Bret Marsi Carruthers in court for spitting on Gympie police officer

A former hospitality worker has faced court for the ‘abhorrent’ act of spitting on a police officer while he was arresting her outside a Gympie pub.

Bret Marsi Carruthers faced Gympie Magistrates Court over the July 22 incident which unfolded when officers were called to the Phoenix Hotel before midnight on July 22, 2024, amid reports the 25-year-old was laying in the middle of the road.

A former hospitality worker from St Lucia has narrowly avoided jail time for the “abhorrent” act of spitting in a police officer’s face while he was arresting her outside a Gympie pub.

Bret Marsi Carruthers faced Gympie Magistrates Court over the July 22 incident which unfolded when officers were called to the Phoenix Hotel before midnight amid reports the 25-year-old was laying in the middle of the road.

Police prosecutor Allison Johnstone told the court officers arrived to find Carruthers not in the road, but on the footpath.

She was “grossly intoxicated”, “verbally aggressive” and “emotional,” Sgt Johnstone said.

When the officers arrested her she “dropped her weight” to make moving her difficult and, once placed inside the back of the police vehicle, spat in the face of one of the officers.

Bret Marsi Carruthers faced Gympie Magistrates Court over the July 22 incident which unfolded when officers were called to the Phoenix Hotel before midnight on July 22, 2024, amid reports the 25-year-old was laying in the middle of the road.

Some of her saliva went into the police officer’s mouth, the court heard.

Carruthers then spat a second time when officers shut the vehicle’s door.

Defence lawyer Chris Anderson said his client suffered from alcoholism, which had developed following “significant” personal traumas in her life.

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She was now in the middle of rehabilitation, Mr Anderson said.

Carruthers’ mother sat quietly in the public gallery during her daughter’s sentencing, and a letter from the Hader Clinic was tendered to the court on Carruthers’ behalf.

Magistrate Bevan Hughes accepted Carruthers’ guilty plea to charges of serious assault of police by spitting, obstructing police, and being drunk in a public place, and told the 25-year-old it was an “abhorrent” offence that showed “no self respect, or respect for authority”.

Sgt Johnston initially submitted to the court a community service order was appropriate given the 25-year-old’s lack of history, but she was stopped short by Magistrate Bevan Hughes who said sentences for similar offending in other courts almost always ended in jail time.

Mr Hughes said spitting on police was a “violent” act that carried with it a maximum sentence of 14 years jail.

After accepting Carruthers’ guilty plea to charges of serious assault of police by spitting, obstructing police, and being drunk in a public place, he told the 25-year-old it was an “abhorrent” offence that showed “no self respect, or respect for authority”.

However, Mr Hughes took into account her lack of similar offending history, her efforts to rehabilitate her life, the trauma she had suffered, and the fact no communicable diseases had been identified through testing following the incident.

He sentenced Carruthers to six months’ jail, with the term wholly suspended for 18 months.

Carruthers was ordered to perform 40 hours of community service, and convictions were recorded.