Staircase push earns attacker home sentence
A REVELLER who sent a stranger flying down a flight of stairs, leaving him knocked out cold, will spend eight months under home detention after admitting to the drunken assault at a Hobart nightclub.
The attack by 26-year-old Joshua Dion Hill was condemned by Supreme Court judge Robert Pearce as “yet another example of alcoholfuelled violent behaviour by a young man late at night in a licensed establishment”.
The father-of-three pushed his 20-year-old victim to his knees after the pair started arguing in the early hours of June 23 last year.
They agreed to go downstairs to “sort it out”, but as the victim reached the top of the staircase and stood with his back to “eight steep stairs”, Hill pushed his chest with both hands.
“The force of the push propelled him down the stairs to the ground at the foot of the stairs without his feet touching the ground and without anything breaking his fall.
On striking the ground he was immediately rendered unconscious,” Justice Pearce said. “It was about five minutes before he regained consciousness. He was then taken by ambulance to the hospital.”
The victim was treated for concussion and given four staples to close a wound in his head but was left without longterm injuries. Hill was interviewed by police two days later, telling them he was sick of the youth “mouthing off” but claimed he was drunk and didn’t push him down the stairs intentionally.
“You claim that, although you obviously intentionally pushed him hard, you did not intend that he be propelled down the stairs or badly injured. If such intention were proved you would be guilty of a more serious crime,” Justice Pearce said.
“However, the potentially tragic consequences of what you did are obvious to any reasonable person. You cannot claim that your intoxication caused you to act in any way which is out of character and it is not mitigating.”
Hill, who pleaded guilty to one count of assault, was sentenced to eight months under home detention with electronic monitoring.