The Age: Judge lashes MPs over low penalty

A Judge has criticised MPs for ignoring repeated calls to increase penalties for drivers who cause serious injury. Judge Thomas Wodak launched his broadside yesterday as he jailed a drink-driver who tried to cut off another motorist and slammed into a power pole, leaving his nine-year-old daughter with a severe brain injury. He said he could jail Colin Gibbs Wilson for a maximum of only five years on each charge of negligently causing serious injury, which judges had recently criticised as too low.

“Over many years courts have called for (an) increase … without attracting any response from the lawmakers to date,” Judge Wodak said in the County Court as he jailed Wilson for 3½ years. “There are many instances in which County Court judges have criticised the maximum penalty for negligently causing serious injury … It is hard to explain why so many very experienced judges should not be listened to when the carnage on the roads causes considerable concern in the community.”

This year Judge Joe Gullaci urged the State Government to toughen laws dealing with drink-drivers after jailing a man who seriously injured four generations of one family in a head-on smash. Jailing Brendon James Healey for a total of six years on four counts of negligently causing serious injury, he said: “The maximum penalties available to the court of five years on each of the counts … is inadequate.”

The Sentencing Advisory Council has recently been asked to look at the maximum penalty, Judge Wodak said. He called Wilson’s act of road rage “a most serious departure from accepted standards of behaviour by drivers”. The court heard Wilson was driving his Ford on September 21 last year when he became angry at a man driving a Datsun. Reaching an estimated speed of 120 km/h in an 80 km/h zone, he weaved in and out of traffic on Stud Road, Rowville, to pursue the Datsun, before losing control and hitting a tree and the power pole.

Wilson, who was on prescription medication and had been drinking all night, had an estimated blood alcohol concentration of more than two times the legal limit at the time. Wilson, 40, of Bayswater, pleaded guilty to three charges of negligently causing serious injury and one of reckless conduct endangering persons. His daughter Melissa has undergone rehabilitation — including physiotherapy, speech therapy and occupational therapy — since her release from hospital, the court was told. “She has a case manager and an attendant carer,”

Judge Wodak said. “The plain and tragic reality is that you should not have driven a car at the time of these offences.” Wilson’s wife, Jodi, and their 14-year-old daughter, Samantha, were also admitted to hospital. Both wrote letters to Judge Wodak pleading for Wilson not to be jailed. Wilson had shown “immense guilt and remorse for what he has done”, according to his wife. Samantha said: “Jail is not the answer for him … What he needs is help.” But Judge Wodak discounted their pleas. “I do not consider that any sentence less than one of immediate imprisonment properly reflects the gravity of your offending,” he told Wilson.