R v CRAFT [2003] NSWSC 588

New South Wales Supreme Court

CITATION : R v CRAFT [2003] NSWSC 588 HEARING DATE(S) : 30/06/03 JUDGMENT DATE : 30 June 2003 JURISDICTION: Common Law JUDGMENT OF : Barr J at 1 DECISION : The accused was found not guilty of either of the charges by reason of mental illness. Order that he be detained in the psychiatric ward of the hospital at Long Bay Correctional Centre or such other place as may be determined by the Mental Health Review Tribunal until released by due process of law.

CATCHWORDS : Criminal Law - accused found not guilty on the ground of mental illness LEGISLATION CITED : Mental Health Act 1990 PARTIES : REGINA v Adam Ronald CRAFT FILE NUMBER(S) : SC 70102/02 COUNSEL : Crown: PS Dare SC Accused: J Stratton SOLICITORS : Crown: SE O'Connor Accused: D Humphreys

IN THE SUPREME COURT OF NEW SOUTH WALES COMMON LAW DIVISION

GRAHAM BARR J

Monday, 30 June 2003

70102/02 REGINA v Adam Ronald CRAFT

JUDGMENT 1 HIS HONOUR: Adam Ronald Craft has pleaded not guilty to two charges, namely that on 23 May 2002 at Mayfield he murdered John William Barr and that on 5 June 2002 at Cessnock he inflicted grievous bodily harm upon Robert Gregory Manning with intent to murder him. 2 The accused has elected for trial by judge alone and the Crown has consented to that form of trial. I shall explain when I review the psychiatric evidence why I think it appropriate that the accused be tried without a jury. 3 The Crown must prove beyond reasonable doubt that the accused did the acts which constitute the offences but he admits all the facts relied on, so there is no doubt about those matters. The accused contends that he is not guilty of any offence because at the time of the events giving rise to the charges he was mentally ill and therefore not legally responsible for his actions. He must prove that it is more likely than not that that was so. 4 The statement of the test for a defence of mental illness was propounded as long ago as 1843 in R v McNaghten. The question to be answered was whether the accused at the time the offence was committed was suffering from a defect of reason, from a disease of the mind, so as not to know the quality and nature of the act he was doing or, if he did know it, that he did not know that what he was doing was wrong. The law has been amplified in Australia in the present century and the test may be said to be whether the accused was able to appreciate the wrongness of the act that he was doing. If through disordered condition of the mind he could not reason about the matter with a moderate degree of sense and composure it may be said that he could not know that what he was doing was wrong. It may also be said that if a disease of the mind so governs the faculties that it is impossible to reason with some moderate degree of calmness about the moral quality of an act, the actor is prevented from knowing that what he does is wrong. 5 The accused was born on 16 March 1974. He was one of a family of three children whose parents separated when he was aged one or two years. He had no contact with his natural father until the age of fifteen or sixteen years. He was brought up by his mother and a de facto step-father who, it is alleged, sexually interfered with him and his brother. Following those events his mother left the step-father, taking the children with her. The accused gave evidence at the trial of the step-father for the reported sexual assaults. The step-father was acquitted and the accused is reported to have been devastated at the result. His mother noticed his becoming more erratic after the trial. He had conversations with himself during which he rambled incoherently. He told her about conversations he had had with his grandfather, who had then been dead for twelve years. After he finished high school he attended the James Fletcher Hospital at Newcastle and was diagnosed with schizophrenia. Part of his treatment included fortnightly injections of an anti-psychotic drug. Over the four years immediately before the events giving rise to the charges he was not taking his medication as directed and he and his mother argued about the matter. 6 It appears from the reports of members of the accused's family that he became fixated with his step-father and what he had done to him. He began when angry or agitated to accused people of being paedophiles. These accusations were unreasonable and included people he had never met, his natural father and even himself. 7 The accused began to use drugs at the age of fifteen or sixteen years. He first tried cannabis and over the succeeding years heroin, LSD, magic mushrooms, amphetamine and cocaine. He is a moderate social drinker of alcohol. 8 He was first diagnosed mentally ill in July 1994, when he was admitted to the Hunter Area Mental Health Service. He was suffering dysthymia, major depressive disorder and possibly personality disorder. In the following months he was again admitted to hospital. He had been homeless and had been destroying property at his mother's house and threatening to kill himself. He had been drinking heavily. The final diagnosis was anti-social personality disorder and borderline personality disorder with alcohol abuse. 9 During the following year he was admitted to Morisset Hospital and the discharge summary reported a long involvement with counsellors and psychiatrists. He had problems with polysubstance dependence. The diagnosis was drug dependence and anti-social personality disorder. 10 Early in 1996 he was admitted to hospital again, accusing his step-father of abusing him. He was thought-disordered and manifested persecutory ideation and ideas of reference. The family reported a long history of odd behaviour and aggression. He was treated with anti-psychotics and responded. The diagnosis was schizophrenia and polysubstance abuse. A month later he was again admitted to hospital and was hearing voices and had suicidal ideation. He was admitted again a month later, having breached an apprehended violence order. He was angry with his family for previous abuse and had assaulted them. He was showing ideas of reference and auditory hallucinations of a persecutory nature. A final diagnosis was chronic schizophrenia, polysubstance abuse and anti-social personality disorder. 11 In March 1998 he caused a lot of damage at his mother's flat and was again admitted to hospital. He reported hearing the voice of his dead grandfather. He was difficult to contain. The diagnosis was query psychotic disorder, query substance abuse and query anti-social personality disorder. 12 He was admitted to other mental hospitals several times more during that year. 13 In 2001 he was apprehended by the police when he was carrying a knife and threatening to kill someone. He told police that he was the son of God, that God had put stigmata on him and that the person he was going to kill was molesting children. He was thought-disordered and had limited insight. The diagnosis was query schizophrenia and query drug induced psychosis. 14 There is a report by a psychiatrist who interviewed the accused in November 2001 at Cessnock Correctional Centre. Dr Hinton believed that the accused was psychotic but thought it unclear whether there was underlying schizophrenic illness or whether the symptoms were the result of drug abuse. He thought that there was a personality disorder marked by poor impulse control, aggression and violence. He thought that the accused required ongoing anti-psychotic medication, drug and alcohol counselling and follow-up by a community mental health team when released from gaol. Dr Hinton was concerned about the risk that the defendant posed to his former girlfriend and those whom he perceived as paedophiles and to whom he had made explicit threats. 15 Not many days before the first of the events giving rise to the charges the accused was released from gaol in Queensland, where he had spent one month for assaulting police. He had been using intravenous amphetamines heavily. His mother was concerned about him. He appeared psychotic. He had been pointing to moles on his stomach, which he believed were signs of the cross and had religious significance, and spoke about hands and hearts which were rotating. He believed that he had a mission to spread the word of God. 16 The deceased, John William Barr, was forty-nine years old at the time of his death. When he was eighteen years old he suffered severe head injuries in a motorcycle accident and was rendered unable to work and had to go on to a disability pension. Following the death of his father he progressed from being a social drinker to an alcoholic and spent time in a number of institutions from time to time for treatment for alcoholism. He had several relationships with women and there could not be the slightest suggestion that he ever sexually interfered with children. He lived in premises at Mayfield rented from the Housing Commission and friends stayed there with him from time to time. One of those friends was the father of the accused, Mr Gordon Cram. 17 In April 2002 Mr Cram was staying with the accused in Bass Hill and on one occasion decided to leave after they had had an argument. Mr Cram found it necessary to summon the police for his own safety. The accused was calling him an alcoholic and a paedophile. Mr Cram is not a paedophile. 18 Mr Cram went to stay with the deceased. When he arrived there from work on 22 May 2002 he found the accused there, drinking alcohol with the deceased. Both seemed to have been smoking marijuana. On the following morning he told the accused that he should find somewhere else to live. 19 At about 12:30 pm on 23 May 2002 the accused attacked the deceased with a knife, putting a fifteen centimetre long transverse incised wound across the front of the throat. The wound produced major airway damage as well as damage to the jugular vein. The deceased was thereby rendered unable to breathe and bled to death. 20 The accused ran away from the premises but returned on the following day and was arrested by the police. He told them that he could not remember how he had cut the deceased's throat but knew that he had done so in a fit of rage. He said that he had intended to kill him because of what he had done to young girls in the past. He was charged with murder and remanded in custody. 21 He was kept at Cessnock and a psychiatric registrar recommended that he be referred to the Community Mental Health Court Liaison Service for a mental health assessment. He was placed in a cell with another man, Robert Gregory Manning. At about 1:45 am on 4 June 2002 a nurse was summoned to the cell following the accused's complaint of nausea. He was agitated. The nurse provided him with medicine and spoke to Mr Manning. Both were polite and there did not appear to be any problem between them. The nurse wondered whether the accused should be sharing a cell and asked another officer about it. It was ascertained that the accused had a phobia of paedophiles and that Manning was not a paedophile. Things were left as they were. 22 At 4:10 am on 5 June 2002 officers attended an alarm call from the accused's cell. When they arrived Mr Manning was lying in the middle of the floor of the cell with blood around his head. The accused was present and kept repeating the words, "What have I done?". Then he said, "I've killed him". 23 Mr Manning was taken to Royal Newcastle Hospital and the following injuries were recorded -