Andrew Ralph, 32, pleaded guilty in Shepparton County Court to home invasion and intentionally causing injury.
The court heard Ralph and another person broke into a Mooroopna hotel shortly after 4am on November 24, 2024.
The pair went into the man’s bedroom and said, “Where’s the money? We want the lot.”
Ralph punched and kicked the victim about 20 times, while the co-accused allegedly also punched and kicked him.
Many of the blows were to the victim’s head.
Ralph took the man’s keys and left the room, before trying to smash back into it after the victim locked it behind them.
The victim was taken to hospital in Melbourne with a bleed on the brain, before being released two days later.
The court heard Ralph had been drinking alcohol at the races and then at a pub in the hours before the attack.
Judge Nola Karapanagiotidis said the offence was “unsophisticated and unplanned”, but that Ralph had a grudge against the victim and was “motivated to take the law into his own hands”.
She said Ralph’s decision-making was compromised by alcohol or drugs, as well as his post-traumatic stress disorder from events from his childhood and seeing a woman severely injured in a crash when he was 21.
Judge Karapanagiotidis said Ralph’s home environment growing up was a “volatile one”, that was “characterised by frequent violence”.
He had used drugs since the age of 18.
However, she said in sentencing Ralph, she took into account his limited criminal history, favourable prospects and the fact he had made effort towards his own rehabilitation.
Ralph was sentenced to 18 months in prison, with a non-parole period of seven months.
The court heard another male had already faced court over the matter and had been acquitted.
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