By Rebecca Peppiatt
The teenager who was behind the wheel of a modified car that was speeding when it crashed in North Lake last year, killing an aspiring footballer, has been jailed for three years and two months.
Nick Campo had just left his 18th birthday party in North Coogee last July when he and a group of friends got into a dangerously modified Toyota Hilux driven by a 17-year-old P-plater who travelled at high speed and ignored traffic signs in a bid to get to a Leederville nightclub before lockout.
Nick Campo died on his 18th birthday.
Campo died when the ute left Farrington Road in North Lake and mounted a curb before colliding with an oncoming Jeep.
Three other young passengers also suffered catastrophic injuries, as did the passengers of the Jeep.
The driver – who cannot be named due to his age – was sentenced on Wednesday, with Judge Hylton Quail telling the court it was not just the teenager who was responsible for the crash.
Quail said that after hearing evidence given by the other passengers, he was satisfied the group was encouraging the driver to speed.
“Although [the driver] accepts the consequences, the moral responsibility is a shared one,” he said.
“It sits with all the boys who got in the car that night … they were all party to the plan to beat the [estimated time of arrival] and get to the nightclub before lockout and encouraged [the driver] to speed.”
Quail said: “No one was mature enough to intervene and stop [the driver]”.
“The atmosphere in the car was one of ‘break the rules and get to the nightclub’,” he said.
“What followed was all but inevitable.”
In handing down his sentencing, Quail told the driver, who is now 18, he was satisfied no one in the car told him to slow down during the 15-minute journey, which saw him reach speeds of 133km/h in a 70km/h zone.
Quail believed evidence that one of the passengers in the car told the driver to “gun it” and “go through it” when they approached red traffic lights, but added: “I am also satisfied that you made your own decisions.”
The judge also found that four of the five people in the Hilux had taken cocaine before they got into the car, including the driver.
He also told the court the boy did not “minimise” his own conduct when giving evidence, and “it was clear the enormity of his conduct weighs heavily on him”.
The former Aquinas College student relinquished his bail last November “to demonstrate remorse”, with Quail also telling the court the boy felt it was the best way to deal with “rumours in the community”, as well as “antipathy” towards him.
“I believe you want to be punished because you think that might be seen to be some atonement for what you have done,” Quail said.
The court also heard for the first time details of how the boy’s 2012 Hilux ute came to be modified, with Quail revealing the teenager had removed the front passenger seat that day to tighten the chassis belts while performing some mechanical work on the vehicle.
The seat was placed back facing the rear of the vehicle and was not bolted down.
“You didn’t turn it back … you didn’t think anyone would sit in there,” Quail said.
“You left it like that because he thought it looked cool.”
But Quail added the driver knew it was dangerous to let anyone sit there, yet allowed them to anyway.
The court heard the car also had its front stabiliser bar – also called a sway bar – removed, which contributed to the Hilux “tripping” after it hit the curb on Farrington Road and contributed to the crash.
The driver had removed it to install a “lift kit”, Quail said, which raises a vehicle’s suspension, allowing it to tackle rough terrain.
Quail said police had found videos on the driver’s phone of him performing burnouts and speeding on other occasions, saying it was part of his “lifestyle”.
As part of the sentencing exercise, victims of the crash, including the Campo family, submitted impact statements which Quail refused to read aloud as they were too harrowing.
But, he told the court, the effect of the incident had torn Nick’s family apart.
“The consequences [of the incident] will live with the victims and their families forever and [the driver] and his family forever,” Quail said.
“I recognise no sentence the court imposes will adequately punish you for the loss of Nick and the life-changing injuries [of the other victims].”
The teenager was sentenced for two years and seven months for the manslaughter charge in relation to Campo’s death, with an extra eight-month term for the combined dangerous driving charges. He was also disqualified from holding a driver’s license for three years.
His sentence was backdated to when he first went into custody in November last year, and he will be eligible for parole next year.
Outside court, Campo’s mum Bianca said she was disappointed.
“We don’t feel that it was enough, and I really don’t think it sets a very good example for young people,” she said.
She said no sentence would bring her son back.
“It’s something we have to live with every day for the rest of our lives,” she said.
“We’ve been quite broken by it. Nick was a really good kid, and he was much loved by all of us.
“I know other families will go through this in the future, we’re not the only ones, but please make sure they do the right thing when they get into cars because this is a pain that’s unbearable and no one understands until you have to live it.”
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