WILLIAMS, R J

STATE OF TASMANIA v RONNIE JOHN WILLIAMS               6 SEPTEMBER 2022

COMMENTS ON PASSING SENTENCE                                                         GEASON J

 

Mr Williams you have pleaded guilty to assault contrary to s 184 of the Criminal Code 1924.

The facts are relatively straight forward- you engaged in an unprovoked assault on the complainant which was brutal in its force and disturbing in its relentlessness and duration. You were heavily intoxicated on the night of this offence and have no recollection of it.

The facts are that on 3 September 2021, you were at the home of a friend at Primrose Sands. The complainant was also there. You and the complainant are known to each other. A number of other people were present and you all had been drinking together throughout the afternoon. After a few hours you all went to the local RSL Club where more alcohol was consumed over about 2 hours before you returned back to the house that you had been at previously. You were still at that house, as was the complainant at around 1am. All of you had continued drinking throughout the evening. An argument broke out between some of the men and a number of people present became involved in the small tussle. You were also involved. CCTV footage was recording at the time and shows the shuffle take place and you exhibiting an extreme level of aggression and anger. You were restrained by a number of people who were trying to keep you away from the complainant. At this stage the complainant appeared to retreat behind a shed. After remonstrating with other males at the house, you followed the complainant behind the shed. You were observed to punch him to the head. This caused him to fall to the ground. You stood over him and punched him again to the face and head. A number of the males present pull you off the complainant. You walked from behind the shed and back into the yard. You took off your shirt and paced around the yard yelling and screaming. You were highly agitated and abusing the people in the yard. The owner of the house attempted to calm you but you ignored him and continued yelling at him and you threw a number of punches at him which did not connect. At one stage you broke down and started crying before again becoming aggressive and screaming at others present. At around 1.12am the complainant staggered back into the yard from behind the shed. He fell to his knees. You started yelling and screaming at him again. Whilst he was on the ground, you approached him, stood over him and began punching him to the head with your fists. You delivered over a dozen punches whilst the complainant was lying on the ground. He was crying and saying “I didn’t do anything” repeatedly. At some stage whilst this was happening people retreated inside the house for their own safety after trying unsuccessfully to extract you from the incident. Over about a 10 minute period, the complainant remained lying on the ground in the yard. You repeatedly returned to him and punched him numerous times to the head whilst he was lying prone on the ground. You would punch the complainant and then move away, pacing around the yard shouting abuse. At 1.22am you approached the backdoor of the house and yelled to be let in. You kicked the door a number of times causing the backdoor to visibly shake. You were not allowed to enter the premises and so you walked back to the complainant who was still lying on the ground and you punched him again to the head and face. You walked off and paced further before returning to him and punching him 6 more times to the face and head. You walked away leaving the complainant on the ground in what appeared to be a semi-conscious state. Police arrived at the residence at around 1.42am, they found the complainant lying on the ground unconscious. They located you walking along the road away from the residence and arrested you. The complainant was taken to the Royal Hobart Hospital by ambulance and was released the following day. On 4 September you participated in a video recorded interview. You told police that you had been drinking Jim Beam pre-mix drinks and had consumed about 10. You could not recall the altercation but believed that you had been in a fight. You were shown footage of the incident and agreed that it showed you as the person responsible for assaulting the complainant. The complainant had no recall of the incident either. As a result of your assault, he received broken left and right cheek bones. He also received a cut underneath his right eye. He had concussion which resulted in severe headaches. His face was significantly bruised and swollen. He saw a surgeon shortly after being released from hospital and was advised that he would not require surgery and they would let the bones set. He was informed however, that he may need surgery later in life as he may suffer from sunken cheeks or droopy cheeks as a result of the injuries caused by you.

I was provided with an independent forensic psychological assessment prepared by Dr O’Donnell and a pre-sentence report. At the request of your counsel I also procured a home detention assessment report.

Dr O’Donnell’s report is the most instructive in terms of explaining your conduct.

She describes you as presenting in a stressed state, principally due to the prospect of imprisonment you face for this offending. She describes you as remorseful for your violence, a proposition repeated on a number of occasions by your counsel. I accept that you are remorseful.

Dr O’Donnell explored your personal history and recorded exposure to clinically significant cumulative trauma. It arose from the following circumstances and events, which I summarise from the materials placed before the court and the submissions made by your counsel.

As a child you were exposed to physically abusive behaviour and substance abuse at home. Your parents separated when you were young. When aged 10 you were leaving a hotel where your mother had been drinking. She attempted to hitch-hike home.  She walked in front of a car. She was struck by the car and died shortly afterwards in hospital. You saw that collision and have vivid memories of the experience. When you were 20 your father died from aggressive brain tumours, his death occurring within months of the initial diagnosis. The following year your sister committed suicide by walking in front of a car at Claremont. That event brought back memories of your mother’s death. The following year your older brother committed suicide by hanging himself, and you witnessed the aftermath of that action.

I am told that by age 13 you were drinking alcohol and you had commenced using cannabis at aged 14. You moved out of home at aged 15. You became a parent at a young age. You have three children today aged 15, 14 and 6.

By 25 you were using methamphetamine and it is recorded that you had also used ecstasy and speed in the period leading to your abuse of this drug. You told Dr O’Donnell that you destroyed your life on methamphetamine and that you had lost everything. Your life was in a downward spiral: lived in your car for eighteen months seeking out food donations from the local petrol station. Subsequently you went to prison. It was while you were incarcerated that you made the decision that you would stop using methamphetamine. To your credit you have remained firm in this resolve and have not used the drug since February 2019- a period in excess of 3 years.

The other development, a direct consequence of this episode it would appear, is that you have not consumed alcohol since. You are presently prescribed a drug for pain management associated with a chronic back injury, but otherwise you have made yourself drug and alcohol free.

Dr O’Donnell viewed the CCTV footage which the Court also viewed. She observes that you have never had a problem with the complainant before, and you are unable to explain the violence you inflicted upon him that night. However she believes that there is a suggestion of a trauma trigger which may explain the way you behaved. There is a suggestion that the complainant was involved or planning to be involved in some form of motor vehicle use on that evening despite a very high level of intoxication. Though there is no objective evidence to support this belief, you suggested to Dr O’Donnell that you may have been worried that someone could have been hurt or killed as a consequence of the complainant’s actions. This, it is opined may have triggered trauma associated with the death of your mother and sister, both deaths involving motor vehicles. I say “may have” because she Dr O’Donnell states that the evidence of the trigger on the night of the offending remains unclear. She expresses the opinion that from the available evidence your violent behaviour is consistent with a combined impact of a binge drinking episode and the activation of externalised trauma symptoms.

She describes your decision to stop using methamphetamine and alcohol as life changing for you because it evidences a focus on re-lapse prevention as well as you giving priority to your partner and your role as a parent and indeed to your employment. Those matters are relevant to personal deterrence – the need to dissuade you from engaging in similar behaviour in the future. Based upon the steps that you have taken to eliminate drugs and alcohol from your life, the Court is able to express some confidence in the proposition that you are unlikely to re-offend.

Of some concern however, is your continued failure to address your personal trauma and your long term progress is dependent on you doing that.

I have received a victim impact statement and have regard to its contents. The injury sustained by the complainant were serious, and I have referred to them already. His children were impacted by your behaviour.

You have a number of prior convictions. They do not record any history of violent offending. On the basis of that record I accept the submission that this offending was out of character for you.

The sentence the Court imposes must deter others from engaging behaviour like this by signalling the fact that violence of this sort will be met with a strong response from the Court. I must also vindicate your victim. Apparently you continue to work alongside him, and there does not appear to be any ongoing tension between you. Nevertheless, as I have noted, the consequences of your conduct were very very serious for him and his family.

Ultimately, it is those matters, general deterrence and the need to vindicate your victim that require the Court to mark the seriousness of your conduct with a strong penalty.

All of that speaks to the need for a sentence of imprisonment.

Having so determined that imprisonment is an appropriate penalty for your conduct, I turn to consider whether home detention represents a suitable sentencing option in the circumstances, as I was urged to do by your counsel. You are assessed as suitable for such order. The advantage of a home detention order is that it enables you to stay at home and to continue to participate in your employment to the extent that that can be arranged in the context of the confinement that is part of this sentencing option. In King and Webb, the Court of Criminal Appeal recognised that such orders have a real general deterrent effect. An informed assessment of the suitability of such order as a means of conveying the Court’s condemnation of behaviour such as yours, is recognised by that decision

From the perspective of your victim, and the need, which I have referred to, to vindicate him, a home detention order with conditions that severally limit your freedoms, in my view, adequately addresses such consideration, provided the period of home detention is of sufficient duration to reflect the seriousness of the case.

In reaching a conclusion that a home detention order is appropriate, I place particular weight upon your remorse, your early plea of guilty, and the insight which you have developed into your offending, reflected in the content of the various reports that I have received.

The traumatic history that you have endured, from when you were a young child, is relevant, but of course at some point you have to be responsible for your own actions. It is because Dr O’Donnell opines that that trauma has had a significant psychological impact upon you, and her judgment is that this trauma was triggered on this evening- providing an explanation for your out of character conduct, that I give weight to it.

I have decided that in the circumstances of this case is an appropriate one in which to make a home detention order. Having regard to the seriousness of your crime, I have determined that the order should be for a period of 15 months. During that period you will be subject to all of the core conditions, and the following special conditions:

  • You are to remain at **address**at all times unless approved by a probation officer.
  • You must not during the operational period of the order take any illicit or prohibited substances, nor are you to consume alcohol.
  • You must if directed to do so by a police officer or a community corrections officer submit to a breath test, urine test or other test for the presence of alcohol or drugs.
  • All of the core conditions contained in s 42AD(1) of Part 5A of the Sentencing Act are imposed.
  • You will submit to electronic monitoring, including by wearing or carrying an electronic device during the period that you submit to such monitoring you must not remove, tamper with, damage, disable or interfere with it.
  • You must not allow anyone else to do so.
  • You must comply with all reasonable and lawful directions given to you in relation to the electronic monitoring, including in relation to the installation, attachment or operation of a device or a system used for the purposes of said electronic monitoring, by a police officer, a probation officer or another person whose function is to be involved in the installation of such system.
  • For the purposes of giving effect to the order you must attend at Highfield House today so that steps can be taken to implement the arrangements for the home detention order that I have just made.