STATE OF TASMANIA v DANIEL VINCENT GARDINER 25 SEPTEMBER 2025
COMMENTS ON PASSING SENTENCE JAGO J
Daniel Vincent Gardiner, you have pleaded guilty to one count of causing grievous bodily harm by dangerous driving. Additionally, I am dealing with two related summary charges being one count of fail to comply with conditions of a driver licence contrary to s 12(1) of the Vehicle and Traffic Act 1999, and one count of fail to comply with a requirement for the taking of blood for analysis contrary to s 14(1)(A) of the Road Safety (Alcohol and Drugs) Act 1970. The condition attaching to your driver’s licence at the relevant time was that you not drive a motor vehicle whilst alcohol was present.
The crime was committed around 8:30pm on 6 November 2021. You had spent the afternoon at the Bridge Hotel in Smithton with your mother and her partner. Whilst there, you had consumed a considerable quantity of alcohol – some 11 glasses of beer and one shot of some type of alcohol. Your consumption of alcohol was captured on the hotel’s CCTV cameras. You left there and went to you mother’s residence. More alcohol was consumed there. Some time at around 8:30pm, you left that residence, in your Landcruiser motor vehicle to travel a short distance back to your home. Part of your route home required you to travel south on Goldie Street. At the time you made the decision to drive, you must have appreciated that you had been consuming alcohol for several hours and had consumed a considerable quantity.
At the same time, a Mr Brock House, then aged 18, his brother, Koby House, aged 15, and their cousin, Ionela House, aged 26, were travelling into Smithton. Mr Brock House was driving a Ford Courier Utility. Ms House was in the front passenger seat and Koby House was in the rear seat. Mr House was travelling north on Goldie Street. Goldie Street leads into the town centre. The group were intending to travel to the supermarket. Goldie Street is a sign posted 50 kph zone. It is a residential area. It is a two-lane road. The lanes are separated by line markings.
As Goldie Street approaches the intersection with Upper Havelock Street, there is a left-hand bend in the road for vehicles travelling south. Critical curve speed analysis conducted following the collision revealed that a vehicle travelling in the south bound lane, should be able to safely negotiate the curve whilst staying in its own lane if the travel speed of the vehicle is less than 63 kph.
At this time, it was drizzling, and the road was damp. As Mr House approached the Upper Havelock and Goldie Street intersection, he was travelling at about 40-45 kph. Just prior to the intersection, he observed your vehicle, coming towards him. He estimated your speed to be approximately 80-90 kph. You were on the incorrect side of the road and some way out of your lane. Your vehicle was crossing over the centre of the road. You failed to negotiate the bend in the road and crossed onto the wrong side, thereby colliding with Mr House’s vehicle. The front right hand side of your Landcruiser struck the front side of the Ford Courier, pushing it backwards and sideways. The final resting place of the Ford Courier was such that its front was perpendicular to the road and it was in the gutter. There was significant damage caused to both vehicles. There was no evidence of braking from your vehicle at the scene, thus a yaw or skid analysis, which would have allowed an estimation of speed to be calculated, could not be undertaken. The fact there was no evidence of braking from your vehicle suggests you did not even see Mr House’s vehicle until it was too late to attempt evasive action – that, in my view, is consistent with a terrible lack of attention and a lack of awareness of your surroundings – both factors being consistent with intoxication.
Mr House recognised you as the driver of the Landcruiser. You immediately tried to reverse your vehicle, but given the extent of the impact, you were unable to do so. You then exited your vehicle and began to walk away from the scene, walking south towards Samson Avenue. Occupants of a nearby house who had heard the bang and come out to investigate. They observed that you were stumbling and affected by alcohol. A member of the public followed you and brought you back to the scene. When you returned to the scene of the collision, you were yelling things like, “You were on my side of the road”, “You hit me”. In my view, the telling of such lies, after your endeavour to leave the scene is consistent only with you having a very clear understanding of what you had done, and an appreciation that you were in the wrong. It was a cowardly attempt to cast blame onto the other driver for your criminal conduct.
Police were called. They observed that you were affected by alcohol and smelt heavily of intoxicating liquor. They described you as being unsteady on your feet and noted you were slurring your words. You had defecated your pants. When police spoke to you, you also claimed that the collision was the fault of Mr House. You said, “This cunt was on the wrong side of the road…we were just sneaking up to my house and then fucking bang, they were on the wrong side of the road”. At another point, you suggested to police that your mother was the driver of the vehicle. Again, all of this behaviour is strongly indicative that you did appreciate your wrongdoing, but clearly had no preparedness to accept responsibility for it. You showed no remorse or concern for the harm you had caused to others. Such behaviour speaks to your high level of moral culpability.
Ms House was badly injured in the collision. Her right arm was in her lap at the point of impact. She felt immediate pain. The engine was pushed into her right foot and her right leg. She was struggling to breathe. She was transported by ambulance to the Northwest Regional Hospital and then transferred to the Royal Hobart Hospital by a medic-flight. She had a closed right elbow fracture, with bruising and swelling. Surgery was required. The surgery saw ten screws and a plate inserted. Her first left rib was fractured. She had a ligament injury to her right foot, which necessitated her wearing a moon boot for about six weeks. She had internal bleeding and bruising. She was hospitalised until 11 November 2021. She was unable to return to work for several months. She had very limited strength in her right arm and did not regain full mobility in that arm for a considerable period of time. The elbow injury was of such severity that two further surgeries beyond the initial surgery were required. She developed deep vein thrombosis and nerve damage in her right leg where it had been crushed by the engine. She underwent surgery in November 2024 in respect to this injury. The internal injuries also exacerbated a previously unknown but seemingly pre-existing renal difficulty. Tubes, which carry urine between the kidney and bladder, were damaged during the collision, which led to further investigation and detection of the kidney issue.
The driver, Mr Brock House, received superficial wounds to his head and swelling and pain to his right wrist. Koby House was wearing a lap sash seatbelt at the time of the collision. The impact caused this to fail, and he was thrown forwards and struck his head on the front windscreen. His head was bleeding, and he also had a significant bruise from the seat belt. His middle finger on his right hand was broken and his right wrist was injured. He had glass in his scalp, which had to be medically removed.
Your mother, who was in the rear seat of your vehicle at the time of the collision was also propelled into the windscreen. She too had lacerations to her head.
At 12:30am on 7 November 2021 at the Northwest Regional Hospital, you were given a formal direction to submit to the taking of a sample of blood for analysis. You refused to do so. Police warned you that if you continued to refuse, you would be charged. You said you understood that warning but nevertheless continued to refuse to provide blood for analysis. A further behaviour, that in my assessment, is indicative of you having an understanding of just how much alcohol you had consumed before driving.
The consequences of your dangerous driving for Ms House have been serious. I have her impact statement. It described the shock and upset she felt following the collision. The pain she endured initially was quite extreme. She remained on heavy pain killers for approximately three months after the collision. She experienced panic attacks when she had to travel in a motor vehicle following her release from the hospital. After her release, she was in a wheelchair for a number of weeks and was entirely reliant upon family members for her personal care. She was unable to stand or weight bear. She had to take a number of medications for her deep vein thrombosis, which caused additional complications to her health. She has endured a considerable amount of physiotherapy. She was unable to work for extended periods of time, which impacted her not only financially, but also in terms of her psychological well-being. She continues to experience pain on a regular basis and has on-going issues with her elbow and with her damaged ankle. She is likely to have these residual impairments for life.
In addition to the physical injuries, Ms House has also suffered much psychological harm. She has had to give up activities which she previously enjoyed because of these physical injuries, including the playing of sport and overseas travel. She remains anxious and hyper vigilant whenever she is in a motor vehicle. She also finds herself subject to mood swings. Ms House eloquently summarises the impact your criminal conduct has had upon her when she says, “My entire life has been turned sideways by this crash. It has profoundly affected ever aspect of my life for the past three and a half years and will continue to do so for the rest of my life”.
You are 39 years of age. You have a terrible record when it comes to driving offences. On six separate occasion you have breached the Road Safety (Alcohol and Drugs) Act by driving with alcohol in your system. .The first occurred on 31 December 2004 when you drove with a blood alcohol reading of 0.115. The second occurred on 6 May 2005 when you drove with a blood alcohol reading of 0.134. On 30 October 2004, you again drove with alcohol in your system and committed an offence contrary to s 6(3) although, your record of prior convictions does not indicate what the reading for that offence was. On 30 November 2004 you drove with a blood alcohol reading of 0.067. On 18 January 2008, you drove whilst under the influence of intoxicating liquor. On this occasion, your blood alcohol reading was 0.202. You were also convicted on that occasion of driving whilst disqualified and failing to comply with the duties of a driver involved in a crash. On 21 October 2011, you again drove a motor vehicle under the influence of intoxicating liquor, this time with a blood alcohol reading of 0.404. On this occasion you were also convicted of being a driver involved in a crash and failing to stop. Additionally, you have prior convictions for driving whilst disqualified, being a learner driver unaccompanied, being a driver involved in a crash and failing to stop, and several other convictions for driving offences.
It would have to be said that your attitude towards drinking and driving, has, in the past at least, been nothing short of appalling. I do not ignore the fact that many of these offences occurred some time ago now, and there was a gap of some 10 years between the last drink driving offence and this crime, but given you were driving on that last occasion with a blood alcohol reading 0.404, it is quite frankly astounding that you would again consider it acceptable to drive a motor vehicle when you had spent the afternoon at a hotel consuming alcohol, and then consumed more alcohol at your mother’s place before electing to drive home. When you fell back into the pattern of driving a motor vehicle after consuming alcohol, you did it in a drastic way and there were serious consequences which flowed from your decision to drive.
You have three children, aged 19, 17 and 15. They all live with you. Whilst you are separated from their mother, you have a good co-parenting relationship with her. You are employed as a leading hand at Grange. You are well regarded in that position of employment and I have regard to two references that were tendered on your behalf. It is obvious that you are a well regarded employee. I also note that as part of your employment, you are subject to random alcohol checks. That has led, I am told, to a considerable reduction in the amount of alcohol that you now consume.
I also take into account your plea of guilty, but I note it was not an early one. The plea of guilty was indicated to the State on 29 August 2025. The matter was scheduled for trial on 22 September 2025. I note witnesses had not yet been briefed. It is submitted, on your behalf, that much of the delay can be attributed to legal advice that you received. It is not for this Court to examine the legitimacy or otherwise of any advice received, but what is relevant to sentencing is the following. Your behaviour at the scene was wholly inconsistent with any remorse, contrition or acceptance of responsibility. For several years, Ms House and other witnesses have had the uncertainty and apprehension associated with the matter remaining unresolved. It is reasonable to infer that although they were not briefed for trial, they would nevertheless have been apprehensive about the possibility of a trial. At any point you could have instructed your counsel that you wished to plead guilty to the charge. You must have appreciated how much alcohol you had consumed before driving, the positioning of the vehicles at the scene clearly indicated it was your vehicle that had crossed to the wrong side of the road, and your behaviour at the scene afterwards was strongly indicative that you knew the collision was your fault. You are, of course, entitled to plead not guilty, and have guilt proved beyond reasonable doubt, but you are not entitled, in my view, to any substantial discount on sentence because you have now, at this late stage, acknowledged your guilt.
Your behaviour immediately after the accident in trying to leave the scene, blaming others for the collision and then refusing to have blood taken so that the true extent of your intoxication might be revealed, is all reflective of you having no sense of remorse or contrition for what you had done. As I have commented, the fact that you tried to blame others for your criminal conduct is inconsistent with any genuinely held remorse. The plea of guilty does retain some value, of course, because it avoids the need for witnesses to give evidence about what was obviously a traumatic incident, but in the overall sentencing exercise, in my view you are not entitled to any marked discount in the sentence.
Your driving was dangerous in several ways. Firstly, I have no doubt you were intoxicated and that impaired your driving. Secondly, you were travelling at a speed that was too fast in all of the circumstances. A combination of that speed and your intoxication meant you were unable to properly control your vehicle and it crossed onto the wrong side of the road and collided with another vehicle. This all occurred in a residential area and on a major thoroughfare, which is subject to regular vehicular and pedestrian traffic. The manner of your driving represents a very significant abandonment of your responsibility as a driver and involves serious criminal culpability. Over the last 25 years or so, courts in this State have repeatedly emphasised that cases involving death or injury caused by culpable driving require penalties that are sufficiently severe to deter both the offender and others who may be similarly minded. In my view, there is no alternative here other than a period of imprisonment. For your own purposes, you were prepared to expose others to the risk of serious injury and potentially death.
I do take into account what appears to be a change in your attitude. You are, as I have commented, now in solid employment and you have significant parental responsibilities. There has been no offending since the commission of this crime, which is evidence that you are capable of engaging in the community in a constructive way, and it is also consistent with there being a significant reduction in your alcoholic consumption generally. The references provided from your employer, and the letter in support provided from the mother of your children also attest to that fact. I note that in 2022, you made arrangements to compensate Mr House for the damage to the vehicle and a mobile phone that was in the car. You paid him the sum $6,500. Whilst that is to your credit, those payments do not, of course, help Ms House.
All of your personal circumstances, must be weighed against the objective seriousness of this offending and the obvious need for a strong response in the hope that others will be deterred from similar behaviour on our roads. The collision and its aftermath have caused great harm of a lasting nature to Ms House. The risks of even more serious injury, or perhaps death, was obvious. That her ongoing physical and psychological harm were caused by your dangerous driving cannot be diminished.
Balancing all matters, I am of the view that a period of imprisonment must be imposed, but given the positive factors I have identified, I will suspend a portion of the sentence.
Daniel Vincent Gardiner, you are convicted of the crime of causing grievous bodily harm by dangerous driving. You are sentenced to imprisonment for a period of two years commencing 5 September 2025. I suspend six months of that sentence on condition that you are of good behaviour for a period of two years and commit no offence punishable by imprisonment during that time. I order that you not be eligible for parole until you have served one half of the operative period of imprisonment.
In respect of the crime of causing grievous bodily harm by dangerous driving, you are disqualified from holding or obtaining a driver’s licence for a period of 18 months following your release from custody.
In respect to the offence of failure to comply with conditions of a driver licence, you are convicted. I impose no further penalty. In respect to the offence of fail to comply with a requirement for the taking of blood for analysis, you are convicted. I sentence you to imprisonment for a period of six months. I order that three months of that period of imprisonment will operate concurrently with the sentence of imprisonment just imposed to give effect to the principles of totality and to recognise the fact that conduct arises broadly from the same set of circumstances. On that matter, you are disqualified from driving for two years. I will backdate the commencement of that disqualification, however, until 7 November 2021, noting that on that date you were issued with an EDN and you have served that period of disqualification.
I make compensation orders in favour of Ionella House, Koby House and Brock House – all of which will be adjourned to allow quantum to be assessed.