STATE OF TASMANIA v KATIE JAHNZ 19 SEPTEMBER 2025
COMMENTS ON PASSING SENTENCE JAGO J
Katie Jahnz, you have pleaded guilty to one count of wounding. I am also dealing with a related summary charge of common assault. The victim of your crimes was your then fiancé, Basil Hughes. You and Mr Hughes had been in a relationship for approximately four months. In the early hours of the morning of 7 April, you and the complainant had an argument. Both of you had been consuming a considerable quantity of alcohol. You were very emotional and began to throw various household items around the residence. The complainant tried to calm you, but to no avail. You asked the complainant to leave on multiple occasions, but he refused to do so. You approached him and started to kick and punch him, resulting in a small cut to his forehead. This behaviour constitutes the common assault. The complainant responded by kicking you in the stomach. The argument continued. At some point, the two of you were in the kitchen. You, again, picked up a number of household items and threw them at the complainant. You picked up several knives from a drawer and threw them towards the complainant. He put his hands up to cover his body and one of the knives hit him on the left hand, causing a cut to his left ring finger. The cut was sufficiently deep to sever a tendon in the finger. It required surgical reattachment.
A neighbour who had heard the commotion called police. They attended and arrested you. You participated in a record of interview. You made full admissions. You told police that matters had escalated out of hand, that you recalled grabbing knives, that you did not want to hurt the complainant, but had wanted to scare him so he would leave. You said you were horrified that you had hurt him in the manner that you did. You displayed genuine remorse when speaking to police.
The State accepts that you did not intend to wound the complainant and should be sentenced on the basis that you foresaw the risk of the wound occurring and threw the knife regardless of that risk.
You are 37 years of age, you were 36 at the time of the offending. You have no recorded criminal history in Tasmania, although there was a matter involving breach of a police family violence order that related to the complainant, which occurred following this incident. It did not involve violence and was dealt with by way of a good behaviour undertaking. In New South Wales, there are some matters from 2012 involving assault, stalking and destroy property. It seems the matters were discharged into something akin to a mental health list. They arose in circumstances where you were involved in a relationship that was characterised by domestic violence and experiencing a number of mental health difficulties.
Following that relationship, you were diagnosed with Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder. You have also been diagnosed with an eating disorder, a borderline personality disorder, depression and anxiety. Importantly, in the lead-up to the offending, you had been undergoing IVF treatment and, as part of this treatment, you had been advised to cease taking some of your mental health medication. Following this incident, you were advised to resume using your mental health medication as you presented in a manner that was described by a medical professional, as “a mental health breakdown”.
The fact that you were not taking your medication led to you being overly emotional and anxious at the time of this incident. When things became heated with your fiancé you were reminded of your previous violent relationship and reacted badly. Your mental state would not have been assisted, I infer, by the amount of alcohol you and your fiancé consumed in the lead-up to the crime.
I accept that your behaviour was out of character for you and reflective of your mental health difficulties at the time. There have been no further acts of violence since this matter. The relationship has come to an end. I take into account your pleas of guilty and the full admissions you made to police. Since this crime you have become a mother. There was some delay with this matter being resolved because your pregnancy had a number of complications which required careful management.
Obviously, you are to be sentenced for a crime which involved serious violence. In a state of heightened emotion and intoxication, you used a dangerous weapon. Mr Hughes was injured but it seems the operation was successful, and I am not told of any residual impact. The use of a weapon, however, in such circumstances is obviously dangerous and your behaviour must be condemned. In my view, there must be a period of imprisonment imposed to mark the seriousness of your conduct, but given the circumstances in which it occurred, and the fact that you have resumed an appropriate mental health care regime, and are now the mother of a young child, which is an additional stabilising factor, I consider it appropriate to suspend the whole of the period of imprisonment in the hope that it will allow you to continue to demonstrate your capacity to be a responsible, productive and law abiding member of our community.
Ms Jahnz, you are convicted of both matters. I impose one sentence. You are sentenced to imprisonment for a period of nine months, the execution of which is wholly suspended for a period of 18 months from today. It is a condition of that order that whilst it is in force, you do not commit any offence punishable by imprisonment. If you breach that condition, then a court must order that you serve the term of imprisonment unless it is unjust.