Judge Robinson said the victim was defenceless, had his back turned, and had no chance to protect himself.<\/p>\n
While there were other injuries caused by a subsequent assault, Williams\u2019 punch alone was \u201cpowerful enough to disrupt the normal functioning of [the victim\u2019s] brain,\u201d Judge Robinson said.<\/p>\n
He described the attack as a \u201ccoward\u2019s punch\u201d and a calculated act of violence in a custodial setting, aggravated by gang involvement.<\/p>\n
He said attacks to the head were always serious and, had the victim died, Williams would have been guilty of manslaughter.<\/p>\n
As the judge read the summary of offending, Williams smirked in the dock.<\/p>\n
Later in sentencing, Robinson drew an analogy to explain the vulnerability of the brain, likening it to the texture of chocolate mousse.<\/p>\n
When the comparison was made, Williams interjected by saying, \u201cWhen you eat it?\u201d<\/p>\n
Judge Robinson later told the defendant there was a broad pattern of his making light of the process.<\/p>\n
The judge said the pre-sentence report showed Williams did not demonstrate remorse, instead attempting to justify the assault on the basis that he disliked seeing his associate lose a fight.<\/p>\n
The report recorded that Williams said the attack made him feel good and that he appeared proud of the lacerations he caused.<\/p>\n
Quoting the report writer, Judge Robinson said Williams laughed while describing the \u201cpool of blood\u201d, remarking that \u201cif you can see the pool of blood, you would know\u201d.<\/p>\n
Judge Robinson said that attitude underscored a high risk of future violent offending and an escalation in danger to others.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere is nothing particularly positive recorded,\u201d he said, adding that the lack of remorse and pride taken in the violence were aggravating features.<\/p>\n
Judge Robinson said comparable cases supported a 12-month starting point for an unprovoked assault causing unconsciousness.<\/p>\n
After a 10% uplift for Williams\u2019 prior violence and a 20% discount for his guilty plea, entered about five weeks after his first appearance, the judge imposed a sentence of 10 months and two weeks\u2019 imprisonment, to be served cumulatively.<\/p>\n
Ben Tomsett is a multimedia journalist based in Dunedin. He joined the Herald in 2023.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Judge Robinson said the victim was defenceless, had his back turned, and had no chance to protect himself.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":267361,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[1443,74,94,89,4250,8604,6788,29052,152105,44161,1334,3958,5503,27135,52485,151636,6804,1446,111,43,139,69,1118,5198,20937,5204,101263,152106,3048,9764,23554,58218,67355,119119,102],"class_list":["post-267360","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-zealand","tag-about","tag-after","tag-appalling","tag-attack","tag-blood","tag-caused","tag-dunedin","tag-fellow","tag-ganglinked","tag-inmate","tag-jail","tag-judge","tag-knocked","tag-lack","tag-laughed","tag-laughing","tag-light","tag-making","tag-new-zealand","tag-news","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-of","tag-pool","tag-prisoner","tag-process","tag-punch","tag-remorse","tag-said","tag-sentencing","tag-showed","tag-single","tag-unconscious","tag-unprovoked","tag-with"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/267360","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=267360"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/267360\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/267361"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=267360"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=267360"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=267360"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}