Volunteer firefighter Jude Craig Wright spared immediate jail term over catastrophic Wooroloo fire

The firefighter responsible for the catastrophic Boxing Day blaze that burnt down a cherished home in Wooroloo last summer has escaped an immediate jail term because of an intellectual disability that means he has the mental age of a child. Jude Craig Wright’s family hurled abuse at journalists outside WA’s District Court on Friday, after their son pleaded guilty to intentionally igniting nine fires over eight days across Wooroloo, Gidgegannup, Beechina and Wundowie during the 2021-22 Christmas and New Year period. “You’ll suffer greatly,” the 20-year-old’s mother screamed at one reporter, after earlier grabbing her microphone out of her hand and shoving her. That tussle came about an hour after the same woman threw her coffee cup at another journalist, dousing her in hot liquid, as she entered the building. During his sentencing, lawyer Maxwell Crispe revealed his client was diagnosed with a string of conditions that meant he did not possess the ability to understand the true consequences of his devastating actions. Mr Crispe said Wright had been volunteering as a firefighter for about a year when he was trapped inside a firetruck during a raging bushfire in Wooroloo in February 2021 — sparking his PTSD. It was ten months later when Wright — who functions in a range of extremely low intelligence and is also diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder as well as ADHD — launched his arson spree. He was aged only 18 when he set his first fire on December 23, scrunching up a piece of paper, setting it alight and hurling it from his moving car into bushland along Old Northam Road. As the fire spread, the Department of Fire and Emergency Services was called to attend, with Wright among the firefighters from the Wooroloo Bushfire Brigade to battle the blaze. Two days later on Christmas day, Wright did the same thing again, this time starting two blazes. He lit his most destructive fire the following day while driving along Government Road. That high-intensity blaze razed more than 165ha of land, a 100-year-old home, multiple sheds, vehicles, machinery and critical infrastructure including the Perth-Kalgoorlie pipeline. While the fire caused more than $1 million in damage, and cost more than $600,000 to put out, the profound impact it had on its victims was far more tragic. “You destroyed somebody’s home. Your actions could have caused the loss of life,” Judge Natalie Whitby said. “The damage to people’s lives, their homes and the environment was immeasurable.” In a victim impact statement, the owner of the home Wright’s fire destroyed — 77-year-old Marianne Nisich — said “the list of property that has been destroyed is too long to mention”. Ms Nisich had left her home to visit the local shops on Boxing Day. She returned to find her home, which had been in the family since 1982, had turned to ash. State Prosecutor Catherine Crouch said Ms Nisich “escaped only with the clothes she was wearing and the car she was driving”, losing everything she owned, including sentimental items that can never be replaced. Judge Whitby added: “She said that all she had worked for all her life was gone”. “You were aware of the damage and destruction that fire can cause. You were a volunteer firefighter, you were trusted by the community to protect them from fires, not light them.” When Wright was arrested on January 15, after he lit his ninth fire which burned more than 500 sqm, the then-19-year-old made full admissions to police. Ms Crouch said the teen even said words along the lines of: “I know I’ve stuffed up”, and was “quite teary”. She said while the State accepted Wright had a mental impairment, he’d “continued to light fires even though … he had first-hand experience of the damage these fires were causing”. “They were lit during the Western Australian summer mostly between the hours of 3pm and 7pm. This is a time that the land is ready to burn because it is dry,” she said. Mr Crispe said after his client was repeatedly targeted by violent assaults in Hakea Prison, he was removed to Casuarina Prison where he was held in the protection unit. He spent a total of 35 weeks in jail before he was released on bail under a number of strict conditions in early 2022. Mr Crispe argued Wright’s case was most unique and urged Judge Whitby to consider suspending the term of imprisonment she was inevitably going to hand down. “Although we say he’s an 18-year-old and aged 19 … in actual fact, his mental age is that of a child. He functions at such a low level,” he said. Judge Whitby agreed that Wright’s mental impairments contributed “causally” to his offending, and that his disabilities lowered his moral culpability in that they reduced his ability to make rational decisions. She also found that Wright’s risk of reoffending was low and that locking him up immediately would not be in his or the community’s best interests. “You are highly vulnerable and it is likely that you’ll be victimised in a custodial environment,” she said. Wright was sentenced to a three-year prison term, suspended for two years.