Journalist: Aneeka Simonis
2 min read | September 30, 2024
Victims’ families and advocates are calling for an urgent overhaul of the state’s “flawed” coward punch laws after just one conviction in a decade.
The Pat Cronin Foundation and champion boxer Danny Green’s Stop the Coward Punch campaign are putting pressure on the state government to redraft legislation so coward punchers are held to account with long jail terms.
Matt Cronin, the father of 19-year-old Patrick Cronin who was killed in a coward punch attack in 2016, said the laws had loopholes that enabled offenders to avoid the 10-year minimum non-parole period for fatal attacks.
“Because of loopholes, these laws aren’t doing what they are supposed to, which is to ensure that cowards who attack unsuspecting victims are held to account with lengthy jail terms,” Mr Cronin said.
Patrick Cronin was killed in a coward punch attack in 2016. Picture: Supplied
The law requires prosecutors to prove four key elements, including that the punch was deliberate, it was to the head or neck, that the victim would not have expected it and that the attacker probably knew the victim was not expecting to be punched.
The violence-prevention group said the requirement of intent posed major issues in criminal cases, resulting in lesser charges and sentences for coward killers, and that all meetings about the issue with the state government to date had been “fruitless”.
Prosecutors in the cases of Mr Cronin and Jaiden Walker – killed in 2017 – did not pursue jail time under the coward punch legislation due to concerns loopholes would undo both cases.
Mr Cronin’s killer Andrew Lee was convicted of manslaughter and spent just five years in prison before being paroled in 2022.
Mr Walker’s killer Richard Vincec was paroled the same year after also serving just five years behind bars on manslaughter charges, which carry a 25-year maximum jail term.
The coward punch laws came into effect following the one-punch attack which killed David Cassai on New Year’s Eve in 2012.
His mother Caterina Politi, co-founder of STOP. One Punch Can Kill, fought for the laws and said subsequent years of lobbying to fix critical loopholes has fallen on deaf ears.
“That this law is flawed and is failing to do what was intended is a real slap in the face to victims and keeps twisting the knife in and causing their heartache to continue,” she said.
“Victims have had enough of being second and their voices not being heard. The law needs to be fixed so that in the case there are more victims, it’s not going to fail them.”
In 2019, Joseph Esmaili became the first and only person to be successfully prosecuted under the coward punch laws after he punched surgeon Patrick Pritzwald-Stegmann at Box Hill Hospital in 2017.
Green said: “On this 10th anniversary, it’s time to pause and reflect and to call on governments around Australia to do more to stop this scourge in our community. We need stronger preventive measures, more effective support systems for victims, and harsher penalties for perpetrators.
“It is imperative that we come together as a society to eliminate this violence and ensure a safer environment for everyone. The time for change is now.”
More than 170 Australians have been killed by coward punches since 2000, according to figures released by the Pat Cronin Foundation.
A government spokeswoman said coward punch laws were being monitored to “ensure they operate effectively and as intended”. “Our thoughts remain with the Cronin family and anyone who has lost a loved one as a result of these senseless attacks that have tragic and enduring impacts,” the spokeswoman said. “Since these laws were introduced, the average sentences for manslaughter cases involving one punch has increased from six years to nine years imprisonment
