr. Hillier then performed a citizen's arrest, detaining the man until police arrived. His partner captured the encounter on her phone, showing Mr. Hillier holding the suspect down. He also reportedly offered the man advice, saying, "This is your chance to change... look what you've done mate, pull your head in."
The girl's mother, watching as the suspect was escorted away by police, expressed her distress. "It's terrifying and it makes me so angry and sick that I had no idea that the man was there," she said. "It just boggles my mind - what was he even doing there? What is there to look at? She's a little girl."
Police confirmed that a 30-year-old man was subsequently charged with two counts of trespass and one count of observations in breach of privacy. He is scheduled to appear in Caloundra Magistrates Court on July 30.
Following the incident, Mr. Hillier has launched a range of T-shirts with slogans such as 'No more Peeping Toms' and 'Not on my Neighbourhood Watch.' He has been recognized online as a local hero, with Mr. Hillier stating, "I would like to think that any other good man would have done the same thing."