The family of an Aboriginal man are angry and heartbroken after their brother’s killer was spared jail on appeal again, before the driver could boast of his death.
In June 2024, Jake Danby hit two Aboriginal people with his car on a Darwin street, killing one and injuring the other.
He was given a 12-month community correction order, five months under house arrest.
Following a public outcry, the Northern Territory Director of Public Prosecutions appealed the sentence as “manifestly inadequate”.
On Friday, Danby’s house arrest was increased from five months to two years as three criminal appeal judges upheld the application.
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Delivering his decision in Darwin, Chief Justice Michael Grant said Danby would also have to wear an electronic monitoring device.
But the family of the victim, known as Whitehurst for cultural reasons, expressed anger and sadness at the latest sentence.
“I have so many questions, but right now, my heart is broken,” Tony Whitehurst said.
“I was strong but I was upset when the new sentence said, It’s okay, he [Danby] Still out there, justice not served.
His previous court case revealed the 24-year-old driver bragged in text messages that the man he killed was an “oxygen thief” and that he would not go to jail.
He called it a “two for one combo” and texted, “It’s so funny watching them roll down the road after going over my bonnet.”
Whitehurst said the words continue to hurt the grieving family, and she dismissed the new sentence.
Prosecutors argued on appeal on Dec. 11 that the text messages aggravated Danby’s crime.
Prosecutor Pat Williams said that depending on the seriousness of the crime and the public’s expectations, a sentence of more than two years in prison should be imposed.
But defense attorney Jon Tippett said the sentencing judge noticed Danby’s text messages and gave them due weight because he was horrified by them.
The defense said Supreme Court Justice Sonia Brownhill had offered her client a chance at rehabilitation and counselling, and that he had complied with his correctional order amid public condemnation of his actions.
“Abandonment in this case was tarred and feathered by the community,” Tippett said.
“Courts should not punish people on the basis of their stupidity or vile remarks.”
Whitehurst’s nephews often asked where their uncle was and remember him as funny, humble and kind.
“They will miss him,” Whitehurst said.
Danby was not in court Friday and Tippett declined to comment on the revised sentence outside court.
The NT Attorney General, Mary-Clare Boothby, has come under fire over Danby’s case, accusing him of failing to report a conflict of interest after it emerged he was his sister’s stepson.
Boothby said she never tried to hide the fact that Danby was a member of an extended family and at no time was she or her office involved in a criminal matter.
