Danny Hodgson, an ascendant soccer prodigy who was left fighting for his life after an unprovoked attack at Perth Train Station, believes harsher jail terms are needed to prevent future assaults.
Hodgson was on his way home after an end-of-season celebration with his ECU Joondalup teammates in September last year when he was struck without warning, leaving him in a coma in hospital and facing a long recovery including daily physiotherapy as he learns to walk again.
His attacker, who was 16 at the time of the assault and cannot be named for legal reasons, was sentenced last month to three years and eight months in jail for the assault and a string of others committed during what the judge described as “seven months of mayhem”.
Speaking for the first time since his assault on Tuesday following news of a $1 million federal government grant to West Australian boxing champion Danny Green’s ‘Stop the Coward Punch’ campaign, Hodgson called for a minimum of 10 years imprisonment for unprovoked ‘coward punch’ attacks.
“I think the real way to stop this happening is a tougher jail sentence, if I’m honest – I think it should be 10 years minimum and maybe 20 years maximum, and maybe that’ll deter people from doing this attack,” he said.
CCTV footage played in court last month showed the teenager approach Hodgson at the train station before balling his hand into a fist behind his back and punching the soccer player without warning, leading him to fall and hit his head on the ground.
The teen fled and attempted to disguise himself while witnesses helped Hodgson as he lay motionless on the train station floor.
Hodgson is now back at home after spending 196 consecutive days in hospital and said he was improving rapidly.
“I’m a determined person and I’ve always had a great mindset; what’s happened happened, you’ve got to put it in the past and look towards the future,” he said.
“Every day’s a challenge, you’re always trying to improve day by day.
Hodgson is recovering with the support of his family, who flew from the UK to be with their son.
“There’s days where you probably don’t improve and there’s days where I can beat myself up because I think I should be doing better than I am.”
At home, with family and friends, he can sit in a chair or take his dog for a walk, which is better than being limited to the confines of a hospital bed.
Hodgson’s parents rushed to fly from the United Kingdom to Perth to be by their son’s side at the high of COVID-19 restrictions, and have remained in Australia as they work through his recovery.
His mother, Nicola, echoed the call for harsher minimum sentences.
“The crime needs to match the time and the moment it’s just not,” she said, adding a further five-year ban from entertainment precincts in the city should also be imposed for convicted offenders.
“Campaigns are all good and well, and good on Danny Green for doing this and getting the message out there, but it’s up to the government now to actually make the change,” she said.
“It broke us, it’s broke Danny, and we’re literally putting the pieces of our lives back together every day, and it’s going to take a long time. And even when we do start living our lives normally again, it’s never going to be normal.”
Former professional boxer Green began his campaign in 2012 in a bid to put an end to one-hit attacks and change the conversation around them, rebranding the assaults ‘coward punches’ and getting rid of the term ‘king hit’.
But such assaults have continued to blight Perth’s entertainment districts.
Only months before Hodgson was attacked at Perth Train Station, 26-year-old Jaylen Dimer was sentenced to seven years and six months jail for a coward-punch attack on Paramount Nightclub manager Giuseppe ‘Peppe’ Raco the year before.
Raco, 40, died after being hit while attempting to break up a fight outside a fast food outlet near the club on Northbridge’s James Street in July, 2020.
Hodgson said it was now up to WA’s government to make the necessary changes.
“If [politicians] want to stop this happening they’ve got to act now,” he said.
“And the quicker they act the quicker it stops.
“It’s in their hands, to be honest.”
with Holly Thompson, Marta Pascual Juanola and Nine News Perth