A man lost his eye in an horrific act of violence where drugged-up perpetrator Jayden McPherson stabbed him repeatedly

A Melbourne night-shift worker arrived home to be confronted by a violent drug-addicted knife-wielding bandit. What happened next changed his life forever.

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A man who stabbed a South Melbourne father four times during a violent carjacking —including once in the eye, rendering him blind — will spend years behind bars.

Jayden McPherson, 24, was sentenced by County Court Judge Anne Hassan over the 2020 incident on Friday.

The court heard a drug-affected McPherson, who had been released from custody some two days earlier, approached the victim’s blue Hyundai sedan about 5.50am on October 5.

The victim had just arrived home after a night shift and was sitting in his car with the window down when McPherson approached brandishing a large knife.

He held it up to the man’s face, demanded he get out of his car and hand over his keys.

The victim was stabbed in the chest and abdomen three times during an ensuing scuffle and, fearing he was going to die, grabbed a glass bottle and shattered it over McPherson’s head.

The victim was stabbed a fourth time – in the right eyeball — in a further attempt to disarm McPherson.

Judge Hassan told the court the victim was punched and kicked while he writhed in “excruciating pain” before McPherson sped away in his car.

The victim’s wife found him a short time later, with his “face covered in blood” and his right eye “protruding out of his face”.

McPherson collided with another car while weaving in and out of traffic on the Westgate Bridge, but failed to stop, before setting the victim’s Hyundai on fire just before 9am.

Last year he pleaded guilty to one charge of intentionally causing injury, one charge of intentionally causing serious injury, one charge of aggravated carjacking and one charge of arson as well as a number of summary offences–unlicensed driving, failing to render assistance after an accident and careless driving.

The court heard McPherson had a difficult and disadvantaged upbringing, suffered from a drug addiction, had a criminal record involving serious offending and had spent the “vast majority” of his adult life in custody.

Acknowledging his “tragic” past, she said his offending was “unrelenting”.

“You should be deeply ashamed of what you have done,” she said.

“This was a vicious and unprovoked attack.”

While noting concern about the fact the offending occurred just days after him being released from custody without support, she also acknowledged the risk of him becoming institutionalised if she sent him back to prison.

But she said the offending against the “defenceless man” was “very serious” and it warranted a custodial sentence.

Judge Hassan said the victim had developed depression, anxiety and post traumatic stress disorder following the attack and had been unable to return to work, causing him to worry about his future.

McPherson was sentenced to a total of eight years and seven months in prison with a non-parole period of five years and seven months.

His 597 days of pre-sentence detention was reckoned as time served.