Kayo Deme, you have pleaded guilty to one charge of intentionally causing injury. You have also pleaded guilty to a charge of failing to comply with a direction to assist.
Briefly, the circumstances of the offending are that between midnight and 1.00 am, on 16 August 2024, you and three other youths were at the Love Machine nightclub in Malvern Road, Prahran. You were aged 19 and the other youths were aged between 18 and 25.
You became involved in a dispute with another group of men inside the nightclub bathroom involving racist comments towards you. You were all ejected from the nightclub.
The dispute continued in the street and you returned to your car to retrieve a knife. You stabbed the victim, Max Fenton, with the knife to the buttocks region and he was taken to hospital.
[2]
I shall now set out the circumstances of that offending in more detail.
Before arriving at the Love Machine nightclub that night the victim, Max Fenton, and his twin brother, Seth Fenton aged 18, and Tony Nguyen, were at Spectrum on Chapel Street from 10.30 pm until midnight.
A few minutes after midnight you parked your car in Chapel Street with your passengers, Meba Ayele and Lulman Hassani. A black Audi containing your other associates, Hassan Said and Ahmed Hannad, parked nearby.
The Fenton brothers and Nguyen arrived at the Love Machine a couple of minutes later and you and your two passengers entered the nightclub about 10 minutes after that, followed a little later by Hannad and Said. At some point Max Fenton had a friendly conversation with some of your group in the bathroom.
Later, the two Fentons returned to the bathroom and Seth Fenton became involved in a dispute with you and your group related to racist comments from them towards you and your group. Max Fenton was struck to the back of the head by an unknown offender and a brawl broke out between all the men in the bathroom.
At 1.00 am the Fentons and Nguyen were ejected from the nightclub by security staff. After they left, they entered a small laneway off Commercial Road. When they emerged, Max Fenton was seen on CCTV footage placing an empty glass bottle down his pants. Seth Fenton placed knuckledusters on his right fist and Nguyen was seen adjusting something in his pants.
Those three men returned to the Love Machine nightclub.
At 1.01 am, you and the others in your group were being ejected from the nightclub by security, just as the Fenton twins and Nguyen returned to that vicinity. The Fentons and Nguyen instigated a fight with your group which escalated into Little Chapel Street, spilling into a carpark. All eight men engaged in the fight, running after one another and behaving in a generally violent manner. Nguyen left the area at some stage.
During the fight you ran to the car in which you had arrived and retrieved a knife from the boot. You returned and chased the twins up Carlton Street. CCTV footage shows you holding a silver object as you ran after Max Fenton. You were closely followed by the other four men in you group.
Said handed Hasani a baseball bat and Hasani ran after the Fentons with the bat in his hand. The other three men remained in the street about ten metres away.
On the corner of Chapel and Carlton streets you lunged at Max Fenton multiple times with the knife, stabbing his left buttock once. Hasani swung the baseball bat at both Fentons at least three times but it appeared to miss each time.
You and your group ran to the black Audi parked nearby. At 1.06 am the car travelled the wrong way up Wattle Street, Prahran, and stopped on the corner of Chapel Street where you and two others got out and returned to the car in which you had arrived. Both cars left the area and you returned home.
The Fenton brothers were assisted by a passerby who rang for an ambulance. Max Fenton was taken to hospital. His injuries included a penetrating cut causing perirectal haematoma and active blush, an injury to his left superior rectal artery, transected left seminal vesicle and vas deferens and an injury to his bowel. He was in an induced coma for four days and underwent three emergency surgeries.
You were arrested at home on 19 August 2024. You refused to provide police with the password for your phone which gives rise to the one summary charge.
You and the other men were all interviewed with only Ayelle answering some questions. The other men were each charged with affray.
Hassani was also charged with two charges of assault with a weapon and one charge of failing to comply with a direction to assist. He pleaded guilty to affray and failing to comply and was placed on a good behaviour bond.
The charges against Ayele and Hanad were withdrawn.
Said has pleaded guilty to affray and was due to appear in court earlier this month.
You were released on bail. The matter resolved at committal mention stage without a committal hearing and in May 2025 you offered to plead guilty. Thus, the plea is an early one for which you are entitled to a discount on your sentence, acknowledging its assistance to the criminal justice system and the saving of the time and expense of a trial.
Importantly, it has spared the victim from having to give evidence at a trial. He was reluctant to be involved and was the subject of a compulsory examination by a magistrate earlier this year.
In his evidence he described animosity from you and your group at the outset when you were all in the bathroom at the nightclub. I have already referred to the escalation of that situation between the two groups, culminating in you retrieving the knife once out in the street and stabbing Mr Fenton with it.
In your letter of apology to Mr Fenton you provided an explanation for your actions in terms of its context and without seeking to excuse your behaviour. You stated:
[3]
'The situation escalated after I was provoked. There were racial slurs and threats and even weapons were involved which put me in a fight or flight mode. I reacted in the worst possible way and I completely over-stepped the line. No matter the provocation, my actions were wrong.'
[4]
You went on to state that you take full responsibility and offered a deep apology in what appears to be a sincere letter.
When you were assessed as to your suitability for youth detention, you gave the report writer further details about the incident. You said that your group was left vulnerable and defenceless in the street when you realised that the other men had weapons. It was then that you fetched the knife from the car at the instigation of one of your group, and that having been the one to retrieve it, you felt obliged to use it to threaten the other group. You said you had not intended to use the knife but even as the other group retreated, they continued to taunt and threaten your group.
Mr Boden, counsel on your behalf, outlined your personal circumstances. You were aged 19 at the time and you have just turned 20. You were born in Melbourne, the middle child of your parents' three children, and you live with them in the family home. No-one in your family has ever been in trouble before. Your family is hard working and law-abiding.
You completed Year 12 at school and in 2024 you completed the first year of a Bachelor's Degree in Business at Victoria University. You deferred your course half-way through second year. Before this you had a casual job in a warehouse.
You have been a dedicated soccer player since you were six years old. Since the age of 12 you have been coached by Emmanuel Saakai, a professional coach and football agent.
He provided a written reference and gave evidence about your success at football and your ability to get your football career back on track after having taken a break last year. He believes you have the resilience and character to rebuild your life and make a positive contribution to society.
Your Godfather, Mr Fissaha Gobena, also wrote a reference and gave similar evidence of your hitherto good character and capacity for rehabilitation.
Indeed, you have no prior convictions and have been in no further trouble. Your plan is to take up your university course again and return to playing football. You have also been offered a job with Swissport as an airline services trainee, although at the time of the plea hearing you had not yet submitted details for a background check which includes criminal convictions or findings of guilt.
The findings of guilt in this case, whether or not a conviction is recorded, may well exclude you from further consideration. However, you should be given credit for the offer having been made.
Clearly, you are a young man who will be capable of interesting, productive and potentially well-paid work, which is a good indication of your very positive prospects for rehabilitation.
Your referees confirm your remorse and regret about the offending. They confirm that violence is not part of your character and you have reflected on your behaviour resolving never to let this happen again.
You have remained at home in accordance with a curfew imposed as a bail condition and so have not attended any nightclubs.
The drugs you had consumed on the night in question were your first experience of drug use and that has not recurred.
You were also unaccustomed to going to clubs and had been persuaded to go by your friends.
[5]
The two central considerations in sentencing you are your youth, on the one hand, and the need for general deterrence and denunciation by the court on the other hand. The starting point is the seriousness of the offending.
As the learned prosecutor, Mr Mohammed, put it, this is a serious example of the charge of intentionally causing injury, about as serious as it gets. The victim's injuries were extremely serious, they were life-threatening, and according to the report provided by forensic physician, Dr Moller, the victim would have died but for the treatment for blood loss and the surgery to treat the internal wounds. It was a shocking injury caused by the knife that you deliberately retrieved from the car, at a stage when you could have walked away despite the provocation.
Accordingly, your moral culpability is high and warrants a severe penalty. It is behaviour which must be sternly denounced by the court and the sentence must be such as to deter others who might offend similarly.
The law recognises that a young person's rehabilitation is of primary importance in sentencing because of the community's investment in a young offender who has a long life ahead of them. Their rehabilitation could result in them making positive and valuable contributions to society.
It is recognised that young people are immature and can make poor decisions, they lack the insight, judgment and self-control that is possessed by an adult. Because they are young, they have potential to change without established patterns of anti-social behaviour. Imprisonment in an adult prison could impair rather than improve a young offender's prospects for rehabilitation and result in detrimental influences that could have adverse flow-on effects for the community.
Indeed, that risk was identified by the writers who assessed your suitability for youth detention, that incarceration in either adult or youth custody would expose you to undesirable influences that you would otherwise avoid in the community. It is generally accepted that the more serious the offence, the less weight is to be placed on rehabilitation.
The prosecution's submission as to sentence is that a prison term, combined with a Community Correction Order, is within range, or alternatively, that a Youth Justice order is also open.
The submission on your behalf is that despite the seriousness of the offending, your youth and good prospects mean that a Community Correction Order, without a conviction being recorded, would be an appropriate sentence. Mr Boden submitted that the decision in the case of Boulton allows for such an order, even in very serious cases such as this. He also referred to the sentence in the case of Candaza[1] where four young offenders perpetrated an armed robbery using a screwdriver to threaten the victims without inflicting any injury.
In 2003 the Court of Appeal upheld the sentence saying the judge obviously considered that rehabilitation was a key principle in the sentencing disposition and that a conviction would place that prospect in serious jeopardy. The court added that it is very unusual for a sentence in such a case to avoid recording a conviction.
Mr Boden submitted that the community would be better served by your remaining at liberty and being able to return to your studies and sport, as well as your part-time job, if that is still available.
In addition, the law also acknowledges that imprisonment should be a sentence of last resort and that the court in Boulton[2] stated that a sentencing court should consider whether there was any feature of the offence, or the offender, which required the conclusion that imprisonment with all its disadvantages was the only option.
These are all compelling factors, but the seriousness of the offending takes precedence over other matters. It is certainly too serious to avoid recording a conviction and the appropriate conclusion is that a custodial sentence is warranted.
I take the view that your youth and vulnerability warrant particular acknowledgement and so a period of detention in a Youth Justice Centre for 12 months will be imposed. That order covers both charges.
If you had pleaded not guilty, I would have sentenced you to two years Youth Justice detention.
First of all, is there anything I have omitted, Mr Boden.
MR BODEN: No, Your Honour.
HER HONOUR: Mr Mohammed?
MR MOHAMMED: No, Your Honour.
HER HONOUR: Mr Boden, it may be appropriate to record on the order some custody management issues.
MR BODEN: Yes.
HER HONOUR: The obvious one would be that this is his first time in detention.
MR BODEN: That's right.
HER HONOUR: Are there any other matters.
MR BODEN: Not really, just as the report writer says, I guess, vulnerability ‑ ‑ ‑
HER HONOUR: Yes.
MR BODEN: Nothing else in terms of physical or ‑ ‑ ‑
HER HONOUR: All right, I'll make sure that is done. Now, I will remain on the bench for a few moments, Mr Boden, if you and the family would like to go to the dock and just say goodbye to Mr Deme, but I am remaining here because these moments can be difficult.
MR BODEN: Yes, Your Honour.
HER HONOUR: And perhaps you could limit the number of people at the dock.
MR BODEN: Yes, we'll do that ‑ ‑ ‑
HER HONOUR: Could I place that in your hands.
MR BODEN: Yes, you can, Your Honour. Thank you.
HER HONOUR: Thank you. Thank you, officers, would you please take Mr Deme now. Ladies and gentlemen, would you please allow Mr Deme to go now. Thank you, officers.