Albany teenager avoids prison after ‘cowardly and unprovoked’ mugging of tourist who finished Bibbulmun Track

An Albany teenager has avoided immediate prison time for a “cowardly and unprovoked attack” on a Queensland tourist who had just finished walking the Bibbulmun Track. Liam Xander Giddens, 19, received a 15-month prison sentence, suspended for 18 months, in Albany District Court on May 9 after pleading guilty to one charge of armed robbery. About 11.25pm on October 12, Giddens — who was 18 at the time — was walking along York Street with a 17-year-old male when they saw the victim and followed him down Vancouver Street. The juvenile co-offender struck the victim in the head with an empty Corona beer bottle, causing him to fall to the ground, before demanding money. The pair kicked the hiker several times to the head, face and body while he was on the ground before taking $75 from the victim’s wallet which they used to buy cigarettes. They then smashed the victim’s phone on the road and left. Disoriented and bloody, the victim walked around nearby streets before flagging down a passing police car for help. During sentencing, Judge Mark Herron said the victim suffered “very serious injuries” including dislodgement of one tooth and displacement of others, as well as cuts, bruising and swelling to his face. The tourist required three stitches to the crown of his head. “I’ve seen the photographs...he’s covered in blood and you can barely recognise him,” the judge said. Judge Herron labelled the incident a “cowardly and unprovoked attack” which continued while the victim was “defenceless and vulnerable on the ground”. Giddens was arrested on October 20 and admitted the offence. Defence lawyer Kyah Langdon said her client had “full and complete remorse” for his actions. “He’s disgusted with himself, and he’s extremely ashamed of what he did that night,” she said. Giddens took part in victim-offender mediation and penned a handwritten apology letter to the victim. Judge Herron said the victim had accepted the apology and ”expressed the hope that you stayed on a positive path in the future”. State Prosecutor Amy Bradley said the unprovoked, alcohol-fuelled attack caused extensive injuries, but the State accepted Giddens was “genuinely remorseful” and “was a person of prior good character”. While handing down the sentence, Judge Herron acknowledged the differences in sentencing between Giddens — an adult at the time of the offence — and his co-offender, who was aged 17 and nine months. The co-offender was sentenced in Albany Children’s Court in December to a nine-month juvenile conditional release order with 60 hours of community service. “On one view, it’s the co-offender who precipitated this and got Mr Giddens involved and was the greater participant, but he had the good fortune to be, by a matter of months, still a juvenile,” he said. “There wasn’t a large age gap between the two of you, but you were the adult, and it’s for that reason I’ve decided to impose a sentence upon you, even though he was dealt with far more leniently. “But he was perhaps fortunate. Had he been three months older and been 18, he might well have been dealt with in a similar way to you.”