ACT Magistrates Court sentences Scott Southwell-Millard for choking child

Scott Brian Southwell-Millard was sentenced in the ACT Magistrates Court on Monday.

Last week, magistrate Louise Taylor found Southwell-Millard guilty of choking another person, namely a four-year-old child who was in his care at the time of the offence.

Ms Taylor found the offender not guilty of a further charge of assault.

Southwell-Millard had previously pleaded not guilty to the charges.

In April last year, Southwell-Millard was left to babysit the autistic child along with other siblings.

The man, who was a friend of the mother, had offered to look after the children.

The four year old had level three autism and, as a result, was non-verbal and required special care. The child was known to put items into his mouth.

When the mother returned on the day in question, she became concerned.

Southwell-Millard told her the boy had vomited three times and there had been plastic in the vomit.

The woman observed the child's breathing to be slow and his heart rate off-beat.

She also saw dots on his face and bruises on neck, so she called an ambulance.

Video of the incident was captured in the home and shown to the court. The footage showed Southwell-Millard with the child in the lounge room.

Southwell-Millard can be seen placing a hand on the back of the boy's neck while holding a bottle in the other. The boy can be seen resisting the hold.

The offender maintained he was trying to remove something from the child's mouth and to get him to take a bottle.

In court, defence lawyer Brandon Bodel argued his client's actions could "not be described in any way as malicious".

Mr Bodel said Southwell-Millard had been trying to feed the child a bottle at the time and the choking had been incidental.

The lawyer told the court Southwell-Millard had lost his job as a bartender at Cube nightclub after six years as a result of media articles and Facebook posts about the offending.

"I would be very surprised to see this person before the courts again for similar offences," Mr Bodel said.

Ms Taylor found Southwell-Millard had "failed fairly spectacularly" in providing care to the child, who did not have the capacity to alert anyone else.

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She said the man had been in over his head from the very beginning but this did not excuse his behaviour.

Southwell-Millard was sentenced to a two-year good behaviour order and is required to complete 180 hours of community service.

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