STATE OF TASMANIA v JARROD MICHAEL PEARSON 6 DECEMBER 2022
COMMENTS ON PASSING SENTENCE GEASON J
Mr Pearson you have pleaded guilty to assault contrary to s 184 of the Criminal Code.
On the evening Friday 24 January 2020 and into the morning of Saturday 25 January 2020, the complainant was drinking with friends.
At approximately 3.30 a.m. he arrived at a venue in in the city where he met another friend. He remained there until the venue closed.
You were also at that venue into the early hours of Saturday 25 January 2020.
You and the complainant were not known to each other.
At approximately 6:00 a.m. when the venue closed and patrons were leaving you became involved in an incident, some of which was captured on CCTV cameras operating outside the venue.
You and the complainant are seen standing around outside the entrance among groups of people. Two members of the group that you are with got into a disagreement with a female, who appears to be known to the complainant. The complainant stepped in and a physical fight with another person commenced and the complainant was knocked to the ground. He managed to get back up but shortly after, another male person, Hayden Black, a friend of yours, turned on him.
Mr Black hit the complainant to the head with his right fist and to his face, before pulling him to the ground. He then stomped on the complainant three times with his right foot to the head/ upper body area of the complainant before three bystanders stepped in over the complainant and moved Mr Black away.
Mr Black then managed to push past these people to get to the complainant again. The complainant was on the ground not moving and Mr Black stomped on the complainant’s head and upper body area with his left foot. In the CCTV footage the complainant appears to be unconscious at this time. Mr Black then kicked him to the head with his left foot, putting his full weight behind the kick.
You are seen stepping in with Mr Vincent to stop Mr Black.
The complainant who by now has regained consciousness attempted to grab hold of you, after which you punched him approximately 10 times and kicked him five times. An off-duty police officer observed you kicking the complainant and stomping on his head while the he was lying on the ground.
The complainant was taken by ambulance to the Royal Hobart Hospital. He did not remember much of what happened but remembers being on the ground and shielding his face and being kicked whilst he was on the ground. He suffered serious injuries in the altercation. It is accepted that Mr Black was the primary aggressor and primarily responsible for the complainant’s injuries which were significant that included: .
- Bilateral gross swelling and bruising to the eyes and eyelids;
- Bloody nose with superficial laceration to the nasal bridge;
- 3 cm laceration to his tongue;
- Missing tooth;
- Bilateral anterior shoulder abrasion;
- Abrasion to the left back of his head;
- Minimally displaced nasal bone fracture;
You were arrested on the corner of Murray and Collins Street, at approximately 6.31 a.m. At the time of the arrest police observed that you had blood and a cut on your knuckle on your right hand, blood down your right arm and splatters of blood on the inside peak of your cap. Your clothes were seized and photographed. Your shoes, t-shirt and inside of your white cap showed those visible blood spatters.
On 25 January 2020 you participated in a video record of interview and made admissions:
You told police that you had arrived at the venue around 4 or 5 a.m. That you had started drinking elsewhere earlier ;
(i) You said that you were with one of your mates but did not feel comfortable giving out their name to police. (That person was arrested);
(ii) Inside the venue a rivalry started between girls and guys;
(iii) One guy pushed, and swung at the complainant and gave him a good hit. you did not know that person;
(iv) You said that everyone had gone outside and those two had an argument, and then that person lost it and he took it out on your mate. His mate “has gone off his head” and hit him;
(v) You said that you had seen your friend hit the complainant and you had gone to stop him;
(vi) The complainant grabbed you and tried to pull you down to the ground. You hit him a few times, and gave him a kick a few times.
(vii) You said the complainant tried to pull you down by the leg;
(viii) You said that as soon as he had hit you once you lost your temper;
(ix) You agreed that there were probably 10 punches and five kicks in total;
(x) You said that you might have hit his tooth or something and that is how you cut your finger;
(xi) You said that the complainant was trying to cover himself up. That you kicked him a few times in the head and in the back. You agreed that the complainant was trying to defend himself;
(xii) You said that at the time you wanted to hurt the complainant, that was in order for the complainant to back off;
(xiii) You said that you thought the complainant was going to pull you down to have a go at you;
(xiv) You agreed you went too far. You said the blood made you stop hitting and kicking him;
(xv) You indicated that you thought you had used an 8 out of 10 force for the punches and kicks;
(xvi) You told police you do not understand why you done this.. You said that you understand how much damage can be done by someone hitting someone in the head. You said that you were disgusted in yourself;
(xvii) You said that you were pretty drunk when this happened, about a 9 out of 10, but you had a good memory of what had occurred;
(xviii) You said the blood on your shoes was from where you had kicked the complainant.
At the conclusion of the interview, you were charged, processed and bailed.
I pause to note that the other men, Mr Black and Mr Vincent have been sentenced already for their participation in this assault. You are not criminally responsible for their conduct and the State does not assert that.
On any view of the fact this was a serious assault and your involvement though initially well intentioned became hostile and aggressive in circumstances where that was completely unnecessary. Whilst I have said, you are not responsible for all of the injuries sustained by the complainant on any objective assessment of your conduct you must be considered partly responsible and the objective seriousness of your offending is high.
Courts have a duty to protect members of the public from vicious assaults such as this. As your counsel acknowledges members of the public have a right to engage in social activities in public free from the risk of behaviour such as that in which you engaged.
You appear before the Court without prior conviction and on the basis of the materials submitted to me and the presentence report which I have received, I have concluded that this episode was out of character for you and it would appear that it is not indicative of the sort of person you are.
You are now 23 years of age, and you are still a young man. For sentencing purposes I regard your rehabilitation as an important sentencing consideration.
I have referred to Mr Black and Mr Vincent already.
I note that the sentence imposed upon Mr. Black who was charged with a different offence and a more serious one was significant.
Mr Vincent was charged with a different offence in the Magistrates’ Court but he had a very poor record of prior convictions.
You have no prior convictions. I differentiate you from Mr Black and Mr Vincent on that basis and on the basis of your participation in this conduct.
In those circumstances it is my view that the proper approach to sentencing you is to consider your conduct, your character and your antecedents in a way which distinguishes you from the other two. Parity is not a relevant sentencing consideration in this case in my view. That is because we are not comparing like with like.
You have completed college and you are the only one of your siblings who has done so. You are involved in dance, teaching contemporary hip-hop and you have made some TV appearances. It appears to me that you are industrious and I note that this charge has impacted your capacity to be involved in some of those activities for what is now a considerable time.
That delay in bringing this matter to a conclusion has also been a source of considerable anxiousness for you but on a positive note that delay enables you to point to the fact that there has been no further offending since this episode and that counts in your favour.
You are in a relationship of some duration. When you last appeared I was advised that you were actively looking for work and had in fact been interviewed to obtain employment.
You have complied on the whole with your bail conditions for a considerable period of time and I have regard to that in a general way as indicating the positives in your character to which I have referred.
You play cricket and have done so for a number of years and you have apparently, and this is important I think, changed your friendship groups so that your associations are now no longer with people like Mr Black and Mr Vincent; your associates are pro-social.
It is clear that the victim of this episode has sustained considerable physical and emotional consequences as a result of this episode and you are partly responsible for those. I note counsel submissions with respect to the victim impact statement and I take into account those submissions.
Whilst I accept that you are affected by alcohol when this offence occurred that of course is no excuse and not mitigatory.
What is mitigatory in my view is the fact that you are remorseful affect evidenced by your plea of guilty, a matter reinforced by your counsel and indeed in your initial interaction with police when you were interviewed.
There is a utilitarian benefit in your plea of guilty. You have obviated the need for the complainant to give evidence and you have saved the State the expense of a trial. I consider your plea to have been a relatively early one and I discount the sentence I would otherwise have imposed by 15% in recognition of that benefit.
Ultimately I have formed the view that you are unlikely to reoffend the impact of your engagement with the court process having had a significant effect upon you and reinforced the lessons of this evening.
The primary sentencing consideration in your case remains therefore the need to deter others from engaging in violent behaviour such as this.
The gravity of this offence necessitates a sentence of imprisonment. In balancing the considerations that are personal to you with a need for general deterrence the appropriate sentence is a period of 8 months imprisonment. Having regard to the matters put to me in mitigation and the observations that I have already articulated I have determined that in your case it is appropriate to suspend the operation of that sentence and I do so for a period of two years. It is a condition of that suspension that you are of good behaviour for that period and commit no offence punishable by a term of imprisonment in that time. If you do commit an offence punishable by a term of imprisonment within that period you may be required to serve the sentence that I have just imposed upon you.