A WELLSFORD man who agreed to help murder Kerang man William 'Bill' Stevenson on Christmas Day 2013 will serve 10 years in jail.
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Darren Lewis, 47, pleaded guilty to murder and was sentenced in Bendigo Supreme Court on March 17 to 10 years and nine months jail, with a non-parole period of eight years and three months.
His sentence was not able to be made public while his co-accused, Danielle Kerr, was on trial for Mr Stevenson's murder.
Kerr pleaded guilty in the Supreme Court on Monday and will face a formal plea hearing in May.
In her opening at Lewis' plea hearing, Crown Prosecutor Lesley Taylor said the day Mr Stevenson died Lewis had agreed to go along with Kerr's plan to "kill Bill", telling her he would step in and kill him if things went wrong.
The court heard the pair had taken Mr Stevenson to an isolated piece of road in Kamarooka before Kerr killed him with a rock, a hunting knife and a branch, then the pair put his body in the boot of the car, drove it to Wellsford Forrest and set it alight.
Ms Taylor said Lewis admitted to having driven the car to chase Mr Stevenson down after Kerr stabbed him, that he also hit Mr Stevenson once with a stick, and that he had assisted with burning the body and dispersing the remains.
Victim impact statements from the deceased man’s daughter, mother, and brother were then read out at the plea hearing.
Andrew Stevenson used words such as "gut-wrenching, numb, in shock and raw" to describe how he felt about his brother's death, and described how it had impacted his family.
"Our Christmases have been stolen," he said.
Kathryn Stevenson, Mr Stevenson's mother, said she was also left numb and devastated because of her son's untimely death.
"The pain has not lessened. This has torn apart a close-knit family," she said.
She said the last words she got to say to her son were "Merry Christmas".
"Never did it occur to me they would be the last words I would say to him," she said.
Mr Lewis' defence lawyer Dermot Dann said he understood it was a "terrible and senseless" crime his client had been involved with, and acknowledged the terrible pain it had caused for the deceased man's family.
Mr Dann told the court Lewis had a limited education and a background as a truck driver who used to move around a lot, before injury forced him out of work and saw him turn to using the methamphetamine ice in recent years.
He said Lewis and Kerr had only known each other a few weeks before the incident occurred and on Christmas Eve, the pair had spent the night using ice with Mr Stevenson, after purchasing 25 "whacks" or points.
He also said Lewis said he did not sleep at all that night because of the effects of the drug, and had made statements to police indicating the plan to kill Mr Stevenson took place while using ice.
He said his client had agreed to be there as a "backer" in case Kerr was overpowered by Mr Stevenson.
In sentencing Lewis on March 17, Judge Terry Forrest said while Lewis had shown remorse, co-operated with authorities and provided evidence which added "substantially" to the Crown's case, he was an active participant in a pre-planned murder.
"You are jointly responsible for ending a man's life," he said.
"It was you who drove after him. You assisted in a lengthy, cowardly attack.
"I regard your objective criminality as high."
He described the victim impact statements as "moving documents" and said he would take family members' suffering into account when sentencing.
"Their grief is profound and palpable," he said.
Judge Forrest said if it wasn't for the level of remorse shown, Lewis could have been looking at a sentence of about 18 years.