'So she didn’t die?’ Shaun Preston Mate who made SICK remark after trying to gas daughter, 3, gets 14-yr jail
EDEN HILLS, ADELAIDE: A man who tried to "inflict maximum hurt on his wife" by attempting to murder their three-year-old daughter in a vindictive act of domestic violence has been jailed for more than 14 years. Shaun Preston Mate and his daughter were found unresponsive and suffering from hypoxia at their Eden Hills home in July 2020. The young girl spent five days in the hospital mostly in intensive care and took weeks to recover from her injuries.
During sentencing in the Supreme Court, Auxiliary Justice Geraldine Davison said the 45-year-old, who pleaded guilty to attempted murder, had committed the most significant abuse of trust of a parent. Daily Mail reported that the dad's desire to hurt his wife was revealed clearly when he regained consciousness after attempting to gas both him and his daughter and asked the police, "So she didn't die, then?"
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Mate purchased a pair of nitrogen gas tanks in July 2020, two days before the crime, and released the gas after an argument at dinner with his then-wife. Justice Davison said while the offending was both planned and premeditated she accepted a psychologist's finding that Mate was suffering from a major depressive disorder at the time. However, she said she regarded his crime as at the higher end of the scale. "The victim was a vulnerable three-year-old child. Your planning indicates that it was premeditated offending," the judge said, according to 9News. "It was the most significant abuse of trust placed on a parent. Your intention was to take your child's life as an act of vindictiveness against your wife thus depriving her of that child. Your plan failed by the good fortune of your wife waking and acting as swiftly as she did, along with the first responders."
The court heard psychiatrists found Mate wanted to take the life of his daughter as she was the only one he had a meaningful relationship in the previous months. Mate's marriage was falling apart and he had become both verbally and physically abusive. Justice Davison said Mate, who worked for the RAA, had started working from home in 2020 due to the pandemic, as his marriage also started to "decline". Mate's then-wife organized for him to see a mental health professional after he sent a number of unsolicited gifts, including a sex toy, to a friend of his wife's. According to ABC News, on the night of the offense Mate had made a photo montage of the couple, which he played on the television and said to his wife, "this is what you're going to miss out on" and that "this is the last time I'm going to kiss you". Justice Davison said Mate became angry and his ex-wife began to feel unsafe and called the police. Police later arrived and the couple agreed Mate would stay in a room downstairs. She further added that the girl's mother woke up that night to find her daughter missing from her bed.
Mate told her to "go away, we're having a little sleep now", but the girl's mother heard her daughter gasp. Police arrived and barged through the barricaded door. Officers later found three suicide notes. The girl's mother, whose identity is not disclosed, has previously told the Supreme Court she would never forgive her ex-husband for his "confident, calculated and brazen" crime. "I saw my child lifeless, gasping for breath and then having her snatched away and taken in an ambulance without me," she said. "This was the most harrowing experience of my life and the fact that this happened because of the cruel actions of her father was sickening. I still fear how Mate will infiltrate our lives in the future and continue to abuse us. Shaun's pride and ego had led him to believe trying to kill his daughter was preferable to divorce."
Justice Davison jailed Mate for 14 years and three months, reduced from 15 years because of his guilty plea. The judge set a non-parole period of nine years.