Court of Appeal Slammed For Reducing Teen Killer's Sentence

21st April 2016

“What a mockery of the system, they used this excuse of a head injury for this kid to get a shorter sentence and now they are reducing his sentence to a pittance. Is that the price the Court of Appeal has put on the life of an innocent shopkeeper?” Jess McVicar

A 14 year who has name suppression was convicted of the murder of Arun Kumar in 2015, he got handed down a 6 year sentence with a minimum non parole period of 3 years and 3 months but he has just recently won an appeal and had his sentence reduced to 4 and a half years with no minimum parole period - meaning he is eligible for release at 18months of his sentence. He will no doubt be free at the end of this year.

Jess Mcvicar youth advocate for Sensible Sentencing Trust says “The Court of Appeal has once again failed us, it's like we have just taken a huge step backwards. This teenager is serving only 18months for the killing of an innocent man. It's disgusting!"

The teenager escaped a murder conviction and instead was found guilty of manslaughter due to his mental capacity from a head injury when he was 8.

A medical report outlined the effect the injury had on the teenager's reasoning on the day of the killing: ‘although knowing right from wrong, the accused was significantly reduced in his capacity to choose right from wrong, due to his lasting brain injury impairments.’

Jess says “What a mockery of the system, they used this excuse of a head injury for this kid to get a shorter sentence and now they have reduced his sentence to a pittance. Is that the price the price the Court of Appeal has put on the life of an innocent shop keeper?”

“You cannot tell me that when he took a knife with him to rob the diary that he wasn’t prepared to use it."

“These kids should not have been doing the robbery in the first place let alone with a deadly weapon."

“I can't even begin to imagine the emotions the Kumar family will be going through right now; they have truly been kicked in guts by the Court of Appeal which has basically laughed in their face.”

Jess says "My fears are now that when he gets out if he commits another crime of burglary he will be in youth court, having a family conference, and it won't deter him. He has been let of lightly for murder and he will keep playing the card of the head injury. He had no remorse for murdering Arun Kumar, if he did he would not have appealed instead he would have sat out his ridiculously short sentence facing the consequences of his actions.”

"What a way to tell our offending youth that they can basically do as they please because they don't have to be held accountable for their actions anymore, the victims will be the one who suffers." ENDS

ends

© Scoop Media