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A WOMAN who shot a man in the chest with a bow and arrow in an Eaglehawk bedroom has been placed on a community corrections order.
Kate Elizabeth McGregor, 40, of Box Hill, was sentenced in the Bendigo County Court on Tuesday on one count of negligently causing serious injury.
McGregor was firing a full-sized bow and arrow from a bedroom door towards a target five metres away when she shot the victim in the chest, severing his thoracic artery in the early hours of June 9 last year.
The target was next to a door leading into an ensuite. The victim had emerged just when McGregor was firing the arrow, the court heard.
He required emergency surgery in the Bendigo Health intensive care unit.
Judge Jane Patrick said it was lucky no one was killed.
“You owed a duty of care to the victim,” she said.
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“Your voluntary actions fell so far below the standard of care a reasonable person would have exercised, and involved such a high risk of death or really serious injury.
“It is a very dangerous thing to do, to discharge such a serious weapon within a confined space and when you were drug and alcohol affected.
“It is very significant that you immediately gave the victim first aid and rang 000.”
The arrow was four-pronged and also caused a laceration to the man’s lung. The court heard both McGregor and the victim had been consuming drugs and alcohol the night before.
McGregor has previously failed to comply with conditions of community corrections orders, and breached an order by committing the bow and arrow offence.
She has spent 114 days in custody, considered time-served.
Judge Patrick said another community order was the best option to help McGregor address her substance abuse and mental health issues.
“It is important that you understand if you don’t address these issues you are likely to re-offend and end up in prison,” she said.
“Your prospects for rehabilitation will be much greater if you able to continue in the community.”
McGregor was convicted and placed on a two-year community corrections order with 250 hours of unpaid community work.