Grace Spalding didn't spend the Friday night before her 21st birthday party drinking into the wee hours. She wound up in a hospital bed after a large, older man assaulted her in Brisbane's King George Square.
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Philip Steven George Taua, 51, barrelled into his victim from behind on February 5, about 7.45pm, knocking her out when her head smashed into a bench.
A few months later he walked out of the Brisbane Magistrates Court with a $450 fine, a nine-month good behaviour bond and no conviction after pleading guilty to common assault and assault occasioning bodily harm.
That's no justice at all according to the corporate program manager, who is considering pursuing civil action.
"It doesn't even compare at all. It doesn't even come close to it," she said.
"The fact that I've had to deal with this for months.
"I've had to deal with actual physical bodily damage and he's kind of just got off scot-free and got to get on with his life, is just silly, to be honest."
Physically, Ms Spalding escaped with an inch-long cut on the top of her head.
Six months on, she said it still caused her some mild pain when she brushed her hair but her major problems were psychological.
She often thought back to that night and worried she would see Taua again.
"I've had a lot of issues since then," she said.
"(I've been) getting quite uncomfortable with people behind me in public and feeling more panicked in certain situations, things like that, which I am dealing with.
"But that's something that has greatly impacted my work life and my social life that I wouldn't have had to deal with if none of this had happened, which is why it seems insane that he just gets kind of a slap on the wrist."
Ms Spalding was at the Pig 'N' Whistle after work, drinking with a small group of friends when Taua reacted badly to a joke.
"Don't drink my drink, we're coming back," her friend said with a laugh, which the 51-year-old replied to by throwing a beer over the women.
Security camera footage shows the moment he turns suddenly and runs from the venue, getting a 15-metre run up before crashing into Ms Spalding as she walks down a small flight of steps.
"My first contact with the ground was my head hitting the corner of a concrete bench outside one of those garden beds, which obviously knocked me unconscious and I came to probably 20 or 30 seconds later," she told Fairfax Media a month after the incident.
"Everybody was standing around me by that point and he'd run off immediately."
Police released footage of the bizarre attack on March 22 in a bid to help find Ms Spalding's attacker and he handed himself in the next day.
He pleaded guilty on May 11, walking away without a conviction.
