R v Davis
[2002] VSC 539
•5 December 2002
| IN THE SUPREME COURT OF VICTORIA | Not Restricted |
AT MELBOURNE
CRIMINAL DIVISION
No. 1463 of 2002
| THE QUEEN |
| v |
| LUKE ANDREW DAVIS |
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JUDGE: | TEAGUE J | |
WHERE HELD: | Melbourne | |
DATE OF HEARING: | 9 October 2002 | |
DATE OF SENTENCE: | 5 December 2002 | |
CASE MAY BE CITED AS: | R v Luke Andrew Davis | |
MEDIUM NEUTRAL CITATION: | [2002] VSC 539 | |
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Criminal Law – Sentencing – Intentionally causing serious injury – knife used to slash neck of 8 year old niece – prisoner suffering paranoid schizophrenia – plea of guilty – hospital security order – 6 years detention – non-parole period of four and a half years.
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APPEARANCES: | Counsel | Solicitors |
| For the Crown | Ms G Cannon | Office of Public Prosecutions |
| For the Accused | Mr I McIvor | Victoria Legal Aid |
HIS HONOUR:
Luke Andrew Davis. You have pleaded guilty to one count of intentionally causing serious injury to Billie Brownlaw on 1 November 2001. Billie Brownlaw was your niece. She was the daughter of one of your sisters. She lived with her mother in the Boronia home of your mother. You also lived there as at 1 November 2001. On that night, you used a knife to inflict a 12 centimetre long cut across the front of Billie’s neck.
For more than three years, you have suffered from paranoid schizophrenia. Your condition led to your being hospitalised first in September 1999, and then in May and December 2000. At times, you absconded from hospital. At times, you were placed on Community Treatment Orders. Under those orders, you were obliged to take anti-psychotic medication. You did not like certain side-effects of the medication. Often, you chose not to take it. That was the situation for some weeks prior to November 2001. You chose from time to time to use illegal drugs, namely cannabis and amphetamines. You also chose at times to drink alcohol to excess. 1 November 2001 was one of those times.
In the weeks before that day, you had been exhibiting signs of your mental illness. Those signs included increased irritability and paranoia. During the afternoon and evening, you were at your mother’s home drinking whisky with your brother. In the late afternoon, you were drinking in the room where the television set was located. Billie Brownlaw was also there. She was with her mother watching a children’s show. You did not like having to watch such a show. You moved the television set. That upset other family members. That they were upset at having to satisfy your needs angered you. You felt angry about Billie, but you did not act then.
You waited until after her mother had put her to bed around 9.30 p.m. By that time, you had consumed a considerable amount of whisky. You then went into the kitchen. You took a knife from a drawer. You walked into Billie’s room, and to her bed. You took hold of the top of her head to stabilise her head. You said to her: “You’re dead.” You then slashed Billie across her throat with the knife. She screamed and tried to move out of your way. As she moved, the point of the knife that you were holding entered her right thigh, causing a second wound.
You walked out of Billie’s room. You dropped the knife nearby. You walked out of the house. You walked around the streets for some days. You slept on the street. You were arrested some days later at the Finders Street Railway Station. Meanwhile, Billie had to receive emergency treatment at the Royal Children’s Hospital. Fortunately for you and for Billie, the injuries that you caused were not as bad as they might have been. The knife wounds were deep enough to cause troubling scars, but not so deep as to cause damage to any major blood vessels.
You have admitted that you have appeared before the courts on 2 occasions in 1992. For offences including some involving violence you received Community Based Orders on both occasions.
I have read the victim impact statement lodged with the court on behalf of Billie Brownlaw. I have read the accompanying psychologists report. The statement and report provide details of the shattering consequences to Billie of what you did to her that night. It is questionable whether she will suffer long term emotional scarring from the injuries inflicted by you, that will be at least as troubling as the physical scars.
You committed a very serious crime. I accept that your conduct on the night was influenced by the condition of schizophrenia. Accordingly, considerations of general and specific deterrence are less important than would otherwise be the case.
You are now 30 years of age, having been born in August 1972. You have had a reasonably normal upbringing. Your father died some five years ago. Until the onset of the schizophrenia, you appear to have had a good work record. I must and do take into account in your favour your plea of guilty, which has facilitated the course of justice.
I have received reports and a certificate from Dr Nina Zimmerman, a consultant forensic psychiatrist. They supplement earlier reports of Drs Moran, Rudolph and Barry-Walsh. Dr Zimmerman has expressed the opinions needed to satisfy certain requirements of s.93(1)(e) of the Sentencing Act. I am satisfied that all other requirements are met, and specifically -
1. That you appear to be mentally ill and require treatment for your condition;
2.That appropriate treatment can be obtained by your admission to, and detention in, an approved mental health service, namely Thomas Embling Hospital; and
3.That you should be admitted and detained as an involuntary patient for your own health and for the protection of the community.
Accordingly, I order by way of sentence that you be admitted to and detained in an approved mental health service for a period of six years. I fix a non-parole period of four years and six months under s.93(4) of the Sentencing Act. You have served 393 days pre-sentence detention. I direct that that be entered in the court records.
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