STATE OF TASMANIA v CURTIS PETER REEVE 8 MARCH 2022
COMMENTS ON PASSING SENTENCE BLOW CJ
Mr Reeve has pleaded guilty in the Magistrates Court to a charge of assault under the Criminal Code. The charge relates to an incident one night in May of last year when Mr Reeve punched a man to the face in a hotel at Somerset.
The two men did not know each other. The victim was a Mr Rushton. One of Mr Reeve’s companions put his arm around Mr Rushton’s partner in the public bar as he walked past her. Mr Rushton appeared not to be pleased. Mr Reeve walked over to him, and told him to come outside and fight him. Mr Rushton said, “You don’t want to do that.” Without any provocation Mr Reeve punched Mr Rushton three times to the face, using both fists. Mr Rushton fell backwards. His back collided with a pool table with some force. He then fell to the floor, and remained there on his hands and knees. Mr Reeve circled around him, yelling at him, but then walked away and left the premises.
Mr Rushton was seriously injured as a result of colliding with the pool table. He suffered three fractured vertebrae, a fractured rib, and swelling to the lips and the left side of his face. He provided a victim impact statement. For a couple of months after the assault he was unable to do daily tasks without great difficulty and pain. His work involves a mixture of office duties and outdoor duties. He was only able to perform light duties for about eight weeks. His injuries have interfered with his recreational activities, which include bushwalking, mountain bike riding, and riding dirt bikes and adventure bikes. He has continuing minor psychological symptoms, including sleep problems. He is continuing to take painkilling medication, despite the medication causing drowsiness and having other side effects. It is too early to say whether he will make a full recovery.
Mr Reeve has been fined by magistrates for assaults committed in 2011, 2015 and 2019. The third of those involved punching a man to the head. He is 29 years old.
He regrets committing this crime. He pleaded guilty on his first appearance in the Magistrates Court. His victim has therefore known from an early stage that there will be no need for him to give evidence. He has worked for the same employer ever since leaving school some 13 years ago. He works for a dairy company in Wynyard, doing maintenance and breakdown work. He is well regarded by the management of the company. He owns his own home, subject to a mortgage, and is financially secure. He has obtained advice from a counsellor about his alcohol consumption and anger management.
Mr Reeve has been assessed as unsuitable for a home detention order, suitable for a community correction order with a community service condition, and in need of a period of community based supervision. He has problems with alcohol misuse, anti-social associations, and anger management.
Because of Mr Reeve’s three prior convictions for assault and the terrible impact of this assault on the man he attacked, I have had to think very seriously about whether Mr Reeve should go to prison. Any other penalty might seem too soft. However he has not previously been required to perform community service, placed on probation, or given a suspended prison sentence. I have decided not to send Mr Reeve to prison today, but to use all three of those sentencing alternatives.
Mr Reeve, you have come very close to going to prison. I am going to impose the maximum possible number of community service hours. And I am going to give you a suspended prison sentence that will hang over your head for three years. If you commit another assault in the next three years, you can expect to go to prison and serve the suspended sentence.
I convict you and make a community correction order for an operational period of three years, with special conditions that (a) you must within that period complete and satisfactorily perform 210 hours’ community service as directed by a probation officer or a supervisor; (b) you must during the next eighteen months submit to the supervision of a probation officer as required by the probation officer; (c) you must, during the next eighteen months, undergo assessment and treatment for alcohol dependency as directed by a probation officer. I also sentence you to eight months’ imprisonment, wholly suspended on conditions that within the next three years (a) you must not commit any offence punishable by imprisonment, and (b) you must comply with the conditions of the community correction order made today.