Graphic footage of kick to head played to court
A teenage club rugby player who kicked another man unconscious one morning in Civic told a court Wednesday that the other man started the fight.
Graphic footage of the violent bashing was played to the ACT Supreme Court as it prepared to sentence 19-year-old Anousone Sikoulabot.
The footage shows the Kambah teenager, who appears to have the upper hand in the fight, picking up and beating the victim until a final kick knocks him unconscious.
The teenager flees the scene.
Sikoulabot later went to police and admitted the fight in October last year had gone too far.
Sikoulabot, who pleaded guilty to a charge of recklessly inflicting grievous bodily harm, told the court he had been at the police station shortly before the fight and lost his licence for a low-range drink drive.
He said he had been in a brawl with the victim and several other people a few months before the fight that was captured on surveillance footage.
Sikoulabot said the victim saw him as he walked through Garema Place looking for his girlfriend and his car.
He said he came running up to him, accusing him of “talking shit” about him.
Sikoulabot said he worked for his mother at her restaurant when he wasn't training or playing with his rugby union team and wanted to continue to help his family.
Barrister James Sabharwal asked the court to order an intensive corrections order assessment, to find out if Sikoulabot could serve his term of imprisonment in the community.
The prosecutor David Swan said he would press for a period of full time imprisonment.
He pointed to the sustained nature of the attack, that Sikoulabot had the upper hand, had landed a kick while the victim was in a vulnerable position before running away and not helping the unconscious man.
Justice Chrissa Loukas-Karlsson said she would be helped by the assessment and ordered one be prepared.
She warned Sikoulabot that the assessment did not necessarily mean that was the course she would take.
"That kick to the head," she said, "is a very serious matter."
The case returns on August 2.