Victim woke a sleeping giant

THE old adage of “let sleeping dogs lie” could be applied to an incident in which a 23-year-old Oakey man was assaulted after waking a drunken man sleeping it off.

By his own admissions, Jonathan David Mataora had drunk a bottle of Jack Daniels whiskey and two bottles of wine on the afternoon/evening of September 24 last year when he attended a gathering at an Oakey home.

The then 24-year-old became so drunk that he walked outside and vomited in the street and a friend had him sleep it off in his car, Toowoomba District Court heard.

Later when the party broke up and people were leaving, a 23-year-old work colleague told Mataora to get out of the car so the vehicle’s owners could go home.

After a verbal exchange between the pair, Mataora got out of the car and threw a flurry of punches, three of which struck the complainant who fell to the ground with blood coming from his mouth, Crown prosecutor Noel Needham told the court.

When the victim ran back inside to clean himself up, Mataora apologised to the home owner saying he was shocked he had done that.

He had little recollection of the incident and later told police: “I couldn’t tell you anything hey... I was, like, hammered man”, Mr Needham said.

Police claimed that after the assault the victim had been more seriously assaulted by a 22-year-old man who was still before the courts, Mr Needham said.

Mataora, who turns 26 on Monday, pleaded guilty to assault occasioning bodily harm.

His barrister Isaac Munsie told the court his client, who was born in the Cook Islands and came to Australia from New Zealand five years ago to work at the Oakey meatworks, had no criminal history at all.

Usually, when things got out of hand at a party, his client would leave, he submitted.

Judge Alexander Horneman-Wren SC noted the build of the defendant.

“You’ll excuse me for saying you’re a big boy,” he said.

However, noting Mataora had no previous criminal history, a good work record and that through references tended to the court people spoke well of him, Judge Horneman-Wren ordered the conviction not be recorded and placed him on 12 months probation and ordered he do 50 hours community service.