A young woman who instigated a savage fight in an Albury shopping centre during which a man was stabbed in the back has copped 20 months in jail.
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That would have had to be spent in a cell, she was told, if not for her insight into her violence and her willingness to engage in a rehabilitation plan.
"Thank you, your honour," Mikayla Murraylee then told magistrate Sally McLaughlin on Wednesday, April 3.
The Glenroy woman, 25, must complete her sentence in the community by way of an intensive corrections order.
She is banned during that time from associating with her alleged co-offender, Jack Allen Mccahon, who is accused of stabbing a man during the brawl on the West End Plaza escalators.
Defence lawyer Hannah Straughan said Murraylee had indicated to her that "she has no intention to associate with that person ever again".
As a way of getting away from negative influences in Albury, she was moving to the Young area to live with her other mother - both parents, Ms Straughan said, were fully supportive of their daughter, with one mother in Albury Local Court for her sentencing.
"It is conceded it is a more significant example of an affray, there is no doubt about that," she said.
"It's conceded Ms Murraylee instigated the physical confrontation."
But Ms Straughan said both Murraylee's rehabilitation and the protection of the community would be best served by her being sentenced to an intensive corrections order.
Ms McLaughlin was scathing of Murraylee's behaviour on January 30.
"This is a grave example of an affray which involved a significant amount of violence by a number of people in a public setting," she said.
Ms McLaughlin said that was ably demonstrated by the fact that someone suffered serious stab wounds during the violence "as perpetrated by Ms Murraylee".
While she had insight into her own offending, Ms McLaughlin said a sentence assessment report showed Murraylee did not with respect to the violence of the others who got involved.
Ms McLaughlin pointed out Murraylee instigated violence on three occasions during the affray, supposedly in protection of her mother.
She said that "to do so by such violence is not a matter of mitigation".
"I am satisfied that nothing other than imprisonment is required to deter and denounce such extreme violence occurring in our community."
The court heard previously that Murraylee and Mccahon, 31, went to the shopping centre with a friend to buy groceries and other items.
They saw another couple on leaving Coles about 5.50pm and began arguing with them as they headed towards the escalators.
Murraylee was standing in front of her shopping trolley on the escalator as she kept arguing with the other woman, who was closely followed by her boyfriend.
She then started a fight with the woman, with several punches exchanged along with the pulling of hair, frightening nearby shoppers including other women who shielded their young children out of fear they would be hurt.
It was during the fight that, police have alleged, Mccahon stepped forward, pulled out a box cutter and stabbed the woman's boyfriend.
Both Murraylee and Mccahon, partners for about seven years, knew him, but had never met the woman before.
Police have alleged Mccahon - who was later charged with wounding a person with intent to cause grievous bodily harm, affray and using a knife in a public place to cause a person to fear for their safety - stabbed the other man, 35, three times in the back.
One "significant" wound involved damage to the trapezius muscle in his back and required surgery at Albury hospital.
During their struggle just before the stabbing, the women ended up wrestling on the floor near the car park entry doors - exchanging blows as the men watched.
At one stage, the other man kicked Murraylee to the head to stop her fighting with his girlfriend.
It was then Mccahon allegedly raised his right arm while holding "a sharp object" matching the description of a box cutter and "forcefully stabbed (the other man) three times in the region of his right shoulder blade".
Murraylee then struck the woman to the head and they fought as a security guard arrived.
The couple were arrested at their home in Ryan Road the following day.
Murraylee must also complete 60 hours of community service work and has to observe an 8pm to 6am curfew for the first six months of the order.
