The maximum sentence handed to a speeding, drug-driver who killed a 20-year-old in a head-on crash is expected to be reduced.
Matthew McLuckie was tragically killed when a stolen Volkswagen Golf, driven on the wrong side of the road by a drug-addled Shakira May Adams, crashed into his Holden Astra in May 2022.
Adams, 24, was travelling at no less than 177kmh and up to 186kmh in an 80kmh zone at the time of the Hindmarsh Drive collision.
In December last year, Adams was handed a 14-year jail sentence with a nine-year non-parole period.
In doing so, Chief Justice Lucy McCallum sentenced the culpable driver to a rare maximum penalty.
The maximum penalty is the most number of years a person can be sentenced for an offence. For culpable driving causing death it is 14 years.
Adams had pleaded guilty to culpable driving causing death and driving a stolen motor vehicle.
Her guilty plea took years, with multiple failed fitness to plead applications, an appeal, adjournments, hearings and an expected trial.
Adams suffered a severe traumatic brain injury as a result of the crash she caused, with much time in court spent debating the effects of the injury.
Three judges in the ACT Court of Appeal are now set to resentence Adams after the prosecution conceded errors had been made in the original sentence.
The conceded errors included that Adams' moral culpability was reduced by her disadvantaged childhood and complex post-traumatic stress disorder diagnosis, resulting in the case not being in "the worst category" for its type.
On Friday, July 31, Kirsten Edwards SC, representing Adams, said her client was being held in segregation in the Alexander Maconochie Centre, which was not only a breach of her human rights but risked exacerbating her brain injury.
The court heard Adams was being housed in the jail's management unit with male inmates in breach of her human rights.
The 24-year-old cannot be kept in the general population area of the jail due to a high risk of her being exploited by other prisoners and difficulties when interacting with others.
Before she was jailed, Adams required 24-hour care in the community due to her brain and physical injuries. She was not considered capable of cooking and needed assistance with daily tasks including using the bathroom.
Ms Edwards said there had been a failed attempt to transfer her to NSW, but even if it had been successful there was no guarantee she would not go backwards.
The barrister argued Adams had not received adequate health care including physiotherapy, occupational therapy, and psychiatric treatment while in Canberra's jail.
She said the management unit was not designed for female inmates nor for long-term habitation and was usually used as a form of punishment or for protection.
Ms Edwards said Adams was lonely, experiencing panic attacks and engaging in self-harm including cutting herself and banging her head against the wall because "she hoped she'd die".
"The more she is distressed the more she engages in self harm ... She's now caught in a loop where it can only get worse," the barrister argued.
"It places her in a unique or exceptional category."
Crown prosecutor Elizabeth Ruddle SC said the human rights issue was a "technical breach" because the cells nearby had been emptied to give Adams space and protection.
Ms Ruddle conceded hardship in custody was to be taken into account for the resentence, but argued the circumstances in the jail "were not as hopeless" as Adams' lawyer submitted.
She said funding for certain therapies had been obtained and were in the process of being organised with providers.
"Corrections has a statutory obligation to ensure that healthcare is being provided," the prosecutor told the court.
In handing down the sentence last year, Chief Justice McCallum found that Adams was "a significant danger to society [and] that was already the case before she committed the present offences."
The top judge said that "possibly the most troubling piece of evidence" was that Adams was again using "that most dangerous of drugs" in combination with her brain injury.
The injury combined with her decision to continue to use methamphetamine meant community protection was "paramount".
On Friday, Ms Edwards argued there was "no proper basis" to prove she was a danger to society and it was "puzzling" she was found to be a danger both before and after the crimes.
She said that since the sentence was handed down there was no evidence Adams had engaged in illicit drug use in jail.
The barrister said the case was not "the worst of its kind or close to it" and urged the appeal judges to emphasise rehabilitation and take her adverse childhood into account.
"[These matters] should be given full force because they are a powerful counteracting factor," Ms Edwards said.
"She's a 19-year-old girl [with] a disadvantaged background ... she's at a very early stage to be considered someone who is beyond hope, who is beyond redemption."
In her submissions to the court, Ms Ruddle said the crime was "an objectively grave example" featuring a fatal collision "of extraordinary and horrific force".
"Due to the [Adams'] extreme recklessness a young, law-abiding citizen is dead," she told the court.
"Those of us in this courtroom can only imagine the unspeakable horror of receiving that news from police."
The prosecutor pointed out Adams had been under the influence of methamphetamine at the time, was driving dangerously for almost 20 kilometres, and put a number of people at risk.
"The reality of the appellant's condition means that she is going to engage in problematic behaviours for a lifelong basis," Ms Ruddle said.
Justices David Mossop, Andrew Muller and Darryl Rangiah will hand down the resentence at a later date.
