A 45-YEAR-OLD food vendor is blinded in one eye after his face was savagely beaten with a tree branch in Doomadgee.
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IN Thursday’s Mount Isa District Court, Judge Ian Dearden described the attack as something from “Clockwork Orange” when sentencing 21-year-old Roy Reginald Barclay to a decade in prison.
Crown prosecutor Sandra Cupina said Barclay met James Robert Pott and two juveniles at a bus stop in the early hours of April 9, 2014, and formulated “a plan to score” money and drugs by burglary.
“They wanted to tie up and torture the complainant for his drugs and money.”
The men went to Rodney Smart’s caravan at about 3am that morning, but Barclay went beyond the plan by wielding a tree branch and using it in a lengthy attack after the victim opened his caravan door.
A description of the attack by co-offender James Robert Pott was read to the court.
“The way he was going, it looked like he was going to murder him.
“He looked like a little murdering c—t.”
Photographs of the crime scene showed a large amount of blood through the caravan, outside and in Mr Smart’s car – evidence of the prolonged attack.
Mr Smart needed numerous facial reconstructions but his jaw remains deformed, and his eye was blinded by the ragged end of the tree branch.
His injuries mean he loses his heavy vehicle licence and will be unable to work as a labourer.
The men stole $35, a small amount of cannabis, and items including a DVD player and television, the court heard.
Ms Cupina compared the violent act to another case in which a man beat a victim with a hockey stick until it broke before running him over twice in a car.
Barclay pleaded guilty to acts intended to maim, disfigure or disable.
Judge Dearden labelled Barclay a serious violent offender, which means he will have to serve a minimum eight years before he is eligible for parole.
Barrister Frank Richards acknowledged his client was “an angry young man who from time to time resorts to violence’’.
But as a child Barclay was the victim of domestic violence from family members including his father, Mr Richards said.