A PORT Fairy man who bashed his partner so severely he caused her death has been jailed for 12 years.
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Justin Garry Turner, 32, of Elizabeth Street, pleaded guilty in the Supreme Court sitting at Warrnambool to killing Kylie Jane Cay and breaching an intervention order by assaulting her, including hitting her with a hammer to the feet and dragging her by the hair.
Turner was jailed for a total effective sentence of 12 years' imprisonment with a minimum nine years to serve before being eligible for parole.
Justice Kevin Bell said the anniversary of Ms Cay’s death was only days ago, on June 21, the day of the winter solstice, the shortest day of the year, the day on which there was the least light from the sun. He said the nature of the offending was shocking to behold and deserving of the strongest condemnation by the court and the community.
“You were her domestic partner of some seven months," he said.
“She met her violent death at your hands in the home that you shared, which should have been her sanctuary. Neither alcohol addiction nor the tempestuous nature of your relationship nor any other considerations in any way exculpate you from, or diminish your personal criminal responsibility for her death or its terrible impact upon her children, parents and extended family.
“Ms Cay was aged 44 years at the time of her death, by reason of injuries that Turner inflicted upon her on June 18 last year.
“It is unfortunately no exaggeration to state that you beat Ms Cay to death with punches and kicks to her body, you a man of 31 years and she a woman over a decade older.”
Justice Bell said the beating did not only involve punching and kicking, although those were the ultimate cause of Ms Kay’s death.
“You held a knife to her throat, which was a means of inflicting terror upon her, and dragged her about by her hair, which was a contemptuous act of physical and emotional degradation, a direct attack upon not only her body but also her dignity as a person and a woman,” he said.
"While she was on the floor trying to protect herself, you also applied blows to the soles of her feet with a hammer, which I can only describe as a sadistic infliction of pain and injury purely for its own sake.
"The violence that you inflicted was protracted. Your assaults upon Ms Cay were not isolated incidents."
Justice Bell said Ms Cay did not passively surrender.
"I infer from the defensive wounds on your face and body that she bravely tried to fight you off, but she was overwhelmed by your superior physical strength. Besides trying to fight you off, she tried to escape, and in fact did," he said.
"Despite her injuries, she managed to crawl out of the house into the backyard and hid in the kennel with the family dog for an hour while you were looking for her. She found in the kennel with the dog the safety you deprived her of in her home.
"Ms Cay went to hospital via an ambulance on the evening of June 18. She realised that something had to be done and agreed to co-operate with the police. Ms Kay was discharged home on June 20 but unfortunately, the nature and extent of her injuries were not fully appreciated and she died of internal bleeding due to a ruptured spleen the next day.
"By the early hours of the morning, she was in agonising pain and needed emergency assistance."
Justice Bell said Ms Kay was fighting for her life and revealed a determination that must have been a feature of her character.
“The circumstances in which the request for that ambulance was refused give rise to serious concern,” he said.
“Ms Cay was brutally beaten, attended hospital, discharged home after treatment, called an ambulance in distress and extreme pain during the early hours of the next morning. The request was refused, she had no money for a taxi to the hospital and she died of her wounds later that day. "
Justice Bell said in his view, it was necessary to consider whether these circumstances should be the subject of a coronial investigation into the response of the emergency services.
“I will therefore be referring the case to the Coroner through the Director of Public Prosecutions, who acknowledges the need for this to happen,” he said.
Justice Bell said Ms Cay was affectionately known as ‘Kiddle’ and ‘Mouse’.
"She is depicted in memorable family photographs as a unique woman who had a special capacity to love and be loved. I hope that this is how she will be remembered, after the pain of her passing has receded with time, the only real source of healing in this situation," he said.
"Ms Cay died a cold and lonely death on the floor of the bathroom of her home. Her mother and son discovered her body. A special and precious human life – that of Kylie Jane Cay – has been lost.
“The measure of the life of Ms Cay is the love that she gave to others and that others gave to her, most especially her children, which is her perpetual gift to them, and which she took with her to her grave."
Justice Bell said family violence intervention orders were not worthless pieces of paper and the contravention was an aggravating feature of the manslaughter.
He said Turner was born in Warrnambool and grew up there and in Port Fairy with his mother, who was terminally ill with lung cancer.
Justice Bell said there two sides to Turner – the gentle and loving son and brother and a man who would kill his female partner in uncontrolled anger, aggression and rage.
He said the defendant was disinhibited due to extremely high alcohol consumption and perhaps due to methamphetamine consumption the previous day.
"Killing someone in a violent and sustained outburst of anger, aggression and rage is a severe crime deserving of severe punishment," he said.
Justice Bell said he was prepared to accept that Turner had prospects for rehabilitation.
"You have a long criminal record, including for making threats to kill, breaching orders of courts, crimes of violence and property offences. However, nothing in your prior criminal history approaches manslaughter in severity and I think you are shocked at that which you have now done," he said.
Turner told a psychologist: "I fell pretty shit about it. It’s not a good thing. I’m really sorry for what happened and all that, but what good does that do. There’s nothing at all I can do for anyone to make it better. I think about it every day and it makes me depressed and sad; it just seems hopeless to me."
In handing down a sentence, Justice Bell said Ms Cay and all other women had an inviolable human right to life, to equality.
"Not just the appearance of equality but to real equality, to physical and emotional integrity, to respect for their dignity and personal autonomy, to loving relationships with children and others, and to freedom from fear of physical or mental harm," he said.
"They look to the law for protection from men who would perpetrate crimes of assault or homicide upon them in a domestic setting by reason of failing to control their anger, aggression and rage.
“The courts must respond appropriately through the sentencing process when those standards are severely or seriously breached, as they have been in this case.”