Isla Bell, the 19-year-old whose body was found in a Melbourne tip 18 months ago, has been remembered as a loving, courageous and open-hearted young woman with a green thumb and an “exquisitely beautiful soul”.

Friends, family and supporters gathered outside the Victorian state library on Saturday to honour the teenager and protest against prosecutors dropping a manslaughter charge against the man who had been accused of killing her.

Marat Ganiev, 55, who was originally charged with murdering Bell on 7 October 2024, had his charge downgraded to manslaughter and, this week, withdrawn, with prosecutors saying they had insufficient evidence for a trial.

Ganiev has instead been charged with attempting to pervert the course of justice, devastating Bell’s family and prompting them to demand changes to the system meant to protect victims of crime.

“My mind was prepared for that outcome, because my expectations were low,” Bell’s mother, Justine Spokes, said of the decision as she addressed the vigil on Saturday.

“[But] I just couldn’t prepare my heart for that. And they didn’t prepare my heart for that.”

Spokes spoke of her grief and frustration with the legal system – which she called “sick and perverted” and “not a justice system” – and the flaws in the system designed to protect vulnerable women and girls.

However, Spokes said she wanted to honour her daughter by ultimately choosing love over “everything else”.

“It’s this revolving door of really hurting men whose hearts are stone, and there’s sort of no real social consequence,” she said.

“We tackle this systemic cultural problem of misogyny in Australia from the inside out, you know? And … the heart is the doorway.”

Spokes said her daughter had endured other “horrors at the hands of really unwell men” before the experience that resulted in her death, but despite this pain she “just kept sharing her exquisitely beautiful soul”.

“See, the essence of my baby was palpable wherever she went,” Spokes said.

Bell’s remains were found inside a fridge in a rubbish tip in Dandenong in Melbourne’s south-east in November 2024, about six weeks after the night police believe she died.

In addition to Ganiev, Eyal Yaffe, 59, was originally accused of assisting an offender and attempting to pervert the course of justice, but prosecutors withdrew the two charges and he walked free from court.

Spokes said there had been “all these chemicals around” her daughter’s body, meaning she could not touch her or brush her hair one last time.

Bell’s disappearance galvanised a community search that lasted for weeks but Spokes on Saturday said she knew her daughter had died the moment it happened.

She said she had felt her daughter come to her after her death.

“She felt guilty. She thought it was her fault. I said, ‘No, my baby, it was never your fault’,” Spokes said. “And I had to let her go to where she needs to be.”

Many people in the crowd, dressed in orange to honour Bell, in memory of her long, vibrant hair, wept.

Other friends and relatives shared memories of Bell and called for an end to “toxic masculinity” and violence against women.

Justine’s father, David, spoke of his “gem” of a granddaughter with pride. He said she had loved gardening so much she carried secateurs in her bag everywhere with her, in case she wanted to take clippings.

He called on the Victorian attorney general, Sonya Kilkenny, to intervene in the case, saying the man who had been accused of killing his granddaughter should have been tried in front of the jury of his peers.

“Our motivation is not vengeance or rage – our community needs to have a conversation about justice,” he said.

“Victims and families are not getting justice in this state. The system appears to be hardwired to limit effective prosecution.”

Bell’s uncle, Chris, told the vigil the justice system needed “a fucking revolution”.

“I remember … the last time I saw her, she went out the door and I gave her a hug and she went into the world as she always does bravely and with an open heart,” he said.

“Always swimming, that Isla, and meeting you and meeting the world and meeting injustice and meeting her anger and meeting her joy and meeting any feeling she had and any person and experience with love in her heart.”