A man who launched a frenzied, near-fatal stabbing attack in a busy bus interchange has failed to overturn his conviction by producing new photographic evidence supposedly suggesting he acted in self-defence.
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Miroslav Jovanovic, 57, also failed to convince the ACT Court of Appeal to reduce
Jovanovic had been in the interchange with his partner, Jamie Weaver, 26, when he saw a man against whom he harboured serious animosity.
He believed the man had assaulted his son while the pair were behind bars together.
Jovanovic ran up behind him and punched him in the back of the head.
A struggle ensued and Jovanovic got the victim in a headlock or chokehold, and then used a pocketknife to stab him five to six times in the back.
The blade caused significant damage; puncturing a lung and severing an artery that would have killed the victim, had he not been treated.
At his trial, Jovanovic's barrister set out to argue that his client had been acting in self-defence, and that the victim had in fact produced the knife first, before it was wrested from his grasp.
But Jovanovic later told the jury he could not remember the stabbing, and the issue of self-defence did not "clearly materialise from the evidence", according to the Court of Appeal.
He was found guilty, but appealed his verdict as unsafe or unsatisfactory.
The appeal was based on a photo of a cut to Jovanovic's hand, which was not tendered as evidence in the trial, as well as a diagram showing the interchange's layout, also not put before the jury.
But the full bench declined to receive the new evidence, saying the photo was at odds with Jovanovic's own testimony at trial.
He did not refer to sustaining any cut to his hand in his evidence.
The photo, the appeal judges found, could also be consistent with the prosecution's version of events.
They found the plan of the interchange would have been of little assistance to the jury, and could have been put before the court by the defence.
The Court of Appeal said the case against Jovanovic was strong, bolstered by CCTV footage and independent witnesses.
Jovanovic had also argued his sentence was manifestly excessive.
The judges - Chief Justice Helen Murrell, Justice John Burns, and Justice Michael Wigney - agreed the sentence of 10 years and nine months was stern, but said it had a shorter non-parole period of five years and six months.
"By imposing a relatively short non-parole period, the primary judge allowed the appellant to demonstrate rehabilitation and re-enter the community at a relatively early stage," they wrote.
"Although the sentence is lengthy, we are not satisfied that it reflects an erroneous exercise of the sentencing discretion in that it is outside the range available to a reasonable sentencing judge."
The appeals against conviction and sentence were dismissed.
