An African thug has been sentenced to 15 months in jail for his role in a terrifying gang fight at a Melbourne service station where machetes, axes, knives, hatchets and a wooden plank were used.
Gang member Mai Mut, 19, pleaded guilty to attempted aggravated burglary, affray, and theft offences over a crime spree in May last year that ended with Mut and five co-offenders attacking three rival teens at a Shell Coles Express in Narre Warren.
He faced the County Court on Thursday where Judge Samantha Marks gave him a 15-month prison sentence and another 15-month community corrections order, including 407 days already served in custody, meaning Mut will be eligible for release by the end of August, the Herald Sun reported.
He was also disqualified from driving for three months, and Judge Marks ordered Mut be placed under strict supervision upon release, undergo drug and alcohol treatment, get a mental health assessment, and not associate with his co-offenders, Star News reported.
Judge Marks said in sentencing the attack on the rival gang happened after two Audi SUVs were stolen from different homes and Mut and his five co-offenders went to a Bunnings Warehouse in the stolen cars and inquired about machetes.
Dressed in hoodies and masks the gang then travelled to the Shell petrol station where three 17-year-olds, also armed with a machete, had taken refuge inside.
“You were armed with various weapons, including a pole, an axe, hatchets, knives, machetes, a wooden plank, you personally were armed with a long machete,” she said.
“Your offending was deliberate, involved planning and preparation, and the attack at the Coles Express was a terrifying incident.”
Mut and his group smashed the doors and windows with their weapons and tried to ram their way in with one of the stolen Audis but were stopped by a bollard, and then fled the scene.
Police arrived and arrested the rival gang when they came out of the service station, while Mut and give other African males were arrested later that day at a shopping centre restaurant.
The court heard that one Coles Express staff member was so terrified she was hospitalised with stress-induced chest pains.
But Judge Marks took into account Mut’s young age, early guilty plea, family support and a diagnosis of PTSD, and the court heard his house had been firebombed by a rival gang, the attack had been retaliatory in nature, and he had been assaulted while in youth detention.
Despite Mut’s long history of youth offending, Judge Marks told him he had “prospects of rehabilitation”, and warned him: “Don’t do things that will send you back to prison.”
“Your history does not have to be your future … you can make different choices going forward.”
Header image: Left, right, African gang members being arrested after the fight (Nine News).
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