A man has been sentenced to six years jail for killing another man during an altercation on the streets of Perth's Northbridge entertainment district.
Samuel Mohamed Lamin Bah, 20, was originally charged with murdering Manar Pan Mading who was stabbed in the chest in the early hours of November 27, 2021, but prosecutors accepted his guilty plea to the lesser charge of manslaughter.
The killing followed other violence in Northbridge that night, in which Bah's friend was stabbed in an altercation involving a group that included Mr Mading, who the Supreme Court was told was seen acting aggressively.
While Bah was not involved in the earlier fight, he ended up in another physical altercation with Mr Mading in a car park.
Mr Mading tried to punch him and Bah decided to use the knife he had in tucked into trousers as a way of defending himself.
Bah maintained he had only meant to stab Mr Mading in the shoulder, but the knife ended up going through his heart.
Mr Mading initially managed to get up after being stabbed, but he then collapsed to the ground while Bah ran away, with police, who were already in the area responding to the violence, giving chase.
'Disaster waiting to happen'
State prosecutor Michael Cvetkoski said it was accepted that Bah had acted in self-defence but his actions were illegal because his response, in using the knife, was excessive and not reasonable in the circumstances.
Mr Cvetkoski said Bah later told police he had decided to arm himself with a knife when he went out in public places because one of his peers had been stabbed months earlier by a member of an outlaw motorcycle gang and he wanted the weapon has protection.
But Mr Cvetkoski said if Bah was so fearful he was going to be attacked, he "could have stayed home".
"This really was a disaster waiting to happen and disaster did strike," he told the court.
However, he said the State did accept that Bah had been responding to the deceased's aggression.
"But for the deceased attempting to strike the offender, it is highly unlikely that incident would have occurred."
Bah's barrister Mark Trowell, K.C. said his client was genuinely remorseful for what he had done and in a letter to the court, he had said "it was not his intention to do anything bad".
Mr Trowell said when Bah was being chased by the deceased he had no way of knowing if he was intending to assault him or whether he was armed, and he made a split second decision to take out his knife.
Justice Sam Vandongen told Bah his response to the deceased man's aggression was "deliberate and excessive" saying he accepted that Bah had intended to cause him a very serious injury.
"You made a very poor decision to arm yourself with a knife that night," Justice Vandongen told the 20-year-old.
"You increased rather then decreased the chances of something like this happening.
"Too many people, particularly young men, think it is okay to go on a night out armed with a knife. It is not okay.
"People must be able to go out at night safe in the knowledge that no one, no one, will be armed with a knife.
"You must realise the effect that stupid decision can have on other people."
Justice Vandongen also noted that Bah had made no attempt to help the deceased when he collapsed to the ground, and instead tried to flee the scene.
The judge took into consideration that Bah was only 18 at the time of the killing, his early guilty plea and his remorse in deciding that a six-year jail term was the appropriate penalty.
He backdated the sentence to the time of Bah's arrest on the night, meaning with time already served he will be eligible for release on parole in November 2025.
