Few young murderers likely to qualify for jail term less than life – صحيفة الصوت

A suggested change in approach to sentencing young convicted murderers would not result in many receiving less than the presumed life imprisonment, a Crown lawyer says.

The Court of Appeal has reserved its decision on the cases of three young convicted murderers who appealed against their life sentences.

The non-parole period for each had been set at 10 years.

The youngest was Georgia Rose Dickey, who was 16 when she instigated events leading to the fatal stabbing in Invercargill of Jack McAllister, 19, also known as Jade Fearn. She had also assaulted McAllister and pleaded guilty to the murder charge.

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Christopher James Brown was 19 when he also played a role the night McAllister was killed near ILT Stadium Southland in June 2017. He was found guilty of murder.

The third was Katrina Roma Epiha, who was 18 when she stabbed Alicia Nathan, 32, at a house party in Christchurch, also in 2017.

Their appeals heard in Wellington on Tuesday and Wednesday were the basis for a broader debate about whether it was clearly unjust to sentence young people to life sentences.

The Children’s Commissioner wrote to the court saying life imprisonment for young people breached the Bill of Rights guarantee against disproportionately severe treatment or punishment.

The court accepted young people did not have the same moral responsibility for their actions as adults, because their brains were still developing.

The law presumes a life imprisonment sentence will be imposed for murder, but can be avoided if a judge believes it will be “manifestly unjust”.

But the exception has been little used, the court heard.

In her submissions, Crown lawyer Charlotte Brook said young people sentenced to serve at least 10 years before being able to be considered for parole from a life jail term usually served between 10 to 12 years, if they didn’t offend further in custody.

They were liable to be recalled to serve the term if they reoffended, but they were less likely to be recalled than murderers sentenced as adults, she said. Research showed younger people were easier to rehabilitate.

Brook accepted young people would feel more acutely the uncertainty of how long they would spend in prison.

In the decade from April 2012, 17 people under the age of 18 received life terms for murder.

But the presumption of life imprisonment for murder was very strong and not many cases would have the strong grounds needed to displace the presumption, she said.

Young people might have extra impairments, such as Christopher Brown, who was said to be very immature at 19 and had borderline intellectual disability.

The Crown accepted he had powerful mitigating features, but they did not displace the presumption of a life sentence given his role in the amping up the pack mentality and joining the group even though he thought McAllister was going to die, Brook said.

Dickey’s lawyers said she had done what she could to lessen the harm by telling McAllister’s friend to take him to hospital, making a statement to police, pleading guilty, and giving evidence at the trial of other accused.

Lawyer Fergus More asked what incentive there was to help if it was not taken into account in the sentence.

But Brook said McAllister was never given the chance to defend himself against Dickey’s allegation of sexual assault and the attack planned against him.

Crown lawyer Rebecca Thomson said Epiha’s risk to others was identified as early as age 13. She would need a lifetime of supervision to manage the risk.

Epiha was raised in an environment where threats needed to be taken seriously and extreme violence was used to solve problems, lawyer Hunter De Groot said.