Jail for vicious brawler
Shoppers hid in terror, court told
A YOUNG thug has been jailed for his role in two brutal fights in the centre of Geelong and Melbourne.
In one incident, Belmont man Robert Tuipulotu rammed another man’s head against a phone booth five times during a group bashing on Flinders St.
The 21-year-old was jailed for three months in Geelong Magistrates’ Court yesterday after pleading guilty to intentionally causing injury and affray.
The first incident — which happened in Geelong’s mall on July 18 last year — involved at need it to be entertaining and that’s why you have MasterChef and My Kitchen Rules,” Gaté said.
“What we do for Taste Le Tour for SBS, the entertainment from my side is to show the beauty of France in a rustic village or the seaside, so it’s visual entertainment.
“Just a chef behind a bench doing a televised cooking demonstration is something that Australians don’t find entertaining enough. least five men swinging punches and kicks in front of frightened onlookers.
The late afternoon brawl lasted more than six minutes and spilt inside Market Square Shopping Centre.
A female shopper was forced to hide behind an ATM machine as the group fought just metres away, while a worker at a nearby store sought cover inside her shop.
During the incident, Tuipulotu punched another man multiple times to the head, including when the victim was lying on the ground. Despite being arrested and charged over that brawl, the New Zealander again delivered a brutal assault on December 18, this time in Melbourne’s CBD.
Shortly after 2am, Tuipulotu and three friends bashed another man after tipping the victim’s cap off his head.
Although Tuipulotu, a former concreter, was not initially involved in the attack, he joined in when the victim was lying on tram tracks in the middle of Flinders St.
Tuipulotu helped the victim to his feet before punching him to the head.
Moments later, Tuipulotu rammed the victim into a Telstra phone box five times, before punching him to the head another three times.
The victim was knocked unconscious and taken to hospital by ambulance.
While being questioned by police, Tuipulotu initially played down the incident, saying it was merely “some pushing and shoving”.
The court heard yesterday Tuipulotu had also been in- volved in another sickening assault in central Geelong last year, for which he is currently serving a three-month jail term.
Defence lawyer Simon Northeast told yesterday’s hearing his client’s offending had started after the end of a long-term relationship. Mr Northeast said Tuipulotu moved to Geelong in his teens and had gained a “sense of belonging” with other youths in the city’s central mall.
Magistrate Ann McGarvie said a strong sentence was warranted for what she described as “extreme acts of violence”.
“The affray (in Geelong) would have caused many members of the public to be horrified, terrified and in fear of their own safety,” she said. “When a group of men are fighting like that, anything can happen. The whole scene is out of control.”
Upon his release, Tuipulotu will be placed on a 12-month corrections order.