A Victorian judge has defended the state's tougher mandatory sentencing laws for assaulting emergency workers, despite a basher avoiding jail.
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County Court Judge Michael Tinney says the laws are working.
He put James Haberfield, 22, on an 18-month mandatory treatment order after a drug-fuelled January assault on a paramedic in Melbourne's north.
"You have established the two special reasons under the act," Judge Tinney said on Monday.
"There is then no requirement to send you to prison for a minimum of at least six months."
Haberfield took a cocktail of drugs during a four-day bender at the Rainbow Serpent music festival before being taken to hospital.
He later fled, hid in a dog kennel and then went into a Coburg home, terrifying residents.
When paramedics arrived, Haberfield punched a paramedic in the face, squeezed her in a headlock and pinned her to the back door of the ambulance.
The assault victim, named Monica, does not want her surname published.
Her colleague, Sam Smith, hit the vehicle's duress button and sedated Haberfield.
"It is hard to imagine a person less likely to engage in a nasty, physical assault upon a female paramedic coming to your assistance," Judge Tinney said.
"You were behaving like a maniac."
Haberfield was the first person sentenced under the state's new laws requiring a minimum six-month jail term for assaulting emergency workers.
He dodged jail by a magistrate in August before prosecutors appealed.
"That should not lead people to think the laws are not working or will not work or will not be applied by judges," Judge Tinney said.
"Indeed they are working, which is precisely why I am not sending you - a mentally unwell, disturbed and suicidal, youthful, first offender with reduced culpability - to an adult prison."
A person who recklessly injures an emergency worker will be jailed in most cases but the judge says the legislation allows for some rare cases.
Haberfield's actions were not solely caused by taking illicit drugs as he also has schizophrenia, Judge Tinney said.
Victorian Ambulance Union general secretary Danny Hill said the laws needed work to deliver the intended outcomes.
"There is not one panacea to fix it but no matter what it is, the government has to get behind it to try to fix it," he said outside court.
Mr Hill said the law required drugs to be the sole cause of the assault.
Monica has not returned to work since the attack and suffers post-traumatic stress disorder and anxiety.
"The attack back in January has had devastating impacts on my life," she said.
Haberfield will also serve an 18-month community corrections order.
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To view the sentencing remarks go to: www.countycourt.vic.gov.au/files/documents/2019-12/sentencing-remarks-dpp-v-haberfield.pdf
Australian Associated Press
