An argument about “hooning” and the suspected sale of drugs triggered a hit-and-run which culminated in three people being left with serious injuries and a man serving his first stint behind bars.
Ilyas Arsalan was handed a three year and sixjmtzywx month prison sentence in Parramatta District Court, for mowing down a neighbour who approached his Toyota Corolla armed with a golf club in November 2020.
The 20-year-old was on Xanax and had been drinking vodka before simmering tensions between he and his neighbour spilled over on Aldridge Street at Stanhope Gardens in Sydney’s west.
Judge Sophia Beckett said a statement of agreed facts noted the 36-year-old neighbour was drinking with friends when he heard “hooning” and knocked on a nearby door with a message for Arsalan’s father.
The neighbour said “tell your son to stop dealing drugs outside my house, we have had enough”.
Afterwards, about 9.30pm, the neighbour could hear banging on his side fence and Arsalan yelling “how dare you go to my house”.
The neighbour responded, telling Arsalan to “stop dealing drugs in my street”.
Arsalan said “come outside” and the neighbour went outside with a golf club and was observed to approach the driver’s side of Arsalan’s car.
When the neighbour was one metre in front of the car, Arsalan revved his engine and drove straight into the neighbour.
“You broke my f****** ankle, I am in pain, help,” the neighbour said.
The court heard the neighbour had been moved onto a nature strip when 15 seconds later, Arsalan did a U-turn and drove into a woman and man who were at the scene.
Arsalan fled to his home, parked his car, got into a Silver Mitsubishi and took off before eventually returning after police arrived.
Initially, Arsalan claimed no one was driving his car and had been parked in his driveway the whole night.
In court he pleaded guilty to three counts of assault occasioning actual bodily harm and one count of using an offensive weapon with the intention of committing an indictable offence.
Arsalan told the court he was under the influence of cannabis, vodka and Xanax at the time of the incident.
“Me and my girlfriend at the time were going through a rough patch,” he said.
“I was in a pretty bad state at that point in my life and I wasn’t really thinking too much about my own safety and my own future.”
Arsalan has been remanded in custody since February 2021 when his bail was revoked.
“Jail’s not for me,” he told the court.
“It’s hard living conditions. It was a one time thing it will never happen again.”
Despite being drunk and on drugs, Arsalan maintained he did not intend to hurt anyone.
“I didn’t know it was a golf club, I thought it was a blade of some sort and I panicked and I got scared and I wanted to leave the situation,” he said of the incident.
“At the same time I was kind of hoping he would kind of get scared in me accelerating and get out of the way.
“I judged the situation entirely wrong. I thought I could do something that would benefit me, instead I made a mistake and people got hurt.”
Arsalan received convictions for the offences he pleaded guilty to and he will become eligible for parole in December 2022.
The three people he drove into suffered injuries ranging from a broken leg requiring multiple surgeries, to cut lips and a broken finger.
