Over the “remorseless” attacks, a man who slashed another on the arm and stabbed a Brisbane shopping centre security guard in the torso has been imprisoned.
On Wednesday in Brisbane District Court, 29-year-old Jake Wayne Peter Purcell admitted two counts of unlawful wounding.
Purcell had threatened two male security guards with a knife following their lawful actions on June 7, 2023, removing him from a shopping complex close to Brisbane’s South Bank tourist zone.
Purcell had gone to a grocery meant to purchase smokes but was hostile when his favoured brand was not available.
” Victim, quite rightly, pushed the defendant upon seeing the firearm. Purcell’s reply was then to wound each individual with what was clearly a deadly weapon,” Muir added.
The guards underwent treatment in hospitals for a three-centimeter laceration and a five-centimeter piercing wound.
Muir claimed it was merely a question of coincidence that one of the victims’ stab injuries did not cause a more major harm.
Muir remarked, “Purcell’s remorselessness is demonstrated by his comment after arrest that ‘I should have just killed him’,” After being mistreated in young incarceration, Purcell had poisoned his life with methamphetamine, according to defence barrister Dominic Nguyen.
Purcell was currently undergoing mental health treatment. “At the time of offending he was unmedicated… while in custody he has been clean of illicit drugs,” Nguyen stated.
Judge Terry Gardiner said he understood mental health had contributed to Purcell’s conduct but he had first been apathetic and had a past with violence and knife carrying.
“Security guards going about their business should not be exposed to the risk of knife wounds,” Gardiner remarked.
Gardiner noted it was noteworthy Purcell had stabbed two persons in an open public retail centre.
Purcell declared as time served a three-and- half year sentence with just over one year on remand.
Gardiner directed Purcell to be immediately eligible for parole, which would subsequently ascertain if he was fit for release.
