ACT Supreme Court sends Thomas Matthews back to jail for hitting police officers with car

Chief Justice Lucy McCallum referred to the notebook in the ACT Supreme Court on Tuesday, when she sentenced Hawker man Thomas Matthews to 23 months in prison.

Matthews' mother hugged him and then sobbed as the 32-year-old, who had already served most of his sentence on remand, was returned to jail after four months on bail.

There was barely an empty seat in the territory's largest courtroom as police officers filled the public gallery in a strong show of support for the colleagues Matthews mowed down.

The incident, which the judge described as "devastating" for the officers involved, occurred while the trio was performing traffic duties near the National Arboretum in July 2021.

Detective Leading Senior Constable Alun Mills was training constables Alyce Mueck and Melanie Miller, who had just graduated from the police academy, on Lady Denman Drive.

The officers were debriefing at the side of the road, having just cautioned a man for ignoring a stop sign, when Matthews' car swerved into them "unexpectedly and violently".

Matthews, who had his right indicator on when he turned the steering wheel 250 degrees to the left, applied the Ford Laser's brakes with maximum force before hitting the trio.

His car was travelling 18 or 19km/h at the point of the impact, which left Detective Leading Senior Constable Mills with a spinal fracture and a screaming Constable Mueck, who was initially pinned under the vehicle, with a badly broken right leg.

Constable Miller sustained less serious physical injuries, but Chief Justice McCallum noted the serious psychological toll the incident had taken on each of the officers involved.

In sentencing, the judge referred to Matthews having been on bail at the time in question after an incident at the Bruce apartment where he had been living in May 2021.

She said a mentally ill Matthews had grown "quite paranoid" that month about the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation, believing the spy agency was monitoring his movements, bugging his phone and poisoning his food.

His state of mind deteriorated to the point police were asked to detain him under mental health legislation.

Believing police were acting at the behest of spies, an "acutely psychotic" Matthews reacted violently and struck at one officer with a knife before setting fire to the apartment.

About a week after this incident, over which Matthews was ultimately acquitted of two charges on mental health grounds, the offender was diagnosed with schizophrenia.

He was accordingly prescribed a combination of three medications, one of which was causing him to experience blurred vision at the time of the subsequent driving incident.

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Matthews later reported "panicking" when he saw a police car near the arboretum that day, fearing his blurred vision might lead him to "do something stupid" in front of the officers.

Prosecutors accepted this fear had prompted him to pull over, resulting in him accidentally hitting the victims as they stood by the edge of the busy road.

Chief Justice McCallum said this incident, which initially resulted in Matthews being charged with three counts of attempted murder, appeared at first to be "a targeted attack".

The factors giving rise to that view included the earlier incident in Bruce, and the discovery of Matthews' notebook.

However, the landscape changed after expert evidence suggested Matthews had not acted with intent to kill and in fact supported the proposition the collision was an accident.

As a result, the attempted murder charges were dropped and Matthews, who instead pleaded guilty to two counts of causing grievous bodily harm by a negligent act, was granted bail last November after spending more than 16 months behind bars on remand.

At his sentence hearing last month, defence barrister Jack Pappas argued the threshold for a jail sentence had not been crossed.

While prosecutor Anthony Williamson SC told the court he disagreed, he did not push for Chief Justice McCallum to return Matthews to prison.

On Tuesday, the judge decided keeping Matthews out of custody would not adequately denounce his conduct or recognise the harm done to the three police officers.

She said there was evidence that established Matthews had known of his blurred vision but decided to drive anyway, meaning there was therefore "a high degree of negligence".

Chief Justice McCallum accordingly imposed a backdated jail sentence that requires Matthews to serve nearly seven more months behind bars.

Matthews will be subject to a 12-month good behaviour order once he is released from custody in October.

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