During a sentencing hearing on Monday, the court was told the events on October 5, 2024, had been sparked by Cooper\u2019s driving before the brawl broke out.<\/p>\n
Judge Heath Barklay said Cooper was \u201cdrunk and driving his car around the streets of Port Elliot, revving his engine and driving at speed\u201d.<\/p>\n
A court heard \u201cinnocent bystanders\u201d were among those hurt in the crash outside this Port Elliot pub. Photo \/ Supplied \/ Google Maps <\/p>\n
He said the fracas broke out after Cooper took exception to being told to slow down and leave.<\/p>\n
The court was told a fight broke out between Cooper and other individuals, who then smashed his car window as he returned to the vehicle.<\/p>\n
But the judge said this did not justify what Cooper did next when he sped away before reversing the car into the group.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere is no condoning their actions, but you brought it all on yourself \u2013 you were the initial aggressor,\u201d Judge Barklay said.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou stopped about 2m ahead then sped, reversing, into a group of people.\u201d<\/p>\n
The judge added not all of the people injured in the incident were directly involved in the altercation but were instead caught up in the aftermath.<\/p>\n
He said at the time of the crash, Cooper had a blood alcohol concentration of 0.12%. The legal limit is 0.05%.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou made a deliberate decision to drive dangerously,\u201d Judge Barklay said.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou say you are sorry that you hurt innocent bystanders, but at that time clearly you could not have cared less.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou also appear to have a complete lack of insight into the fact it was your actions which caused this situation.\u201d<\/p>\n
The court was told Hogg was the victim who suffered the greatest harm in the crash after he was pinned against the pub by Cooper\u2019s Ford hatchback.<\/p>\n
It left the man, who was 22 at the time, fighting for his life, requiring emergency surgery to stabilise him and his leg was broken in two places.<\/p>\n
Other victims included a 35-year-old who required surgery and an 18-year-old who suffered serious injuries.<\/p>\n
\u201cYour victims are traumatised by what they witnessed and the injuries they suffered as a result of your driving,\u201d Judge Barklay said.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe harm they have suffered was not simply physical.\u201d<\/p>\n
The court was told Cooper had grown up in New Zealand but moved to Australia in 2006 and was a father of four aged 22, 16, 14 and 12.<\/p>\n
He had separated from the children\u2019s mother and at the time of the crash had been living in a caravan park in Goolwa, south of Adelaide.<\/p>\n
Cooper was jailed for six years, with a non-parole period of three years and 10 months.<\/p>\n
His sentence was backdated to the day of the crash, meaning he will be in prison at least until August 2028.<\/p>\n
On his release, he will then begin a 12-year ban from driving and could face deportation back to New Zealand.<\/p>\n
Sign up to Herald Premium Editor\u2019s Picks<\/a>, delivered straight to your inbox every Friday. Editor-in-Chief Murray Kirkness picks the week\u2019s best features, interviews and investigations. Sign up for Herald Premium here<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"During a sentencing hearing on Monday, the court was told the events on October 5, 2024, had been…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":414394,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[1443,1135,33396,213056,124,3549,19552,31046,305,296,14641,3958,7494,117,111,43,139,37968,69,14727,1523,124707,40123,213055,3048,8844,80],"class_list":["post-414393","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-zealand","tag-about","tag-australian","tag-backwards","tag-cared","tag-could","tag-crash","tag-driver","tag-drunk","tag-have","tag-into","tag-jailed","tag-judge","tag-less","tag-new","tag-new-zealand","tag-news","tag-newzealand","tag-nine","tag-nz","tag-outside","tag-over","tag-ploughed","tag-pub","tag-pubgoers","tag-said","tag-victims","tag-zealand"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/414393","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=414393"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/414393\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/414394"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=414393"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=414393"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=414393"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}