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'There was blood everywhere, it was horrific': Toutai Kefu relives home machete attack

15th October, 2021
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15th October, 2021
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Wallabies World Cup winner, and Tonga coach, Toutai Kefu, has revealed the horrifying details of the home invasion where he was stabbed and his wife seriously injured by a machete blow.

The 1999 World Cup team member Kefu, also watched his children caught up in the robbery gone horribly wrong.

His wife Rachel almost had her arm severed by a machete blow. His son Josh, 21, was also attacked and nearly suffered a punctured lung.

Kefu suffered deep abdomen wound that needed seven hours of surgery. And with a sliced liver, broken ribs and heavy bleeding his injuries were considered life-threatening at first.

Now on the road to recovery, Kefu has told the story of the attack to the Daily Mail.

Kefu said the first sign of danger was when he heard Rachel scream.

“She screamed, so I knew something was wrong,” Kefu said.

“I was shocked at the age of the kids — how young and small they were.

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“They were looking for car keys. It’s been common in the area; car thefts. I think the kids were quite agitated when they saw me, because of the size of me. Then when my son came down, who is 21 and the same size as me; that really escalated things. One of the kids was happy to leave, but the other one just went crazy.

“We actually backtracked and said, ‘Look, there’s the front door, here are the keys — go’. I said that because one of them had a machete and the other had a knife. If they were a bit older and more mature, they may have left. But they were young and could have been on drugs. They panicked.

“The bigger one did all the damage with his machete. He lunged at my wife and got her arm. I had a knife by then, but I put that down, grabbed a stool and charged them. That’s when my son came down and it ended up that he had one and I had another. There was blood everywhere. The scene was unbelievable, it was horrific.

“The one that I had ran away and slipped at the front door. I chased him, then my neighbour came up the front steps, we got the knife off him and pinned him down. My neighbour held him down then I went to help my son, but that guy had got away. My son had got the machete off him. There was fear in the kid’s eyes when my son stood up with the weapon and he bolted out the window.”

Kefu said the incident happened quickly and adrenaline took over.

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“We went into attack mode,” Kefu said. “We’re proud people — we’ll stand up for ourselves. I didn’t even realise I was stabbed until the whole ordeal was over. I was bleeding profusely. When we were waiting for the police and the ambulance to arrive, I was sat on the ground applying pressure to my wound with a towel, but it just wouldn’t stop bleeding.

“The worst wound was my wife’s, where they had cut down to the bone and severed all the tendons and nerves. I got a sliced liver and my son almost had his lung punctured by the machete, but he was OK.”

Kefu thanks well wishers from around the world that have strengthened the family in their recovery.

“We felt loved,”’ said Kefu. “It has really helped us to heal.”

But he acknowledged there were deep mental scars from the incident.

“We’re further down that road than I thought we would be,” said Kefu.

‘My wife sees a psychologist every week and I’ve had a couple of conversations with a professional — explaining what we are going through. He assured me it is normal and it will get better. It was traumatic, but we’re handling it.”

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