The 'low-life' was just going to give him a hiding. Noone can condone that but it is unlikely he had any intention of killing the victim.

Does finding God reduce a prison sentence?

Scop #1 - if you can prove remorse - Hence Dave Moore's well written column

This scumbag was a bully and a coward who, in a perfect world, would be put down. What was Justice Judith Potter thinking of for handing down such a light sentence? I hope he will be deported when released.

I feel great sorrow for the Patel family.

There's nothing special about road crime. Unfortunately these issues apply to all crime and all violent criminals.

Our "justice" system is spectacularly ineffective at either compensating victims or stopping offenders from reoffending.

And why is he not being deported at the end of his sentence?

"Proof that they're not working is the road toll - we're tracking to be about 60 deaths ahead of last year by the end of 2009".

This is not a complete argument in and of itself. After all, last year's penalties for road rage and drunk driving were as lax as this year's (I assume), and we had 60 fewer deaths then.

I'm not saying I disagree with the conclusion that current policies have no deterrent effect; just that you haven't given me a reason to agree with your conclusion either.

PS - If there has been some relaxation of the sentencing policies since last year, then I retract my objection, although I think that you should have mentioned it in the article.

If you want to stop offending or reoffending, then the justice system is not the place to do it. The best way of doing that is preventing the potential offenders from entering the justice system in the first place.

You only ever see a snapshot of what goes on in the criminal justice system through the media anyway. If you were to look into every case rather than just those you hear about, you might find that the reality is a little different to the perception of sentencing in this country.

I don't really know much about this case in particular, but it's difficult to really criticise without knowing what the judge's actual reasoning was. I assume it was given in open court, so why not tell us exactly what she said? Rather than just the result.

I vaguely remember also reading that he's not a New Zealand resident/citizen? If that's true, then I imagine he'll likely be deported at the end of his sentence.

It does suck.

From what I understand the guy (O'Brien) was very cooperative and that helped towards the reduced sentence. Still, I would have put him away for a long time. It was a complete over reaction from someone with some serious anger issues towards an old guy who would not have been able to defend himself.

(And it wasn't last year that Paris Hilton went to jail - it was 2007).

Well written bit Dave, but I think your quip at the end implying the increase in the road toll (60 more than this time last year) is primarily alcohol driven is partially misplaced. The stats tell a different story – there appear to be three drivers (excuse the pun) for the increase, being firstly speed and alcohol, secondly 15-24 age group of which speed and alcohol plays a part but only a part and thirdly the increase in motorcycle accidents where arguably alcohol is not playing a big part at all.

However, as to your substantive point, the sentence handed down in this situation can only be described, in my view, as stupidly inadequate.

Karyn #7

Why do you assume he'll be deported. I seem to remember a man with AIDS who had deliberately infected several women who was not deported because it would be "hard on his family". I'm sure the same will be true here.

Boo bloody Hoo I say. Get rid of them. Australia doesn't have any problem sending a person who was born here but spent less than a few years living here back as a "NZ undesirable".