STATE OF TASMANIA v MICHAEL RAYMOND MURFET 4 NOVEMBER 2026
COMMENTS ON PASSING SENTENCE PEARCE J
Michael Murfet, you plead guilty to assault and to strangulation. Both crimes were committed against your former partner Kiannah McDougall, the assault on 22 February 2023 and the strangulation on 8 November 2024.
By 22 February 2023 you had been in a relationship with Ms McDougall for several years.. However you had only recently moved into her home where her seven year old daughter from a previous relationship also lived. Ms McDougall was nine weeks pregnant with your child. You argued with Ms McDougall about money. You made a comment which upset her and she pushed you to the chest. You responded by grabbing her to her throat with your hands and pushing her against the wall and then on to a nearby couch, where you would not let her up. Your actions made it difficult for her to breathe. Some of these events occurred in the presence of her daughter. She came out of her bedroom and yelled at you to stop. She told you that you were “going to kill” her mother. She was so distressed that she ran to a neighbour for help. She told the neighbour that her mother was on the ground and she was worried that you were going to kill the baby, before running back into the house. The neighbour called the police but heard the complainant’s daughter screaming to her mother while this was happening.
The police attended, saw the complainant’s distress, her torn T-shirt and red marks and a scratch on her neck. She was uncertain about making a formal complaint. You were served with a police family violence order and charged with strangulation. You appeared unrepresented in the Magistrates Court, pleaded guilty and were bailed to appear later in the Supreme Court. Your daughter was born in September 2023. By that time you were no longer living with the complainant although there was continued communication during the following year or so about the possibility of reconciliation and contact with your child. The police family violence order expired on 22 February 2024. There was only one breach of the order, which occurred when you made a threatening phone call to the complainant on 27 January 2024. On 2 February 2024 you withdrew your guilty plea after having received legal advice.
The second crime was committed later in that year. At about 5.30 pm on 8 November 2024 you phoned Ms McDougall. You told her that you intended to come to her home to pick up your daughter, who by then was just over a year old. This had not been agreed and she told you not to come. However you arrived 30 minutes later. In a state of agitation, you removed the baby from her highchair and pushed her into Ms McDougall’s arms. Then, while she was holding the child, you pushed Ms McDougall back against the stove behind her and grabbed her around the neck with both hands and squeezed. She could not breathe. She felt blood “rush to her head”, began to lose consciousness and fell to the ground, simultaneously letting go of the child who also fell to the floor. Ms McDougall’s elder daughter was again in the house. She heard the child crying and ran out to see her mother and sister on the floor in a distressed condition. Ms McDougall threw her phone to her and asked her to call the police, which she did. You then left.
Ms McDougall contacted a neighbour and her father for help. She went to the hospital. The medical officers observed notable redness and inflammation around her neck. Very fortunately, the baby was not injured. You were arrested and spent three days in custody before being admitted to bail. A family violence order was made on 11 November 2024, which expired a year later without further breach.
You are now aged 38. You have prior convictions for violence. In 2009 you were sentenced by this court to community service for a violent incident during a football game. In 2011 you were given a two month wholly suspended sentence for common assault. In 2018 you were given a three month wholly suspended sentence with community service for common assault. That was a family violence offence committed against a different former partner. The State accepts that there had been no history of violence in the relationship with Ms McDougall. You held responsible employment as a plasterer and a reference from your recent employer speaks highly of you. Another reference attests to the considerable contribution you make to the local Australian Rules football community. Perhaps most significantly, you have resumed your relationship with your former wife. A letter from her suggests that in the last couple of years you have turned your life around. She describes you as a supportive partner and a responsible and loving father to your now teenage children. You accept that alcohol played a part in your crimes, but you stopped drinking in November 2024. Your plea of guilty to these crimes is in your favour. It has avoided the need for a trial, facilitated justice, and, most of all, spared the complainant and her daughter the additional trauma of having to give evidence. The plea came soon after agreement was reached about the crimes you would plead guilty to, and early enough so that neither the complainant or her daughter had to be briefed for trial. You have been subject to strict bail conditions for a considerable period.
I would accept that the dynamics of relationships can be complicated, volatile and stressful, especially when contact with children is involved. However that is never an excuse for violence. Violence within relationships or committed in the context of the breakdown of relationships, is an insidious, prevalent and serious problem in society. The devastating impact of violence perpetrated against women in domestic circumstances is well recognised across Australia by the criminal courts and the community. In relation to the assault on 22 February 2023 you are not charged with strangulation. Although the type of force you inflicted had the capacity to interfere with Ms McDougall’s breathing or the flow of blood to or from her head, you are not to be sentenced on the basis that you did intend or foresee that result. Nevertheless, most responsible persons would have appreciated that consequence, and so there is not much reduction in the level of your criminal culpability. Nor are you charged with assault of a pregnant women, and so you are not to be sentenced on the basis that you knew she was pregnant.
By contrast, you accept guilt of the crime of strangulation on 8 November 2024. You were on bail when this crime was committed. Strangulation is a serious crime because it is a particularly dangerous form of attack, indicative of the exercise of power and control and carrying a real risk of serious injury or death. As far as I have been made aware there was no lasting physical injury in this case but the psychological impact of such crimes can also be very serious. The crimes were committed in the complainant’s own home, and on the second occasion when you had been told not to come. For those reasons there is a strong need for a court to provide such protection as it is able to provide through the imposition of sentences that will act as both a punishment and a personal and a general deterrent. For both crimes it is a strongly aggravating factor that they were committed in the presence of Ms McDougall’s daughter and, on the second occasion, your own daughter. The crime in 2024 risked the safety of your daughter, although she was not injured. Exposure to family violence can have a devastating long term impact on children. On two occasions, Ms McDougall’s daughter was exposed to circumstances which must have been terrifying and traumatising for her, at a very tender and impressionable age. Ms McDougall’s victim impact statement refers to her own ongoing fear and anxiety, but also to ongoing impact on her daughter.
I was asked to consider an order which would not require you to serve a term of actual imprisonment. However the combined circumstances of these two crimes make the matter too serious for that. You spent four days in custody which will be taken into account. You were remanded in custody on 18 September 2026. I intend to incorporate into the sentencing orders a period of supervision in the community for a period beyond the term which a parole order might extend.
Michael Murfet, you are convicted on both counts on the indictment. In accordance with the Family Violence Act, s 13A, I direct that each offence be recorded on your criminal record as a family violence offence. I impose one sentence. You are sentenced to a term of imprisonment of two years from 13 September 2026. I make no order as to parole but suspend one year of that term for two years from your release on the following conditions:
- You are not to commit another offence punishable by imprisonment during that period. If you breach that condition you will be required to serve the suspended term, in addition to any other sentence, unless that is unjust.
- During the two year period of the order commencing on your release, you will be subject to the supervision of a probation officer. The conditions referred to in s 24(5B) of the Sentencing Act apply to this condition and will be set out in the order you will be given. These include that you must report to a probation officer at the office of Community Corrections in Launceston within three clear working days of your release, you must submit to supervision and comply with the directions given by your probation officer, you must not leave Tasmania without permission and you must notify of any change of address.
- In addition to the core conditions, the order will also include the following special conditions that you must following your release:
- attend educational and other programs, undergo assessment and treatment for alcohol or drug dependency, submit to testing for alcohol or drug use and submit to medical, psychological or psychiatric assessment or treatment as directed by a probation officer;
- attend and complete the EQUIPS addiction program as directed by a probation officer.