A baby who suffered severe burns to his body after a stranger poured a thermos of hot coffee on him has been returned to the scene of the ordeal.
Little Luka was on a picnic with his mother and friends at Hanlon Park in Coorparoo, Brisbane, on August 27 when an unknown man approached the group.
He poured coffee on Luka before fleeing the scene and is believed to have since left the country.
Luka was rushed to Queensland Children’s Hospital where he underwent multiple surgeries.
Four weeks later, he turned 10 months old and the detectives investigating his case dressed him in a juvenile police uniform to celebrate this milestone.
Following his recent discharge from hospital, Luka returned to the park on Thursday with his parents and older sister, where he happily played on the swings and the slippery slide.
His parents have renewed their calls for police to share more information with the public about their son’s attacker, who reportedly fled Australia the day after the incident.
“We would just like to have some reassurance that we are on the right path and that (the offender) will be caught,” Luka’s father said. Seven News.
Little Luka recently turned 10 months old.
Luka returned to the park on Thursday for the first time since the ordeal.
“How do you plan to bring him back? And if you know where he is in that particular country, is that country working with us?”
After a difficult month, Luka and his family are settling into a new home.
“He’s really strong, resilient and brave,” his mother said.
His father added: “We can’t believe how well he’s doing. He’s very happy and achieving all his goals.”
Queensland police are remaining tight-lipped about the case and what they know about the attacker’s whereabouts.
“We need to balance our investigative strategies with the need for the community to know what’s going on,” said Acting Commissioner Shane Chelepy.
Luka recently received a special gift from the detectives investigating his case.
The worldwide search continues for the man who spilled hot coffee on little Luka
Professor Donald Rothwell, an international law specialist at the Australian National University, recently warned that the suspect could be “difficult to track down” after he fled the country just days after the incident.
Professor Rothwell warned the case may never be solved because the foreign national left Sydney airport the day before police identified him on August 31.
“If someone doesn’t want to be found – and often they don’t want to be found because they’ve fled Australia, because they’re a suspect or a fugitive in these sorts of matters – they can also be very difficult to locate,” Professor Rothwell told the ABC.
He added that unless the man surrenders voluntarily, there will be nothing investigators can do to extradite him to Queensland.
Professor Rothwell added that numerous factors such as the man’s notoriety and current location could become obstacles to the “legal and political process that must be followed”.
The extradition process “could be complicated and lengthy” for the police, he added.