The jury has retired to deliberate in a manslaughter case where Strathmerton postmaster John Burke was killed.
Troy Matthew Maskell, 44, then of Numurkah, pleaded not guilty to manslaughter and has been facing a trial by jury at the Supreme Court since Thursday, August 3.
The prosecutor told the court 73-year-old John Burke had gone to the Strathmerton Roadhouse soon after midnight on August 8, 2021.
Mr Burke was hit in the head with a one-litre bottle of drink that was thrown at him by Mr Maskell, before he was kicked in the hip and fell to the ground, after Mr Maskell’s then girlfriend had taken offence to Mr Burke speaking to a child with her.
While Mr Burke was lying on the ground, Mr Maskell kicked the drink bottle at him, hitting him in the groin area.
The postmaster died in hospital 11 weeks later.
The jury heard evidence for five days from those who were in the service station on the night of the assault, paramedics, treating clinicians and other medical specialists.
On Thursday, August 10, the prosecutor and defence counsel outlined their cases to the jury for the final time.
Prosecutor Stephanie Clancy told the jury that even though Mr Burke had underlying health issues that made him more susceptible to problems, “his killing cannot be described as an accident”.
“The act of throwing the bottle was a cause of his death,” Ms Clancy said.
The prosecution maintained that Mr Maskell meant to hit Mr Burke with the bottle and that he meant to kick him to the ground.
Ms Clancy argued that evidence given by a paramedic who treated Mr Burke that night showed there was concern about a bleed on the brain on the drive from Strathmerton to Shepparton.
Ms Clancy spoke of the initial bleed on the brain, followed later by blood clots on Mr Burke’s lungs on August 11, and then a second bleed on the brain that occurred on August 16.
Mr Burke died in October.
Ms Clancy argued the two brain bleeds and blood clots on his lungs were all connected, as the second bleed resulted from treatment for the blood clots, and would not have occurred without the assault by Mr Maskell.
She said the pathologist who carried out an autopsy on Mr Burke found the cause of death to be multiple brain injuries caused by blunt force trauma.
Ms Clancy told the jury that the “law says you have to consider if the acts were a significant or substantial cause of death”.
Ms Clancy also urged the jury to find that Mr Maskell acted dangerously during the assault, saying that a reasonable person would have realised that throwing a one litre bottle at a person’s head and then kicking them would have resulted in risk of a serious injury.
Mr Maskell’s defence counsel Julia Munster said that while her client’s assault of Mr Burke had been “uncalled for and shameful” that “it does not mean he is guilty of manslaughter”.
Ms Munster said there was no evidence that the initial brain bleed was caused by the assault and was not a pre-existing or returning bleed.
She also said that it could not be ruled out that the second bleed may have been caused “naturally” from Mr Burke’s pre-existing illnesses, including cerebral amyloid angiopathy, and said it was not necessarily linked to the assault.
She also said another pathologist, called by the defence, had said the cause of death was bleeding on the brain but did not say what caused it.
Ms Munster also said it could not be proved her client acted dangerously.
She said her client threw the bottle in Mr Burke’s “direction”.
“A reasonable person in Mr Maskell’s position may not have known that they would expose Mr Burke to an appreciable risk of serious injuries (by their actions of throwing the bottle),” she said.