STATE OF TASMANIA v MEGAN JANE DEHLE 25 NOVEMBER 2021
COMMENTS ON PASSING SENTENCE GEASON J
Ms Dehle you have been found guilty by a jury of assault contrary to s 184 of the Criminal Code.
I find that on 16 September 2019, the complainant, Lauren Webb was travelling with her daughter and drove her motor vehicle into the carpark near the Fourways in Devonport, for the purposes of allowing her daughter to use the toilet. Upon doing so she and her daughter became aware of the presence of her former husband, who is now your partner. He was walking with you in that area. She manoeuvred her car bringing it to a stop. That manoeuvre is the subject of CCTV footage which was tendered in the trial, and I have viewed it. It shows the car entering the carpark at speed, cutting across car parking spaces and parking illegally, close to the point where you were walking. I cannot say and do not find that she did that in order to intimidate you or anyone else. In fact I do not think at that stage it was her intention to engage with you at all, despite the history of tension and ill-feeling between you.
Her daughter’s evidence was that upon seeing her father, she wanted to talk to him, and I have no reason not to accept that. As you were all walking away the car would need to have been manoeuvred into place quickly or that opportunity may well have been lost.
It is not at all clear to me that you will have seen the vehicle arrive, but you became aware of the car and the complainant’s presence shortly after she arrived.
Quite unnecessarily, you turned around and headed back towards the complainant’s vehicle, where you engaged in a conversation with her through the passenger side window. That exchange was argumentative, even aggressive. It made you angry, and you walked around to the driver’s side of the vehicle. Thereupon the complainant made to get out of the vehicle. In doing so she gave you the impression that the engagement would change from a verbal one to a physical one. It is likely you gave her the same impression. In that moment, I accept that you believed it was necessary to take action to protect yourself before she took action against you. However, it is my finding that in doing so you acted in excess of what was necessary or reasonable in order to do protect yourself. Your conduct was in the nature of a pre-emptive attack upon the complainant. To the extent that self-defence is engaged, your belief – a fleeting belief, could not justify the extent of your actions. Indeed the situation you found yourself in could have been managed as easily by running away from the complainant, further emphasising the unreasonableness of your actions in response to the complainant.
Indeed any form of engagement by you with the complainant that morning was unnecessary, and what followed was the result of your decision to turn back towards the motor vehicle and engage with her. The mature response would have been to continue walking. You took the matter beyond what was necessary to deal with the situation and it amounted to an unreasonable response to that fleeting belief. On that basis the jury found you guilty.
In respect of the particulars of the initial action to retrain the complainant as she alighted from her car, I find that you grabbed the complainant around the throat as alleged. That act was of very short duration and followed by 5 or 6 hard punches to her face and eye . I have based my conclusion in relation to the allegation of grabbing the complainant by the throat, by closely examining the CCTV footage in evidence , and considering the other evidence on the trial, from the complainant and her daughter.
The assault was of short duration, and that the complainant’s injuries resolved. There was no need for surgery and no complications are suggested. Nevertheless, as the victim impact statement records, the complainant still suffers pain, and this event would have been extremely upsetting.
Your conduct is aggravated by reason of the public nature of your actions and the presence of the complainant’s daughter who became involved towards the end of this altercation, a most unpleasant sight (captured in the footage), given her age.
I have regard to matters put to me by Mr Sullivan.
You are qualified in art, having graduated with a bachelor of contemporary art in 2008 and you commenced a masters in teaching in 2009. You did not complete that Masters degree for various reasons. You are presently operating your own business.
I accept that the conviction may impact your capacity to continue to retain your working with vulnerable people card, and I also accept that there has been some publicity around your behaviour which will have served to cause embarrassment and shame.
you appear before me without prior convictions. It was clear from the evidence and in the matters put to me by Mr Sullivan that there had been a history between you and the complainant. That is no excuse, but it is likely that the stresses associated with that history have caused you to act in a way which is out of character.
Nevertheless, it is necessary to impose a penalty upon you which deters you from engaging in similar conduct in the future, and which serves to deter others.
As to personal deterrence, I take the view that the experience of being involved in an extended process, first with the police, and then in court, and participating in a trial, will have had a significant impact upon you, and will go some considerable way to deterring you from similar conduct in the future.
there is a lack of sentencing options that fall between the nominal penalty, and the ultimate, a term of imprisonment. This is not a case where for a first offence I would impose a term of imprisonment. (It would be legally wrong to resolve this by imposing a term of imprisonment and suspending the operation of that sentence). In saying that I do not in any way want to be understood to be suggesting that this is anything other than a serious matter.
I have decided, that the appropriate order is a community corrections order which has within its terms an obligation to carry out community service work. This can be undertaken in such a way as to avoid an impact upon the operation of your business and the obligation to comply and participate will be upon you and you are to work with community corrections to do that. If you do not you can be brought back before me for breaching the order I am about to make. On your conviction I make a community corrections order requiring you to perform 160 hours of community service work, and I allow you a period of 24 month to complete that obligation. I direct you are to report to community corrections in Devonport by close of business today to begin the arrangements for that work to be undertaken.